Is it Faith or Is It Presumption?

Faith lies at the heart of Christian living. A person who fails to place His trust in God and His promises has no basis for positively expecting specific blessings from God (see James 1:6-7). That’s not to say that God does not bless us even when we are in doubt or in error. In many respects, He blesses the unjust as well as the just. But the point I am trying to make is that we have no basis for positively expecting a specific blessing from God when we are walking in unbelief. That’s a reason why our faith is so important. Moreover, I believe many Christians mistake presumption for faith.

A favorite verse in the Bible that we use as the basis of claiming a particular blessing as ours is found in Mark 11:24 (NIV). It says, “Whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.” I love this verse. It tells us in a nutshell how the Lord expects us to pray in faith. We are to believe we have received what we ask for in prayer—before we actually see the manifestation of the blessing. This verse is a reflection of God’s trustworthiness. We are to be so confident that He will do what we ask of Him that we consider it done before we see anything happening.

But there is one word in this verse that many Christians misapply. It is the word whatever. First of all, this verse is not a license for us to lay claim on anything and everything we can think of. I know—the word whatever does suggest that, but like any other teaching in the Bible we must view this verse in light of the entire Bible.

For example, when we pray in faith, and we passionately believe that we have received what we’ve asked God for, if what we have prayed for is not consistent with the will of God and the teachings of the Bible, we invalidate the promise of the aforementioned verse. Hence, the Bible says, “When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures” (James 4:3, NIV). So a person who prays with wrong motives may truly believe that God has heard His prayer, and he may act accordingly, but in such a case this would be mere presumption because the very motives of his prayer were wrong.

I want to affirm that God still hears and answers prayer in accordance with Mark 11:24. Oftentimes, when we feel He has failed to answer us, the real problem is that we have failed to pray consistent with His will and with biblical teachings, or we have failed to exercise faith. Similarly, if we are of the notion that this verse means that prayer is a means by which God rubber stamps any request we make to Him, and we live our life accordingly, our actions will be based on presumption and not faith. God has given us the Bible so we can know how to pray consistent with His will and His Word. When we pray that way—in faith, He hears and answers us.

Copyright © 2011 by Frank King. All rights reserved.

Poll Reveals Christian Views on Capitalism and Other Economic Issues

(Article first published as Poll Reveals Christian Views on Capitalism and Other Economic Issues on Technorati.)

The serious budget negotiations that recently went on in Washington nearly shut down the government. Negotiations will be even more grueling the next few months as members of Congress dig in and try to arrive at an approved 2012 budget. Against this backdrop, the results of a recent survey conducted by the Public Religion Research Institute, in partnership with Religion News service, addressing the public’s views on capitalism, wealth inequity, taxes, and the like was published last week.


In this article, I will briefly highlight some of the findings relating to the Christian community. First of all, among Christians in the U.S., only 38% believe capitalism and the free market are consistent with Christian values while 46% believe the two are at odds. Personally, I expected the percentage of Christians who view capitalism and the free market as being consistent with Christian values to be higher. I say that because local churches have tax exempt status, and in the name of separation of church and state, the government reaches very little into the nonprofit operations of local churches. To me, it just seems that this experience with very limited governmental regulation in the nonprofit arena would have favorably influenced the views of a larger portion of the Christian community in terms of capitalism and the free market.

As for wealth inequity, 62% of Americans believe that one of the biggest problems in this country is that increasingly more wealth belongs to a small population. Fifty-five percent of white evangelical Protestants see this as one of the biggest problems in the country. A whopping 75% of Americans with no religious affiliation hold the same view, according to the study.

A strong desire among conservatives in Congress is to at the least substantially reduce the government’s regulatory powers over businesses. The problem is that increased regulation drives up the cost of doing business. According to the results of the study, however, 61% of Americans disagree that most businesses would act ethically on their own without government regulation. Only 37% of Americans believe that most businesses would. This view holds across political and religious lines, according to the study. The one exception is the group that identifies with the Tea Party movement. Fifty-three percent of those in this group trust most businesses to do the right thing without regulation.

According to the study, the majority of minority Christians, Catholics, and evangelical white Christians believe that economic issues are important enough for the clergy to address them as well as social issues. Moreover, as Congress looks for ways to reign in deficit spending, it is reasonable to assume that some of the future economic policies will take aim at the treasuries of local churches.

Copyright © 2011 by Frank King. All rights reserved.

The Preaching of the Cross

To me, the greatest thing about Easter is that in churches everywhere, preachers are preaching about the cross. That is not to suggest that the cross is a seasonal message, for it is not. On the contrary, the cross is central to the gospel. In other words, in the Bible, all roads lead to the cross. That being the case, we should expect to hear the message of the cross proclaimed throughout the year. But being a preacher who has been preaching in and hanging around churches for nearly 30 years, I am convinced we don’t give the message of the cross due attention.

Paul the apostle said concerning himself, “For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel: not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect” (1 Corinthians 1:17). Similarly, we must make sure that our modern version of the gospel does not negate the message of the cross. But before we talk about how we might end up making such a mistake, let’s first talk about the message of the cross.

The message goes something like this: All of humanity was lost in sin and destined for hell. There was no one in the entire earth realm that could stay man’s fate. But God loved the world so much that He sent His only Son clothed in human flesh as the perfect sin offering for humanity. What this all means is that every one of us is born a sinner, not one of us can do enough good to earn our salvation, and the acceptance of Christ’s redemptive work on the cross is not an option but a must. These truths constitute the essence of the preaching of the cross.

This message can be offensive to some who hear it. The offense lies in the fact that the cross disregards human worth. Even though we may come from different social, educational, and financial circles in our world, the message of the cross reduces us all to being sinners who desperately need Christ the Savior. What Paul the apostle is saying in the aforementioned verse is that we must not allow anything to make this vital message of the cross of none effect. One way we can do this is by suggesting or outright proclaiming that Christ is simply one among a variety of ways to become reconciled to God. Jesus said no one can come to the Father but by Him (John 14:6).

Christ’s vicarious death at Calvary was not a pretty sight. It was our sins and not His own that drove Him to the cross to die a barbaric death. This because the holiness of God demanded that the sins of the world be judged. And so the one who had committed no sin was made a sin offering for us!

The message of the cross is good news. God has made provisions for all men to be reconciled to Himself. To avail oneself of Christ’s atoning death, each person must personally accept it as his or her personal sin offering. This message lies at the heart of the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. It is not a seasonal message. It is a matter of eternal consequences. Let us boldly and lovingly proclaim the cross throughout the year.

Copyright © 2011 by Frank King

Jesus’ Death: Was it Really Three Days and Three Nights?

(Article first published as Jesus' Death: Was it Really Three Days and Three Nights? on Technorati)

Here is the issue: Before Jesus was crucified, He said, “For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the whale’s belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth” (Matthew 12:40). The duration of His time in the grave has been a point of discussion for generations, and today we are no closer to solving the mystery. Accordingly, each year we approach Easter, or Resurrection Day, we resurrect the subject.

A couple of days ago I read an article on this subject that appeared on The Huffington Post’s site. Two of the more popular attempts at reconciling the above Scripture with the biblical timeline of Jesus’ death and bodily resurrection are mentioned in the Huffington Post article. One has to do with how the ancient Jews reckoned a day. According to scholars, a portion of a day was counted as a full day. So if Jesus died on what we call Good Friday and rose from the dead on Sunday morning, that span would include portions of three days, and could be referred to as three days and three nights.

But that explanation, I suppose, seems so far-fetched to many of us in this current culture in which we keep time to the second. No, we could never accept such sloppy time-keeping as being the answer to the disparity. Accordingly, another argument is that the timeline for the Last Supper and the crucifixion, as recorded in Scripture is flawed, and that these events must have occurred a day or two earlier in the week to make the time duration work out.

And so next year when Easter rolls around again, you can look for this subject to be brought again from the dead. But let me close by offering this as a possibility. On the same day Jesus rose again, it is recorded in the Bible that He showed up and walked along with two men who were going about sadly because it was now the third day since Jesus had been crucified, and they thought He had not risen from the dead as He had promised: “We trusted that it had been he which should have redeemed Israel: and beside all this, today is the third day since these things were done,” they said to Jesus, not knowing it was He to whom they spoke (Luke 24:21).

My point is that however Jesus meant what He said about the duration He would be in the grave before He would rise again, these men understood that the day He showed up corresponded to the day He said He would be raised from the dead. So maybe, just maybe, it’s confusing to us today, but it wasn’t to those of His day. Just a thought.

Copyright © 2011 by Frank King. All rights reserved.

Love Covers Many Faults

The fabric of a local church is rather complex. It is made of mature Christians, babes in Christ, many who are somewhere in between, and you have those who are nowhere in terms of their decision for Christ. An important goal of the local church is to help all of these become faithful followers of Christ.

There is much room for disappointment in such a mission. That’s because people aren’t perfect. They won’t always get with the program. In particular, I want to quickly talk about two areas where fellow church members may disappoint us. One has to do with their personal lives. Their imperfection can manifest itself as infidelity, tax evasion, alcoholism, etc.

The other area has to do with their service in the local church. For instance, when I was a pastor, I wanted everything our congregation did for the Lord to be done in the spirit of excellence. So I was always concerned when I had to commit some ministry work into the hands of a person who had never done it before. I had to bear in mind that the person was new to the task, and would probably make some mistakes along the way, but that the impact would not be catastrophic. Interestingly, one thing I notice about many churchgoers is that they won’t volunteer to do anything for the Lord, but they are quick to criticize those who love Him enough to try.

We must bear in mind that as Christians, we are not called to be overly critical but to love. “Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins,” the Bible says (1 Peter 4:8). Note the words above all. As I stated earlier, an important goal of the local church is to help believers become loyal followers of Christ. But according to this verse, above all, we must walk in love toward each other. This verse is not about our justifying or covering up one’s faults, but it is about us loving others in spite of their failures and shortcomings.

When we are preoccupied with criticizing others, it puts them in bondage. They are not willing to go beyond their comfort zone because they fear the possibility of failing. On the other hand, love liberates. It conveys to our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ that if they fail we will not crucify them, but we will genuinely love them forward.

Are their times when we have to confront others about their actions? Of course, there are. But here is the point. It’s much easier for us to provide constructive criticism to others when they know that we have consistently shown them love in the past. On the other hand, if all we have ever done in the past was find fault with everything they did; they will count us as the enemy and will not be as willing to receive our two cents. We can love the way this verse tells us to because God is love, and He has put His love on the inside of us.

Copyright ©2011 by Frank King. All rights reserved.

Pastor Rob Bell’s New Book Sets the Subject of Hell on Fire

(Article first published as Pastor Rob Bell's New Book Sets the Subject of Hell on Fire on Technorati)

Mega church pastor Rob Bell’s controversial book, Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived, arrived in stores last month. Even before then, some of his teachings had been labeled as errant, even heresy by some prominent Christian leaders.

Esteemed by some as a rock star in the church world, Pastor Bell also is regarded by some as a universalist, meaning he believes everyone will be saved from eternal damnation, including those who have not expressed faith in Christ and His redemptive work on the cross. But Bell denies that he is a universalist. Because of the widespread attention given to the book, resulting primarily from its controversial views on hell, the Evangelical Alliance published a response to the book on last week. The Alliance’s response was written by Derek Tidball, a member of the Alliance’s board and council, and a former principal of London School of Theology.

“Above all, Love Wins, is confusing,” Tidball writes. “I can see now why people are asking whether Rob Bell is a universalist (all will be saved in the end) or not, because it’s unclear.”

In the book, Pastor Bell attempts to paint a more appealing picture of hell. He questions the traditional Christian belief that most persons will go to hell, and relatively a few will be saved. He does not believe that a person cannot repent after death. Moreover, he wrestles with the prospect of scores of people around the world who have never heard the gospel and innocent children going to hell at the hands of a loving God.

The truth is, none of us are all-knowing on the subject of hell and the fate of others. What we do know is that God is love AND God is holy. He is not only love but also He is holy. If He were only the former, the idea of everyone going to heaven on his own terms would be a possibility. But if that were the case—that is, that holiness was not an attribute of God--there would have been no need for Him to send His Son to die for the sins of the world. Hum, so much for that idea.

We must be careful not to try and develop our own theology to provide answers for the things that we don’t understand or that we disagree with, regarding the mysteries of hell. For in doing so, we run the risk of giving multitudes a false sense of eternal security.

Copyright ©2011 by Frank King. All rights reserved.

Beware of False Teachers and Prophets

A friend of mine sent me a link to a You Tube video clip of a popular Christian pastor who has come under attack by some other Christian leaders for some of his teachings that they regard as being unbiblical. I won’t bother to mention his name because I know so little about him, and I must be careful to not be so quick to judge. An estimated ten thousand worshipers come to hear this preacher each week so he does have significant influence.

After watching most of the video and hearing some of the things that were being taught, I started entertaining the idea of false teachers in the world. The Bible warns, “Believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world” (1 John 4:1). According to this verse, the existence of false messengers was a widespread problem even doing the first century A.D. Moreover, this verse admonishes us to be discerning. We must not indiscreetly lend our ears to everybody who claims to be a messenger of the Lord. If we do we will find ourselves embracing seriously errant teachings.

Some months ago, Harold Camping, an influential Christian radio broadcaster and president of Family Stations, Inc. predicted that the end of the world would begin on May 21, 2011. He claims that he based his calculations on his studies of the Bible. I did a post on this subject already so I won’t retell the story here. Click here to read my previous post. Anyway, this was one of the most heavily read and shared articles I have ever posted on my blog. I am certain that based on the readership associated with that post, many people are quite anxious as we approach the May 21, 2011, date. But how serious should we take Mr. Camping’s prediction? He was wrong in his previous prediction that the world would end in 1994. Moreover, the Bible is clear that no one can accurately predict the coming of the Lord (see Matthew 24:36).

Today, there are many signs pointing to the end of this age and of the coming of the Lord, though we don’t know the day or the hour these will occur. As these signs become more pronounced, we will see an increase in the amount of false prophets and teachers coming on the scene. It is imperative that we study the Bible for ourselves. For until the Lord returns, the Bible will be the standard by which we are to judge the proclamations of men.

Copyright ©2011 by Frank King. All rights reserved.

What is True Worship

Look in the yellow pages of the phone book in any sizable American city, and you will see many Christian churches and denominations listed. You are bound to find a place of worship to your liking. Might even find a denomination or two you haven’t heard of before.

Variety is good because not everybody worships God the same way. Some people believe that a traditional form of worship is the only way to go. Others like a more contemporary style. Still others may desire something in the middle, etc. But though diversity generally is a good thing, when it comes to worshiping God, we must make sure—very sure—that what we do is based upon a clear understanding of what constitutes true worship.

In the fourth chapter of the Gospel According to John, the Bible tells of a meeting between Jesus and a Samaritan woman. They had an interesting conversation about worshiping God, and during that conversation Jesus said, “The hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him” (John 4:23).

In simplest terms, to worship God in spirit is to worship Him from our innermost being, as distinguished from some superficial display. To worship Him in truth denotes worship in accordance with His Word because His Word is truth (John 17:17). That means the true worshiper is one who worships God from the depths of his being and in accordance with biblical truth. Jesus said we must worship God this way because He is a Spirit (John 4:24).

Interestingly, sometimes different Christian bodies who claim to worship the same God are polarized along the lines of their different styles of worship. We must be careful not to “write off” those of other Christian denominations simply because their style of worship or their house of worship differs from what we are accustomed to. Different is not necessarily wrong or less appealing to the Lord.

The word worship used in the Scripture above comes from a word (proskuneo, pronounced pros-koo-NE-oh) meaning “to do reverence to.” That’s what worship is all about; it involves acts of reverence to the Lord, and it is not limited to a physical location. We can do reverence to God in a stately edifice, and we can do the same in a hut of clay!

Also, we can reverence Him in a ritualistic setting with monotone preaching and traditional hymns, and we can equally reverence Him in a very free style of worship with fiery preaching and loud, contemporary music. We can also fail to do reverence to Him via both of these forms of expression and anything in between. Style and location are not what matters to God; what matters to Him is whether or not we are worshiping Him in spirit and in truth.

As I reflect on Jesus’ conversation with the Samaritan woman, I get this chilling thought. She and her people the Samaritans had a zeal for God, but it was not in accordance with the truth. Many churchgoers today are that way. They take their worship experience seriously. They put all their heart and soul into it. There is nothing they wouldn’t do for their “church”. They literally worship all it stands for. Their sincerity is not in question. But the warning in Jesus’ meeting at the well is that if we are not careful we can end up being sincere but dead wrong in what we deem as worshiping God.

Copyright © 2011 by Frank King. All rights reserved.