Preface To The Second Printing
1. Must God Plead With God?
   
2. How The Spirit Leads
   
3. Physical Reinforcements of Faith
   
4. Jesus' Physical and Spiritual Death
   
5. Is There Merit in Pain?
   
6. The Six Days of Creation
   
7. Adding Guilt to Anxiety
   
8. Wine and The Disciple
   
9. Revolution or Evolution
   
10. I Am That Disciple
    
11. When People Disagree
    
12. Is Unity Based Upon Seven Doctrines?
    
13. Our Seven Sacraments
    
14. Instrumental Music
    
15. The Mood of Worship
    
16. Justified Then Sanctified
    
17. Is Christian Our Name?
    
18. The Lord's Table
    
19. Righteousness That Exceeds
    
20. Neither Destroyed Nor Nailed To The Cross
    
21. The Right of Self-Protection
    
22. A Tree of Error
    
23. God is Limited
    
24. You Are Here
    
25. God is In Charge
    
26. Hook's Points
    
27. Lamentations of A Mediocre Preacher
    

GOD IS IN CHARGE AND HE KNOWS HIS OWN

How can a person possibly experience the peace and joy which Jesus has promised while burdened with concern for billions of lost souls? We will have concern as long as one person is lost. So, it seems that our joy is smothered out by the burden of the unsaved. How can we keep both our sanity and our concern?

This treatise may seem to be an effort to justify my lack of zeal. It is intended to be an effort to discover that "my yoke is easy, and my burden is light."

The burden of the whole world does not rest on me. I am not to blame for its dire condition. It is my Father's world. He did not bring the evil, but he did permit it. He has not abdicated. When the whole world went sour in the time of Noah, God demonstrated that he was still in charge. In the time when his chosen people were in captivity because of idolatry, God reminded that "the Most High rules the kingdom of men, and gives it to whom he will, and sets over it the lowliest of men," and that he "changes times and seasons; he removes kings and sets up kings" (Daniel 4:17; 2:21).

When we are tested to the limit, it is easy for us to feel that God has abdicated and left us as hapless victims of evil. The Israelites cried out in despair as the Egyptian cavalry trapped them at the Red Sea. Moses urged them to stand still long enough to see that God was still in charge. David calms our bewildered hearts with, "Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; yea, wait for the Lord!" (Psalm 27:14). And Isaiah tells us, "They who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint." (Isa. 40:31). John Milton, on accepting his blindness, learned that "They also serve who only stand and wait." God knows the evil condition. That peace that passes understanding can come only to those who have learned to wait for the Lord.

One of the most intriguing thoughts in the Bible is expressed by Paul: "When the fullness of time came..." (Gal. 4:4). "It came to pass" is used many times. God plans and guides with infinite love and wisdom. In our impatience, we may not want to wait for God to fulfill his purposes.

God promised a son to Abraham and Sarah. Time passed. No son. Sarah suggested that they help God out by letting Abraham bear her a son through Hagar. Ishmael came. Years passed. Now, Abraham tried to help God out by suggesting that Ishmael be his heir. God had other plans. It was not yet the fullness of time.

Moses accepted the role of deliverer. He did not wait for the Lord. He killed the Egyptian, thinking that the Israelites would rally to the cause. But he had to run for his life, and he waited another forty years for God's timetable.

I heard this story. A young man just out of high school was being urged by a Christian educator to attend college. The young man felt the urgency of lost souls in Africa and wanted to go there immediately. The educator insisted that he needed to get his education first. The young man insisted, "I can't afford to waste four years in school because people are dying unsaved." To this the seasoned educator replied with compassion, "Young man, God knows there are souls dying unsaved in Africa, and he could have had you born four years earlier."

Why did God wait so long to send Jesus? Why not send him in the time of Moses or Elijah? "But when the fullness of time came, God sent forth his Son..."

Jesus said, "Go preach." For more than forty years I have been trying to do that. My big burden has been in converting. But that is God's task. If I will preach, he will take care of the converting. The power is in his Word, not in me. Maybe we try to help God out in disappointing ways also. We give crash courses to make soul­winning specialists, teaching the psychology of salesmanship, the latest soul­winning techniques, and the refined interpretations of the Church of Christ in order to convert the reluctant soul by overpowering him by our personality and techniques. These same tactics would sell vacuum cleaners as easily, and the reluctant buyer may not be too happy about his purchase after the salesman is gone.

Do we really believe in the power of the Word and that God will work through it? Why are we not leading all others in distributing Bibles? There are countless millions of literate people. It is much easier to send Bibles than persons. But we seem convinced that persons cannot find salvation and the Church of Christ in the Bible by themselves. There is doubt that God can save through his Word without our explanations and tactics.

World Bible School, initiated by our beloved Jimmie Lovell, has been successful by depending more on the power of God to convert. Thousands in America have spread the message by mail and have sent Bibles. These teachings have not been altogether without our guidance, but we have depended more on God for the converting. There is no way of knowing, but I would guess that more souls have been saved overseas by this method in our generation than by all our missionaries combined. This is not meant to discourage missionaries. God forbid. But even missionaries must trust God more than their skills. Isaiah reminds us, "So shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it" (Isaiah 55:10f). God is still in charge of it.

In the parable of the soils, Jesus taught us that all will not be saved. God knows the stony ground. It may be America. You cannot make garden soil with a jack hammer, someone has observed. He knows the good soil. It may be India or Nigeria. Stony soil has frustrated many mission efforts and killed the spirit of many missionaries.

God knows the soil. He knows his own. He made it possible for the man from Ethiopia to learn the gospel. He directed Paul to a new continent to reach Lydia. He directed Paul through Thessalonica, Beroea, and Athens until he came to Corinth. There God assured Paul, "I have many people in this city" (Acts 18:10).

A certain elder began to accept a more intimate working of God in his life. His new ideas were not readily acceptable in his congregation. He resigned. After several years passed in which I had no communication with him, he visited me. He was a changed man. He seemed to have it all together, being totally at peace. He told me of the pressures and frustrations he had felt formerly in his harried efforts to achieve for the Lord. Now, he explained, the pressure is gone because God sends the people to him, or him to the people, to whom he wishes him to minister. He believes that God knows his own and still fills those who hunger and thirst for righteousness.

It was dark in Israel in the days of Elijah. The prophets of God were slain. Altars of God were replaced by altars of Baal. Jezebel kept 450 prophets of Baal at government expense. However, with Elijah's help, God began to change things at Mount Carmel. The prophets of Baal were killed, but now Jezebel vows to kill Elijah. He runs for his life, all the way down to Beer-Sheba. This weary and depressed man sat down under a broom tree and asked to die, saying, "It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life; for I am no better than my fathers" (1 Kings 19:4). This poor man had felt the burden of the world on his shoulders too long. Evil was winning, it seemed. Loneliness sapped his spirit. He had had it!

God gave that despondent man food, for he still had traveling to do. Forty days later he was hiding in a cave in Horeb. God called, "What are you doing here, Elijah?" He lamented in answer, "I have been very jealous for the Lord, the God of hosts; for the people of Israel have forsaken thy covenant, thrown down thy altars, and slain thy prophets with the sword; and 1, even I only, am left; and they seek my life to take it away."

God called Elijah to the mouth of the cave to observe an awesome demonstration of God's power. There was a wind that broke rocks, followed by an earthquake, and then a fire. Now Elijah hears the still small voice! God again asked him why he was there and Elijah repeated the same despondent wail of an answer. He was the only one left and they were after him! God told him to go and anoint Hazeel to be king of Syria, Jehu to be king of Israel, and Elisha to take his place. And God concluded, "And him who escapes from the sword of Hazeel shall Jehu slay; and him who escapes from the sword of Jehu shall Elisha slay. Yet I will leave seven thousand in Israel, all the knees that have not bowed to Baal."

God was saying to that great prophet, "You have 'psyched' yourself out! You have tried to carry the world, but 1, the Almighty One, am still in charge. You did not wait for me or listen for the still small voice. You judged yourself to be the only faithful and righteous person, but I am the judge. Had your judgments not been so narrowed, you would have had the strength of seven thousand people to aid you and to dispel your loneliness. I am still in charge and I know who are my own. Wait for me!"

Jesus did not call us to bear heavier burdens and to wear more galling yokes. Jesus still invites, "Come unto me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you shall find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light" (Matthew 11:28-30).