Insight for the Journey

Years ago I heard a story that impressed me so deeply at the time, I’ve never forgotten it. It goes something like this:

Lt. John Blanchard was a young soldier stationed at an Army Base in Florida during the first part of WWII.  One day he was reading through a book he had borrowed from the Base Library.  He was impressed with some of the notes written in the margin.  They were written in feminine handwriting and they were so tender and so thought provoking that he looked back at the fly-leaf to see who had been the previous owner of the book.  He found it was a woman named Hollis Maynell. 

Blanchard did some research and found her address in New York.  He wrote her a letter telling her how much he appreciated her insights in the book.  The next day he was shipped overseas but for the next thirteen months, John Blanchard and Hollis Maynell corresponded back and forth.  They developed a tremendous relationship through their correspondence and found they had much in common and they thought very much alike. 

They began to realize they were falling in love with each other though they had never met.  Blanchard asked Hollis Maynell if she would send a picture but she refused.  She wrote, “if you really care about me, it wouldn’t matter what I look like because it’s character and what’s inside that really counts.”

After thirteen months the day finally came when he was to meet her.  They made arrangements to meet at Grand Central Station in New York City at 7:00 p.m. on a particular night.  She said, “you’ll be able to identify me by the red rose I’ll be wearing in my lapel.” 

Lt. Blanchard waited with anticipation.  Finally, a group of people got off a train and were coming toward him.  Out in front was a slender, blond woman with great poise and beauty.  She came in a pale green dress that looked like the freshness of Spring and his heart leaped out of his chest as he started toward her.

Then he saw that she did not have a red rose in her lapel even though she was looking directly at him.  As she went by with a provocative smile she said, “going my way, soldier?” 

Suddenly, he felt a strong desire to follow her but then right behind her he saw Hollis Maynell.  She was over forty years of age, had graying hair and was vastly overweight but she was wearing a rose in the lapel of her wrinkled coat.  She had gray eyes and a kindly expression but he was so disappointed. 

Everything within him wanted to chase after the beautiful blond who was now disappearing.  But then he remembered the relationship he developed through those letters and even though this probably wouldn’t develop into marriage, he realized maybe it would develop into something very meaningful, a friendship, a companionship perhaps that he had not known before. 

So, without hesitation, he handed her the book which identified him to her and reached for her bag and said, “Are you ready to go to dinner?” 

“Young man, I don’t know what this is all about,” she said, “but that blond woman begged me to put on this red rose and she said if you asked me out to eat with you I should tell you that you were suppose to meet her in the restaurant across the street.  She said it was some kind of test.”

Lt. John Blanchard passed the test.  Would we?

I have a growing concern about how we view salvation in the evangelical church. Many people see it as simply a transaction that is slick, quick; no fuss, no muss. I pray a little formulaic prayer, get my spiritual barcode, and never think much about it any more since I know that now I will slide right through God’s “scanner” on judgment day.

Is this really how God intends us to view salvation? Hardly.

Biblically speaking, salvation is spoken of in three phases: past, present and future.

Speaking in the past tense it is appropriate to say “I was saved” meaning that God saved me from the penalty that my sins deserved.

Speaking in the present tense it is appropriate to say “I am being saved” meaning that God is increasingly saving me from the power of sin in my daily life.

Speaking in the future tense it is appropriate to say “I will be saved” meaning that God will one day save me from the very presence of sin in heaven.

Salvation past is justification.

Salvation present is sanctification.

Salvation future is glorification.

Come with me now in your imagination.  We are going to go way back to 1850.  The place is Colchester, England.  It’s a relatively small community, maybe 50 or 60 miles northeast of London.  It was the second Sunday in January.  There was a terrible snowstorm.  Now, it doesn’t snow much in Britain, but there was a snowstorm that day!  It was almost a proverbial whiteout.  Trudging along the street that Sunday morning was a young 15 year old lad.  Had you been there, you would say, “what in the world is that teenager doing out on a crazy day like this?” You would never believe it.  He was going to church.

You see, at the age of 6, because he was an incredibly precocious child, he had gone through that great book by John Bunyan, Pilgrim’s Progress and there was a burden on his shoulders that he just could not bear any longer.  He determined, “I’m going to go to every church here in Colchester and maybe some preacher or some person will tell me how this terrible burden can roll off into that grave that I read about in Bunyan’s great classic.”

Trudging along, he passed a little dead end street called Artillery Street and then he remembered, “you know, my mother told me that there is a little, Primitive Methodist church down this street.  And man, it’s a long way where I plan to go and it’s such a miserable day, I’ll just turn in down there.”

Now, in that little church building you could drop about 5 or 6 of them here in our sanctuary at Grace.  He became the 15^th worshipper that day.  He sat about two thirds of the way back on the preacher’s right.  Well, it was such a miserable day that even the pastor didn’t show up that day.J  And an old, kind of lanky, rather illiterate layman got into the pulpit and began to preach.  I’ve got to tell you friends, he didn’t know how to preach a lick.  All he knew to do was to quote his text, make a few comments, quote the text again, a few more comments, quote the text again and around and around he went.  His text was that beautiful passage from the Old Testament, “look unto me all the ends of the earth and be ye saved.”  And he droned on, “look unto me all the ends of the earth and be ye saved.  Now, ye don’t have to have a thousand pounds in the bank to look.  Why, you can be a pauper and look.  Look unto me all ye ends of the earth and be ye saved.  And ye don’t have to have a college degree and a great education to look.  Why, you can be stupid and look.  Look unto me all ye ends of the earth and be ye saved.”  And he just churned over in that fashion for about ten or fifteen minutes until suddenly, he spotted that 15 year old kid back there.  Now, he did what a preacher really ought not to do.  He stopped and he sort of stepped aside from the pulpit, pointed his finger right at the young man and said, “Young man!  You look terribly miserable!”  That young man later said, “Oh I was so miserable.”  The old preacher went on, “yes, and you’ll be miserable in life and you’ll be miserable in death unless you obey my text young man.  Look to Jesus!  Look!  Look!  Look!”

Later he said, “I did look… and clang, went every harp in heaven and I lived!”

Four years later, at the age of 19, that young man became the pastor of the church that met in the beautiful big structure in the south of London called The New Park Street Baptist Church.  But guess how many people heard him on that day?  The church was in bad times and only 80 people showed up.  Well, he was only 19 years old. But 37 years later, that church became the largest evangelical church in the world.  Charles Haddon Spurgeon stands today as probably the greatest English speaking preacher who ever lived. 

How do you account for a pastorate like that?  Listen to Spurgeon’s words.  “I take my text and I make a bee line to the cross.”

He kept the focus on the gospel.

Some of you may have seen the movie Castaway with Tom Hanks. If you’ve never seen that movie, it’s too late. I’m going to ruin it for you right now!

Tom Hanks plays a guy named Chuck who is marooned on an island for four years after a plane crash. He has a dull routine every day, and finally he gives way to despair. He starts to commit suicide. But at the last minute that is thwarted.

The next day, after almost committing suicide, the tide brings in a piece of metal that he determines can be used as a sail for a raft to get him off the island. When that is completed he sails off, and 500 miles away he is rescued by a ship.

He had been on the island four years.

He gets back home and sees his fiancé. She has kept him alive in memory and, understandably, has married someone else. He is devastated!

But then he says at the end of the movie, “I know what I’ve got to do. I’ve got to keep breathing. Because tomorrow the sun will come up …and you never know what the tide might bring in.” And just about that time a pretty girl comes by.

The life of most Christians I know is not easy, prominent or glamorous. Sometimes life on this planet leaves us feeling isolated and forgotten, hurting and even struggling to maintain hope.

When that happens, what do you do?

You just keep breathing, keep plugging along in the power of the Holy Spirit. But you never lose hope. Because tomorrow the sun will come up and you don’t know what new mercies the tide of God’s will has in store for those who love him.

Christianity is based on miracles! The birth of Christ, the life and ministry of Christ, His resurrection and ascension … all of these are miracles. One day He will return in power to this earth. That is also a…, you guessed it, a miracle. Christianity is solidly founded on a series of amazing miracles.

Why is it then that many Christians struggle with the idea of miracles? More specifically, why do many struggle with the idea of God answering prayer in miraculous ways? I’ve met numerous Christians who were quite clear about the fact they believe every miracle recorded in Scripture. In fact, they can eloquently defend their belief in miracles. But when they hear of a modern miracle, they immediately retort with skepticism: “It’s probably someone’s over-active imagination. I doubt if it really happened like that.”

The result of skepticism in the Christian community has been devastating to our desire to seek God in prayer. If people have no faith that God will respond (with or without miracles) it greatly hampers their willingness to keep on asking, seeking and knocking as Jesus encouraged.

My faith in God’s willingness to sometimes respond miraculously was greatly bolstered in 1985-86 while grading thousands of applications for Amsterdam ’86, an international conference for evangelists. The participants were from 184 countries around the world. Their applications often told of how God had miraculously helped them while conducting their ministry. Let me share two such stories.

Festo Kivengere, a Ugandan Christian missionary and speaker at the conference, tells of fleeing with his family from Idi Amin and crossing the African plains by night into Kenya. The Kivengere family became seriously lost in the blackness of the night on three different occasions, and on all three occasions a stranger mysteriously appeared and pointed them in the right direction. By dawn they arrived safely at their destination.  Kivengere can’t say with certainty that these were angels, or simply people who helped, but someone appeared miraculously to preserve he and his family.

Another contemporary saint with a similar experience is an Indian missionary named Sadhu Sundar Singh. He is a legendary evangelist in India. He tells about preaching in Tibet, where he offended the chief Lama by his proclamation of the gospel. He was thrown down in a well. And the well was sealed with a lid for a covering, and it was locked. He was left there to die. 

In the fall down into the well, his left arm was injured seriously, as he fell among the bones and the rotting flesh of others who had been imprisoned in the same well. For the next three days and nights he prayed constantly and cried out to God. On the third night he said that the door of the well suddenly opened and a rope was lowered. Fortunately it had a hoop in it, because he was unable to hang on by his arms. He put his foot in and held on with one arm as he was pulled up. He got out of the well to find no one there!

He slept that night, and then in the morning went back to the same village and again began preaching Jesus. The Chief Lama was enraged and set out to find who had helped him escape. The subsequent investigation proved that the only key to the lid of the well rested on the belt of the chief Lama himself.

Sundar Singh could not say with certainty that he was rescued by angels, or the invisible hand of God. But there seems to be no logical explanation for his miraculous delivery.

Sometimes God works miraculously in answer to our prayers…

…but not always.

When He doesn’t we must keep on trusting and looking to Him. Genuine faith does not require a miracle a day to keep the Devil away. But as believers in a miracle-working God, we should be open to any miracle God truly wants to perform.

Last Thursday was a wonderful day!  In the morning I spoke to almost 500 Pastors and other church leaders gathered at The Cove, had meaningful discussions over lunch, and felt really encouraged that God had blessed a lot of people.

In the afternoon I attempted to study for the upcoming weekend sermon, but couldn’t concentrate.  The weather was beautiful in Asheville so I decided to take a walk and enjoy the mountain scenery and pray.

Believe it or not, sometimes I have pity parties.  Yes, sometimes I feel sorry for myself that I don’t have more impact, more influence for God, or more ability.  That shocks some people, but it is true.

During my walk somehow my thoughts turned down pity-party lane.

That’s when it happened!  I felt overwhelmed with gratitude.  I remembered the hardscrabble Tennessee farm on which I grew up, my mother and father and other humble people who guided my early years.  The contrast between that and what I had just experienced hit me with force.  Here I was walking on the gorgeous grounds of The Billy Graham Training Center at The Cove, living the life I’d always dreamed and prayed for.  In addition to a marvelous family in Tennessee, back home in Albany I have a wonderful wife, two wonderful children, a church that loves us, and friends who really care.  I enjoy excellent health, plenty to eat, a meaningful vocation, and lots more!  God seemed to be saying, “My son, if I never did another thing through you, your life is a miracle story of my grace.  What do you have that you did not receive?”

That question is from 1 Corinthians 4:7.  As I thought of it I actually said it out loud and through tears I responded each time, “Nothing Lord.  Everything I have is pure grace.  Everything I have is a grace gift from you.”

The depth of my emotion surprised me.  But there was more.  God then emblazoned another verse on my mind, this time from Ephesians 4:7.  It says, “But to each one of us grace has been given as Christ apportioned it.”  I had never noticed that last phrase: “as Christ apportioned it.”  In other words, if I was complaining and unhappy that I didn’t have more grace in a certain area of life, more influence or impact, my “beef” was really with Jesus.  My portion of grace was not the result of a random lotto drawing, but the personal choice of my Savior!  I’m still working on that one!

Coincidentally, both verses happened to be from chapter four, verse seven of their respective letters.  So I’ve dubbed it “The 4:7 Principle.”

I’ll never forget that walk.  God met me in a mysterious way with grace and truth.  I returned from it with renewed energy, fresh insight, and a heart brimming with gratitude.

Most people know me as a voracious reader.  It is true.  I’d rank reading a good book among life’s most rewarding activities.  Because of my job as a Pastor and Preacher reading is a necessity.  But, for me, it is also avocation.  Truly enjoyable!

Because the word is out that I read a lot, you’d be amazed how often I’m asked questions about reading.  So let me share some things I’m learning about reading; the good, the bad, and the ugly.

Let’s call this “Tips for getting the most out of your reading”:

Tip #1: Most books aren’t worth reading! 

Wow!  How is that for an opener? It’s true.  That’s no rip on modern publishing companies.  They have to earn a profit.  I respect that.  It is more a reflection of where our society is as a whole.  Fact: most readers are not willing to grapple with the greatest books ever written, so they settle for the popular, easy reading pabulum that lines the shelves of the big bookstores.  Learn to love the more difficult books.  Generally they are the classics.  Most of what is written today is simply a footnote to what was already written in the past.  Why eat hotdogs every day when you can dine on filet mignon?  Pull up to the table with the great masters and feast with them.  The table is set.  Plenty to eat!  No one has to go away hungry.

Tip #2: Before you read too much, learn how to read a book.

My computer has capacities far beyond my ability to utilize.  Because it meets my needs day-by-day, I’ve not taken the time to learn how to get the most out of it.  Many people are that way with books.  I recommend reading Mortimer Adler’s and Charles van Doren’s work, How to Read a Book.  It will help you get the most out of the books you do read.

Tip #3: Talk back to your books!

Really!  Your talk-back can be audible, of course.  But it will more likely be notes you scribble in the margins, between lines, and in the blank pages at the front and back.  Often, the most precious part of my books is the notes, questions, and comments I’ve written as I read.  I recommend you read and frequently stop to record your own feelings and thoughts.  If you can then discuss them with a friend who may be reading the same book, you’ll find even greater reward.

Tip #4: Carve out specific times to read.

Time spend reading good books is time well invested.  Do not waste God’s gift of time.  William Penn’s word, penned over three hundred years ago, ring truer than ever: “There is nothing,” wrote Penn, “of which we are apt to be so lavish as of time, and about which we ought to be more solicitous; since without it we can do nothing in this world. Time is what we want most, but what, alas! we use worst; and for which God will certainly most strictly reckon with us, when time shall be no more.”

I shutter to think where my own life would be without the guidance of some of the good books I’ve read.  Read on!

Occasionally God puts people in our lives that make a difference, a huge difference in our spiritually development.  Charlie Riggs was such a person for me.  He passed away Monday, July 21 at the age of 92.  He was a friend to Billy Graham and a long-time BGEA team member.  Charlie taught more people how to share their faith in Christ than any human who has ever lived!  I know that seems like a grand claim.  But it can easily be proven.

I first met Charlie in Amsterdam, The Netherlands.  At that time he was a already a living legend among the Billy Graham Team members.  I was straight out of Seminary and working my first assignment for BGEA.  We shared only a brief conversation, but I was struck by his humble walk and sincere manner.

Later, while working as Coordinator of Counseling and Follow-Up for the Billy Graham Team in Tallahassee, Florida, we had much more interaction.  I was as green as you can get, working in my first actual Crusade (Amsterdam was a conference for evangelists).  Charlie was a seasoned veteran.  He chose to spend time with me to try to teach me how to be a better follower of Jesus.  I will forever be grateful.

We worked in many crusades together after Tallahassee, but I will never forget how this seasoned soldier was willing to take a risk on me and allow me to learn and grow.

Franklin Graham wrote of him: “Charlie was an author, teacher, prayer warrior, mentor and friend to many.  He modeled the life of a Christian soldier and left his mark on all those with whom he invested his time and wisdom.  He was honest, direct and stretched people to be all they could be in Christ and encouraged them to use Scripture in application to everyday life.  He often said, ‘Through my ups and downs, God has become very real to me.  I would like Him to become very real to others.’  Even after he retired, he continued to be a friend and mentor to those he had known for decades, even ministering weekly until he was 87 years old in four prisons in Canon City, Colorado, where he had retired.”

Those of us who knew Charlie well often share “Charlieisms”.  He was a reservoir of wisdom.  A Charlieism is one of those pithy statements loaded with punch and spiritual insight.  Let me share two that I’m particularly fond of.

Charlie said, “You don’t have a ministry.  Your life is your ministry.” 

By that he meant “You cannot share what you don’t possess” and “your life speaks far more powerfully than your mere words.”

Another one of which I’m particularly fond is, “Always try to be in over your head.”

By that he meant, “Unless you are attempting something for God that is far beyond your ability to pull off in your own power, you are not living by faith.”

Charlie’s legacy lives on in me and dozens of others that he impacted personally.  May a double portion of his spirit rest on all of us!

This is my first week back in the office after a wonderful time of vacation.  One of my favorite things to do on vacation is read.  Yeah, reading is a favorite for me almost anytime.  But on vacation I normally read some books that I’ve been waiting to read; fun books, leisure reading.  I store them up throughout the year like a squirrel hiding away choice morsels to be enjoyed later.  During vacation I pull out those delicacies and dig in! 

If you’ve not yet read The Shack, by William Young, I highly recommend it.  Don’t read it for theology (I’m neither promoting nor renouncing any of its theology in this blog) so much as for the beautiful parable that it is.  I think it will help many people who have felt burned by life and/or by institutional religion.

Among several other books I read over vacation I’d recommend The Leadership Secrets of Colin Powell by Oren Harari.  It is a pretty good summary of wise leadership principles, that have served Powell well.  Finally, I’d suggest you pick up A Resilient Life by Gordon MacDonald.  Superb!  By the way, I’m not suggesting these books are “fun” per se.  But they are a little lighter than my normal reading for sermons.

But why am I so passionate about reading?  Why should anyone be?

In my opinion, there are few exercises more significant for our personal growth than the books we read.  Just as the body becomes, in a practical sense, what a person eats, so our minds are largely shaped by what we read.  The collective thoughts we’ve devoured through reading become an inner reservoir that can splash out and bless others as well.

If reading is not your gig, get books on CD.  Find some way to feed your mind valuable material.  Our lives don’t have to look the same, but we must all seek ways to grow.  Reading is a major one for me.

Bill Borden was an outstanding young leader and athlete at Yale.  When he was 25 years of age he inherited well over a million dollars.  His parents were part of the famous Borden Dairy Products family.  That was in 1912.  In today’s currency that would probably be over 100 millions dollars.  But he gave everything away.  He gave it all away! 

He had become a Christian as a young man, and had been feeling an increasing sense of call to China as a missionary.  He wasn’t married and lived an unpretentious lifestyle, so he said, “I don’t need much money on the mission field.”  He carefully calculated to give all his money away. 

100,000 dollars went to National Bible Institute.

100,000 dollars to Moody Bible Institute in Chicago.

250,000 dollars to the China Inland Mission, with 100,000 to be invested and the interest used for a retirement fund for missionaries.

He gave more to other Christ-centered causes.  And then, Bill Borden, when he had given all his money away, headed overseas.  Within a few months he was dead!  He contracted meningitis in Cairo and died.

Most people in this world, if evaluating Borden’s life would conclude, “What a waste!”  I beg to differ.  Sure, if he had hoarded the money and continued living a “safe” life he might have died of old age.  Then he could have passed it on to distant relatives who would have fought over it or wasted it or hoarded it up, and what good would it have been?

But why would Borden make such a radical move and give it all away?  I’ll tell you…

People became more important than things.

Eternity was more important than time.

Christ was more important than his own selfish desires.

When he died they found among his possessions a poem that Bill’s mother had given him when he was seventeen years of age.  He kept it with him all the time because it meant so much to him.  It sums up how he viewed life.

Just as I am Thine own to be

Friend of the One who lovest me.

To consecrate myself to thee

Oh, Jesus Christ I come.

In the glad mornings of my days

My life to give, my vows to pay.

With no reserve and no delay

With all my heart I come.

I would live ever in the light

I would work ever for the right

I would serve thee with all my might

Therefore I come to thee.

Just as I am, young, strong and free

To be the best that I can be

For truth and righteousness and thee

Lord of my life I come.

A wasted life?  I don’t think so.  I’d say Bill Borden died a winner.  He got it!  He fully understood that he is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.