Max Solbrekken Gospel Crusade at
DuValier Stadium, Port au Prince, Haiti, 1973
JESUS CHRIST:
THE ABSOLUTE TRUTH
By Pastor Max Solbrekken, D.D.
Only
in Jesus Christ do we find absolute truth. In Him ALONE there is no lying,
hypocrisy, deceit or darkness. He alone is the ultimate Truth. In His High
Priestly Prayer to His Father our Lord stated: "Sanctify them through
Thy Truth. Thy Word is Truth." (John 17: 17)
To His Disciples He declared, "I am the Way, the TRUTH
and the Life: no man cometh unto the Father but by Me."(John 14:6). He
said: "I and My Father are One." (John 10:30); "I
came to do My Father's will." (John 6: 3)
"...My Father worketh hitherto and I work. Therefore the Jews
sought the more to kill Him, because He not only had broken the Sabbath, but He
said also that God was His Father, making Himself equal with God.
JESUS stated: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, The Son
can do nothing of Himself, but what He seeth the Father do: for what things
soever He doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise." (John 5: 17-20)
"... When
ye have lifted up the Son of Man, then shall ye know that I am HE, and the I do
nothing of Myself; but as My Father hath taught Me, I speak these things. And
He that sent Me is with Me: the Father hath not left me alone; for I do always
those things that please Him." (John 8: 28, 29)
JESUS PROMISED THE HOLY SPIRIT!
JESUS PROMISED THE HOLY SPIRIT!
The Holy Spirit is called, "The
Spirit of Truth." (John 14: 17). Speaking of the Holy Spirit, our
Lord stated: "But when the Comforter is come, Whom I will send unto
you from the Father, even the Spirit of Truth, which proceedeth from the
Father, He shall testify of Me." (John 15: 26); "Howbeit when
He, the Spirit of Truth is come, He will guide you into all Truth..." (John
16: 13)
JAMES
RUSSELL LOWELL wrote: "Once to every man and nation, comes
the moment to decide. In the strife of Truth and Falsehood, For the Good or
Evil side."
About 65 years ago I memorized a poem written by British poet William
Dunkerley, under the pseudonym of John Oxenham. Hundreds of
times during the last half century, I have quoted it in my sermons. It is called 'The
Way'. May the message penetrate your heart as it has mine!
To
every man there openeth
A
Way, and Ways, and a Way,
And
the High Soul climbs the High Way,
And
the Low Soul gropes the Low,
And
in between, on the misty flats,
The
rest drift to and fro.
But
to every man there openeth
A
High Way, and a Low.
And
every man decideth,
The
way His soul shall go.
When
you tell people that there is only ONE way to God and Heaven, they often react
negatively. Many want to do their own thing, go their own way and leave
everything to chance. After all, if everything we see evolved from nothing as
the pinhead evolutionists preach, then there is nothing to
fear.
If
there is no God, then there are no laws that must be obeyed and no punishment
for wrong doing, they erroneously assume! If there is no authoritative
figure called God, Maker of Heaven and earth, then there is No-one to give
an account to. We may as well then do as the Scripture says of the rebellious
man, "Eat, drink and be merry." (Eccl.8:15)
When
you confront people because of their sins of unbelief, unrighteousness, lust,
greed, pride, hatred and jealousy, they get on their 'high horse' saying, "We will not have this Man to rule over
us." (Luke 19: 14). When told that we ought to help the poor,
lift up the fallen and bring the gospel to the lost, they often answer like
Cain: "Am I my brother's keeper?” (Gen.4:9)
WHY DO PEOPLE REJECT
THE BIBLE AND CHRIST?
Why would anyone in their right mind reject
God's Holy Word? How could anyone, of even limited understanding, reject the
liberating Gospel of God's grace and love to fallen, degenerate and undeserving
sinful man? And what would make human beings who were created in God's image,
become so stupid that they would reject the world's Redeemer and Emancipator,
our Lord Jesus Christ, and cling to Satan, the Cosmic Liar?
THE ANSWER: After
more than fifty years of intense Bible study, observing human nature, current
events, and having preached the Gospel of Christ and ministered His saving and
healing power to multitudes across the world, here is a concise answer to the
three questions posed!
1).They love their sins and refuse to give up
their ungodly lifestyles!
"And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world,
and men loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil." (John
3:19)
2). They have been enticed, deceived and snared
by the devil, who is the Father of Lies, deception and spiritual death!
"In
meekness instructing those that oppose themselves; if God peradventure will
give them repentance to the acknowledging of the truth; And that they may
recover themselves out of the snare
of the devil, who are taken captive by him at his will." (2
Tim.2: 25, 26)
3). If they admit that the Bible is God’s Word
and that there is a Day of Judgment for sinners, they would have to repent of
their sins and receive Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour!
"For
everyone that doeth evil hates the light, neither comes to the light, lest his
deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth comes to the light that his
deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God." (John 3:20, 21)
The basic flaw in the ‘Theory
of Evolution’ is, that they can "strut
their stuff" and at least until the 'angel of death' comes
calling, they can have a feeling of superiority. It's called the 'escape
from God' factor.
Professor D.M.S. Watson's address
to the British Association of Scientists gave support to this same 'foolosophy'.
He flatly stated that the reason for the "universal acceptance of
evolution" among his peers of atheistic scientists, was that
the Biblical account of "special creation is the only
alternative". He
called the Bible account of creation as "clearly incredible", meaning
it is unbelievable.
BRILLIANT MINDS BLINDED BY SATAN!
What keeps these seemingly
brilliant minds from believing the only plausible answer to the questions of
creation, life, death and eternity?
The ANSWER is that there is a lying devil
who "has blinded the minds" of those who refuse to
believe the truth and have rejected Christ and is glorious Gospel! (2 Cor.4: 3,
4; Rom.1: 18-22)
St. Paul, one of the most brilliant minds of the First Century, who met
the resurrected Lord Jesus on the Damascus Road, addressed this phenomenon. He
stated that they had been "taken captive" by
the Evil One and are slaves to his deception, lies and downright stupidity! (2
Tim.2: 26)
No wonder than that King David
stated: "The fool hath said in his heart, there is no God." (Ps.14:
1). The Hebrew meaning of the word fool as used here is that of an idiot or
insane person. He implied that you cannot blame an idiot for saying that there
is no God. He doesn't know any better!
VLADIMIR LENIN, the father of Soviet Communism stated: "Religion
is the opiate of the people. There is no God, but woe unto us Communists if
there is one." He
died in January 1924, aged 53, after suffering three strokes leaving him
paralyzed and dumb. The Soviets covered up his erratic, manic behaviour, his
bouts of rage and his untimely death.
Miss Rappaport, an expert on Russian history has uncovered the
medical records of his death from syphilis! She makes her claim in a
new book "Conspirator: Lenin in
Exile". That shouldn't surprise us, should it?
TOILED ALL NIGHT: TAKEN NOTHING!
CLARENCE
DARROW, famed atheist and criminal lawyer and winner in the Scopes - Monkey Trial in 1925, that
opened the flood gates of the teaching of the 'Ape - Doctrine' in U.S. Schools,
at the end of his life, stated: "My colleagues say that I am a success.
Many honors have come my way, but in the Bible is a sentence which expresses
the way I feel about my life: "We have toiled all night and taken
nothing."
HOW SAD! In the end, the brilliant atheist had to use a
passage from the Holy Bible - which will be opened at the Judgment -
to express the emptiness of the evolutionary, atheistic teaching he had helped
to promote!
The fact of the matter is that they would rather believe a lie, in
order to somehow escape the truth that God exists and demands an accounting of
our lives! They have convinced themselves that they are as good as their
neighbour and that if there really is God, He is good, charitable and kind and
would never judge anyone to Hell for their sins.
After all, they didn't ask to
be born, had no part of Adam's sin and its damming influence on us all,
including our eternal abode! They live in a dream world that everything
will turn out alright in the end. And after all, their parents may have
brought them to church as a baby and had them christened or sprinkled!
SOLUTION TO THE SIN PROBLEM!
We often hear people talk about drug problem, the alcohol problem, the
gambling problem, the crime problem and the racism problem. What we really have
is a SIN PROBLEM and the drug, alcohol, gambling, crime and racism problems
disappear when the Gospel of Jesus Christ is invited to function in the hearts
and lives of the people!
The
Bible says: "Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord:
though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be
red like crimson, they shall be as wool." (Is.1:18)
"Seek ye the Lord while He may be found, call ye upon Him
while He is near. Let the wicked forsake His way and the unrighteous man His
thoughts: and let him return unto the Lord, and He will have mercy upon him;
and to our God and He will abundantly pardon." (Is. 55:1, 6, 7)
THE BIG QUESTION: How did we get into this
situation? What drove us away from the sanctuary of God's presence? Why did we
get estranged from our Heavenly Father and God? And how do we get back into His
Eternal Kingdom? And will He receive us as we are?
The answer is that we were, "born
in sin and shapen in iniquity" (Ps.51: 5). We are sinners by birth, by nature and by choice: "Wherein
in time past, ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the
prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now works in the children of
disobedience. (Eph.2: 2; Gal.5: 10-21)
HE WILL RECEIVE US BACK AGAIN!
"Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the
lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind: and
were by Nature the children of wrath, even as
others.
"But God, Who is rich in mercy, or His great love with which He
loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with
Christ (by grace are ye saved);
and hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in Heavenly places in
Christ Jesus." (Eph. 3-6)
The GOOD NEWS is that even though we may have drifted away from Him, we
can be forgiven, healed and liberated by God's Divine love and power: "All
have sinned and come short of the glory of God." (Rom.3:23);
"The wages of sin is
death but the gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord." (Rom.
6: 23); "He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life; and he that
believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on
Him." (John 3: 36)
God is merciful, gracious and loving: "For
God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever
believeth in Him should not perish, but have Everlasting Life. For God sent not
His Son into the world to condemn the world but that the world through Him
might be saved." (John 3: 16, 17)
It is TRUE that sin had its grip on us all and we were on our way
to a Christ-less Eternity, but God in His great mercy and love redeemed us by
His precious blood that He shed on Golgotha. To receive His forgiveness and
mercy, however, we must repent of our sins and by His grace receive His pardon.
It is also true that all those who spurn and reject His offer of love
will be forever left outside to meet God's judgment. If His mercy is spurned
and rejected there will be nothing left but judgment!
He is the God of mercy, but when He comes again, He will come “to
judge the Living and the Dead.” (1
Peter 4: 5); "I charge thee therefore before God, and the Lord Jesus
Christ, Who shall judge the quick (living) and the dead at His
appearing and His Kingdom.” (2 Tim.4: 1)
St.
Paul admonished Timothy: "Preach
the Word; be instant in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke,
exhort with all long suffering and doctrine. For the time will come that they
will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to
themselves teachers having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears
from the truth and shall be turned unto fables." (2 Tim.4: 2-4)
JESUS CHRIST SAYS: BE YE READY!
Jesus warns: "Verily, verily I say unto you, He that
heareth My Word, and believeth on Him that sent Me, hath everlasting life, and
shall not come into condemnation: but is passed from death unto life.
“Verily, verily I say unto you, the hour is
coming, and now is, when the
dead (spiritually dead) shall hear the voice of the Son of God; and
they that hear shall live." (John 5:24, 25)
Our
LORD is inviting all sinners who are "dead in their
trespasses" to hear His voice and be saved for time and eternity! If
however, they do not respond, they will be in the Second Group who
will hear His voice and come out of their graves and face the Judge of the
Entire Earth.
Here is His WARNING: "Marvel not at this for the Hour is
Coming in the which all that are in the graves shall HEAR His Voice, and
shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and
they that have done evil unto the resurrection of damnation." (John
5:28, 29)
Jesus said: “All that the Father giveth
Me shall come to Me; and him that cometh unto Me I will in no wise cast
out." (John 6: 37).
"Behold, I stand at the door (your heart's door), and KNOCK: if any man hear My voice, and open
the door, I will come in to Him and will sup with Him, and he with Me." (Rev.3:
20). Amen.
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