A Poem

24 September 2017

Dear Phyllis,

Since I cut my thumb two weeks ago I have had a lot of time to sit in my chair and ruminate of my life. My thumb is much better – I think. It is bandaged up so I can't see it, but a week ago I had surgery where they dressed up the wound, cut back the bone, and sewed up the end of my thumb. All I have to do now is to wait for Jesus to heal the wound.

Over the years it has been my privilege to know a large number of some of God's greatest servants. In the archives of God's Hall of Fame, one that would be near the top of the list is JB Friends. I have mentioned him to you several times before. He is one of my favorites. He was one of the weakest men I ever met, but, oh, the presence of Christ in his life! There is much I could say of him, but one startling incident was when he was speaking at a Japanese conference. One night he stood up and said, “Konban wa” (Good evening). We all snickered. Then he said, “Konban, watakushi wa Nihongo de inoritai to omoimasu” (Tonight I want to pray in Japanese). We were startled. We had never heard a visiting speaker say such a long sentence in Nihongo (Japanese). Then we were all dumbfounded as he poured out his heart to God speaking Japanese. After the meeting I asked him, “How in the world did you learn that?”. He said, after he was saved he wanted to be a missionary to Japan. The Lord said, no, South Africa was to be his field. But for his love for Japan he had read the entire Japanese Bible through on his knees in South Africa and looked up every word. I have lived in Japan for 50 years and never done that.

I don't know how many times JB Friends had been in Japan as a visitor – maybe half a dozen – but one year when he was back I spoke to his wife saying, “Mrs. Friends, you wouldn't know me but my name is Bill Cook, and I met you and your husband when you were here in 1965”. She utterly floored me when she replied, “Bill, we looked for you when we were here three years ago, but we were told you were in the states at that time”. But the real shock came when we had the Friends up to our house for lunch. I introduced Mrs. Friends to Take chan, who was living with us. (Take had had serious mental problems but the Lord had wonderfully saved and healed her.) When I said, “Mrs. Friends, this is Take chan...”; she turned to her husband and said, “Burtrum, Burtrum, this is the girl we have been praying for in South Africa”. Take burst into tears. I have no idea how the Friends ever got a copy of our prayer letter. I never sent them one, but obviously they had been praying for us for years.

In unforgettable message Brother Friends told the story of a young missionary, around the turn of the last century, who was going out to preach one morning. As he was walking through a village he noticed a man lying on a mat in a house reading a book that looked like a Bible. Bibles were so unusual in those days he stopped to see if that was what it really was. The man was dying of TB but somehow had come to possession of a Bible. The man had never met a Christian in his life but simply by reading the Word of God he had been saved and brought into the deeper life. As the missionary was leaving the dying man said,”I have written a poem. If you care I would like to give you a copy”. This was later translated by Buckley Buxton.

The poem.

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With Him, with Him upon the Tree, ah this, yes this is rest at last. Here is the souls felicity, here is the crown of victory, here is all sorrow past.

With Him, with Him upon the Tree, here all my pain and grief have died. I look in vain for misery, for joy is all that I can see, with Jesus crucified.

Strong pain hath held me in its sway for six long weary, weary years, and yet my heart is always gay, my lips are singing all the day; I have no time to tears.

No tears... and yet the more His grace doth this my joyful heart o'r flow, the more 'tis torn by fierce distress, the while I see a wooing grace rush to its form of woe.

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I never heard anything like it. Here is a man, in Japan, dying an agonizing death with TB – he has never met a Christian in his life - but simply by reading the naked Word of God he has been taught by the Holy Spirit the deepest truths of our identification with Christ. More than that he experienced the paradox of the Gospel; always suffering and yet triumphant. “No tears and yet the more His grace doth this my joyful heart o'r flow, the more 'tis torn by fierce distress, the while I see a wooing grace rush to its form of woe”. This is one of the great mysteries of the Gospel that is seldom taught. Paul told us about it in his own experience of always dying and yet living. Always chastened but never killed. Always sorrowing and yet always joyful (2 Cor. 6:9, 10). That was one of the most amazing messages I ever heard.

The testimony of that man is utterly unique. He wasn't a hardened sinner who had thumbed his nose at Jesus for years and then, when he got in serious trouble, thought he would be kind to God and accept His offer of salvation. He wasn't a man with a Christian background who was surrounded with Christian friends praying for his salvation. He didn't have a dust covered Bible on a shelf in his house and a waste basket full of tracts. He hadn't heard endless hours of TV evangelists. He hadn't sat in church for 15 years hearing Bible expositors explaining to him the deeper truths of the Gospel. He had never heard the testimony of anyone who had been born-again. And yet, with no other witness than the printed Word of God, he had accepted the truths of what is written there, and the Holy Spirit had taught - and imparted to him - the life of Christ like few people ever experience.

But the miracle doesn't just end there. No doubt this suffering man died and went to heaven having never seen another Christian other than that young missionary who stopped for a brief one hour of fellowship. Little did this nameless man realize that 120 years later, his testimony and poem would have been translated into English by one of the most famous British missionaries; it would be quoted by a man from South Africa and then 52 years later sent out by email to many from an American living in Thailand who remembered it just like it had been said last night. Most of us can't remember a Sunday morning message by the time we get home for lunch. I sat in church listening to a Japanese preacher for five years and cannot tell you one message he ever preached. But JB Friends message has been engraved in my mind like it was cut in stone.

Little do we realize the importance of little things. One man that I want to look up in heaven is this Japanese brother and tell him how those words he wrote in his loneliness and sorrow had such an impact on my life. Of course I am looking forward to seeing JB Friends in heaven and renew fellowship on a much deeper level than we ever enjoyed here.

And, of course, I am looking forward to seeing you in heaven and give you a big hug, if I don't see you before hand. Oh Jesus is wonderful. It can't be far from here.

Hoping to see you soon. Sayonara, bill                      

Fire

10 September 2017

Dear Phyllis,

This is nothing new but last week the Lord reminded me again of the importance of fire. It is not without significance that we see the order of the message God has given us in His Word. In Genesis we see the men of the family God has chosen to be His people – Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph. In Exodus we see God drawing His people out of Egypt and establishing His tabernacle to dwell among them. Then the next thing we see in Leviticus is instruction concerning offerings.

My goodness, if this isn't the first message to give to those who choose to follow the Lord, what is? Another word for offering is sacrifice. Somehow this seems to be a silent word in Christianity in America today. Let's hear some preaching on sacrifice. How in the world these idiots (That isn't the right word. They are false prophets) of the champions of the prosperity gospel (?) came up with that message is a mystery to me. They certainly didn't get it from the Bible. The prosperity gospel is the perfect antithesis of the central message of the Bible. Jesus never taught it. Jesus' message was to give up all, take up a cross and follow Him. Where do you get prosperity in that? The Jesus Family in China had a motto of five words – sacrifice, abandonment, poverty, suffering, and death. If this is what you were after you were welcome to join them. If not, please don't apply for membership. And they were the genesis of the present day Back to Jerusalem Movement. Maybe I missed it, somehow but it looks to me like the word of the Lord teaches, is not what can I get out of it but what can I give to Jesus. If offerings and sacrifices are not the foundational message of the Bible what is?

In the OT every time a man met with God it was at an altar. If we would have more encounters with God perhaps there should be more altars in our life. But if there was a sacrifice laid on the altar there was one more element that was necessary – fire. A phrase that was repeated over and over in the initial chapters of Leviticus was “it is an offering made by fire, a sweet savour unto the Lord.” If the offering is to be a sweet savour unto the Lord it must have fire. Any offering laid on the altar is just dead meat until it is consumed by fire. Fire less altars attract more flies than the blessing of God. If want our lives to be a sweet savoir to God the one essential element is fire – and that falls on altars not Christmas trees. I believe the Holy Spirit is more interested in anointing a sacrifice than getting a new bicycle for Christmas.

I'm sure I wrote to you before about my series of messages on the seven Spirits of God in Revelation (Rev. 1:4, 3:1, 4:5, 6). That was one of the most enlightening series I ever preached. One of the points that I got from it was a strong conviction that one of the seven Spirits of God is the Spirit of Fire. There is a tremendous amount of material in all the Bible to substantiate that point, but one is what John said about Jesus that he would “baptize with the Holy Spirit and fire”. And when the Holy Spirit came at Pentecost He came on the believers as tongues of fire. If there is one attribute that is universal to anyone filled with the Holy Spirit is they are “on fire for God”. Jesus said of John that “he was a burning and a shinning light” (Jn. 5:35).

The Holy Spirit is the one indispensable element that we need in our lives. Take the Holy Spirit out of our lives all we will have is dead orthodoxy. There is no heat in that. One of the primary effects of heat is that it will melt ice. DL Moody said of his experience listening to Henry Moorhouse preach on John 3:16; “As I sat there listening the iceberg in my heart began to melt”. The other night I was listening to a number of excellent testimonies of salvation on You Tube. The temperament of these believers varied considerably but, when they got to the point where Jesus came into their heart, without exception, everyone broke down and wept. My own experience in preaching, when I feel the Holy Spirit coming on me strongly tears begin to flow. In fellowshipping with friends a consistent phenomenon is, when the Holy Spirit moves tears flow. Peter Xu's Born-again house church group in China - of which there were 6, 000, 000 Christians – they were known as the weepers. Those critical of this group falsely claimed that they insisted all believers must weep. Peter Xu denied this accusation, but it certainly is understandable why their enemies would think so. There was so much of the Holy Spirit in their meetings it would be difficult not to weep. In my opinion, anyone who claims to be filled with the Holy Spirit and does not break into tears when they talk about Jesus is questionable. I remember attending Kichijoi meetings in Kobe where, for one year, I never was in a meeting where you couldn't look around the room and see tears trickling down cheeks. Melting ice certainly is one of the evidences of heat.

I was in a prayer meeting a couple years ago where a young girl showed up that I had never seen before. Consistently, every week those meetings were really dead prayer meetings but, my goodness, did we have church that night! What a phenomenon! That girl was absolutely dominant. Seldom had I heard prayer like that. I was tremendously curious about this unusual girl and spoke to her at the end of the meeting. I asked, “Where are you from?” She replied, “I'm Chinese.” “Okay, now I understand.” The heat coming of that girl was tremendous. If I ever saw a person who was on fire for God it was that young lady.

But there can be an enthusiasm that is just natural temperament. Just because someone is excited and all over the place is not necessarily an evidence of the Holy Spirit. Of the many conference speakers I heard in Karuizawa the two men that I would rate as the most Spirit filled men were two of the most low keyed. One was JB Friends from South Africa. Brother Friends was one of the weakest men I ever met. Shaking hands with him was like picking up a dead fish. He looked like, if you said “boo!”, he would jump out of his skin. But when he stood to preach I feared he would tare the pulpit apart. How the power of God would come down on his message. More than any man I ever met the Holy Spirit came through him unfiltered. The Lord was so clear because, as a natural man, there was no one else there. The second most impressive speaker was Bob Smith of Bethel college. He was so unimpressive and dull, when he began a message you would look at your watch and wonder, “How long do I have to endure this?” An hour later you would look at your watch again and wonder, “What happened?” Bob Smith would drone on in almost a monotone and yet his message was so gripping you would forget where you were. Again, the only thing you could say was this was the Holy Spirit.

The point is this; if we are serious about walking with and serving Jesus, the question we must ask ourselves is, what is the altar in my life? What am I sacrificing for Jesus? And to what degree is the fire of God burning in my heart? It takes the fire to convert the solid state of meat of the sacrifice into the gaseous state of smoke. And it takes the Holy Spirit to convert the natural things we offer Him into spiritual realities. And where that happens there is the sweet savour unto the Lord.

Lord Jesus, help us to make this real,

                                                    bill

Eschatology

3 September 2017

Dear Phyllis,

I really don't have anything to say today. The only thing that is on my mind is a few rambling thoughts about eschatology. As I have told you before, my view of eschatology has evolved considerably in recent years. The man I consider the closest at this point is Joel Richardson. He has come up with a position that is a radical departure from the traditional, Hal Lindsey, approach to end time prophecy, and I strongly believe he is right. His position is that for the past one or two hundred years western scholars have viewed the scripture through western eyes, and he says the Bible is a Middle Eastern Book. I believe he is right. The traditional interpretation of scripture has made the revived Roman Empire the main player and nearly everybody has jumped on the European Union band-wagon. Many years ago prophetic scholars were warning, “When we hit ten (the EU), the rapture will occur”. They pasted ten many years ago and we are still here. Richardson's position is basically Islamic. He believes the ten nations that are so prominent in Daniel and Revelation are an Islamic caliphate. And he has suggested that the anti-Christ is Islamic.

Richardson strongly emphasizes that if there is any subject that requires humility it is eschatology. Amen! The other night I was looking at a You Tube message by a very powerful American preacher. The first thing that impressed me was his dogmatic, arrogant attitude. It was almost chilling to listen to him pray with that same arrogant attitude. He talked to God just like he talked to everybody else in the audience. As I listened to that prayer I thought, “You don't talk to God like that”. His very attitude demonstrated that he didn't know God. If he would ever be like John and hear a voice behind him; I don't believe he would be so arrogant when he turned around and faced Jesus (Rev. 1:10,17). Our very attitude in prayer proves that we don't know God and are only speaking to an imaginary god when we pray.

As this poor turkey was railing on, he rattled off the names of the countries mentioned in Ezekiel 38 and 39. telling who these countries are. Much of that was pure speculation. But one classic was when he said “Gog, that is Russia”. The idiot. If he read the Bible he would notice that Gog is not a nation but a person. Two or three places the Bible clearly says that Gog is the prince of Meshech and Tubal. He is a person – not a place. Richardson suggests that Gog is the anti-Christ. That makes a lot of sense to me.

Recently I read three books by Joel Rosenberg. He is a very good author but he is a weak Bible scholar. One book, The Copper Scroll, was a novel about Israel after the invasion of Ezek. 38,39 and the building of the Third Temple. He was right that there will be an invasion of Israel as clearly predicted in Ezek. 38,39; and it is clear that the Jewish Temple will be rebuilt. But to prove the point that the Temple will be built after the invasion Rosenberg authoritatively pointed out that “the next eight chapters in Ezekiel, 40–48, describes that Temple in detail.” Amazing! The nut! If he had carefully read those chapters and tried to draw a design of the measurements given there he would have seen that that is impossible. I tried it and soon discovered that such a building is impossible. In chapter 40 every measurement was “one reed, one reed, one reed”. Put that on paper. Obviously this temple is a spiritual one – the Body of Christ.

The time schedule of Ezek. 38,39 is a subject that is hotly contested among prophetic scholars. Everyone agrees that this invasion will happen but the issue is when. For many years I agreed with Hal Lindsey and many others that this battle will be at the start of the seven year period, but now I see no other place than at the end. Personally I strongly believe this is Armageddon. I base this on two strong arguments. One is, I believe Richardson is right that Gog is the anti-Christ and all the nations listed in Ez. 38,39 are Islamic. Secondly, the language in Ez. 39 is identical to Rev. 19, that is unquestionably Armageddon. In both cases God invites the fowls and animals to His great supper for them (Ez. 39:4,17-20; Rev. 19:17,18). Revelation is just a further description of Ez. 38,39.

In all the hassle of the time frame of Ezekiel and the rebuilding of the Temple, the rapture gets overlooked by everyone except strong dispensationalists. For them the rapture is paramount and everything else is built around it. I will agree that there certainly is such a thing as the rapture. If 1Thes. 4:15-17 and 1 Cor. 15 are not talking about a rapture I don't know what else you could call it. The question is not what is it? but when is it?. If the Bible is clear in giving any specific time I find it hard to believe that it is at any time other than at the last trump ( 1Cor. 15:51,52). And I don't fell it is too wild a guess to suggest the last trump is nothing other than the last trump mentioned in Rev. 8:2; 10:7; 16:1. To me that is the most logical position.

But this is an anathema to dispensationalists. It flies in the face of their position of the immanent 2^nd coming of Christ. Here we have a problem. The clearest thing that Jesus ever taught us concerning His return is that it will be at a time when “ye think not”. It is obvious that the 1^st century church expected Jesus to return soon. The disciples probably thought He would be back in a year or two. Paul obviously taught the immanent return of Christ. The main point of his writing the 1^st book of Thessalonians was to explain a problem of what would happen to believers who had died recently, and the Thessalonians wondered if they would miss the rapture. Regardless of what my position is concerning the rapture one corner stone that I will not move is the immanent return of Christ.

How can you believe in the immanent return of Christ if you believe that the rapture will come at the last trump? The same way I believe that both the Calvinists and Armenians are right. I believe there are a number of spiritual things that exist in a world that has more detentions than the three with which we are familiar. I believe the events in Revelation come in a configuration other than the liner one with which we are familiar. If we lived in a two dimensional world it would be near impossible to comprehend a three dimensional world. I believe that is the problem we are up against with spiritual truth.

As I view eschatology there are a number of things that are hard to set on paper. That is why Joel Richardson suggests that there are few subject that require more humility than eschatology. But there are a few things appearing on the horizon that look very much like the stage set for the last days. We might be wrong but can't imagine that it's far from here. Let's let it all hang out for Jesus.

 Gambarimasho. bill