Christmas Story 2

30 December 2018

Dear Phyllis,

The other morning I opened my Bible and read, “The Lord is gracious and full of compassion, slow to anger and of great mercy”. I burst into tears and protested, “The Psalmist insulted the Lord. He didn't. half express the truth. What he said concerning the Lord is so badly understated that it is almost insulting.”. Oh, how can we describe who (what) the Lord is? Our vocabulary is ridiculously inadequate. The tools of our trade in human speech are so terribly limited that to describe the beauty and majesty of the Lord is like trying to cut diamonds with a butter knife. Angels weary themselves trying to worship Him. When John was caught up to heaven, he, like Isiah, saw the Lord sitting on His Throne and the seraphims crying “Holy, holy, holy” Isa 63; Rev. 4:8). It had been 1500 years and they were still crying the same thing, inadequately trying to express the magnitude of what they were looking at. Oh, if I could wear my tongue down to a stump in praising and thanking Jesus, I wouldn't have expressed half His worthiness and the depth of thankfulness I owe Him.. In this I haven't begun to express the truth of the (I don't know what the adjudicative is. Worthiness is close) of our Father and His Son.

Today is the last Sunday of 2018. My goodness, I can't believe it. Another year has just fallen off the calendar. How many are left? Thank God that is a finite number. The Lord has set a fixed number on them and when “In that day” comes, Jesus will appear in all His glory and all that hath breath will worship Him. Praise God!

Today, being the last Sunday of the year, demands that I should write a New Years letter, but Christmas morning I was reviewing the Christmas story in Luke and was struck again with the mystery of the announcement of the birth of Christ. This underscored a theme that I consider perhaps the most important truth the Lord has ever shown me. I have written my book, The Inverted Kingdom, two times and it is doubtful that it will ever be published. But I consider that theme perhaps the most basic spiritual principle the Lord has ever shown me. There is a major difference between the soul and the spirit. One has to do with the natural world and the other lives in the spiritual world. To try to understand the spiritual world with human understanding is like looking at a rock and trying to learn the laws of quantum physics. Looking at the laws of the Kingdom of God through the eyes of human logic is utterly impossible. It is like trying to measure the distance to the moon with a 3 meter tape. It is just too short.

If we were a PR firm in heaven and God came to us asking us to come up with a program to announce the birth of His Son, how would we handle it? To start with, it goes without saying, that our first concern would be location to make that announcement. If it was today the most logical place would be Washington DC, New York, or some equivalent major city. In the first century the leading location would either be Rome, or perhaps, Jerusalem. Our second concern would be the announcer. Anyone outside of a celebrity or internationally well known figure would be unthinkable. The president of the USA would certainly be a logical candidate. The third consideration would be the audience. The people you make this announcement to are vitally important. You don't want to do this in a city rescue mission or child's play ground. You want to make this news to highly influential people. Media coverage is vital. Today it would be imperative that all the major networks from the BBC, NHK, to ABC, CNN and Fox News would all be alerted and assembled. What the news media was in the 1^st century, I have no idea, but whatever it was it would only be reasonable that they were properly involved. You want to get the message out. After we get together our plan and present it to God, then He shows us His approach; the shock could not be greater.

Unquestionably, this is the single most significant event on this planet since God brew into His created man the breath of life and Adam opened his eyes in the Garden. This is the first time ever that God became a man, and how did He handle it? Jesus was born in a barn in a small town. It was appropriate that the announcer should be an angel, but the place that the announcement was made and the crowd that it was delivered to was in a field to shepherds late in the evening. Shepherds were about the lowest level on the social ladder and a field late at night is about as remote as you can get. How about that for media coverage? If ever there was a mystery this has got to be near the top.

What message does this say to us? To suggest that God's ways are backwards from ours, goes without saying. This is about as hantai (backwards) as you can get. Secondly the Gospel is clearly hidden. In the midst of His evangelistic career Jesus prayed and thanked the Father that He had hidden the Gospel to the wise and prudent and revealed it to children (Lk. 10:21,22). Today there is no question that the name of the game is major news coverage. If we could get on TV prime time in every country, that would be our highest objective.

I am a Calvinist, but I have no quarrel with Armenians. I agree with every point on the Armenian platform. Unquestionably the Gospel is to “whosoever” (Jn. 3:16). There is no restrictions there. It is not the will of God that any perish but that all come to repentance and are saved (2 Pet. 3:9). Judgment would be pointless if man did not have a free will and was responsible for the things the does. When Jesus gave the Great Commission in Mt. 28:19 He didn't say go to some nations but commanded that we go to all nations. In Rev. 14:6 we see that the Gospel must be preached to every nation, kindred, tongue, and people before the final bell rings. In the parable of the Marriage Supper, when the King saw that His invitations was snubbed, He commanded His servants to go to the highways and to as many as they found to bid them come to the Supper (Mt. 22:9). Oh, thank God for the universality of the Gospel. My dear wife is witnessing like the world is on fire, and everybody she meets she pleads with them to flee to Jesus for salvation.

All this is obviously true. But I do wish my dear Armenian brothers would open their minds to consider very clear scriptural truth that is scattered throughout the Bible. There is as much irrefutable scripture on the Calvinist side of the argument as there is on the Armenian. If we consider the words of Jesus alone, He appears to be far more Calvinist than Armenian. If we can take our glasses off and objectively read the Lord's prayer in John 17, it is unquestionably clear that He is only praying for one group of people. He says repeatedly, “I am not praying for the world but for THEM THAT THOU HAST GIVEN ME.” If there is one note that is clarion in John 17 it is that Jesus' concern is exclusively for those whom the Father has given Him. And this theme is not restricted to John 17 but throughout His entire ministry Jesus frequently talked about those who were God's elect and those who were not.

If ever the Lord made a statement it was in the manner He brought His Son into the world. That was so hidden that had it been the news coverage in Jerusalem the night before, very few would have

believed it. How ridiculous can you get? A young peasant virgin girl has a Baby in a barn and the only ones that the Father shares this news with is by an angel to some shepherds in a field. This is Christ the Son of God. This is God incarnate in flesh. Yea. Sure. Does anyone want to buy a bridge?

And yet the message certainly got out. It has been suggested that these shepherds were the ones raising lambs used for offerings in the Temple. Certainly all the priests would have heard that story. Anna and Simeon were two of the best known people in the Temple, and both of them had some of the clearest prophecies concerning Christ.

When we read, “For unto us a Child is born, a Son is given, and the government shall be upon His shoulder...”; all we can do is: bow our heads and say, “Oh, thank God that includes me”. Thank the Lord that Jesus came and He has sent His Spirit to lead us throughout 2019.

                                                          bill

Christmas Story

23 December 2018story

Dear Phyllis,

Paul Harvey had a Christmas story that he would relate every year at Christmas. It was called the Miracle of the Sparrows. Like Paul Harvey I have a Christmas story that I like to tell every year. I heard it first many yeas ago at a Christmas party at the Manza Hotel where Roald Lidal was speaking. It was the story of a Chinese man that had happened about four or five years before then.

There was a fine Christian Chinese couple who had prayed for a son for many years. Like Abraham and Sarah, it was in their later years that their prayer was heard and they named him Isaac. But when the child was still very young an evil man in that city falsely accused the Christian brother of a serious crime that wound up in court. During the trail the Lord spoke to the Christian man telling him something that was the most horrible thing imaginable. He desperately fought this conviction but, at length, tremblingly shared it with his wife. He said, “I believe the Lord wants us to give our son to our enemy.” To his terror his wife replied, “Yes, I know. The Lord told me the same thing.” Such a thing was unheard of in China. The greatest gift that is possible, is to give your son to another person; and to give your son to your enemy was unthinkable. At length the couple submitted themselves to the will of God and gave their only son – the son of their elderly years – to their enemy. Stunningly this unthinkable gift had no effect on the implacable heart of their adversary and the Christian man was falsely convicted and sentenced to 20 years in prison. During his time in prison his wife died and when, at length, he was released his life was over with little left to live for.

With no other purpose in life he devoted himself to being a traveling evangelist and spent his last remaining years traveling around China sharing the good news of the Gospel of Christ. It was on Christmas day he was riding a bus in a remote area of China when the bus broke down. All the passengers had to get off and fend for themselves to find some place to stay. As he was walking alone in a snow storm he passed by a farm house and stopped to ask if he could have shelter for the night. The people there turned out to be Christian. He was welcomed to stay, but they told him they were going out that night. There was a wonderful evangelist coming to a city some distance away and they were going to a dendo kai (evangelistic meeting). He was welcome to go with them if he cared. Of course he was delighted to accept such a gracious invitation.

As they were going to the meeting, the old man shared with them his testimony. He told how he and his wife had prayed for many years for a son, and then after the miraculous birth of a son they gave him to his enemy, but to no avail. He had spent 20 years in prison. He said he had heard that the enemy had since moved to a location where there had been a serious earthquake and the entire family had been killed. With his wife dead and no surviving family he had devoted his remaining years to traveling around preaching Jesus.

They were late arriving at the dendo kai. The room was packed and they had to take a seat in the back of the room. The old mans eyes were dim with age and with the poor seating he stood to get a better look at speaker. The evangelist saw the old man standing in the rear of the room and stopped speaking. The two men stood there staring at each other. Then suddenly the evangelist burst out, “Are you my father Zhang?”

Unbeknown to the Christian brother the gift of love had born fruit. The evil man had been converted and shared with the lad the story of his true parents. He had been raised in a Christian home and developed into an outstanding evangelist. The story of the earthquake was true and the family had been killed but the lad had survived. It was on a cold snowy Christmas eve in a remote city in China that the Lord brought the father and the son back together.

I never heard a story like this in my life. The night Roald shared this incredible testimony in Manza, the meeting had been over for over 20 minutes; the room was virtually empty, and I was still sitting there with my head down weeping.

We have heard John 3:16 until it has become trite. “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son...” But this put a new edge on it. What happened in China was unthinkable. That a man would give his only son to his enemy and then suffer in spite of that gift. But what has happened with the Gospel is 10,000 times more incredible. Oh thank God for the places the Gospel has born fruit and millions have been saved. But how is it possible that guilty hell deserving criminals could roll up their nose and say, “No thank you”? The only son of the Chinese couple was dear to their heart, but he was not as loved as deeply as the only begotten Son was to the Father in heaven. For many years it appeared that the Chinese gift of love had gone on unrewarded. But the hidden fruit of that had gone on well beyond imagination. What that couple reaped in heaven stands as one of the greatest testimonies I have ever heard. Had they not done that, the hateful man and his family never would have been saved. Had there never been a problem they could have lived out normal lives and gone to heaven to join the crowd. The boy Isaac might have grown up to be an evangelist but there never would have been the testimony of this amazing story.

One of the great mysteries of heaven is time. We want instant results but God is in no hurry and sometimes it is decades or centuries later that we see the results of obeying Jesus. In the old mans case it was over 30 years. But what a reward he got! This morning I read again the 22^nd Psalm and relived the crucifixion. It was so painful that I couldn't imagine how John ever endured standing there watching Jesus on the Cross. And how the Father not only endured it, but at the worst time, turned His back on His Son. At that point reality goes totally beyond human comprehension. This morning, I protested to the Father, “Father how can it be that Jesus suffered all this and it seemingly goes unrewarded by the vast majority of humanity?” It has been 2000 years and 99% of Japan and Thailand are totally unresponsive. The Lord had to remind that the day will certainly come when every knee shall bow an every tongue shall confess that Jesus is the Lord to the gory of God (Ph. 2:10,11). And the day will dawn when the earth shall be filled with the glory of God as the waters cover the sea (Hab. 2:14). Weeping may endure for a night but joy will come in the morning (Ps. 30:5).

The Lord could not have chosen a more wonderful Christmas present for His servant than He did on the cold, snowy, Christmas eve when the bus broke down on a lonely road to bring his son back to him a mighty man of God.

Maybe this story has a message for all of us that perhaps much of what we think is lost is only in God's safe keeping when the Lord may return it to us with His ribbon on it. Nothing will ever be lost that was given to Jesus.

May you have a truly holy, prosperous, Christ-honoring, joyous Christmas, bill

The Ten Commandments

16 December 2018

Dear Phyllis,

The other day in reading Deuteronomy 10 I was struck with the connection of the Stone Tablets (the 10 Commandments) and the Ark of the Covenant. The history of the first Tablets was extremely short. Moses hadn't got down from the mountain before Israel fundamentally broke the first commandment and Moses smashed them on the spot. But before the Lord spoke to Moses about making some new ones, He first instructed him to make a place to put them. According to the first 5 verses of Chapter 10 perhaps the basic purpose of the Ark was it was made to be the place to keep the Law of God.

I am constantly amazed at how badly the Ten Commandments are maligned in Christian circles. The Law of God is almost presented as the enemy that Jesus came to save us from. We are constantly being told Jesus came to save us from the Law. And in some circles I have even heard that the Ten Commandments don't apply to Christians. Really?? If you are saved does that mean adultery, murder, and theft are now permissible?

I see the Ten Commandments in a totally different light. I see them as the expression of the character of God and this is the character He desires to be reflected in all His people. In a discussion that Jesus had with a lawyer He perfectly capsulated the Law, when He reduced it to two – to love God and love man (Mt. 22:35-40). If you love God and love your neighbor there is no problem of committing some sin against them. The Law of God has been broken down to ten different categories where the negative presentation of the Ten Commandments is a warning against violating them. But in the positive aspect, love is the fulfillment. God's purpose in giving us His Law is not to keep us from violating these things but that we should excel in doing good in them.

According to substitutionary propitiation one sinner can't die for another sinner. Everyone has to pay the price for his own transgressions. Only a sinless person could pay the price for a sinner. The usual presentation of salvation is like there are ten bottles set up in the middle of the road. The name-of-the-game is to get to the end of the road without busting a bottle. For every bottle you break there is a penalty. Jesus was the only one who successfully got all the way through to the end without breaking a bottle. That makes Him qualified to pay the price for our sins. But that is not the point. That is not what the Law of God is all about. The Law of God is His character.

When God gave the second copy of the Ten Commandments He first told Moses to make an Ark (box) to put them in. Two thousand years later God found a better place to put His Law. Hebrews 10 begins with the expression, “For the Law having a shadow of the good things to come...”. Then in verse 5 it says, “When He cometh into the world He saith... a Body hast Thou prepared for Me”. It is certainly true that Jesus came to be the Lamb of God to take away the sin of the world (Jn. 1:29,36). But here is another very important aspect of the coming of Christ. God needed a Body in which to place His Law. In the OT the Law of God was placed in a wooden box – the Ark – but in the NT God found a different place to put His Law – the Body of Jesus. Jesus didn't come to run a course to see if He could make it to the end without breaking a bottle; Jesus was the animation of the Law of God. In Him was the character of God. He perfectly fulfilled it in loving God and loving His neighbor. He was the living example of what the Law was intended to produce. This is the miracle of Bethlehem. This was when that Body was made in which God could place His Law. Then in verses 7 and 9 of Hebrews 10 twice it is written; “Lo I come (in the volume of the Book; It is written of Me) TO DO THY WILL O God. What is the fulfillment of the Law of God? It is doing the will of God. This is what it is all about. Jesus came to do the will of God.

God wanted His created being to love Him. Love demands an opportunity to express itself by choice Forced obedience is not love. Adam had a good shot at it. He was made without a sin nature. God gave Adam the simplest opportunity to express his love by staying away from the knowledge of the Tree of the knowledge of good and evil. But Adam failed and every descendant of Adam from Adam to Jesus was born with his sin nature. Jesus was the first body that ever came out of a woman without Adam's sin nature. This is why the virgin birth of Christ is so important. Science has discovered that when the two seeds, of a man an woman, are joined in conception the infant gets his blood from the male's seed, and there is no mixing of that blood with the woman's blood. In Mary's case she conceived by the Holy Spirit, and Jesus was the first human to be born in 4,000 years without a drop of Adams blood in Him. And Jesus was absolutely unique in when He was born where God could place His Law in Him. He had the character of God. He was God in a human Body. And He proved this by perfectly doing the will of God.

I was genuinely surprised last week when the Lord showed me the Ark of the Covenant was made to hold the Ten Commandments in the OT and the Body of Jesus to be the repository of God's Law 2,000 years later.

But now God has found a third place to place His Law. There are four tenants of the New Covenant, and the first one is: “I will put My law in their mind and write them in their hearts” (Heb. 8:10). The first time God wrote His Law it was on stone tablets. The second place God put His law was in the Body of Jesus. And the third place God has written His Law is in our hearts. Just as the Body of Jesus was important as the repository of the Law of God our bodies are important as it is in our bodies that God has placed His Law. To say that obedience and clean living is not important to salvation is non- sense. Just as the Body of Jesus was important as the repository of God's Law as it is in our bodies that God has placed His law today, as written in our hearts.

Ravi Zachariah defines the Law of God as sacred. I would choose a different word and define the Law by the word LOVE. But Ravi certainly has an arguable point. He says that the reason adultery and sexual perversion is such a serious transgression is because the things of God are sacred. The body is sacred because it is made by God. I would add to that, that another reason the body is important is because, in it, God has placed His Law. How has God placed His Law in us? When we accept Jesus into our hearts Jesus comes to live in us. Jesus is the living animation of the Law of God. This is called the new nature. If Jesus lives in my heart how can I say my body is not important? May I suggest that that not only applies keeping my body from engaging in sin but that I keep my body in good shape by not over eating. It goes without saying that we should keep bad substance – tobacco, drugs, etc. - out of our bodies but I believe that also applies to Christ-dishonoring food. We should treat our bodies with respect. They are not our own. They are bought with a price to glorify God (1 Cor. 6:13,20).

That Body that was born out of Mary 2,000 years ago was unique. God made that Body to be a place where He could place His Law. Today God has found a third place to put His Law when He has written it in our hearts. When we accept Jesus into our hearts this should be an act of giving Him our bodies. Ravi Zachariah is right. The Law of God is sacred. The Ark of the Covenant was sacred. To touch it was to die. The Body of Jesus was sacred. It never saw corruption (Acts 2:27,31). And we should respect our bodies with similar respect. If God has written His Law in our hearts that makes our bodies sacred too. Oh what an awesome privilege! Hallelujah! 

Lord Jesus, live Your life in me.

                                       bill

Visa Update

25 November 2018

Dear Phyllis,

Half a century ago Vance Havner was one of the most colorful speakers in America. I had the privilege of hearing him preach a message up in Ashville NC that remains as fresh in my mind as if I heard it this morning. He told how when he was a young boy he frequently would go out to preach on Sunday at distant places, and his father was always concerned that he got home before it got dark. He told how his intense desire all life had been that he didn't want to hang around too late in life. For decades his prayer to God was, “Father, I want to get home before it gets dark”. Now he was in his 80s, his wife had died, the shadows of old age were creeping upon his soul, and it was getting very dark. It was a very serious concern, whether or not God would give him that request to take him home before the sun was set over the horizon. Forty years later I can sit with Vance and share his concern.

For years my singular ambition in life was that I wanted my last lap to be my fastest. The Christian life is known as a race (1 Cor 9:24, 26). In running a race it is alright to pace yourself for the long run, but when you come to the end you are supposed to let it all hang out. When I cross the finish line in life I want to have my head down, pouring all the fuel on the fire, running at top speed. I don't want to close out my journey in a nursing home with my feet on the couch looking at TV. Right now I am perilously close to that. My daily grief is that I am doing so little for Jesus.

If I can't write fresh accounts of amazing things the Lord is doing in using me, at least there is no lack of excitement last week. A month ago I shared with you how I was faced with a serious visa crisis. If the Lord did not intervene in giving me a huge amount of money for a Thai visa I was in immanent danger of being a homeless wanderer again. I said, “My present Thai visa is up on the 26 of November and if I can't get a new visa by then I am history in Thailand”. For the past two weeks we have been desperately trying to figure out how to get a new visa. I had two options but both required a staggering amount of money. A brother offered to give me a huge amount to put in the bank for a bank statement if it was in a frozen account and I didn't spend it. I was deeply grateful for that but time was killing us. The law required that that money must be in the bank three months before I apply for a spouse visa. We went to a visa service that said they could help us but we had to go to Laos and apply there, and that would cost more than than we get in four months. Then we learned that I could get a 60 extension on my present visa. That wouldn't solve the long term problem but would give us more breathing room. I was down to less than a week. We went to immigration to get that extension but we had to a have a letter from our land owner proving that we lived at our present address. Pammy said she didn't know if we had that or how to get it..

Wednesday I went with a brother to the bank to open an account so we could make a deposit for the spouse visa. The bank manager asked to see my passport. I was stunned when the manager said, “Your visa expires today.” “No it doesn't!!! It expires on the 26.” There are two aspects to immigration in Thailand. One is getting a visa. The second is that, once you are living here, you must report to immigration every 90 days. To fail to do that is almost as serious as overstaying a visa with a serious fine. The stamp I was looking at in my passport was the 90 day check, but the actual visa was up on the 21^st. To say I was stunned to learn that my visa for Thailand was up in 5 hours would be an understatement. I had checked it several times and had seen the 26, but 21 was the actual day my visa was up. I called Pammy from the bank and said the visa is up today.

I still don't know what happened but, somehow, Pammy found an old paper from the land owner showing that we lived at this address. Armed with that paper we went back to immigration and one hour before I would have been dead meat we walked out of immigration with a new stamp in my passport that I am good until 20 January.

You talk about a miracle; now there is one. Had I not just happen to go to the bank that day I never would have realiz3d that my visa was up on the 21^st. And if Pammy had not miraculously found that document from the land owner I would have to pay an overstay fine and leave Thailand in 24 hours. And to get a visa to come back would have been extremely difficult.

I still don't know what we are going to do, but having 55 days to work on it is a whole lot easier than four hours. There seems to be one option of going to Laos and apply for a spouse visa there. The visa service here in town has told us that they can get a spouse visa for us there without the three month bank statement required here. If that is true that looks pretty good, but even that is going to be very expensive. But if we can get it, once I have a spouse visa, that is almost as good as a permanent visa with a minimal requirement to renew it each year. Last Sunday I thought the Lord spoke to me when I saw in Psalm 37:3 where He promised “Trust in the Lord and do good, so shalt thou dwell in the land and verily thou shalt be feed.” If that is truly he Lord's personal word to me that would indicate that He intends for me to stay in Thailand and He will take care of our support.

But that trip to immigration was really of the Lord. While there we met two interesting men. One was the son of some Hmong refugees from Laos, and he is now a missionary here in Chiang Mai. I went bonkers when I met him. I said, “Man howdy, I know right where your parents are from and have taken hundreds of Bibles to Hmongs living there.” The other guy was an old man who had been a pilot in Vietnam.. When I told him, “I used to be a fighter jock flying F-86 Saber jets ”, he went out of his mind, and that lit a fire telling war stories.

In 1959 I was assigned TDY (temporary duty) to a bomber squadron in Korea. Our squadron commander had been one of the leading pilots during the Korean war. He was the most interesting man I ever met in my life. Every night he would hold three or four of us spell-bound at the table in the Officers Club for two or three hours telling the most incredible stories I had ever heard. Talking to that guy in immigration reminded me of Major Wolf, and the Lord reminded me that I have a couple of interesting stories to tell myself. If the Lord has consigned me to a quiet life as a retired missionary living in Chiang Mai with a Thai wife, at least I can pull from a file stories of past events that may be interesting to some. I have written two books that probably will never be published and this could be a third, but – if I have nothing fresh to share with you each week – maybe I could recount past events of an unusual life that Jesus has privileged me to have. Some of these may not be too spiritual but some might find them interesting, and - in all - the unmistakable hand of Jesus is clearly there. This is not an autobiography (I have already written that) but just a few things that I have experienced that are not common to everybody. They are too many to share in one letter so I will spread it out over a few weeks unless something happens in the mean time.

Singha continues to be a great blessing to me. Pammy is leading people to Christ on almost a daily basis. But apart from that the only voice I have is writing to you once a week. This week it was the excitement of getting extension to stay in Thailand,for another 60 days. But if there is nothing else to write about, maybe next week I will start reviewing a few noteworthy events that happened along the road up to here.

Thank you for your prayers, and if you speak to Jesus this week you might remind Him that He has a servant who needs to get a new visa to stay in Thailand in the next 55 days. Hoping to see you next week.

Arigato gozaimasu, sayonara (thanks and good bye),     bill