Oh My God – The Inner Witness
INTRODUCTION
Have you noticed in these last days of WORLD HISTORY, when people either THRILL TO or AGONIZE OVER what is happening TO THEM or AROUND THEM or IN THEM, they will exclaim with a loud emphatic:
“OH MY GOD!”
Have you heard it? If you haven’t, get an appointment with an ear-nose-throat doctor. How could you not hear it? It is incessant! It is pervasive. People would be hard pressed any more to communicate at all without their “OH MY GOD.”
“OH MY GOD” even tops “WHATEVER,” which I believe is one of the LEAD EVIL SPIRITS LET LOOSE ON HUMANITY IN THE END DAYS! (SITUATION ETHICS – MORAL RELATIVISM – NO ABSOLUTES – WHATEVER TURNS YOU ON – IF IT FEELS GOOD DO IT – WHATEVER)
And “OH MY GOD” now covers every situation imaginable!:
- Oh my God, have you seen the price of milk lately!
- Oh my God, have you seen her hair, it looks like road-kill!
- Oh my God, I think we missed the turn we needed!
- Oh my God, what is wrong with those people!?
- Oh my God, I just can’t believe it!
It has become one of the most common mantras, strangely enough, permeating the UNBELIEVING, GOD-IGNORING, GOD-DENYING, GOD-HATING, and GOD-OPPOSING SOCIETY in our world. How can that be? UNBELIEVERS ARE POPULATED WITH “OH-MY-GODERS.” At the same time, we see the growing HATRED people have for GOD AND FOR HIS CHRIST, and we grieve at the enormous assault on all things godly.
OH MY GOD is common in other countries as well:
-Spanish – ODIOS MIO
-Italian – OH MIO DIO
-German – ACH MEIN GOD
-Portuguese – MEU DEUS
-Dutch – OH MIJN GOD
-English – OH MY GOD
ILLUSTRATION
For instance, on recent TV programs like EXTREME MAKEOVER with Ty Pennington, Ty stands there beside a mile long motor home with the family involved, and he asks the family whether they are ready to see their new digs. The mile-long motor home pulls away and they see for the first time their new castle. Then the cries are heard, “OH MY GOD – OH MY GOD – OH MY GOD!”
“Go ahead,” he says, “go check out your new home.” They open the front door and walk in – BOOM – OH MY GOD – OH MY GOD! With each new room rises the chorus – OH MY GOD – OH MY GOD. Even the new garage gets an OH MY GOD. I have never been in an OH MY GOD GARAGE IN MY LIFE! That isn’t all – a new Ford Hybrid out back gets a loud OH MY GOD too. I have never been in an OH MY GOD FORD in my life either, except maybe when it breaks down. FORD – FOUND ON ROAD DEAD! OH MY GOD!
THE PEOPLE’S “OH MY GOD” HAS NEVER BEEN SO POPULAR! Or is He?
*******
I. THE BROKEN BUT INESCAPABLE GOD IMAGE
The NAIVE among us might be led to think that those who emphatically declare “OH MY GOD” do so for the following reasons:
FIRST – Maybe they are believers who are having spontaneous MOMENTS OF PRAISE and PRAYER and WORSHIP – OH MY GOD! You know, like the Psalmist in Psalm 25:2,
“Oh my God, in Thee I trust, do not let me be
ashamed; do not let my enemies exult
over me.”
Maybe it is the sudden inspiration of the HOLY SPIRIT, and a heavenward lifting up of God’s name. OH HOW I LONG THAT THIS WERE in fact THE CASE!
SECOND – Or perhaps it is a sudden CONFESSION OF FAITH IN GOD not only, but they are owning GOD TO BE THEIR GOD – OH MY GOD! A PERSONAL EXPRESSION OF FAITH IN A SUPREME BEING! It sounds like they are taking personal ownership of God – OH MY GOD.
ILLUSTRATION
Mother was talking with her son little Johnny about God. Johnny asked, “Mother, where is God?” Mother replied, “Johnny, God is everywhere.” Johnny asked, “Mommy, is God in the room with us now?” “Definitely Johnny,” mother said. Then Johnny asked, “Is God in my milk mug,” as he held it close. Mother said, “Yes son!” Johnny suddenly cupped his hand over the mug and said, “GOT HIM.”
OH MY GOD! Something in man not only cries out to God, but instinctively OWNS GOD AS HIS GOD. Indeed, there are no ATHEISTS IN FOXHOLES. Deep within, man needs to possess God Whom he has dispossessed. Like Johnny, he wants to say “GOT HIM.” But he can’t, because sin and Satan “HAS HIM.”
***
Now turn with me to the Apostle Paul’s inspired teaching in Romans 1:21,
“For even though they KNEW GOD, they did not honor
Him as God, or give thanks; but became futile in
speculations, and their foolish heart
was darkened.”
***
There are some critically important things we must understand here:
1. Paul is writing about ALL MEN UPON THE FACE OF THE EARTH THROUGHOUT ALL HISTORY WHO KNEW, AND YET DISBELIEVE AND DENY GOD. They commit the two cardinal sins:
-THEY DON’T THANK GOD, but simply take God’s blessings just as a thief takes his neighbor’s possessions. A thankless man is a ROBBER OF GOD.
-THEY DON’T HONOR GOD, but take all the credit in their lives for success. A self-honoring man is a SUP-PLANTER OF GOD.
-Everything falls apart in society from that point on (the rest of Romans 1).
Paul is telling us that something in each and all of them deep down KNOWS GOD – THEY KNEW GOD. How can that be you ask? Each man has a GOD AWARENESS – SENSUS DIVINITATUS – SENSE OF GOD DOWN DEEP IN THEIR HEARTS. Because everyone in this world has been created in THE IMAGE OF GOD.
We read in Genesis 1:28,
“Then God said, ‘Let Us make man in Our image,
according to Our likeness…..”
2. It is in that Divine Image man was created in that the SENSUS DIVINITATUS – THE SENSE OF THE DIVINE – THE KNOWLEDGE GOD is imprinted. THEY KNEW GOD!
-The IMAGE OF GOD deals with GOD-LIKENESS and with GOD-AWARENESS. We are dealing here with that deep innate GOD-AWARENESS in universal man.
-But Adam and Eve, our original parents, fell into sin, and with them all of mankind. And when that happened, the GOD IMAGE along with the SENSUS DIVINITATUS – KNOWLEDGE OF GOD – was clobbered, mangled, shattered by sin.
-However, though blasted by sin, the GOD-IMAGE – the GOD-KNOWLEDGE is still there. It is broken, busted, blitzed, bombed, and blasted – but still present, for God has not left Himself without a WITNESS inside man (THE INTERNAL WITNESS), and in the creation around him (THE EXTERNAL WITNESS).
Hear it:
“THE INTERNAL WITNESS TO GOD IN MAN IS NOT
AN EYEWITNESS, AND THEREIN IS THE
PROBLEM, FOR MAN IS SPIRITUALLY
AND MORALLY BLIND.”
Jesus spoke directly to this in Mark 8:18,
“And having eyes to see, do you not see….?”
The answer is NO found in the NOT, for it is a rhetorical question.
-But, THE BLINDED INTERNAL WITNESS is in each man and no man can escape it – MAN KNOWS DEEP DOWN THAT GOD IS, and yet because the IMAGE OF GOD IS SIN-SHATTERED IN EVERY MAN, by nature he does not KNOW GOD – HE DOES BUT HE DOESN’T.
-Yet something in man IS CRYING OUT TO GOD – BUT THE VERY ESSENCE OF THE CRY IS NOT APPREHENDED BY THE CRIER.
I believe in these last days of CHAOS AND FEAR, the “OH MY GOD CRY” IS BECOMING LOUDER AND MORE DESPERATE, AND YET THE CRIERS ARE DEAF TO THEIR OWN INNER and OUTER CRY.
ILLUSTRATION
Several years ago, around the time that the Soviet Union was imploding, American Christian booksellers were invited for the first time to show their wares at the Moscow Book Fair. One of those booksellers brought 50,000 Bibles to give away to people there.
After several hours, the police stopped the give-away for the simple reason that there was such a mob of people clamoring for Bibles that every aisle of the Book Fair was jammed and traffic was gridlocked. So they were required to stop giving the Bibles away for two hours, then they were allowed to resume for another hour, then another break, then resume for another hour. The police weren’t trying to prevent them from distributing Bibles – they were simply trying to keep the Moscow Book Fair open.
Further down the same aisle of the Book Fair, at the American Atheist Society booth, Madalyn Murray O’Hair was displaying their wares. Someone who was there told me that virtually no one even stopped to see what she had to offer, because they knew all too well. They had had atheism for seventy years and they wanted nothing more to do with it.
***
Is that where you are today? The DIVINE WITNESS IS CRYING OUT DEEP IN YOU, AND LOUD FROM YOU – OH MY GOD. For HE IS WHAT YOU HAVE MISSED AND NEEDED SO DESPERATELY YOUR WHOLE LIFE, and you are sick of your unbelief, your sin, and your whole sin-sick mess! And yet THE CRY OF THE INNER WITNESS FROM YOUR HEART AND MOUTH GOES UNHEARD!
***
-Plus, in the frantic rush of the everyday on their/our way to work, fighting traffic on the highway, fielding the umpteenth phone call in a row that has kept us from our work, perhaps in the midst of all that they/we focus only on the momentary.
By accident or by design, most days are hectic enough that we can keep ourselves from listening to our deepest yearnings. But every once in a while something may call us up short. A piece of music stabs at our hearts and reminds us of such a profound beauty that suddenly the mundane nature of our work-a-day world seems tawdry by comparison. It reminds us that beyond this particular moment, we pine for something higher,
“OH MY GOD,”
but then it vanishes as QUICKLY AS IT CAME, absorbed again into the rat race.
*******
II. UNDER PRESSURE – THE BIG EXPLETIVES
Jesus says in Matthew 12:24,
“For the mouth speaks out of that which
fills the heart.”
The heart of man IS THE EMOTIONAL PRESSURE COOKER, and the MOUTH IS THE BLEED VALVE.
So that when the PRESSURES OF EMOTIONAL ECSTASIES come upon men and fill them, the GOD AWARENESS – OH MY GOD – POPS UP FROM DOWN DEEP AND OUT OF THEIR MOUTHS.
And when the PRESSURES OF EMOTIONAL AGONIES come upon men and fill them, the GOD AWARENESS – GOD DAMN IT – POPS UP FROM DOWN DEEP AND OUT OF THEIR MOUTHS.
THE POSITIVE PRESSURE ELICITS – OH MY GOD, and the NEGATIVE PRESSURE ELICITS – GOD DAMN IT (really damning God for the mess.)
In either case, the masses don’t get it, they don’t understand it, they don’t apprehend it, and they don’t believe in the God they acknowledge or condemn.
But this is why when the THRILL OF VICTORY COMES, they do not say: OH MY DOG – for they were not created in Rover’s Image. They do not say: OH MY HONDA – for they were not created in Das Auto’s Image. They do not say: OH MY DELL – for they were not created in their Computer’s Image, though every day their computer is trying to recreate them in its image. They do say: OH MY GOD, for the DIVINE IMPRINT AND KNOWLEDGE IS DEEP IN THEM THOUGH SMASHED BY SIN.
When things REJOICE MAN or RAVAGE MAN, it requires a BIG EXPLETIVE, and it doesn’t get any BIGGER THAN GOD – THEY GO FOR THE GOLD.
If you will:
“IN EACH HUMAN HEART THERE IS THE ALTAR
TO THE KNOWN BUT UNKNOWN GOD.”
So near and yet so far!
So present and yet so absent!
So known and yet so unknown!
So everything and yet so nothing!
So personal and yet so impersonal!
So alive and yet so dead!
Is that where you find yourself today? SO NEAR AND YET SO FAR! Spiritually and morally in EVER-NEVER-LAND! OH MY GOD emotionally pops up in you, but in a milli-second it evaporates into darkness! Like a LIGHTNING BUG, so quickly on and then so quickly off, as it disappears again into the night. Did you see that? I think so but I can’t say for sure! What was that?
You join with the believers on Sunday once or twice, but then you vanish and are absorbed into the world of the OH MY GOD GODLESS AND UNGODLY the rest of the year. TWINKLE-TWINKLE LITTLE STAR – HOW I WONDER WHERE YOU ARE! NOW YOU SEE THEM, AND NOW YOU DON’T.
OH MY GOD – did I really say that? Where did that come from? I don’t really believe that! I don’t know what I must have been thinking. OH MY GOD – I really said that? I’ll be GOD-DAMNED – PARDON MY FRENCH!
*******
III. THE DARKNESS OF THE HUMAN HEART
Romans 1:21 again:
“…their foolish heart was DARKENED.”
So much here! SIN did that and sin does this – SPIRITUAL AND MORAL HEART DARKNESS.
Hear me:
“WE WERE CREATED WITH INNER LIGHT, BUT SIN
TURNED THE LIGHT OF GOD INTO DARKNESS.”
Hear it:
“WHEN UNBELIEVERS CRY OUT ‘OH MY GOD,’ IT IS
LIKE DARKNESS BRIBING THE LIGHT.”
Listen:
“SIN IS SO DARKENING AND BLINDING, THAT IT NOT
ONLY TAKES AWAY THE SENSE OF GOD, BUT IT
TAKES AWAY THE SENSE OF SIN, AND YES,
EVEN THE SEEING OF SIN – SPIRITUAL
AND MORAL DARKNESS.”
This is what has been happening in America for the last many years. It has gone that far! And as it does, America is losing its CONSCIENCE.
***
1. Remember – GOD WORKS IN THE LIGHT
We read in I John 1:5,
“…God is light, and in Him there is no
darkness at all.”
We read in Psalm 36:9,
“For with Thee-God is the fountain of life, in
Your light we see light.”
We read in Psalm 119:15,
“Your Word God is a lamp unto my feet, and a
light unto my path.”
***
2. Remember – SATAN WORKS IN THE DARK
Ephesians 6:12 tells us that,
“Satan and his demons are the powers
of darkness.”
Listen now:
“SIN IN THE HUMAN HEART CAUSES DENSE
DARKNESS, AND SIN-DARKENED HEARTS
ARE THE DEVIL’S WORKSHOPS, AND
THE DEMON’S PLAYGROUNDS.”
Hear it:
“OLE WICKED HEROD COULD NOT HAVE MURDERED
JOHN THE BAPTIST, HAD NOT THE SIN OF LUST IN
HIS HEART FIRST MURDERED HIS CONSCIENCE.”
Understand:
“SIN BLACKENS THE WINDOWS OF THE SOUL, AND
MAKES THE INNER ROOM OF MAN TOTALLY DARK.
SATAN LOVES DARK ROOMS.”
***
3. SATAN IN THE INNER DARKNESS REDEFINES WHO MAN IS:
In the inner darkness of man’s heart, Satan convinces man that he is but a SPECIES IN THE EVOLUTIONARY CHAIN.
In the inner darkness of man’s heart, Satan convinces man that BABIES IN THE WOMB ARE NOTHING MORE THAN BLOBS OF TISSUE.
In the inner dense darkness of man’s heart:
-Satan convinces JOE THAT HE IS JUDY.
-Satan convinces SHIRLEY THAT SHE IS SAM.
-Satan convinces JIM TO MARRY JOHN.
-Satan convinces BETTY TO MARRY BEATRICE.
And all the while these perverted sinners are saying that God’s Word approves of such perversion, which is ADDING BLASPHEMY TO REBELLION.
Such heresy today is ruining and destroying entire denominations, turning them into into ashes, and turning our government into Satan’s stronghold. If this goes unrepented of:
“NOT ONLY WILL CHURCH AND STATE DIE IN THEIR
SINS, THEY WILL ALSO DIE FOR THEIR SINS.”
And as for man,
“THE LESS HE SEES AND FEELS THE HORROR OF HIS
SINS IN THIS WORLD, THE MORE HE SHALL SEE
AND FEEL THE HORROR OF HIS SINS IN
THE NEXT WORLD.”
***
Here it is:
“YOU CANNOT KNOW WHO YOU REALLY ARE
UNTIL YOU KNOW WHO GOD REALLY IS.”
Listen to me:
“THE INNER CRY OF “OH MY GOD” IS THE BROKEN
IMAGE OF GOD IN MAN SEARCHING FOR ITS
TRUE IDENTITY.”
ILLUSTRATION
A fairly recent issue of “Sports Illustrated” featured a story about an illegitimate son of the 7’ 1” basketball legend, Wilt Chamberlain. In his 1991 memoir, A View From Above, Chamberlain famously boasted that he had slept with 20,000 women. But he had never, he claimed, fathered “any little Wilts.”
Then along came Aaron Levi, biracial, very tall, and lost. Though he had been adopted by a very lovely and loving white family, Levi always wanted to know his birth parents. From an early age, he began to search for their identities. He finally found his birth mother and learned that Chamberlain (now deceased) was his father.
But it wasn’t good enough for him. His aunt Victoria, a Boston area psychiatrist, said Levi’s essential questions are, “Who does he belong to? Where are you in the world? Who are you? Who claims you as theirs?” Those questions aren’t unique to Aaron Levi. They are the questions answered once and for all by the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Good News of what the Triune God has done to bring lost children home.
How can you know God as TRULY YOUR GOD? You must change the “OH MY GOD” and say to Jesus and mean it, “BE MY GOD. I SURRENDER MY WHOLE HEART TO YOU.” And once you do, then you can cry and mean it for the first time – OH MY GOD. Only then!
*******
IV. THE FOOL’S NO-GOD HEART
Read Psalm 14!
Now notice that both in Romans 1:21 and Psalm 14;1, we have the words FOOLISH AND FOOL. The words FOOL OR FOOLISH mean WORTHLESS, EMPTY-HEADED IDIOTIC, GOOD-FOR-NOTHING THINKING. They mean that UNBELIEF IS FOOLISHNESS – HOTHEADEDNESS – GOOD-FOR-NOTHINGNESS – STUPID – MORONIC. They mean that ATHEISM IS FOOLISHNESS – EMPTY-HEADEDNESS – GOOD FOR NOTHINGNESS – STUPID – MORONIC.
Psalm 14 paints what Jennifer Green calls:
“A picture of humanity that could hardly
be more dismal.”
In fact, while most Psalms begin by acknowledging God in praise or prayer, the Psalmist begins Psalm 14 with the fool’s claim that there is no God.
The Psalmist then goes on two times in just three verses to basically assert that,
“…there is no one who does good.”
The psalmist goes on to add that fools don’t just hold dimwitted views of reality. They also act wickedly on the basis of those wrong views. Is this a picture of modern America and the world or what? In fact:
“THE MORE AMERICA HAS REBELLED AGAINST AND
DENIED GOD, THE MORE ROTTEN AND IMMORAL
SHE HAS BECOME IN THE HORRORS OF
INFANTICIDE AND PERVERSION.”
***
EXAMPLE:
Elie Wiesel, in his book “Night” describes how the NAZI attackers herded millions of Jews into cattle cars on their forced journeys to the Auschwitz and Buchenwald concentration camps. The Germans, the victimizers, crammed the Jews, the victims, into cattle cars with no provisions.
Then they gassed them and incinerated them in huge ovens with the noxious smell of burning flesh blanketing nearby villages. How is that possible, man’s horrific inhumanity to man?
Hear it:
“WHEN MAN DENIES THE EXISTENCE OF GOD, MAN
ALWAYS DESCENDS TO THE LEVEL OF ANIMALS
WHO WERE NOT CREATED IN THE IMAGE
OF GOD.”
***
Turn in your Bibles with me to Psalm 14:1 (Psalm 53:1),
“THE FOOL HAS SAID IN HIS HEART, ‘THERE IS
NO GOD.’ They are CORRUPT, THEY HAVE
COMMITTED ABOMINABLE DEEDS, there
is no one who does good.”
Before getting into it in depth, we must remember what the Bible says in Proverbs 4:23,
“Keep your heart with all diligence, for from it
flow the issues of life.”
The heart is the CONTROL CENTRAL in life. What a man really believes, and what is really going on in a man is first found in, and determined by the HEART.
Proverbs 23:7 says about man,
“As a man thinks in his heart, so is he.”
***
LISTEN now:
“WHAT IS SPOKEN BY A MAN’S MOUTH AUDIBLY, IS
FIRST SPOKEN SILENTLY IN HIS HEART.”
Hear it:
“THE FOOL SAYS IN HIS HEART, NOT HIS HEAD,
‘THERE IS NO GOD.’”
The HEART is the throbbing pulse-beat of all of man’s passions, his loves, his hates, his indifference, his apathy, and his longings. Here is the point that we must see:
“ATHEISM – THERE IS NO GOD – BEGINS IN THE
HEART, NOT IN THE HEAD OF MAN.”
***
Let me tell you about the heart of man by nature:
“BECAUSE OF SIN IN THE HEART, MAN BY NATURE
HATES GOD, AND IS HOSTILE TO THE VERY
THOUGHT OR IDEA OF GOD, AND DOES
NOT WANT THERE TO BE A GOD.”
(Romans 8:7)
Why is that?:
“BECAUSE DEEP DOWN MAN WANTS TO DO HIS
OWN THING, AND DOES NOT WANT TO
DO GOD’S THING.”
ILLUSTRATION
This is the story of man throughout the ages. Israel did not want God to be King of their lives, but rather wanted a flesh and blood king like themselves who would protect and provide for them like the kings of other nations. There is no protection without God, and the other nations overran Israel again and again.
Germany had rejected God as Lord and King of their nation, and kicked Him out of their colleges and universities. Instead, they embraced ADOLF HITLER AS THEIR RULER who would lead them to becoming a SUPER RACE. To do that, Hitler murdered the Jews who were a threat to the SUPER RACE, which was called THE FINAL SOLUTION. Germany was destroyed!
America has rejected God as her King, and instead has embraced Barack Obama as her Messiah. Dictator-Muslim Obama is God’s punishment on America for rejecting God and His Christ. If she persists in rebellion against the King of kings and Lord of lords, she will also perish like Israel and Germany.
***
Now hear this:
“ATHEISM IS NOT FIRST OF ALL ABOUT THEOLOGY,
BUT RATHER IT IS ABOUT MORALITY.”
Listen now:
“FOOLS HATE THE VERY IDEA OF GOD BECAUSE
THEY HATE THE LAWS AND WAYS OF GOD.”
Get this big:
“WHERE THERE IS NO GOD, THERE CAN BE NO LAW;
WHERE THERE IS NO LAW, THERE CAN BE NO SIN;
WHERE THERE IS NO SIN, THERE CAN BE NO
GUILT OR ACCUSATION. THAT IS THE BIG
AND ULTIMATE GOAL OF ATHEISM.”
I hope you get this! Atheists think that they are so smart. They are not, but in fact are dumber than stumps. Hear it:
“IT ISN’T THAT ATHEISTS AND AGNOSTICS THINK
BETTER, BUT THAT THEY WANT TO LIVE
WORSE AND DO SO IN PEACE.”
***
–Well then, this is how it works:
The GOD-HATING HEART OF MAN sends strong commands to the HIS SINFUL MIND:
“MIND, HEART CALLING MIND, COME UP WITH
STRONG ARGUMENTS TO PROVE THAT THERE
IS NO GOD, AND TO PROVE I AM RIGHT WHEN
I SAY, ‘THERE IS NO GOD.’”
The HEART OF MAN GOES ON TO SAY TO HIS MIND:
“HOP TO IT MIND, FOR I THE HEART WANT THE
PROOFS THAT THERE IS NO GOD ON MY DESK
BY MORNING.”
So man’s sin-darkened mind goes to work to PROVE THAT THERE IS NO GOD in response to the GENERAL OF HIS LIFE – THE GOD-HATING HEART.
One theory man comes up with is that DUMB MATTER OR STUPID PRIMORDIAL OOZE IS ETERNAL, and this mindless, dumb MATTER or OOZE on its own GOT SMART and developed into lower life forms like the MONKEY AND THE APE. Then the APE got real brilliant and EVOLVED INTO MAN. It is really:
“FROM THE GOO TO THE ZOO TO YOU.”
Now get this, MAN HATES GOD SO INTENSELY that he would rather believe that he CAME FROM DUMB OOZE AND THE ZOO, than that he was CREATED BY the OMNISCIENT AND OMNIPOTENT GOD. They would rather have APES AS THEIR ANCESTORS than believe GOD AS THEIR CREATOR.
It is put so powerfully by the Apostle Paul in Romans 1:25,
“For they exchanged the TRUTH OF GOD FOR A LIE,
and worshipped the CREATURE RATHER THAN
THE CREATOR.”
EXPLANATION
One of the fruits of evolution has been the proliferation of atheists. Do you realize that before Darwin, an atheist was as scarce as a hen’s tooth? Do you know why? Because if you said you were an atheist, all I had to say to you was, “Look around, buddy. Where did all of this come from?” And the atheist said, “Ah…bu…da…I don’t know.”
Then came Charles Darwin, who, as one evolutionist said, “made atheism respectable.” I would not want to be Charles Darwin on Judgment Day. Think of all the people whom he has led astray. Some were led astray quite willingly, but he is responsible for a lot of unbelief, ungodliness, and misery. To say that tiny changes in all organisms (micro-evolution, if you will) prove gigantic changes from one species to another species (macro-evolution) is a gigantic leap of blind faith. The missing links were missing in his day; they’re still missing in our day.
We believe in God, the Creator of heaven and earth. We should do all we can to counteract the false teaching that has been so readily accepted at every level of our society.
***
Then there is the BIG BANG THEORY. Eternal matter became so DENSE that at some point there was a COSMIC EXPLOSION, and when the dust settled, THERE WAS THIS UNIMAGINABLY ORDERED UNIVERSE in all of its unfathomable intricacies and vast expanse.
Another stupid theory, like if you blow up a junkyard, and after the explosion and the dust settles, there is a 747 in perfect flying order. Get your seat today as we fly you to a blue lagoon where everyone walks around in a BIG BANG SWOON.
***
Now then, the HEART OF GOD-HATING MAN wants there to be no God so desperately, that he believes and revels in these IDIOCIES and INSANITIES. “Good job mind, you have proved my point that THERE IS NO GOD,” says the heart.
The FOOLISH – STUPID – IDIOT heart of man constantly seeks for more REASONS AND ARGUMENTS TO PROVE THAT THERE IS NO GOD. It is a SIN-DARKENED HEART that is so DESPERATELY IN LOVE WITH A NOTION, which really is only a potion to soothe his heart into thinking:
“THAT HE CAN RIGHTLY ACT WRONGLY AND DO HIS
OWN THING RATHER THAN GOD’S THING.”
Hear me:
“THE ONLY WAY MAN CAN JUSTIFY HIMSELF AS A
VIRTUOUS DRUNKARD, A MORAL CHEAT, AN
UPSTANDING ADULTERER, AND A
RIGHTEOUS PERVERT, IS TO
PROVE TO HIMSELF THAT
THERE IS NO GOD.”
***
The Bible tells us in Psalm 97:10,
“Let those who love the Lord hate evil….”
Equally true:
“Let those who love evil hate the Lord.”
Which are you? Are you living your life pursuing FOOL’S GOLD, or are living your life pursuing FAITH’S GOD. Really, which are you!
-Ah, but here is the rub:
“WHEN THE PRESSURES OF ECSTASIES AND AGONIES
COME UPON THE FOOLISH HEART OF MAN, HE
SOMEHOW STILL CANNOT RESIST
CONFESSING THE VERY ONE
THAT HE HOLDS IN
CONTEMPT – OH
MY GOD.”
It all reminds me of the ATHEIST WHO SAID:
“THERE IS NO GOD – THANK GOD.”
*******
V. TAKING GOD’S NAME IN VAIN
If you asked JOHN FOOL DOE what he means when he says “OH MY GOD” in a particularly pleasing and exhilarating moment, or in a particularly displeasing and depressing moment, you would find that it would be without DEFINITION and without the SLIGHTEST UNDERSTANDING.
In short, JOHN DOE would more than likely say about OH MY GOD:
“IT IS JUST AN EXPRESSION.”
Walla! There indeed is the greatness of this sin:
“GOD MUST NOT EVER BE JUST AN EXPRESSION.”
We have all kinds of “JUST EXPRESSIONS IN OUR VOCABULARY”:
-OH MY GOSH
-GOLLY MISS MOLLY
-HOLY MOTHER OF GOD
-HOLY SMOKES
-JEEZ OH PETE
-HOLY CRAP
-OH MY GOODNESS
-OH MY GOD
Now we are bull’s-eye on target – dead center. Here exactly is the wretched emptiness, hollowness, and grievous sinfulness of it all! God becoming an EMPTY, MEANINGLESS, EMOTIONAL EXPRESSION, and a MINDLESS – EMPTY-HEADED HOLLOW CLICHÉ!
It is the very heart of what God is addressing when He commands us in Exodus 20:7,
“You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in
VAIN, for the Lord will not leave him go unpunished
who take His name in VAIN.”
VAIN comes very close to FOOL. VAIN MEANS EMPTY – WORTHLESS – TRITENESS – MEANINGLESS – FRIVOLOUS. A mindless, heartless, trite use of God’s name turns the God-expression into an grievous AFFRONT TO GOD. It is a horribly discordant noise in the ears of God
God commands this:
“THAT WE ARE NEVER TO MOUTH GOD’S NAME
WITHOUT THE HIGHEST REVERENCE,
GREATEST HONOR, HOLIEST LOVE,
AND PASSIONATE EXULTATION OF
GOD IN OUR HEARTS.”
Hear it:
“GOD MUST NEVER BE SIMPLY THE SUBJECT OF
A BULL SESSION.”
Now this may shock us, and there are many like myself who need to be shocked by the truth, and that is this:
“THE F-WORD, AND THE S-WORD, AND THE D-WORD,
AS VULGAR AND SINFUL AS THEY ARE, PALE IN
COMPARISON WITH THE MINDLESS
AND HEARTLESS G-WORD.”
ILLUSTRATION
When my dear Ruthie married me on September 2, 1960, she took my name – Ruth Klingenberg. Still at that time, it was far more than traditional, but it was sacred to do so. That was a holy symbol of the church – the bride of Christ – bearing the name of Christ her husband – Christian. That is not purely done in many instances today, as the wife keeps her own name and adds her husband’s name to it. He is an add-on, but not her total identity.
Ruthie forsook her parent’s name, and took her husband’s name – Klingenberg. The taking of the new name meant a total new identity, a total change in status, a total change in priorities, in short, a total change in life.
Ruth Klingenberg was no longer a single woman, she became a married woman. She no longer dated for she was mated. She was no longer available to men, but only available to one man. She was now responsible for her husband, and then her family in a relationship that has now lasted over 54 years.
Now get this, if my wife had taken my name, but had not changed her single identity and lifestyle, she would have taken my name “in vain.” She would have been my Gomer, and she would have disgraced my name, trivialized my name, dishonored my name, vained my name, and broken my heart.
But she has borne my name with deepest love and highest honor. She has not disgraced but graced my name, and I have not deserved one bit of it. I still don’t, and I am the most blessed husband on the face of the earth.
Listen now, when it comes to our Lord, multiply that principle by a zillion millions:
“BEAR GOD’S NAME – WEAR CHRIST’S NAME – SPEAK
HIS NAME – PRAISE HIS NAME – PRAY HIS NAME –
WITNESS HIS NAME WITH THE HIGHEST
EXULTATION AND DEVOTION THAT
IS DUE HIM ALONE.” AMEN!
