Randy Alcorn's Blog, page 33

We Are Not Dying Out; We Are Hastening on to a More Glorious Life

During the four years my beloved wife was dying of cancer, she read daily from Spurgeon’s messages and books. I searched “Spurgeon” in the typed manuscript of my Nanci’s last four years of journals. I knew they were full of Spurgeon quotes, but I wasn’t prepared for the total—170! The only person she quoted more often was God, from His Word. It’s no exaggeration to say that other than her Creator and Redeemer, and her immediate family and closest friends, no person spoke to her more powerfully than Charles Spurgeon!

Nanci quoted from Spurgeon’s devotional Faith’s Check Book several times. (You can read it online here.) Here is December 14’s devotional:

"And He that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new"  (Revelation 21:5).

Glory be to His name! All things need making new, for they are sadly battered and worn by sin. It is time that the old vesture was rolled up and laid aside, and that creation put on her Sunday suit. But no one else can make all things new except the LORD who made them at the first; for it needs as much power to make out of evil as to make out of nothing. Our LORD Jesus has undertaken the task, and He is fully competent for the performance of it. Already he has commenced His labor, and for centuries He has persevered in making new the hearts of men and the order of society. By and by He will make new the whole constitution of human government, and human nature shall be changed by His grace; and there shall come a day when the body shall be made new and raised like unto His glorious body.

What a joy to belong to a kingdom in which everything is being made new by the power of its King! We are not dying out: we are hastening on to a more glorious life. Despite the opposition of the powers of evil, our glorious LORD Jesus is accomplishing His purpose and making us, and all things about us, "new" and as full of beauty as when they first came from the hand of the LORD.

Nanci copied down longhand Spurgeon’s words: “We are not dying out: we are hastening on to a more glorious life. Despite the opposition of the powers of evil, our glorious LORD Jesus is accomplishing His purpose…” Then she wrote, “I would not trade my cancer journey for anything because of the growth in my love, adoration, and trust in my God.”

Though I never read anything by Spurgeon in Bible College or seminary, once I discovered his books (and especially his sermons) he became one of my greatest sources of eternal perspective, joy, and insight. But even if I’d never read a sentence by Spurgeon, the effect he had on my wife in her greatest years of need would have forever changed not only her life but mine.

P. S. If you haven’t met Charles Spurgeon, introduce yourself to him by reading his classic devotional Morning & Evening, which Nanci loved. I also recommend Spurgeon Gems, 280 short quotations mostly gleaned from his sermons. I have the Charles Spurgeon collection (an incredible 149 volumes, including over 3,500 sermons), one of my favorite add-ons to my Logos Bible Software, an amazing resource I use often in my research.

If you want to read what I selected as the best Spurgeon insights on Heaven and the New Earth (most of them excerpts from his sermons), see my book We Shall See God, which is 60% Spurgeon’s words and 40% mine. (The expression “It’s easier to ask forgiveness than permission” came to me often while writing that book, since Spurgeon wasn’t available for me to ask if I could co-author it with him! Though it seemed a bit presumptuous on my part, when Nanci introduces me to him in Heaven I don’t anticipate him being offended!)

Photo by Matthew Hicks on Unsplash

Quality Resources to Teach the Bible to Children

A friend asked me for some recommendations for resources on teaching the Bible to children. I researched and found some, but also thought I would include some resources for kids to read and discuss with their parents, which would help them understand God’s Word and hopefully get them excited about it. I also threw in some quality videos.

Our duty to our children is clear: “Bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord” (Ephesians 6:4). I hope parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and those involved with children’s ministry find this list helpful. What could be more important?

7 Ways of Teaching the Bible to Children: Includes 25 Lessons, Plus Activities That Satisfy Different Learning Styles.

Leading Little Ones to God: A Child’s Book of Bible Teachings, emphasizes the role of parent and teachers.

The Jesus Storybook Bible: Every Story Whispers His Name, by Sally Lloyd Jones, my favorite book of Bible stories for kids.

The Beginner’s Bible: also good Bible stories.  They’ve made a video series based on the book. Here’s one of them: The Greatest Story.

The Bible in Pictures for Little Eyes: this is by Ken Taylor, who Nanci and I knew and loved. He was the founder of Tyndale House, one of my two major publishers. This is a classic, long-time bestseller among children’s Bible stories, now updated.

The Biggest Story: Kevin DeYoung has written a delightful book that both young and old will enjoy. It is a small treatment of a huge theme—God’s drama of redemption, centered on Jesus Christ. Kevin’s words are fresh, engaging, playful, and biblical. Many Bible storybooks offer pearls without a string. This one puts the pearls on a string—the right one. The result is magnificent and memorable.

The Gospel Story Bible: I know and love Marty Machowski, a pastor with a heart for children.

Kingstone Comics published two of my graphic novels, and they have some great stuff for older kids. They do cover some more challenging aspects of the biblical narrative, so it would all depend on what you think is age appropriate, and I would recommend looking them over first before giving them to your kids.

The Kingstone Bible Trilogy: a very large and well done 3-volume series. Violence is depicted where there is violence in the Bible, but it’s usually not gratuitous. There is an occasional image that I think could’ve been toned down for kids, but that’s a matter of taste, and kids aren’t their only audience, so people in their teens 20s and older adults really can benefit from these. (I was raised in an unbelieving home and loved comics, so that format appeals to me.) This big set is a terrific resource for families where they could be reading and looking at stories and choose in advance which ones they think are best. It is very biblically oriented. A southern Baptist pastor, Art Ayris, heads up the whole project, and has become a good friend of mine. The two graphic novels I did, at least parts of both, are in this big Bible set as are most of the other products they produce. If you get this set, you get a lot of the things that they sell in smaller forms.

101 Questions about the Bible and Christianity: Another great Kingstone product. It is essentially apologetics for the young, but also for the old. I recently gave it to two of my teenage grandsons. Again, some of it is too advanced for really young kids but parts of it would be helpful to upper elementary school kids. You just have to choose what questions apply to them and read in advance and decide when you want to share it with them. (If you have younger children, trust me, your kids will be teenagers before you blink your eye! My daughters are 43 and 41, and it seems like yesterday they were elementary school, and the day before that they were born!)

The Bible Project: an amazing and ever-growing collection of relatively short videos, most in the five to seven-minute range, some of which are very appropriate for children, and all of which are great for adults. Nanci and I used to watch these together in the evenings and talk about them. It’s a fun way to learn as a couple, and as the kids get older, for the whole family together.  Also, your Bible study group could use them where you say, “Let’s listen to this video or these two videos this week and talk about them when we get together,” or you could just simply watch them and talk about them together on the spot.

The Gospel Project: This is a systematic curriculum for teaching the Bible to kids both young and older, often used in churches. Trevin Wax supervises this as managing editor; he’s a good friend and rock solid. I’ve endorsed several of his books. Here’s an interview with Trevin where he explains what it’s all about.  

Tim Challies, a friend I deeply appreciate, lays out the distinctives of The Gospel Project in an interesting and informative article. This may be the single best thing for use in churches. Here’s one of their videos for kids on Jesus and the Samaritan woman. For sure it sticks closely with the text of Scripture. The Gospel Project for PreSchoolers is just one of their many products. This video explains it.

Route 66 Book: The 66 Books of the Bible for Kids, Grades 2-5 .

“What’s in the Bible?” is a fun and excellent resource for kids from Phil Vischer, who created Veggie Tales but went much deeper with this.

Shai Linne is a rapper and a pastor, and he is rock solid. Check out his Bible teaching to kids through song. Here’s more Shai Linne stuff for kids.

Some more recommendations of resources are on this page.

Do you know about the Christian children’s video subscription called yippee? It has all kinds of videos and stuff for kids. Not all Bible teaching, but good stuff.

Truth and Grace Memory Book

Doorposts: If you haven’t seen this resource, you might want to check it out.

Here are some resources my assistant Amy recommends:

Big Truths for Young Hearts by Bruce Ware: encourages and enables parents of children 6-14 years of age to teach through the whole of systematic theology at a level their children can understand.

Big Thoughts for Little Thinkers (series) by Joey Allen: The most foundational teachings of the Christian faith are presented in the Big Thoughts for Little Thinkers series at a level preschool and elementary children can understand. 

Big Theology for Little Hearts (Board book series by Devon and Jessica Provencher): Each book in the Big Theology for Little Hearts series introduces a big idea from the Bible with concise definitions and engaging illustrations to help young minds gain a foundational understanding of God’s word.

My First Books and More by Carine MacKenzie:  a year’s worth and more of Bible readings, devotions, and memory verses.

The Daily Grace website has great resources for kids and families, including Theology Cards for Kids and A to Z Promises of God Kids Cards.

And my thanks to Ashley Roethlisberger who gave me these great suggestions:

Our kids love listening to Adventures in Odyssey at bedtime or in the car. (Some of them do get pretty intense though, so we had to stop them at bedtime.)

They also enjoyed listening to The 7 Habits of Happy Kids in the car.

Their favorite Bible stories on video by far are The Superbook Show.

My newest source for teaching children a biblical worldview is Foundation Worldview. They have many resources, including 20-minute videos for children 4-8 years old that my kids have enjoyed and that give us practical things to discuss throughout the week.

Last idea would be the book The New City Catechism for Kids. They also have an app. My 3-year-old nephew has already started memorizing those! Biblical doctrine Q&A made simple.           

Finally, my thanks to reader Wendy McCloy for suggesting Danika Cooley's website: Help Your Kids Learn and Love the Bible - Thinking Kids (thinkingkidsblog.org)

I watched Danika's interview with Focus on the Family. Great stuff! She also has a prolife book for children titled Wonderfully Made, which she reads online.

May we, as parents and grandparents, have a passion for the things of God and for teaching our children what will truly matter for eternity!

“Choose for yourselves today whom you will serve…but as for me and my house, we will serve Yahweh” (Joshua 24:15).

Photo: Pexels

Reading about the New Earth Changed Her View of All Creation and Gave Her Hope

Our ministry received this letter from a reader of the Heaven book. In her own way, she captures the essence of what has happened in the lives of countless people who for many years were held in bondage by the false view of Heaven and eternity that has been widespread in Bible-believing churches. There are still many people who think that way, though I would say definitely less than 20 years ago when I wrote Heaven. I am very, very grateful that the message is getting out. But I can’t tell you how many conversations, letters, emails and texts I’ve received—including from pastors and other serious Bible students—that echo what this woman wrote to tell us.

I wanted to tell you how much your ministry has touched me. I was a veterinary assistant for three years, and I’ve had to be a part of many euthanasias. As much as you become used to it, the pain you see in the owners’ eyes as they say goodbye to their beloved pets will never stop affecting you. I’ve seen horrific things as a VA, and every time it reminds me it was never supposed to be this way. We were never meant to watch people and animals suffer like this.

I used to believe what you’ve coined as Christoplatonism. I was utterly devoid of any hope for the world, and I just thought the only creation that will benefit is those who follow Jesus. I always thought that was so unfair because in reality, animals and plants and the globe itself never did anything wrong—it was us. Even some non-Christians have a sense of how the world suffers because of the sins of people.

For 22 years of my life, I believed that God would just destroy the earth one day and then Christians’ spirits would be taken to Heaven, and we’d forget everything that ever happened and be disembodied spirits that only sang for the rest of our lives. I did not understand why Christians so anticipated the second coming.

My dad actually recommended your book Heaven to me to help understand the physical and spiritual redemption of not only humanity but the whole world. I was shocked! It changed my perspective on a lot of things. I started realizing that there are a lot of very good things in the world that are often just polluted with sin. Things like reading, writing, painting, laughing, athletics, drama, etc. All of these things are good, but sin often pollutes them into being used for evil.

I had thought, “Well, God wants me to use my gifts now, but that won’t be a thing once we are in Heaven with Him. We’ll just be too focused on Him that we won’t do anything else.” Once I learned we will work, eat, worship, and experience endless pleasures (I learned this from your book and Scripture) my mind was completely changed. I started seeing God in a different perspective, and not as a dictator who wants to punish mankind and whose original idea lost to Satan. I realized God doesn’t have a plan B; He’s going to make sure His original plan is reinstated and much better. I see that as a huge win!

I used to think (because my Sunday school teachers who didn’t care for animals told me so) that if I ever had a dog, when they died, that was it, and there’s no way I’d ever see them again. They just cease to exist. It never settled well with me. I prayed about it many times and when I’d pray about it, it never felt like God was affirming what these people told me, quite the opposite. I’m not saying God ever told me directly what He plans to do; more that He gave me this sense that what I’ve been told wasn’t exactly true.

The older I’ve gotten and more I’ve studied and read, I firmly believe that God will redeem all of creation. I sincerely hope and am fairly certain all the animals I’ve had to watch suffer and eventually be put to sleep will one day get to play on God’s New Earth and many will be reunited with the owners they made so happy here!

Even with my own dog, who as of now is still fairly young and very healthy, it makes me sad to know someday he’ll pass away, but I have hope that it’s not the last time I’ll see him. I’m not someone who would put my dog’s life over another person’s, but I surely do love him. He’s been a great comfort to me and companion to me as a single woman. I truly believe God sent him to me, because I got him when I was going through an extremely rough time. I believe that God wouldn’t just let him cease to exist, and I think animals who bring joy and comfort to humans here and now are special to Him.

Basically, I just want to thank you for helping me change my perspective and for seeing the value in all creation. It’s disheartening to hear Christians speak so terribly about animals and treat them like trash. It’s lovely to see a fellow Christian who believes in the humane treatment of animals and loving them the way God loves them. May God continue to bless your ministry!

When I was reading over 150 books and researching the subject of Heaven in 1999-2003, it was remarkably difficult to find much at all about the New Earth, and especially much that was biblically grounded and made sense. It was maybe 1% of what I read, if even that. What I did find jumped out to me as biblical truth that I had never been taught in an evangelical church, Bible College, or seminary. In my conversations with people, it was shocking what pastors and Christian leaders believed and did not believe about Heaven.

I have had people tell me (and I hope they’re right) that the Heaven book has had a major effect on changing the perspectives of evangelical pastors and laypeople on the subject of the New Earth. I’m humbled and grateful. When the book came out in 2004, it was regarded as unique and radical. Some thought it was off-the-wall, but others resonated with it, and began looking into what Scripture had taught all along. I think I believe more in its truth now than I even did when I first wrote the book. (I would not have written it had I not believed it!) But it was so different than 98% of what I was reading. I could only find references to the New Earth in mostly obscure books and a few reformed systematic theologies. 

Many have been influenced not only by my book but by Surprised by Hope, by N. T. Wright. It came out four years after my book Heaven, and to my surprise and delight, world-class theologian Tom Wright not only read my book but wrote to me to express his agreement. (He only objected to me calling the New Earth the future Heaven, since he thinks only the present Heaven should be called that, though I think Heaven won’t cease but be relocated to the New Earth, where God’s dwelling place with His people and this throne will be—hence the New Earth will be Heaven on Earth.)

I’ve had many people ask if I based my book Heaven on N. T. Wright’s Surprised by Hope. Fortunately, mine was published in 2004 and his came out in 2008, otherwise given the number of times we cite the same quotations about the New Earth it might appear that I leaned heavily on it! But I really do like what Wright did, and he’s an excellent and creative communicator with an audience that includes many readers not in mine.  

I have noticed a striking difference when I speak to groups today than when I spoke to them 20 years ago. Despite the clear teaching of Scripture, the  pushback against the New Earth used to be very strong, now it’s milder and some are totally onboard. I still have many people say, “I’ve never heard that before,” but noticeably fewer. When people ask me what I consider my most influential books, I often say those related to Heaven and the New Earth. I add to that my books on giving, prolife issues, those on suffering, and those on happiness. (Though many people have been more influenced by my fiction than my nonfiction, and I’m grateful for that also.)

But more than anything, I hear from people that they have a transformed picture of Heaven and the New Earth that’s helped them fear death less and focus less on bucket lists and more on the blood-bought promises of Jesus about the wonders of eternal life with Him and His people. If the belief that God’s people will never pass their peaks and really will live happily ever after as resurrected people living on a resurrected earth is a significant part of my legacy as a writer, I’ll certainly be happy and grateful to God!

If you’d like to read more about Christoplatonism, here’s a video, and here’s the appendix I wrote about it in Heaven. (I coined the term “Christoplatonism” to capture how Plato’s notion of a good spirit realm and an evil material world hijacked the church’s understanding of heaven. From a Christoplatonic perspective, our souls occupy our bodies like a hermit crab inhabits a seashell.) And here’s an excerpt from the book: Will Animals, Including Our Pets, Live Again? And in this article, I address Eight Myths Many Believe about Heaven.

Photo by Patrick Hendry on Unsplash

Social Media Is Hurting Our Children: What Can Concerned Parents and Grandparents Do?

Note from Randy: This is a sobering and important article from The Gospel Coalition’s Joe Carter, explaining how social media is causing our children to suffer, and encouraging parents to be proactive in protecting their children. (And it’s not just children who are negatively impacted by social media; many of us adults are too.)

If your child has a smartphone or has access to a phone, a tablet, online gaming console, or a computer, they are vulnerable. As a parent you might wonder, “Do I have the right to interfere? Isn’t that being nosey?” Your job is to interfere, and to know what is going on in your children’s lives, as well as what happens when they’re at friends’ houses and at school. You need to protect them, just as if you were standing next to a freeway and would feel an obligation to put your arms around them and say, “Stay off that freeway.”

This is a battle for our children, with their lives and futures at stake. May Christian parents answer the Lord’s call to protect their children.

Social Media Is Causing Our Children to Suffer

By Joe Carter

The Story: The U.S. surgeon general, Vivek Murthy, has issued a warning about the potential risks of social media on children’s mental health. Here’s why Christian parents should be concerned—and what we can do to protect our kids.

The Background: The surgeon general’s warning comes in response to growing scrutiny over the harmful effects of inappropriate content on and excessive use of social media. These platforms have been linked to a range of harmful consequences, from disrupted sleep patterns to promoting suicidal thoughts among young people.

Murthy has called for policymakers, platforms, and parents to establish safe limits, and he believes children shouldn’t join social media before the age of 13. The Biden administration is simultaneously releasing plans to improve online safety for children that include establishing an interagency task force, promoting digital literacy and habits, and supporting efforts to prevent online harassment and child abuse.

An estimated 95 percent of teenagers and 40 percent of children aged 8–12 are on social media, often exposed to extreme and harmful content. Those spending more than three hours a day on these platforms are twice as likely to experience depression and anxiety. Additionally, one-third or more of girls aged 11–15 have reported feeling “addicted” to certain platforms.

As family researchers Jenet Erickson and W. Bradford Wilcox point out,

Newer research indicates that yes, social media is a factor, with some adolescents and young adults especially affected by platforms like TikTok and Instagram. The largest study to date found that girls between the ages of 11–13 appeared to be especially vulnerable. And Facebook’s own research, leaked by a whistleblower last year, revealed a link for teen girls between Instagram use and increased suicidal thoughts (13.5%), eating disorders (17%) and feeling worse about their bodies (32%). [links in original]

What It Means: Human inventions are part of God’s common grace to mankind, and most have the potential to be used for our flourishing. However, in our focus on the potential benefits of technology, we often downplay or dismiss the obvious harm and suffering they can cause. This has been especially true of communication technologies like social media. While Christians, in particular, have been slow to respond to the threat of social media, we can no longer ignore the effects on our children and teens.

We should become more aware of how communication technologies shape our thinking and interactions. Harold Innis, a 20th-century communication theorist, posited that media technologies have three profound effects on us: they shape (1) the structure of our interests, (2) the character of symbols, and (3) the nature of community. Applying this model to social media reveals significant areas of concern.

The structure of interests refers to the subjects that hold our attention. In this age of algorithms, social media can greatly influence what our children and teens think about. It’s unsurprising there’s been a skyrocketing number of teens exploring and engaging in bisexuality, eating disorders, and transgenderism when social media sites have been promoting those topics to teens.

It’s easy for teens to start with a worthy interest and be led down a path to suffering. A teenager interested in fitness might receive an onslaught of posts promoting unrealistic body ideals, leading to body dissatisfaction and unhealthy behaviors. Social media algorithms may then point them to proanorexia (“pro-ana”) and probulimia sites and to online communities where they can interact with others who promote “thinspiration” (i.e., “inspirational” pictures of extremely thin bodies).

The character of symbols, or the ways we interpret and communicate information, has also been revolutionized by social media. Platforms tend to favor brevity and instant gratification, reducing complex ideas to emojis, hashtags, and viral challenges. This shift can undermine critical thinking skills and encourage a superficial understanding of issues, such as the Bible and faith. Rather than turning to parents, pastors, or mature adults who can help them navigate their questions and doubts, teens are encouraged to learn from their frivolous and ill-informed peers.

The nature of community is greatly affected by social media. While these platforms offer a way to connect with others, they promote shallow, fleeting interactions over meaningful, deep relationships. This can impair the development of critical social skills such as empathy and conflict resolution.

Teens tend to confuse social media with “real life.” On platforms like Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok, users are regularly exposed to idealized and often unrealistic portrayals of the lives of others. Seeing peers and celebrities flaunting their “perfect” (often photoshopped) bodies, luxurious lifestyles, and flawless appearances can lead to unhealthy comparisons and a distorted self-image. Many teens and preteens feel pressured to meet these unattainable standards, which can lead to body dissatisfaction, low self-esteem, and eating disorders.

Cyberbullying is another significant issue. Before the internet, bullying was mostly confined to school grounds. Now, it has infiltrated homes through screens. Online platforms have become a breeding ground for harassment, trolling, and abuse, where anonymity often emboldens bullies (as any adult who has been on Twitter can attest). The effects of cyberbullying can be devastating, leading to anxiety, depression, and, in extreme cases, suicidal ideation. According to a survey by Pew Research taken in 2022, nearly half of U.S. teens aged 13 to 17 (46 percent) report ever experiencing at least one of six cyberbullying behaviors.

What can we do to protect our children? While the Bible doesn’t say anything directly about social media, it has a lot to say about considering the company we keep and avoiding negative influences:

Whoever walks with the wise becomes wise, but the companion of fools will suffer harm. (Prov. 13:20)

My son, if sinners entice you, do not consent. (Prov. 1:10)

Do not be deceived: “Bad company ruins good morals.” (1 Cor. 15:33)

We can’t completely control who children and teens are exposed to online. But we can pray earnestly to the one who cares for the souls of children and welcomes them into his kingdom. We can ask him to work in their hearts and the hearts of those around them, keeping their feet from evil ways and causing them to delight in him above all.

Parents also can and should take greater precautions to protect their children. The most effective way is to limit or take away their access to smartphones. As Leonard Sax says,

As a family doctor, I pay attention to these nuts and bolts. I advise parents to install parental monitoring software on any device with Internet access, to enforce limits on social media use. Common Sense Media recommends Net Nanny and Qustodio, as well as Bark or Circle, among other parental monitoring apps.

Explain to your teen that the use of a smartphone is a privilege, not a right. Inappropriate use of the smartphone will result in forfeiture of that privilege. What constitutes inappropriate use? Downloading or sharing obscene photos is inappropriate use. Cyberbullying is inappropriate use. Posting nasty comments anonymously is inappropriate use. A parental monitoring app will let you know whether any of this is happening, and it’s the job of parents to know. [link in original]

“My advice to parents: don’t wait for state or federal legislation,” adds Sax. “You could be waiting a long time. Parents need to act now.”

This article originally appeared on The Gospel Coalition , and is used with permission of the author.

Photo by Andrik Langfield on Unsplash

Do We Understand Stewardship 101?

Grasping God’s ownership of everything is the foundation of a biblical theology of money. Faithful money-managing stewards act in the owner’s interests, regularly consulting Him to understand and implement His investment priorities. That’s why when I was asked “What are the most basic principles of stewardship?” my answer begins with God’s ownership.

Here’s what God’s Word says about who owns everything:

“The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it.
    The world and all its people belong to him.” (Psalm 24:1).

“Look, the highest heavens and the earth and everything in it all belong to the Lord your God.” (Deuteronomy 10:14).

“The land must never be sold on a permanent basis, for the land belongs to me [God]. You are only foreigners and tenant farmers working for me.” (Leviticus 25:23).

“Yours, O Lord, is the greatness, the power, the glory, the victory, and the majesty. Everything in the heavens and on earth is yours, O Lord, and this is your kingdom. We adore you as the one who is over all things. Wealth and honor come from you alone, for you rule over everything. Power and might are in your hand, and at your discretion people are made great and given strength.” (1 Chronicles 29:11‑12).

“Who has given me anything that I need to pay back?
    Everything under heaven is mine.” (Job 41:11).

“For all the animals of the forest are mine,
    and I own the cattle on a thousand hills.
I know every bird on the mountains,
    and all the animals of the field are mine.
 If I were hungry, I would not tell you,
    for all the world is mine and everything in it.” (Psalm 50:10‑12).

Jesus asked, “If you are untrustworthy with worldly wealth, who will trust you with the true riches of heaven?” (Luke 16:11). He taught more about how we should handle money and possessions than anything because our spiritual condition and service qualifications are inseparable from our attitude and actions concerning material wealth.

Jesus gave the best investment advice: “Store up for yourselves treasures in heaven” (Matthew 6:20). We can’t take our treasures with us, but we can send them on ahead!

Happiness, not mere duty, permeates a God-honoring theology of money. Jesus said: “There is more happiness in giving than in receiving” (Acts 20:35, GNT). When grace-saturated, kingdom-minded, eternity-oriented disciples lovingly utilize God’s money and possessions, we fulfill the first and second greatest commandments. We thereby store up treasures in Heaven and cheerfully “take hold of what is truly life” (see 1 Timothy 6:19, CSB).

So search Scripture, seek God’s wisdom, then give, save, and spend His money well, and thereby love Him, your family, neighbors, and a needy world.

See more resources on money and giving, as well as Randy's related books, including  Managing God's Money  and  Giving Is the Good Life .

Photo by Nathan Dumlao on Unsplash

Don’t Let Grief and Pain Become Your Idol—Let Them Point You to Jesus

Note from Randy: Lee Warren is not a rocket scientist, but he is a brain surgeon. He is also a brother who understands both suffering and God’s grace and kindness in the deepest trials. I got to know Lee while my beloved wife Nanci was dying of cancer. We developed a quick friendship, partly because when we talked I never doubted whether he got it. I love Lee’s tender heart and warm wisdom, and both are everywhere evident in his new book Hope Is the First Dose.

Dr. Warren also has a great podcast, and I’ve had the privilege of being on it twice. The first time was to talk about happiness, and how to find delight even in the midst of difficult circumstances. The second time was to talk about the hope of Heaven, and how that hope sustains us through grief.

I hope you find this excerpt from Hope Is the First Dose helpful. In our pain and grief, may we turn to Jesus, our true source of comfort, hope, and peace. “This is my comfort in my affliction, that your promise gives me life” (Psalm 119:50).

I‘ve performed thousands of surgeries in my neurosurgery career. But probably the most difficult one was to save the life of a little boy named Mason who’d hit his head in a playground accident, just a few weeks after my own son died. The surgery went well, but I was almost overwhelmed with the guilt of saving someone else’s child, when I had been powerless to save my own. As I often do, I retreated to the hospital chapel to sort myself out after the procedure.

Ever since I was a medical student, I have found my­self in hospital chapels when I’m struggling with difficult situations. Something about the quiet and the stained glass seems to center me when the hospital is too much to bear. And at East Alabama Medical Center, Pastor Jon had an uncanny ability to show up when I needed someone to talk to.

But I hadn’t been in this chapel since before Mitch died.

Over the years, whenever I was stressed, hurting, or preparing my mind for a tough case, I’d come to the cha­pel. Once, I’d run into a crisis of faith when I struggled to under­stand how to doctor someone when I couldn’t save them from their brain tumor. Pastor Jon had helped reframe my think­ing, particularly about prayer. He was my sounding board as I worked through the stitching together of faith and science that led me to begin writing I’ve Seen the End of You, back when I thought I had learned about pain by studying people going through it.

But that was before I lost my boy; now I was in the depths of it myself.

It was also in this room that Pastor Jon had told me he’d lost not just one child—a little girl born with congenital heart disease—but his son as well, who had died in a car accident as a young adult.

I’d learned so much from him, had my faith strengthened and so many questions worked out during our talks. But now I felt restless and angry.

“This is the first operation you’ve performed since Mitch died, right?” he asked.

I nodded. “Yes. I wasn’t planning on coming back for a couple more weeks.”

“What a blessing you were here, though, for Mason and his family. You gave them back their son.”

I started to cry, and he put his hand on my shoulder. I said, “Yes. I’m glad about that. I just . . .”

I felt pressure rising in my chest, climbing its way up my throat, and I wanted with everything inside me to run away.

I stood and walked to the little table in the corner of the chapel where a box of Kleenex sat next to a foot-tall statue of Jesus on the cross. I wiped my eyes and my nose and noticed the ceramic nails in the ceramic Jesus’s hands and feet, the ceramic thorns in his crown. My right shoulder was on fire, my jaw ached, and my heart felt as though it was going to shatter into a million ceramic shards.

Pastor Jon shattered the silence. “You wish someone could give you your son back, too, right?”

I heard him but at the same time didn’t. I turned, walked back to the pew, and sat. “I’m sorry. What did you say?”

Pastor Jon put his hand on my shoulder. “You wish someone could give you your son back, too, right? That’s why you walked away a while ago,” he said.

I shook my head. “’Walked away’? What do you mean?”

He lowered his voice a little. It’s the first time I’ve ever seen you not stay to pray with a family.”

I looked away for a moment. “I didn’t even realize I did that. Prayer feels, I don’t know, just impossible. I’ve been involved in saving lives and rescuing people from pain and suffering so many times, but this feels like there’s no rescue, nothing that can ever make it better. Of all the things I’ve been through—war, divorce, tough cases—this is extraordinary.”

Pastor Jon looked at me for a second and his eyes narrowed. “I know. I’ve been there, remember? But I need you to know that you’re in a lot of danger right now, Lee.”

I pinched the bridge of my nose. “Danger?”

“Yes. This is the point where it’s so easy to make an idol out of your pain.”

I straightened. “What are you talking about?”

“Grief can be all-consuming. You’ve seen it before, right? Remember the lady who dragged her poor husband all over the country trying to save him from the brain tumor long after he’d lost all useful brain function? Because she couldn’t let him go? What was her name?”

I nodded. “Mrs. Andrews. Her husband couldn’t speak or move the last six months of his life, but she put him through surgeries for feeding and breathing tubes, took him to some quack in Houston who sold her a hundred thousand dollars’ worth of snake oil before he finally died.”

“That’s right,” he said. “She made keeping her husband alive the most important thing in her life. She couldn’t even see what was best for him or her family, couldn’t make room for God to comfort her because she made her circumstances determine how she felt. You told me that, remember? One of the things you discovered in your research was that people who think their circumstances determine their peace of mind, their faith, their happiness—they’re the ones who do the worst when hard times come, right?”

I waved a hand. “Yes, but what does that have to do with idolatry?”

“Everything,” he said. “Remember the Ten Commandments?”

“Of course,” I said.

“What are they?”

“You’re really giving me a test right now?”

He smiled sadly. “I just need you to remember the first two.”

“You shall have no other gods before me, and you shall not make an idol for yourself.”

“Very good! That’s it. So you and Lisa have a choice to make here. You’re on a mountain of pain and grief, reeling from losing Mitch and wondering how you can ever get over this, right?”

I looked down at my feet and then back at Pastor Jon. “Pretty much.”

“Okay, then here’s your choice: Are you going to let God help you, or are you going to walk away from him? You can let God be with you on this mountain, like he was with Moses. It’s scary. There are thunderclouds and lightning and darkness, and it’s terrifying. But he’ll be there with you, and he’ll give you the tools to make it through. And it hurts like he’s carving them on the stone tablet of your heart.

“It plays out in finding his promises in Scripture and holding on to them for dear life, in friends coming alongside you, in figuring out your marriage and your other kids in the context of one of you being permanently gone. Books will show up at just the right time, you’ll hear a pastor with just the right message, see a sunrise that seems particularly hopeful. Somehow, you will climb off that mountain carrying what you need to find your way again.”

His words were exactly true, and I knew it. It was already happening. Every day, someone called or emailed something that was exactly what we needed that day. The verse of the day on Bible Gateway would speak right to us, or one of the kids would text something that helped so much. And we were doing it for each other and the kids too. God was ministering to us, even when I felt so very far away from him. Every day, there was manna right in front of us, just enough.

Pastor Jon leaned closer and looked directly into my eyes. “But remember what Aaron was doing while Moses was on the mountain?” I thought for a moment. “He was in the valley, making the golden calf.”

He sighed. “Right. While Moses was doing the scary close-to-God stuff and getting the help he needed, Aaron and the rest of the people stayed away from the cloud and the fire and the darkness where God was, and they made themselves a god they could touch and feel.

“A lot of people do that with grief and pain. They fix their eyes and their hearts on a casket or a divorce or a diagnosis, they drink or do something else to numb the pain, and they spend their lives holding on to the hurt so tightly that it becomes the only thing they have. That’s basically idolatry. It’s making a god out of your circumstances instead of letting God help you process them. That’s a dangerous place to live, Lee.”

I’d never thought of it like that. I’d seen so many patients over the years who had never gotten over something that had happened to them, even if they had survived it. A cancer scare that turned someone’s world upside down and left them emotionally wrecked even though they were cured. A loss that embittered and enraged someone so much that their whole life was ruined.

“But there’s one more thing you need to know if you want to survive this and find your peace, your happiness, again,” he said.

I waved a hand. “What?”

“Losing a child is extraordinary. But, my friend, it’s also really ordinary.”

I started crying again. “How can you say that? I mean, you’ve lost two kids, which I can’t even imagine, so you know it’s not something you’re supposed to feel, and it’s certainly not an ordinary part of life.”

“Not what I meant,” he said. “Take a few deep breaths and just think about what you know from working in this building. I guarantee you that even today, someone is dying or has died. Someone is having a heart attack or holding their wife’s hand as she slips away. Zoom out to the cities around us and the amount of suffering happening in this very moment is staggering.”

“You’re not making me feel any better. I hope this isn’t your Sunday
sermon,” I said.

He huffed. “No. I’m making the point that extreme, extraordinary suffering and pain is an ordinary, normal, constant part of life. And that’s why you can find a way to make it through.”

“That doesn’t make any sense,” I said quietly.

He put his hand on my knee. “If it really were happening only to you, then it would be extraordinary, and it would be reasonable for you to feel hopeless or singled out by God or abandoned. But the extraordinarily ordinary pain of life is mixed in with all the extraordinarily ordinary amazing things too—while we’re speaking, people are being born, falling in love, achieving a long-held goal, or being baptized. Someone is holding hands or seeing a rainbow for the first time. Yes, life is really hard, but it’s also really good. All at the same time. And when you’re submerged in pain, it can be so deep and so dark that you can forget all that light is out there. But it still is.”

Adapted from Hope Is the First Dose by W. Lee Warren, M.D. Copyright © 2023 by W. Lee Warren, M.D. Published by WaterBrook, an imprint of Penguin Random House. Used with permission.

Photo by RDNE Stock project

Is Joy Possible Apart from Feelings of Happiness and Delight?

It’s common to hear writers claim that joy is unemotional. A Bible study says, “Spiritual joy is not an emotion. It’s a response to a Spirit-filled life.” But if this response doesn’t involve emotions of happiness or gladness or delight or good cheer, in what sense is it “spiritual joy”?

Many Christians spiritualize the word joy, contrasting it with happiness and portraying it as independent of emotion or pleasure. Some claim that joy is a fruit of the Spirit and therefore not an emotion. But in Galatians 5:22, love and peace sandwich the word joy. If you love someone, don’t you feel something for them? And what is peace if it doesn’t involve feelings of contentment and satisfaction?

Our Happiness Reflects His

Understanding that God Himself is happy is foundational. “In your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore” (Psalm 16:11). As love and holiness are found in God’s presence because God is loving and holy, so joy and happiness are found in God’s presence because God is joyful and happy. How could it be otherwise? 

The Father said twice, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased” (Matthew 3:17; 17:5). To be well pleased means to feel pleasure. Whether you call those feelings joy, happiness, gladness, or delight—and I think any and all are appropriate—the Father certainly felt them toward Jesus, and so should we.

When the Father said of His Son the Messiah, “Behold my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen, in whom my soul delights” (Isaiah 42:1), did He have feelings toward His Son? Have you ever delighted in someone without having strong feelings about that person? Weren’t the Father’s feelings toward His Son joyful?

In The Treasury of David, Spurgeon said it well: “There is enough in our holy faith to create and to justify the utmost degree of rapturous delight. If men are dull in the worship of the Lord our God they are not acting consistently with the character of their religion.”

He Desires Our Joy

Yes, it’s possible to obey and serve God without feeling joy. We should do what’s right and honors Christ, even when we don’t feel like it. But God rebukes those who serve Him joylessly (see Deuteronomy 28:47-48). In other words, He emphatically says He wants us to feel joy! Just as parents of children want them to not only obey, but to obey with happy hearts, God also wants our joyful obedience and trust. He knows that’s ultimately in our best interest.

“Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice” (Philippians 4:4). When God calls us to rejoice in Him, does He care only about what we think and do, not how we feel about Him? No. He commands us to love Him not just with all our minds but all our hearts (see Matthew 22:37). Feelings are not the entirety of joy, but since God’s joy involves His emotions, shouldn’t our joy involve ours?

The psalmist said, “I will go to the altar of God, to God my exceeding joy, and I will praise you with the lyre, O God, my God” (Psalm 43:4). Can you imagine saying to someone, “You are my exceeding joy,” without feeling strong emotion?

Yahweh created both our minds and our hearts. Sure, emotions can be manipulated, but so can intellects. God designed us with emotions, and He doesn’t want us to shun or disregard them. We’re ill-advised to redefine joy and happiness and pit them against each other rather than embracing the emotional satisfaction of knowing, loving, and following Jesus.

Mike Mason writes in Champagne for the Soul: Celebrating God’s Gift of Joy,

When I’m joyful, I’m happy, and when I’m happy, I’m joyful. What could be plainer? Why should I want anything to do with a joy that isn’t coupled with happiness, or with a kind of happiness that is without joy? Happiness without joy is shallow and transient because it’s based on outward circumstances rather than an attitude of the heart. As for joy without happiness, it’s a spiritualized lie. The Bible does not separate joy and happiness, and neither should we.

Christ Is the Source and Supply of Our Happiness

Consider J.C. Ryle’s reference to “happy feelings”—something often dismissed today as unspiritual. He spoke of these feelings as utterly compatible with joy: “Above all, Christ can give us peace of conscience, inward joy, bright hopes, and happy feelings.” 

Surely knowing the Creator of the universe—our Savior, Friend, and Redeemer, who has rescued us from the grip of sin—evokes feelings of happiness!

The Holy Spirit’s permanent indwelling in our lives allows us to continually access a supernatural happiness, so we can “confidently approach the throne of grace to receive mercy and find grace whenever we need help” (Hebrews 4:16, NET). Our God of happiness has made the way for us to come before Him freely and draw deeply from His mercy, grace, and help at any and all times, including when we’re feeling drained of joy.

May we always remember that following God’s ways and seeking Him first brings great heart-felt happiness.

Browse more resources on the topic of happiness, and see his other related books, including  Does God Want Us to Be Happy?

Photo by Olya Harytovich

 

12 Questions for Those Considering Universalism

Note from Randy: I so appreciate this article by Michael McClymond (professor of modern Christianity at Saint Louis University and author of The Devil’s Redemption: A New History and Interpretation of Christian Universalism). It’s theological and serious, but has great practical implications, because “Christian universalism” is spreading. I’ve addressed it in various critiques of Paul Young’s books The Shack and Lies We Believe about God. But Michael’s article is much more ambitious, covers more ground, and puts things in a succinct way.

This is an excellent resource, not only for those who are personally struggling with questions about the doctrine of hell, but also for readers who are interacting with friends, family members, and members at their church who are tempted to move toward universalism.

There are many good points in Michael’s article, but this paragraph may be the best:

“Perhaps one underlying reason why professing Christians today are examining or embracing universalism is that they don’t want to be placed on the hot seat in a world that’s increasingly hostile toward Christianity. They’d like to avoid ever being in a position in which they must tell a non-Christian that there are dire consequences for rejecting Christ. Hell is a disturbing doctrine, an ultimate turnoff, an egregious insult. The so-called 11th commandment—'You shall not offend’—has become paramount for some. Universalism offers a semblance of Christianity with the unseemly parts edited out.”

12 Questions for the Would-Be Universalist

By Michael McClymond

No compassionate person delights in seeing other people suffer. How much less should a Christian believer rejoice in anyone’s everlasting suffering? Christian belief is not compatible with schadenfreude—taking pleasure in another’s misfortune.

It’s not surprising that some thoughtful Christian believers today are being drawn toward universalism—the belief that all humans will finally be saved into God’s blissful presence. His love makes universalism an obligatory belief, some contemporary voices contend. Any Christian who isn’t a universalist is, in effect, a moral imbecile.

If we compare universalism to a house for sale, we should admit the house has curb appeal. But would any of us decide to buy a house we’d only seen from the outside? Wouldn’t we want to check out the inside too? And wouldn’t we insist on getting down into the crawl space so we might inspect the plumbing, the wiring, and the HVAC system? Whether the house was habitable would be decisive in our decision to buy—or not.

What follows is especially intended for those who are convinced of or inclining toward universalism. These are honest points for discussion, not trick questions. Still, I’m convinced the universalist “house” is ultimately not worth buying—and not permanently habitable for someone committed to biblical teaching and Christian living.

1. How should we interpret Jesus’s words regarding ‘hell’ or ‘Gehenna,’ ‘the outer darkness,’ ‘the fire that is not quenched,’ ‘the worm that does not die,’ and the like?

Christian belief in the reality of hell and the possibility of separation from God rests on Jesus’s own words in the Gospels. “Hell” or “Gehenna” and other related terms point toward a state of punishment and suffering after death. Yet if everyone without exception is headed toward the same final destination with God—as universalists claim—then why do we find Jesus saying the “sheep” will be separated from the “goats” (Matt. 25:31–46)? That the “wheat” will be separated from the “weeds” (Matt. 13:30)? That the “wheat” will be separated from the “chaff” (Matt. 3:12)? That the “good fish” will be separated from the “bad fish” (Matt. 13:48)? That the “wise virgins” will enter the wedding feast but the “foolish virgins” will be stuck outside (Matt. 25:1–13)? Separation is occurring in all these passages.

But if universalism is true, there can be no truly lasting separation. And in that case, isn’t Jesus’s teaching highly misleading? Are we to imagine that our Savior frightened his hearers by describing a fixed separation of sinners that will never occur, or a future state of punishment that will not exist?

2. If hell is a temporary state but heaven is a forever state, then why are both denoted by the same word as ‘eternal’?

In the ancient church, Severus of Antioch and Augustine made a similar observation: in Matthew 25:41 and 25:46, the same Greek word (aionios) is used to describe both the duration of heaven and the duration of punishment after death. Universalists often argue that aionios as applied to hell or punishment doesn’t mean “eternal” in the strict sense, but merely “age-long.” In other words, hell exists but it’s temporary. In that case, though, we’d need to conclude heaven too is temporary—that heaven comes to an end. Otherwise, how can the same Greek word have two different meanings in the very same verse—“age-long” when applied to punishment or hell, but “forever” when applied to heaven? This makes little sense.

3. What about the ‘two ways’ theme in the Old and New Testaments?

The New Testament’s teaching on heaven and hell doesn’t materialize out of nowhere. The theme of “two ways” leading to differing outcomes is woven throughout the Bible. In just the second chapter (Gen. 2), Adam is given a choice between life with God (if he doesn’t eat from the forbidden tree) or death in defiance of God (if he does eat). In Psalm 1 there are different outcomes for the righteous and the wicked, and so also in Isaiah 1: “If you are willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land; but if you refuse and rebel, you shall be eaten by the sword” (Isa. 1:19–20). The universalist idea of only one outcome for everyone—regardless of choices made—doesn’t merely contradict one verse here or there. It runs against the whole thrust of Old and New Testament teachings.

4. Why did Jesus need to die such a horrible, agonizing death on the cross for our sins?

It’s a poignant moment in the Garden of Gethsemane when Jesus asks his heavenly Father to “remove this cup” of suffering from him (Mark 14:36). What is the outcome? His petition is denied. The sinless Son of God prayed to the Father—yet his request wasn’t granted. It’s hard to imagine how the necessity of his death on the cross could be demonstrated more emphatically than this. But why? If God simply wanted to demonstrate his love for humanity, there were innumerable ways he might have done so. Yet as John Stott argued in The Cross of Christ, the love revealed in Jesus’s death was a holy love. The cross satisfied justice and demonstrated love—thus it can’t be viewed as an act of divine love in isolation from divine justice.

Universalism struggles to explain the necessity of Jesus’s horrifying death. For if a universalist admits that God’s righteous opposition to sin required something that awful (i.e., the death of God’s incarnate Son), then it also makes sense to say that sinners not justified by Jesus’s death deserve hell or something like it. God’s justice requires one or the other—either the hell of Jesus’s agony, in which the sinner’s guilt is vicariously atoned for, or the hell of individual suffering for the one who rejects Jesus and his atoning work. The logic of atonement and the logic of hell are intertwined.

5. How should we interpret the end-times teaching of Revelation?

Universalists generally understand God as a loving being who doesn’t exercise judgment toward sin or sinners. Yet Revelation offers a picture of God’s righteous judgment against a sinful world, in overt rebellion against himself, as the bowls of his wrath are poured out (Rev. 16). The Beast, the False Prophet, and the Devil are later seized by the Lord and thrown into “the lake of fire” (Rev. 19)—an outcome set over and against the New Jerusalem, where the Lord dwells with Christ and the saints (Rev. 21).

In his book The Evangelical Universalist, Robin Parry tries to interpret Revelation in a universalist fashion, and does so by equating God with “the lake of fire.” Sinners fall into “the lake of fire,” get purified in God’s fiery presence, and then enter the New Jerusalem. But since Revelation identifies “the lake of fire” with “the second death” (Rev. 20:14), if “the lake of fire” is God, then God is “the second death.” Such exegesis twists the meaning of Scripture and distorts the character of God.

6. Doesn’t the New Testament show that salvation is connected to faith?

No less than seven times in the Gospels, Jesus says, “Your faith has made you well” or “Your faith has saved you” (Matt. 9:22; Mark 5:34; 10:52; Luke 7:50; 8:48; 17:19; 18:42). A concordance will show the words “faith” and “believe,” with their cognates, appear over 500 times in the New Testament. The texts are too numerous to cite. Hebrews 11 is a whole chapter linking salvation to faith. But how is this tight connection between salvation and faith consistent with universalism?

The universalist is bound to say either that (1) people in the present life who don’t seem to be believers really are believers in some hidden or cryptic fashion, (2) people who depart this life in unbelief get a further opportunity to become believers after death (see #11), or (3) salvation isn’t tied to faith, despite the biblical witness to the contrary. None of these three options is congruent with Scripture. Some universalists believe God saves people who don’t believe and don’t want to be saved. This sounds a lot like coerced salvation.

7. What’s the historic teaching on final salvation in the major branches of Christendom?

If universalist teaching is correct, then it’s remarkable it never found its way into any of the official documents, confessions, or creeds of the major Christian communities—Catholic, Orthodox, or Protestant. With the exception of the Universalist Church in the States, beginning in the 1800s and continuing to the early 1900s, one simply doesn’t find universalism officially taught by any Christian community. (Many Unitarian Universalists today don’t believe in life after death at all.) Read through Philip Schaff’s or Jaroslav Pelikan’s multivolume works on the creeds and confessions—you won’t find universal salvation as a historic Christian teaching.

In Orthodoxy and Eastern Christianity generally, certain individuals were self-conscious universalists (e.g., Gregory of Nyssa, Isaac of Nineveh), but they represented a minority group, and their universalist views were merely a tolerated, private opinion. Universalism was never admitted as official public teaching nor allowed to be preached from the pulpits of Catholic, Orthodox, or Protestant congregations.

Moreover, the best-known early teacher of universalism—Origen—was condemned by name at the Second Council of Constantinople in AD 553. Throughout history, this condemnation was taken as a rejection of Origen’s teaching on universal salvation. In the ancient church, the number of nonuniversalist writers far outnumbers the universalists, by a factor of about 10 or 12 to 1 (see my tabulation in The Devil’s Redemption, 1097–99). This was true not only of Latin-language authors but also of those who wrote in Greek, Coptic, and Syriac.

If the universalists are correct, then many of the greatest Christian teachers—including Augustine, Chrysostom, Aquinas, Luther, Calvin, Bellarmine, Pascal, Owen, Edwards, Newman, and so on—were all mistaken on an essential theological question. Do we really think 21st-century Christianity is so much more enlightened than preceding centuries that we alone have discovered the truth of universal salvation? Is it not more plausible to imagine we inhabit an age of spiritual and moral laxity and that universalism is growing because of a widespread desire to find a more permissive set of beliefs?

8. What would happen if Christian congregations or denominations embraced universalism?

Some universalists say that if only Christian churches would abandon their teaching on hell, an ecclesial golden age would commence and multitudes of new members would enter in, no longer hindered by the offensive “stumbling block” of hell. History, though, suggests an opposite conclusion: universalism is a church-destroying doctrine. In the mid-1800s, the Universalist Church—which few today remember—was briefly the fifth-largest denomination in the States. What happened? Having officially declared themselves for universal salvation, a theological self-demolition promptly took place.

Already in the early 1800s, universalist thinkers denied that Jesus was our sin-bearer on the cross. God punishes no one, they argued, and so Jesus wasn’t punished. Soon enough the universalists began to question, and then to deny, the divinity of Christ. Jesus was now simply a moral teacher. Eventually, the universalists merged with unitarians to become the Unitarian-Universalists—still with us today, though in ever-shrinking numbers. The greatest irony was that some people in the Universalist Church stopped believing in the afterlife and ended up as secular humanists. Heaven, once it was made all-inclusive, became unreal and irrelevant even to the universalists themselves. Why should we imagine a 21st-century universalist church would fare any better than the 19th-century version?

9. What’s the final destiny of Satan and demons?

Universalists often begin from the presumption that God does not, would not, or could not create intelligent, moral beings (i.e., who are capable of making moral choices) without ensuring all such beings are finally saved. So argues David Bentley Hart, among others. But if this is so, it means Satan and the demons must all be saved—just like all human beings. In Scripture, however, there isn’t the slightest hint that Satan or the demons will ever be saved. Jesus speaks of the “eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels” (Matt. 25:41). There’s never a call or summons or invitation for demons to repent.

Throughout history, believers have prayed in hope for the salvation of mass murderers and other egregious sinners. But there are no traditional Christian prayers for the salvation of Satan. Scripture and church practice give us no reason to assume Satan or demons will ever be saved. The universalist assumption—that God would never create an intelligent creature who sins and is eternally separated from him—thus appears to be a false starting point. And if Satan and the demons are lost forever, then one must consider some humans might also be lost forever, as implied in the wording of the verse just cited: “Then [Christ] will also say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels’” (Matt. 25:41).

10. Can sinful people make atonement or satisfaction for their own sins through their own sufferings?

Essential Protestant teaching—based on Scripture—holds that Christ’s death made full payment for the guilt of sinners. Nobody can add or subtract anything from his atoning work. Scripture is clear: sinners must simply receive in faith what Christ has done to make salvation possible. But many universalists contradict this. Those not ready at death to be with God, they say, will make satisfaction for their own sins in a fiery state of suffering and punishment (akin to Roman Catholic purgatory). This idea of paying for one’s own sins through postmortem suffering is utterly incompatible with salvation by grace alone. But what is the alternative for the universalist? The only alternative is to say everyone proceeds immediately at death into the blissful presence of God. In the 1800s this became known as “ultra-universalism”—heaven for everyone as soon as death occurs.

But this “ultra” position means it’s not only saintly people who go immediately into God’s presence but even the mass murderer who’s shooting his victims and is suddenly struck down by a policeman’s bullet. And if everyone immediately enters heaven, then our moral and spiritual choices in this life appear not to matter at all. The universalists feuded among themselves as to whether or not there’s postmortem purification from sins, yet they never resolved the issue. (For more on American universalists’ lack of cohesion in their 19th-century heyday, see chapter 6 of The Devil’s Redemption.) They could not agree, for it appears to be an insoluble dilemma. If universalists affirm people can self-atone through postmortem suffering, they’re denying Christ’s full atonement on the cross. But if they affirm a full atonement on the cross, they must admit everyone goes immediately to be with God at death—regardless of how they lived or the choices they made.

These are the only two options for the universalist, and neither makes much sense theologically.

11. Is it plausible to believe there will be a ‘second chance’ for salvation after death?

If there is such a “second chance” for salvation after death, then it’s never clearly presented or described in Scripture. Instead, Jesus’s teachings seem to point in the other direction. The parable of the wise and foolish virgins (Matt. 25:1–13) emphasizes the limited time and opportunity that humans have to respond to God—and it implies a time will come when the door to the “wedding feast” will shut and it’ll be too late to enter in. One key text appears in the Gospel of Luke: “Someone said to [Jesus], ‘Lord, will those who are saved be few?’ And he said to them, ‘Strive to enter through the narrow door. For many, I tell you, will seek to enter and will not be able’” (Luke 13:23–24).

Jesus’s message is explicit. Some people—or rather “many”—will wish to enter God’s kingdom but will “not be able.” How is this passage consistent with the idea—common among universalists today—that the Lord will give endless opportunities, both prior to and after death, for individuals to turn to Christ and find salvation? He explicitly says that “many . . . will seek to enter and will not be able.” Take heed.

12. Is universalism compatible with the Christian mandate to preach the gospel, practice self-denial, and suffer for Christ and the gospel?

Some universalists assert that belief in universalism would not interfere with the call or motive toward Christian evangelism. But there’s no evidence this is so. An consistent universalist evangelist wouldn’t call people to decide for Christ but would tell them God had decided for them. He or she wouldn’t tell people to be saved but would say they’re saved already. It’s hard to imagine a theological view more likely to engender complacency or indifference.

Christian missionaries—like Isaac Jogues in French Canada or Jim Elliot among the Huaorani people of Ecuador—went into dangerous situations to preach the gospel to those who’d never heard it, and in the process, they gave up their lives as martyrs. Father Damien, for another example, went to serve and evangelize the lepers of Molokai—knowing in advance that he’d eventually contract the disease and die. Can anyone imagine a Christian universalist doing this? Is there a single case of such a universalist missionary-martyr? Christian believers have undertaken the most arduous labors in evangelism, in self-denial, and in self-giving service precisely because they were aware of the eternal realities of heaven and hell and believed that “this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison” (2 Cor. 4:17). Christian martyrs bear witness to a practical fruit of holiness among those who believe in a final state of heaven and hell.

Final Thoughts

Perhaps one underlying reason why professing Christians today are examining or embracing universalism is that they don’t want to be placed on the hot seat in a world that’s increasingly hostile toward Christianity. They’d like to avoid ever being in a position in which they must tell a non-Christian that there are dire consequences for rejecting Christ. Hell is a disturbing doctrine, an ultimate turnoff, an egregious insult. The so-called 11th commandment—“You shall not offend”—has become paramount for some. Universalism offers a semblance of Christianity with the unseemly parts edited out.

Richard Niebuhr (1894–1962) spoke of liberalized Christianity in this way: “A God without wrath brought men without sin into a kingdom without judgment by the ministrations of a Christ without a cross.” Here we have four essential doctrines—God, humanity, kingdom, and Christ—minus their hard and scandalous aspects: wrath, sin, judgment, and the cross. These words, though written by Niebuhr in the 1920s, are a fitting description of Christian universalism a century later. No wrath of God, no sin that damns, no fearful judgment before the throne, no cross of suffering to satisfy God’s justice.

Yet these are precisely the doctrines that, perhaps counterintuitively, express God’s moral goodness. These are the doctrines needed to reawaken and reenergize the church as we reach out, in humble love, to an increasingly confused and broken world that is perishing without the Savior.

Friend, don’t be fooled by universalism’s “curb appeal.” Step out of the car and examine the integrity of the house. Just be careful—it’s fragile within.

This article originally appeared on The Gospel Coalition , and is used with permission of the author.

Photo by Christian Lue on Unsplash

John Stott on How the Church Preserves Our Humanness in a Dehumanized Society

In his 1982 book I Believe in Preaching, John Stott wrote these prophetic words:

It is difficult to imagine the world in the year 2000, by which time versatile microprocessors are likely to be as common as simple calculators are today.

[This will lead to] the probable reduction of human contact, as the new electronic network renders personal relationships ever less necessary.

In such a dehumanized society, the fellowship of the local church will become increasingly important—whose members meet one another, and listen and talk to one another in person rather than on screen. In this human context of mutual love, the speaking and hearing of the Word of God is also likely to become more necessary for the preservation of our humanness, not less.

(My thanks to Matt Smethurst for sharing this quote on Twitter.)

After reading this quote, I did some research, and it wasn’t until 1993 that electronic mail was first dubbed email. I literally had the first home computer of anyone I knew in 1985, to facilitate my writing books. Our church got our first one the following year in 1986, and I was the go-to person to explain it to everyone on staff, because I was the only one who had ever used a computer!

Yet Stott wrote this in 1982? Stott was on the shortlist of people who deeply influenced me. A godly brother, with profound insights into God’s Word, who encouraged a generation of us and beyond in believing, teaching, and preaching God’s word, and living a life honoring to Jesus that would make our preaching of the Word credible and eternal in impact.

If John Stott had never written anything besides The Cross of Christ, his entire life would’ve been more than worth it. His first books that powerfully influenced me as a young Christian, and then as a young pastor, were Basic Christianity, Your Mind Matters, and Between Two Worlds. I would say that after C. S. Lewis, A. W. Tozer., Francis Schaeffer, Charles Spurgeon, John Piper, Eugene Peterson, and a few others, he certainly is in my top 10 of all time writers and Christian leaders. 

I can’t put into words my degree of nostalgia in seeing the name John Stott, much less reflecting on his words. Here are some quotes from a list of 160 John Stott quotes:

“Our love grows soft if it is not strengthened by truth, and our truth grows hard if it is not softened by love.”

“Before we can begin to see the cross as something done for us, we have to see it as something done by us.”

“We must allow the Word of God to confront us, to disturb our security, to undermine our complacency and to overthrow our patterns of thought and behavior.”

“Christianity is in its very essence a resurrection religion. The concept of resurrection lies at its heart. If you remove it, Christianity is destroyed.”

“The church lies at the very center of the eternal purpose of God. It is not a divine afterthought.”

“If we truly worship God, acknowledging and adoring his infinite worth, we find ourselves impelled to make him known to others, in order that they may worship him too. Thus worship leads to witness, and witness in its turn to worship, in a perpetual circle.”

Photo: Pexels

 

As You Age, Feed Your Mind with an Eternal Perspective

This wonderful message our ministry received from an 83-year-old reader made my day. I listened to it twice. What a sweet and vibrant voice, and I love her transparency. She may not remember book titles well, but she remembers the books and the message of the books! (She references We Shall See God, Heaven, and Safely Home.)

I was struck by the fact that as this woman ages, and honestly faces the reality of death, she is choosing to read books that will prepare her for eternity with Jesus. She is not feeding herself primarily on the news (which is usually bad news!), but on the good news of gospel truth, particularly as it relates to our eternal destiny. 

Her realism and faith and eternal perspective and cheerfulness really touched me. Some people get more sour and dreary with age, but this woman has a sweetness that is so clear and moving. What an example to us all. (And my thanks to her for allowing us to share her message.)

David said, “Show me, O Lord, my life’s end and the number of my days; let me know how fleeting is my life. You have made my days a mere handbreadth; the span of my years is as nothing before you. Each man’s life is but a breath” (Psalm 39:4-5). Picture a single breath escaping your mouth on a cold day and dissipating into the air. Such is the brevity of life here. “We can fly away at any time,” this woman said in her message. The wise will consider what awaits us on the other side of this life that so quickly ends. (And if we have a biblical view of Heaven, this won’t depress us, but excite us!)

Since life’s greatest certainty is death, it only makes sense to prepare for what lies beyond this life, as this dear woman has done. Any life that leaves us unprepared for death is a foolish life. Matthew Henry put it this way: “It ought to be the business of every day to prepare for our last day.”

In school, did you cram for tests? I did. Death involves the greatest examination in our lives, with by far the greatest consequences. It merits careful and thorough preparation. Whether we are 80, 50, 30, or 12, our time on this present earth is limited. So no matter our age, may we spend our lives joyfully preparing for Heaven!

Photo by Javier Esteban on Unsplash