Matthew-108

Compare the meaning in Scripture verses to understand what Jesus said

We have been studying the Lord Jesus’ teaching concerning the Second Coming, the things regarding the end time. In the last message, we studied the meaning of the passage in Matthew 24:34, “Truly I say to you, this generation will not pass away till all these things take place.”

What I will do today is what we may call comparative exegesis. That is to say, we will compare the verses one with the other to bring out the meaning that is within those passages. We do this because we want to understand what did the Lord say, not what is my idea of the Lord Jesus’ teaching.

It is really hard to comprehend this reality: Jesus will come again

Today, we will not deal in great detail with the meaning of the words in Matthew 24: “Truly I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things will take place.” But as we sit here, you might almost say, it is somehow almost “far-fetched”, if we may use the term, to think that Jesus will come again.

As Christians, we are used to acknowledging that, but it is hard for the reality of this truth to dawn upon our minds. It seems that every­thing keeps going in a certain sameness, then comes this sudden interruption, this Coming of the Lord Jesus compared to a coming like the thief in the night, in its unexpectedness. Somehow, it’s hard for us even to conceive what it would be like to say suddenly, “Jesus is here!” We talk about it almost in a casual way. Sometimes, when I hear Christians say, “Yeah, Jesus is coming again” in so casual a manner, I wonder if they really grasp the significance of this event, and what we are talking about. I think it is really hard for our minds to comprehend this reality that Jesus will come again, and that he will come in the glory that we are not used to. When we think about Christmas, we think about him born in a manger with the straw and the animals around. But Jesus will come again in the clouds of heaven? It sounds like a fairy tale too difficult for our minds to comprehend.

For some of us here, and for many Christians, it seems it’s almost a pity that the order of things should be disrupted as it were, by his Coming. As I have shared before, we are not at all keen on this idea to have the neat pattern of our plans disrupted. Think what it does to your Registered Retirement Savings Plan (RRSP)? All that you have saved up for your retirement is wasted! Think of what you could do with all that! If only you could be sure that Jesus would come in your life-time and maybe before you retire, then you could plan what else to do with that money than put it in the bank like this, never to be able to enjoy the money that you have stored up. If Jesus comes, he ruins your nice holiday plan. You were going to ski in the Alps, swim in the Bahamas. You were also going to get your B.A., or B.Sc., or Ph.D., or whatever it is, and just before they put this hood around your neck, which would help to puff up the chest, and just make you feel so good, Jesus comes just before the day! You have worked so hard and they were just going to give you a summa cum laude, first-class honors, and then Jesus is here spoiling all your plans, and there’s nobody to applaud you.

Either we don’t welcome Jesus’ Coming so much, or if we do welcome it, we would be living quite differently than the way we are actually living. When I look at the lives of many Christians, I really wonder whether they believe Jesus will come.

Jesus solemnly says in Matthew 24:34-35, “Heaven and earth will pass away but my words will not pass away. This generation will live to see the truth of my words about all these things.”

“Generation” is: a certain kind of people in this present age

The last message hinges on the meaning of this word “generation. It is very important to hold a distinction between what “generation” means in Scripture and what it means in the English usage. Very often, the language we know influences our understanding of a language we don’t know so well. In English in particular, “genera­tion” has the idea of a span of time, or people living within this span of time, whether we are talking about a span of 30 or 70 years. And there seems to be very little agreement on how long is a generation even in English. I would really exhort you to take a concordance and study carefully how this word in the Greek is used in the Scriptures, and we will find the word translated as “generation” refers rather to offspring or descendants. For example, it says there are 14 genera­tions from Abraham, and then another 14 generations from David, and another 14 generations from the deportation to Babylon as in Matthew 1:17. But when you look at this, Matthew is talking about 14 successions of offspring or descendants rather than about periods of time.

For example, when we study Paul, we cannot say that the way John uses a word is also the way Paul uses it because they often use the same word in quite a different way. I have illustrated this with the training team, on how John and Paul use the term “eternal life” quite differently, and people are often not aware of that. Paul uses the term “eternal life” always as a future event, never a present event. But the apostle John uses “eternal life” in a slightly different sense in which he can speak of it as a present reality. Paul never uses it in that sense. Anyone who studies the Scriptures carefully will realize that. Yet, I hear preachers who confuse the issue without realizing that the terms are used quite differently by the apostle Paul and the apostle John. This is due to a lack of careful procedure in studying the Word of God, hence you have confusion.

It is very important to look at the way particularly the Lord Jesus uses the word. When we look at the way the Lord Jesus uses the term “generation,” we find that he uses it in the sense of a certain kind of offspring or descendants. He speaks about the character of the off­spring. Now the word genea translated as “generation” in fact, by definition means offspring or birth. The very English word “genera­tion” also means procreation, the fact of birth. Except that in English, this general word referring to birth has somehow begun to take on this significance of time. That is why I say we must be careful not to let our knowledge of one language influence our understanding of another.

Those who speak more than one language have to be especially care­ful of this because sometimes, we use a word in one language and simply translate it across to another language thinking that it has the same meaning in the other language. There is a confusion for example, of “skin” and “hide.” Hide also means skin and skin also means hide. But of course, if you say to a woman, “You have a very beautiful hide,” I think that you are likely to run into trouble with that statement! If you look at the dictionary definition, “hide” means skin so what is the problem? You simply say that you don’t conven­tionally use the word in this way. It’s not a nice way to use the word. “Hide” has taken on a derogatory sort of meaning. So we have to be careful.

Take for example the labels of food products made in Hong Kong, Taiwan or China. You will find that the English is literally translated out of the Chinese and it gives you some very good laughs to read those kinds of English translation. I have often enjoyed myself when reading this kind of labels! You could see that whoever translated that had a simple dictionary in his hands and translated the words literally although they are totally inappropriate. I recall reading a label on a tin of food made in Taiwan which read “grounded fish.” Now there is some difference between “ground fish” and “grounded fish.” But obviously, the translator did not know the difference. When you say a ship got grounded, you mean it went too near the shore and got stuck on the seabed. Or when you say the airplanes are grounded, it means they cannot take off; they have to stay on the ground. So a “grounded fish” presumably is one that swam too near the shore and got stuck on the shore! What they really meant to say was “ground fish,” which means fish which has been reduced to powder. Obviously, the translator had not seen that there is any real difference between “ground” and “grounded.” He just thought maybe “grounded” is the past participle of “ground.” Or perhaps, that was the translation the translator got from a tiny Chinese-English dictionary.

In the same way, when we study the Scriptures, and I am spending some time on this because often, I as an expositor, understand that the word in its original language does not carry the same sense as it does in the language we are familiar with. So “generation” as used by the Lord Jesus refers rather to a kind of person. We are summarizing what we mentioned in the previous message.

“Generation” means “sons of”

 There is a very close relationship between the word genea and gennēma, that is to say, both really mean the same thing: offspring. The word gennēma is used for example in Matthew 23:33, when the Lord Jesus says to the Pharisees, “You generation of vipers!” as the Authorized Version translates it or as other English versions trans­late it as “brood.” Here “generation” has nothing to do with a length of time. It is referring to the Pharisees as “You offspring or descen­dants of vipers!” You may say then the term “sons of” is really the same in meaning as “generation,” such as the term “sons of vipers,” “the sons of this world.”

The Lord Jesus uses this term, “son of this or that” very frequently. For example, he uses the term “sons of the resurrection” in Luke 20:36, and the term, “son of peace” in Luke 10:6. Now “son” like “generation” means offspring. It has the same idea.

What do we mean by a “son of the resurrection”? It has within it a two-fold meaning: it means such a sort of person who will be able to inherit the resurrection. What is a “son of peace” in Luke 10:6? A “son of peace” is a person who is peaceful, who will also inherit God’s peace, that is, God’s salvation. Peace and salvation are quite exchangeable terms in the Bible. A “son of the resurrection” then is someone who has the resurrection life through the grace and power of God, and who will enter into the fullness of resurrection on that Day, when God will raise the dead.

What is a “son of hell”? The Lord Jesus uses the term in Matthew 23:15. A “son of hell” is such a kind of person whose conduct, whose character, whose behavior will inherit hell. That is why we said that the word “generation” has to do with being. What you are is what you will get. It is because the people the Lord Jesus is referring to are such a kind of people as hypocrites, so they will inherit hell. And so this term, “son of this” or “child of that,” is the same idea of the word “generation.”

You can see for example, in Philippians 2:15, Paul says Christians must shine as lights in the midst of this “crooked and twisted generation.” He is not saying only those people living in his life-time were crooked and twisted, that those before were not crooked and twisted, that those in time to come are not crooked and twisted. No, he says it is people who are of such a character as crooked and perverse. Therefore, “generation” means the kind of person, “sons of.” Paul speaks of “sons of disobedience” in Ephesians 2:2 and 5:6. “Sons of disobedience” are the same as “crooked and twisted generation.”

So we need not spend much more time on this, but simply to say that we understand the Lord Jesus uses the term “generation” to refer to the kind of people who live in this present age. And the Lord Jesus is saying that this kind of people, this crooked and twisted genera­tion will be brought to an end when he comes. This generation will only pass away when he comes. Or if you put it in the negative form, this generation will not pass away until all these last things are fulfilled.

Two kinds of people: sons of this world, and sons of light

Let us move on then in our comparative study to another verse in Luke 16:8b where we find these words “generation” and “sons” used side by side simply to further illustrate the point. Since this is not a Bible study, I am not going to quote a whole string of references. I will also not expound the Parable of the unjust or unfaithful or untrustworthy steward, whichever name you would like to use for this parable, as I have expounded it before. And this parable concludes with verse 8. The master commended the untrustworthy steward for his prudence, his shrewdness:

I should tell you that the words “dealing with” do not exist in the original and it is a piece of interpretation put in by the translators. The Authorized Version is more faithful here to the original, where there are no such words “dealing with,”. They have been imported into the text.

Here you see the word “generation” again. What does “the sons of this world are more shrewd in [dealing with] their own generation” mean? If they don’t deal with their own generation, their own contempora­ries—as generation means contemporaries—then who would they deal with? They could not deal with those who are dead, and they could not very well deal with those who haven’t been born. So the sentence becomes meaningless if contemporaries is the meaning of “generation.” I must say that there are some translations one feels rather embarrassed about because they show astonishing lack of intelligence.

Rather, the meaning is that the sons of this world given their own character, given the kind of people they are, given their way of thinking, their philosophy, are wiser than the children of light. Here again, you have the word “generation” which has basically the meaning that refers to the kind of people they are. And given the kind of people they are, they have that particular way of thinking, that way of doing things. So given their logic and thinking, given their character, their actions are very wise. What does it mean? It means that given another kind of generation, the generation of light, the sons of light, their thinking is not wise.

Now we see more clearly. The word “sons” simply means kinds of people just as “generation” does. And you have “generation” because you have “sons.” That is the meaning. So given this situation, we have two kinds of people: you are either sons of this world who think as people of this world think, and behave as people of this world behave. Or you are sons of light and think as sons of light do. Every one of us belongs to one or the other of these two kinds of people. In a moment, we will look at how do sons of light think and how do people of this world think.

Why are the non-Christians wiser than Christians?

Today, I only want to ask this question, why are the sons of this world wiser than the sons of light? There are further exegetical points of a technical nature that I don’t want to go into because you may find it harder and harder to understand. For example, we can ask if this statement is to be understood relatively or absolutely. Does he mean for example, that relative to the sons of this world the sons of light are less wise? Or does he mean in the absolute sense, that is, seen from the point of God? Who is the wiser? Clearly, the Lord Jesus is speaking from an absolute sense, and as I say, I shall not go into detail, otherwise the exposition may be hard for you to follow. He is saying that the sons of this world are wiser than the sons of light. To put it more plainly, non-Christians are wiser than Christians. Non-Christians are wiser than Christians because there are some “Christians” who are really non-Christians; they only have the name of Christian. How can it be that non-Christians are wiser than genuine Christians? This is the point that we must look at.

Look again at this parable. What is the parable about? The parable is about the steward who was about to be fired by his master, and when he realized he was about to be fired, he decided that in the last day of his office, he must quickly make friends with the people who were not his friends before, because he was collecting money from them and no one likes money collectors too much. So he decided that instead of collecting money this time, he was going to be generous. He was going to remit quite a lot of the money that they owed. Therefore, he decided to take action quickly in order that when he loses his job, he would have a few friends around who remember that he was kind to them, and would therefore still do him a favor in return. So he decided to take some quick action and turn enemies into friends in order to provide for his future. That is why you see in Luke 16:9,

Make an investment in friends. That is a better investment than money. The Lord is saying that this steward is very wise. He has foresight; he looks into the future and realizes his predicament, that is, he is about to be fired, then what is going to happen to him after he is fired? Therefore, he decides to make friends quickly before he loses his office. Friends are a very important investment to secure his future; he would still have some friends who are willing to help him out when he gets trapped in joblessness and pennilessness.

“Christians” don’t have foresight to prepare for their eternal future

It is in this context that the Lord Jesus says that the children of this world, of this age—non-Christians—are wiser than true Christians. What does he mean? How come non-Christians are wiser? The more I study this passage and look around at Christians, the more I must say how true the Lord’s words are. The point is that the non-Christian is more careful and exercises more foresight in preparing for his future in this world than the “Christian” is for his eternal future. I wonder if you have understood what the Lord Jesus means.

I just mentioned RRSP, the Canadian pension savings plan, the non-Christian is very wise. He secures his future. He makes sure that he invests in this way so that in his old age, he will have something to live on. That is wise. You prepare for the future. And why do you study so hard? In order that you can get a good job in the future. Why do you want a good job in the future? So that you can make more money. Why do you want more money? So that you have a better old age, also when you die, you’ll have a nicer tomb. Who wants to be just buried in a hole in the ground with a wooden stick over it? It’s much nicer to have a great big marble slab which says “Here lies so and so.” So you have to secure both your future and a nice tomb­stone. So the non-Christian carefully thinks into the future and plans in advance. The Lord Jesus says, “Look at how hard the non-Christian labors. Why does he work so hard? It’s in order to have a good future. He is wise.” Maybe right now he can’t have a good future. Never mind, he will see to it that his son will have a good future. If he can’t enter university, he is going to slave at work and sweat so that his son will enter university, and perhaps get a Ph.D., then his son can look after him. His son becomes his investment. After all, when his son does so well and have a big mansion, he will find a nice room for his parents in it. And rightly so. Why shouldn’t he do that?

What about the Christian? The Christian is foolish because his pro­vision for his spiritual future is nothing like the provision that the non-Christian makes for his earthly future. Think of it. As a Christian, what provision have you made for your eternal future, your eternal welfare? I think you will get to heaven and find yourself bankrupt, if I can use that imagery. The non-Christian is wise, but not the son of light! That is the truth of the situation, and the Lord Jesus foresaw it even as it is said in Luke 18:8b, “When the Son of man comes will he find faith upon the earth?” The Lord Jesus foresaw that the Christian is going to be like the non-Christian, storing up treasure on earth than in heaven. Frankly, when you put your money in the bank, you can satisfyingly see how much you have in your bank book, and feel secure that you can withdraw funds to meet your needs. But when you store up treasure in heaven, where is it? It’s gone! I gave $100 to a poor person and that’s the end of my $100; I am $100 poorer. This transaction isn’t recorded in my bank book. The Bible says, “treasure in heaven,” but I don’t see it and I can’t withdraw it as it’s locked into a long-term fixed deposit. I can only withdraw it when I get up there. This is quite a problem.

 Why do I think like this? Basically, the question is what kind of wisdom do I have? Given the wisdom “in their generation,” they are wiser. Given their kind of wisdom, they are right because if this world is the only reality that we have, then we should store up. I should not be preaching the gospel. I should go out into the world and get a job that pays well, and make sure that my bank account gets fatter. I will preach the gospel in my spare time, if I have any spare time that is. But if I don’t have spare time, that’s fine because my bank account is still profiting. So the Christian is foolish!

If I, as a Christian, compromise my thinking, I am foolish on both counts. I am foolish as far as this world is concerned, because by preaching the gospel, I cannot earn anywhere as much as the fellow in the world, so I am losing financially. And if I am compromising, if my thinking is still worldly, then I am losing on the spiritual count as well because I am storing up nothing in heaven either! So I have nothing in the world and nothing in heaven. As Paul said, “We are of all men most miserable.” We are the biggest fools of all!

Look at the people in the Training Team. Here are the biggest fools you have ever seen! They give up their jobs and the good pay and income and so forth. If they had been staying in Hong Kong for example, in the last two years, their bank accounts would have been growing bigger all the time. And what happens when they come to Montreal? They have to pay for their own fare so that even what little they have is gone. And by the time they return to Hong Kong, they have lost two years of experience and two years of promotion even if they could get back the same job. They are big fools! This is an error in terms of this world! However, if they have this way of thinking and persist in it, that is, “I lose in this world, but I gain in the spiritual life,” that is fine. I think all those in the Training Team are looking for that, and that is like putting treasure in heaven which requires faith.

The Christian life is faith from beginning to end. Can you see the treasure that you have deposited in heaven? No way! Can you draw out your heavenly bank book and say, “Lord, can you show me how much I’ve got there?” No way! “Can I withdraw a small amount of funds? I’m a little tight right now.” No. So what’s the advantage of putting it all there? No advantage! It’s plain stupidity! These people in the training team are all fools as far as this world is concerned. Many non-Christians will say they are really fools to throw away a career, money, and a future. By this time, other people will be driving beautiful cars, living in beautiful houses, and what do they do? They are going to return to Hong Kong with one little suitcase, mostly books—which if they try to sell in Hong Kong, no one wants to buy—and old shoes, old clothes. That is all they have after this time. They are really fools! Perhaps you congratulate yourself that you are not fools like them: “I’m a Christian and I’m still doing all right. These poor guys are fools!”

Put one foot in the world and one foot in the kingdom of heaven?

You must make up your mind once and for all as Christians, exactly what is your wisdom? Many Christians regard the height of wisdom is this: have a bit of both. Put one foot in the world and one foot in the kingdom of heaven and then you are safe. Put some into the kingdom of heaven, so that when you get there, maybe you will have a little something there; and also put enough into this world and you are secure in this world too. Play it safe on both sides. Make sure that you don’t get outplayed in anything. If there is no heaven, I played it safe anyway. I didn’t have it bad in this world anyway; it was quite nice too. I still had my nice house, my nice job; it was OK. In case there was a heaven, I would get there. If there is no heaven, too bad! Those in training are foolish. They don’t play it safe on both sides. They play it only in the spiritual direction so that if there is no God, no heaven, everything is gone! They did not enjoy anything. They never drove the nice car they could have driven. Or got the promotion they could have got. They never enjoyed this world so much and now they end up with nothing on either side. So play it safe! That is wisdom!

If God is not real, let’s forget about Christianity!

We are dealing with the living God. I would like every Christian to remember that. You won’t make a fool of God. You will only manage to make a fool of yourself. That is why I have said time and again, if God is not real, let’s forget about Christianity! Let’s forget about heaven, let’s forget about the kingdom of God! If God is not real, let’s call it a day! Let you and I go into the world and show them how we can make money! Show them what we can do! Just say that the Christian philosophy is very good for the mind, very good for the ethics. We think of Christianity as a psychological thing, as a social thing and we forget about the spiritual aspects of Christianity. As I look around at the church today, if I am not mistaken, the church seems to have adopted precisely that thinking in many places.

I have heard Christians say that it is very glorifying to God to make more money. They have in fact turned the fact upside down and said, “The more successful you are in this world the better.” In fact, they even go better than that. There is a kind of teaching going around even on American television stations which tells you: “If you become a Christian, you could get the promotion that you could never get left to yourself. Oh! This is marvelous! We are going to beat the non-Christians at their own game! When you give money to God, God will give you 10-fold back! If that isn’t enough, 100-fold then! You can’t outplay God!” I’m sure you are familiar with this teaching that is going around.

When you turn on the TV, there will be an ad about giving money to the church, or particularly to that television station. If you give it to the church, maybe God will give you 10-fold but if you give it to that TV station, God will give you 100-fold! It’s good to give it to other churches but not too much, give it mostly here, and God will give you special blessing.” Am I speaking the truth or am I exaggerating? You know that is the truth. Just turn on the TV and listen to it for yourself.

“Seed faith”: Christians have senseless thinking, but God is not mocked

You’ve heard about this kind of promise of “seed faith.” There’s a whole book about “seed faith” and you can find it right there in the book shop. What is “seed faith”? “Seed faith” is: you plant your money which is just like a tiny seed, and get something big in return. That’s “seed faith.” So you put in $10 for God and get $100 back. A bank can give you perhaps 18% or even 19% interest, but this is 1,000% interest! No bank can compete with that. What kind of Christianity have we got?

What do we call “wise”? The sons of this generation are wiser than the children of light because they don’t have that kind of senseless thinking in their minds. Why do the children of light behave so foolishly? Do you think that you can outplay God? When the Lord says, “Do not store up treasure on earth,” and you store up treasure on earth, but you think you are playing it safe. Do you think you will make a fool of God? No way!

Why don’t I rush out and get myself a lucrative job? I know that God is real. I’m not interested in the lucrative job. I know that God is real and therefore, without compromise and without hesitation, I aim to live in this way. Because on that Day when God asks you, “Why did you store up when I told you not to?” I wonder what you will an­swer? I wonder what the average Christian will answer? “Because I was trying to be wise.” Wise? The wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. More than that, it is disobedience with God. But we have a kind of Christianity today that I don’t intend to be a part of. And I know that I will be attacked by the rest of Christianity for saying that this way of being Christians is unacceptable in the light of God’s teaching. Call me extreme if you like. My extremism is based on one fact, that God is real! I’d like to know what their compromised religion is based on. I’ll tell you in a moment.

Root problem in a nominal Christian: Dare not trust God for the future

Let us turn to another passage to see why there is this situation, why the sons of light are less wise than the sons of this world: Matthew 26:41. Here we come back to this theme about “watch and pray” that I’ve been expounding on, and here we want to see what’s the problem with Christians.

That sums up the root of the problem in a Christian’s thinking. And that is why we hold no credibility with the non-Christians. “The spirit indeed is willing but the flesh is weak.” Even the non-Christian knows that.

“Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation.” What was the temptation that we saw when we last studied this passage about watch? We saw that the Lord Jesus warned his disciples that the cares of this world, the things of this world, the desires of this world will constitute temptation for the Christian. We have already fallen into that temptation for the most part, never mind watch and pray. We see our spirit is willing but our flesh is too weak in the Christian’s thinking. We dare not trust God for the future. That’s where the weakness is. Do we believe that God is almighty? Oh yes! Do we believe that God can see us through? Oh yes! Do we believe it? So we say. But we dare not practice it when it comes to the crunch.

No wonder Bertrand Russell used to say, “I don’t think you Christians believe what you claim to believe. If you believe what you claim to believe, you would be behaving differently from the way you are behaving now.” And Bertrand Russell was right. We say that we believe God can watch over us. We believe Matthew Chapter 6, that God can provide for the birds of the air and the flowers of the field, but we are neither birds nor flowers. And given this kind of logic, we can dispense with the whole teaching of the Lord. So the Lord can keep on feeding the birds but what has that got to do with me? What do you think the Lord Jesus said that for? Just to remind us that birds are being looked after by God? There is the problem.

Most Christians’ spirituality is disobedient and devious due to worldliness

Therefore the Lord Jesus goes on to say, “The world seeks for all these things. As for you, seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness.” And we reply, “Oh yes! Amen, amen, Lord. But you see, the flesh is weak. Because the flesh is weak, Lord, I’ve got to store most of it on earth, a little bit in heaven, but most on earth. And you say, don’t store up treasure on earth? Okay Lord, I’m not storing it up, I’m just temporarily putting it there for the next 50 years or so, but not permanently.” Why? Because fundamentally, we don’t believe that if we are in a financial tight spot, the Lord will provide. Our hypocrisy is revealed there.

The non-Christian hasn’t got this problem. He goes with the flesh all the way. But the Christians compromise between Spirit and flesh. Hence they become foolish, less wise. At least, the non-Christian is consistent in his worldliness. The Christian is inconsistent in his spirituality because his spirituality is compromised with worldli­ness. How many Christians are genuinely spiritual? For the most part, worldliness is everywhere and we make excuses because we admit the flesh is weak.

What does Paul say? Let us read Romans 8:5-6. Can we then compromise with the flesh? Does it really matter so much? Doesn’t the Lord have regard for our weakness?

What do you set your mind on? Mostly the world? A little bit on the Spirit? And Paul goes on to say in verse 6, if you set your mind on the flesh, you will die. But if you set your mind on the Spirit whole­heartedly, consistently, uncompromisingly, that is life and peace.

Here then I would like us to see why this generation is perverse and crooked. I find that there is a certain character like this: “Perverse” or “twisted” means disobeying God, and “crooked” means devious in our dealings.

The faithless, worldly church cannot witness to the world

In Matthew 17:17, the Lord Jesus says, “O faithless and twisted generation! How long am I to bear with you?” And what shocks me about Matthew 17:17, if you look at it, the words, “O faithless and twisted generation!” seem to be addressed primarily to the disciples. You remember the Lord Jesus came down from the Mount of transfiguration and he was met by a man who asked if he could cast out the evil spirit from his son because his disciples could not do it. And the Lord said, “O perverse and faithless generation!” We are faithless and we are perverse in our faithlessness. We make excuses for our faithlessness not realizing that in so doing, we put ourselves in great spiritual danger.

Why am I saying all this? Firstly, because I am called upon to expound the Word of God and I aim to do it faithfully without compromise. If that is what the Lord says, that is what I will say. Search for yourself if that is what the Lord is saying, whether I have added anything to it or not.

Until the church is transformed, our mission to the world is in vain!

Secondly, unless and until the church is transformed, our mission to the world is in vain! We do not deceive the world. The non-Christian looks at the Christian and he knows whether you are genuine or false. He knows it. You cannot fool the non-Christian. Remember that they are wiser in their generation. We think that non-Christians sometimes are fools, that they can’t tell a true Christian from a false one. They know the difference very well! I knew it in the days when I was a non-Christian. I could tell a genuine Christian from a false Christian. Until the church becomes genuine, consistent, faithful, true sons of light, without compromise because of weakness of the flesh, our mission to the world is unavailing.

I get papers and leaflets and articles all the time. They keep sending these to me, whether it’s from CCM or CCOWE, from Chinese churches or Western churches, and what are most of these about? All about missions! A whole big book has been sent to me lately on missions and mission research, about the state of Chinese populations and Chinese churches throughout the world. Mission is fine, but the church is not in a fit state for missions. That is the point I am trying to make clear.

Until we ourselves are light in the world, we can talk our mouths dry, what kind of Christians do you hope to produce? You will produce only Christians after your own image. If you are a compromising Christian, the kind of Christians (or sons, generation, the next generation) you will produce will be the same as yourself. If you are a worldly Christian, the only kind of Christian you will produce is another worldly Christian. Don’t you understand? Don’t we see these things today? That is the principle of “generation”: You cannot produce anything other than what is in your own image. That is why in Matthew 23, the Lord said to the Pharisees, “You go out and proselytize. You try to convert the world. You cover land and sea to make one convert and you make him twice as worthy of hell than yourselves.” When you are worthy of hell, the convert you make will be twice as worthy of hell. Do you see that the sons often exceed their father in their character? If you are a worldly Christian, what kind of convert do you hope to make?

What do we do with missions? What do the churches do today? Worldliness seeps into every part of the church. The flesh is every­where. All we can read about is money. We want money for this building, we want money for that project. I get leaflets for money, money, all the time money. What is the Church? A money-collecting organization? What kind of mission are we talking about? We must be ruthlessly honest with ourselves if we are going to be effective in mission. It is urgent that we do mission work effectively. China is waiting for the gospel, and in a way, I’m very glad that the doors have been shut to the church up to this day because I don’t know what kind of Christianity we hope to bring into China. I pray that the kind of Christianity we are going to bring in is the pure, unadulterated, uncompromising gospel of Christ, without having been messed around with and watered down, made in our own image.

We must win the battle against the flesh. As I have said and I say again, if you are a worldly Christian, you are simply going to get endless spiritual trouble for yourself. In this church, I’m constantly trying to sort out people who were baptized at a time when their commitment was very much in doubt, and their commitment is in doubt even to this day. I am constantly having to deal with “Christians” with compromised or partial commitment, because they were converted to be Christians in the image of the people who converted them; they inherited all the “genetic problems” from their spiritual fathers, speaking spiritually of course, and now they are in various kinds of trouble. It zaps so much of my time and energy to sort out such people. There is a spiritual birth defect right from the beginning. They were the “generation,” the offspring of people who themselves were not genuine Christians, or “genuine Christians who still lived in compromise to the world”!

What is your condition today? What kind of Christian are you? What kind of Christian am I? Let us ask God to search our hearts on this matter.

Let us be quiet before God in prayer.