The Dogs Bark But The Caravan Moves
On!
By Pastor Max Solbrekken,
D.D.
Years
ago I saw an interesting cartoon with the caption, ‘The Dogs Bark but the
Caravan Moves ON.’ The cartoon
featured a large elaborate caravan drawn by a number of powerful horses, with a
few mangy little dogs biting at its wheels as it passed by them!
Immediately, I thought about the Gospel
Message of the Jesus Christ, that has been lied about, vilified, discounted,
ignored and rejected by ‘Enemies of
the Cross’ for nearly 2000 years and yet continues to be heralded
across the world in great power!
The Gospel marches on regardless
of low-life, fame-seeking authors, penning distortions, lies and historical
revisions in their hatred of Jesus Christ and their ‘love of Money’! Their
lust-filled, play-acting cohorts together with money-grubbing perverts in
Hollywood’s Movie conglomerates have been unable to stop the everlasting truth
of Jesus of Nazareth and His sacrificial, vicarious death on the cross and
glorious resurrection from the dead!
God is in charge of everything!
When the ocean tides come in and rush back out to sea, they carry with them
refuse from the shore. The love of God is an ‘Ocean Divine’. It
cleans up human lives, sweeping away the filth and garbage, leaving a clean
slate! St. John
WHO CAN STOP A RIVER?
Damn it up and it will detour or go
underground! A river is awesome and at
high tide unstoppable, as it sweeps inland and often leaving fertile soil in
its wake. The Bible is a river of life, cleansing minds and
spirits of those who receive its life-giving nourishment and depositing fertile
ground for the gifts and fruit of the Holy Spirit to grow and operate.
For nearly two millennia Gospel preachers
have walked for miles, ridden horseback and travelled by land, sea and air to
share the GOOD NEWS with people of
all races, religions and cultures, dispensing hope, peace and joy through our
Lord Jesus Christ!
Many have been brutally beaten,
imprisoned, tortured and martyred. Their only crime was sharing God’s divine
(gr. Agape) love with the people and wanting to help them. Christian martyrs have died trying to
save souls, while Islamic suicide
martyrs die trying to kill as many people as possible!
It has been said: “God’s Mills grind slowly.”
His payday is not always on Friday or at month’s end! The Bible says: “And
as it is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment.” (Heb. 9: 27 );
“It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God?” (Heb.10:
31); “Do not be deceived. God
is not mocked; for whatever a man sows that he will also reap.” (Gal.6: 7); “How shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation...” (Heb.2: 3)
The Bible describes the ‘Great White Throne Judgment’ where unbelievers
will stand trial: “And I saw the dead,
small and great, standing before God, and books were opened. And another book
was opened, which is the Book of Life. And the dead were judged according to
their works, by things that were written in the books…And anyone not found written
in the Book of Life was cast into the Lake of Fire
MANY CHANGE AFTER REALITY CHECK!
After more than forty years in
the Ministry I have documented many great conversions among those who had
previously been vile sinners, atheists, free thinkers and others. Here are only
a few great testimonies of God Divine power liberating sinners – all slaves of
satanic intrigue and unbelief!
AUGUST
STRINDBERG
- celebrated Swedish author – made this powerful statement shortly, before his
death: “Clearly said: I ascribe all my misfortune
to this one fact, that I have been godless! An individual that has broken
contact with God cannot receive any blessings. All this talk about ‘being your
own man and making your own happiness’ is chaff. If the Lord does not build the
house, they labour in vain who build it. This is the whole truth! That
misfortune can also strike a person of faith, we know. But the outcome is not
the same. These accidents seem only like trials that pass over and leave peace
in their wake! A curse rests upon all that an ungodly person puts his hand to.
If money comes his way it will disappear like it came. Nothing remains –
nothing prospers in the life of the ungodly!”
Last
year Norway
“Mikkel
Vigilius made that statement in his May 1st. speech. He
pointed out that August Strindberg had been a blasphemer most of his life. He had given himself over to a life of drinking and
adultery, immersed himself in occultism and destroyed one marriage after
another. He had given
himself more violently to sinful practices then most men had.
“Near the end of his life,
however, he became totally convinced that the Bible was God’s Word, and that
shortly he would meet God. In that situation he
saw only one hope for salvation” Christ’s cross! Christ’s work of salvation
him”,
said Vigilius. And he stated
further: “But the truth is that if Strindberg
died in that faith, he is SAVED! And in reality, no one can be saved in any
other way. By Christ’s cross and His saving work alone!”
GEORGE W. SHAW (1856-1950) winner of 1925 Nobel Prize in Literature
said: “I am ready to admit after
contemplating the world and human nature for 60 years that I see no way out of
the world’s miseries but by the way that would be found by Christ’s will.”
ABRAHAM LINCOLN stated: “I now
see as never before the preciousness of God’s love in Jesus Christ, and how we
are brought near to God as our Father by Him.”
BLAISE PASCAL, French mathematician, scientist and
philosopher (1623-1662) declared: “Man is an incomprehensible monster, at once sovereign
greatness and sovereign misery… If they turn their back on God, one of two
things will happen. They will think they are gods and become insane or turn to
carnality and become animals.”
DAG HAMMERSJØLD, United Nations General Secretary, made this
statement in 1956: “Unless the world experiences a thoroughly life - gripping spiritual
awakening in the very near future, it will be irredeemably lost!”
MALCOLM
MUGGERIDGE, Former Marxist, celebrated writer, broadcaster and
actor poured his time and talents into writing Christian apologetics, which
portray a living Saviour, after his much – publicized conversion to our Lord
Jesus Christ! In his book The Man Who
Lives, Muggeridge writes:
“That the resurrection
happened, and that in consequence of it Jesus’ followers who had scattered drew
together again, and resolved to go about their Master’s business, seems to me
to be indubitably true. Likewise Jesus’ claim to be the light of the world, and
His related promise that through Him we may be reborn into new men, liberated from
servitude to the ego and our appetites into the glorious liberty of the
children of God …
“If the story of
Jesus’ ended on Golgatha, it would indeed be of a Man Who Died, but as two thousand years later the Man’s promise
that ‘where two or three are gathered in My name, there am I in the midst of
them’ manifestly still holds, it is actually the story of a Man
Who lives!”
Muggeridge’s counsel
to a troubled world is worth listening to: “Christ is the only answer to an insane world… They
will not understand that the trouble with the Western Civilization is not
economics, but more – good and evil! They are thinking they can make things
work by policies, inventions, but man will never live on this planet without
God.”
WILLIAM GLADSTONE, statesman, Prime Minister and unquestionably one of Great Britain Great Britain
WINSTON
CHRUCHILL, famous British Prime Minister during World War 11
stated: “The return of Christ is man’s only hope.” This quotation is taken from the writings of Great Britain
GOD’S GREAT ANVIL!
Jesus Christ stated: “I will build My Church and the gates of
hell shall not prevail against it.” (Matt.16: 18); “Jesus saith unto
them, Did ye never read in the Scriptures, The stone which the builders rejected, is
become the head of the corner: this is the Lord’s doing, and it is marvellous
in our eyes? And whosoever shall fall on this stone shall be broken; but on
whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder.” (Matt.21: 22,
24)
C.S. LEWIS, brilliant
British Oxford professor and Christian author (1898-1963) stated: “I am trying
here to prevent anyone from saying the really foolish thing about Him: “I’m
ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept His claim to
be God.” That is the one thing we must not say.
“A man who was merely
a man and said things that Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He
would either be a lunatic – on the level with a man who says he is a poached
egg – or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either
this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse… But
let us not come up with any patronizing nonsense about Him being a great human
teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”
Many skeptics, agnostics, atheists,
communists and modernist theologians have worn out their hammers on God’s great
anvil. They have gone to their reward: A lost eternity and a devil’s hell. The
cartoonist was right: ‘The dogs keep barking but
the Caravan continues moving on.’ Praise the Lord!
