Monday, August 06, 2007

Essential Reading

Short version (but whole thing should be read anyway): The right to access courts to seek redress is an essential component of a healthy democracy -- which Our Leaders, as haters of democracy, which is to say haters of America -- are long against and continuously work to weaken and destroy. Ditto a system of law generally and more ditto the issue of holding corporations accountable.

Tort reform is simply unamerican.

And in true rightwing fashion, it's a brutal solution, that benefits only the wealthiest, and the underlying problem in fact does not exist.
How the Republican Party and Its Corporate Allies Are Taking Away Your Right to Sue

Thanks to constant political oratory against "frivolous lawsuits" and "jackpot justice," it is widely known that there's a legal crisis in this country. President Bush never misses an opportunity to call for laws that would bring more "common sense" to a legal system that, he claims, is out of control, wrecking the economy, driving doctors out of their practices, bankrupting small businesses, and costing American jobs. Journalists repeat the charges without examining them.

As a result, the lawsuit issue has moved to the political front burner, and in the past three years, state after state has responded by limiting citizens' rights to sue. Just this year alone, the Republicanled Congress has passed restrictions on class action lawsuits and is steps away from enacting limits on medical malpractice lawsuits.

But is there really a crisis? National data show that the number of civil suits is falling, not rising, and that the average damage award is also going down. Despite intense media hype to the contrary, the number of personal injury lawsuits filed every year has been tumbling for the past decade. Upon closer examination, the stories of ridiculous lawsuits usually turn out to be false or badly misleading. The crisis, in short, appears to be a phantom.

So how do we explain the scary headlines? Who's behind the "tort reform movement," and what are the real goals? Blocking the Courthouse Door will show that the movement against so-called greedy trial lawyers and irresponsible plaintiffs is the result of a concerted and successful campaign by large corporations to get this issue on the table and thus limit their own vulnerability in the civil justice system. They have spent decades, and many millions of dollars, on focus groups and Madison Avenue public relations research. They have funded institutes, sponsored academic research, bankrolled politicians, set up phony "astroturf " grassroots organizations (with chamber of commerce return addresses), and fed copy to all-too-gullible journalists.

For corporations, the self-interest involved is fairly plain. Tobacco companies, no longer able to dodge the bullet of liability for knowingly selling poisons, are making an end run around the civil justice system. If they can't win a class action suit, they'll make suing itself illegal. Insurance companies, drowning in red ink from mismanagement and bad investments in the bond market, hike insurance rates by huge sums and blame malpractice suits. The doctors in turn blame greedy lawyers -- and their own injured patients. And for Republicans, the campaign provides an extra bonus: defunding the Democratic Party. Limits on lawsuits cut into the income of some of the Democratic Party's most generous donors, the trial lawyers, who are often the only source of campaign cash for Democrats in many states.

By exposing some of the dubious characters, corporate chicanery, skewed research, fudged numbers, and bogus journalism that have buttressed the calls for lawsuit reform,Stephanie Mencimer shows who's behind the movement to close the courthouse doors, and how they've successfully persuaded millions of Americans to give up their critical legal rights without fully understanding what they're losing -- often until it's too late.
Link.

And here's the Introduction:
The story of Frank Cornelius would be funny if it weren't so awful.

In the mid-1970s, Frank Cornelius worked as a lobbyist for the Insurance Institute of Indiana, an industry group that was trying to change the state's medical malpractice laws. Back then, doctors across the country were protesting rising medical malpractice insurance rates, which they blamed on escalating jury verdicts in lawsuits filed by patients injured by bad medical care. The doctors staged white-coat protests at state capitals and buttonholed legislators with their claims that lawsuits and rising insurance costs were forcing them to stop delivering babies and to give up their practices.

Cornelius hand carried these gripes to the back halls of the Indiana statehouse. His goal was to win legislation limiting the amount of money injured people could receive in malpractice lawsuits, awards that were generally paid not by the doctors but by the companies that employed him. As he made his rounds, Cornelius told stories about frivolous lawsuits and ambulance-chasing lawyers. He argued that a cap on lawsuit damages would help the state rein in health care costs.

Indianapolis's governing class was persuaded. In 1975 the legislature passed one of the strictest medical malpractice laws in the country. The new law capped all awards at $500,000, including actual losses like wages and bills related to botched medical care, regardless of how much those bills actually amounted to. And legislators abolished pain-and-suffering awards entirely. In the places you'd expect, the champagne flowed.

The new law made Indiana, and Cornelius, early pioneers in tort "reform," an emerging movement led by insurance companies, doctors, big corporations, and conservative ideologues who sought to restrict personal injury and other lawsuits.

Cornelius's work on the medical malpractice bill was just one item in a long and quirky professional resume. He went on to lobby for several years on behalf of a state police group to ban cop-killer bullets, then later moved into journalism and, eventually, to running a car dealership.

But in late 1988, the forty-three-year-old Cornelius fell and injured his left knee. A few months later, he went to the hospital for routine arthroscopic surgery to fix the problem. When he went home, however, he suffered a great deal of pain. He called the surgeon several times that day without reaching him. The surgeon finally called back the next day, told Cornelius's wife, Cathy, to get him a bedpan, and then left on a skiing trip, saying he'd see Cornelius when he got back.

Cornelius continued to suffer, so he consulted another surgeon, who immediately diagnosed him with reflex sympathetic dystrophy, a degenerative nerve disorder brought on by an accident or medical prodecure. The condition is so painful that many sufferers desire to amputate the affected limb rather than endure the torture that comes with it, according to Stephen B. Caplin, Cornelius's lawyer.

To deal with his condition, which at that point was still treatable, Cornelius sought care from a physical therapist, who a few months later, Cornelius claimed, accidentally jolted his leg with a current of electricity from an improperly used medical device. The zap rendered his condition incurable and cost him the use of his leg. A year later, Cornelius had surgery to install a filter in his leg to catch blood clots, but the main vein from his leg to his heart was punctured. Cornelius would have quietly bled to death were it not for a visit that evening from his wife, who sounded the alarm. Another doctor intervened to save his life, although Cornelius suffered a punctured lung in the process.

The series of medical mishaps left Cornelius unemployed, a wheelchair user, and dependent on bottled oxygen and a continuous morphine drip to dampen the pain. His medical expenses and lost wages were estimated at more than $5 million should he live to retirement age.

Following the three-word American tradition known as "sue the bastards," Cornelius consulted a lawyer and filed a medical malpractice lawsuit against the physical therapist, the hospital, and some of the doctors. That's when he discovered exactly what he'd accomplished back in 1975. The medical malpractice bill he'd helped pass through the Indiana legislature as a lobbyist ensured that he could recover only a fraction of the $5 million in losses the health care system's failures had cost him. In 1990 Cornelius settled his lawsuits against the hospital and physical therapist for $500,000, the most he could get. The experience transformed Cornelius into something of a consumer advocate, and he used his lobbying skills to help Ralph Nader and others across the country campaign against further restrictions on lawsuits. He went on The Phil Donahue Show.

In 1994 he wrote a mea culpa in the New York Times in which he wrote, "I have received last rites from my church. . . . At the age of 49, I am told that I have less than two years to live. . . . All of my suffering might have been worthwhile, on some cosmic scale, if the law had accomplished its stated purpose. But it hasn't." He went on to note that the argument he'd used to persuade legislators to cap malpractice awards -- that it would reduce health-care costs -- had proved to be a sham. Health care costs in Indiana had soared 139 percent between 1980 and 1990, he wrote, noting that it was just about the national average.

Cornelius's public act of contrition couldn't erase the severity of his condition. The daily dose of narcotics prevented him from driving, and the pain left him unable to work steadily, according to Cathy Cornelius, who became the breadwinner for a family of seven. Depression plagued him. His marriage fell apart, and as Cornelius wrote in the Times, "The emotional fallout on our five children has been difficult to witness, to say the least."

On March 1, 1995, Cornelius died, after intentionally overdosing on morphine. Along with his suicide note, he left behind one last piece of written testimony for the Indiana state legislature, which was considering a new bill to restrict lawsuits even further.



For years, the tort reform movement was something of a fringe element in Washington and elsewhere, a special-interest group that popped up every ten years or so when insurance premiums got out of whack. Democrats have historically opposed it, and Americans have never put lawsuits at the top of their list of national concerns. They're far more concerned about education, crime, and Social Security. Even the term itself, tort reform, is largely meaningless outside of Washington and certain legal and business circles. (Tort is the legal term for "injury.") As the famous Mississippi trial lawyer Richard "Dickie" Scruggs reportedly once said, "Most Americans don't know what tort reform is, and if they did, they'd be against it." But when President George W. Bush and Senator John Kerry sparred over the issue in front of fifty million TV viewers in the second 2004 presidential debate, tort reform went mainstream, joining the Iraq war and illegal immigration as top issues facing the nation.

During that debate in St. Louis, audience member Norma-Jean Laurent posed a tough question for the Democratic challenger. Laurent noted how Kerry had bemoaned the rising cost of health care for Americans. Yet she wanted to know how the candidate could reconcile this concern with his choice of a running mate who had made millions of dollars successfully suing medical professionals.

The question reflected the ongoing debate over high rates for doctors' medical malpractice insurance. Bush had turned this into a major campaign issue by blaming the problem on greedy trial lawyers and frivolous lawsuits and calling for restrictions on jury awards. It also presented Kerry with a tremendous opportunity. As a lawyer himself, Kerry had a powerful opportunity to deliver a spirited defense of the civil justice system. He could have argued for the good sense of American jurors, who know a frivolous lawsuit when they see one, without needing the heavy hand of Washington to tell them what to do. He might have suggested that people need the legal system to hold doctors accountable for the injuries they cause, which number in the hundreds of thousands every year. Most important, he might have pointed out that malpractice awards had little to do with rising health care costs.

Instead, Kerry simply said, "John Edwards and I support tort reform." Kerry then referred Laurent to his website, where he said she could find a tort reform plan outlining his proposals for limiting lawsuits.

Kerry's dodge reflected just how much success the business lobby has had in framing the nation's conversation about the civil justice system. In putting himself and trial lawyer John Edwards on record as tort reform supporters, Kerry was explicitly endorsing the conventional wisdom put forth by Bush and his business backers that Americans are too litigious, that an epidemic of frivolous lawsuits is driving doctors out of business, and that lawsuits are hindering America's economic progress.

Kerry's office never responded to several requests to interview him for this book to clarify his position, but in truth, Kerry and Edwards did not support tort reform, at least not as it's commonly articulated by its major proponents. In the Senate, neither man had ever voted for a major tort reform bill, and Kerry would go on to vote against a bill to restrict class actions in 2005. Apparently, though, not even the $33 million donated to his and Edwards's campaigns by plaintiff lawyers, whose primary issue is fighting off limits on lawsuits, or the fact that his kid brother is a trial lawyer, could persuade Kerry to rise to the defense of the beleaguered American civil justice system on prime-time TV. And why would he?

Thanks to three decades and millions of dollars' worth of careful marketing by corporations and their paid legions of lobbyists, pundits, and think-tank hacks, it's hard to find an American who hasn't heard the story of Stella Liebeck, the woman who spilled McDonald's coffee in her lap and won a $3-million jury verdict against the company. Poll after poll shows that Americans overwhelmingly support limits on "lawsuit abuse" and believe that out-of-control litigation is just another symptom of the decline of personal responsibility in America.

Persuading Americans that the "litigation crisis" is a myth was a losing battle, and one that would take a lot longer than the brief time Kerry had to respond in the televised debate. Besides, as it's currently packaged, tort reform sounds so reasonable. Who could be against reform?

But the self-described "reformers" Kerry was rhetorically linking arms with are anything but. They are a retrograde alliance of insurance companies, corporate interests, and political operatives -- mostly Republican -- who seek to do away with many of the consumer, worker, and environmental protections established in the 1960s and 1970s. They have manufactured a litigation crisis that does not exist, to support their efforts to limit or even abolish average citizens' right to sue for damages when they have been wrongfully injured. And the legal rights they seek to curtail are things that most people take for granted, at least until they really need them.

It's hard to think of another public policy issue where the reality is so far removed from the myths that dominate the public discussion. Popular culture regularly leaves the impression that justice in the courtroom is alive and well. Movies like Erin Brockovich or A Civil Action suggest that David regularly bests Goliath in the courthouse and that great legal heroes are still fighting the good fight on behalf of the little guy. That impression, though, couldn't be more wrong.

New state laws pushed by anti-lawsuit crusaders and slanted media coverage are partly responsible for pushing jury trials to the verge of extinction, and the trial lawyers who lead them are an endangered species. Sober government data repeatedly show that plaintiffs' success rates at trial are at an all-time low, and they're winning ever smaller amounts of money. The right to a civil jury trial -- guaranteed by the Bill of Rights -- is in serious jeopardy. Personal injury lawsuits, the kind most despised by Bush and his business supporters, are on the decline. Punitive damages awards, which are given only in cases involving really egregious conduct, are equally rare events. The notion that Americans who take on deep-pocketed defendants or health care providers are making out like bandits is belied by numbers showing that plaintiffs in civil cases are taking it on the chin, losing far more often than they win.

Yet the perception of the legal system as out of whack has proven highly resistant to correction by the truth. This is by design. The movement against greedy trial lawyers and irresponsible plaintiffs is the result of a concerted and successful campaign by large corporations (especially the tobacco and insurance industries, but many others besides), to get this issue on the table and limit their vulnerability in the civil justice system. They have spent decades, and many millions of dollars, on focus groups and Madison Avenue public-relations research. They have funded institutes, sponsored academic research, bankrolled politicians, set up phony "Astroturf" grassroots organizations (with chamber of commerce return addresses), and fed copy to journalists. And in 2004, they succeeded in making the issue the stuff of a presidential debate, after having funneled millions of dollars into every one of Bush's political campaigns since 1994.

For corporations, the self-interest involved is fairly plain. Tobacco companies, no longer able to dodge the bullet of liability for knowingly selling poisons, are making an end run around the civil justice system. If they can't win a class-action suit, they'll make suing itself illegal. Insurance companies, drowning in red ink from mismanagement and bad investments, hike insurance rates by huge sums and blame malpractice suits. The doctors, in turn, blame greedy lawyers -- and their own injured patients.

In larger terms, the tort reform movement is just the logical sequel to the war against government regulation. Unable to fully dismantle popular consumer-protection and environmental laws in Congress, corporations have changed tactics and instead gone after trial lawyers and the suits that give teeth to those laws. This has proved to be an effective strategy, achieving the same results without mobilizing political resistance. After all, who can really come to the defense of lawyers?

Tort reform also draws on the ideological backlash against the 1960s-era policies that expanded civil rights and protections for various minority groups and added new legal remedies for people injured by defective products and environmental degradation. The language of antilawsuit propaganda is rich in calls for "personal responsibility." The welfare queen of the 1980s has been replaced by the fat guy suing McDonald's. The movement is populated by people who want to return to the golden years when elderly women who spilled coffee on their laps got sympathy, not punitive damages.

Even so, tort reform for many years had been a hard sell. Most of the companies looking for protection from lawsuits had such dismal safety and environmental records that they were case studies in the need for lawsuits. Tort reform might have remained on the fringes were it not for the beauty of polling data. In the early 1990s, based on polling and focus-group research largely underwritten by the tobacco industry, Republicans discovered that tort reform offered an ideal wedge issue in competitive campaigns. When framed as "lawsuit abuse" and focused on greedy trial lawyers rather than polluting and negligent corporations, it played wonderfully as a populist notion with voters.

As Bush also discovered, it made for a fabulous fund-raising vehicle as the "chronic defendants" in the business world happily anted up to support lawsuit restrictions. Even more importantly, though, GOP strategists realized that by attacking lawsuits and trial lawyers, they had a tremendous opportunity to undermine a principal source of Democratic support. Limit the earnings of plaintiffs' lawyers through caps on damages and other restrictions on lawsuits, and you limit a major source of income for the Democratic Party.

This book is in part about that marriage of corporate desire for immunity from lawsuits and the new breed of GOP politics. It's also the story of how big businesses succeeded in taking bad public-policy proposals, packaging and stage managing them, and selling them to the public through well-paid "experts," gullible journalists, and intensely misleading propaganda -- all to the detriment of the average citizen, who still thinks that if he ever needs the legal system, it will be there for him. Unfortunately, as this book will show, in many parts of the country today, that is no longer the case.

Since 1986, forty-eight states have passed some type of restriction on lawsuits, ranging from limits on lawyers' fees, to restrictions on plaintiffs' access to expert testimony, to caps on noneconomic and punitive-damage awards. Since 1995 Congress also has passed legislation to rein in shareholders' lawsuits and class actions, and it has attempted to grant legal immunity to favored industries, from defense contractors to pharmaceutical companies to gun manufacturers to fast-food chains.

None of these restrictions on civil lawsuits and the power of juries that have come over the past twenty years would have been possible without the complicity of the media. The vast majority of the reporting on the civil justice system has been lazy and gullible. Reporters have bought into the propaganda, the spoon-fed story tips and bogus research generated by the tort reform movement. Respectable outlets like 60 Minutes and U.S. News & World Report have reported outright falsehoods about lawsuits and the legal system, without apology. There are reporters who have questioned the conventional wisdom, but they are few and far between.

In one sense, it's easy to see how it happens. Few newspaper or TV reporters ever cover the civil side of the legal system as a beat, so they rarely understand its complexities. They only report the occasional big verdict, which skews the coverage by suggesting that such events are commonplace, when they aren't. Unlike most Americans, journalists are also frequently threatened with lawsuits, and occasionally sued. The same goes for their employers, which are increasingly the same types of huge corporations that have long backed the tort reform movement.

The truth is that the corporate war on the courts is also a war on journalists. It's an effort to keep the lid on potentially damaging information. Journalists are deluding themselves if they think they can produce important and groundbreaking investigative reporting without the documents and other information that is produced in discovery through private lawsuits. The Catholic Church wasn't about to turn over its files on pedophile priests just because the Boston Globe asked nicely. Most of the documentation on the scandal, including the names of the victims and the errant priests, came into the public eye because those victims sought out lawyers, who then forced the church to come clean under the threat of court sanctions.

Indeed, much of the country's greatest investigative journalism over the decades has relied heavily on information produced in the very private lawsuits that tort reform seeks to restrict. Who can forget the story of the Ford Pinto, where lawyers turned up the written cost-benefit analysis the automaker used to decide whether it was worth $5 per car to prevent passengers of the Pinto from going up in flames? The 1977 story in Mother Jones magazine that turned the Pinto into a national scandal would never have been written without the information produced in those lawsuits.

Only through private lawsuits did the public learn the extent to which asbestos companies hid the dangers of their products -- products that have caused the deaths of more than 250,000 people since the 1960s, with numbers increasing daily. Ditto for tobacco litigation, which forced the release of millions of internal documents from big tobacco companies showing just how much they were lying to the public. All of this litigation produced award-winning journalism, which in turn created the impetus for change for the public good.

The same big businesses that want to put caps on medical malpractice lawsuits also want to limit plaintiffs' ability to request documents in discovery, and they want to keep those documents that are released sealed away from the public view. While they claim to fear the financial implications of litigation, they are just as afraid of the outrage that might occur if the public really knew the truth about how they run their businesses or treat workers and consumers.

In a country with a weak regulatory system, moreover, it's rarely the Food and Drug Administration or the Department of Justice that sheds light on these critical public concerns and generates calls to withdraw dangerous drugs, ban toxic substances, or address rollover risks on SUVs. It's private citizens through lawsuits. In fact, not only do journalists rely on these lawsuits for information, so do government regulatory agencies that lack the resources or the power or the political will to investigate themselves. Oftentimes, the most important function of civil lawsuits, even beyond compensation or justice for injured victims, is their role in unearthing critical health, safety, and financial information about the workings of private institutions.

Perhaps more than anything, tort reform is a frontal assault on the civil jury. It's designed to limit the power of average citizens to set community standards, mete out justice, and to hold wrongdoers accountable in the courts. That's why tort reform, at its heart, is an elitist notion based on distrust of the intelligence and good sense of American citizens to sit in the jury box and make a decision. That same logic can be used to make a case against voting, as voters and jurors are one and the same. With its current emphasis on caps on damage awards, tort reform creates arbitrary limits on a jury's power and vests judges -- some who have lifetime political appointments -- with vastly more authority over the outcome of a trial.

No system of justice is perfect, but the American civil jury system is close to perfect democracy. As a lawyer once explained to me, jury verdicts are like having 100 percent voter participation in elections; except in the case of the jury, the "voters" are much better informed. On a jury, everyone has to listen to the evidence presented by both sides, hopefully by articulate advocates, and then they have to vote. The jury is a tremendously powerful institution, powerful enough to prompt businesses to spend millions of dollars trying to disarm it. The Founding Fathers saw the jury trial as a protection against imperial judges, and the Constitution was nearly scuttled because it didn't include a provision for civil jury trials. (One was later added in the Seventh Amendment.) The French author and statesman Alexis de Tocqueville thought the civil jury was evidence of Americans' great faith in their ability to govern themselves.

In supporting the tort reformers' agenda, Americans don't seem to realize that they are hastening their own exclusion from the democratic process and creating yet another impediment to meaningful participation in public affairs. It's not just the ability to recover financially from a wrongful injury that's disappearing as a result of restrictions on lawsuits. Fundamental constitutional rights are dying a quiet death, as the thousands of serious lawsuits that never got filed are eclipsed by one or two big ones that did. The irony of the tort reform movement is that even as it's convinced Americans that the nation is in the midst of a litigation crisis, it's reinforced their misguided belief that the system will work for them if they need it. Like Frank Cornelius, a great many people have discovered the hard way that this just isn't the case. This book, I hope, will tell some of their stories and serve as a wake-up call about what's been lost -- and what else we are about to lose -- as the nation embraces the corporate war on lawsuits.
And there's more here and here.

The author has a blog, which is to say she's staying on the story, at least to some degree.

And as is not uncommon, the book was begat (as they say) by this article.

1 comment:

Rafael said...

THEORIES OF EVOLUTION ARE FOREVER DEAD

Saturday, August 4, 2007
EXPANSSION, QUANTUN, THEORIES, ARE EXPOSED AS FOOLISH AND IRRATIONAL. BE THE JUDGE IF YOU CAN.

We will look at the theories of evolution in their two main and not yet aproch together foundations: the expanssion of the universe, and the quantun or microorganisim. To understand it with reason,thee first subject we are confronted with is God.
Let us read a few verses from the Bible. Psalm 14:1 of the Old Testament says, "The fool has said in his heart,/There is no God." This sentence may also be translated as "The fool does not want God in his heart." The result of saying this can be found in the second sentence of the same verse: "They are corrupt; they do abominable deeds."
Let us also take a passage from the New Testament. Hebrews 11:6 says, "For he who comes forward to God must believe that He is."
THREE KINDS OF PEOPLE
Whether you claim to be a Christian, a non-believer, or a seeker after truth, we will start by examining the subject of God. In this respect the world is divided into three camps. The first is that of the atheists who do not believe in a God. The second consists of the agnostics. They have no sure knowledge about the deity. On the one hand, they dare not say there is no God, but on the other hand, they are not clear if God does exist. We belong to the third category of those who believe in God.
PROSECUTION
Is there a God? I will not try to say yes or no to this question. Rather, I will make this place a law court. I will ask you to be the judge, and I will be the prosecutor. The work of a judge is to make decisions, to approve or disapprove the truth of statements; the work of a prosecutor is to present all the evidence and arguments that he can possibly gather.
Before we proceed, we have to be clear about one fact: all prosecutors are not eyewitnesses of crimes. They are not policemen. A policeman may personally witness an event, whereas a prosecutor obtains his information only indirectly. He places all the charges, evidence, and arguments collected before the judge. In the same way, I shall present before you everything that I can possibly find. If you ask whether I have seen God or not, I would say "no." I am reading or demonstrating what I have gathered. My job is to search for facts and to call for witnesses. You are to arrive at a conclusion yourself.

QUALIFICATIONS
Many people assert that there is no God. As a prosecutor I ask you first to check the qualification of these people. Are they qualified to make such claims? Are those who assert that there is no God moral or immoral? Do not just listen to their arguments. Even robbers and swindlers have their arguments. Of course, the arguments support them as robbers and swindlers. The subject of their arguments may be very noble; they may talk about the state of the nations and the welfare of society, but their opinions cannot be seriously considered. They are not worthy of passing such judgments. If a man is upright in his conduct and moral judgment, we can give credibility to his words, but if not, his words lose their credibility. This is especially true when it relates to the question of deity. It is interesting to note that the moral standards of men are directly related to their concept about God. Those who admit their own ignorance have a passable standard, while insistent atheists invariably have a low level of moral responsibility. I do not claim to know all atheists, but of the several thousand that I know, none of them possess a notably commendable morality. You may tell me that there was once a moral atheist, but if there was one, he is dead. Or you may tell me that there will be a moral atheist, but whoever he may be, he is not here yet. At least we can say that for now, we do not know a moral atheist.
NO ATHEIST IS MORAL
Once at a gathering at the University of Nanking, I remarked that no atheist is moral. There were many students on the campus who did not believe in God. They were greatly offended by these words. The next day, while I was speaking, they came and shuffled their feet in an attempt to distract me and the audience. The next day when they came again, they made funny gestures and faces at me and carried on continuously throughout the speaking. On the fourth day the vice-president of the university, Dr. Williams, came and said to me, "We had better change the place of meeting. These students are infuriated by your assertion on the first day that atheists are not moral. Today they are not going to use their feet and lips only; they are going to use their fists. I heard that they will be waiting at the entrance of the hallway and will jump on you when you step in." I went along with the arrangement and conducted the meeting at another place. On the way to the meeting I walked alongside many students and listened to their conversations. Although many did not agree with me and felt uneasy about my preaching, they wanted to come back. One among them remarked, "Mr. Nee said that people who have no God have no sense of moral responsibility. This is perfectly right. How can anyone with moral decency shuffle his feet and jest while others are delivering a speech? Yesterday they caused such a disturbance in the meeting, and today they are going to come to fight. This is surely not what an honorable person would do. There is no doubt that those who do not believe in God do not have moral decency. Let us go to the meeting regardless of what they plan to do."
Once a young man told a preacher, "When I was young, I seriously believed in God. But now that I am in college. I can no longer believe in Him." The fifty-year-old preacher patted the young man's shoulder and said, "My son, you do not believe in God anymore! Let me ask you a question: Since you have been converted to be an atheist, have you advanced morally? Has atheism helped you become better? Has it made your thoughts cleaner or your heart purer? Or did it make you just the opposite?" That young man felt ashamed. He admitted that he had gone downhill morally since his denial of God. The preacher pressed on: "I am afraid that you are not really saying that you believe there is no God, you are just hoping that there is no God."

DO NOT JUDGE ACCORDING TO HOPE
Many people are not really convinced that there is no God; they merely hope so. They would rather that there were no God in the universe. For them it would be much more convenient in respect to many things.
I myself was one of those people. When I was a student I claimed that there was no God. Although I was extremely strong in my claim, something within me seemed to be protesting and saying, "There is a God." I knew deep in my heart that God exists. But my lips refused to admit this so that I could have an excuse for sinning. By declaring the nonexistence of God, going to sinful places was justifiable. If there were no God, I would become bold to sin. When you believe in God, you dare not do certain things. When you do away with God, you feel free to commit the worst sins without any fear whatsoever. If you sincerely hope to raise your moral standard by asserting the nonexistence of God, then your arguments are still plausible. However, the only reason men claim that there is no God is for an excuse for lawlessness, immorality, license, and indecency. For this reason, their whole argument is not worthy of consideration. The question is, "Are you qualified to claim that there is no God?" If your hope is merely for an escape from justice, you have lost your ground already.
IS MAN THE GREATEST?
One day a young man came to me and said, "I do not believe in a so-called God. Man is the greatest. He is the noblest among all creatures. There is no God in this universe; man is everything." We were sitting opposite each other. After hearing what he said, I stood up, went to one side of the room, stooped down, and gazed at him intently. I said, "You are really great!" Then I walked to the other side of the room and looked at him from another angle. "That is right," I said deliberately; "You are great! In Kiangsu province there are thirty million who are like you. There are at least four hundred million of your kind in China. The world contains only two billion who are the same as you are. Do you realize that during the last few days there has been a flood in the south? The dykes along the river are in jeopardy. The whole population in Hsing Hwa with more than two hundred thousand people have been recruited and rushed to the dykes in a panic. They are carrying earth with them to reinforce the banks. The repair work is still going on.
"Suppose that the world is recruited to hollow out the sun. A hole is drilled through the surface, and everyone has to remove a load from the inside. Assuming that no one will be burned to ashes, do you think that they can do the job? Even if all the people themselves were inside, they would not fill up the sun. That is not all. If you put several hundred planets the size of Earth inside and started shaking it, you would still find that the sun would be very empty inside. How many suns are there in the universe? Do you realize that the number of solar systems is in the hundreds of millions?"

HOW VAST IS THE UNIVERSE?
I then said to the young man, "And here you are! You have not even walked through the whole earth, and yet you consider yourself greater than the whole universe. Let me ask you, do you know how vast the universe is? Take light for example. Light travels at 186,000 miles per second. Try to calculate how far light travels in one minute, or one hour, or a day, or a year. There are some stars whose light takes three thousand years to reach us. Go and work out how far they are from us! And you think you are so great! I would therefore advise all atheists and young men alike to admit the incompetency of man not only morally, but intellectually and academically as well."
CAN MAN EXTEND BEYOND THE BOUNDSOF TIME AND SPACE?
Another time when I was in Kaifeng, I met another one of those young, stout atheists. I walked up to him and patted him on the shoulder, saying, "I saw God today!" He stared at me in curiosity and demanded a further word. I replied, "You are God! If you know that there is no God, then you have to be God." He asked for an explanation. I said, "Since you are convinced that there is no God, you must have traveled over the whole earth. If God is not in Shanghai, He may still be in Nanking. You must have been to both places. That is not all. If God is not in Nanking, He may be in Tientsin. You must also have been to Tientsin. But you cannot draw this conclusion simply by being in China; God may be in another country. So you must have been to every country on this earth. If God is not in one place, He may be in another. Therefore, you must have traveled throughout the world. One never knows if God is hiding at the North Pole or the South Pole, or in the woods or wilderness somewhere. So you must have combed through all those regions as well. If God is not found on earth, He may be found on the moon. You therefore must have been to the moon. God may also be on other planets or in outer space. This means that you have traveled through space and all the other galaxies as well. If you can say that there is no God, it must mean that you have traveled throughout the whole universe. If this is the case, you must be God yourself.
"This is not all. Even though you know that God does not exist in Shanghai today, how about yesterday? Perhaps God will come tomorrow. You say that you know there is no God today, but what about last year? And how do you know that God will not come next year? You say that there is no God this year, but what about a thousand years ago? Very well, you must be an everlasting one who knows everything about the past and future. You have to be a being beyond time and space. You must be in Tientsin and in another country at the same time; you must be omnipresent from the east to the west, from the North Pole to the South Pole. Who else but you can be the very God? If you are not God, you can never be qualified to say that there is no God."

THE EVIDENCE
Some will immediately step back and say, "I have never said that I know there is no God. One can never tell whether there is a God or not." Well, if you cannot give a conclusion, I will ask witnesses whom I consider trustworthy to present arguments to you and prove the existence of God. Again let me say this, you are the judge, and I am the prosecutor. I am presenting only the evidence before you. Decide for yourself if there is a God.
THE UNIVERSE
First, look at nature, the world that is before our eyes and every phenomenon in it. We all know that scientific knowledge is the rational explanation of natural phenomena. For example, there is an observed drop in the temperature of a patient. The drop in temperature is a phenomenon, and the explanation for it is scientific knowledge. When an apple falls from the tree, it is a phenomenon. Why does an apple not fly into the air? The explanation for this phenomenon constitutes knowledge. A man with knowledge is a man who has the proper explanations.
ONLY TWO EXPLANATIONS
The universe displays countless phenomena of diverse forms, colors, shapes, and nature. We cannot fail to notice these phenomena before our eyes. The explanation for all these phenomena is known as knowledge. All thoughtful persons have only two explanations as far as the origin of the universe is concerned; there is no third explanation. You have to take one or the other of them.
What are these two explanations? The first says that the universe came into being through natural evolution and self-interaction; the second attributes its origin to a personified Being with intellect and purpose. These are the only two explanations presented by all philosophers of the world. There is not a third one.
Where did the universe come from? Did it come into existence by itself or through chance? Or was it designed by the One from whom we derive the concept of God? You have to think and then make a decision about it. Everything that is by chance has certain characteristics. I would suggest you list all of these in a detailed way, the more the better, and then compare all the phenomena of the universe with your list. Alongside of this make another list of the characteristics which, in your opinion, would be prominent if the universe were created by an intelligent Being. Now by a simple comparison of nature with your two lists, it will be easy to draw a reasonable conclusion.

CHANCE EVENTS
What are the characteristics of things that come about by chance? First, we know that they are unorganized. At the most they can be partially integrated. They can never be totally organized. One can achieve a specified goal by chance once, but he can never achieve a specified goal by chance all the time. Anything that comes together by chance can only be integrated partially, never totally. For example, if I throw this chair to the other side of the room, by chance it may come to rest at a perfect angle. If I do the same with a second chair, it may also lie neatly beside the first one. But this will not keep on happening with the third and the fourth and so on. Chance can only provide partial organization. It does not guarantee total integration. Furthermore, all random interactions are aimless, disorganized, and purposeless. They are without order and structure; they are loose, formless, disorderly, and not directed toward any meaningful purpose. Briefly, we can say that the characteristics of chance events are disharmony, irregularity, inconsistency, purposelessness, and insignificance. We will write down these four characteristics on our list.
CONSISTENCY AND ORGANIZATION
Now let us compare the things in the universe with these characteristics. Take, for example, the human being. He is carried in his mother's womb for nine months and delivered; he grows up and eventually dies. This cycle is repeated for every single individual. Consistency can be observed. It is not a wild game of chance. Again, look at the sun above your head. It does not exist purposelessly. Rather, it has its purpose and significance. Look at the moon, the stars, and the myriads of galaxies through your telescope. Some stars have their own planets. They all follow definite tracks and patterns. They are all organized. Their manner of motion can be calculated and predicted. The calendar in your hand is derived from them. Even next year's calendar can be printed before this year is past. All these show that the universe is organized, consistent, and purposeful.
MICROORGANISMS
Let us turn to the micro-world. Take a thin slice of wood. Put it under a microscope and observe its grain and structure, all meticulously regular and rhythmic. Even a blade of grass and the petal of a flower are finely fashioned. Nothing is unorganized or confused. Everything is disciplined and functional. All these things witness one fact to you: the universe, with its macro and micro aspects, is purposeful and meaningful. Can you say that all these came into existence by chance? Surely you cannot.

IS IT OCCUPIED?
Once I was preaching the gospel with a co-worker of mine in a village. On the way back we were extremely thirsty. There was neither a teahouse nor stream for us to get water. In fact the whole area was uninhabited. After walking for a while we came across a thatched hut. We went to the door quickly and knocked. For a long time there was no answer. We thought that no one lived there. When we opened the door and went in, we found that the floor was swept clean. In one of the rooms was a bed with nicely folded sheets. There was a teapot on the table, and the tea in it was still warm. I said, "Surely someone must be living here. All the arrangements indicate beyond doubt that this place is occupied by someone. We should not drink this tea. We must get out quickly or else people will think we are thieves." We walked out and waited for the owner to return.
By observing the arrangements of the house, we concluded that someone was living there, without having seen the occupant. In the same way, we know that God is there by the arrangement of everything in the universe, although we cannot see Him. Every single phenomenon of nature is so balanced, organized, meaningful, and functional. You may say that they come by chance, but it is impossible for me to believe that chance is its sole originator. The Bible says, "The fool has said in his heart,/There is no God." Only foolish people can say in their hearts that there is no God.
CHANCE OR DESIGN
The universe has to be created by Someone with profound wisdom, vast knowledge, and intricate design. If you cannot accept the concept of random formation of the universe, you have to admit that it was created by such a God. There cannot be a third explanation. The choice is left to you. You have to decide if the universe came by chance or whether it was created by God.
A DEMAND AND ITS OBJECT
One witness may not be enough. I will call in another. This time we will consider man's heart. Before doing so, we should also observe one fact: wherever there is a desire, there must first be an object for that desire. For example, an orphan who has never seen his father naturally has a desire for a kind of paternal love. I have asked many people who were orphans, and they all have felt this irrepressible yearning. By this we can see that every desire of the heart arises out of an object in the world.
As human beings we have a need for social belonging. We need companionship and mutuality. If you put a boy on a deserted island and he grows up alone, he still has the yearning for companions, for beings like himself, even though he has never seen a human being. This yearning or desire is the very proof that somewhere in the world there is something known as "man." At a certain age, man begins to think about posterity; he starts desiring children and grandchildren. This is not a mere fantasy. This desire stems out of the existence and possibility of offspring. Hence, where there is desire, there is an object for that desire.

THERE IS GOD IN THE HEART
Do we have any desires other than social identity and self-propagation? What other cravings do we have? Deep in everyone there is a craving for God. Whether they are highly civilized races, such as those among the Caucasians, or the ancient civilizations, such as the Chinese civilizations, or the African natives and uncultured aborigines, they all have a common craving --God. As long as they are men, they have a yearning for God, no matter what race or nationality. This is a fact. You cannot argue against it. Everyone is seeking after God. Everywhere man is craving for God. This is very clear.
By applying the principle that we just mentioned, we can see that since our heart feels the need for a God, there must necessarily be a God in the universe. Since there is a need for God in the heart, there must be the existence of God in the universe. If no God exists, we would never have such a craving in our heart. We all have an appetite for food. In the same way, we all have an appetite for God. It would be impossible to live if there was only an appetite for food but no food. Likewise, it would be impossible to live if there was a capacity for God but no God.
NEVER THOUGHT ABOUT GOD?
Once an atheist rudely rebuked me in a loud voice: "You said that a man has the psychological need for a God. But there is no such thing, and I do not believe in it." I said, "Well, do you mean to say that you never think about God? In fact, even while you were talking, you were thinking about Him. This indicates that you do have a capacity for God. There is no one who has never thought about God. He may try not to think much about Him. Since this thought is in you, there must be such an object outside of you."
THE WORDS AND THE HEART
A young man once came to me to argue about God. He was vehemently against the existence of God. He gave me one reason after another for saying that there is no God. As he was enumerating the various reasons why God should not exist, I listened to him quietly without saying a word. Then I said, "Although you insist that there is no God and support yourself with so many arguments, you have lost your case already." He said, "What do you mean?" I went on to explain: "Your mouth can say as much as you want about there not being a God, but your heart is on my side." He had to agree with me. Although one can give all sorts of reasons in the head, there is a belief in the heart that no argument can defeat. A stubborn person may give a thousand and one reasons, but you can have the boldness to tell him, "You know better in your heart that there is a God. Why bother to look for evidence outside?"

Now what would you say? After looking at nature and the universe, after checking with your inner feeling, it is up to you to decide whether or not there is a God. But you should not be irresponsible; your attitude must be sober because everyone has to meet God soon. One day you will all stand before Him. Everything concerning yourself will be laid bare. On that day you will know God. But now is the time for you to be prepared. We should all be prepared to meet our God.

posted by RAFAEL @ 9:14 AM 0 Comments Links to this post

CONSIDER THIS SCIENTIFICALLY AND OBJECTIVLY

I shall begin by assuming that the issue of God's existence is settled. We all believe that there is a God. As those who desire to know the truth, we must go one step further to find out what kind of God He is. God is the greatest Unknown. We must spend some time to find out about this unknown One. The next step now is to know what kind of a God He is.

In the past few thousand years man has been inquiring about the nature of God. Is He kind or is He righteous? Is He indifferent towards us, or is He extremely interested in human affairs? These types of questions are the direct cause of all human religions. What is religion? Religion is man's inquiry about God and his explanation of Him. Through these explanations, different men have arrived at different concepts about God. What kind of God is He? This is a big question. It is also a very serious question. We have all given our thought to this subject at one time or another. The question might even have occurred to our little mind when we were five years old. All men, educated or ignorant, have been intrigued by this question. It comes naturally after some contemplation and observation.

But a person trying to speculate about God is like an ant attempting to understand a human being. It is extremely difficult for the little creature to try to realize our life, nature, and mind. In the same way it is impossible for us to try to comprehend God. For this reason, in the past few thousand years, all kinds of people, theologians and philosophers alike, have done much thinking about Him. What has God been doing all this time? Has He been indifferent to us or has He tried to reveal Himself to us? What is God's attitude? Do you think He would say, "I am God and have nothing to do with human beings. I do not care what you think about Me. I shall stay in heaven as God. Let the mortals be ignorant!" Or do you think He has a desire to reveal Himself to man and visit him?
When I was in India, I saw some people lying naked on beds studded with nails. Some walked with bare feet on burning coals. These people devoted a great deal of energy to seeking after God. What has God done to them? Did He hide Himself and take no notice of them at all? Has He not kept Himself as a perpetual mystery? This is a great question. We have to consider it scientifically and objectively in order to find out what God is like.

A few years ago I spoke on a similar subject to some medical students in an auditorium in Cheloo University. I said that man is an organism with a life. God also is a life. Man's life is higher than that of the lower animals, and God's life is even higher than that of man. I asked the students, "Since we realize that all living organisms have some common laws and express some common traits, can you name them?" Different ones then started to bring up different points. At the end we summed up the discussion in this way: all living organisms contain two common characteristics. You can call these characteristics their common expressions or their common laws. First, every life wants to preserve itself. It tends to reproduce itself. There is the ability to produce posterity, to continue its own life. Second, every life wants to have fellowship with other lives. It cannot stand being by itself. When a man cannot find fellowship with another human being, he goes to dogs, cats, fish, or birds and makes friends with animals. All living creatures desire fellowship.
Based on these two characteristics of life, namely, the preservation of itself and fellowship with others, laws of human government are instituted. For example, the death penalty reflects a convict's desire to preserve his own life; punishment comes in the form of taking away and terminating such a life. This is the way to inflict suffering on a life. Imprisonment, as a less serious punishment, cuts him off from having fellowship with others. This reversal of the life principle becomes then a suffering for him. From this we see that punishment is applied according to the principles of life.
With these two chief characteristics in mind, let us turn to the life of God. God is an organism of a higher order than human beings. He is naturally governed by this law of life. We can know God by the characteristics and distinctive features of His life. From this we can deduce whether or not God wants to have fellowship with man.


There are two kinds of religion: religion based on natural concepts and religion based on revelation. Natural religion starts with man as the center. He is the one that is seeking after God and studying about Him. What then is revelational religion? Revelational religion comes directly from God. He is the One who comes to reveal things to us. Man's thoughts are often useless fancies. God's revelation alone is trustworthy. Christianity is different from all other natural religions in that it is a religion that comes from revelation. Christianity begins from God. It is God who comes to seek out man, rather than man who seeks after God.
I will not try to persuade you to believe in Christianity or to read the Bible. I will only make a few suppositions. We will treat the subject in the same way as if we were solving a problem in geometry. We will start from the suppositions and then deduce our arguments step by step. We will examine our reasonings to see if they are sound and if our conclusions are logical. As in mathematics, with some problems we work forwards, while with others we work backwards. At any rate, in the end we should be able to tell whether or not a supposition is justified.

We have to make a few suppositions. The first one is that God exists. This in fact has been covered by us already. We have agreed that there is a God. He is a Being who has a purpose.
Second, we assume that God has a desire to reveal Himself to man. If God wants to reveal Himself to man and if He wants us to know Him, how does He do it? In what manner can He be made known to us? If He speaks to us through thunder or writes to us through lightning, we will not be able to comprehend His message. How then does God make Himself known to us?

If He is to reveal Himself and if He wants us to know Him, He necessarily must do it through human means. What then are the common ways that men communicate with one another? First, they do it through speaking and second through writing. All means of communication, whether telegraph, telephone, sign, or symbols, are all included in these two categories. If God is to manifest Himself, these are the only two means for Him to do so. For the present we set aside the aspect of speaking; we will see how God communicates with us through writing.
If God reveals Himself through writing, of all the volumes written by different people throughout the centuries, there must be one book which is divinely inspired. This is a very crucial test. If such a book exists, it proves not only the existence of God, but it contains His written revelation to us as well. Is there then such a divinely written book?
In the search for such a book, let us first mention a few basic principles. Suppose I want to order a book from a publisher. If I can tell him the name and author of the book, there will be no trouble getting it. If, however, I forget the name and author of the book, I can describe the characteristics of it to the publisher, such as the contents, size, color, binding, etc. The publisher will then search through all his books and locate the volume I want. God has one book in this universe. How do we find it? We have to know its characteristics first. If there is any book that has been written by God, it must meet certain conditions or have certain qualifications before one can say that it is from God.


Let me put forth a few propositions. If there is a book written by God, it must first of all mention God. It must tell you that it is from God and that its author is God. This is the first qualification. Second, it must carry a moral tone that is higher than what we commonly know. If it is a fabrication, it can at the most be on the same level as man. Third, if there is such a divine book, it must tell us about the past and the future of this world. Only God knows clearly what occurred in the past and what will happen in the future. Only by telling us these matters will we know Him as God. Fourth, this book must be simple and available so that all may be able to secure and understand it. If there were only one such book in the world, then only a very few people would be able to see it. It would not pass the test unless it is a book accessible to everyone. In the United States there is a group of people who claim to have a book from God. It is engraved in gold and contains only twelve pages. Such a book then would not be accessible to the Chinese. God would never write to us a book at which we could not look.
Now the matter is simplified. Let us repeat these four conditions once more. (1) If such a book exists, it must tell us explicitly that its author is God. (2) It must carry a high tone of morality. (3) It must give a detailed description of the past and the future of the universe. (4) It must be available. Let us pick out some of the more important writings throughout human civilization and check them against these qualifications to see if any meets our requirements.

We will start from books that are generally considered to be good. Let us take the Chinese classics of Confucius. They are immediately disqualified under the first requirement, for none of them claims to be written by God. They do have a high tone of morality, but they fail to give the origin and destiny of the world, the universe, and man. This does not mean that they are worthless books; it means that they do not contain the qualifications we want. They are not what we are looking for.
Let us go to the classics of other cultures. There are numerous volumes of famous writings, but none of them passes the first test. They are all clearly written by man. They may be masterpieces in philosophy or morality, but they are not written by God, nor are they divinely inspired. We have to set them aside.
There is a book in India called the Rig-Veda. It once dominated Hinduism. However, it does not claim to be written by God.
Another book called the Avesta, written by a Persian named Zoroaster, is also extremely influential in the Middle East. It does not claim to be from God either. Moreover, its moral tone is not especially commendable.
Let us come to the Koran of Mohammedanism. This is the closest one we can find. It tells us that it comes from God; it meets the first requirement. However, it does not fulfill the second requirement, for its moral tone is too low. The heaven it describes is full of lusts and flesh. God could never write a book with such licentiousness and immorality. Hence, this book does not pass the test of morality.


After searching through all the books, you have to come finally to the Bible. If God desires to communicate with man, and if He does so through writing, then this is the only book that can pass the four tests. Hence, this must be the book God has for man.
What does this book say? In the books of the law in the Old Testament, it says, "Thus saith the Lord," at least five hundred times. Other books in the Old Testament repeat the phrase about seven hundred times. In addition to the references in the New Testament to the speakings of God, the Bible has more than two thousand claims of divine origin. If God has no intention of communicating with man, we can forget about this book. But if He does communicate with man through writing, then this book has to be of immense value. Can you find another book where God is claimed as its author that many times?
We have to see if the Bible meets the second qualification. Let us take a look at its moral tone. Everyone who has studied this book confesses that it carries the highest moral standard. Even the sins of the most noble persons are recorded and condemned without mercy. Once a strong opposer of the Bible was asked by his son, "Why are you so strong against the Bible?" He answered, "If I do not condemn it, it will condemn me." This book does not let us get by easily. The human concept is that all sexual acts outside marriage are considered as fornication. The Bible, however, says that even an evil thought is fornication. Human morality condemns an act of killing as murder, but the Bible condemns a slight hatred in the heart as murder.
We consider a man who lets his enemy get by without paying vengeance as forgiving. But the Bible charges man to love his enemy. How high is its moral tone, and how low we are before its standards! You cannot help but admit that it presents the best ethical code for humanity.

Furthermore, this book describes in detail the past and future of the universe. Once a friend told me that he could believe in everything the Bible says except the parts in Genesis and Revelation where it talks about the origin and destiny of the heavens and earth. I told him that if this is indeed a book from God, it must, of necessity, contain these matters. If the Bible did not contain Genesis and Revelation, it would be the same as any other book, and we would have to look for another book; it would not be the one we want. But the past condition of the world and its future destiny are recorded here. Hence, the third qualification is also met.


What is the circulation of such a book? Last year (1935), more than two hundred million copies were sold. Can you name another book that has such a high circulation rate? This statistic, moreover, is not limited to just last year; every year the number has remained approximately the same. In one sense this book is very popular. In another sense it is like a thorn in your hand; it pierces you. This book gives you a headache. It creates an unspeakable uneasiness within man. It even causes man to oppose it. In spite of this, its annual sales are still over two hundred million.
Furthermore, this book is translated into more than seven hundred twenty languages. In every country and among every race, there is a translation of this unique book. It is extremely easy for anyone to obtain a Bible anywhere in the world. If the Rig-Veda were God's book, then more than half of the world would perish due to a failure in obtaining it. Even if you put the Rig-Veda in my hand, I would still be unable to understand it. If only the educated ones can contact God, then I am destined to go to hell. If only the Indians have the opportunity, we Chinese, as well as other races, are out of hope. If God speaks through the Rig-Veda, then where can we find that book? Maybe we can only find the original copy in the London Museum. And even that may not contain the original meaning of God's revelation to man.

This is not all. The Bible contains sixty-six books and it is divided into the Old and New Testaments. It was written by no less than thirty people. The span from the time the first book was written to the time when the last book was finished is more than sixteen hundred years. The places where they were written are also different. Some were written in Babylon, some in Italy, some at one end of Asia Minor, others at the other end of the Mediterranean. Furthermore, the writers themselves differed in their backgrounds. Some were lawyers; some were fishermen. There were princes, and there were shepherds. All these writings by men of different backgrounds, languages, environments, and periods are put together. The amazing thing is that it is still a complete book.
All those who have had some experience of editing know that in order to put together a few articles written by different authors, it is necessary for the authors to be of comparable level of academic achievements and viewpoints. Even when the academic standard and viewpoints are similar, there will still be conflicts and contradictions when you put five or six articles together. But the Bible, though complex in contents, contains history, poetry, laws, prophecies, biographies, and doctrines and was written by so many different ones at different times and under different circumstances, yet when you put them together, they surprisingly run as one continuous volume. There is no conflict or contradiction. They are written in one breath.


If you read this book carefully, you have to admit that God's hand is behind all the writings. More than thirty people of varied backgrounds and ideas in different times and places wrote these sixty-six books. When you group them up, they link together as if they were written by one individual. Genesis was written about fifteen hundred years before Christ, and Revelation was written ninety-five years after Christ. There is a time span of sixteen hundred years. One talks about the beginning while the other projects the end of the world. Yet whatever begins in Genesis is concluded in Revelation. This amazing feature cannot be explained in human terms. Every word of it has to be written by God through man. God is the motivating One behind the whole composition.

There is another remarkable thing about this book. In itself it is a book that gives life. Yet countless numbers of people have lost their lives for its sake. There was a time when anyone who held this book in his hand would immediately be put to death. The most powerful empire in history was the Roman Empire. There was a time when this empire summoned all its forces to destroy this book. Everyone who possessed it would be inhumanly persecuted and later killed or burned. They wiped out thousands of people and burned countless copies of the Bible. They even set up a monument at a place where they killed Christians. On it was the inscription: "Christianity is buried here." They thought that when they had burned all the Bibles and removed all the Christians, they would see Christianity lying there beneath their feet. But it was not long after that when the Bible came back again. Even in a country like England, which has already accepted Christianity as its state religion, you can still find tombs of martyrs for Christ if you visit different places there. Here and there you can find places where the Bible was once burned. Or you may come across a tombstone that tells you that such and such a person tried so hard and wrote so many books in his life to oppose the Bible. One place may tell you that the Bible was once burned there, and another place may tell you that Christians were once killed there. One signpost may point you to a statue of martyrdom, and another may point to a site of Bible burning.
Why is it that so many people have tried so hard to oppose this book? Why is it that men would pass by other books, but would either oppose this book with every fibre of their being or would put their whole life to the stake for it? There must be something extraordinary here. Even if you do not believe that this is God's word, you have to admit that there is something unusual about this book.


This book seems to be very simple and easy. If you consider it from the historical point of view, it tells the origin of the universe, the earth, the plants, human beings, how they established their kingdoms, and how they will eventually end. This is all. There is nothing special about it. Yet it has been handed from generation to generation for centuries. Today it is still with us. Moreover, if you do not confess that it is truth, you have to conclude that it is false. You can disregard many books, but you cannot ignore this book. Nor will it ignore you. It will not let you go. It demands a verdict from you. It will not pass you by.

Another remarkable thing about this book is that almost half of it is prophecy. Among the prophecies, almost half of them are fulfilled. The other half are for the future and await fulfillment. For example, it predicted the fate of the nations of Moab and Ammon and of the cities of Tyre and Sidon. Today when people talk about big cities, they mention London and Shanghai. Then it was Tyre and Sidon. They were two chief cities of the ancient world. The prophecies concerning these two cities were all fulfilled. Once I was in the Middle East. For some reason I did not visit those two places. However, I bought two pictures of those cities. It amazed me when I looked at those pictures. I could not help but believe in the Bible. It was prophesied that if these two metropolitan cities did not repent, they would be destroyed and devastated. Their land would become hills of rocks and pebbles where fishermen would come to dry their nets. In the pictures that I bought, there was nothing but fishing boats and open nets on the shore. This is only one small fact that proves the reliability of biblical prophecy.
If you compare past events with the prophecies in the Bible, you will find that they all correspond one with another. For another example, take the birth of Christ. Isaiah prophesied concerning a virgin with child a few hundred years before Christ actually came. Later, He was born indeed of the virgin Mary. The prophecy was accurately fulfilled. As the prophecies concerning the past have been fulfilled, so the prophecies concerning the future must also be fulfilled.

If God desires to communicate with man, He must do so through common human channels of communication. He must use the human language or human writings. In other words, there must be a book in the world that is a direct revelation from God. If such a book does exist, it must contain the four criteria we mentioned. Now we can say that such a book is found. This book tells us that God desires to have fellowship with us. He speaks to us through this book. Through it God is no longer an unknown Being. We can now know Him. This book is the Bible. I hope all of you will read it.

posted by RAFAEL @ 9:02 AM 0 Comments Links to this post

THIS IS A SERIOUS MATER, IS HE CRAZY? A LUNATIC?A LIAR? PLEASE YOUR VERIDICT.,

God desires to reveal Himself to us. He does so through means that are comprehensible to man. These are namely written and spoken language. We have seen how God reveals Himself through writing. Now we want to take a look at His revelation through speaking.
Suppose that you have had correspondence with a person for many years; however, you have never seen him. Naturally, you would want to know him more by having some direct acquaintance with him. Full understanding of someone cannot be achieved merely through writing. Direct contact gives a better chance. It seems as if communication through speech is of a more intimate and thorough nature than writing. When spoken language is added to written language, communication becomes enhanced. If you take away either of the two, you have a gap. Of course, if you take away both, communication is completely voided. Effective communication is always carried out by these two means.
If God's intention is to reveal Himself to us, He must of necessity do so through speaking. But how does God speak? Does He trumpet from the heavens? If so, we would all be frightened to death. We would all run away. No one would dare to listen. There is a chasm between Him and us. He, being so high and great, would drive us away from His holiness. How then does He speak?
THE WINTER ON THE MOUNTAIN
Let me relate to you a story. One winter I was staying on the mountain Lu-shan, recovering from an illness. It was immediately after the war, and there was practically no one living on the mountain. In the vicinity of my dwelling, one could hardly see anyone all day long. I am a quiet person by nature. This kind of environment was very appealing to me. Not only was it quiet there, but the weather was cold as well. From morning till dusk, all I saw was a boy who came three times to deliver my meals. At the beginning I was quite at ease. But after a while, even a person like me began to feel lonely.
One day after lunch I went to take a nap. There was a balcony outside my bedroom window. When I woke up I saw some little creatures gathering around the balcony. Bits of my meal had been dropped there, and the birds were busily chirping around them. As they hopped around, they chirped and made many cheerful noises. I said to myself, "All right. Since I cannot find any human beings, I will try to make friends with these little birds."
I rose up and went out to greet them. But in an instant they all flew away. An idea came to me. I took some of the leftover rice and began to arrange it in rows, with only a few grains in the first row and gradually increased them towards the entrance of the doorway. I hid behind the door and watched them coming. Soon they gathered around again. I said to myself, "This is my chance." I walked out and began to make friends with them. But the minute they saw me, they all scattered. Some perched on the branches of the tree across the balcony and stared at me, as if trying to determine what my intention was. Every time I approached them, they flew away, and every time I walked away, they came back. This went on a number of times.
I wanted to preach to the birds. I wanted to tell them, "Little birds, I have no special intention in doing this. This is winter on the mountain, and food is scarce. I have enough food with me, and I just want to share it with you. Please be at peace and come down. I only ask that as you eat, I can sit among you. I want to listen to your songs and watch you playing. Come. Let us be friends..." But the birds would not come. They did not understand me. I had to give up.
Later I had a certain realization within. I began to preach to myself. I said, "This body of mine is too big. If I could shrink from five feet eleven inches to the size of a bird, and even change myself into a bird, they would not be alarmed by my presence. I could then tell them my heart's intention, and we could spend the winter on the mountain Lu-shan together."

We have a similar problem today. If God remained God, we could never understand Him. If He talked to us in His language, we would be altogether lost. If God wants to reveal Himself through speaking and have fellowship with man, He must shrink Himself to such a degree that He and we are the same. Only then would He be able to speak to us and tell us of Himself and of the mysteries of the universe. Only then would we be able to understand Him.
Has God become a man to reveal Himself through His speaking? Let us again use the method of supposition. What if God revealed Himself through the human language? What if He became a man and fellowshipped with man? The implication is tremendous here! It would mean that in this world, among all the human beings throughout history, one person was not merely a man, but God as well! If it is granted that God became a man, there must be a mortal who was also divine. We need to find out about this One.

This is a thorny task. But we will employ the effective method we have adopted—namely, setting down a few principles. Then we will search according to these qualifications and directions. We want to base our evaluation on what manner of life a person should possess and what qualifications he must have if he is God.
The first condition that this person must fulfill is that he must claim to be God while he is on earth. He cannot be apologetic about it. He must declare boldly that he is God. Only then can we know who he is. Without this declaration, we have no way to guess his identity. Hence, a declaration is our first qualification.
Second, the way this person came into the world must be different from ours. If I said that I am God and yet was born in the same manner as every other mortal, my words would carry no force. If on the other hand, I dropped down from heaven, my assertion would be taken seriously. The way this person comes into being must be extraordinary. He must come in an absolutely different fashion; otherwise, his words will not carry the necessary weight.
Third, this man must bear a moral standard that is far above that of all other human beings. He must have God's holiness, and his life must bear the mark of God's righteousness. For example, if I became a bird and lived in exactly the same way as other birds, without showing them anything extraordinary, I could not convince them that I was actually a man. If God is to become a man, His moral behavior must be of the highest quality. This is the only way that we could identify Him as God.
Furthermore, if a person is God, he must necessarily be able to perform things which no mortal can do. If he can achieve what we cannot achieve and know what we do not know, we can say that he is truly God.
Lastly, this person must be able to tell us the divine purpose concerning man. What was God's purpose in creating the universe and man? How does He take care of human pains and sorrows? What is the origin and ultimate solution of everything in the universe? What should our attitude towards God be? All these he must reveal to us. Unless this one shows us what we do not see, we cannot say that he has shown us any revelation.
We will set down these five conditions and put the whole of humanity to the test. Let us find out if someone meets the five requirements. Such a person would surely be qualified to be God.
The first person to put to the test should be yourself. Of course, you are not God, because you have never claimed to be God. Nor have I ever claimed to be. So that rules out you and me. Very well, now we will introduce Confucius. If you read his books, you will find that he did conduct a very moral and proper life. But he never claimed to be God either. Hence, he fails in the first step.
What about Sakya Muni, the founder of Buddhism? Not only was there an absence of the claim of divinity, but his philosophy itself is void of deity. He did not believe in the existence of God. Since he had no God, he cannot be God either.
Next, go to Mohammed. He believed in God. But he never claimed to be God. He called God Allah and himself the prophet of Allah. If you go through every person in history, you will discover that no one ever claimed to be God except One. That One was Jesus of Nazareth. He claimed to be the living God. No other person put forward such a claim.

How can Jesus of Nazareth claim to be God? Before going on, we have to pause for a moment to seriously consider the matter. It is not a light thing to claim to be God. A person who makes such a claim falls into one of three categories. He must belong to one of these three categories; he cannot belong to all three. First, if he claims to be God and yet in fact is not, he has to be a madman or a lunatic. Second, if he is neither God nor a lunatic, he has to be a liar, deceiving others by his lie. Third, if he is neither of these, he must be God. You can only choose one of the three possibilities. If you do not believe that he is God, you have to consider him a madman. If you cannot take him for either of the two, you have to take him for a liar. There is no need for us to prove if Jesus of Nazareth is God or not. All we have to do is find out if He is a lunatic or a liar. If He is neither, He must be the Son of God. These are our three choices. There is no fourth.
What did Jesus of Nazareth say about Himself? In John 10:30 He said, "I and the Father are one." We need some explanation here. In the Bible the invisible God is called the Father. The Son manifests and expresses the Father. What is hidden is the Father, and what is expressed is the Son. The Son is the One who can be seen and touched. Behind, you have the Father. In front, you have the Son. The two are actually one. They are the two sides of the same reality. When we talk about two, we refer to the fact that one is hidden while the other is revealed. When we talk about one, we say that the revealed One is just the hidden One in manifestation. This is the biblical interpretation of the Father and the Son.
Therefore, when Jesus of Nazareth one day said, "I and the Father are one," it was a statement that no one else could make. This man was saying in reality that He and the invisible God are one entity. He is God and God is He. God is the invisible Father, and He is the manifested Son. The Father and the Son are one! Who can this One be that made such a claim? Is He a madman? Is He out to deceive us?
After Jesus spoke such a word, what reaction do we see? "The Jews again took up stones that they might stone Him. Jesus answered them, I have shown you many good works from the Father; for which of these works are you stoning Me? The Jews answered Him, We are not stoning You for a good work, but for blasphemy, and because You, being a man, are making Yourself God" (vv. 31-33). The Jews understood very well that Jesus' words meant that He claimed to be God. After hearing these words they wanted to stone Him to death. A claim was made by Jesus, and an accusation was charged by the Jews, both of which concerned His divinity. Was Jesus insane? Did He speak pure nonsense just to cause people to kill Him? Or was He a swindler setting up some kind of a scheme? If so, what was He trying to gain? Was He trying to gain death?

Perhaps we will go back a little bit to the earlier parts in the Gospel of John and see what it says there. John 1:18 says, "No one has ever seen God; the only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him." Why has no one seen God? It is because God is invisible. Jesus said that He was the only Begotten of the Father; He expressed the invisible Father. When you see the only Begotten, you see the Father.
Again He spoke concerning Himself, "And no one has ascended into heaven, but He who descended out of heaven, the Son of Man, who is in heaven" (3:13). Have you ever heard anyone say such words? I cannot say, "No one has been to Shanghai, but he who comes from Shanghai to Tientsin, even I, Watchman Nee, who is in Shanghai." If I say so, I would be gibbering nonsense. But Jesus was speaking a heavenly language. He said that He came out of heaven and is still in heaven. What can a person be if he can be in two places simultaneously? Either he is God or he is a lunatic or he is a liar. If you have not yet believed in Christ, please give a verdict to this issue. Who is this man?
Let us read John 3:31-32: "He who comes from above is above all; he who is from the earth is of the earth and speaks out of the earth. He who comes from heaven is above all. What He has seen and heard, of this He testifies, and no one receives His testimony." He said that He came out of heaven and was above all. After a while He said the same thing again. Let us see what is the purpose behind these words. He came to preach the things of heaven, but no one received His words. He mentioned words like "heaven," "above all," "out of heaven," etc. What kind of man was He? Confucius never said this. Neither did Sakya Muni or Mohammed. Was Jesus of Nazareth a madman, a liar, or the Son of God?
John 5:17 says, "But Jesus answered them, My Father is working until now, and I also am working." He always put Himself in the same place as the Father. Verse 18 says, "Because of this therefore the Jews sought all the more to kill Him, because He not only broke the Sabbath but also called God His own Father, making Himself equal with God." When we read His words now, we may consider them to be ordinary remarks. But the Jews knew what He was saying. They knew that He was making Himself equal with God. The words in fact meant that God is His Father and He came to express God. The invisible One is God, and the visible One is He. Therefore, the Jews sought to kill Him. What should we do about such an unusual person?

John 6:46 says, "Not that anyone has seen the Father, except Him who is from God, He has seen the Father." Here the word is clearer. He said that no one other than Himself has ever seen God. Only He knew what the Father is like. I can only say with soberness and reverence that Jesus of Nazareth is the Son of God. Read John 8:18. What did He say? "I am One who testifies concerning Myself, and the Father who sent Me testifies concerning Me." The question in verse 19 is most interesting: "They said then to Him, Where is Your Father? Jesus answered, You know neither Me nor My Father; if you knew Me, you would know My Father also." Have you seen what He was saying? They had seen Him, yet did not know Him. Of course they would not know the Father either, whom they had not seen. If men knew Him, they knew God. Who is He then? If knowing Him equals knowing God, is that not the same as saying that He is God and God is He?
Read John 8:23: "And He said to them, You are from below, I am from above; you are of this world, I am not of this world." The preposition "from" in this verse is ek in Greek. It means "out of." That is how it should be translated. He said, "You are out of this world, but I am not out of this world." This man claimed to be from above; He did not come out of this world. Who can He be?
The Jews were confused. They were totally bewildered. Who was this man? The ancestor of the Jews is Abraham. They boasted of being the descendants of Abraham in the same way the Chinese boast of being the offspring of Hwang-ti. The name Abraham was highly venerated among the Jews. Now they brought out Abraham. Please read John 8:53: "Are You greater than our father Abraham, who died? The prophets died too. Who are You making Yourself?" How did Jesus answer them? Was He greater or smaller than Abraham? In verse 56 Jesus said, "Your father Abraham exulted that he would see My day, and he saw it and rejoiced." What is this? Even Abraham had to look forward to Jesus! Hence, verse 57: "The Jews then said to Him, You are not yet fifty years old, and have You seen Abraham?" Now please pay your attention to Jesus' answer in verse 58: "Truly, truly, I say to you, Before Abraham came into being, I am." Tell me who this man is. If I told you that before Hwang-ti was, I, Watchman Nee am there, you would immediately write me off as a lunatic. Some of you would say that I am a liar. The words Jesus spoke made Him either a madman, a liar, or God. There can be no fourth alternative.

We have to read on. In John 10:37-38 Jesus said, "If I do not do the works of My Father, do not believe Me; but if I do them, even if you do not believe Me, believe the works so that you may come to know and continue to know..." Know what? The clause following is very crucial. It is a big statement: "...that the Father is in Me and I am in the Father." Who then is this man? He said that He was in God and God was in Him.
Passages like the above are numerous in the Bible. I shall mention one more. Read carefully John 14:6-7: "Jesus said to him, I am the way and the reality and the life; no one comes to the Father except through Me. If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; and henceforth you know Him and have seen Him." It says clearly that if you know Jesus of Nazareth, you have known the invisible God. Why is this so? It is because He is God.

One of the disciples was confused. John 14:8 says, "Philip said to Him, Lord, show us the Father and it is sufficient for us." Philip was asking to be shown the Father who had been mentioned again and again by Jesus. Verse 9 says, "Jesus said to him, Have I been so long a time with you, and you have not known Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; how is it that you say, Show us the Father?" Here Jesus made it very plain that to see Him is to see God. He made no apology about it. He is God. There is no need to see the Father anymore. If you see Him, you see God!
Who is Jesus of Nazareth? What would you say? Is He merely the founder of the Christian religion? Is He merely an example of self-sacrifice and humanitarianism? Is He a social reformer? Is He an advocate for universal love, peace, and freedom? Listen to what He said about Himself. He said that He is God. What is your conclusion? Is He a lunatic or a liar? Is He a hoax, or is He God? This is a vital question.
Can He be a madman? If you read His biographies in the Gospels and observe His life and manner, you will realize that not only was He sane and sound, He was very sober and firm. If there is a perfectly sound person in this world, He has to be the One. His mind was clear, and His mentality was alert. If you study His deeds and words carefully, you have to confess that His thoughts are very logical and consistent, and His manners are most comely and appropriate. To opposing ones He only needed to reply a few sentences, and their arguments against Him were defeated. He did not have a trace of madness in Him. A madman could never have done what He did.
Then is He a liar? A liar always lies for a profit. If there is no profit to be gained, what is the purpose of lying? Why was Jesus crucified? For no other reason than that He claimed to be God. At the last judgment, the hour when His release or crucifixion was to be deliberated, He was examined as to who He was. What was His answer? He said that the Son of Man would be seen sitting on the right hand of the Majesty on high, descending on the clouds in glory (Matt. 26:64). Even then He claimed to be God. As a result, He was crucified on the cross. Is there a liar who would sacrifice his life for his lie?

Once I met a person who wanted to talk with me about our faith. He read some books about Jesus and admitted that Jesus had a high standard of morality. He could consider Jesus as a perfect man, a model for humanity. But he could not believe that Jesus is God. I said, "If you admit that He has a high standard of morality, then He at least is not a liar. If you agree that He is not a liar, then you have to accept His claim of divinity as truth. He repeatedly asserted that He is God. If you admire His morality, you have to recognize His divinity as well. Jesus of Nazareth is God!"

Please read John 1:1: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." Verse 14 says, "And the Word became flesh and tabernacled among us (and we beheld His glory, glory as of the only Begotten from the Father), full of grace and reality." What is the "Word" mentioned in verses 1 and 14? Verse 1 speaks of the relationship the Word has with God. In reference to when, the Word was there from the beginning. In reference to where, the Word was with God. In reference to what, the Word was God. Today the Word has become flesh; He has taken on a human body and dwelt among men. As to how He dwells, it says that He is "full of grace and reality," and "we beheld His glory, glory as of the only Begotten from the Father." Who is this One? He is Jesus of Nazareth.
Here we have only seen one of the five qualifications mentioned earlier. Only Jesus of Nazareth meets this first condition. This proves that He is God. We shall go on to see the four other conditions or qualifications. Jesus of Nazareth must meet all the other four qualifications before we can conclude that He is God.

posted by RAFAEL @ 8:30 AM 0 Comments Links to this post

EXAMINE THE CLAIMS

If God is to be a man, He must come into the world in a way that is very different from all other mortals. We come into the world through our parents and are conceived by our mothers. To ascertain whether Jesus of Nazareth is an ordinary person or the incarnated God, we need to examine His birth. If His birth was no different from ours, we have to conclude that He is nothing but a man. Not only does He have to pass the first qualification, but He needs to pass the second one. Do not hastily believe in a person simply because he claims to be God; we have to test him by our second criterion. If he is indeed God, he must be born in an extraordinary manner.
If we study the birth of Jesus, we will find that it was very different from ours. He was born of a virgin. Both the Gospel of Matthew and the Gospel of Luke in the New Testament tell us this fact. Jesus was born of a virgin, Mary.

Before we go on, we have to realize that there are two ways to know God: by natural speculation or by revelation. According to natural speculation, one meditates and conjectures about God. In revelation, God speaks to man. We want to look at the revelation of God. We want to know what God says.
The Gospels of Matthew and Luke show us that Jesus was born of a virgin, Mary. This important fact enables us to conclude that He is no ordinary person, and it justifies our being a Christian.
The natural mentality cannot readily accept this fact. Some years ago, a big debate was conducted in England. On one side were prominent leaders of modernistic schools of theology. On the other side was a famous Presbyterian pastor-theologian. Four major topics were raised. Twice a day, for four consecutive days, each side took turns delivering a long speech for a total of eight messages. One of the topics was related to our subject—the virgin birth. The modernistic theologians asserted that one reason alone was enough to disprove the virgin birth—the event was biologically impossible. According to the law of biology, it is impossible to have the virgin birth.
On the same day, their opponent gave the rebuttal. Let me briefly mention a few of his arguments. He said, "Our friends have denied the possibility of such an event on the ground of biological law. I am here to ask whether such an event happened. They asked, 'Can this happen?' They referred you to academic principles. I am asking, 'Has this happened?' I point to a historical occurrence. It is one thing to be academically justified. It is another thing to be historically recorded."
As he was speaking, he drew out a newspaper from his pocket. In the paper was an article about an accident that had happened a few days earlier. A man was driving on a winding mountain road. Due to carelessness, the car slid and tumbled down a deep gorge. The car was totally wrecked. Not even a square foot of the vehicle was left untouched. It was thoroughly damaged. But the man on the ground was absolutely unhurt. Later, he rose up and walked away. The theologian read the passage aloud and said, "This car tumbled down a thousand feet into ruin. You cannot even find a square foot of whole metal, and yet the man was unharmed. My friends would ask, 'Could this man live?' But my question is, 'Is this man alive?' He is alive! If you consider the possibility, there is none. But if you consider the fact, there it is!"
What we have is a historical fact. If we try to study the virgin birth from a scientific point of view, we may conclude that this is an impossible event. But my question is whether or not such an event occurred. The Gospel of Matthew says that Jesus was born of a virgin. So does the Gospel of Luke. At least you have to say that these records have said such a thing and that such an event was recorded in history. At least you have to believe that there is a historical event.
I am not asserting that Matthew and Luke were inspired by the Holy Spirit when they wrote their books. Whether these books were divinely inspired or not, we will set aside for a moment. We are saying that there were a few people who followed Jesus. They wrote His biography. Both Matthew and Luke were contemporaries of Jesus. Matthew followed Him for more than three years. Luke was not as close, but he "carefully investigated all things" (Luke 1:3). I believe that when he wrote his gospel, the mother of Jesus was still alive. What did they say about the birth of Jesus? They all testified that Jesus was born of the virgin Mary. His birth was absolutely different from ours. Today, after almost two thousand years, some who never saw Jesus, never talked to Mary His mother, and never met Joseph His father, conclude that He was not born of a virgin. How can you say that He was not born in this manner? Are you ruling out the possibility of such an event and concluding that it did not happen because of some arguments you proposed in your study room or some theories you fashioned in the laboratory?

Perhaps we should read the genealogy of Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew. There are forty-two generations in the genealogy. Beginning from the first generation, it repeatedly says, "So-and-so begot So-and-so." This phrase is used through verse 15, which says, "And Eliud begot Eleazar, and Eleazar begot Matthan, and Matthan begot Jacob." Verse 16 continues, "And Jacob begot Joseph." The surprising thing is that the next part of the sentence does not continue with "Joseph begot Jesus." Rather, it says, "Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ." When the line reaches Joseph, the pattern is dropped. This is because Jesus Christ was born of the virgin Mary. His way of birth was very different from ours.

We have seen that His method of coming into the world was an unusual one. Now we want to look at His way of departing from the world. As we shall see, this was also contrary to our ordinary deaths. No one can ever predict the place, time, and manner he or she is going to die. A hundred years from now, all of us here will be dead. But no one knows how we are going to die. Jesus of Nazareth, however, foresaw His own death. He knew exactly when, where, and how it was to happen.

Once when someone told Him that He was going to be killed, He answered that it was not acceptable for a prophet to perish outside of Jerusalem (Luke 13:33). He knew that He was going to die in Jerusalem. One day, He told His disciples that the hour had come. Not only did He sense the imminence of His death; He told others that His death hour had come. He knew also how He would die. A number of times He mentioned that He would be crucified. This was recorded at least three times in Matthew. Not only was this man different in His way of entering into the world, but His manner of departure was no less extraordinary. Both His birth and His death were very unusual. Is this the Son of God?Let us consider the third qualification. What kind of morality did Jesus of Nazareth have? Was He the same as we are? Did He ever sin?
I like the sentence Jesus spoke in John 8. Many were opposing Him at that time. They surrounded and cross-examined Him. In return He asked, "Which of you convicts Me of sin?" (v. 46). This was a tremendous challenge! Which one of us would dare to stand before everyone and challenge to be convicted of sin? Whoever dared do such a thing would be put to shame the minute his wife stood up to testify against him. Perhaps, in less than five minutes, seven or eight people would immediately rise up to expose his lies and unfaithfulness. But when Jesus made such a statement, no one was able to convict Him of sin. There has been a countless number of saints and sages throughout the ages, but none was bold enough to claim to be perfect and sinless. Why is it that Jesus alone dared to make such a claim?
All I can say is that this man is either arrogant to the extreme or holy to the uttermost. A proud person may talk in an outlandish manner because he does not know himself; he has no realization of what kind of person he is. But when Jesus challenged, "Which of you convicts Me," there was no way He could be humble or polite about it. He is without sin, and He is holy to the uttermost.
Jesus of Nazareth is not like Confucius, who said that given some more time, he would be rid of big, moral flaws. Jesus is sinless. When He made such a statement, He made it before His enemies. If there had been a slight misconduct on His part, the Jews would have caught it right away. The Jews are not prolific writers; they have not produced many books other than the Holy Scripture. But after Jesus, many books were written by the Jews to contradict Him. All these books deny His divinity, but none touch His morality. Of all the opposing writings, none can prove that Jesus ever sinned.
Every philosopher or founder of religion, at one time or another, has said, "I repent," or "I regret such and such a matter. I will do better from now on." But Jesus of Nazareth never repented. A sinner must of necessity repent. But what does a sinless man have to repent of? Jesus never apologized to anyone; He never did anyone any wrong.
When I was in England, some British friends asked for my opinion concerning their people. I said, "Among you, once ever so often, I hear, 'Excuse me' and 'I beg your pardon.'" To the English, anyone who does not know how to make these two remarks has to be an extremely base person, for he knows not his own mistakes. Anyone can make a mistake, but when one refuses to admit his mistakes, he makes himself vulgar. For this reason we have to say, "Excuse me" and "I beg your pardon" all the time.
The amazing thing is that Jesus of Nazareth never said "sorry" to anyone. He never apologized. Could He be so evil as to ignore His conscience completely? Was He oblivious to His own errors? Or is He really sinless? If so, He cannot say, "sorry." It is not a matter of humility or politeness to Him, but a matter of maintaining His standing.

I love the story about Jesus once walking down a road. Many people were gathered around Him, hoping to see the resurrection of a dead person. It was so crowded that the people pressed upon each other. One woman, who suffered from an issue of blood for years, thought that Jesus would surely be able to heal her since He had performed all kinds of miracles. She did not come to the Lord directly. All that she did was touch the fringe of His garment, and the sickness was immediately healed (Mark 5:25-29).
Jesus felt something, turned around, and asked, "Who touched Me?" How did the disciples respond? They said, "You see the crowd pressing upon You and You say, Who touched Me?" (v. 31). He should have asked, "Who pressed Me?" instead of "Who touched Me?" If I were Jesus, I would have said in a gentlemanly fashion, "Excuse me." But Jesus did not need to say that. When He said that it was a touch, He meant that it was a touch and not a pressing against. The disciples only knew that many thronged around Him. But He knew that someone "touched" Him. He knew what He was doing. There was no need for apology. He knows no sin because He is without sin.
Let me mention another story about Jesus. One day He came to the synagogue in His hometown. Someone handed Him the Scripture, and He started to read from a passage about Himself. The people there, however, despised Him. He remarked that a prophet is always despised in His own place. For this reason, God would not choose them but would rather go to someone else. After they heard this, they were very indignant. They carried Him outside and tried to throw Him down a cliff. I like very much what Jesus did then. He passed through their midst (Luke 4:16-30). If someone tried to push us over a cliff, we would struggle to escape. But He was no ordinary person. He simply passed through the persecutors' midst. They could do nothing except let Him pass by! He is without sin.
Again, you see the same Jesus preaching to a ruler at midnight in a house (John 3:2), while choosing to converse with a woman beside a well at midday (4:5-7). Everything He did was very proper. No one can say anything against Him. You cannot find fault in Him.

Another time some opposers came to tempt Him. They asked whether or not it was lawful to pay tax to Caesar. The Jewish nation, as you know, no longer existed then, and Caesar of Rome was their king. If Jesus said "no" to the question, He would have been involved in a political issue, and the opposers would have had an excuse to condemn Him. If He said "yes," all the Jews would have counted Him as siding with the Romans and hated Him. The result, of course, would have favored the opposers. This was a question that could not be answered "yes" or "no."
How did Jesus reply? He said, "Show Me the coin for the tribute" (Matt. 22:19). He was wise. He even had the opposing ones draw out the money from their own pockets. Then He asked, "Whose is this image and inscription?" (v. 20). They had to admit that it was Caesar's. Jesus gave an excellent reply: "Render then the things that are Caesar's to Caesar and the things that are God's to God" (v. 21). With that He dismissed the whole case. This is where His majesty lies. He never made a mistake. You cannot get a case out of Him.

I cannot enumerate all His deeds. Everything He did bears such a mark of nobility that there is absolutely no flaw in His behavior. I will briefly mention His betrayal as a final example. It was very late in the night, and men armed with torches, spears, and swords came to arrest this empty-handed Jesus. He asked them, "Whom do you seek?" They said, "Jesus the Nazarene" (John 18:7). He replied, "I told you that I am" (v. 8). At that very word, the band of rogues whose minds were set on capturing Him fell back to the ground. If Jesus had not voluntarily given Himself over to them, they would never have been able to seize Him. Such calmness and majesty can only be seen in Him!
As to the traitor, Jesus knew from the first day of his intention. Yet He allowed the same to follow Him and even let him be the keeper of the money. All the time Jesus knew that money was being stolen by him. Who can demonstrate such forbearance and uprightness? Here is a man who is absolutely different from all others. In every respect, He has been proven to be the Son of God.
The fourth qualification we mentioned is that one who claims to be God incarnated must be able to perform what an ordinary person cannot. Has Jesus of Nazareth performed any supernatural acts? We are not His contemporaries; it was almost two thousand years ago that He walked on earth. Naturally, we cannot be His witnesses. But one thing is sure: the apostles who followed Jesus recorded, preached, and testified the things concerning Him. The four Gospels were all completed within thirty years after His departure. Most of the Jews who were then alive had seen Jesus. If the apostles' records were false, they would have been repudiated long ago. However, the Jews only argued that Jesus is not the Son of God. They never denied His deeds, for the deeds were all facts.
Today, when we read the four Gospels, we have no apprehension about their authenticity. If there had been a slight error when they were written, there would have been grave problems because many of the contemporaries had actually seen and heard Jesus. There was no chance for any fabrication. Hence, these books cannot be a hoax. If the Jews could not attack these books, there is even less of a basis for an attack today.

Let us examine some of the deeds of Jesus of Nazareth. Matthew 11:2 and 3 say, "Now when John heard in the prison of the works of the Christ, he sent word through his disciples and said to Him, Are You the Coming One, or should we expect another?" John wanted to make sure that Jesus was the Christ sent from God. If He was not, John would wait for another.
Verses 4 and 5 say, "And Jesus answered and said to them, Go, report to John the things that you hear and see: the blind receive their sight and the lame walk; the lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear; and the dead are raised and the poor have the gospel announced to them." Jesus answered neither "yes" nor "no." He only asked the messenger to tell John of the things heard and seen. He wanted John to think about them and decide for himself if Jesus was the Christ. Jesus proved His divinity by the miracles He performed. Here is a man who accomplished things that are impossible for human beings. You cannot help but confess that He is God.
John 7:31 says, "But many out of the crowd believed into Him and said, Will the Christ, when He comes, do more signs than this man has done?" Many people testified that He performed all kinds of miracles which no man could do.

John 10:24 says, "The Jews therefore surrounded Him and said to Him, How long will you hold our soul in suspense? If you are the Christ, tell us plainly." On the one hand, the Jews hardened their hearts and refused to acknowledge His divinity, and on the other hand, they were puzzled by the many supernatural miracles that He performed. They gathered around Him and pressed for an answer. There is one thing in which Jesus never gave in: His claim to divinity. He performed what mortals could not. These acts testify to His divinity. He told the people clearly, "The works which I do in My Father's name, these testify concerning Me" (v. 25). On the one hand, He made His claim, and on the other hand, He performed miracles to justify His claim.
In John 14:11 He said to His disciples, "Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me." This is the same as saying that He is the invisible Father. "But if not, believe because of the works themselves." If He had not done anything impossible, this word would have had no value at all. If He had not performed any extraordinary acts, they would have asked back, "What works have You done? We do not know what You are talking about." But the disciples knew of the acts He did. All these acts prove that He is the Son of God.

We have to check Jesus of Nazareth against a fifth qualification. If He is God, He has to show us what He is. Is He kind, or is He severe? Is He gentle, or is He fierce? What kind of a God do we have? As a matter of fact, Jesus did show us what God is.
This is a most wonderful thing. The eternal, invisible God is now seen by us. There is no need to conjure up an untouchable and far transcendent God or imagine what He is like; He has revealed Himself to us. He has dwelt in our midst and walked among us. Jesus of Nazareth is the very God dwelling among and with man. He has manifested God's nature and attributes to us. There is no need to search for God anymore because He has revealed Himself. Our mentality is too limited. Our hands are too short, and our viewpoint too narrow. If we were left to ourselves to study and search for God, we could only conclude that He is the unknown One. Now we know that God desires to reveal Himself. In fact, He has revealed Himself to us already.

We have said that the two means whereby God communicates with us are the written and spoken language. For this reason, the Bible and Jesus of Nazareth are the two indispensable factors in our faith. When you take away either one, God becomes the gravest problem in the world. Hebrews 1:1 says, "God, having spoken of old in many portions and in many ways to the fathers in the prophets." These speakings constitute the Bible. "Has at the last of these days spoken to us in the Son" (v. 2). This is Jesus of Nazareth. Whoever is in Christ now may know Him. To have heard the words of Jesus of Nazareth is to have heard the words of God.
Dear reader, what is your attitude towards Jesus of Nazareth? Thomas confessed, "My Lord and my God!" (John 20:28). Peter proclaimed, "You are...the Son of the living God!" (Matt. 16:16). Martha said, "I have believed that You are the Christ, the Son of God" (John 11:27). Even a Roman centurion exclaimed at the sight of Jesus hanging on the cross, "Truly this was the Son of God" (Matt. 27:54b). I hope you will make the same confession.

posted by RAFAEL @ 8:15 AM 0 Comments Links to this post

WHO IS HE?

Our Christian faith is based upon the revelation of God. It is different from all other religions which are attained through meditation, conjecture, and searching. We believe that the Bible is God's revelation to us. In other words, it is His spoken word to us. We also believe that God has become a man, who is the very Jesus of Nazareth. God, the Bible, and Jesus Christ constitute the basis of our faith.

Let us begin by looking at the position that Christ occupies in our faith, or we may say, in Christianity. However, Christianity has been altered and is not what it ought to be. At the present we will not mention what Christianity ought to be. Rather, we will only draw a comparison between Christianity and other religions in order to see the distinctiveness of our faith. We will not try purposely to exalt Christianity and debase other religions. We will only draw an objective comparison between them.
First, let us consider Confucianism. Actually, followers of Confucius never formally assert that theirs is a religion. Confucianism merely exercises great influence on Chinese culture, education, ethics, and philosophy. One thing, however, is certain: the teachings and doctrines of Confucius are of foremost importance, while the person Confucius is not as crucial. I do not mean that Confucianism has no concern for Confucius. The man indeed was an extraordinary person. However, in order to be a part of Confucianism, one only needs to understand the doctrines of Confucius, abide by his teachings, and be thoroughly acquainted with his books. It does not matter whether one understands the man Confucius or not. The principles, doctrines, and teachings of Confucius are the essence of the religion.

Next let us consider Buddhism. The founder of Buddhism was Sakya Muni. Once he preached to his disciples about evil persons being reincarnated through the Wheel of Rebirth after death. This is something that attracts man's attention. But in all of Buddhism, the point of emphasis is doctrines and theories. Concerning the man Sakya Muni, although he has a history and biography, they are something parenthetical. They do not form the crux of Buddhism. The center of the religion is not the man Sakya Muni. Whether there was such a person is unimportant to today's Buddhism. All that is needed are the doctrines and teachings.
Other religions such as Taoism and Mohammedanism are all of the same principle. After each founder set up a religion and left his teachings, doctrines, and regulations as the content of his religion, the founder himself was disassociated from the religion and had little to do with it.
But our faith is entirely different. From its outset, Christianity is built on the man Christ. It is not built on the doctrines and teachings of Christ. It is amazing that when you open the Bible, you will not find too many chapters of doctrines. Passages where pure doctrinal issues are expounded are rare and of less concern to people. What concerns one the most is the man Himself and what kind of person He is. All who have read the Bible know that the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth are not outstandingly voluminous. His person draws our attention. He alone is the foundation of our faith.
The word Christ came from Greek, meaning the Anointed One. According to the Chinese, when a man takes up a task, he is given a letter of employment. The Jewish equivalent of this is anointing. When God summons a person for a work, He pours oil on the person as a seal of commission. Christ is the very God who was set apart to come to earth to be a man for the manifestation of God, in order that man may know God. Christ is the Anointed One. He is commissioned to such a task.

Due to this basic distinction, Christ is different from the founders of other religions. Once He asked His disciples, "Who do you say that I am?" Over and over again He demanded that His disciples believe in Him. He said that he who believes in the Son has eternal life. Again He said, "He who loves father or mother above Me is not worthy of Me; and he who loves son or daughter above Me is not worthy of Me" (Matt. 10:37). Unless a man loves in this way, he is not worthy to be His disciple. Words such as these have been uttered only by Him. No other religious leader ever said anything like that. Confucius never said to Yen-weh or Tze-lu, "Believe in me," nor did he ever say, "Love me." Neither did any of the other leaders, such as Sakya Muni or Mohammed, demand of their disciples faith in them. All it takes to be their disciples is to believe in their doctrines.

Hence, the true Christian faith is based on a person. It is built on Christ and not on some doctrines. The crux of the true Christian faith is a question of who Jesus is! Is He merely a Jew? Is He only a prophet? Or is Jesus the Son of the living God? The whole matter hinges upon who Jesus of Nazareth is. The difference between a genuine Christian and a false one lies not in the knowledge of the doctrines of Christ. Rather, it lies in the knowledge of who Jesus is!
Who is this man from Nazareth? Since this is a crucial question related to our basic faith, we have to find the answer in the Bible. We will pay more attention to the Gospel of John and discover that only Christ Himself is the center of the Bible and the focus of the whole of Christianity.
Before taking up the Gospel of John, we have to take a look at the background of the book. Prior to the coming of Christ, a forerunner was sent by God to prepare a way for Christ that men might be ready to acknowledge Christ. The forerunner was John the Baptist. Because of his powerful preaching, many people were convicted. As a result, many thought that he was the Christ who was supposed to come.
But John 1:8 says, "He was not the light, but came that he might testify concerning the light." The light means Christ. He is called the light because light reveals and manifests. John was not the Christ. He was only bearing witness to Christ.
Concerning this light, verse 9 says, "This was the true light which, coming into the world, enlightens every man." In this dark world, if a person has Christ, he will know all about God. When this light shines forth, man will say, "Here is God." They will recognize the light as God.
Up to verse 9, we still do not know who this light is. Read on from verse 10 to verse 15: "He was in the world, and the world came into being through Him, yet the world did not know Him. He came to His own, yet those who were His own did not receive Him. But as many as received Him, to them He gave the authority to become children of God, to those who believe into His name, who were begotten not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. And the Word became flesh and tabernacled among us (and we beheld His glory, glory as of the only Begotten from the Father), full of grace and reality. John testified concerning Him and cried out, saying, This was He of whom I said, He who is coming after me has become ahead of me, because He was before me." Have you realized, after reading the above verses, that all that is recorded here are actual facts, rather than many doctrines?

What did John the Baptist say about Christ? He said, "He...is...after me." And yet He who was after John would be before him. This is because Christ was before him in the first place. This is the beginning of the testimony of John the Baptist.
John 1:27: "He who is coming after me, the thong of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie." The preaching of John is the beginning of our faith. He came just to tell others who Jesus of Nazareth is. Not only was Christ before John, He was so much greater than John that he was not worthy to untie the thong of His sandal and be His slave.
John 1:29: "The next day he saw Jesus coming to him and said, Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!"
Verse 30: "This is He of whom I said, A man is coming after me who has become ahead of me, because He was before me." When John introduced Jesus, he said, "This is He"! (v. 30). The Gospel begins by showing us who Jesus is!
This is the word of the forerunner. But what about Christ? What did He say? We admit that in the Bible there are a few basic doctrines. For example, regeneration is one of the basic truths. Buddhism and Mohammedanism also talk about regeneration. In their teachings they teach that whatever is past is considered as dead yesterday, and whatever is hereafter is considered as born today. But what did Jesus say about regeneration? Let us look at the record of John 3.
"There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This one came to Him by night" (vv. 1-2a).
Nicodemus was a ruler. He was also a learned and aged person. He came to Jesus to discuss some problems with Him, and Jesus brought up the matter of regeneration.
"Truly, truly, I say to you, Unless one is born anew, he cannot see the kingdom of God" (v. 3).
Jesus showed Nicodemus the matter of regeneration, telling him that he needed to be born again. After Nicodemus heard this, he was confounded. He wondered how an old man could be born again. Did that mean that he had to go into his mother's womb and come out again? Jesus told him that this is not a birth of the flesh, but a birth of the spirit. If a man is not born of the Spirit, even if he could go into his mother's womb again, the flesh would still beget flesh. Only the Spirit begets spirit. Here you can see that even in such a basic and fundamental matter, Jesus did not expound much doctrine. He only mentioned a very simple fact—the need to be born again.

No wonder Nicodemus asked, "How can these things be?" Jesus told him that this is not an earthly matter. It is something heavenly. That is why he could not believe. How can a man be born again? "And no one has ascended into heaven, but He who descended out of heaven, the Son of Man, who is in heaven. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that every one who believes into Him may have eternal life. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that every one who believes into Him would not perish, but would have eternal life. For God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him. He who believes into Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe has been condemned already, because he has not believed into the name of the only begotten Son of God" (vv. 13-18). Have you seen this? This is regeneration!
Jesus was saying that regeneration is not a doctrine. It is believing into Him. To be born again is to believe into Him. If a man does not believe into Him, he cannot be regenerated. After saying so much, it all comes back to "Him."
What is our concept of regeneration? We think that if one was a thief yesterday and returns his booty to the owner today, that this is regeneration. Or, if one thought of having a mistress yesterday, but gives up that idea today, that this is regeneration. We think that as long as we quit doing whatever was bad in the past, considering it as dead, and strive to do well hereafter, we are born again. But this is man's concept. This is not the regeneration that Christ gives.
The way of Jesus depends on whether you believe into Him or not. He who believes into Him has eternal life! God gave His only begotten Son that every one who believes into Him would not perish, but would have eternal life. He who believes is not condemned, but he who does not believe is condemned. This is not a doctrine. It is a matter of the person. It is a relationship between Him and man.
Besides regeneration, there is another crucial matter, which we call Christian satisfaction. A genuine Christian feels that his hopes are fulfilled, his aspirations attained; he has no want; he is absolutely satisfied. But this satisfaction is very different from the contentment that people commonly talk about. Contentment is to see things in an optimistic way, to let things come and go by as they are without insisting on anything. There may not be much wealth or position. There may not be much honor or renown. But as long as one can live in peace and be left unbothered, that is good enough! This is contentment. But this is not satisfaction. When a person is satisfied, he feels that he has what he wants and that he has no more desires.

There is an excellent record in John 4. What did Jesus say to a Samaritan woman there? "Everyone who drinks of this water shall thirst again" (v. 13). If you desire worldly glory, renown, wealth, position, etc., you will never be satisfied. When you have ten thousand dollars, you will want a hundred thousand, and when you have acquired a hundred thousand, you will start dreaming about a million. There will never be satisfaction. He who drinks of this water will thirst again.
How do you quench this thirst? The Lord Jesus said, "But whoever drinks of the water that I will give him shall by no means thirst forever" (v. 14). An amazing fact is that neither Confucius nor any other religious leader ever said such a thing. The teachings of Confucius and Mencius only tell you to be content and to abide in your poverty. The person Confucius or Mencius has nothing to do with your contentment. However, the person Jesus has a great deal to do with your thirst-quenching.
Naturally the woman desired to drink of this thirst-quenching water. When she asked Jesus for this living water, "Jesus answered and said to her, If you knew the gift of God and who it is who says to you, Give Me a drink, you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water" (v. 10).
Was Jesus preaching a doctrine? No. There was no doctrine. The only thing He did was point to Himself, as if to say, "Well, if you know who He is, you will ask of Him at once, and He will give you living water, that you may never thirst again." Have you seen this? The whole question is who Jesus of Nazareth is.
The Samaritan woman was not a decent woman. The fact that she had had six husbands showed what kind of woman she was. She must have been dissatisfied with this one and that one. One husband could not make her happy; another could not make her satisfied. As a result, she changed from one husband to another, and then to a third and a fourth, until she came to the sixth. One day she came out to draw water, a symbol of her being one who drinks and is still thirsty. The remarkable thing is that on that day, her life was changed. She became satisfied! What did she do? She did not do anything! On that day she realized who Jesus of Nazareth is and she was saved. Let us look again at the process through which she came to know Jesus and believe in Him.

posted by RAFAEL @ 8:02 AM 0 Comments Links to this post

KNOWING


"The woman said to Him, Sir, I perceive that You are a prophet" (v. 19). Because Christ told her everything that she ever did, she perceived that this was no ordinary man. He must be a prophet. Jesus said something more to show her that He was not merely a prophet: "Believe Me" (v. 21). The woman said, "I know that Messiah is coming (He who is called Christ); when He comes, He will declare all things to us" (v. 25). What did Jesus answer her? He said, "I, who speak to you, am He" (v. 26). The first thing that a sinner needs to do is not to repent and change his behavior, but to realize who Jesus is. All will be well if he realizes who Jesus is.Later the woman returned to the city and told the people, "Come, see a man who told me all that I have done. Is this not the Christ?" (v. 29). I do not like the words, "Is this not." Since she knew that this man was the Christ, why did she say, "Is this not"? At any rate, she believed and went to tell others that Christ had come. You can see clearly that the whole issue is not about doctrine but about a person! Our basic concern is not doctrines. Rather, it is seeing who Jesus is! Once we have the Lord Jesus, we will have real satisfaction; we will be filled with the sense of having acquired everything.We will see a little more from John 5. It seems that in chapter five the Lord Jesus spoke some doctrines. But actually not much was expounded. It was once again an invitation to receive the knowledge of who Jesus of Nazareth is. He spoke some words, but they were to lead us to believe into Him. The Lord Jesus said that the Jews searched the Scriptures. But the Scriptures, the Lord pointed out, are a witness to Him. What is written there concerns Him. It is important to know the Scriptures. But more important than that is the knowledge of who Jesus of Nazareth is. The question is not what kind of teaching He teaches, but what kind of a person He isWhen we come to John 6, the matter is brought out in an even clearer way. "Jesus said to them, I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me shall by no means hunger, and he who believes into Me shall by no means ever thirst" (v. 35). He did not preach any doctrine. He just said, "I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me shall by no means hunger." Have you seen the implication here? If I say that I am your bread of life and that he who eats me shall never hunger, you will surely say that Mr. Nee is a madman from Shanghai. Religious leaders can only give doctrines to others. They cannot give themselves to others. But Jesus is different. He is the bread of life. He is also the thirst-quenching water. The problem is in the people's unbelief in Him. When anyone believes in Him, everything will be all right."I am the bread of life. Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. This is the bread which comes down out of heaven, that anyone may eat of it and not die" (vv. 48-50). These are words that no other can speak. Only Jesus can say this. He is neither a madman nor a liar. And whatever He says always points back to Himself. This man is the bread of life. He who eats of Him shall not die!Hence, our Christian faith is based on the issue of who Jesus of Nazareth is. We are not spending time merely to study His teachings. We are only asked to answer one question: who is He? What Christ proclaimed persistently on the earth was not His doctrines but Himself. The focus is not on the doctrines but on the person. As far as doctrines go, the books of Confucius and Mencius are filled with philosophies, ethics, and morality; they far exceed those in the Bible. But there is only one issue: who is Jesus of Nazareth? Do you know? Who is this Jesus of Nazareth?Let us read on. John 6:51: "I am the living bread which came down out of heaven; if anyone eats of this bread, he shall live forever; and the bread which I will give is My flesh, given for the life of the world."Here His words become more and more peculiar. It is strange enough to say that He is the bread of life which came down out of heaven. Now He says that he who eats Him, not only will not die, but will live forever. This is extraordinary. Even more intriguing are the words that say that the bread He gives is His very flesh. No wonder the Jews at that time said that it was a hard saying. Who can take this? It is right! We never heard such words before. We never heard them from Confucius, from Mencius, from Lao-tze, from Chuan-tze, or from any other sages. We never heard them in China or in any other country. No man has ever spoken such words.After Christ spoke such words, verse 52 says, "The Jews then contended with one another, saying, How can this man give us His flesh to eat?" What doctrine did Jesus preach? None. All that He said was to eat His flesh. Verses 55 and 56 say, "For My flesh is true food, and My blood is true drink. He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me and I in him." You can see that He is only emphasizing Himself. This is not a set of doctrines. Rather, it is the eating of His flesh and the drinking of His blood. Those who eat and drink will live forever.When we come to John 7, we see the last day of a great feast. Jesus spoke some words in front of those who were attending the feast. "On the last day, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes into Me, as the Scripture said, out of his innermost being shall flow rivers of living water" (vv. 37-38). Just imagine: on one of our busy festive holidays, I, Watchman Nee, stand up in the midst of a crowd and shout, "If you are thirsty, come to me and drink. He who believes in me, out of his innermost being shall flow rivers of living water." What would you say? You would surely say that I am a senseless fool from Shanghai who is talking nonsense. But that was exactly what Jesus did and said. There was really no doctrine; there was just the person Christ.On that day when Jesus spoke those words, a dispute arose among the Jews. Some said that this truly had to be the Christ. Others reasoned how Christ could come out of Galilee. In trying to answer who this man was, an argument arose among the Jews. The argument centered around one thing: who was this Jesus of Nazareth? A genuine Christian is one who believes that Jesus is the Christ.Further on in John 8:12, Jesus told the crowd, "I am the light of the world; he who follows Me shall by no means walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life." You can see that again His words are not doctrinal. The emphasis here is the "light" and the "I." It is not the practice of His teachings that makes a Christian. Rather, it is a relationship with Christ that qualifies us as one. Only by believing into Him will we receive the light of life. Only by receiving Him will we not walk in darkness.John 8:21-22 says, "He said therefore again to them, I am going away, and you will seek Me and will die in your sin. Where I am going, you cannot come. The Jews then said, He is not going to kill Himself, is He, for He says, Where I am going, you cannot come?" The Jews were confused again. Where is the place He is going that we cannot go? They thought that perhaps He was going to commit suicide. Actually if that place could be reached by committing suicide, the Jews could still get to it by killing themselves. How could the Lord go to a place to which they could not go? Verse 23 says, "And He said to them, You are from below, I am from above; you are of this world, I am not of this world." It is because of this that where the Lord was going they could not go.Furthermore, they did not die in their sins because they were murderers and adulterers. Verse 24 is crucial, especially the latter half: "Therefore I said to you that you will die in your sins; for unless you believe that I am, you will die in your sins." The King James Version added the word "he" after "I am." Let us quote the words of the original text. The Lord said, "You will die in your sins; for unless you believe that I am, you will die in your sins." The question is whether or not you believe that He is. What does this mean? It means that of the millions of people in humanity, you can pick out one and say, "This is He! This is God!" We want to examine Jesus of Nazareth to see if He indeed is! If we believe that He is, we will not die in our sins. Many are believing in a distorted Christianity, but we want to believe according to what Christianity really is. The first question we must ask is whether or not Jesus of Nazareth is.Once again the Jews retorted by asking, "Who are You?" (v. 25). Jesus' answer seemed to say, "This is not the first time that I tell you who I am. Concerning this matter I have never given in. I told you that I am; I am the One." Time after time He proved to others that He is; He is the Son of God.If we read the Gospel of John through, we will find that every passage concerns this one point: Jesus is the Christ. In John 10 the Jews surrounded Him and said, "How long will you hold our soul in suspense? If you are the Christ, tell us plainly" (v. 24). The question still hung on this one point.How did Jesus answer? He said, "I told you, and you do not believe...You do not believe, because you are not of My sheep" (vv. 25-26). All who do not believe that Jesus is the Son of God, that He is God incarnated as a man, are not Christians. Those who do not recognize Him as the Son of God do not have the life of Christ in them; they are not His sheep. Upon this issue stands the whole basis of the Christian faith.In John 11 Jesus said again, "I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes into Me, even if he should die, shall live" (v. 25). Can a common mortal utter such words?In John 12 Jesus cried out aloud, "He who believes into Me does not believe into Me, but into Him who sent Me; and he who beholds Me beholds Him who sent Me. I have come as a light into the world, that every one who believes into Me would not remain in darkness" (vv. 44-46). You can see that the One who sent Him hinges on Him. To believe into Him is to believe into the One who sent Him. To see Him is to see the One who sent Him. The light also hinges on Him. To be in the light is to believe into Him. Everything hinges on Him.Then in John 14 the Lord said, "Do not let your heart be troubled; believe into God, believe also into Me" (v. 1). He wants us to believe into Him in the same way that we believe into God. The one thing He always insists upon is the demand to believe in Him.John 15 speaks of some who hate the Lord. He said, "He who hates Me hates My Father also" (v. 23). Once again He reveals that He and the Father are one.In John 16, the Lord said that one day the Holy Spirit would come and convict the world concerning sin, righteousness, and judgment. Why concerning sin? The explanation is in verse 9: "Concerning sin, because they do not believe into Me," because they do not believe that He is the Son of God. This is a sin, a very serious sin. When the Holy Spirit comes, He will convict men, and they will realize how serious a sin it is not to believe in Jesus being the Son of God.One further passage in the Gospel of John will suffice. 17:3: "And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Him whom You have sent, Jesus Christ." Here we are shown what eternal life is. The Lord's definition of eternal life is to know God. Believing in the eternal God and believing in His sent One—Jesus Christ—is eternal life. Eternal life hinges upon this person.I hope that we would all realize who Jesus of Nazareth is. Our faith does not have any empty doctrines. It is based on the fact that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God. To receive Jesus Christ is to receive God.

posted by RAFAEL @ 8:00 AM 0 Comments Links to this post

FIRST THE KNOWLEDGE

We have said that Christianity does not emphasize doctrines. Rather, it emphasizes the person Christ. Even when some doctrines are mentioned, they are few in number, and when you go about expounding them, they always point back to a person. If you turn to the four Gospels you will be amazed to find that everything recorded is just a description of Jesus of Nazareth. There must first be the knowledge of who He is; doctrines come afterwards. We have ascertained the person of Jesus Christ. Now we want to take a look at the doctrines of our faith.

You cannot find many doctrines in the four Gospels. Neither are there many doctrines in the Acts of the Apostles. One finds doctrines only after coming to Romans. This is exactly what we have said before, that you have to know who Jesus Christ is before you can understand what His doctrines are all about.
Concerning doctrines, there is also a vast difference between those in Christianity and those in other religions. I would like to mention again that the fact that I am a Christian does not mean that you have to feel and see things as I do. I will not take such a presumptuous attitude. I will only present the facts again, showing the difference between Christianity and other religions. I will not decide what is good or bad. You are asked only to examine the facts. If you think that this is right, then believe in it. Otherwise, take your choice. Emotional words are unnecessary here. I will, therefore, make no plea or invitation.
Observing all the religions that are before us, you will see that all of them emphasize doctrines, not a person. Whether Confucius or Lao-tze, who they are and what they teach are two different things. They are two separate entities. Their doctrines do not have much to do with their person. You can take the person away from the religion, and it will not make much difference. The person only preached the doctrines, but he became disassociated from that which he preached.
This is not the case with our faith. When did Christian doctrines come into existence? It was after the death, resurrection, and departure from the world of the person Christ that the doctrines began. All doctrines came later. Moreover, all these doctrines are centered upon Christ. The doctrines and Christ are inseparable. First you have Him, then you have His doctrines.

For example, there is a doctrine in Christianity that speaks of the union of God and man. It is a very important doctrine. If you open the Bible to see how this can be, you will see that the source of such a doctrine is the fact that God became a man—Jesus. He is God mingled with man.
The Bible does not present a doctrine of God becoming one with man. Rather, it shows Jesus of Nazareth, who is a sample of God being one with man. Originally, God and man were separate; there was a wide gulf between them. There was no possibility of union. But the Nazarene came. He was God coming to be a man. He was the bridge between man and God, joining the two into one. This is not a doctrine that teaches people to be one with God. Here is the fact: henceforth, when a man is in Christ, he can be one with God.

THE SOLUTION
Another very important doctrine in the Bible concerns death. The Bible depicts man as being totally corrupted, without any possibility of being reformed. The only solution is death. A man is like a piece of worm-infested wood with no chance of being carved or shaped. The only destiny for him is the fire. Death is the solution. Only dead people will not be proud if you praise them a thousand times. Only dead people will not be angry if you rebuke them repeatedly. Only dead people will not be tempted by sin and will not sin. Death solves all problems concerning sin.
But how can we die? How can such a death occur? A religion will exhort you to die. Be dead! If you are dead, sin will no longer have an object to work on! But how can one die? By committing suicide? By throwing oneself into the sea? Or as the old Chinese scholars have said, by considering everything that is past as dead yesterday? No! All these are methods of common religions. They are not the Christian teaching.
EXPERIENCES BASED ON A PERSON
The doctrine of death is absolutely related to Christ. His person determines His doctrines. Jesus died. What does the Bible say about this? It says that the world died with Him (2 Cor. 5:14). His death was to sin; hence, the whole world is dead to sin. Originally, the whole world was in sin, being dead in it. Only Jesus was not affected by death. He did not die of sin; He died to sin (Rom. 6:10). If we are one with Him, we are also dead to sin by His death (v. 11). Sin will not have an object to work on. All the problems of sin in us will be solved.
This is the doctrine of Christianity. It is a fact that is absolutely tied to the person Christ. It is not an exhortation for people to conduct a moral life and repent from their wrongs. These are not Christian doctrines at all. Since Christ has died, whoever is in Him is also dead, thoroughly dead, to sin. Sin has no more grip on us. If Christ had not died, there would not have been any doctrine. All experiences and doctrines are based upon this person Jesus Christ.

Another fact we have is the resurrection of Jesus Christ. He died and was resurrected. Hence, on our side, we are not only dead to sin, disassociated from it; we are regenerated and a new creation in the resurrection of Christ. All these are bound to the person Jesus Christ. No accomplishment is by us. Everything depends on Him.

The Bible is not completely void of teachings. However, all the teachings rest on the person Christ Jesus. Only when He has a certain experience can there be a certain doctrine or teaching. Every single doctrine or teaching is bound to His personal experience. His incarnation is the basis of the union of God with man. His death is the basis of our dying to sin and self and the foundation of a life of holiness. His resurrection is the basis for receiving our new life. Everything we have obtained is based on what He has attained. The doctrines are absolutely based upon the person and bound to the person. This is genuine Christianity. This makes our faith different from all other religions.

MAJOR RELIGIONS DEMAND TO BE HONEST
Once when Christ Jesus was about to leave the world, He spoke of a very amazing doctrine. Of course, this doctrine is again closely related to Him. He said, "I am the way and the reality and the life" (John 14:6). Perhaps you have heard others quote this passage. He said that He is the way. He is the way to overcome sin. He is the way to overcome the temptations of the world. He is His own teaching! All the ways to victory are Him.
He also said that He is the reality. We have often heard people say that there is reality in So-and-so's words. Sometimes when someone puts forth a theory, we call it reality. In geometry, when we have proved that this equals that, we say that we found a truth. But the reality that Christ Jesus speaks of is Himself. He is the reality.
Moreover, He is the life. He does not merely preach a doctrine and ask you to work it out yourself; He is the very life-power to perform what He preaches. Religion tells you to be honest and not to lie. Maybe someone has come and told you, "Exercise yourself not to lie. Every time you lie just bite your tongue once." I think that if we were able to recognize every lie we told, our tongue would be in two pieces before the day was over! Since our life is a human life, there is no possibility for us to not lie or sin. The life of man is absolutely impotent in this respect. Merely to give you some nice, lofty doctrines, while leaving it up to you to work them out, is not the way of Christ.
The Bible says that He makes you able. That ability is of Christ. As long as you are in Him, He is your life. He can make you not lie, no matter what kind of a person you are!

No other founder of a religion is great enough to uphold these three items: the way, the reality, and the life. All of man's experiences are included in these three things. Whenever you do something, you always have to decide whether or not it is worth doing. This consideration is a weighing of the reality. After the decision is made, you have to find a way. And after the way, you must have the power. Whenever you set out to accomplish something, you always have to pass through these three steps: the way, the reality, and the life.
All three are inseparable. You are not given reality first, then the way, and then left to yourself to find the life. Every one of these three items is found in one person. When you have Him, every problem will be solved. This is Jesus. This is our faith. As long as there is a way to Him, everything will follow.
TEACHING USSELES WHITHOUT HIM
When we look at a few passages in the Bible, we easily discover that when the Bible mentions a doctrine, it always says that it is "in Christ." The words "in Christ" are constantly mentioned. Some passages say, "by Christ." But "by Christ" is not the best translation. It is better in those instances to translate them as "through Christ." God does not give things to us directly; they have to go "through Christ." In addition, there are phrases like "with Christ" and "together with Christ." They show the position Christ occupies in the Bible. Everything has to be through Him. Receiving Him is receiving His doctrines. Without Him it is useless to have any of His doctrines.
NO RELATIONSHIP IN THEIR CREEDS

The above cannot apply to all other religions. You can be a devotee of other religions, abiding by their every creed, without having anything to do with the founders themselves.
In arithmetic, there is a table called the multiplication table. You can find the product of any two numbers from one to nine from the table. Everything is arranged neatly. Do you know who formulated this table? I am afraid that millions who use this table never know who made it. But you can use this table without knowing the person who made it. All common religions are like this: you need not have anything to do with their founders, but you can apply their doctrines. The doctrines and those who preached them have no relationship with each other.
In Kaifeng I met a foreign missionary. He had heard my preaching. I discovered that he was related to the doctrines of Christ but not to Christ Himself. He told one of my former classmates, who is also now my co-worker, how to practice the teachings of Christ and expound the theologies in the Bible. My co-worker asked him, "Can you touch people by these? Has anybody repented, forsaken his sins, and had his life changed by your preaching? Do you have such power?" He was dumbfounded by my co-worker's words.
RELATIONSHIP
The source of our faith is Christ. If we have no relationship with Christ, we have no power. The doctrines of Christ are absolutely joined to Christ. The gem of the doctrines lies in Christ. It is useless to merely infer and discuss in an outward way.
Let us now look at the book of Romans in the New Testament. I will not give many explanations. Rather, I will merely present the facts to you. We want to see what the Bible says.
Romans 3:22, 24: "Even the righteousness of God through the faith of Jesus Christ to all those who believe, for there is no distinction;...being justified freely by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus." These verses say that a man receives forgiveness of sins and justification before God by the redemption of Christ Jesus. They are based on a relationship with Christ. Without redemption, the sins of man cannot be forgiven.
ALL IS RECIEVED
Romans 5:1: "Therefore having been justified out of faith, we have peace toward God through our Lord Jesus Christ."
Verse 2: "Through whom also we have obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand and boast because of the hope of the glory of God."
Verse 10: "For if we, being enemies, were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more we will be saved in His life, having been reconciled."
Verse 11: "And not only so, but also boasting in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation."
Everything that we have received, such as justification, reconciliation, standing in grace, salvation, joy in God, etc., is received through Jesus Christ. Simply by going through Him, we inherit all these.

THE GIFT
Romans 5:15: "But it is not that as the offense was, so also the gracious gift is; for if by the offense of the one the many died, much more the grace of God and the free gift in grace of the one man Jesus Christ have abounded to the many."
Verse 17: "For if by the offense of the one death reigned through the one, much more those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ."
Because of Jesus Christ, the grace and gift of God can be bestowed upon all men. We can also reign in life due to Him. Verse 21 says, "In order that just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness unto eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord." The receiving of eternal life is through Him. It does not depend on the good behavior of man.
THE PERSON
Romans 6:6: "Knowing this, that our old man has been crucified with Him in order that the body of sin might be annulled, that we should no longer serve sin as slaves."
Verse 17: "But thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin, you have obeyed from the heart the form of teaching into which you were delivered."
This is a vital doctrine in our belief: that by faith, we are crucified with Christ, and the old man is annulled. I do not crucify myself. When Christ was crucified, I was crucified with Him. By this I am set free from sin, being no longer a slave to it. In this way I can reckon myself dead to sin and alive to God in Christ. This is a big doctrine that hinges on the person Christ.
LIBERATED
Romans 7:24-25: "Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from the body of this death? Thanks be to God, through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh, the law of sin."
Here is a man who was constantly defeated by his own fleshly lusts. When he was at the end of his hopes, crying for deliverance, he saw the way of salvation: liberation by the Lord Jesus Christ. The power of liberation is also in the Lord.

Romans 8:1: "There is now then no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus." There is no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus. "Condemnation" does not refer to any ordinary kind of condemnation. According to some recently discovered old manuscripts of the Bible found in Egypt, this word has two meanings. The first is a legal term; the second is a common daily expression. In the legal context it means condemnation as a verdict. But in its ordinary usage it means impotent, powerless, bound, etc. For this reason I will translate this portion as, "There is now then no impotence..." There is no more weakness and inability.
Verse 2: "For the law of the Spirit of life has freed me in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and of death." Here are two laws. Originally, we were all bound by the law of sin and of death. Now the law of the Spirit of life has freed us; we are no longer under the control of the law of sin and of death. The law of the Spirit of life is in Christ Jesus. Have you seen this? Once again, our relationship with Him sets us free.
Verse 10: "But if Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, the spirit is life because of righteousness." Since Christ is in me, I can live.
MORE THAN CONQUERORS IN HIM
Romans 8:35, 37: "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation or anguish or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or sword?...But in all these things we more than conquer through Him who loved us." Although there is so much trouble outwardly, we are still more than conquerors. Strength is obtained by going through Him. Not that we are able in ourselves. It is all by Him and through Him.
In the same manner, verses 38 and 39 say, "For I am persuaded that neither death nor life nor angels nor principalities nor things present nor things to come nor powers nor height nor depth nor any other creature will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." Why can nothing separate us from His love? It is not because of our virtues, but because this love is "in Christ Jesus our Lord"! Love is tied to the person Christ. When we are in Christ, we are in this inseparable love.