The Dragon

 "Jesus is 'the stone you builders rejected, which has become the cornerstone.' Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to mankind by which we must be saved." Acts 4:11-12...."The church knows that the real issue is sin, and it knows who the solution is; Jesus Christ, but it's afraid to say so." Christine Caine

It's been on my heart for some time now to write what I do today. Today I feel like I must, and so.....I write.

The above words from Christine Caine strike me hard, because I know how true they are. I think most reading this do as well. We do know what the real problem in this world is, that it is the sin that permeates not only the human race, but all of creation itself. There was a time when the church did not fear to bring that truth, and bring it boldly. Not in a condemning, angry way, but with a deep love for the lost, a love that came from the heart of God Himself. It was the reason for the sending of His only Son, Jesus Christ, because Christ's death on a cross on behalf of a fallen race was the only way to deal with the penalty and horror of sin. Yet for decades now, we have become ever more reluctant to proclaim that message. We've been told, by many in the church itself, that it's a negative message, that people are made uncomfortable by it, that we needed to focus on His love, His grace, and His forgiveness. This has led to a kind of thinking that really, we're not all that bad. Paul said that apart from Jesus Christ and His redeeming grace, there was no good thing in Him. We can admit we're fallen, but really not all that far. There is good in us, and Christ just makes us even better. So sin ends up being not all that terrible and our fallen condition not all that serious. The church has become afraid to boldly expose that delusion.

A.W. Tozer said this; "I look back and remember a day when it was common for men and women to come to an altar of prayer and kneel there, shake, treamble and weep in agony of conviction over their inequity. We do not see it now because the God we preach is not the everlasting Holy One who cannot look upon inequity." He cannot look upon our sin, and so hence our beyond desperate need for a Savior, and that Savior is Jesus Christ....alone. He does not merely make our lives better. He is Life itself. Without Him, death is all we can expect.

The church has bought into the deception that humankind is basically good, even though the witness of history shows that we're anything but that. I recently watched a documentary detailing the eradication of the Jews of Hungary during WW2. Jewish survivors of the death camps told how when the Nazi's were leading them away from their homes. often to be immediately executed, neighbors who'd once seemed friends lined the street jeering them, calling out for their deaths. Apart from Christ, every human heart has a sleeping dragon within, and it only takes the right "match" to ignite it and bring forth the deep evil within. In Christ alone is the dragon slain, but we cannot know that until we're first confronted with the truth about the dragon within, and the truth about the only One who can slay it.

We are all of us, watching our culture disintegrate before our eyes. Practices once seen as openly deviant, perverted, and evil, have found their way into growing mainstream acceptance. Violence against one another, and the hateful rhetoric that goes with it, grows by the day. Mankind cannot and will not evolve out of it. Neither can we be educated out of it. It is ingrained in our very natures. Our fallen natures. God alone has the answer, and that answer is Jesus Christ. A clear message about this must be proclaimed by the church, and we cannot shrink back from that message.

We are born trapped in our sin, and we are helpless to deliver ourselves from its penalty. That's what makes John 3:16 so real; "For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes on Him should not perish but have eternal life." As the old hymn says, He gives "grace greater than all our sin." Yes, we must confront a lost world and race with the reality of our sin, but also with the Living remedy for all of it; Jesus Christ. The first is very bad news for our self sufficient flesh, but the second is the greatest of news. It is the Good News of Jesus Christ. Why do we fear to proclaim such wonderful news?

The pastor of my youth would often say of "converts" in the church, that it seemed like they only ever got about "half saved." In truth, such a state is actually a lost one. Throughout the Word of God the message is that we are hopelessly lost and without eternal hope. The message also is that we are desperately loved, even when we mock, reject, and blaspheme Him. He sent His Son to a race that for the most part didn't want Him and refused to receive Him. He continues to send Him through those who have. Jesus said the world hated Him because He convicted it of its sin. His message and life always will, but we must proclaim it anyway. He and His message are the only means to slay the dragon. The price of not doing so is beyond imagination.

We are all of us born into captivity to the dragon. We have no means of freeing ourselves, yet to Jesus Christ the dragon must yield. The dragon is powerless against the King. In Him, all who believe and receive are born into a Living Hope. At the cross, the power of the dragon was forever broken. In His resurrection, our freedom was given. What a message of Life and of hope. One, either the King or the dragon will rule over us. Who rules over you?

Blessings,

Pastor O