The previous chapter ended with the introduction of Jesus-Christ to his public ministry. For many years, apart from a lad of twelve, whose story we followed through from Jerusalem back to Nazareth, to a man of thirty years of age there is a complete silence. We read nothing in the New Testament that relates to this carpenter of Nazareth who waited patiently for God’s time to begin to preach the Gospel that would save millions of Jews and Gentiles right up to this century, and beyond, and is still doing it every day and won’t end until the last. Jesus-Christ was introduced to the people by John the Baptist at His Baptism in the River Jordan, John said of Christ: “Look, (or behold) the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the worlds…Then John gave this testimony: ‘I saw the Spirit come down from heaven as a dove and remain on Him. I would not have known Him, except that the one who sent me to baptise with water told me: ‘The man on whom you see the Spirit come down and remain is He who will baptise with the Holy-Spirit. ‘I have seen and testify that this is the Son of God.” (John 1:29-34  

The remainder of the confession from John the Baptist, this remarkable and humble man, gives a fitting end to the ministry of all prophets who prophesied concerning Christ in the Old Testament. I have chosen it to introduce the works and words of Jesus-Christ who during the three years of His Holy Life changed the world, and the eternal destiny of millions of men and women. Concerning these special people, made up of all those He called from the nation of Israel and from the pagan nations, the Gentiles, Jesus said: “All that (or those) the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away, or cast out.” (John 6:37.) This truly is a plus to what John the Baptist said when he declared: “He (Jesus) must become greater; I must become less. The one who comes from above is above all; the one from the earth belongs to the earth, and speaks as one from the earth. The one who comes from heaven is above all. He testifies to what He has seen and heard, but no-one accepts HIS testimony. The one who has accepted it has certified that God is truthful (or truth personified). For the one (Jesus) whom God has sent speaks the words of God, for God gives (Him) the Spirit without limit. The Father loves the Son and has placed everything in His hands. Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God’s wrath remains on Him.” (John 3:31-36.) 

As I have stated, we do not know anything concerning the years of the life that Jesus lived in Nazareth as the son of a carpenter. We know the reason for their flight to Egypt and why Joseph took them to Nazareth. God willed that Luke should mention his visit to Jerusalem at the age of twelve, apart from that there is a total silence. In His relationship at home, with his parents and siblings, Jesus never once forgot who He was and nothing marred His holiness and purity and his love for his earthly family. It was in His pure nature to love, there never was the desire to prove something to them, nor would he ever get into a quarrel with any of them, for Jesus was born without sin, and loved to help His earthly family and the citizens of Nazareth. 

He attended the synagogue, as was expected of Him, and no-one had anything bad to say about Him or lay any charge against Him. In His relationship with them, be it in the synagogue or as He was discharging His work as a carpenter, Jesus never faltered. So, nothing is said about those years, what we can deduce is, that as the time He came to John the Baptist to be baptised by him, he had lived a completely holy, sinless and blameless life, and now he was in the place where God could say something openly about Him and confessed: “This is my Son, whom I love; with Him I am well pleased.” (Matthew: 3:17). The main purpose of Christ’s mission was to offer the tithe of His life, three years, to the purpose of saving those that the Father gave to Him before the foundation of the world, and for which He was going to offer His Holy Life as a sacrifice for the sins of the world. 

We must note that in God’s economy, the first thing that was all important for Him is to reveal to the world that, ‘this Man from Nazareth, Jesus’ “on whom descended, from heaven, the Holy-Spirit like a dove”, so He said for the first time: “This is my Son”! It is crucially important for men of today to know and acknowledge who Jesus really is. Before God can deal kindly with any human being, and lead him to Christ and save him, He, the Father, will firstly convince that person that Jesus is divine, His only begotten Son. This Jesus of Nazareth is God incarnate, and He was so from eternity and remained His Son right from the moment He was conceived in Mary’s womb, yet as such He grew in a normal human family, worked in Nazareth where he was known as the son of Joseph, a carpenter. But suddenly the mystery came to light and baffled human nature for the people of Nazareth said concerning Jesus: “we know His father and mother; how can He now say: I came down from heaven?” (John 6:41-42.) Jesus- Christ is God-man, man-God, whom the Father raised from the dead and seated at His right hand in heaven! (Hebrews 1:1-4)

The greatest sin of the, ‘Church’, or whatever name one might give to it, whether that of Rome, or England, Scotland, etcetera, etcetera, is the complete silence concerning the divinity of Christ, they do this to suit the spirit of the times we live in, because the divinity of Jesus-Christ offends many! Speak of God and everybody is happy, for everyone has some sort of god, but Jesus is unique so are His true followers, but whatever sin such a church is guilty of, it cannot change anything concerning Christ’s origin and His deity, at the end of every argument there always will remain only One Church and she belongs to Christ who is its head. He is Church’s only founder and He is her mighty keeper and defender, He created her and redeemed her and it is He who said: “I will build my Church and the gates of hades (hell) shall not overcome it.  (Prevail against it).” (Matthew 16:18.) Much is said about the true Church in the Epistles in which Paul the apostle says: “Christ loved the Church and gave Himself up for her to make her holy by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to Himself as a radiant church, without stains or wrinkles any other blemish, but holy and blameless.”(Ephesians 5:25-27.)  

Therefore, those clericals that bring Jesus down to a human level are heretics, shutting the only door that God opened for men to repent and return to Him in humility and brokenness of heart. One can only be saved by confessing that Jesus-Christ is the Son of God! The Bible makes it very plain when it says: “But what does it say? The word is near you; it is in your mouth, and in your heart, that is the word of faith we are proclaiming: That if you confess with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord’ (meaning Yahweh ~Jehovah ~ who said ‘I am that I am’) and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with the heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved, as the Scripture says: ‘anyone who trusts in Him will never be put to shame. For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile ~ the same Lord, is Lord (Jehovah- Yahweh) of all and richly blesses all who call on Him, for, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. (Romans 10:8-13.) Everyone means, man or woman, rich or poor, masters or servants, Jew or Gentile, black or white, yellow or red, all without exception! Halleluiah! These are the ones, who from all nations is calling out His Church and when He has finished it, He will take it up, to be where He is!

 For many years the Gospel has turned away from its objectivity to a complete subjectivity, meaning that man has, with subtlety, become the important entity, of which Christ is but a servant.  Many preachers spread a humanised potion of the truth concerning Jesus-Christ, which appeals to man’s questing selfish spirit by which he asks: ‘what can God do for me? Never asking: ‘What should I do for God?’ ‘What can the Gospel do for me?’ ‘What will it give me?’ Therefore, the preaching of the Gospel towards the end of the nineteenth century has become an invitation to happiness, to wealth and the satisfaction of self and all its soulish greed. Take Jesus and you will be happy! You might for a while be very miserable. People will make fun of you, family, neighbours may turn against you. To avoid all this aggravation Christians in general rarely confess openly their faith, or Christ as Lord! 

Of late, I have heard preachers say: ‘If you want to draw people to the Lord be like them, meet them in the Public Houses, theatres, etcetera. There is nothing wrong to go to a public house for a meal with friends and have a drink, but if one goes there with the purpose of proving to them that there is no change in one’s life, or hear you use bad language to prove someone you cannot be, that is pure treason, that idea came out from hell, and it will never draw men to Jesus, if they realise that you are like them how on earth will they feel the need to change?  Although believing truly ‘The Gospel’ will bring happiness and a sense of deep fulfilment, but it will not be this joy which arises from being saved and at peace with God, a conversion will never happen if Jesus-Christ is not the objective of true faith, which changes man to the very core of his being. Christians must continually remember what kind of people they were before ‘this big change happened’. To that end the apostle Paul writes: “Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor male prostitute nor homosexual offenders, nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkard nor slanderers nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God. And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.” (1Corinthians 6:9-11) If one wants to prove to the world that they are like them, then Jesus, is not Lord of such a man or woman!

Not all at Corinth were the type of people that Paull mentions, but all were sinners lost in sin, even if some were bigger sinners than others, for “All have sinned and come short of the glory of God.”(Romans 3:23) But the kind of life they lived has gone, because of what happened to them when they believed in Christ. So, man can never just be happy, nor fulfilled in his quest for self-gratification in unbelief, whatever Christian confession he may belong to, if Jesus-Christ is not given its rightful place, all piety is useless. The word of God says: “Believe on the Lord Jesus-Christ and you will be saved.” (Acts 16:31.) There just is not another way!

Man’s great problem is that he has erred away from God and is His enemy by wicked works. A sinner thinks that he has the full rights to lead his life as he wants, and govern his affairs without any reference to The Almighty, he even vehemently opposes himself to any intrusion in his affairs by anyone, especially God, such a man is lost! His only God is mammon, greed, and all his activities aim at getting as much of it as possible. Money gives power to his egoistic bias! The Bible is right when it says: “The love of money is the root of all evil.”  (1Timothy 6:10).  Now the whole object of the Gospel is to bring man to God through repentance, and convince him that Jesus-Christ is his only hope for living a new life, without sin, now and then forever. The life of a true Christian, while on earth, the New Life Jesus came to give to all those that would believe in Him, is a gift from God. Man is an eternal being but life on earth is transient, short, so true happiness and true fulfilment, now and then, is to live the life that Christ offers and never forget where he was and how he was!

The true message of the Gospel is that ‘Man has lost the way!’ Look at the state of the world; the hatred that is rising again between nations, races, colour of the skin, etcetera. The place man has in society, the echelons of pride, that slot men into different boxes. Look at the deep tensions in politics, between blues and the reds, not sparing the yellows, greens and every other nuance. Wars of words between classes, if that is happiness and freedom, let me tell you it is a time bomb ready to burst, and when it does, then what? The Bible teaches that return to earth of the Lord Jesus Christ will become a necessity to put the world to right. According to the Gospel, which eventually is Christ Himself and His teachings, teaches that the only purpose of the Lord’s coming into the world, was to reconcile man with God, this is why He says: “I am the way the truth and the life. No-one comes to the Father (God) except through me.” (John 14:6.) A bit of piety, of one form or another, seasoned with some morality and one thinks ‘that all is well’! But it is not, a bit of wrong faith is more dangerous than opium, it is the poison for the soul, this notion has led millions to hell, right up to this generation, it is still going the same way, seeking help from the wrong kind of Christianity. But hope is not lost for there still remains the Gospel; what does it teach us? It teaches everything that one needs to be saved and how to live eternal life right here, right now, with Christ in the heart, and making Him the centre of one’s life. 

1. What does the Word of God, the Bible, say about Jesus-Christ?

Although what the apostles wrote concerning Jesus-Christ was written two thousand years ago, it is still as fresh as ever, the Word of God is always in the present, just as Jesus is who said “I am that I am” so is His Word, eternal, and it shall never pass away. It is of great importance to note that the four evangelists, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, never omit, in their record to assert that ‘Jesus is the Son of God!’ His power and divinity and true nature are found everywhere. I have come to the conclusion, after many years in the ministry, that the work of the Holy-Spirit is to reveal, firstly: ‘that Jesus is God’, every faithful herald of the Gospel never tiers to proclaimit, for he knows that it is the key to lead a man to a true conviction of sins. ‘The Good News’ the Gospel, is Christ who came from heaven to rescues men from the devil’s clutches and the weakness of their sinful and human nature. It states that God Himself came into the world, to do what no man could do for himself. Man cannot save himself from the wrath to come; ‘the wages of sin is death.’ (Romans 6:23) I have already quoted the following verse: “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God’s wrath remains on Him.” (John 3:31-36.) 

The whole world is cursed and the object of God’s wrath, whether they be Jews or Gentiles. The Gospel teaches that God has determined to destroy mankind, but by His grace He has deferred this judgement until all those that will believe in Christ are brought out of the world into the Church, the rest of men, that will not believe remain under God’s wrath that shall be revealed on the last day. This is why to be saved, by faith in Christ is so wonderful, and urgent; you can believe in Him right now, and surrender to Him the rest of your life and let Him lead you. A simple Prayer is enough: “Lord Jesus, I believe that you are the Son of God, and that you had to die for me to save me and forgive all my sins. I accept you now as my Saviour! Amen!” So, that you could do this, by His death on the Cross, Jesus positively fulfilled what He came into the world to do! ‘Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures’. (1Corinthians 15:3.) Without the shedding of (His) blood, there is no forgiveness”. 

The first thing the Holy Spirit says through Matthew, Mark, Luke and John whom He inspired, is that Jesus-Christ came from heaven, sent by His father, to save men from eternal damnation and reconcile them with Him. To do this He had to die on a cross, to bear in His body the sins of those that would believe in Him, and rise from the dead to justify them forever! A hymn says: “There was no other good enough to pay the price of sin, He only could unlock the gates of hell and let us in.” Many men came before Christ, and many have come since, but Jesus alone was caught up to heaven, from where He reigns at the right hand of God. All these false Christs gathered a small following and died. Religious men who laid the foundation of pointless pagan religions, that still exist, are just as dead as their gods, so are their beliefs and their thoughts; they all failed. They all rose from the earth and returned to it, there is only ‘One’ that rose from the dead by the glory of His father, that man is Jesus-Christ of Nazareth. 

Firstly, The preaching of the Gospel must begin with the account that gives the apostle John. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through Him (King James version says ‘By Him’. Meaning that Jesus, who is the Word, did it) were all things made; without Him nothing was made that has been made. In Him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in darkness, but the darkness has not understood it (or put it out- or overcome it.)” (John 1:1-5.) 

Whenever was this beginning which deals with all things, all was created by Him, things visible or invisible. Galaxies with their stars and planets, filling infinity in which our earth has been given its place, created, no doubt, much later, but all planets   have been created by this God-man, the Son of man, Jesus of Nazareth, begotten of God, born of a virgin. ‘Emmanuel, ‘God with us. Yes, this God, that became the man called ‘JESUS’, is the One that created the earth on which He came to die! God knew just all the controversy that fallen men would find to dispute these amazing facts, but men’s attitude did not deter the Father from stating the truth concerning His Son. He declared it at His baptism: “As soon as Jesus was baptised, He went out of the water. At that moment heaven opened, and he (John the Baptist) saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and lighting on Him (Christ). And a voice from heaven said, ‘This is my beloved son, whom I love; with Him I am well pleased.”(Matthew 3:16-17.)

At the mount of Jesus’ transfiguration where His glory shone through before those present up the mount, Peter, James and John his brother, Elijah and Moses descended from heaven; in that blissful atmosphere God came down: “While Peter was still speaking, a bright cloud enveloped them, and a voice from Heaven said, ‘This is my Son, whom I love; with Him I am well pleased. Listen to Him!”(Matthew 17:5.) But voices from above, if they came a hundred times, would not make any difference, men are dead spiritually and it is because of the state of the heart that they behave atrociously towards their Creator. Such behaviours from men only prove their inability to fathom the greatness of God’s power. Any man that spends his whole life trying to ridicule the Word will have all eternity to regret it. Men in all generations have mocked God and His existence, and to this day nothing has ever changed, yet God is still God and so is His Word which still stands. There is nothing and no-one that has not got it’

Secondly, John continues: “There came a man who was sent from God; his name was John. (The Baptist ~ (Malachi 3:1) He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, So, that through Him, all men might believe. John was not that light; he came only as a witness to the light. The true light that gives light to every man was coming into the world”. Can you believe it? It can shine in your heart right now and change your whole life for the better!

John the Baptist was a special prophet, it is to him that God revealed that Christ was on earth and hat He was His Son and John saw it and introduced Jesus to the people. God gave John a sign so that he would recognise Jesus when He came to Him, when He saw the Holy Spirit descend on Jesus and fill Him, that was the sign, John the Baptist said: “I saw the Spirit come down from Heaven as a dove and remain on Him. I would not have known Him, except that the One who sent me to baptise with water told me, ‘The man on whom you see the Spirit come down and remain is he who will baptise with the Holy Spirit. I have seen and testify that this is the Son of God.” (John 1:32-34.) 

So, John the Baptist gave revelations that are still potent and real today, for nothing ever changes in the plan of God of which Jesus is the centre. What John the Baptist said he did it as a witness to the Israelites and every nation on earth, then and now, his words are a living witness to the true character of the Son of God and as God showed it to him, he revealed His true origin and mission on earth. We cannot be so blind as not be able to see how important it was to God, to reveal to men the greatness and glory of Christ His Son, since through Him, His beloved Son, He is still willing and able to meet their great need of redemption and the forgiveness of all their sins. 

It is true to say that the need of man’s salvation started in Eden, where God gave the first inkling that He was going to send a deliverer. (Genesis 3:15.) Adam sinned and became slave to its power which always leads to death, from which man cannot free himself, but the deliverer came, Emmanuel, ‘God with us’, with God on his side he cannot fail.  So: Nothing and no-one could set men free from this yoke of servitude, except the promised redeemer. When the time actually came God sent one man, John the Baptist, to announce to Israel that the deliver has come, and that He was already amongst them. True preachers are not made in colleges or Universities, although knowledge of any sort, if consecrated, can be an asset, preachers are made and sent by God, they are men furnished with the right character, experience and a deep love for Christ, men baptised in the Holy Spirit, anointed and appointed by Him.

We sense here that Christ was sent to the whole world ‘so that through Him all men might believe.’ To that end the apostle John states: “For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only (begotten) Son, that whoever (Jew or Gentile) believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life”. (John 3:16.) History shows that most men dismissed Him, but many have believed in Him and enjoy eternal life, some are in paradise already, whilst others enjoy life in Jesus on earth right now, the end will come when the last elect is brought into the fold. It becomes obvious, as we read what John the Baptist spoke concerning the Lord, and of His mission to save men lost in sin, how deeply he honoured Him.To that fact the Old and the New Testaments prove how important was the mission of every prophet and preacher, right down to the witnessing of every disciple of Christ. One man sent of God, with the power of the Holy-Spirit upon him, has proved, time and time again, to be greater than an army.

Thirdly, “He was in the world, and though the world was made through (by) Him, the world did not recognise Him. He came to that which was His own, (Israel) and His own did not receive Him. Yet all those that received Him, to those that believed in His Name, He gave the right (the privilege – the power) to become children of God ~ children born not of natural descent, nor human decision of a husband’s will, but born of God… The WORD became flesh and made His dwelling among us. We have seen His glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.” (John 1: 1-14)

So often people say, no-one has ever seen God, it is like a ‘cliché’ men just say what they have heard from others, unbelievers have a small ‘repertoire’ it has not changed for centuries, yet they use it over and over again and again, whatever their race, colour or creed, it just sounds good to them, but in fact, many have seen God, many have heard Him, but never did they hear God more plainly, than when His Son was on earth and spoke His words to the crowds that heard Him! Jesus-Christ has been seen by crowds of people, they heard Him, they saw Him, handled Him as He walked through the crowd, they touched Him and were healed. Jesus said to His disciples: “Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father” (John 14:9.) The problem with men, is their unbelief and hardness of heart, the facts are all around us, but men are blind and rebellious to the WORD! God, it is said, made his dwelling amongst us. Many have said: ‘If we can see a miracle we shall believe!’ Yet, thousands upon thousands have seen mighty miracles, in the days of Christ and His apostles, throughout History to this very day, and they have not believed! This mighty creative power, which out of nothing made everything that exists, visible or invisible, even every man alive, because God gave him life and breath, and to all those that live today, right to the very least one, all have their life and breath from of Him. (Acts 17: 24-27).

John says that Jesus took him up the mountain, together with Peter, James his brother, as I mentioned previously. There, before them He was transfigured and His inner glory shone out before them, for Jesus never ceased to be God, in this holy atmosphere, they felt as being in heaven, so much so that Peter said: “Lord, it is good for us to be here, we will set up tents, and we shall live here, in this blessed presence forever, with You, with Elijah and with Moses.” (Matthew 17:1-8.) But it could not be done, because they had a mission to fulfil, a GOSPEL to preach and lead men back to God.  So, they had to return on ground level, into reality. But these three never forgot their experience which they shared with everybody once Jesus was glorified. Nor could they forget the voice of God the Father, who from the cloud said: “This is my Son, whom I love, with Him I am well pleased, LISTEN to Him!” The greatest tragedy on earth, and the reason the world is as it is, is because men have not listened to Jesus and sin was finished when they killed Him.

He came to His own people, it is to Israel that God sent Jesus, the Jewish authorities did not receive Him. They hated him, they hated His message and all that He stood for. Nevertheless, some did listen to Him, the elect believed in Him, and to all those who put their trust in Him; He gave the right to become sons, children, of God. Children born of God! This creative WORD came to recreated dead men into New men, a new spirit came into them and they were born again by the operation of the Holy-Spirit. You also have that right, but you must believe all that Jesus says about Himself. The WORD that was with God, the WORD that was God became flesh; a perfect man, He was God yet absolutely human, shared humanity with us, and was tempted in all points, just as we are, yet without sin. He came into the world pure and without sin. After thirty and three years He was still as pure and as sinless as He was when born in the manger, and He laid down His sinless life willingly, as a sacrifice for our sins, now from heaven He forgives the sins of all those that, listening to the Gospel preached to them; believe that only His blood can wash their sins away!

John the Baptist cries out, saying: ‘This was He of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me has surpassed me because He was before me.’ From the fullness of His grace, we have all received one blessing after another. For the LAW (The Ten Commandments etcetera) was given by Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus-Christ. No-one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only (or the only begotten SON) Who is at the Father’s side, has made Him known.” The record, as we find it in the New Testament, which includes the words and the life of Jesus-Christ, is the only one on earth, in which we can find everything we need help man find God and know Him! All the references written above are part of the first chapter of the Gospel of John, which we will end with the quotation of the confession of John the Baptist which he made concerning Jesus-Christ’. John the Baptist was a jewel of humility and faithfulness, a perfect example for all men, Christ deigns to call to serve Him in the greatest mission on earth, for which He came down from heaven: “To preach good news to the poor.”.

These words were spoken by the greatest prophet: “Now this was John’s testimony when the Jews of Jerusalem sent priests and Levites to ask him who he was. He did not fail to confess, but confessed freely: ‘I am not the Christ. They asked him: ‘Then who are you? Are you Elijah?’ He said: ‘I am not’. ‘Are you the Prophet?’ He answered: ‘NO’. Finally, they said: Who are you? Give us an answer to take back to those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?’ John the Baptist replied in the words of Isaiah the prophet: ‘I am the voice of one calling in the desert: ‘Make straight the way for the Lord. Now some Pharisees who had been sent questioned him: ‘Why then do you baptise if you are not the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the prophet’? I baptise you with water’ John replied, ‘but among you stands one you do not know. He is the one who comes after me, the thongs of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie” (John 1:1-28.) 

Jesus, as God, came to open a new era by which He ended the previous Covenant, which God made with Israel, through Moses, when they reached Mount Sinai. God gave the Ten Commandments to bring sin out into the open and show how sinful and hopeless and lost is all of mankind. After all the failures, and the awful sin of bringing God’s Son to an unjust death, the Jews still stick to the Law and continue to reject Jesus-Christ, as do most of the Gentiles; all still blindly follow their pride and stubbornness, always trying to save themselves in their own way. Generation after generation, the people of Israel have been unable to obey the Law. It took God a long time to teach them their insufficiency, and how weak they were, calling them continually to trust in Him fully, but they would not! It was for the hardness of their heart and their rebellion that God finally sent them into captivity in Babylon. Seventy years after they returned to the land, by God’s mighty intervention, and still they did not get the message, and when God sent Jesus to them the nation was under the power of the Roman Empire having lost freedom and the uniqueness as God’s own people!  

God had spoken by His prophets and promised a new beginning. That time had come; God works to His own calendar and on the set time, He sent to the World Emmanuel, who as God came to do for man what man could not do for himself, and after fulfilling the whole Law to the letter, Jesus brought into force THE New Covenant, God granting forgiveness of sins and eternal life, without merit whatsoever, to all those ‘Who believed in His name.’! That is pure GRACE the unmerited favour from an offended God. By true repentance and faith in Christ, God’s Son, men are brought back into an eternal communion with God! Do you still think that you can become perfect without the help of Emmanuel? I say perfect, because that is how one needs to be to enter God’s presence. Being good won’t do, men have to learn once and for all that to enter Heaven where God resides one must be perfect. 

I have learned that, when men are suddenly face to face with God’s Holiness and that He requires from men true perfection, they rebel against such a statement and come quickly to the conclusion that no man can be perfect and sinless, hence, no-one can ever hope to reach heaven. A false teaching has convinced men that doing your best is all that God requires! That kind of Gospel is the fruit of a backslidden clergy who offer no hope for a sinner that needs to know the Grace of God; under a ‘New Covenant, eternal life and forgiveness of sins, are given freely to all that accept Jesus Christ as their Saviour. The Bible speaks, and on what it says is built the true faith concerning Christ and His power to save: “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of god, and are justified freely by His grace!” (Romans 3:23) …”  For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Romans 6:23) So no-one needs despair for Jesus Christ has opened a new way, by which men can return to God and make their peace with God whom they have offended!

Accept Christ and with Him in your heart you will be, in the eyes of God, as perfect as He. Much of what is written in this first chapter of the Gospel of John is detailed and amplified in the rest of the Gospel, and it ends with the risen Christ ministering loving words to His disciples restoring them with a breakfast He cooked around a camp fire. Jesus-Christ, the man-God, victor over the devil, sin and death, resurrected, in a NEW glorified body, this King of kings and Lord of lords, prepared and served, on the beach in Galilee, a cooked breakfast of fish to a band of hungry fishermen! That is absolutely amazing, God’s love is beyond comprehension! Jesus, knew the way to their hearts, and how to restore them, for He knew how they felt the weight of their failure. They forsook Him, Peter denied Him, they all fled and left Him, and yet Jesus comes lovingly, as a servant, to restore them to a renewed fellowship, not even once did Jesus mentioned anything about their unbelief and miserable failure. Halleluiah, what a SAVIOUR! Can you continue to live without Him? You cannot afford to be that foolish! We must add that it is faith is Christ, whilst it saves all that turn to Him in true repentance; it also changes the whole aspect of the world. In the eyes of God, the world is divided into two distinct groups of people; The Christians on one hand, and the Non-Christians on the other; of believers and unbelievers, and each group is destined to a different place Heaven for the Christian, and Hell for the Non-Christian! The change that Jesus Christ made to the world is that radical! One can agree with it or disagree, but one’s opinion does not make one iota of difference, this is how God has willed it!

Fourthly. Luke in his record of the Gospel brings to our attention the visit of an angel to Mary in Nazareth. A very Human story, this is the record: “In the sixth month, (Of Elizabeth pregnancy as mentioned in Luke 1:23-25.) God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man called Joseph, a descendant of David ~ The great King of Israel ~ The virgin’s name was Mary. The angel went to her and said, “Greetings, you who are highly favoured! The Lord is with you.” Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. But the angel said to her, ‘Do not be afraid, Mary, you have found favour with God. You will be with child and give birth to a son, and you are to give Him the name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of The Most-High. The Lord will give Him the throne of His father David, and He will reign over the house of Jacob for ever; His kingdom will never end.’

         ‘How will this thing be,’ Mary asked the angel, ‘since I am a virgin?’ The angel answered, ‘The Holy-Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most-High will overshadow you, So the Holy one to be born will be called The Son of God.’ Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was barren is in her sixth month. For nothing is impossible with God.’

         I am the Lord’s servant, said Mary. May it be to me as you have said. Then the angel left her.John said: And the WORD became flesh! It happened just as John wrote it. (John 1: 14)

As I have said before, I type these passaged of Holy Scriptures, because some folk may not have a Bible or have never heard of one, it is therefore important for all to be able to read the words of the Bible which I quote word for word! They are the true Gospel. Whereas John the apostle was inspired by the Holy Spirit to write his account of the Gospel, He was led by the Holy Spirit, right at the beginning, to present the role of Christ in creation, who He was and is, the second person of the Holy Trinity, and all what He did prior to His coming into the world. But as for Luke, He was inspired to present the human side of Christ’s personality, and the miracle of Christ’s incarnation, with all the personalities involved in it, right from Zachariah and Elizabeth, Mary’s cousin, who were the parents of John the Baptist. They were little people with a big faith in God which qualified them for huge purposes in God’s plan. 

Thus, the Bible brings humanity and divinity together, Emmanuel: ‘God with us.’  However, we must note that God simply states things as they were, as they still are, truth that will stand forever. The Bible does not spent time to explain events so as to help us humans to understand this miraculous birth of Jesus-Christ the Son of the Living God. To understand God and appreciate Him and what He says: “one must be born again of the Holy Spirit!” He gives faith to those He wants to, and as such they believe in the impossible. If you need this faith humbly ask God to give it to you, and He will.  From its very beginning the Gospel invites men to consider the miraculous character of Christ and Christianity. Men have invented many religions, before Jesus came into the world and since he left it, but only He, the Son of God, has brought true faith, faith that works and creates a new life! Outside of this faith we have a collection of man’s efforts to find how to approach and communicate with a god, without ever finding the way to reach the True God; in fact, all their efforts have proved to be damnable.

Idolatry is the fruit of man’s useless efforts to find God, and it is his greatest sin which is his rebellion to Him. In Christ, God takes the initiative and opens a way of repentance, which alone can lead man back to Him. God’s way results in the salvation of his soul by faith in Christ, and leads man to reconcile himself with His Creator through the forgiveness of his sins. Outside of Jesus-Christ there is no way to return to God, who has appointed a day of wrath, in which He will take vengeance on the ungodly, and all his ungodly deeds. The Bible is a book one must approach humbly, with the respect it merits, for in it God our maker is revealing His love and what He has planned to redeem man from the power of sin and the misery it has imposed on humanity, and to save forever those that will believe. These powerful words can alone create a new life, eternal life, in men that are dead in sin! There are so many other statements in the Bible that support the truths expressed until now, but these belong to a more detailed study! Of the many subjects that have been written up till now, none is more wonderful than the deity of The Founder of the CHURCH, which is CHRIST the Lord blessed forever! What I have quoted is sufficient to establish that the babe that was born in a manger in Bethlehem, is the one that appeared to the public at the age of thirty when he begun to preach the unsearchable riches of the Gospel, which brings an eternal hope to a lost world. God has ordained that Christ be preached also to our generation; it might be the last one! The end times are upon us, Jesus is coming back, soon. Make your peace with God now, tomorrow might be too late!

Fifthly. Matthew states the following concerning Christ, the Son of God, and His miraculous birth. “This is how the birth of Jesus-Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit. Because Joseph was a righteous man and did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly, but after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said: ‘Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what she conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you will give Him the name Jesus, (Jesus is the Greek form of Joshua, or Hosea meaning ‘God saves) because He will save His people from their sins.’ All this took place to fulfil what the Lord had said through the prophet: ‘The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call Him Immanuel’ (Quoted from Isaiah 7:14) ~ which means ~ ‘God with us’.” When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord commanded him and took Mary home as his wife. But he had no union with her until she gave birth to a son. And he gave him the name: Jesus.” (Matthew1:18-24.) It takes a big man to trust God to do the impossible.

I wonder how anyone can profess to preach the Gospel, if they never mention that Jesus is God in flesh. Many mention Jesus as a man that is not wrong in itself, for He was truly man, but He was also God incarnate, who knew hunger and thirst, got tired and fell asleep in a boat, this he did right in the midst of a tempest and he did not wake up. He wept at the tomb of His friend Lazarus, and brought comfort to his grieving sisters by raising him back to life. So now, because of Jesus and all that he accomplished during three years of His life which ended in His sacrificial death on the Cross, the poorest and most insignificant of men, despised by masters and rulers, can be born into the family of God! HOW? 

“If you confess with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord’ (meaning Jesus is Yahweh ~ God) and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. If man is not convinced of the fact that Jesus- Christ is God, he cannot be saved. It is found in The New Testament’s teaching from Matthew to Revelation, all writers accord to Christ His rightful place, and teach that Jesus is divine, the Son of the Living God, the second person in the Divine Trinity! The apostle John starts by stating firmly: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” (John 1:1) And that: “The word became flesh and made His dwelling among us. We have seen His glory, the glory of the One and Only (Begotten) who came from the father, full of grace and truth.” (John 1:14.) At one point Jesus took, as I said before, Peter, James and John his brother and: “Led them up a high mountain by themselves. There He was transfigured before them. His face shone like the sun, and his clothes became white as white as the light. …While he was still speaking, a bright cloud enveloped them, and a voice from the cloud said: ‘this is my Son, whom I love; with Him I am well pleased. Listen to Him’. When the disciple heard this, they fell, face down to the ground, terrified. But Jesus came and touched them. ’Get up’ He said. ‘Don’t be afraid.’ When they looked up, they saw no one except Jesus” (Matthew 17:1-6.) 

When God began to prepare Martin Luther for the great work he did, he said, as he was facing the truth of his ignorance and said: “How can I love a God I do not know?” But He got to know Him in the reading of the New Testament, with the revelation that he found concerning Jesus-Christ, began the Reformation, which has to this day saved the ‘True Church’ from corruption but it has not changed ‘the false Church’ it is still lost without a ‘raison-d’etre’. It still is irrelevant to the true message of the Gospel. Luther discovered what Jesus meant when He said to Phillip: “Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father.” (John 14:9-10.) Jesus revealed His Father in His life, in His words and in everything He did. All the miracles Jesus performed were done with that purpose in mind, and they spoke of the presence of the Father in Him, for Jesus said: “The words I say to you are not just my own. Rather, it is the Father living in me, who is doing the work.” (John 14:10.) Jesus might have left His glory when He came to dwell amongst men, but he never lost the oneness that exists in the Holy Trinity from eternity! Much more could be said about Jesus-Christ, loved and honoured, worshipped and adored by all those that He has saved, but what I have written about Him is sufficient to bring a sinner to confess that Jesus-Christ is Lord and be saved.

2.                                  The sovereignty of God.

Firstly. It is since the nineteenth century, that the nations of the Western world, (mainly those of Western Europe and the USA) have gradually lost all notions of spiritual realities. Of all religions existing in the world, only the Christian faith has lost ground and very few now believe in the fundamentals of the faith. The governments of what used to be known as Christian Countries, have changed morals laws, by acts of parliament, to the extent that nowadays everything is permitted under the excuse of human rights. To such God says: “The soul that sins it shall die”. Nevertheless, if such things are prominent in a modern way of life, true Christians should not be surprised that it is so, for it was prophesied and taught by the apostles, that in the end times there will be a great departure from the faith, and sadly, worse is yet to come. Such backslidings point to the near return of Jesus Christ.

With the increase of knowledge, and all the inventions, that have completely changed the way the nations of the world live, yet after all that men of science have discovered is what God had previously created. Whereas science should help men to glorify God it has led the world into a greater unbelief and rebellion. This advance in science should have helped man to admire the wisdom and power of his Creator, but it has used its discoveries to promote ungodliness, not that all scientists are unbelievers, but it is the unbelieving lot that men listen to! This attitude shows that even as knowledge increases so does the rebellion of man to God, and the wisest have become greater fools. Man cannot help himself, by nature he is an enemy of God. Whereas modern man has increased in knowledge above his predecessors, to the extent that new gadgets appear almost daily, especially in the field of electronics; in his heart man has not changed at all, his attitude to his Creator, to whom He owes honour and praise, has made him a thankless entity and has turned most men into godless, thankless creatures; nevertheless, it does not stop Jesus, the good shepherd, to seek and find His sheep and bring them to the safety of Home! It is so because the unbelieving world is ruled by evil forces that make men an God’s enemies, but together they shall know a terrible end!

Unbeknown to the world at large, a truth it cannot grasp or accept is that God has always been the supreme authority over it, and evil men can only go as far as God allows them to. I have mentioned in previous chapters things concerning this subject, men will not admit that God has the absolute right to rule their lives, all His creation speaks of His power and supremacy; it is God who rules the earth, heavens and all its hosts, although evil is rampant God reigns as KING over all nations. His work at present is not to destroy men; He waits patiently for the repentance of all that will be saved. Many have yet to join the family of God. Jesus is still building His Church, and through the Grace of God the Holy Spirit will present her to Him perfect, sinless and holy. God has, in His sovereignty, already established decrees and set times when He will bring the world and men to a sudden end and burn it with fire! “Then death and hades were thrown into the lake of fir. The lake of fire is the second death. Man lives a living death while on earth; he is without hope and without God. Translated into a new eternal existence, his soul will be cast away from the presence of God forever ~ that will be hell; men damned forever! If anyone’s name was not found in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.” (Revelation 20: 14-15.) 

Nevertheless, having decided how to bring an end to the devil and his wicked subjects, that have polluted God’s creation, He deals with the people of the world with love, patience and kindness, for in the midst of all the evil and sufferings, brought about by Satan’s activities and that of his demons, God in His sovereignty is calling out from the world a new humanity, a people which He is preparing for a New Heaven and a New Earth. Satan master’s men, and through the power of sin has raised them to fight and resist their Creator, and together they will finally bring all men to the unavoidable day of judgement. The way God is dealing with men, since the fall of Adam, has one governing factor, which brings out into light another side of His divine character, such as His love and loving-kindness, to save certain people from sin, people He has chosen for Himself before the foundation of the earth; He does it through the miracle of the new birth, by an operation of the Holy Spirit, sinners lost and doomed for hell, by faith in Christ, become God’s sons.

Secondly, the mighty power of God is seen in the Bible in His dealings with men out of control, such as Kings, Governors and rulers, which are set over men and abuse their position He has given them.  Sometimes God has dealt with them directly, such as in the case of King Herod Agrippa, when he gave a public address in Tyre, the record says: “On the appointed day Herod, wearing his royal robes, sat on his throne and delivered a public address to the people. They shouted, “This is the voice of a god, not of a man.” Immediately, because Herod did not give praise to God, an angel of the Lord struck him down, and he was eaten by worms and died.” (Acts 12:21-23.) It is man’s great folly to live his life in doing what he wants without realising that he can stray too far, then, through his pride and rebellion lose his own life. 

It is like the story of this rich man whose fields yielded a great abundance of goods! He looked at it with pride and said, now I have enough to sell the lot, retire and live it up! This is what the Bible says concerning him: “Jesus told his disciples this parable, called (the parable of a rich fool.) The ground of a certain man produced a good cop. He thought to himself, ‘What shall I do?’ I have no place to store my crops.’ Then he said, ‘This is what I’ll do. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I’ll say to myself, ‘You have plenty of good things laid up for many years. Take life easy, eat and drink and be merry.’ But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself? This is how it will be with anyone who stores up things for himself but is not rich towards God (Luke 12:16-21.) 

This foolish man had no thoughts of God, he thought he did so well, with his own craft and strength he managed it, and never thought that it was God who sent the sun and the rain, just as He promised, and in his foolish pride this foolish man did not give God the glory, he was not thankful for what God gave him; for health, wealth, and goods are gifts from God. God does not go about cutting down the life of men, but the lesson of this message draws our attention to the fact that life is very uncertain. Man should never forget that it is God that gives life and breath and all these things, as I have already mentioned previously. Eventually, come ‘The Ultimate Voyage’ and if we are in the wrong boat, hell is the end of the road for all godless men; this truth is an unavoidable fact of life.

We live in a very materialistic world, men are greedy, wanting more and more and sell their soul to unscrupulous creditors, a life that has been called; ‘living on the never-never!’ Many will never finish paying their debts; but they want it so, at all cost they have to have it! There was a time when profits sufficed; nowadays in general, men are in business not only to make money but to make a lot of money!  Inspired by greed, most of them rob and cheat at will. They rip off people giving them little in return. Crooked deals are plentiful; men are lovers of money and the pleasure it gives them, they live as if they are without any responsibility, and yet God sees it all and none will get away! “Now listen, you rich people, weep and wail because of the misery that is coming upon you. Your wealth has rotted, and moths have eaten your clothes. Your gold and silver are corroded. Their corrosion will testify against you and eat your flesh like fire. You have hoarded wealth in the last days. Look! The wages you failed to pay the workmen who moved your fields are crying out against you. The cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord Almighty. You have lived on earth in luxury and self-indulgence. You have fattened yourself for the day of slaughter. You have condemned and murdered innocent men, who were not opposing you.” (James 5:1-6) No! There is no escape from the reach of God, whose righteousness will shine for those that have wrongly suffered under the hand of greedy and unrighteous men!

This is why the Bible is foretelling the collapse of The Financial World which is built on godless foundations; a secular world building their sorry end. All the money in the world will suddenly become worthless and then what will men do? If I am reading rightly the Word of God, most of them will even blame Him for it. Job was a man who accumulated great wealth. Over a very short time he lost everything he had, and even all his family. His wife said to Him: ‘Curse God and die!’ But Job was a righteous man and had faith in God and trusted Him fully, instead he said: “The Lord has given; the Lord has taken away, blessed be the Name of the Lord!” He said to his friends: “If I have put my trust in gold, and said to pure gold. ‘You are my security. If I have rejoiced over my great wealth, the fortune my hands have gained. Then these also would be sins to be judged, for I would have been unfaithful to God on high.” (Job 31:24-28.) How very different is the reaction of the godly to that of the ungodly? This is why we live in times of God’s patience, forbearing and forgiving men waiting for them to repent of their sins and return to Him through faith in Christ! The love of God is speaking to men through the Gospel, which is Christ, but at the same time, by the Gospel He forewarns the whole world, because one day, the door of grace will shut, and when that happens? It will be too late! God who is gracious and kind is also a hater of sin and He is righteous, He cannot let sin go unpunished, He has vowed to put sin out of His total domain forever and He is doing it, men may ignore Him but they cannot hide from Him

Thirdly, if God does apply himself in this way to deal with simple men; He does not spare the high and mighty either! It appears sometimes to men, down the ladder of society that the rich and the mighty get away with murder, as we say. But God does not spare anyone from his righteous intervention. There is a story in the Bible from which we got the saying: ‘The writing on the wall.’  It happened in the times of Daniel, who was a mighty man of faith in the days of Israel’s captivity in Babylon. One day he was summoned to appear urgently before the King Belshazzar, who succeeded his father King Nebuchadnezzar, to him Daniel explained dreams and visions that God gave him. 

In spite of all that King Belshazzar knew about his father’s experiences with God, and all that happened to him, he went and organized a great banquet for thousands of his nobles and drank wine with them. He drank far too much and became careless, as it often happens to men who indulge in too much eating and drinking, it says that at one point: “He gave orders to bring in the gold and silver goblets his father had taken from the temple in Jerusalem, so that the king and the nobles, his wives and his concubines might drink from them…So they drank the wine, they praised the gods of gold and silver of bronze, iron wood and stone. Suddenly the fingers of a human hand appeared and wrote on the wall, near the lampstand in the royal palace. The king watched the hand as it wrote. His face turned pale and he was so frightened that his knees knocked together and his legs gave way.”

It is a fact that there comes the time in every man’s life when he can carelessly steps over the line, whether they be Kings or subjects of Kings, men suddenly feel that they have gone too far and their life changes for ever, and fear takes over their mind and heart. King Belshazzar realised that something awesome was taking place. He called: “Enchanters, astrologers and diviners…. All the king’s wise men came in, but they could not read the writing or tell the king what it meant. So, King Belshazzar became even more terrified and his face grew pale. His nobles were baffled! The queen, hearing the voices of the king and his nobles, came into the banquet hall” She had heard of Daniel, who in the days of her father-in- law explained to him dreams that troubled him, so that he too could not sleep. 

So, finally they brought in Daniel, the servant of Jehovah, before King Belshazzar and told him: “O king, the Most High God gave your father Nebuchadnezzar sovereignty and greatness and glory and splendour. Because of the high position He gave him, all the people and nations and men of every language dreaded and feared him. Those the king wanted to put to death, he put to death; those he wanted to spare, he spared; those he wanted to promote, he promoted; and those he wanted to humble, he humbled. But when his heart became arrogant and hardened with pride, he was deposed from his royal throne and stripped from his glory. He was driven away from his people and given the mind of an animal; he lived with the wild donkeys and ate grass like cattle; and his body was drenched with the dew of heaven, until he acknowledged that the Most High God is sovereign over the kingdoms of men and sets over anyone He wishes.

There is enough in this portion of the Bible, to show that men are but a breath before their Creator. Pride is an awful thing, but God has intervened to humble men, raised them up, only to bring them down again, He even ends their lives if needed their pride brought them down as the case of ‘King Belshazzar’. God sets up kings, governors and rulers. At set times, many nations have elections of presidents and governments, this happens among nations that are rules by a democratic form of government, which is not perfect, but better than any other! It happens often that there are surprises, and people that one never thought possible, win the election! Why? How often have I heard people say: (I quote fictionally) ‘I wanted to vote for John, but at the booth I chose Martin’, I suddenly thought he would be a better president than John. He was not the only one that thought like that because Martin became president for another term, and not John; Why? Such things are mysteries only for unbelievers, because people that believe in God and His sovereign power know that God reigns over the affairs of men! Finally, He has the last word and chooses whom He wants to rule even a democratic nation! Men have a lot to learn, even Christians, at times, not to act as if it was all up to them, and are surprised when the unbelievable happens! Why? Because it is God who sets up kings, governors and rulers. 

So, Daniel continued to explain to the King and said: “But you his son, O Belshazzar have not humbled yourself, though you knew this. Instead, you have set yourself up against the Lord of heaven. You had the goblets from his temple brought to you, and you and your nobles, you wives and your concubines drank wine from them. You praised the gods of silver and gold, of bronze, iron, wood and stone, which cannot see or hear or understand. Bu you did not honour the God who holds in His hands your life and all your ways. 

Therefore, He sent the hand that wrote the inscription. MENE, MENE, TEKEL, PARSIN. This is what the words mean:

MENE; God has numbered the days of your reign and brought it to an end.

TEKEL; you have been weighed on the scales and found wanting (too light).

PERES (the singular of PARSIN.) Your kingdom is divided and given to Medes and Persians.

Then at Belshazzar’s command, Daniel was clothed in purple, a gold chain was placed around his neck, and he was proclaimed the third highest ruler in the kingdom.

That very night Belshazzar, king of Babylonians, was slain, and Darius the Mede took over the kingdom, at the age of sixty-two”. (Daniel 5)

Now obviously the easiest thing man can do is to say: ‘I do not believe it!’ But whether one believes it or not, it changes nothing, because up to this day and age God works in the same way and however hard it is for the natural man to believe it and fear God, he is only here for as long as God grants him breath! It is HE, that holds man’s life and ways in His hands, and in His patience, he may spare, but eventually, every man will face the judge of all the earth and give an account for his rebellion and godless living! Some believe that this only happened in the Old Testament, and that in the New Testament God does not do this anymore. That’s a cop out, because we see that the same things happen as already quoted, but to Christians, the disciples wrote words to instruct the believers to teach that we all owe respect they our rulers. Paul the apostle writes: “Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God. Consequently, he who rebels against the authority is rebelling against God who has instituted, and those who so will bring judgement on themselves.”(Romans 13: 1.) These words bring clearly to light how God’s hand is ruling the affairs of all nations. 

Jesus Himself was questioned about the honour we owe to our rulers. In His days the rulers of Israel and all the people with them were ruled by Rome, a Gentile power, which the people and their rulers hated; they ‘were sons of Abraham’, and through pride they found it hard to submit to a rule that they despised. But in their hypocrisy, they tried to trap the Lord Jesus Christ, so as to find a reason to accuse Him of sedition before these hated rulers, but “Jesus took a coin and asked them whose portrait is this? And whose inscription? ‘Caesar’s, they replied.’ Then he said to them, ‘Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s.” (Matthew 22: 15-22.) There are, of course, many other references to this matter, but we have enough to settle our minds on this biblical fact. God is master, and He alone rules, even the wicked is limited in his crimes, he is even free, if he so wished, to hung himself for his wrong doings, but when God says it is enough, then it is enough!

Fourthly, We cannot overemphasize to the people of the world, that Jesus came down on earth without man’s permission, and before His ascension He gave orders to His disciples, to go and preach the Gospel to the whole world, because it belongs to Him, He made it, and He made great, eternal plans for it! In His divine will, according to that plan, Jesus is building ‘His Church’ in every nation under the Sun; the Holy Spirit calls His elects. This Jesus did, in love for the whole world, which after all, is a product of His great authority and power! He is, ‘God.’ who, loves creating things not just for the pleasure of it, but with a great purpose! Everything that He has created has a purpose and a place in infinity, nothing that floats in space is without a purpose and nothing is created outside of God’s control. 

He is the Sovereign ruler over every created being, some we know about, for they are mentioned in the Bible, such as angels, archangels etcetera, others we know nothing about, but one thing we do know, that everything outside this globe and right through the whole of God’s creation, is perfect, holy, beautiful and that everything out there, is outside the scope of evil, earth alone knows his destructive and evil influence of sin which is the devil’s venom. Death is only known to man on earth, with all its sufferings, injustices, violence and cruelty, all imperfections are the product of sin. Into this world, dead in trespasses and sins, God has, in His Sovereignty, put into motion a plan decided upon before the creation of the earth, according to which He works to bring a new life out of this death, and create a new people that does bear His Name.  

Whatever opposition He might have encountered from men and demons, it has not deterred God, nor stopped Him from doing what He planned and willed by his love. To this very day, through the preaching of the Gospel, Jesus still saves people, for God is love, and no power on earth will stop Him from bringing the last elect to the CROSS to save his soul! His sovereignty is at work on earth and outside of it, undeterred and always fulfilling His will. Since Adam fell, men under the rule of Satan have rebelled against God, by various means have pitted themselves against Him, yet no-one has been able to press Him into annulling this great plan for the restauration of this planet, lost in sin. In the world today God reigns supreme, and continues to work for the salvation of mankind, all those that will yield their will to do His. The Psalmist said: “I know that the Lord is great, that our Lord is greater than all gods. The Lord does whatever pleases Him, in the heavens and on the earth, in the seas and all their depths… He makes the clouds rise from the ends of the earth; he sends lightning with the rain and brings out the wind from His storehouses…The idols of the nations are silver and gold, made by the hands of men. They have mouths, but cannot speak. Eyes, but they cannot see; they have ears, but cannot hear, nor is there breath in their mouths. Those who make them will be like them and so will all who trust in them!” (Psalm 135:5-7 & 15-18.) 

The Bible says: “It is terrible thing to fall in the hands of Almighty God.”  He Deals with great patience with the worst of sinners, always hoping that he will listen to his conscience, (which is His laws imprinted on man’s soul), change his ways and return to Him with a profound repentance. His judgements are never rush, He always forewarns man of what will happen, if with pride and hardness of heart he continues to resist Him, he will, finally, in His own time and in His own way, deal harshly and radically with foolish unbelievers, for they have crossed the point of no return. Faith in God is not some kind of morality; but true faith is obedience to His will which is found in the Gospel! 

Fifthly, I mentioned previously how God dealt with Cain, after that he mercilessly killed his brother Abel by casting Him away from His presence! He gave him time to amend his ways by warning him what sin was about to do to him, but Cain did not listen to God and planned to, and murdered Abel for no reason at all! There is no greater punishment for man than to be banished from God’s presence; we see the awfulness of it as we read the dreadful end of all rebels, men that gave their soul to promote evil whilst in bondage to the devil. (Revelation 20:7-15.) When the earth was filled with violence, in the days of the flood, it repented God to have created man, He gave them one hundred and twenty years to change their ways; during all that time, Noah, under his instructions, was building the ark, warning his contemporaries that God was about to send rain and end their lives with a flood! They mocked him, thinking that this poor man lost his mind. It is believed that until the flood, a heavy dew watered the earth during the nights, and that no rain fell from heaven, as we know it, rain started falling on that day! The heavens opened to flood the earth. (Read Genesis 6 to 9). During those long years generations of men were born into the world, they saw this strange man, Noah, building an ark near forests, and they wondered what he was doing, building such a big boat, miles away from any sea? Something so big, was unknown till then! As they came of age, they joined the other mockers, and when eventually the floods did come, they called on Noah to open them the doors of the ark, but God had shut them in, and proved that it is always wrong to resist the Almighty!

I mentioned that after the flood, remembering all that happened to this family, saved by grace, that it increased and multiplied, yet it did not take them long, for the descendants of Noah, to organise themselves and rise against the Lord. Noah died three hundred and fifty years after the flood, that was in two thousand and six years from Adam, or one thousand, nine hundred and ninety-three years before the birth of Jesus-Christ! They turned away from Him, and chose to worship the heavens, on the foundation laid for their idolatry, the world continues, up to our days, to worship manmade gods, just as they did then. From this rebellion of men there arose a wicked, violent man, called Nimrod, a self-made king, whom God called ‘the mighty hunter’ (Genesis 10.) Already then, Nimrod sought to gather the people under his leadership, to unify the worship of their various idols, and for that purpose, he got them to build a massive temple, which, in the Bible is called as the ‘Tower of Babel’! in open rebellion to God. From Babel rose, a lot later, the Babylonian Empire. In their foolish endeavour, they chose to ignore the past, and how their ancestors perished in the flood; for one cannot contest with The Almighty, and pit oneself against Him! Before they even finished this massive temple, God sent fire from heaven and burned it to the ground; it was something like an atomic explosion. It is from there that God scattered the people on the face of the whole earth. 

During those two thousand years, from the call of Abraham to the coming of Jesus-Christ, much of what was written from Genesis chapter 12, to Malachy, concerned the history of the People of Israel, which after four hundred and thirty years of captivity in Egypt, God delivered by His Sovereign Power, and used one man, ‘Moses’ to destroy utterly Egypt, which at that time, was a mighty Empire. During the rise and fall of Israel, mighty Empires followed each other, until came on the scene the Greatest of them all, the Roman Empire, under which was born Jesus, the Son of the living God, who, rejected by the religious setup of His nation, died on that awful alter, the CROSS, bringing His human life to an end. This happened by the decree of Pilate the Roman Governor. 

But that death was not the end of Christ’s mission for By His resurrection from the dead, God brought into the world a spiritual order of which Jesus-Christ is King Eternal. From heaven Jesus ministers, life and power to His Church, an assembly of the redeemed, in the midst of which, the Holy Spirit works mightily to bring into being, by the new birth, all those that the Father gave to His Son, Jesus, before the world began! It is written: ‘Praise be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blest us in the heavenly realms with very spiritual blessings in Christ. For he chose in Him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in His sight. In love He predestined us to be adopted as His sons through Jesus Christ accordance with the pleasure of His will’! (Ephesians 1: 3-5) Much more is written concerning this subject, but this must suffice to show that true Christians were a people born in the heart of God before He created the world! The power and the reign of Christ, over the redeemed, influences the whole world over which Jesus will eventually reign as King of kings and Lord of lords over every nation under the sun. His kingdom will last for a thousand years, until the predicted end of the earth, which God will burn up with intense heat, and create thereafter a New Heaven and a New Earth, in which will dwell righteousness; to His Kingdom there shall be no end.

As mentioned, with the death of Christ, Israel as a nation joined the spiritual state of the Gentile nations; God rejected them and opened to the Jews just as He did to the Gentiles, a way of repentance, and reconcile every believer to Him, by Faith in the Lord Jesus-Christ. This Jesus clearly proved by the fact that He preached the Gospel to the Jews only, for He never crossed the boundaries of Palestine. A second fact which stands forever is that Jesus is building His church on the foundations of the apostles and prophets which, at the beginning, were all converted Jews. Christ commissioned his disciples, all Jews, and sent them to preach the Gospel to every nation, beginning in Jerusalem. Today, the Gospel has reached the uttermost parts of the earth. The Sovereign Lord has purposed to save His elects, from amongst all nations, that this may happen, Jesus died a cruel death on a CROSS, to redeem His people, whom God raised from the Dead, He rose triumphantly over Satan, sin and death, as mentioned previously. Lastly after throwing into the lake of fire, the devil and the false prophets, together with all whose names are not written in the Lamb’s book of life, God will usher a new order!

Lastly, everything that God created has been created for His own purpose, but facing this fact, that faith finds it so easy to accept, it leaves the natural man puzzled because he cannot fathom the depth of such power, nor can he understand the plan and the power of God. Man finds it easier to believe that there is no God, because of his pride he finds it impossible to accept that so much power could rest in one mighty perfect being. How can anyone claim that all of creation, which modern man, has not yet been able to see let alone discover, could be the handy work of this Being we call God! How can one Being create such profusion of galaxies out of nothing? Yet all the works of God witness to His own eternal, sovereign glory; “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”. (Romans 1:20.) 

Every man must have, at least once in his lifetime, looked into the heavens on a clear night, and looked in wonder at the beauty and greatness of millions of glittering stars, with millions of light years between them filling this immensity, shining like diamonds in the night sky, and not stand in amazement and not think how infinitely small he is! King David wrote: ‘When I consider the heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars which you have created and set-in place. What is man that you are mindful of Him, the son of man (Adam) that you care for Him?’ (Psalm 8: 3-4) What is man indeed?

All of God’s creation is a witness to ‘His existence, His eternal power and divine nature’. The Bible says that men are without excuse! There is a time in every man’s life when God speaks to Him in the silence of his heart, and what men do at that time, determines the direction they take into eternity! Most of them start to search for another explanation, in open rebellion to God. Much of science has paved the way to lead unbelievers to their destruction, and what scientists discover, instead of bringing men closer to God, they have chosen, to make it a weapon, with which they fight the reality of His stamp on everything He has made! They put distances between planets in millions of light-years; everything is so extremely huge so wonderful, planets and suns, moving in an immense circle at an amazing speed, like wheels within wheels, hurtling through space around the throne of God! 

Men, on the threshold of infinity, stand wondering if there could be human like creatures, of even men like us, somewhere out there! Whereas God has clearly spoken to man throughout history, by His prophets that he sent to him, concerning such important things that he needs to know to live, yet man does not seem to have heard anything and remains blind. Then God sent His own Son who left to the world the Gospel. His teachings the disciples have taken, and still do, all over the world; but still a great majority of humanity knows nothing about their Creator, Jesus Christ, the Son of the Living God. The Lord says: “In the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days He has spoken by His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, and through whom he made the universe” (Hebrews 1:1-2.) There are other creatures, millions and millions, there are others places in infinity where they live. Jesus the Son of God spoke about going to heaven, to prepare a place for them, and come back to take them there! But no-one can reach it with space crafts, or a mortal body! To get there, man must know a change. It starts with a new birth, a new creation, spiritual, and a time will come when all those that have believed will be resurrected, as Jesus was, and in a new glorified body, eternal, they will be taken to their eternal home, without man made machines! Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and book your place in that massive translation into a new world!

After all that God has said, men of the world still listen, night and day, for sounds from space, and record sounds that mean nothing, but they do it always hoping that some messages will reach us, from, we do not where or whom! But one has already spoken from heaven he came, and left the Gospel through which He still speaks! Whereas, the true message that reached the uttermost part of the earth and turned multitudes from death to life, by faith in Jesus-Christ, men chose to refuse God’s message. ‘Men are still without excuse!’ Still looking, still listening to no avail! Whilst, the prophets spoke to the Israelis, their word also applies to the Gentiles, since The Son of God Jesus Christ has concluded the messages of all the prophets, by speaking from God to the whole world. Whilst it is yet day, give your life to Christ, and take Him as your Saviour, before comes the night, the end!

The Bible is God’s book to the world, He has chosen to reveal Himself and speak to men by it. It tells us that there are other intelligent creatures, but they are not human they are spiritual beings, eternal beings, cherubim, seraphim, angels, archangels, spirits, that do God’s will and war against the powers of darkness! They minister to and protect the family of God, the assembly of believers. There are such beings, God’s armies that men of God actually saw, as quoted. It happened in the days of a prophet called Elijah, when the king of the Arameans had personal reasons to want to kill him. But what this Gentile King did not realise was that Elisha was a prophet of God, but he greatly feared Elisha.

Came a time when he wanted to apprehend Elisha, to do this this king sent horses and chariots with a strong force of soldiers to capture Elisha, the man of God, and bring him to face king Aram who wanted to kill him. His envoys, during the night, surrounded the town of Dothan where Elisha was with his servant: “When the servant of the man of God got up and went out early the next morning, an army with horses and chariots had surrounded the city. ‘Oh, my lord, what shall we do?’ the servant asked. ‘Don’t be afraid,’ the prophet answered. ‘Those who are with us are more than those that are with them.’ And Elisha prayed: ‘O Lord, open his eyes so that he may see.’ Then the Lord opened the servant’s eyes, and he looked and saw the hills full of horses and chariots of fire all round Elisha.”(2 Kings 6:15-16.) God’s armies always ready to deliver men like Elisha, servants of the living God. Men have read the Bible, but these mighty deeds are like fables to them, their minds are shut to reality, and they grope in the dark hoping to find another light, but God has spoken many times to no avail, yet men are still looking into the sky, listening, hoping to hear a human voice, ever learning but never finding the truth, yet the way is so easy!

Yet a man, David, who was the greatest king in Israel, looked into the heavens and saw and considered creation and saw great and marvellous things, he saw also how small he was and wondered why God bothers with men like him! Feeling how small he was, how insignificant before these glittering sights, and said: “When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have made (Created) and set-in place, what is man that you care for him? You made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honour…O Lord our Lord how majestic is your name in all the earth.” (Psalm 8:3-5 and 9.) David was a man of faith. God touched his heart and opened his eyes when he was but a child; yet with a faith in God he was strong enough to deal with a lion and a bear to save his sheep from destruction!

 Faith sees God’s glory everywhere, yet blind unbelievers never can see it, they are like blind men looking into the sun. One of my great friends, a wonderful man of God, lost his sight following a fall in a fishing boat; he loved sea-fishing. One day he said to me. Edward, (as many do, he used the English pronunciation of my name), I am completely blind, I can look into the sun, feel the heat, but I cannot see one little beam of light! Scientists dealing with eternity, say that the creation of the earth happened millions of years ago! As men of science, they face daily the amazing divine faculties and powers of an Almighty God, and yet, most of them, because they cannot see Him, they do not believe in Him! The God they cannot see, revealed Himself to men under names, such as Elohim, Jehovah, and El-Shaddai! He changed their lives and opened their beings to the Heavenly light, which in Jesus-Christ, is the light that shines in darkness ever pointing men Godward. To the majority, these names of God do not seem important at all, and they do not mean much to men, it even happens that many Christians are ignorant and cannot fully grasp the glorious character of God, as revealed in the Bible by these various names! But men, unless they live an experience with God, remain spiritually dead, cut off from God and His true life; but to the true believer, all these names under which God reveals Himself, are wells of blessings, because with each name something of God’s character shines through.

Therefore, it is proved that God does just what He wants and as He wants with celestial things and spiritual beings, it is clearly declared in the Bible that He does the same with earthly things and with every human being. God is just, He cannot tolerate sin; He must judge it and eradicate it with those that delight in it! But God is also full of love, in fact the Bible says that God is love, and He never applies wrath without warning, and patiently He waits for men to repent and turn away from their sins; ever ready to grant forgiveness and mercy, to those that with a broken heart return to Him! The Word of God proves that He is to be feared, He already has judged some men very severely, He destroyed all living souls with a flood, because of their sins and wicked ways, but He did not do it without giving them a long time to change their ways, but they did not listen to Noah and his pleadings to repentance but they did not. But there are many occasions when God forgave sins of people, who humbled themselves before him and He forgave their transgressions. But when Jesus Christ died on the CROSS, with His death many things came to an end, especially with the way God relates with men of the world.

I have stated it before, in previous articles that it was there, on Calvary’s Hill that God applied the final judgement on all Gentiles and the Israeli nation, and from then on, He only communicates with men through the Gospel. It is through the preaching of the Gospel that He calls them everywhere to repent.  Christ, in His body, suffered death for every man, He tasted what death really was when God turned away His face from Him! This was so painful to Him, that He cried out with a loud voice: “Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani ~ which means, ‘My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?”~ Shortly after He cried again and gave up the ghost! To be forsaken of God is real death. Jesus did not know until then, what death really was. He suffered greatly when our sins like a thick cloud were put on Him and cut Him off from God His father! From the deep pain of His soul, He shouted: “WHY”! Have you forsaken me? It sounded as if it was something that He did not expect! 

For three days His maimed body laid in the grave!  Until then, Jesus and His Father have never been apart, even on earth they were together. Jesus said so often ‘I and my father are one.’ But Jesus was appointed to taste death for every man, and it was a very bitter experience, it occasioned the greatest pain that He suffered. The awfulness of sin is seen there more than anywhere else, because sin reached even the Holy-Trinity, and Jesus-Christ paid with His own life to take it out of the way, and by His death, He defeated sin, death and the devil!  He was forsaken of His father because at that moment, He who knew no sin became sin for us! But even then, all was directed by Almighty God, and His sovereignty has shined out even from such an awful end. At the Cross, all communications between God and men have been cut off forever. As long as Israel had prophets sent to them there remained a ray of hope for them, there on that CROSS they killed the last prophet that God sent to them.

John the Baptist, whom Jesus called the greatest prophet, was cut off so awfully on the whim of one adulteress women, now followed by the hateful rejection of Jesus-Christ, Israel’s died a forever death! Rightly so, for when Pilate could find no reason for His crucifixion, asked of them: “What shall I do, then, with Jesus called the Christ?’ With one accord the people together with their Priests and religious rulers, shouted: “Crucify Him!” Why? What crime has He committed?’ asked Pilate. But they shouted all the louder, ‘Crucify Him.’ When Pilate saw that he was getting nowhere, but that instead the uproar was starting, he took water and washed his hands in front of the crowd, ‘I am innocent of this man’s blood,’ he said: ‘He is your responsibility!’ All the people answered: ‘Let His blood be on us and on our children.’ Then Pilate, released to them Barabbas (a condemned criminal). But he had Jesus flogged, and handed Him over to be crucified. 

Since Christ death on the CROSS, there has not been a prophet sent to Israel, there has not been anything good to say about Israel, as a special nation they stopped to exist as a special people born from a believing patriarch, Abraham, whom God called the father of all believing Christians. The only way back to God, whether man be a Jew or a Gentile, is through faith in the Lord Jesus. This is why He said: “No man cometh to the father but by me”! (John 14:6) It is to them that He preached the Gospel, it is to them that His disciples preached the Gospel, witnessing to a resurrected Saviour, yet what remains of Israel is now a sorry political entity, established by man for man’s purpose. It has never known peace since it has rooted itself in Palestine. It will be so until they see the Prince of Peace, descend from heaven with His triumphant saints, to save a small remnant of them, it is then that the people, as one, will cry to God for their salvation and accept that Jesus is their Messiah. 

When Jesus returns to set up His kingdom, He will then destroy all His enemies, and all men shall see Jesus-Christ, even those that have pierced and recognise in Him, as their Christ, their messiah, God’s promised King, His Kingdom shall be an everlasting Kingdom, just as God promised it to David, in the covenant he made with Him millenniums before Jesus came! If God were not Sovereign and the sole Master in His domain, everything would have ended long ago, but because God is God, from the ashes of a bloody history, and all the evil men brought upon themselves, there rose from the dead Jesus-Christ the Son of the living God, and ever since ascension into glory, He builds from heaven His invisible Church, and reigns over it as Saviour and Lord. At present He affects the affairs of the world by His saints, the that Believe in Him and live for Him! He alone knows who they are and He alone will finish His work: “When from Faithful Abel to the last Christian, He, Jesus Christ and by the poser of the Holy Spirit, will raise from the dead all His people, and will take them to heaven just as He promised. 

Since Jesus Christ rose from the dead and ascended to heaven, God deals with the world in a completely different way. The sole mission of Christ which is to call unto Him and save His elects is continued by the Holy Spirit whom He has sent to call men out of death into life, sanctified and perfected, He present to Jesus, His Church, Holy, sinless, pure without spots or wrinkle. The Church is God’s work, it exists purely by His own initiative and it is He, Father Son and Holy Spirit, that shall complete it, so that not one will be missing when all the saints are caught up, to meet the Lord in the air! From where, together with His redeemed He will cleave the sky and return to earth in all His Glory! If you are a disciple of Christ, a true Christian, you are alive for ever, if you are not a believer, a sinner, an enemy of Christ and God, you are dead forever. This truth started when Jesus rose from the dead, and the world since is has never been the same! What God has in store for the near future is beyond words, most glorious!

I invite you to follow assiduously the next chapter of what is a small work concerning such a great subject! God’s ways with men, and what must be the greatest subject that can be known to man, born out of a hopeless world through the pure love of God to sinful guilty men: “For we are saved by GRACE, through faith in Christ.”