Matthew-008

 

Opening prayer

We worship you, God, Creator of heaven and earth. You are the King of the universe, Lord of lords and King of kings. Forgive us that the very meaning of these titles of yours don’t mean a lot to people today because we have become deaf and blind spiritually, and the power and significance of things on the eternal level don’t strike us any­more, at least not with the kind of force it should, because we have become accustomed only to temporary things. Speak to us now, open our hearts and grant to each one the grace and strength to make the kind of life-changing decisions that only you can accom­plish in us. You know the deepest anxieties, the highest expectations, the broadest hopes, and every person’s need at the deepest level. So I commit every person here to your loving hands. and we commit this time to you. We ask for your glory’s sake, amen.

 

Camp theme: Spiritual Vision

I said yesterday, that according to the camp theme, we are here to talk about spiritual vision. Spiritual vision is the vision of spiritual or eternal things, as distinct from transient material things that will pass away soon. Life passes at an astonishing speed. Just ask people who are over 60 and they will tell you. Perhaps you are now 30, 40? You think you have a long time ahead, but not so my friend. I will be 70 this year, and I can remember my youth not long ago. The things I did seemed just a few blinks of the eye ago.

 

For self-discipline: Walked without hiking gear, food or water in the Swiss Alps

When I have trouble walking around these days, I remember the fact that I used to walk in the Swiss Alps. I would set out early in the morning and walk the entire day without eating or drinking. It was for self-discipline, a way to toughen myself. I was a very disciplined man. Switzerland, as I told you, is a prosperous country, and I didn’t want to become a couch potato. No, I was going to be a disciplined soldier of Christ, and I did the most outrageous things. When I see people who hike today, wearing expensive, special mountain boots, I remember I couldn’t even afford a pair of slippers in those days, but I was walking in the high mountains, the Alps! But it doesn’t mean that because I could not afford mountain boots that I would leave these wonderful trails in the high mountains to these moun­taineers, who are well equipped with wonderful wind jackets and rucksacks containing all kinds of gears. The Swiss are rich.

I came from a well-to-do family, but by that time, my father didn’t want to know me anymore because I, being the only son, was determined to be a preacher of the gospel, of all things! He had hoped that I would really be someone in the world. Eventually, he got mixed up in another branch of Christianity which I won’t name. My mother was equally fed up with me wanting to be a preacher. So I was basically disowned. Whether the family has money had nothing to do with me anymore. I went to Switzerland to visit my mother, as she was in the sanatorium fighting for her life. It took me so long to get there, and by the time I got there, she was out of hospital and resting at home, minus one lung.

This meant that I had no money, and went walking in the mountains with ordinary clothes. They said that it was a crazy thing to do because the weather can change very quickly in high altitudes. It can be very warm and sunny in the afternoon, but freezing cold at night. I only had a thin jacket, and a pair of ordinary walking shoes with a smooth sole. I remember the looks that the mountain-walking people gave me. They looked me up and down wondering, “Why are you dressed like this to walk up here?” Well, nothing was going to stop me. I had studied the map to go from point A to B, and I knew it would take me probably 12 hours of walking. I started this long walk in the morning and arrived at the other end at night. I brought no food or water, but I felt neither hunger nor thirst along the whole way, and I had a wonderful time of communing with God, who took care of me. This was the way I learned to walk with God.

What I want to stress today is the point that when you have been softened by the life you are used to in this part of the world, you cannot make a soldier of Christ, at least, you won’t endure for very long. I knew this. I wonder how many of you are disciplined enough. I always appreciate those who go into tough sports in order to keep themselves in shape.

 

Cycled an old bike across Switzerland

Once, I did four days of non-stop toughening-up cycling in Switzerland, although only an old bike was available. I had stopped cycling for a few years after coming out of China, and I was afraid that I was weakening. This old bike was made of some kind of heavy iron and had no gears at all. It was like the old bikes that people ride around in China as their normal mode of transportation. I used to cycle back and forth across the city of Shanghai because that was the cheapest way to the church at the other end of the city. So I had to cycle literally from the west end to the east end. And do you know what a gigantic city Shanghai is? Today, I think it has a population of about 20 million. It is several times that of Hong Kong’s.

I’m not in that physical condition anymore now. I puff and pant to get up a little hill even on a bicycle with gears. I don’t think that bicycles without gears even exist now! All bikes are equipped with a minimum of 3 gears, and it goes up to something like 24. Nowadays, most have 21 gears, and if you have less than that, you belong to the dinosaurs. However, not all bikes had gears in Switzerland at that time, so I tackled the Alps with a no-gear bike. I wonder how many of you would have liked to come with me if I said, “Come on, let’s crisscross Switzerland on bike!” I think you will take one look at the bike and say, “Yeah, but not with this one!”

The first day, I went from north Switzerland right to Altdorf, in the center of the country. Altdorf is famous because it is the village of a man called William Tell, who shot an apple off his son’s head with his cross bow. Do you remember that story? The Austrians were in charge of Switzerland at that time, and they liked to make life difficult like all oppressors do. So when Tell and his son came to Altdorf, the Austrians said, “You can pass if you shoot the apple off your son’s head with your cross bow.” So an apple was put on his son’s head, and William Tell aimed and shot the arrow through the apple, which made him very famous. It was a long ride to the center of Switzerland for one day, so I stopped there for the night.

But the next day was even tougher because I had to scale the Alps on a bike with no gears. To be very honest, there were stretches of the old road that were impossible for me to pedal. The new road is a highway that soars above the Alps, and cycling is prohibited, whereas the old road zig-zagged all the way up the Alps. At some stages, no matter how strong I was, and how hard I tried, I just could not go up with no gears on that bike. But I tried as far as I could go. Often, what I did was I finally put this heavy bike on my shoulder, climbed straight up over the zig-zag bend so that it would save me a bit of time. The lower area was covered in grass, while the higher area was rocky, and I went right up to the high pass which went over to the Italian side of Switzerland. Coming down on the other side on the zig-zag road, I was going faster than the cars! I was just zig-zagging around the bends, zipping full-speed, and overtaking car after car, all the way down to Lugano! Lugano is a town at the foot of the Alps, near a lake, on the Italian side. Then I biked all the way west to Geneva.

I love young people who are passionate to take on challenges. Why? The gospel is for people who don’t just love comfort and ease, but look a challenge in the face and say, “I’ll take that on.” That’s why the younger people usually respond better to the gospel. Older people say, “Oh no, this is too tough. The day of challenges is over for me.”

 

Cycling from Shanghai to Suzhou

In my time in Shanghai, I cycled from Shanghai to Suzhou also for self-discipline. Nowadays, a high-speed train from Shanghai to Suzhou probably takes a little over an hour. In those days, there wasn’t even a highway. It was a mud road that ran through the rural area, and you biked in its mud tracks. Some friends joined me, and it took us from early morning to the following early morning, almost 24 hours of cycling. We had no sleep, but had a snack along the way.

At first, my good friend and I decided: “Let’s cycle to Suzhou!” Then, when two other fellows heard about it, they also wanted to go. One was our boxing teacher who also taught boxing at a school. He was a muscular man with a V-shaped body which is very admirable. The V-shape of his back is envious to behold when he sits on the bicycle.

The other was a young fellow who was as thin as a stick, with his bones prominently visible. “I’m going with you guys!” he told me.

So I looked him up and down and said, “We are neither going across the street nor the city, but to Suzhou. Do you understand?”

He said, “I do.”

“Are you really game?” I continued.

He said, “I’m game! Let’s go!”

And I said, “What kind of a bike do you have?”

He said, “I have a balloon wheel bike.” Balloon wheel bikes are dropped from military aircrafts to be used by paratroopers. This kind of bike has very thick wheels so that bumps are minimized, and it has no gears. Most people ride with no gears in China. Actually, his bike proved to be the best because the road was so bad it was like firing a machine gun for 12 hours. Our wrists were completely worn out because the bike was just banging on the track the whole way! We should have ridden mountain bikes, but of course, we didn’t have them in those days.

 

Few take the narrow road that requires vision and endurance

Is the Christian life tough enough, or perhaps too tough for you? The Christian life is too tough for those who have no stomach for difficulties. The Lord Jesus put it in another way: There is a broad and smooth road that the crowds like, and there is a narrow country or mountain road that is rough and bumpy. When I climbed the Alps on the old route, there were no roads but very narrow and rough paths. How do hikers go from one point to another? They simply look for a splash of paint on a rock that may be 20 or 30 feet away, walk in that direction, and look for the next splash of paint to continue on. That’s how you walk in the mountains.

The gospel divides people into two types: one kind goes for the comfort and ease of the broad road where the crowds go; and the other kind takes the narrow road. The crowds don’t go on a bike ride from Shanghai to Suzhou. Nobody except crazy people like the four of us go on this kind of road. The crowds don’t climb high jagged mountains where people who take challenges go. How many of you would care for a ride across Switzerland even on gear bikes nowa­days? I challenge you to take a gear bike and try to do what I did with no gears. At the end of the journey, you will say, “How did this crazy guy do it?”

I can tell you the route I took, and you can look it up on a map. It’s from the north of Switzerland near Basle, down to Altdorf in the center, then to Lugano, on to Geneva and back. I’ll leave you to figure out how many hundred miles that is to ride in four days. You can say, “Okay, you are tough like steel,” which I was in those days. I can only recollect all these memories since I can’t repeat those feats anymore. All I want to say is that it takes people who are not afraid of difficulties, who listens to the call of God and responds.

I deliberately chose a few examples which are a little bit excessive, because that’s a bit like a person who is willing to give up his career, just as the apostles Peter, Andrew, James and John were willing to give up their fishing business, to follow some unknown preacher, Jesus, who had just emerged to preach about the vision of the king­dom of God. No one had even heard this message before. This person comes along and are you going to abandon everything to follow him? And he is telling you, “If you follow me, you will end up getting crucified like me.” This fellow is already talking about his own crucifixion. What kind of people must it take to follow him? When Jesus selected his disciples, he was looking for a certain type of person that can accomplish the mission.

When I got home last night after preaching the first message, my wife, Helen said to me, “Maybe only two or three might respond to the kingdom of God. It must be very discouraging for the hearers.”

I said, “I am only speaking the truth as I know from experience. I don’t preach with any false imagination that everyone will say, ‘Hooray! I’m going to follow Jesus!’”

I’ve been in God’s work too long to know what kind of people follow and what kind don’t. When I look at people, I know this one is a potential and that one isn’t. I’m sorry that I’m very blunt. I told Helen this is what Jesus said: “The road that leads to destruction is wide, and many will go that way. But the road that leads to life is exceed­ingly narrow and few find it” (cf. Mt. 7:13-14). “Few” is his word not mine. And what is “few”? It’s relative to the proportion of listeners, perhaps 1% or 2%. But this 1% or 2% are the ones who will turn the world upside down. The others will accomplish nothing.

Today, you have to decide which side of the fence you are on: the broad or the narrow road? The many or the few? As I said, to be with the few requires a certain kind of vision that keeps you going, not just for that short distance, but all the way to the end. Whenever I preach, I know that I am preaching just to the few. The others are asleep either physically or spiritually. They don’t even want to be with it.

I am very disturbed about these chairs in this camp, because I think they are designed for sleeping not for listening to the Word of God. The seats in the basement where the Montreal Church meets are almost as comfortable. Have you seen those sofas upstairs in the chapel? I thought to myself, “Who designed this ridiculous place?” I’m sorry, do you see how blunt I am? I make all kinds of enemies. Is this a church, or some kind of asylum where you all come to sleep? It’s even hard to get out of one of those gigantic seats. The seat pulls you in, and your eyelids begin to get heavy. Who can blame you if you fall asleep in that kind of chair? What have they done? They have removed all the nice hard seats that keep people awake and put in the comfortable sofas. Those of you who haven’t seen those seats must go and look at the chapel in the Presbyterian College where we used to have our services. That is why I asked our congregation to move downstairs where the seats are not as comfortable. You don’t produce soldiers out of this kind of environment.

I am not surprised that the American army has to train soldiers by drilling them with almost ruthless hardship in order that they can fight, because they come from a country which has comfort and ease. When they went to Vietnam, they ran into people who knew what it is to take the greatest hardship. So they realized that if they were going to fight the Vietnamese who were really soldiers—trained to take the toughest kind of life, to get by without food, or eat leaves in the jungle—they had to produce soldiers that could match them. Therefore, they made their training tougher and tougher, and rightly so, otherwise you would never win a single war.

The Swiss army had to do the same thing. They went to the greatest extremes to produce soldiers who could endure. They were made to swim across the river with a full army pack weighing 80 pounds. Can you swim a river with a weight of 80 pounds on your back? You would be happy if you could drag yourself across. To tell you the truth, a couple of soldiers died drowning as it was too late by the time they were rescued. They simply couldn’t make it across the river with 80 pounds of equipment on their back. The army made no apologies that those soldiers drowned. Do you want to be a soldier in the Swiss army? Then you must toughen yourself!

Do we have an army of the soldiers of Christ who can endure the hardship of the narrow road? Can you make it? I doubt if many can. You don’t even have the mental quality to do it. They had to change the way the American soldiers think until they can endure. They were deliberately insulted and shouted at by officers, to reduce them to the point where they will obey any command.

 

Democracy survives on a non-democratic institution, the army

Do you remember that I said democracy is the will and the power of the people? Do you realize that the survival of democracy depends on a non-democratic institution? And you must have guessed by now what that institution is. There is no more autocratic and ruthless organization in the world than the army of any country. The German army was one of the finest fighting machines under Hitler. And why was the German army respected? It’s because of absolute obedience and loyalty. If they were told to hold the place until the last man, they would remain and fight to the last man. The Allies knew it, and what a price they paid to defeat the German army! There is absolutely no democracy in an army. You don’t vote to say, “Am I going to fight the enemy and attack this point today?” Neither will the captain say, “What do you think guys? Shall we attack this point?” The order comes from above, “Attack!” your business is to take that strategic point regardless of the casualties. It’s interesting, isn’t it? Democracy cannot survive except with the support of a powerful non-demo­cratic army.

In fact, very few institutions are really democratic because if they were, the whole country would collapse. What do I mean? Let us take a big industry like General Motors, the biggest car manufacturer in the world. How does General Motors run? Does the management say, “Let’s vote. Would like to work today? How many cars are we going to produce? Today’s a bit hot, so we’ll reduce our production to 2,000 cars. But the weather may be better tomorrow, perhaps we’ll produce 3,000.” Or “Today, let’s all go for a picnic and forget about work.” The company will go bankrupt and collapse! Is any company a democratic institution? Can you do what you like? Do they vote on your opinion? You must be joking! The CEO gives the instruction: “This is the way we are going to plan the production. This is what every man’s job is. If you like to strike within reason, fine, but if it isn’t, you are out!” There are laws against striking too. Major corporations require a level of discipline similar to, albeit not as rigorous as in the armed forces. If a country is going to survive, it has to have discipline. If you take away the army and large businesses, your democracy is gone.

How large is the army? Hundreds of thousands of men with not one bit of democracy in it! Every man will do his duty as he is com­manded. The army is sworn to pledge absolute obedience and loyalty in a democratic state. If democracy were robust enough, it wouldn’t require an army, but it relies on the military for its survival. As a Christian soldier, I can tell you there is a lot more freedom in being a Christian.

 

God is king but not tyrant

The kingdoms of this world are man-centered, and being man-centered does not just mean democracy, it also means totalitarian authority in the army. This is why so often democracies are taken over by the army. In South America, a person is voted into power and then he is thrown out by the army. When a general of the army takes control, no one can do anything because you cannot fight against the army. The democracy cannot protect itself without the army. In fact, there is no true democracy in the kingdoms of this world.

But in the kingdom of God, God is in control and he is not a dictator or tyrant. He is One who takes our best interest into account like a father. That’s why we, who walk with God, call him “Father.” As the head of the house, a good father is in charge and looks for qualities, but he is not a tyrant. What kind of son would you like? Is it someone who fools around with all his time, who has no self-discipline, who splurges all your money, who gets into trouble? Then think, what kind of son does God look for? That should be easy to understand.

 

Are you willing to do God’s will regardless of despise or slander?

There are fundamentally two types of people in the world, and the Lord Jesus makes it very clear in all his parables. For example, one type is like sheep or wheat, and the other like goats or darnel. Similarly, there are two kinds of people in this room. You are one or the other category, and you should know which side of the fence you are on. What are you? There is one kind that does the will of God, and they are doing it because they are committed. The other kind doesn’t do God’s will. And pitifully, there are a lot of those who are in the middle, who don’t know whether or not they are going to do God’s will, and they spend the rest of their lives trying to sort that out. As long as you haven’t sorted yourself out, you can be sure that you are not doing God’s will. We must decide!

I want you to consider your attitude of looking at the gospel. Even as I preach it, you are going to find two sentiments arising in you. That’s why I told you yesterday, that I’m not a popular preacher because I preach the Word of God, the power of God, and the power of God is salvation. The apostle Paul said the Word of God is offensive and foolish depending on your attitude. He says in 1 Corinthians 1:18 that this power is foolishness and a stumbling block to some, whereas it is truly the power of God to others. How does it appear to you? Is it foolishness and a stumbling block? I said that many people don’t have the pre-requisites to see the vision, so I’m laboring this point. There is no point talking about a vision you cannot see, because your response to this message is: “Oh, I haven’t heard this kind of thing. It’s offensive!”

In Matthew 7:6 the Lord Jesus says, “Do not give what is holy to dogs and do not throw your pearls before pigs.” When I was a young Christian, I thought that was very offensive. Is this saying offensive? Do you hear it saying something? Over the years, I began to realize it is so true. He says if you throw what is holy to dogs, if you throw your pearls before pigs, do you know what will happen to you? They will trample these things underfoot, and then turn on you to tear you to pieces. Those are the Lord Jesus’ words, not mine, and they have generated so much anger and hatred. The apostle Paul went out to preach the salvation of God, not curses to the people, and in return he was stoned so many times, and once, he was even left for dead! How many times was he lashed? How much did he suffer! He said he had scars all over his body to prove his faithfulness to God and Christ (cf. Gal. 6:17). Why did people stone him when he wasn’t saying offensive things to them, but just talking about the salvation of God and inviting them to come and do God’s will?

I’ve been attacked many times with “stones of words,” designed to tear me apart, slander me, calling me every name under the sun, and that is done by so-called “Christians.” We can see that there is something worse than just negative reactions: “I don’t like this mes­sage. I don’t want to listen to this. It’s offensive to the values I was brought up with.” Some people ignore you, but others will tear you to pieces. Can you take it? Never mind cycling across Switzerland, or from Shanghai to Suzhou, but can you take hard, unfair, untruthful words and say nothing in return? I have never slandered those who slandered me. No, I don’t do that because I have the One who will take care of all those accounts in due time.

Can your attitude be, whatever the truth is, I am prepared to do it no matter what other people think? You must commit your life to God for one reason only, because you will begin to see the vision when you take this step forward. I wonder if you can do that. Then won­derful things will happen! Sometimes, I just wonder how to share with people about the incredible journey of walking with God. I feel that they miss so much and have so little spiritually. They have a big house, a nice car but they have nothing that is worth having because these are all passing away. When I look through the long years of walking with God and all that I have experienced of him, I wouldn’t even exchange one of those things for a car, or a house, or anything else. It’s so amazing to know God and communicate with him!

 

God as king, led 2 million Israelites in the desert for 40 years

Let’s go back again to the kingship of God. “King” is an old word, and we don’t use it nowadays. Let’s say, the headship, the rulership, the presidency, the chairmanship of God, provided he is not there by election. Israel was the only nation on earth that was ruled by God, the only theocracy. And God called out Moses, a relatively timid, quiet man, rather like Timothy in the New Testament. The apostle Paul had to tell Timothy that God didn’t give us a spirit of timidity but of boldness (cf. 2 Tim. 1:7), and he did a lot to help Timothy. God called out Moses to lead the nation of Israel on a challenge that was really extraordinary, which makes my cycling across Switzerland look like sheer peanuts, because he was going to march a total popu­lation of 2 million of men, women and children through the desert to the Land of Promise. What a challenge! 2 million people had to walk through the desert where there are no 711’s along the way to buy a nice cold drink; no McDonald’s or Kentucky Fried Chicken, and not even a road! If you can, read Exodus again, and forget about your Sunday School ideas of it. What an extraordinary challenge! It couldn’t be done! How much water would 2 million people need in a single day? And water is the one thing the desert doesn’t have! I can tell you because I’ve been in that desert. It is freezing at night and burning during the day time. It would be hard enough for you to walk through it, let alone 2 million people and their livestock. The point of all this is: God is king. He is in charge. And what happens when you walk along the way, not doing your will but God’s will? Miracles happen!

That was still a story to me when I was a young Christian. I have since walked a long way in many deserts with my God. I have been without food, frequently without a cent in my pocket, and had to trust God for my provisions, and my God is real. The more you do God’s will, the more you’ll experience him; and the more you experience God, the more you will do his will. It becomes a spiritual cycle that grows in intensity. Do you hear what I’m saying? Is God real to you? I think very few people know God in a real way. And because you don’t know him in that way, you would consider it crazy to go to a desert even in this day and age. If you don’t believe it, try walking the shortest route in the Sinai Desert, taking all the water and food you can carry, but no help from helicopters or special 4-track vehicles that drive in the sand, and see how far you will go. Not very far, I’m afraid. We read and don’t understand. You cannot bring food or water for 2 million people that can last very long. God wanted to show that when he is king, you will lack nothing. As long as you do his will, you will know the reality of God. It’s too wonderful for words! God has given me this challenge and he has never failed.

 

Taking the gospel into China via radio

I have shared with some of you before, that since China is open to the gospel in certain ways today, I kept on pondering about how are we going to get the gospel into China as fast as possible in the shortest period of time? One thought that came to me was the radio. We need to get a radio station. I said, “God, would it be according to your will that we can try to get the gospel into China by radio?” I still recall how I once asked a person in our church who was a professor at McGill in the Electrical Engineering Department, about radio transmission.

He said, “I’m not in that field, but I know a professor who specializes in the field of transmitters.”

So he introduced me to this other professor, who asked me immediately, “Do you have a lot of money?”

I said, “No, I don’t.”

He said, “Well, without millions, you can’t talk about broadcasting.”

So he made suggestions like renting time from the Canadian world radio and broadcasting. He didn’t know whether or not CBC would rent time, but we could inquire. So I had to leave that for the time being.

One day, a co-worker said to me, “I’ve just been approached by a Christian radio station who wants to sell their station broadcasting into China.”

I said, “Really?” And I remember the professor saying, “You’ll need millions.” “How much are they talking about?” I asked. US$ 1 million. We don’t have rich people in our churches, so how are we going to raise those funds? That is a challenge. Is your God real?

I thought, “If this is your will, God, what is a million dollars, right?” For God, is that a big deal? That’s no big deal. Is US$ 1 million a lot of money for you? Of course it is, especially when you don’t even have a fraction of that amount. This radio station originally cost US$5 million some years ago, but they were willing to settle for a million because they were in debt, and was therefore desperate to sell. But being a Christian station owned by people who love God, they wanted to sell to people who love him at a fraction of the cost price of millions.

You would look into your pockets and say, “It can’t be done.” But I have known my God through all these years. Is God real enough to put $1 million on the table? Do you think so? What would your answer have been? I said, “Yes, we’ll take it, then we’ll see what God will do.”

We had more challenges besides that. First of all, we had no idea how to operate the station; we had no radio engineer. Yet, it’s wonderful! Since the year 2000, the radio station has been broadcasting into China for 4-1/2 hours every day. The Word of God goes out and can reach more people in 4-1/2 hours every day than what most of us could possibly do in a life time! That is why I say, unless you know God is real, it’s not even possible to live this Christian life as it is meant to be lived.

Did someone pass you a bag asking for donations for Radio Station in the Montreal church? That’s the normal way churches would raise funds. We have more than 25 churches to pass the bag around to collect funds, but we never did that. No one saw a bag passed in front of them to collect their funds. I trust in the living God. I asked no one to raise HK$8 million. How much did you give? Probably nothing, or not much. And where did the $8 million come from? It’s wonderful how God went ahead.

There was a brother who had total savings of over HK$3 million, and about two years before that, he had come to me and said, “I want to sell my apartment which is worth HK$3.5 million. I want to give it to the Lord’s work.” I said, “I can’t suggest where to put this money at the moment, so why don’t you keep it until the time that the Lord will draw on that money?” And the following year, he said to me, “I’ve already waited one year.” He was very anxious to offer this HK$3.5 million. And I said, “I’m sorry, but nothing has come up yet, so why don’t you hang on to this $3.5 million until something comes up?” A year and a half later he asked me again, “What about this $3.5 million? I don’t want this money hanging around. The bank interest rate for savings is terribly low.” So I said, “Yes, there is something now. Would you like to put it in a radio station we are going to buy?” His eyes brightened and he said, “Finally! Finally!”

Amazingly, other people approached me saying, “I have $1 million, $2 million,” and we had to pay up for this radio station within one year in 3 payments. If we miss any payment, we would be forfeited of all our purchasing rights as well as the money we had already paid. In other words, if we had already paid 3 installments out of 4, and we fail to pay the fourth installment, we’ll lose the entire amount because we are in breach of contract. So we had to trust the Lord that the money would be there for each installment without publicity. No one heard any publicity from us. We did not raise funds. It’s amazing how God worked. This is the wonder of God’s power! No human methods were used. I am a witness to this whole matter. How real is your God?

When Israel had God as king, miracles were happening. What was happening? Two million people needed water to drink in the desert. Can you imagine how much water was needed? And you know what Moses did. He was told, “Strike the rock and water will gush forth.” He struck the rock and water came out. Can water come out of rock? How much water do you need gushing out like a river? It was for 2 million people not just to drink but to wash themselves too. That’s amazing! What about food? It came down in the form of manna. In the morning, it could be picked up on the ground. They could make bread or pitas with it, and eat as much as you wanted and it was very nourishing too. The Israelites were fine for 40 years. God supplied the water and the food. Do you think our God’s work is a fairy tale? If you do, then this message is not for you.

People ask, “How practical is God? When I’m hungry, does he give me food?” He sure does. I experienced that for nearly 3 years. I can speak as one who knows. It’s too bad when you have comfort and ease, and the government looks after all your needs, because you don’t need God to provide anything for you. If you are sick and have no money and no God, you are really in trouble. But when you have God, you lack nothing, provided that you are always truly doing his will.

 

Religion is: Not be in touch with God

In carrying out his will, it isn’t merely a temporary act of doing his will, nor does it imply that you think you are doing his will. We are very good at deceiving ourselves, so we have to constantly check ourselves. What do I mean by thinking that you are doing his will? There is the difference between religion and spirituality. Yesterday, I said that I have no use for religion, and neither do you. Do you know what’s the difference between religion and spirituality? Which one do you have? There is a world of difference. To be spiritual is to be in touch with God. “To know him, the true God, whom to know is life eternal” (1 Jo. 5:20). Do you know him? If you don’t know him, you don’t have life eternal. Those are the words in the Bible. In Biblical language, to be saved is to have a relationship with God. You have to know him.

However, you don’t have to know him in religion. In fact, hardly anyone in religion knows anything about God. They know about him knowledge-wise, but they don’t actually know who they are talking about. Religion is a human system, mostly of culture. Look at the architectural style of a church. Is it the architectural style in the Bible? Of course not. It’s a human style. If you are in the West, you have Western architectural style, if you go to the East, you have churches in Eastern architectural style. You can build a log-cabin church, which doesn’t look very fancy, but it’s still a church. It’s just a building, and you can have it in any kind of style you like. But that has nothing to do with God.

Then, we have all kinds of ceremonies and rituals. We either start with 40 minutes of singing or have none at all. I went to a church that was just singing song after song after song, and you wonder if there is a message to be heard in that church. There is a group singing on the platform, and the people down below were also singing some­times. Then the group on the platform sings again, and this continued. I thought to myself, “I’ve been here for one hour, is the pastor going to say, ‘Okay, we’ll say the closing prayer and we can leave’?” In the end, there was some sharing but not preaching. Every church has its own tradition. The Charismatics seem to think that singing is everything, and a bit of message on occasion is sufficient.

Sometimes, I hear the message on TV about how you can get rich. They don’t preach the gospel of Jesus Christ but “the gospel of Abraham” because Jesus was poor and Abraham was rich. Who wants the gospel of Jesus? They want the “gospel of Abraham.” He had countless herds and flocks, and we can translate that into property or cars. “The gospel of Abraham”? In which generation are we living nowadays? That is “Christianity”! That is religion! I don’t want to name names, but if you turn on the TV, you will hear it all.

Or the other big deal is healing. The faith healer says, “I see right now that someone has a cancer, and the cancer is in this part of the body. And someone has a problem with his right eye. I’m praying for you right now, and that cancer and eye problem are going away. You have to believe it.” You can be sure that someone out there has that cancer or a problem with his right eye if you are speaking on TV or radio. I’m just tired of these religious gimmicks. At the end, they will say, “In order to keep this program on air, we need your generous donation. Please remember us, and we’ll give you a little booklet free of charge when you send your money.” We don’t do that on our radio station. On the contrary, we say, “If anyone wants this message, we will send it to you in print or over the internet, whichever way you like.” We never ask for a cent from anyone. There’s a world of difference between religion and spirituality. Religion takes money to continue. Spirituality doesn’t require it. God will meet your need, so you don’t have to ask anyone.

You can be a pastor in a church and not know God. The Church is full of pastors who don’t know God, and they are my biggest enemies because I always show them up. But they have no business to be pastors when they don’t know God, because the only kind of pastor I see in the Bible are people who walk with and know the living God. Don’t think that because you go to a Bible college, and get a degree, then that qualifies you to be a pastor. It qualifies you for nothing! You have to know God! If you come to this camp and leave without knowing God, it’s a great pity! You are not likely to hear another message very similar to this anymore, because a pastor who doesn’t know God cannot preach this kind of message. So he has to preach religion.

Once, I went to a church in Hong Kong and got a lecture on Biblical theology. I looked around and wondered, “Does anybody know what this man is talking about?” What is he going to preach when he doesn’t know God? He has to preach something that sounds reli­gious. He opened a book on theology and preached that. I went to another church and heard very nice, interesting, moral stories from beginning to end. When he finished, I thought to myself, “Those are nice stories but what was he getting at? If there was something that threads them together, I missed it and he never said what it was.” So religion becomes a means of telling moral stories.

Some people say, “All religions are the same. They just tell you to be a good person.” And to a great extent that’s right. All religions on that level are basically the same. Buddhism tells you to be a good man, so does Islam. What religion doesn’t? Does any religion tell you to be a bad man? Certainly not! So what’s the difference? Christianity is no exception. That is why Christianity is collapsing. What did I say? I say it is collapsing. Do you know why? Because it’s not the Christianity in the Bible about knowing God.

I am reading a book by a doctor who tells you how to live a better life to stay young. And one of the things he advises is to go to church. You will say, “What?” He said go to church to be healthy, not so that you will know God. You’d ask, “What do you mean go to church and be healthy?” When you go to church, you have a caring society where people are generally nice, but not always. So when you walk in on Sunday, they will say, “How are you? Haven’t talked to you for a long time. Are you well?” They show you some caring. If you stay at home, who cares about you? No one is interested in your existence. But when you come into church, at least people might even spare five minutes to talk to you. Of course, many are in a hurry to rush home for their meal. And you can join some small church groups to receive some support. Support groups are very important because they support you emotionally or in other ways, similar to “Alcoholics Anonymous” or various social support groups. So a church can grow without any spiritual content.

 

A church dies when it doesn’t commit to knowing God

Why do I say the Church is dying? Because fewer and fewer people actually know the living God. That is the tragedy! I don’t want to build this type of church. I would like the church to be very small, and every man really knows his God, and is committed to doing his will. There is only one kind of Christian the Bible is concerned about – people who are totally committed to God. And that message goes down well with some, and not well with others.

The book, Totally Committed was taught in a church in Indonesia that was dying and it brought on a revival in the church! The co-worker was so shocked. She was not even one of our best teachers, but she taught this church to be totally committed, and the church revived, and the pastors changed, and the whole situation changed. So she wrote and asked, “What am I supposed to do now? What’s the next step? Where do I go from here?” She was quite panicky once God started to work. The same thing happened to a church in China. When a young man passed the Chinese edition to the leaders of the church, they read it and caught fire. But no one wants to look at it here. Totally committed? These are radicals! Extremists! Nutcases!

 

A Christian must always keep in touch with God, and do his will

Let me reiterate once again, that the essence of the whole Bible is summed up in a single concept, and that’s the only thing you truly need to know. You don’t have to be a Bible scholar because the sole essential is this: Doing the will of God. Either you do it or you don’t. That’s all there is to it. If you don’t do it, you are out as far as the kingdom of God is concerned, because the kingdom is where the will of God is done. If you do it, it is not according to what you think is right.

What do I mean by that? For example, you say, “I know that God likes me to help the poor, so I decide that I will help the poor. Every month, I will give some money to some Christian organization, and I am doing God’s will.” No, no, no. You’ve got it all wrong. You have no right to decide what to do with that money. You will say, “What?” That’s why I told you it isn’t easy. When you live with God, when you are belonging to him, your money is not your own. I don’t own a cent in my pocket. It’s not an exaggeration because every cent in my pocket is God’s. I don’t decide and say, “I want to give this money.” If I can decide what I do with it, that money is mine, not God’s. If it is his, I haven’t got the right to do what I want with it.

Even if I think it might be pleasing to God to give $10 to this poor man by the roadside, I have to ask my God first, “Should I give him the $10? I’m willing and happy to give, if this is in accordance with your will.” You will say, “God will certainly say, ‘Of course.’” Well, not of course. If you give him $10 and you walk down the road and see someone else in an even worse condition, you don’t have $10 to give because you already gave away your $10. Only God knows who has the greater need. If you decide to give to the Christian Children’s Fund, how do you know that is the fund God wants you to give to? There are lots of funds. Maybe he wants you to give that money somewhere else, and you have given it to one, so you haven’t got it for the other. The Christian life is always keeping in touch with God.

 

God is real: Ask and listen for his will

However, you might say, “I don’t know how to commune with God.” Well, learn. If you are willing to do his will, you have to know what that will is. If God doesn’t exist, you will have no problems because there is no will to know, isn’t it? So you cannot commit yourself to something that doesn’t actually exist. When you want to do his will, you have to know what it is. And you don’t discover it just by thinking, “I think this is what God wants.” That’s you, not him. You don’t play God and try to imagine that is his will. What you have to do is learn to listen. That’s the next step, but we don’t have the time to talk about it today. I have just laid the foundation that the will of God is the central element. There is nothing in the Scriptures that does not have to do with the will of God. What is baptism? One can write books on it, or one can sum it up in one sentence: Doing God’s will.

We don’t have to be theologians to live the Christian life. For example, you sit in the car, but do you know about motor mechanics? Probably not much. I know perhaps more than most people because I have driven old cars for some time, and my old cars run smoothly because I know a fair amount about maintaining and sustaining their performance. If you always drive new cars, you don’t have a clue about this. It’s all covered by your insurance. If it breaks down, you get a mechanic to fix it. I didn’t have that kind of luxury, so I know how to fix cars. You may not understand anything about cars but that doesn’t prevent you from driving one. You turn the key to start the engine and drive down the road. That’s all you do. Do you know anything about aerodynamics or jet engines? Presumably not. I also don’t. But that doesn’t prevent you and me from getting on an airplane and flying across the world.

Do you know the dynamics of spiritual life? Most people don’t. But you don’t need to know in order to say, “I have come, O God, to do your will. Just tell me what your will is and I will do it.” Do I run the risk of being hooked onto religion? Not at all. Why? For the simple reason that if God doesn’t exist, there is no one to be hooked onto; there is no one to give you instructions. If I don’t get into the car, but I only insert the key and say, “Okay, go.” It can’t move. There’s no driver in the seat. When my life is this car, and I hand it over to God and say, “Here are the keys of my life, run my life.” If God doesn’t exist, there’s no one to run your life. Nothing happens. Isn’t it per­fectly easy to understand? That is why the person who does that and finds that God indeed directs his life, knows that God is real. That’s the first step in beginning to hear his voice.

 

God guided me to my cousin

I went to meet my cousin who lives in China, but I did not have a clue of what he looked like. He was a professor in Hunan, and he phoned me in Hong Kong saying, “I’m taking an American professor down to Shenzhen where he will cross into Hong Kong. Would you be able to meet me in Shenzhen?”

I was in Hong Kong at that time, and I said, “Yes George, but we haven’t seen each other since we were teenagers. Both of us have undoubtedly changed in appearance since then, so we have no idea what the other looks like now. How can we possibly meet?”

So he said, “How about I meet you at the railway station at counter number one when you come across from Hong Kong? There must be a counter with that number.”

I said, “Okay, that’s fine.” I had never been to the Shenzhen railway station, so I had no idea. It turned out that he also had never been to the station, so he just assumed that there would be a counter number one.

My wife, Helen and I got there, and we went around looking for counter number one only to discover that no one on the China side could even enter the railway station! Only those from Hong Kong and people with foreign passports could. It is out of bounds for Chinese citizens. Since my cousin couldn’t come in, it was useless to stand inside the station.

We went outside and saw multitudes of people. How was I going to find my cousin among them? I could only do one thing to find him in this crowd: Listen for instructions from God. I would become a guided missile with God guiding me. How wonderful! What does Romans 8:14 say? “For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.” The Bible does not talk in hypothetical terms. When it says, “led by the Spirit of God,” it means led by the Spirit of God. I took it literally.

I said, “God, there’s no other way to find my cousin. So instruct me. I am listening.” He led me forward, and turned me in this and that direction, and straight on. Then he said, “Stop. Look up. That’s your cousin.” I looked up and saw someone standing on a ledge to look over the huge crowd of people, to try to identify me. He had a com­pletely wrong picture of me, so he was looking elsewhere. Although I had no idea what he looked like, I looked up, and assuming him to be my cousin, I said, “Are you George?” And he looked down and said, “That’s me. I suppose you are Eric.” And I said, “Yes!”

I told him the story afterwards and he was stunned. He said, “In this day and age, you can hear the voice of God?” You sure can! But what is the secret? I have no secret other than what I have told you. I am committed to doing his will in everything!

 

“God, what would you like me to eat?”

I shared with the church in Hong Kong, that when I order in a fast food restaurant, I look up and down the list and ask, “God, what would you like me to eat?” They were shocked! They said, “My goodness! You mean, we have to ask God what we want to eat in the fast food restaurant?” I said, “You don’t have to. You are a free man. But I want to know his will.” You will say, “Why? What’s the impor­tance of that?” Well, do you know that sometimes, I ordered and ate the food, and I had no stomach trouble, but another person ordered another dish at the same restaurant and had diarrhea the whole night? Does it matter? Yes, my God cares for me. He said, “Don’t take that one. Take this.” I obey and I have no problems. You are a free man. If you do your own thing and choose chicken instead of beef, he is not going to send you to hell. No, no, no. You know our God is not a tyrant, but he cares. That is why I say, “Father, is it all right if I take this dish?” If I have no negative response, I go ahead. It’s wonderful to walk with Father!

That is why I look around and say, “What a pity Christians live a poverty-stricken spiritual life. They live a life that has no direction, meaning or purpose.” What kind of life would you live? Can you catch the vision? We are talking about vision, and vision depends on a living relationship with God. If you have that relationship, you will experience him, and you will have vision. If you don’t have that relationship, you will have nothing. Let us pray.

Closing prayer

God, we pray that you will unplug our ears and open our eyes and grant that there are those here, who are listening to your Word. We pray that you will speak with power to their hearts. We pray that you will help each one of us to know the delight of doing your will, not because it’s some heavy obligation, but because it’s the highest privilege. Once more, I commit each person here into your hands. Amidst all the distractions and temptations of the Enemy, may you speak with the power that nothing can distract or tempt them to turn aside. Fulfill your purpose. Glorify your name in our lives. Amen.