Mark 8: 34-38 Then Jesus called the crowd to Him along with His disciples, and He told them, “If anyone wants to come after Me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake and for the gospel will save it. What does it profit a man to gain the whole world, yet forfeit his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul? If anyone is ashamed of Me and My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man will also be ashamed of him when He comes in His Father’s glory with the holy angels.”
God's judgment upon us is based on our response to Christ. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. (John 3: 18, 19) If we truly believe in Him, and want to follow Him, He says, deny yourself and take up the cross. He says that it doesn't profit us one bit to gain the whole world at the cost of our soul. We can gain wealth, or become famous, it is of no use if we lose our soul. We can be humanitarian in our approach, but it is of no use if we lose our soul. What good is it to complain that it is because of someone else that we don't believe in Christ? "The Christians didn't live up to our expectations, so I don't want to follow Christ" can never be an acceptable excuse. "Religious divisions cause disruption to the unity of people, so I don't want to accept a creed which says that Jesus is the only way" can never be an acceptable excuse. He has said, "He who endures till the end will be saved". There is no use being half in and half out. There is no use running half the race and then walking back. If we are ashamed of Christ and His teachings, He has declared that He will also be ashamed of us.
I would like to tell you about five different people today: Philip Pullman, Muhammed Ali, Mahatma Gandhi, David Flood, and Jim Elliot.
Let us begin with Philip Pullman. He is an English author born in 1946. In 2011, he was given a services to Humanism award by the British Humanist Association for his contribution as a longstanding supporter. He was knighted in 2019 for services to literature. He is famous for his trilogy - 'His dark materials', a book like the Milton's paradise lost, but where Satan is the hero! His other famous book is the fictionalized biography of Christ, 'the good man Jesus and the scoundrel Christ'. He has singled out elements of Christianity for criticism: "if there is a God, and he is as the Christians describe him, then he deserves to be put down and rebelled against."
We then move on to Muhammed Ali. Muhammad Ali born Cassius Marcellus Clay Jr. in 1942 was an American professional boxer, activist, entertainer and philanthropist. He is nicknamed 'The Greatest', and is widely regarded as one of the most significant and celebrated figures of the 20th century and as one of the greatest boxers of all time. Once his wife Belinda asked him to write down why he had embraced Islam. In the letter, Ali writes that once when he was a teen, he took a newspaper, and a cartoon caught his eye. It showed a white slave owner beating his black slave and insisting the man pray to Jesus. The message was that Christianity was a religion forced on slaves by the white establishment. “I liked that cartoon,” Ali wrote. “It did something to me. And it made sense.”
There needs no introduction for Mahatma Gandhi! The following is the response of Mahatma Gandhi to Frantz’s letter asking Gandhi to read a recent publication he had written with verses about Christianity. Gandhi wrote, “Dear Friend, I have your letter. I am afraid it is not possible for me to subscribe to the creed you have sent me. The subscriber is made to believe that the highest manifestation of the unseen reality was Jesus Christ. In spite of all my efforts, I have not been able to feel the truth of that statement. I have not been able to move beyond the belief that Jesus was one of the great teachers of mankind. Do you not think that religious unity is to be had not by a mechanical subscription to a common creed but by all respecting the creed of each? In my opinion, the difference in creed there must be so long as there are different brains. But how does it matter if all these are hung upon the common thread of love and mutual esteem?”
Let me now read about the life of David Flood. He and his wife Svea Flood went to serve the Lord from Sweden to the heart of Africa - the Belgian Congo in 1921. They felt led by the Lord to spread the gospel to a remote village called N'dolera. However, the village chief didn't allow the young couple to enter the village nor teach about God. The only contact with the villagers was a young boy, who was allowed to sell them chickens and eggs twice a week. Svea Flood would speak to this boy about Christ. They prayed for a spiritual breakthrough in the village, but there was none. Malaria continued to strike one person after another. Meanwhile, Svea Flood became pregnant. She died 17 days after delivering a little girl. Inside David Flood, something snapped in that moment. He dug a crude grave, buried his twenty-seven-year-old wife, and then took his children back down the mountain to the mission station and gave them to another missionary couple and said, “I’m going back to Sweden. I’ve lost my wife, and I obviously can’t take care of this baby. God has ruined my life.” With that, he headed for the port, rejecting not only his calling but God himself. David Flood later remarried, fathered four more children, and generally dissipated his life with alcohol. Even when he was 73 years old, he had one rule in his family: “Never mention the name of God because God took everything from me.”
Finally, let us read about Jim Elliot. Jim knew Christ from an early age and was never afraid to speak about Him to his friends. In 1945 Jim traveled to Wheaton, IL to attend Wheaton College. His main goal while there was to devote himself to God. He recognized the importance of discipline in pursuing this goal. He would start each morning with prayer and Bible study. Jim’s desire to serve God by taking His gospel to unreached people of the world began to grow while at Wheaton. It was Jim’s desire to be able to reach the Aucas people of the Waodoni tribe that lived deep in the jungles of Ecuador and had little contact with the outside world. Jim and the four other Ecuador missionaries began to plan a way to show the Aucas they were friendly. They began dropping gifts to the Aucas. They also used an amplifier to speak out friendly Auca phrases. After many months, the Aucas even sent a gift back up in the bucket to the plane. Jim and the other missionaries felt the time had come to meet the Aucas face-to-face. They shared a meal with them, and Nate took the man up for a flight in the plane. The missionaries tried to show sincere friendship and asked them to bring others next time. Later, one day the missionaries landed and waited for the people. As they turned they saw a group of Auca warriors with their spears raised, ready to throw. Jim Elliot reached for the gun in his pocket. He had to decide instantly if he should use it. But he knew he couldn't. Each of the missionaries had promised they would not kill an Auca who did not know Jesus to save himself from being killed. Within seconds, the Auca warriors threw their spears, killing all the missionaries: Ed McCully, Roger Youderian, Nate Saint, Pete Fleming and Jim Elliot. One of the famous quotes of Jim Elliot was "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which He cannot lose". With his life, his death, and his quotes he's given us this question today: What does it profit us to gain the whole world but lose our soul? When forgiveness, grace, a dwelling place with our Lord, and spiritual riches are promised for us, what does it profit us to leave all that for the fleeting pleasures of the world?
Let me continue and finish the story of David Flood! His child was adopted by an American family and taken to USA at the age of 3. This girl was named 'Aggie'. She grew up and married and had children of her own. Her husband became president of a Christian college in the Seattle area, and Aggie was intrigued to find so much Scandinavian heritage there. One day a Swedish religious magazine appeared in her mailbox, as she turned the pages, she saw a primitive setting was a grave with a white cross-and on the cross were the words SVEA FLOOD. This article was about missionaries who had come to N’dolera long ago, the birth of a white baby, the death of the young mother, the one little African boy who was serving them food, who had been led to Christ, and how, after the whites had all left, the boy had grown up and finally persuaded the chief to let him build a school in the village. The article said that gradually he won all his students to Christ, the children led their parents to Christ. Even the chief had become a Christian. Today there were six hundred Christian believers in that one village. All because of the sacrifice of David and Svea Flood. Aggie went in search of her father and found him. “Papa?” she said tentatively. He turned and began to cry, “I never meant to give you away.” “It’s all right Papa,” she replied, taking him gently in her arms. “God took care of me.” The man instantly stiffened. The tears stopped.
“God forgot all of us. Our lives have been like this because of Him.” He turned his face back to the wall. Aggie stroked his face and then continued, undaunted. “Papa, I’ve got a little story to tell you, and it’s a true one. You didn’t go to Africa in vain. Mama didn’t die in vain. The little boy you won to the Lord grew up to win that whole village to Jesus Christ. The one seed you planted just kept growing and growing. Today there are six hundred African people serving the Lord because you were faithful to the call of God in your life. “Papa, Jesus loves you. He has never hated you.” The old man turned back to look into his daughter’s eyes. His body relaxed. He began to talk. And by the end of the afternoon, he had come back to the God he had resented for so many decades. Over the next few days, father and daughter enjoyed warm moments together. Aggie and her husband soon had to return to America—and within a few weeks, David Flood had gone into eternity.
God is no debtor to man! He is the hound of heaven pursuing even those who hate Him. How much more will He pursue those who want to serve Him. Just that David Flood lost his time on earth, being angry in vain. Just that he chose to lose touch with the very source of comfort after His wife's death. Let me not paint a rosy picture here. The cross Jesus is asking each one of us to carry is heavy! It is not easy to deny ourselves. Jesus means it when He says "whoever loses his life for My sake and for the gospel will save it". This includes losing one's own life like Jim Elliot, or losing the loved one like David Flood. Are you willing? Have you counted the cost?
Link to the previous article: Is anything too hard for the Lord? Link to the next article: Whom shall I send?
Comments