- Oct 13, 2009
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Dear friends, greetings in the blessed Name of our Lord Jesus 
. I trust that the Lord is prospering you spiritually and materially. A few months ago I was watching a TV show (on CNN, I think) which aired the story of a conman (who many believed was a Christian. They probably didnt heed the Lords advice to judge a person by his character and not merely by his confession) who ripped off many Christians off their life savings. A senior woman (about 65) was in tears as she explained in detail about how she was conned by a Christian business man. She and several others in her church trusted this man as he professed Christ. These brothers and sisters didnt want anything to do with Wall Street and its worldly ways (probably scared of people like Jordan Belfort, Bernie Madoff , and the legendary Gordon Gekko) and so they invested in a fund (I think) started by this Christian man who absconded with all their savings. That really broke my heart. It got me wondering: are we Christians really naïve and are the people of the world smarter than us?
Id like for us to turn to Matthew 10:16 in which the Lord Jesus instructed His disciples to be as shrewd as snakes (paraphrased: wily as a Fox) and as innocent as doves. Sometimes I get the feeling that we are innocent as doves but not shrewd enough. The Lord Jesus, pure as He is, was well conversant with the world and its thinking. When the Pharisees tried to trap him by questioning about the legality of Roman taxation, he astounded them with a politically and spiritually correct response: render unto Caesar that which is Caesars and unto God that which belongs to God (Matthew 21:22). Its obvious that God wants us to know and understand the ways of this world, but not adopt them (1 Corinthians 5:10). Our churches sometimes teach us too much spirituality which renders us defenseless and useless in this world. The book of Proverbs is an excellent resource for us Christians to learn about and protect ourselves from the smart alecks out there.
I think were all familiar with Field Marshal Erwin Rommel who was dubbed the Desert Fox by the allies during WWII. In his book The Trial of the Fox, David Irving had this to say about Marshal Rommel: He outwitted, bluffed, deceived, and cheated the enemy. It was said that his greatest pleasure was to trick the opponents into premature and often quite needless surrender. Those of you who are veteran tank commanders probably understand (much better than me) the difficulties of desert combat, i.e., theres no place to hide! Marshal Rommel, with very limited resources, gave the British a run for their money (at least during the initial phases of the North African campaign. By the way, I got to tell you there is nothing more beautiful than a sprawling and open desert. My dad was posted in Algeria when I was young, and I absolutely loved the Sahara. Incidentally, the allies landed at Oran and Algiers during WWII.). The wily and cunning character attributes of a Fox like deception, bluffing, stalking, and cheating are the hallmarks of the people of this world. Maybe its time that we Christians wised up to these facts, without indulging in them. Lets look at some of these fox like behavioral patterns in detail.
Outwitting: In 2 Corinthians 2:11 the Apostle Paul was preaching the virtue of forgiveness. In 1 Corinthians the Apostle Paul rebuked the church for its carnality and in particular a man who was sleeping with his fathers wife. That man was obviously rebuked by the church and in 2 Corinthians 2:11 Paul advocated forgiveness for the penitent sinner. The key take-way from this is that un-forgiveness leaves the door open for Satan to divide the church. The church is only as strong as its weakest link and forgiveness unites the body of Christ and enables it to outsmart Satan.
Bluffing: People of this world are pretty good at bluffing (ex: high stakes poker). I suspect that the self-professed god-man who conned Christians to part with their money as described in the opening paragraph was good at bluffing too. In Matthew 4:8-9 Satan displayed all the wealth of the world and tempted the Lord Jesus to abandon God for money. The Lord Jesus rebuked Satan in Matthew 4:10. But beyond that, my sense is that the Lord Jesus knew that Satan was bluffing. In other words even if the Lord Jesus had bowed to Satans wishes (which of course was impossible) Satan wouldnt have given the Lord all that wealth (because its not Satans to give. The world belongs to our Heavenly Father (Psalm 24:1) ).
So you see saints even though we shouldnt imitate the world, it may not be a bad idea to be street-smart as the Lord Himself was. The carpenter from Nazareth embodied within Himself both the proverbial (street sense) and Divine wisdom (1 Corinthians 2:6-16).
Dear friends, Im quite certain that all of you are sanctified, Holy Ghost baptized saints. Should there be any amongst you that dont know the Lord yet, I pray that the Lord of the Universe will set you free from sin and disobedience into His glorious light and freedom. Amen.
[FONT="]PS: Thanks for taking the time to read my scribble saints. If you find a lot of similarities between this writing and those of Rev. Oswald Chambers, thats because the late Rev. Chambers is my mentor. Dear friends, please forgive me if I dont respond to your mails and debates. Im a full time college professor and havent the time to debate (that and Im not very good at it.) Perfect love casts all fear .. (1 John 4:18) Amen.[/FONT]
. I trust that the Lord is prospering you spiritually and materially. A few months ago I was watching a TV show (on CNN, I think) which aired the story of a conman (who many believed was a Christian. They probably didnt heed the Lords advice to judge a person by his character and not merely by his confession) who ripped off many Christians off their life savings. A senior woman (about 65) was in tears as she explained in detail about how she was conned by a Christian business man. She and several others in her church trusted this man as he professed Christ. These brothers and sisters didnt want anything to do with Wall Street and its worldly ways (probably scared of people like Jordan Belfort, Bernie Madoff , and the legendary Gordon Gekko) and so they invested in a fund (I think) started by this Christian man who absconded with all their savings. That really broke my heart. It got me wondering: are we Christians really naïve and are the people of the world smarter than us?Id like for us to turn to Matthew 10:16 in which the Lord Jesus instructed His disciples to be as shrewd as snakes (paraphrased: wily as a Fox) and as innocent as doves. Sometimes I get the feeling that we are innocent as doves but not shrewd enough. The Lord Jesus, pure as He is, was well conversant with the world and its thinking. When the Pharisees tried to trap him by questioning about the legality of Roman taxation, he astounded them with a politically and spiritually correct response: render unto Caesar that which is Caesars and unto God that which belongs to God (Matthew 21:22). Its obvious that God wants us to know and understand the ways of this world, but not adopt them (1 Corinthians 5:10). Our churches sometimes teach us too much spirituality which renders us defenseless and useless in this world. The book of Proverbs is an excellent resource for us Christians to learn about and protect ourselves from the smart alecks out there.
I think were all familiar with Field Marshal Erwin Rommel who was dubbed the Desert Fox by the allies during WWII. In his book The Trial of the Fox, David Irving had this to say about Marshal Rommel: He outwitted, bluffed, deceived, and cheated the enemy. It was said that his greatest pleasure was to trick the opponents into premature and often quite needless surrender. Those of you who are veteran tank commanders probably understand (much better than me) the difficulties of desert combat, i.e., theres no place to hide! Marshal Rommel, with very limited resources, gave the British a run for their money (at least during the initial phases of the North African campaign. By the way, I got to tell you there is nothing more beautiful than a sprawling and open desert. My dad was posted in Algeria when I was young, and I absolutely loved the Sahara. Incidentally, the allies landed at Oran and Algiers during WWII.). The wily and cunning character attributes of a Fox like deception, bluffing, stalking, and cheating are the hallmarks of the people of this world. Maybe its time that we Christians wised up to these facts, without indulging in them. Lets look at some of these fox like behavioral patterns in detail.
Outwitting: In 2 Corinthians 2:11 the Apostle Paul was preaching the virtue of forgiveness. In 1 Corinthians the Apostle Paul rebuked the church for its carnality and in particular a man who was sleeping with his fathers wife. That man was obviously rebuked by the church and in 2 Corinthians 2:11 Paul advocated forgiveness for the penitent sinner. The key take-way from this is that un-forgiveness leaves the door open for Satan to divide the church. The church is only as strong as its weakest link and forgiveness unites the body of Christ and enables it to outsmart Satan.
Bluffing: People of this world are pretty good at bluffing (ex: high stakes poker). I suspect that the self-professed god-man who conned Christians to part with their money as described in the opening paragraph was good at bluffing too. In Matthew 4:8-9 Satan displayed all the wealth of the world and tempted the Lord Jesus to abandon God for money. The Lord Jesus rebuked Satan in Matthew 4:10. But beyond that, my sense is that the Lord Jesus knew that Satan was bluffing. In other words even if the Lord Jesus had bowed to Satans wishes (which of course was impossible) Satan wouldnt have given the Lord all that wealth (because its not Satans to give. The world belongs to our Heavenly Father (Psalm 24:1) ).
So you see saints even though we shouldnt imitate the world, it may not be a bad idea to be street-smart as the Lord Himself was. The carpenter from Nazareth embodied within Himself both the proverbial (street sense) and Divine wisdom (1 Corinthians 2:6-16).
Dear friends, Im quite certain that all of you are sanctified, Holy Ghost baptized saints. Should there be any amongst you that dont know the Lord yet, I pray that the Lord of the Universe will set you free from sin and disobedience into His glorious light and freedom. Amen.
[FONT="]PS: Thanks for taking the time to read my scribble saints. If you find a lot of similarities between this writing and those of Rev. Oswald Chambers, thats because the late Rev. Chambers is my mentor. Dear friends, please forgive me if I dont respond to your mails and debates. Im a full time college professor and havent the time to debate (that and Im not very good at it.) Perfect love casts all fear .. (1 John 4:18) Amen.[/FONT]
