Constructing the circle of faith

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Author: John A. Turkson

Looking back some five years ago, in Junior High School, Pre-technical Skills was one of my favourite subjects; specifically the Technical drawing aspect of it. I don’t know how they call it these days, considering the frequent alterations in our curricula over these past few years.  There was something special about following all those given instructions to construct various fascinating figures, the precision that came with practicing, the accuracy you needed to employ in your drawing to gain the highest mark, the habit you needed to form to present the neatest work possible, the instruments you needed, even the wide range of pencils required to perform specific tasks. Those were the days; when you’d go to school carrying your big drawing board as if you were that architect chosen by God to draw the plan of an entire new world!

 It sounds funny at first, but that is exactly who we are: architects chosen by God to draw for the world to see His grand blue-print of love! With the tip of the compass firmly planted in Christ, the author and finisher of our faith, we Christians are supposed to describe certain circles in the world with our lives. Christ must be the centre! Christ must necessarily be our focus and salvation, our goal! But all we see in the ‘goalpost’ today are ‘balls’ of gospels about wealth, work promotions, favours, concocted prophesies etc. when the purpose of the gospel message is to reach as many as we can with God’s gift of salvation. Christ is no more the centre and without the centre, a circle does not exist! As tiny as that point is, Jesus, His death and resurrection—the gospel—holds us together in one piece. When our lives are void of this key ingredient, we are lost in the haze of hopelessness and like a lead-less pencil, our lives are pointless. Jesus must be the focus!

 Johannes Kepler, upon analyzing the astronomical observations of one Tycho Brahe proposed three laws supposed to describe the nature of planetary motion. In the first law, he asserted that the orbit of a planet was elliptical with the Sun at one of the two foci. An ellipse is an almost-circle with two ‘centres’ called foci (singular: focus). At one of these foci, in our solar system, the Sun holds the planets in place. Christianity is a kind of solar system in which Jesus is the Sun. The strategic position of the Sun is imperative to our survival. As it stands now, the Earth is hanging in space because it is suspended by threads of gravitation from the Sun; likewise the other planets. It’s been said about Jesus, “And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together” (Colossians 1:17, ESV). Jesus is our Sun, around whom we are supposed to revolve. Without him, we shall fall. Apart from him, we’d sink into darkness. But today, we hear about preachers instead of Jesus. The gospel which will lead to salvation has become relegated to the appendix session of our sermons when in the life of the early church, it was the main theme (Peter’s sermon in Acts 2, Paul’s famous Athenian sermon in Acts 17:16-31 and many more throughout the book of Acts). Apart from the Vine, the branches are as useful as firewood! If we are indeed bearing fruit apart from the Vine, I shudder to think we have decayed for some opportunistic multicellular fungus like mushroom to sprout on our ‘skin’! Have we not been deceived enough already? Look within and examine yourself: is Jesus at the centre?

 After the rains have fallen, the winged reproductive termites will want to congregate around a source of light. This forms part of their ‘nuptial’ flight ritual. In the process, they lose their wings. This mode of life is natural. The termite species will not survive without this process the same way we the branches cannot do without the Vine. Apart from the Vine, we lose our wings of faith. We lose our wings when we choose to hover around some drugging ‘miraculous’ light lit to trap our attention from the real Bull’s-eye, Jesus. Jesus promised us he’d send us a comforter, the Holy Spirit. Even as we believe Jesus has sent forth His Spirit to enable us bear fruit, the Holy Spirit will only flow through us through the Vine and not apart from Him. Jesus still remains a chief part of the equation! After all, the Holy Spirit was promised through Jesus to empower the Church (Acts 1:8)  to further the cause of reaching far and near with the gospel—that Jesus, died and resurrected and that it is only in believing in him that we are saved (1 Corinthians 15:1-4). The various gifts the Holy Spirit stirs in us are not to be used for amassing wealth, or procuring passports or visas, or promotions. The message must not be about how God wants us to be wealthy (really?), about prosperity, success etc but must be about Jesus in the right concentration—the gospel (1 Corinthians 15:1-11). The dilution thereof makes the ‘solution’ fake (Galatians 1:6-10). The centre must be Jesus, otherwise the fruit is wrong and the bearer, false! (2 John1:9-11).

 Today, the Prophet, the Apostle, the Miracle worker and the Teacher are the celebrities. Where is Jesus? Today, we can only have faith when we have that ‘special’ wrist band on our wrist, that white handkerchief, or that bottle of ‘anointing’ oil, or that ‘Florida’ water. Where is the Author and Finisher of our faith? Today, it’s all about prophesies and miracles (I am in no way saying they are not real. God reveals to redeem. He also works awesome miracles) but have we forgotten about the fruit of the Spirit; about love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; the very ingredients that make us Christians? Have you even examined that Prophet and seen the fruit in him? What did Paul really mean in 1 Corinthians 12:28-31? What is the most excellent way? In the subsequent chapter, we read about love. Does that celebrity Preacher come to mind as a lover of the needy, friend of the widow or a vendor of the recipe to prosperity? Or Jesus does— the pure definition of love? Is Jesus at the centre of the web of ‘spirituality’ you are entangled in?

 Jesus still stands in the centre of time—He virtually holds history together with wood drenched in His blood. Blood He shed for you and I to earn a place at the centre of our hearts. Where is Jesus in relation to your life—outside that circle, inside somewhere or at the centre?

 In constructing that circle of faith in your life, Jesus MUST be the centre. Without Him, “things fall apart and the centre cannot hold”!

Unmasking the Prosperity Gospel

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Author: Robert G. Coleman

About two and a half decades ago, the popular Christian message that one often heard in Ghana was about salvation, and this was traditionally presented as relating to sin, righteousness and eternal life. The call then was “Repent and accept Jesus and you will be saved.” Today, in many places, salvation is presented as an experience with Jesus Christ that will give us the tools and power to be successful in life, enable us rub shoulders with rich non-Christians and make us happy. In addition, the understanding of the word “faith” has also been changed. Faith used to be seen as a living trust in God so that even when things did not go well, we still trusted in the Lord. Today, faith is understood in many quarters as a power or force that is used to get anything we want. This modern interpretation of the gospel is what theologians call the Prosperity Gospel.

This gospel may be presented in different forms and even with different words, depending on who is preaching it, but the core of the message is that Jesus died so that the one who believes in him will become materially or financially wealthy and will never fall sick. Some of this gospel’s oft-used vocabularies include “sow a seed,” “abundance,” “breakthrough,” “anointing for success,” “inheritance,” “prophesy into your life,” “you are destined for greatness,” “claim it by faith,” “positive confession,” etc. Another unique thing about this gospel is that it thrives on changing or playing with the meaning of particular words. The meanings of scriptural verses are often twisted in order to present a semblance of biblical grounding for the prosperity gospel’s non-biblical message.

He Became Poor So That You Might Be Rich

Prosperity preachers usually tell their hearers that God wants them to be rich or to have material abundance. It is not uncommon to hear them use a verse like 2 Corinthians 8:9 which teaches that Jesus became poor so that those who believe in him might be rich. But did the author, Apostle Paul, actually mean that Jesus’ agenda for his followers was to make them rich materially or financially? Ironically, the reason why Paul even brought up this issue was because he was seeking for donations to help the believers in Judea, who were in need. Now think about it, if believers in Christ are automatically to be materially rich just because Jesus “became poor,” as it were, then why were the believers in Judea so in need that Paul had to get the assistance of the churches in Macedonia and Corinth (2 Cor. 8:1-4, 8-15). If it was case that the believers in Judea had failed to “claim their inheritance or birthright,” as the prosperity gospel language goes, all Paul needed to do was to tell them to either “claim it by faith” or “prophesy it into their lives,” but he did not do this because this was not the kind of Christianity he was preaching. It is also worth noting that the apostle made particular mention of the fact that the churches in Macedonia gave generously “even though they are very poor” (vs. 2 GNB) and he meant this in terms of material wealth (vs. 3).

In verse 9 however, when he uses the word “rich” he does not imply financial or material wealth. The context bears witness. He clearly states what he means by “rich” in verse 7 of the same passage: “You are so rich in all you have: in faith, speech, and knowledge, in your eagerness to help and in your love for us.” GNB. There is no mention, literal or implied, of material riches here. Indeed if by “rich” Paul had meant material or financial riches then his actions would be either a joke or an insult to the Judea believers, on whose behalf he was asking for donations, because they would already be materially rich by virtue of Christ having “become poor.” But the prosperity preachers have a different agenda: they want the believer in Christ to see riches as a birthright, something to be grasped, something the Christian is entitled to. But this only leads many believers to disillusionment, because when God has not promised something and you force yourself to believe that he has, disappointment is inevitable in the long run.

The Blessing Of Abraham

It is also common to hear prosperity preachers make reference to the blessing of Abraham in the book of Genesis, in the Old Testament. At the same time these preachers are inclined to use Galatians 3:29, in the New Testament, which says that “If you belong to Christ then you are the descendants of Abraham and will receive what God has promised” (GNB) to explain why they believe a Christian ought to be materially rich and fulfilled as Abraham was. A successful linking of this passage in Galatians to the Genesis narrative about Abraham’s blessings seems to provide a solid foundation for preaching material prosperity in the Church today. But there are some important things to note here.

What really is the blessing of Abraham? Abraham is called blessed in Galatians not because he received prosperity or material wealth or good health. Instead he is called blessed because he believed God and God accepted him, on the basis of his faith, as righteous (Gal. 3:6). It is this “righteous” status that the apostle Paul has in mind when he says that all who believe are blessed as Abraham was (Gal 3:9). Any person who believes in Jesus today is blessed because the righteousness of Christ is imputed to him. Galatians 3:13&14 explains: “But by becoming a curse for us Christ has redeemed us from the curse that the Law brings; for the scripture says, ‘Anyone who is hanged on a tree is under God’s curse. Christ did this in order that the blessing which God promised Abraham might be given to the Gentiles by means of Christ Jesus, so that through faith we might receive the Spirit promised by God.” GNB [Emphasis mine]

Paul’s meaning of “God’s promise to Abraham” is very clear. He does not have in his mind any idea about Abraham’s material blessing nor does he allow room for extending the meaning of this phrase beyond Abraham’s spiritual blessing of righteousness to include “everything” (Gen. 24:1) else in Abraham’s life, like the prosperity preachers like to do. The promise of blessing for the whole human race through Abraham, according to the Spirit-filled Apostle Paul is spiritual not worldly – it is the receipt of the Spirit promised by God. Interestingly, the author of Galatians, Apostle Paul, whose words prosperity preachers like to use to justify their material wealth preaching, actually wrote disapprovingly about people who try to interpret the Christian faith materialistically in 1 Timothy 6:5-12 saying:

“…They think that religion is a way to become rich. Well, religion does make us very rich, if we are satisfied with what we have. What did we bring into the world? Nothing! What can we take out of the world? Nothing! So then, if we have food and clothes that should be enough for us. But those who want to get rich fall into temptation and are caught in the trap of many foolish and harmful desires, which pull them down to ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a source of all kinds of evil. Some have been so eager to have it that they have wandered away from the faith and have broken their hearts with many sorrows. But you, man of God, avoid all these things. Strive for righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance, and gentleness. Run your best in the race of faith, and win eternal life for yourself; for it was to this life that God called you when you firmly professed your faith before many witnesses.”(GNB) [Emphasis mine].

Paul lifts the attention of his readers from the material to what really matters – the fruits of the Holy Spirit: righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance, and gentleness.

Sickness

Typical prosperity gospel does not allow room for a believer to get sick. It claims that a Christian, full of faith, full of the Holy Spirit and who has favour from the Lord simply cannot get sick; Jesus has redeemed the believer from every disease. Thus if you get sick it must be because of your sin or unfaithfulness. But as if to refute the prosperity gospel on this particular point, the Bible contains a record of several godly men (both those who can be described as physical seeds of Abraham and those who are spiritual seeds of Abraham) who suffered sickness yet the Scriptures put no blame on them: Elisha, a man with the “double portion anointing” died of a fatal disease (2 Kings 13:14); King Hezekiah, a man described as one who did what was pleasing to the Lord (2 Kings 18:3), actually got sick and almost died (2 Kings 20:1); Timothy, Apostle Paul’s son in the faith, had frequent stomach problems (1 Tim 5:23); Trophimus, one of the early Christians, was left in Miletus by Paul because he was ill (2 Tim 4:20); Epaphroditus, Paul’s fellow worker in the faith, fell ill and almost died (Philippians 2:25-30); the great Apostle Paul himself got ill physically (Gal 4:13). If the Prosperity preachers’ teaching is true then we must question whether the apostle Paul (whose letters we consider as part of Scripture) and his colleagues in the early church, who got sick, were truly the seeds of Abraham or even Christians at all.

Conclusion

In a developing country like Ghana, where many people struggle financially and with health issues, and where a lot of young people are upwardly mobile, the Prosperity Gospel sounds appealing and inspiring. But it would be in our interest to heed the warnings of Scripture and also the warning of Jim Bakker, the former American prosperity preacher, whose ministry was hit by financial scandals in the 1980s and was subsequently imprisoned. From prison, he repentantly wrote in a letter saying: “It’s time the call from the pulpit be changed from ‘Who wants a life of pleasure and good things, new homes, cars, material possessions etc?’ to ‘Who will come forward to accept Jesus Christ and the fellowship of his suffering?’ … I believe the heart of God is grieved when we cannot delay self-gratification for earthly things in exchange for life in eternity with Him.” Having deceived masses of people, Jim Bakker finally saw the light. I hope the prosperity preachers of our day and their sympathizers will also come to the same realization before it is too late. C. H. Spurgeon once insightfully noted that, “The old covenant was a covenant of prosperity. The new covenant is a covenant of adversity whereby we are being weaned from this present world and made meet for the world to come.”

While Biblical Christianity does not teach believers to actively seek poverty or sickness, it does warn against seeking worldly riches (2 Tim. 6:9&10) and worldly fulfilment (Matt. 16:26) and also entreats Christians to pray for the sick and care for the poor, both within the Church and outside of it. In the Christian life, whatever the believer does, he is to work at it with all his heart as though he were working for God and not for human beings (Col. 3:23). Hard work is encouraged. In the end, however, whether a believer becomes rich or poor or in-between, sick or healthy, the important thing is to have a living trust in Jesus. Faith, in the Christian sense, is a confidence in Jesus Christ and in his power so that even when his power does not take away the unpleasantness you face in this world, your confidence in him remains because of who Jesus is. He is a loving God who can be trusted to always do what is good for those who belong to him.

Gods Mysterious Ways

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Living with convictions

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Authored by: Robert G. Coleman

On the morning of April 20, 1999, 16-year old Cassie Bernall, a student at Columbine High School (USA) wrote a note to her friend, Amanda Meyer, which said this: “Honestly, I totally want to live my life completely for God. It’s hard and scary, but totally worth it!”[1] What she didn’t know was that the genuineness of her expressed desire was going to be severely tested later that same day. With a gun pointed to her head, a gunman asked, “Do you believe in God?”[2] She said “yes” and the next thing was Kabooooom! She was shot to death. Several other students in the school who held the same belief paid with their lives that day. One year earlier, Rachel Scott, who was among the students killed that day, had written in her diary these words, “I’m not going to apologize for speaking the name of Jesus. … I’m not going to hide the light God has put in me. If I have to sacrifice everything, I will.”[3] And sacrifice she did, on the 20th day of April, 1999.

C. S. Lewis once noted that you never know how much you believe a thing until it becomes a matter of life and death. You see, conviction is what makes a person not cower when his beliefs are being tested. Real Christian conviction goes beyond having personal preference for the Christian gospel. It goes deeper than a personal opinion. Having conviction is when you are so thoroughly convinced that something is absolutely true that you take a stand for it regardless of the consequences. Are you really convinced about Christ and his teachings or are you only wishing them to be true? If you are not sure if the Christian message is really true, are you making the effort to find out? To be a Christian fit for Christ’s Kingdom, you must have convictions – convictions about Christ, about the ultimate Truth. Christianity is about truth, about reality as it really is. The gospel is not just to help us through life, it is really true and until you come to this conclusion, it will be very difficult to have genuine Christian convictions.

For most Christians today, the test of our beliefs does not need to be stretched to the point of “life or death” for us to deny our beliefs. All we need is the threat of a little “heat,” a little discomfort, and we are willing to deny, bend, amend or alter the claims and teachings of Christ and his apostles.

A few weeks ago I engaged two young people in a chat regarding the Christian teaching of Salvation. They appeared to agree that it is through Jesus Christ alone that a person gains salvation from God. So I asked them what they thought of other religions. After a short period of thinking, they said something to the effect that, different people have different ways of worshiping God. I probed further by asking them whether they actually believed that the gospel of Jesus Christ was true or they were only hoping and wishing it to be true. (There are people in the world today who think that believing something to be true is what makes it true thus making truth something that subjective.) Both of them, without hesitation, said they believed it was objectively true. At this I reminded them that Jesus claimed to be the only way to God. They agreed. Then I pointed out to them that if Jesus’ claim is true then all other religions must be false by default on the issue of salvation, since they don’t accept this claim of Jesus. From the look on their faces, I could tell that what I just said had switched on a light. Apparently they had not really given this issue much thought.

I went further to explain the situation a person falls into when he/she comes to the realization that it is really true that Jesus is the only way to God: I told them to imagine they were in school and a few minutes away from writing a mathematics exam and that they had found themselves with a group of friends trying to solve a particular math problem. As a group they managed to arrive at an answer. But then after they (as individuals) left the group to study on their own they noticed an error made during the process of calculating the final answer. So then they correct the error and whooaaaa, they arrive at a different answer. I asked them, “What would you do as someone who is concerned about how well your friends fared on the exams?” The answer was clear: You would quickly go to your friends and prompt them about the error so that they can also correct the answer previously arrived at. And I said it is the same for the Christian. The moment you become convinced of the truthfulness of the gospel message, you want to tell others about it and not only that but you also want to live for this truth.

This was the case of Cassie Bernall and her school mates who were shot dead. They had convictions. They were only teenagers, yes, but they knew what they believed, or better still, in whom they had believed. It is this kind of convinced, committed belief in Christ and his gospel that every professing Christian is challenged to pursue. Jesus says, “If a person is ashamed of me and my teaching in this godless and wicked day, then the Son of Man will be ashamed of him when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.” Mark 8:38 GNB. The Apostle Paul was convinced about Christ and his teaching. He really knew the resurrected Christ and had faith in him. He was stoned and left for dead, he was given lashes, he was imprisoned and eventually beheaded. While alive and enduring suffering he declared in letter to young Timothy, “… . But I am still full of confidence, because I know whom I have trusted, and I am sure that he is able to keep safe until that Day what he has entrusted to me.” 1 Timothy 1:12 GNB.

Do you know Jesus to this degree of commitment? Are you living with convictions about Jesus Christ and his teachings? Are you so convinced that the Christian message is absolutely true to the point that you are willing to take a stand for it regardless of the consequences?

[1] Quoted in, Beyond Belief to Convictions, 2002, Josh McDowell, Tyndale House Publishers Inc., p. 23.

[2] Ibid p.23

[3] Ibid p. 23

The God of Wonders

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I did some reading today on the concept of ‘light years’. Although I previously had a vague idea of what it was, I wanted to know a little bit more. And honestly speaking, today’s reading experience has given me a refreshing appreciation of God’s grandeur.

Prior to my reading today, I knew that light had the fastest travelling speed than any other thing but I didn’t know the nitty gritty of such a speed. Today I found out that light travels at a rate of 186,287.5 miles per second. According to the ‘Ask an Astrophysicist’ section of US National Aeronautics And Space Administration’s (NASA) Imagine the Universe website[i], a light year is the distance that light travels in one year. Question: what is the distance travelled by light in one year?

You can find out the number of seconds in a year by multiplying the number of seconds in a minute (60) by the number of minutes in an hour (60). Then multiply that by the number of hours in a day (24), and multiply that by the number of days in a year (approximately 365.25): 60seconds x 60minutes x 24 hours x 365.25 days = 31,557,600 seconds in a year. So a light year (i.e. the distance travelled by light in one year) is about 5,878,786,100,000 miles (i.e. 31,557,600 seconds x 186,287.5 miles per second).  This is approximately 6 trillion miles.  Can you even mentally picture this distance? What’s more? I found out on this NASA site that (1) the distance from the earth to the Sun is 93 million miles. (2) The distance to the nearest star is 4.3 light years. If some of the information I’ve read on the internet are right, then the Sun is bigger than the earth and most stars are much bigger than the sun so you can just imagine this picture. Mind you, one galaxy is supposed be a collection of some millions to trillions of stars that are held together by gravity.According to the NASA website, the following observation is what they have made:

 “… in 1999 the Hubble Space Telescope estimated that there were 125 billion galaxies in the universe, and recently with the new camera HST has observed 3,000 visible galaxies, which is twice as much as they observed before with the old camera. We’re emphasizing “visible” because observations with radio telescopes, infrared cameras, x-ray cameras, etc. would detect other galaxies that are not detected by Hubble. As observations keep on going and astronomers explore more of our universe, the number of galaxies detected will increase.”

Can you imagine? One star as big as the sun or even bigger and one galaxy containing millions to trillions of stars and then having over 125 billion of such galaxies. Make no mistake, this universe is vast beyond imagination! And all these were created and are being sustained by God. This is the God who can be everywhere at the same time, who lives outside of time and who is All-powerful. What an awesome God! And this is only a little bit of the universe I am discovering.

In his letter to the Christians in Rome, Apostle Paul argues that the invisible qualities of God can be seen in the visible world:  “For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities–his eternal power and divine nature–have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.” Romans1:20 NIV. How true! God is big and mighty. No wonder the Psalmist (8:4) asked “what are human beings, that you think of them; mere mortals, that you care for them?” The music band Third Day sing of God’s awesomeness in their song God of Wonders thus:

Lord of all creation

Of water earth and sky

The heaveans are your Tabernacle

Glory to the Lord on high

[Chorus:]

God of wonders beyond our galaxy

You are Holy, Holy

The universe declares your Majesty

And you are holy holy

Lord of Heaven and Earth

Lord of Heaven and Earth

Early in the morning

I will celebrate the light

When i stumble in the darkness

I will call your name by night

[Chorus]

Lord of heaven and earth

Lord of heaven and earth

Hallelujah to the lord of heaven and earth

Holy……holy….holy god

[Chorus]

Precious lord reveal your heart to me

Father holy..

[backround]…Lord god almighty…

The universe declares your majesty

You are holy, holy, holy, holy,

Hallelujah to the lord of heaven and earth.[ii]

Yet this is what the Lord of heaven and earth says through the prophet Isaiah (57:15): “I am the high and holy God, who lives forever. I live in a high and holy place, but I also live with people who are humble and repentant, so that I can restore their confidence and hope.” Further, He sends the prophet Ezekiel (33:11) saying, “Tell them that as surely as I, the Sovereign LORD, am the living God, I do not enjoy seeing sinners die. I would rather see them stop sinning and live. Israel, stop the evil you are doing. Why do you want to die?” His heart cries for us sinners. This same God – the creator of this awesome universe – is still calling us all, today, to come out of darkness into his own marvellous light. This is the God who humbly took on human flesh, in Jesus Christ, to redeem us from sin through that gory death on the cross at Mount Calvary. This is the God who wants to give us eternal life. This is the God before whom we go in prayer; the one who has torn the curtain in the holy of holies to allow ordinary people like you and I to have access into his holy presence daily, hourly, minute by minute, pico second by pico second – in fact His door is ever open to the meditations of our hearts and the words of our mouth. What a privilege to have the God of Wonders as a father and King. Let’s give him all our devotion.

Written on January 17, 2012.

References:

Unless otherwise stated, all scriptures are taken from the Good News Bible – Second Edition © 1994.

[i] NASA’s Imagine the Universe, Ask and Astrophysicist, http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/ask_astro/answers/980211a.html , Accessed on January 17, 2012.

[ii] A-Z Lyrics Universe, Third Day Lyrics, God of Wonders, http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/thirdday/godofwonders.html, Accessed on January 17, 2012.

The Human Condition: Are We Good by Nature?

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“Man is essentially good but it is society that corrupts him.” This idea for many is inarguable but still for many others it evokes irony, confusion and doubt. We look around and see so much evil – from little lies to murders – yet there is also no denying that men at one time or another do acts of goodness to their fellows. But are these good deeds enough to warrant our thinking that we are good people through and through? In the ninth stanza of Steve Turner’s satirical poem, Creed,  concerning the modern mindset in the West, he says this:

 We believe that man is essentially good.

It’s only his behaviour that lets him down.

This is the fault of society.

Society is the fault of conditions.

Conditions are the fault of society.

Question: Who makes up society? Man. Who proposes those evil ideas of ethnic cleansing, lying about company profits, racial superiority and suchlike? Man. And I am immediately called to attention by the following profound statement which has been attributed to a research done many years ago by the Minnesota Crime Commission:

“Every child starts life as a little savage. He is completely selfish and self-centred. He wants what he wants when he wants it – his feeding bottle, his mother’s attention, his playmate’s toy, his uncle’s watch. Deny him these once and he seethes with rage and aggressiveness which would be murderous were he not so helpless. He is in fact dirty. He has no morals, no knowledge, no skills. Every child then is born delinquent. And if permitted to continue in this self-centred world of his infancy, given free reign over his impulsive actions, every child then would grow up a criminal; a thief, a rapist or a killer.”

The Christian scripture is even more to the point when it says that the human heart is wicked and only God can understand it (Jeremiah 17:9). One author, describing his visit to the Nazi death camps of Auschwitz and Birkenau in Poland, where Adolf Hitler sought to exterminate the Jews, recalls seeing Hitler’s words that hung on a wall saying: “I freed Germany from the stupid and degrading fallacies of conscience and morality … We will train young people before whom the world will tremble. I want young people capable of violence – imperious, relentless and cruel.” Quite ruthless!

Admittedly for many of us, Hitler is an exceptionally evil man. But we are also reminded of the tragedies in Kosovo and Rwanda, Sierra Leone (where even babies’ arms were chopped off) and Liberia; in these places the world witnessed unimaginable human cruelty – mass killings mingled with rape cases. But let us come home to Ghana and to less gruesome pictures of evil, albeit still symptoms of human depravity. Recent atmosphere in the political arena has given most Ghanaians reason to protest against the coarse verbiage that politicians use against each other. Most of these politicians are educated and they also know our culture’s sense of right and wrong but this has not stopped them from being insulting to each other. Further, let us look at some of the things which we consider normal in our society today: In business circles, a promise is not enough we need a contract. (We may argue that this is necessary because of forgetfulness but it is also often the case that we want to insure against any sneaky behaviour from the other party). We build houses and make doors but they are not enough, we need to lock and bolt them, and sometimes even employ security men in addition. When travelling on long journey buses and aeroplanes, we buy tickets but this is not enough, the tickets must be inspected and collected before we board. Making laws is not enough, we need the police to enforce them (and in some cases even the police need to be policed). All these things, although so familiar to us, are due to our sinful nature. We cannot trust each other. We need protection from one another. So going back to my initial observation that society consist of man, the following question becomes vital: if man makes up society and society corrupts man then where are we getting this idea that man is by nature good?

There is sometimes the idea that, “Oh if only we educate people and give them employable skills and also educate them in ethics and moral values, our social vices will be curbed.” But this misses the point! D. L. Moody, the famed American preacher (1837 – 1899) is credited with the humorous observation that if a man is stealing nuts and bolts from a railway track and you send him to school for formal education, at the end of his education he will steal the whole railway track. The point is this: man’s fundamental problem is not a lack of information or education on how to be ethical or moral. The problem is that our hearts are diseased, if not twisted. Thus, giving a man the best education that money can buy while his sick heart, with all its twisted desires, has not been healed is at best a joke. Fundamentally, we lack the power to do what we know to be right and to do this consistently.

Admittedly we sometimes do good deeds and also find others doing good in our society. Thus there is the question: how is this possible if we indeed are not good people by nature? Since man is the creature of an infinitely good and holy God, there are times when his ways and culture may mirror the beautiful and good attributes of God – such as mercy, charity, honesty, unity etc. But because man is fallen (resulting from the sin in the garden of Eden), all of our ways are tainted with sin. The Bible tells us that man was created in God’s image. Think of man’s condition as a mirror that has fallen and been cracked all over. The image you would see of yourself in such a mirror will be a distorted one. God’s image in man‘s current state is a distorted one . So yes, men do good deeds but this is not because they are naturally pure at heart.  We are like clocks that do not work. Yet even a clock that is not working will show the correct time twice a day, won’t it? But this does not mean it is keeping time. Thus our doing good deeds is not evidence that we are good (i.e. our clocks are functioning well). Rather we are dead spiritually. In theological verbiage, we are fallen – we are separated from God. It is often the case that even what seems like a pure gesture of goodness has some selfish goals – self validation, or emotional satisfaction – rather than for the sake of pure goodness. We often lack that sense of transcendent goodness (the goodness from God’s own person and character) – that something is good, whether or not I or those around me approve of it.

Paul, an Apostle of Jesus Christ, who described to himself as the chief of sinners (1 Timothy 1:15) also explained our human struggle of knowing what is good and yet not being able to do it in these words:

“I know that good does not live in me – that is in my human nature. For even though the desire to do good is in me, I am not able to do it. I don’t do the good I want to do; instead, I do the evil that I do not want to do. … My inner being delights in the law of God. But I see a different law at work in my body – a law that fights against the law which my mind approves of. It makes me a prisoner to the law of sin which is at work in my body. What an unhappy man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is taking me to death? Thanks be to God who does this through our Lord Jesus Christ!” Romans 7: 18-19, 22-25

In a day when the prevailing mindset says that man is good at heart but society is to blame for his flaws, the words of Jesus Christ come echoing through the centuries in sharp contrast: “… from your heart”, says Jesus Christ, “come the evil ideas which lead you to kill, commit adultery, and do other immoral things; to rob, lie, and slander others…” Matthew 15:19. But Jesus comes to us not just with wise teachings and profound observations about human nature; he also gives us new hearts – hearts that beat after God’s own heart –  a new view of God, the world and ourselves and also through his Holy Spirit he gives us the enabling power to do what we know to be right. This is where Jesus Christ stands unrivalled among the founders of all the world religions. Rather than only pointing you to some enlightening teachings and deep truths, He, by his power transforms selfish lives into selfless ones. This is what Christians call the new birth (i.e. born again) – our natural desires and inclinations begin on a journey of transformation: Our desire for power turns into a love for humility and service. We begin to exalt commitment over feelings, forgiveness over anger, patience over shortcuts, confession over cover-up and sacrifice over comfort. And a powerful example is given us in the life of the one who called himself ‘the chief of sinners’; he once persecuted Jesus’ followers, but after having bowed to the Lordship of Jesus, Paul declares to the Church in Philipi that, “All I want is to know Christ and to experience the power of his resurrection, to share in his sufferings and become like him in his death, in the hope that I myself will be raised from death to life.” Philippians 3:10-11. Not only did he confess it, he lived it and it ultimately led to his execution.

In the Christian worldview being good or doing all the good things is not what will earn you a place in God’s eternal Kingdom. It is your acting faith in the finished work of Jesus on the Cross – that his death pays for your sins and where your life into the future manifests this belief. Indeed, when a Jew once came to Jesus saying “Good Teacher, what must I do to receive eternal life?” Jesus responds saying, “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone” – Mark 10:17-18. So, if no one is good except God and the situation is such that only good people will be going to heaven then who really is qualified for heaven? No one! But thanks be to God who makes entry into heaven possible for us by means of our faith in Jesus Christ . This is why all the religions and belief systems where one has to do good things to earn a place in heaven miss the real issue. Man cannot be transcendently good on his own to please God. At best a man may be able to abide by his own definitions of goodness (and ofcourse these definitions often change to suit him) but this is not the goodness God seems interested in. Without Jesus Christ, there is really no hope for mankind in having our hearts changed and in pleasing God.

** All Bible quotations have been taken from the Good News Bible – Second edition © 1994.

Why I Still Remain A Christian – Part 3

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 2. Actions

“If thou therefore wilt worship me, all shall be thine.”…

In his most criticized theory on motivation, Maslow’s hierarchy of needs spells out significant stages that a person goes through in his quest for accomplishment. As a matter of fact, the theory is used to explain what motivates people to act. At the bottom and most basic is the physiological needs [clothes, food, sex, shelter etc]; then he mentions safety [need for certainty and security in our actions, positions, and engagements]; socialization [the need to be with friends and family or have some sort of a relationship with people]; self esteem; and then finally self actualization [a position which has been argued that very few people in this life have attained]. This is not an endorsement of Maslow’s theory because there are a lot of weak ends, yet it has been consider very fundamental to the study of human needs in many fields, so I subject my discussion to that credibility it holds. In addition, I believe that we all act based on certain motivation whether rational or otherwise.

According to Maslow’s theory our actions are guarded by our needs… but that has to be progressive… the theory says until one lower level need is satisfied the next level is not aspired for. So here we are in this world of ours… I remember finishing my bachelors and all I wanted was a job [any work?…ha ha] as long as I made some salary at the end of the day, it was cool. Just like the guy who took up a job at the zoo to be a monkey. He did not think about the strain of playing a monkey… but as long as it was going to give him some money, he was fine… well he ended up falling into the lion’s cage after a while when his human arms could not support the numerous leaps he did from one branch to another… what saved his life was that, just when he started screaming for help because the lion was pacing at him, he heard a rather an unusual voice from the lion saying, “shut up!!! or we’ll all lose our jobs”. Believe it or not, the fundamentals of this theory has been true for many people in this life, including me…

It is on this assumption that the devil makes an offer to Jesus. This offer has been made to me several times and truth is, I have falling sometimes for them… some for the good reason and others for the bad reasons… But why do I remain a Christian when I have fallen for the devils offers and obeyed the human theory of needs? The answer is in this statement, “Get thee behind me, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve”.

So, my 2nd reason for remaining a Christian is that, my actions are supposed to dare the world’s orders. Norms of society and the rituals of life are not the controlling and motivating factors of my actions. I have seized to have excuses such as, I am human and therefore liable to failures. I don’t think I will win the battles all the time, but when I fail in my actions to be right, I know it is because I went into normal cruise mode of humanity. My actions are controlled by divine instructions now and so shall it remain. I act because God says so… so even when I am out of the public’s eye and somewhere 1000s of miles from home, His divine instruction keeps my identity as a Christian.

I remain a Christian because, when I fail to act right in favor of the pleasures of this world, there is no remedy; except for the divine instructions the lift me beyond the walls and laws of my own humanity. Maslow was right but Jesus said the truth when He taught us how to pray… check the hierarchy of the Lord’s Prayer and you will realize it is an inversion of Maslow’s theory. I remain a Christian because self actualization comes to me in worship and that is the first need of motivation to act as Christians… “My father who is heaven, holy is your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven”… all other things come second to this basic course and call of my actions. Hence the questions related to my actions remain, will it honor his name? Is it His will for my life? Will heaven approve this action?

I remain a Christian because I dare to be different from the world’s norms and rituals in my actions.

Written by  Nathan Lee-Winans Annobi

Why I Remain A Christian – Part 2

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I believe we were made with a purpose which gives meaning to our lives. Hence what we do every day whether consciously or not is part of the process of searching for harmony between decisions and actions we take, and the grand purpose of our lives. In that case, I reflectively submit that to define life we need to satisfy our understanding of our existence, actions (including decisions) and purpose. My view is hinged on this scripture, “For in Him we live and move and have our being” [Act 17:28].

In expressing my understand of the three elements mentioned afore, I wish to use a scriptural context to which I will explain my understanding of my Christian view of life.

In the book of Luke the chapter 4, we read the account of Jesus’ encounter with Satan; a dialogue that has come to be known as the temptation of Jesus. Let’s pay a visit to the discussion or debate and see how it sits within the modern day view about life.

  1. Existence

The Oxford online dictionary offers a definition for the word existence as “the fact or state of living or having objective reality” and “continued survival”. For the purpose of this discussion I will admit both definitions and use then interchangeably when suitable. However, my biggest challenge begins with the first definition – on the issues of reality. How do we measure reality? How do we prove reality? And is reality a universal concept?

Let me put it this ways… how do we measure reality with a Dutch when I say to him it is disrespectful not to say “hi” to people in an elevator when you join but take the time to say “bye” when he is disembarking. You see, in my culture saying “hi” comes more important than “bye”. Once you don’t say anything to me, I am closed to any further discussion with you — that is reality for me but not for him. Those familiar with this will remember what happens when you do not greet people you meet and you later have to come back and ask for some help or information. Another example is, to the Chinese time is 24hrs in a day’s work. Work can be done at anytime and delivered as long as it is within the 24hr cycle (a more stereotypical view though). Meanwhile the German sees time as 8hrs for his work and the rest for other appointment. Even though they may agree on a universal time, the meaning of time is given a different sense of reality. Well, it therefore stands to say the there are grey areas in discussing reality; nevertheless, there are well established fields as well which are universally verifiable. For instance, no human can exist without oxygen, or water for a certain number of hours or days. I can tell the difference between liquid and solids… this is universal and we can verify it. Having tried to deal with the issue of reality, I can now get more indepth.

So Jesus’ first temptation was “if you are the son of God turn this stone into bread”. We realize that existence is placed in both contexts of reality (relative and objective); as well as survival instinct. First of all, the issue about the existence of God and our relationship with Him is conditional in the statement by the mention of “if”. As if to say, if it is reality to Jesus to claim there is God then he should turn stone into bread; where the stone and bread reflect the survive aspect of existence. To rephrase the statement made, we shall have it like this, “if God is reality, and you claim you are his son then show me how you survive by turning this stone into bread”.

Jesus’ response, “man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the father”. My first reason why I remain a Christian is that, my friendship with God sets me apart from mere material search for meaning. My scope of life is broader; I search for meaning not only for survival but also to prove reality. My reality is that I was once a sinner; condemned to eternal death – then Jesus comes my way and offers me life. It is not for earthly survival, but the reality that when I die, I want to be in heaven. I live with the gift of salvation – no matter how much I have tried to study about salvations, it still beats my reasoning, that God will love me that much and send His son to die in my place. It beats my thoughts, that when I am depressed and bound in the chains of fear, there on my knees with those quibbling lips and often meaningless and selfish words out of my mouth – my heart and mind can still find rest with Christ. I still don’t know how it happens, yet years after my father use to hold my feet in bed and pray for, that I find God ordering my steps in life no matter how far I drift sometimes.

I remain a Christian because, even though eating makes me strong to conquer my daily schedules, fasting makes me stronger to defeat spiritual battles. I am a Christian because, I have felt Christ closer than any other relationship I have had with any flesh here on earth. I am a Christian because beyond my ability to show my certificates, payroll, cash in the bank, number of friends in high places, and all that I may call success… there is always a avoid which lust, pleasure, and imagination have not filled except for the knowledge of His word and the love of Christ.

I use to worry about how well I can convince people about how reality plays in my world fused with my daily actions of survival to define the meaning of life. But I have news for you – I no more do. Rather I have kept this code for years, “to live is Christ, to die is gain”. Forgive me if you don’t see Christ in me because I don’t meet your standard, and this is the more reason why I am a Christian. Bible said, I love Him because He first loved me.

For this reason I still remain a Christian.

Written by Nathan Lee-Winans Annobi

Why I Remain A Christian – Part 1

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Staying away from the luxury of the culture I have known in more than 20years of my life has given time to reflect on many of the things that I grew up knowing by default. One of such is my belief as a Chrisitian. Back home I have asked the question about why I am a Christian, but before I could give any convincing answer, my activities restored sanity – for instance, going for prayer meetings, bible studies, and Sunday services were significant measures that gave away my probing mind to the question “why I am a Christian”. But now, I have had such a long time to ask this question in a different environment and most especially so, one of the least religious countries in the world. And my conclusion, has necessitated this paper. It is a note that represents my views and not that of the entire Christian race; however, I am confident that if what I believe in is the same as the millions of Christians all over the world, then there are a lot of areas that we might share together. Having said this, I am open to your rebuffs on my stand and comments.

As science leads us to more discoveries and our societies get more complex in understanding the human nature, I believe there is a nagging voice from God that cautions us against rebellion and arrogance. The Christian view about the world is explicitly spelt out by David in Psalm 24 when declared:

“The earth is Jehovah’s, and the fullness of it; the world, and those who live in it. For He has founded it on the seas and established it upon the rivers. Who shall go up into the hill of Jehovah? And who shall rise in His holy place? He who has clean hands and a pure heart; who has not lifted up his soul to vanity and has not sworn deceit.”

Throughout history, our societies have traveled journeys of intellectual adventures characterized by the enormous heavy weight philosophies such as existentialism, nihilism, and a more recent phenomenon of  post-modernism ideologies. The actual virtues and moral standards that were once cherished in societies have given way to societies that have no definition of what is right or what is wrong. It is by now no news to know that the thought that God does not exist is the only truth that the world considers absolute. One who gives us a good definition of that situation is Fyodor Dostoevsky (1821-1881), a novelist who himself was a Christian but who has characters that often display what later will seem to be Existentialist attitudes and ideas. One of those characters (in The Brothers Karamazov, 1879-1880) says (in effect), “Without God, all is permitted.”  And truly, if the loss of God means the loss of all meaning and value, then our modern world is pushing for a meaningless empire, by trying to eliminate the existence of God.

Our modern day experience is illustrated in Bible by the story of Moses. In the account as recorded in the book of Exodus, Moses was known to have taken an early retirement from modern day civilization and settled in the desert. The reason for his retirement is a common story. In short he was playing hero and committed murder – trying to escape punishment, he bolted and found himself playing hero with another woman, but this time it brought him shelter and a wife.   While in Egypt, he lived in the palace of Pharaoh – a place where the very finest women and strongest men were kept as servants. The best wine brewed in the country was served in the best silver and gold molded cups from which he drunk. He saw the best of the best magician, the power of Egyptian science and art. Moses up to the time of fleeing was living in the best nation in terms of advancement in science and technology, economic prosperity, and military might. As it is said, “he had seen it all”. Now he made his home far in the desert and made his living by tending to the flock of  his father in law. His day was spent under scorchy sun and in the dusty windy desert. I bet in all of his endurance and adaption tactics, he still reminisced those days he lived his life as a prince in the palace; everything coming to him at the snap of his figures. Suddenly he has become a man with two contrasting worlds.

One day Moses notices a burning bush which is not consumed. The startling suspension of nature’s fixed laws arouses Moses’ curiosity. “I must turn aside to look at this marvelous sight; why doesn’t the bush burn?” he might have thought to himself. I am sure his curiosity was not in just superstition, but also a scientific probing mind knowing that he has been exposed to learning how to provide reasoning for things that happen. Close, closer, and then closest he could be, his feet led him to the burning bush. In the moment of awe and wonder the Lord calls out to him, “Moses! Moses!”.

In a similar fashion, we have been caught up in the many wonders of the time. High tech science researches, tourist on the moon, living our lives via the internet, cars almost designed to represent a home – simply put we live in a time of possibilities. Some of us if not the majority are captured in the awe of advancement in our search for happiness and pleasure, dreaming our lives away into a world of imagination; even to the point where that which is imagined and that which is real have a very thin line. An example is having 5000 friends on facebook – it feels so real and yet truth is these are nowhere near acquaintances.

Yet it is at this same time that God is screaming out the more and announcing his presence in our imagination and creativity. This world of imagination and creativity is a holy dwelling place – where the Divine grand weaver downloads his nature and our essence to establish harmony between our existence and his purpose for us.

Written by Nathan Lee-Winans Annobi

Is secularism capable of maintaining moral objectivity?

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Nietzsche is the prophet who foresaw and foretold the coming of the modern age of lack of moral objectivity. Indeed, he proclaimed the greatest commandment which created a society of savages when he said, “the time has come to oppose morality with immorality, to call what priests call good, evil and what they call evil, good. The time has come for the transvaluation of all values.” In a less revolutionary tone, Jean Paul Satre the French philosopher accredited for the use the term existentialism, said “…the existentialist on the contrary finds it extremely embarrassing that God does not exist, for there disappears with Him all possibility of finding values in an intelligible heaven. There can no longer be any good a priori, since there is no infinite and perfect consciousness to think it. It is nowhere written that “the good” exists, that one must be honest or must not lie, since we are now upon the plane where there are only men.”

The godless world has left us with no sense of objectivity for morality to answer the question “why”. This is because, in its attempt to solidify its stake within the social nerve, secularism celebrates pluralism or inclusiveness as the greatest virtue of life. It was Dostoievsky who said, “If God does not exist, everything would be permitted.” But wait a minute; don’t be fooled by the sheer tolerance attribute of the words pluralism and inclusiveness. For us to understand the dimension of this discussion on pluralism there is the need to explain the forms that pluralism has taken. This paper does not focus on cultural diversity. In fact, cultural diversity or pluralism is much celebrated and really is one of the beauties of creation. What is in focus here is moral pluralism which is to be understood against a broad cultural backdrop with three major components.

Firstly we can take it on the strand of intellectualism, in which case the focus of its expression would be relevant to postmodernism. Here the assertion is that there is no objective truth. Plurality of beliefs is inevitable and there is the need to encourage it. Hence any suggestion to the claim that a group of people or an individual believes in truth presents irritating suspicion and disgust. This is however a false claim and an intellectual dishonesty. By essence the word truth ascribes to itself exclusivity and absoluteness. Hence the claim that there are many truths is a contradiction in term.

On the other hand pluralism can be viewed in the religious sense where the consideration of many religions are said to be of equal valid expression of an ultimate reality. By extension, all religious values or ethical beliefs associated with the religion are acceptable and hence the need to celebrate them. Here again, Christianity will find itself falling of the trail because Jesus said, “And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent” (John 17:3). Christianity has no shame claiming exclusivity in its beliefs and we stand by distinguishing ourselves from the others.

Finally, pluralism can be express as a prevailing liberal political ideology which encourages plurality of beliefs and actions, and points to an emphasis on individuality with regards to freedom of action – in other words self determination. Yet we know that we are not of ourselves entirely whether we are people of God or of the devil. The spiritual politics has not made provision for a demilitarized zone where refuges are kept. You either are hot or cold. There is nothing like absolute freedom and there shall never be. Anytime we make choices, we surrender our will to the benefits and dictates of that thing or person.

The rather clandestine nature of the concept of moral pluralism has left no one responsible for the provision of an answer to why there is so much human evil. There is indifference in dealing with the root cause of evil rather than the consequence. Children are being deprived of knowing a single truth except the truth that there is nothing like an absolute truth. So the hearts and minds of the younger generation have become laboratories for the manufacture of dreadful acts of evil. Talk to any young person and ask about any moral question if it is right or wrong. The very likely answer will be “it depends on the situation and the individual”. Why? Because, the basic training in school is to privatize morality as long as you deem it fit to your developed set of values. G.K. Chesterton said it this way, “The tragedy of disbelieving in God is not that a person ends up believing nothing; alas, it is much worse. A person may end up believing in anything.” This is our world today as a result of the forces of atheism and agnostics manifesting in secularism.

When we speak of right and wrong based on a set of objective values, we are seen to be intolerant with other people’s views and beliefs. Christianity has become one such bad faith because of its claim to moral exclusiveness. The only reason why Christianity has a place in this age of humanity is because it is considered one of the many truths and must be accommodated as long as it does not impose its teachings on other religions and persons who do not share the same moral values.

So when I stand at one point of civilization and try to draw a meaning to life, I find nothing to measure and nothing to hold on to as the bench mark. In his reflection Nietzsche asked, “who gave us as humanity the sponge to wipe the horizon? What sacred games will we need to invent? Is there any up or down left? Must we light lanterns in the morning hours?” obviously we have wiped every form of reference to an objective moral truth. We have slipped suddenly and our pride urges us to consider the slip as an emerging fun. Where are the people with a heart to correct this menace? Then the ‘Job syndrome’ rings in my ears, “are we godless because we are sinful or we are sinful because we are godless?” Our civilization is an advertisement of meaninglessness of our evil enterprising hearts. The pulpit has unfortunately become a decorated shrine with no potency to rescue an ailing generation. If God does not start the course of life; does not define the course of life; and does not call the end of the course of life; all is meaningless because no one will take the responsibility anyway. It is then that existentialism reigns on the back of its upheld philosophy of absurdity.

Written by  L. W. Annobi (E-mail: annobi.nathan@gmail.com)