The following VOE article appeared in Volume 6 No. 3
UNBELIEF… THE ROBBER
I want to tell you about a city that was robbed. From the richest politician to the poorest beggar, each was robbed by unbelief. Matthew 13:53-58 gives the account.
“And it came to pass, when Jesus had finished these parables, he departed thence.
“And when he was come into his own country, he taught them in their synagogue, inasmuch that they were astonished, and said, ‘Whence hath this man this wisdom, and these mighty works?’
“Is this not the carpenter’s son? Is not his mother called Mary? And his brethren, James, and Joses, and Simon, and Judas? And his sisters, are they not all with us? Whence then has this man all these things?
“And they were OFFENDED in him. But Jesus said unto them, ‘A prophet is not without honour, save in his own country and in his own house.’ AND HE DID NOT MANY MIGHTY WORKS THERE BECAUSE OF THEIR UNBELIEF.”
Jesus’ ministry of healing had great results in Galilee, Capernaum, and round about Jerusalem; but He had very few results in His hometown of Nazareth. Luke 4:16-30 gives us the account of Christ preaching in a synagogue at Nazareth. After telling His audience that Elijah and Elisha were rejected by the Jews, therefore God sent them to minister to Gentiles, the audience rose up to kill Him. They attempted to take His life by casting Him headlong over one of the large rocky cliffs; but Christ supernaturally walked through the midst of them unharmed.
From that moment on (for 3 ½ years) the world saw a great light, but Nazareth dwelt in darkness and ignorance. This city rejected this “hometown boy turned prophet.” They were more concerned with who gave this carpenter’s son this authority, than they were in recognizing God’s power on Christ’s ministry. Instead of Nazareth saying, “Christ is the Messiah. God has honored us and visited our city,” their unbelieving attitude was “Jesus is just the son of Mary and the carpenter, Joseph.” They missed the time of His visitation. They didn’t recognize the Savior in their midst. As a result, they missed seeing firsthand the miracle working power of God in their midst.
Parallel in the Church World
I see this same unbelief prevailing in some circles in the church world. There is a great move of the Holy Ghost sweeping the world like a mighty wind. Many people from the older denominations are receiving the Holy Spirit and operating in the Word of God. Testimonies are being heard of outstanding things occurring, which are coming from God. They are supernatural! Yet, many churches sit back and say, “If God is doing this in the charismatic movement, why isn’t it happening in our churches? If it were real, we would be seeing it, too!”
Friend, it is happening all around us, yet we are becoming like Nazareth and missing the visitation. Many of us Pentecostals have grown up with Him working in our churches. Yet now, many other denominations are passing us by, while we sit back and become critical of those who are claiming God’s gifts in their life. The real problem is this: we have fallen into unbelief. Many of us can’t even listen with faith to a minister, under God’s anointing, tell a true illustration without questioning in our minds, “I wonder if that really happened.”
Some think that because Christ was God’s Son, He could have worked great miracles in Nazareth, DESPITE their unbelief. I do not believe this. One gospel writer said, “He, there (in Nazareth), could do no mighty works, save He laid His hands upon a few sick folks and healed them (Mark 6) Literally, Christ COULD NOT do mighty miracles. Only a few with minor ailments were delivered. Doesn’t that sound like us today? We have people with great needs who need mighty miracles, but only those with minor ailments are receiving. Our unbelief is robbing us of God’s best. There are things God could do for us, but He won’t because of our unbelief.
God Works Through Grace – Yet Through Faith
There are things that God does simply because He exercises great grace upon us to demonstrate His love. I have, on several occasions, seen even drunken sinners be healed by the power of God. I remember in Pearisburg, Virginia when an elderly man wandered into the building from off the street. He was so drunk you could smell him when he entered the back door. That night I had a prayer line for the sick. He stumbled out of his seat to the front. He said, “Can you pray that God will heal me? I cracked several ribs and I’m in severe pain.” I touched his ribs (where he had pointed) and he began to yell. I knew he was really hurt. I said to him, “Sir, I will pray for God to heal you under one condition. If God will instantly heal those ribs, I want you to get saved and accept Jesus.” He agreed. I prayed, and he began to yell and jump up and down. He said, “There’s no pain!” He hit himself in the ribs to prove it. He came back the next night and was sober. He prayed the sinners’ prayer and accepted the Lord!
That man was not healed because of his goodness. He was healed because of God’s grace. Many things God does (even miracles), He does because of His favor upon humanity. He loves people.
Someone may say, “But I serve the Lord, pay my tithes, and have been prayed for, but nothing has happened.” Since you know the Word of God, you should have faith. You already have the grace of salvation and the gift of the Holy Ghost, but you should have faith. Don’t try to receive from God because of your credit account of all the good things you have done for Him. God has already settled the old account! Accept His power and miracles because you BELIEVE in Him and expect Him to do it!
Some people can hear a gospel message and be thrilled about it. Others can hear the same message, and it has no effect upon them. Why? The same sun that melts wax also hardens clay. The same electricity that cooks chicken can freeze chicken. The same gospel that sets men free can cause others to become hardened. It is not so much the Word that does this, as your REACTION to the Word. Your heart’s reaction to God’s Word determines your level of belief.
Relief for Unbelief
There is no sure cure for unbelief. Because we are surrounded by a world which is continually operating off unbelief, it is difficult to continually walk the faith walk, without bits of unbelief attempting to seep into our minds. But here are things we can do to keep unbelief from dwelling in our hearts. You can’t keep birds from flying, but you can keep them from building a nest in your hair!
Think on good things. Your mind is not a garbage can. You are a child of God, bought by the blood of Christ. There are some things you don’t have to hear. If certain things seem to bring depression and cause unbelief to enter your heart, don’t dwell on those things. Think on good things. Hear good reports.
Keep a renewed mind. You keep a renewed mind by allowing the gift of the Holy Spirit to stay stirred in your spirit. I personally feel that every believer should have private devotions every day. Set aside a time when you can spend precious moments alone in the presence of God. During these private devotions, you should read sections of God’s Word and pray in the Spirit. Praying in the Spirit keeps you in tune with the will of God. The mind of a man only knows the things of man, but the Spirit of God knows the things of God.
Don’t allow unbelief to gain control. Resist the unbelief. Fight the battles with the Word of God. Unbelief questions if God’s Word is true. Unbelief says God can’t do what He has said He can and will do. Unbelief is the opposite of faith. God never rebuked faith, but always rebuked unbelief. You are a faith creature, made in God’s image. You were not made to doubt God; you were created to believe upon Him!
Feed your faith and starve your doubts. If you practice these three simple steps, I believe it will help you not only to overcome unbelief, but keep unbelief from overcoming you!
If the battered wooden altars at the old storefront church could speak, what wonderful stories they could tell. Look closelyand you will see spots on the dark wood. This is a silent testimony to the hundreds of tears that have streamed down people’s faces, allknown and collected in heaven by God himself. Notice the scratches in the wood where men have gripped the altar, struggling between life and death, heaven or hell, eternal life or eternal destruction. In desperation they buried their heads in their arms, groaning, travailing, praying, and weeping their way into eternal life.
The old wooden altars could tell us many stories. What about the aged grandmother who offered intercessory prayers for her unsaved grandchildren, or the young wife who beseeched God for her husband’s salvation. The breath of hundreds of grandparents, parents, and children have warmed the top of the old altar.
The greatest stories the altar could tell are those of the conversion of sinners who knelt in desperation butstood on their feet with new life in Christ.
What really happens when a sinner gets saved? Let’s look at the reaction in three different worlds at the conversion of a sinner.
THE REACTION IN HEAVEN
Our High Priest and personal lawyer, Jesus Christ, is sitting down on the right hand of the Father and is “ever making intercession” for us.
When a sinner repents, Christ the lawyer takes his case as the great High Priest and deals with the sin element. Under the old covenant, the blood of an animal that was sprinkled by the high priest covered or hid the sins of the people from the sight of God. Under the new covenant, the sins are blotted out by the great High Priest, never to be remembered again!
In God’s third heaven, activity begins to take place over the conversion of just one sinner. When the great High Priest declares the person’s sins forgiven and justifies him by Christ’s blood, the angels surrounding God’s throne begin to rejoice! Jesus himself stated that there is “joy in the presence of the angels over one sinner who repents….”Great joy fills the heavens each time a sinner repents.
THE REACTION UNDER EARTH
This may seem strange to some, yet I believe that beings under the earth react when a sinner gets saved. From researching the scriptures, it is clear that fallen angels, some types of demonic powers, and the spirits of lost souls are in the heart of the earth. The abyss is dominated bydemonicspirit beings that are capable of communicating with one another.
When a human being who is possessed by an unclean spirit is delivered by God’s power, I have wondered how the unclean spirit explains to the other demonic forces what occurred. Imagine the legion that possessed the man of Gadara. Remember when the legion of spirits came out of the man and entered the swine? What man can’t stand to live with, the animals can’t live with either!
Those spirits no doubt reported to the others how the presence of Christ tormented them, and how that by Christ’s command, they had to leave the man. No wonder the spirits possessing the mad man of Acts 10 cried out, “Jesus I know and Paul I know….” Satan and his armies recognize the blood washed, Spirit indwelt, God ordained believers who walk in authority!
THE REACTION ON THE EARTH
What happens on the earth when a sinner repents?
The moment we confess our sins to Christ, those sins are not only forgiven butalso forgotten. God dumps the sin into the sea of forgetfulness and posts a “no fishing” sign. The tremendous weight of guilt is not only lighter but lifted completely. A woman recently commented following her conversion, “I feel good all over from the inside out.” Friend, that’s the best description of old-time religion you will ever hear!
The apostle Paul stated: “If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature.” Literally, he is a new creation. Paul continued, “Old things are passed away and behold all things are new.” The convert receives a new nature, a new name, a new attitude, and a new outlook on life. His entire being is changed.
FROM CRAWLING TO WALKING
Some precious people want to go from a sinner to a saint in one session with God. Growth in grace is not usually that quick. At your initial conversion to Christ, you are a “babe in Christ”. You must begin your new spiritual walk with God by drinking the milk of the Word (learning the basic doctrines of the Christian faith). You must be trained to walk on your own (walk by faith and not by sight). You must depend on the fellowship of brothers and sisters in Christ to undergird you during your new walk with Christ. Babies can fall easily and often when learning to walk.
Instead of hanging around your old crowd, fellowship with your new adopted family. You are now a member of the royal family of God, and you should fellowship with light rather than darkness. Babies cry a lot, especially when they are hungry or need attention. We should not ignore the lonely signals from the young babes in Christ. They need the same love, attention, devotion, and understanding that a small baby does!
As the new convert grows in the grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ, the eyes of their understanding will be enlightened. They will be able to see their own progress in the Lord as they develop from crawling to walking and from milk to meat.
The altar may be gone from the old storefront church, but the God we encountered still has our name in His city directory, the Lamb’s Book of Life.
Dr. E. L. Terry was a noted international evangelist who traveled to over 100 countries preaching the Gospel. Dr. Terry saw hundreds of thousands of souls saved for the kingdom.This article appeared in the VOE magazine in the 1990s.
“Then came Amalek, and fought with Israel in Rephidim. And Moses said unto Joshua, choose us out men, and go out, fight with Amalek; tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill with the rod of God in mine hand. So Joshua did as Moses had said to him, and fought with Amelek, and Moses, Aaron, and Hur went up to the top of the hill. And it came to pass, when Moses held up his hand, that Israel prevailed: and when he let down his hand, Amalek prevailed.”
– Exodus 17:8-11 (KJV)
Let us note verse nine. Moses did not merely say, “I’m just going to stand or sit on top of the hill with the rod of God that works miracles and the staff of life that sustains God’s people in order to be effective.” Let’s take a quick look at the man Moses. He was the first prophet of God. In his early descriptive life, he appears to be a lonely man. In the book of Hebrews, the 11th chapter, Moses is mentioned as a proper child, a Godly child, a child that was different from others. The man of God that is going to accomplish anything is going to have to follow the pattern of being a proper child, a Godly child, and a child of God that is different from other people. The minister cannot help his members if he is on the same spiritual level as they are.
It is then that he is able to help those he comes in contact with. It is then that he becomes “one lonely man on top of the hill.”
The shepherd must give his life and his time for his flock. He must walk and talk with God so that he can walk and talk with man. It is a lonely life to be a shepherd. The shepherd does not have a lot of friends, and there are many times that even his family does not understand him. There are times that he must rise before daylight and pray. There are also times that he must stay up late into the night to pray.
Tradition tells us that John Knox, the great Presbyterian minister, was lying on the floor in his home in Scotland late into the night. Because of the cold weather, he had wrapped himself in a quilt. His wife heard him moaning and groaning and went into the room where he lay. She said, “John, you’re rolling and moaning and groaning, and you’ve awakened me from my sleep. If you don’t come to bed, you’re going to die from pneumonia.”
John Knox rolled over, looked at his wife, and answered, “Elizabeth, don’t you know that I have 3,000 souls in my parish, and I don’t know how many of them stand with God.” While many sleep, that lonely man, the pastor, the shepherd of the flock, has climbed to the top of the hill to communicate with God about the burden he carries for his people. Although the minister walks with God, his is a lonely life.
The Bible says in the book of Hebrews 11:24-25: “By faith, Moses, when he was come to years, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter; Choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season.”
He became a lonely man by choosing to suffer, “Esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt.” He looked into the future and saw how it was going to come out. By faith, he forsook Egypt and became a lonely shepherd on the backside of a mountain. It was there that he saw the burning bush and heard the call of God to go back to Egypt and redeem God’s children.
If the minister stays by himself, he is considered unsociable. If he is sociable, it is said he has no time for God. Some people are never pleased. Jesus walked with the publicans and sinners to save them and the religious people called him a “winebibber.”
The minister is a lonely man, but the man who climbs to the top of the hill shall not be lonely forever. When God raptures the church, the loneliness of the ministry will disappear. There is a difference between loneliness in the valley and loneliness on top of the hill. When he is on top of the hill, he has fellowship with the Father, but he still desires the fellowship of earthly people.
If the devil can pull you down, he will pull down your friends with you. If he can pull the minister down, it affects everyone who has ever heard the name of that minister. When he is down, he needs to be lifted up rather than kicked in the teeth.
Recently, I had a minister friend who was going through very difficult times physically. The church he pastored was standing with him through this difficult time, that is, all of them but two or three families. Those families began to cause trouble in the church, wanting him to leave because of his physical condition. In his desperation, he had no one to turn to, no one holding up his hands, and he saw no way out. (Sickness does that to the very best of us!) He took his own life! I wonder who is really to blame? Where were those he had stood with so many times when they needed him? Consider the following survey that was conducted in 1991:
90% of pastors work more than 46 hours a week.
80% believe pastoral ministry has affected their families negatively.
33% say being in ministry is an outright hazard to their family.
75% report a significant stress related crisis at least once in their ministry.
90% feel they were inadequately trained to cope with ministry demands.
70% say they have a lower self-image now than when they started.
40% report a serious conflict with a parishioner at least once a month.
70% do not have someone they consider a close friend.
Leviticus 21:4 states, “But he shall not defile himself, being a chief man among his people, to profane himself.” A minister is a chief among his people. If you know more than your preacher knows, you either need a new preacher or you need to go to another church. The minister is not to defile himself. It is not the man that is the “chief,” but the “call of God.” It is that gift of God that causes him to be “one lonely man on top of the hill.”
If a preacher is going to accomplish anything, he must be elevated to a position with God that is higher than his laity. If he has nothing but death within his life, he can only give out death. But if he has life within his bosom, then he is able to give out life. If he has nothing but bitterness, then bitterness is all that his congregation will ever hear. If he does nothing but find fault, then his laity will be the recipients of that fault-finding.
However, if he has climbed and scaled the heights to the heavens above, and he has submerged himself in God’s love, then he has a vantage point in which he can look out over the difficulties and shout triumphantly, “The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want.” He may be a lonely man, but he is a man on top of the hill.
As Moses stood on top of the hill and the battle progressed, his hands became heavy. Aaron and Hur placed a stone under him so he could sit, and then they held up his hands until the sun went down. If the minister wants to be anything with God Almighty, he must journey to the top of the hill. There will be times that he cannot do it by himself, but God will send men to strengthen him. If the laity will hold up the hands of the ministry, God will fight the battles for us and the victory will be ours.
