Many people were saved. And this was a positive force which kept America from falling into the terrible decline that European Christianity experienced in the 1950’s and 60’s. Churches grew strong, seminaries exploded in size, and more and more people made a difficult decision which led them to Heaven.
But there was a problem. The constraints of time and the focus of the Graham organization meant that people who came to Christ because of Billy’s preaching felt that they had arrived – and they had – but despite the organization’s best efforts, most people who made their decision for Christ settled comfortably into their new-found pews. And they stayed there – filling the pews of many churches – but staying in those pews. They had made their difficult decision – they were now safe from hellfire – but they often stuck with their old lives to a large extent.
Through Billy’s preaching, they had seen God and Heaven. But when they sat in the pews, they turned their faces away from God and focused upon the highway to God, the Laws that God gave to Moses.
It had happened before to God’s people.
Numbers 21:4-9; Psalm 107:1-3, 17-22; Ephesians 2:1-10; John 3:14-21
At the time of Moses, God put a difficult decision to the Israelites, those people who were slaves in Egypt under Pharoah. They could take a lamb, keep it in the house four days, long enough for it to become a pet for their children. Then, they were asked to killed and roast the lamb, putting its blood on the outside of their doors, and then they were asked to leave home the next morning for an unknown land, full of unknown dangers, simply because a man named Moses appeared to have been sent by God.
Many made the decision. Their lives in Egypt were so terrible that they found the lamb, killed and ate the lamb, spread the blood, and then hit the road in the morning.
Others didn’t make the decision. That evening, they had a normal dinner like every evening. Perhaps they didn’t think Moses and Aaron were telling the truth, that God had commanded the special activities. Perhaps they basically believed what Moses and Aaron said, but they didn’t put two and two together and realize that if God really had told people to do this, it was important! Perhaps they decided to wait and see what happened, figuring that they could always make the decision the next morning. After all, they didn’t want to be seen as gullible, as fanatic believers who went far beyond being rational in following a religion.
And that terrible next morning, those who did not make the decision were in mourning because the Angel of Death had visited all the homes of Egypt without the blood of the lamb on the doorway, killing the firstborn of every family. Their lives had turned into Hell on earth because they had ignored God or discounted God or simply chosen to see what happened. And so they waved goodbye to their fanatic neighbors as those neighbors left town. Years later, did they look up from their slavery and say to one another – “I wonder what ever happened to those people who followed Moses and his God? Whatever happened to them?”
I wish I could say that was the last time a group of people chose to ignore God.
We still act the same way, don’t we? We basically believe that God spoke through Jesus, through the Bible, through prophets and pastors. Yet it seems as if only those people in the worst conditions, those bound by the slavery of addiction, by terrible loss, by horrible circumstances are interested in trading the certainty of their conditions for the uncertainty of the unknown road with Christ. And so we ignore God and remain behind, only to wonder what might have been…
When those Israelites were in the desert, traveling in the wilderness outside the Promised Land, they moved around from time to time. Always, God was with them. God had shown smoke and fire and earthquakes to them. God had led Moses to tap a rock with his staff and they had seen water pour out of the rock. God had given them manna from heaven every morning to eat. They had seen Aaron’s walking staff bud and blossom and grow almonds. They had heard the voice of God from the mountain. But although the Israelites recognized that God was with them, they had not made the leap from recognizing the existence of God to fully understanding that this was not a series of stories or magic tricks that Moses was bringing to the people.
“The people grew impatient on the way; they spoke against God and against Moses, and said, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? There is no bread! There is no water! And we detest this miserable food!”
The manna - food God had given them from heaven - had become boring! You can just imagine the Israelites trudging along, staring at their feet, the path just a couple of yards in front of them, always looking down as they followed the donkeys and the carts and the oxen ahead of them, dodging the presents the donkeys and the oxen had left in the road. The men and women and children were tired and thirsty and they behaved like five-year-olds. And so God tried again to get their attention.
Then the Lord sent venomous snakes among them; they bit the people and many Israelites died. The people came to Moses and said, “We sinned when we spoke against the Lord and against you. Pray that the Lord will take the snakes away from us.” So Moses prayed for the people.
The Lord said to Moses, “Make a snake and put it up on a pole; anyone who is bitten can look at it and live.” So Moses made a bronze snake and put it up on a pole. Then when anyone was bitten by a snake and looked at the bronze snake, they lived.
What was this? It was a bronze snake on a pole! It was an idol, an image, a statue of the very creature that had started the chain of events that got Adam and Eve tossed out of the Garden of Eden. God wanted people to look at a snake and God would cure them.
What was this all about?
First of all, they were in a desert. No trees. Think about were you would find snakes in a desert. Lying on the ground, crawling on the ground, slithering among the rocks near your toes! You keep your eyes down.
And consider those Israelites. They had been looking down at the dust, at the dung, at the sharp rocks and snakes on the road. They had walked hundreds of miles. They kept looking down.
But God wanted to show God’s power over anything and everything. And so, God told Moses to make a bronze snake and put it up on a pole, and then anyone who looked up at the snake lived. God understood that the people didn’t understand who God was, and so God made a them rule which would once again lead people to think about who God was. Once again, God would enter their lives.
Imagine that you’ve been bitten by one of those poisonous snakes. Your foot is swollen, the red streaks are moving up your leg. You can only hobble and you feel the pain. You remember that the snake was the lying enemy in the Garden and you don’t want to die yet.
And so your family helps you to get to the snake. And because you want to live, you raise your eyes from the dust and the dung and the stones up to the snake, the bronze snake on the pole and then you remember that God told Moses to make this snake, to put it up high, and you stare up at the snake and remember all the other things God has done for you since that night back in Egypt when the lamb was sacrificed and you spread the blood on the door and your family survived. You remember being trapped by the sea and the water clearing out and the mad dash across the bottom of the sea, you remember the manna, you remember the water, and now you remember the God that you are dealing with, the God that has saved you countless times and now you believe God is more powerful than a little snakebite, and and with that belief the swelling starts to go down almost immediately.
You have remembered and honored the God that made you and rescued you from slavery and certain death so many times.
And I wish I could say that all of God’s children remembered God and followed God after that episode, but it would be a lie.
In Israel at the time of Jesus, the principal Jewish authority in Jerusalem was the Sanhedrin, a collection of seventy elders and rabbis, including the High Priest. These men were there principally because they were recognized as the most holy men in the country. The great rabbi Gamaliel was there, a great teaching rabbi who is still remembered to this day and who is quoted in the greatest works on the Jewish law. It is as if the heads of all the major churches in town were gathered together to make law for the city. As much as you might disagree with another synagogue over the interpretation of God’s Law, you had to accept that, on balance, this legislature was focused upon interpreting Holy Scripture in a godly way.
But even though these men read and debated scripture regularly, they were stuck in a stage many people were stuck in – they were focused upon understanding the rules of God rather than focused upon understanding God’s character.
One of these men was Nicodemus, a rabbi, a teacher, a wealthy man.
After dark one evening, he came to visit Jesus, the radical traveling teacher who had come to town. Nicodemus came late because he didn’t want to be publicly seen with the controversial pastor until he understood what Jesus was teaching.
Nicodemus said, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the signs you are doing if God were not with him.”
Jesus replied, “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again.”
And Nicodemus was completely confused. “How can someone be born again?”, he asked.
And Jesus talked to him for a few minutes, explaining that the Holy Spirit needs to come into a person so they can understand God and heavenly things. Nicodemus was still confused, so Jesus stepped back and showed a bit of frustration.
“You are Israel’s teacher,” said Jesus, “and do you not understand these things? Very truly I tell you, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, but still you people do not accept our testimony. I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things?
Sometimes, you see, we can be in the church for decades, we can read and study and even teach scripture, but without the Holy Spirit, we can still miss the point and be stuck outside, never quite understanding, never moving into the inner circle of disciples who learn from Jesus daily…always being an outsider like Nicodemus.
The difference is whether we are trying to understand Christianity – the system that Jesus taught – or understand and follow Jesus – the God-man who walked on earth and still lives. Are we trying to understand Christianity – or Jesus?
Jesus then said, referring to himself, that “Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him.”
Just as that bronze snake had to be made and lifted up in the desert and believed in so people could be healed from the snakebite, Jesus must be lifted up and looked at and believed in so that people would have eternal life.
The purpose of Jesus’ life, sacrifice, and resurrection was so we would stop looking at the Law of Moses, the rules given by God, and look instead at God directly as a Person, a complex personality who loves us – not just another slave master, but our Father, who gave His son’s life so we could escape from our slavery to the drudgery of life, our sins, our addictions, our old dreary life.
And when we look up and believe – the clouds go away, the sun shines, there is hope again!
I once worked with a woman who had had a difficult decade. Her husband had left her, her children wouldn’t talk with her, her health was poor, and she had recently had a car accident, which gave her a concussion and put her on crutches. One day, my wife Saundra came to visit me at work during lunch. Now, many of you know Saundra’s personality – most of the time, she is happy, upbeat, filled with sunshine and God’s love.
I suggested that Saundra might want to spend a few minutes talking with this woman, which Saundra did for about fifteen minutes. I think it was the first time they had met.
That afternoon, the woman came to me and said, “What is it like to be around such joy all the time?” I replied that it was great, for it is great- and pointed out that this is what knowing Christ is like. Saundra usually acts as part of the body of Christ should. And the woman began going to church and the clouds lifted in her life. For the church she chose to attend focused upon God’s love and not on God’s rules.
Sometimes, we just need to be reminded of who the God is that loves us – instead of focusing upon the rules that God has given us to lead us toward Him. It is time to remember that all of the 613 commandments in the Bible are simply the highway. The goal is to understand and fall in love with God, the destination of that highway.
And to do that, we need to move beyond the simple decision to accept Jesus into our heart, we need to move even beyond baptism, that mildly uncomfortable ritual where we bow down before Christ and receive the Holy Spirit with the water, and we need to step on the highway of holiness.
After time, we need to stop studying about Jesus and we need to follow Jesus.
Do you remember when you were in school, the endless days in the classroom? I spent a year of kindergarten, twelve years of elementary and high school, four years of college, and then another five years getting my two and a half master’s degrees. And almost all of that time was spent in the classroom or lab.
I spent a year and a half getting my Master’s in Business Administration in the classroom. But it was the next year, working for Texas Instruments, that taught me business. I spent a year getting half a master’s degree and a certification to teach. But it was the next five years working at Parkersburg Catholic that taught me to teach. I spent three years getting my Master of Divinity degree. But it was the three years pastoring churches in Pleasants County that taught me to be a pastor.
You will learn the basics of Christianity listening to sermons. You will learn more advanced Christian ideas going to weekly bible studies and classes. But you will step on the road which follows Christ when you begin to serve others in a ministry.
If you want to learn to pray, you will need to lead prayers in your family and in small groups – or pray with and for people who come to the food pantry. Pray right there and then with people – don’t say, “I’ll pray for you!”, because you will forget – and you will make a difference with people when you pray with them, then and there.
If you want to see answers to pray, put your prayer requests in a journal and look back over those prayers in 6 months – you will see the hand of God in action.
If you want to understand the love of Christ, drive downtown and tell Chris Mullens at the Clarksburg Mission that you’d like to work three hours a week in the mission. If you want to see joy, tell Tina that you’d like to become a helper in a children’s Sunday school. If you’d like to learn to handle suffering as Jesus did – make it your ministry to visit people in the hospital or nursing homes and read scripture with them. If you’d like to hear testimonies of God in action, come to the Saturday evening AA meeting and just listen.
Or, we could listen right now to some testimonies. Ask some friends today what God has done for them.
And if you truly want to follow Jesus, begin your path by coming to the Lay Servant training in Buckhannon on April 14. See me to register. Or if you are already a Lay Servant, call Mary Ellen up and tell her you’re available to begin serving a small church, leading other people onto the highway of holiness, for nothing pushes you down that highway faster and farther than leading other people, preparing a sermon every week, visiting people and holding conversations about God, leading Bible studies.
If you consider Jesus and His disciples, they did not stop with baptism. He did not hold a classroom study. He taught them with words and example for three years, and then he left them so they could become apostles, telling and showing the world what it meant to be Christ in this world.
There are three key decisions that people must make to truly follow Christ.
Three decisions: Accept Christ, be baptized by water and the Holy Spirit, and decide follow Christ into some form of ministry, helping others.
And if you do, like the people in the desert, you will be rewarded by understanding the love of God.
At the time of Moses, God put a difficult decision to the Israelites, those people who were slaves in Egypt under Pharoah. They could take a lamb, keep it in the house four days, long enough for it to become a pet for their children. Then, they were asked to killed and roast the lamb, putting its blood on the outside of their doors, and then they were asked to leave home the next morning for an unknown land, full of unknown dangers, simply because a man named Moses appeared to have been sent by God.
Many made the decision. Their lives in Egypt were so terrible that they found the lamb, killed and ate the lamb, spread the blood, and then hit the road in the morning.
Others didn’t make the decision. That evening, they had a normal dinner like every evening. Perhaps they didn’t think Moses and Aaron were telling the truth, that God had commanded the special activities. Perhaps they basically believed what Moses and Aaron said, but they didn’t put two and two together and realize that if God really had told people to do this, it was important! Perhaps they decided to wait and see what happened, figuring that they could always make the decision the next morning. After all, they didn’t want to be seen as gullible, as fanatic believers who went far beyond being rational in following a religion.
And that terrible next morning, those who did not make the decision were in mourning because the Angel of Death had visited all the homes of Egypt without the blood of the lamb on the doorway, killing the firstborn of every family. Their lives had turned into Hell on earth because they had ignored God or discounted God or simply chosen to see what happened. And so they waved goodbye to their fanatic neighbors as those neighbors left town. Years later, did they look up from their slavery and say to one another – “I wonder what ever happened to those people who followed Moses and his God? Whatever happened to them?”
I wish I could say that was the last time a group of people chose to ignore God.
We still act the same way, don’t we? We basically believe that God spoke through Jesus, through the Bible, through prophets and pastors. Yet it seems as if only those people in the worst conditions, those bound by the slavery of addiction, by terrible loss, by horrible circumstances are interested in trading the certainty of their conditions for the uncertainty of the unknown road with Christ. And so we ignore God and remain behind, only to wonder what might have been…
When those Israelites were in the desert, traveling in the wilderness outside the Promised Land, they moved around from time to time. Always, God was with them. God had shown smoke and fire and earthquakes to them. God had led Moses to tap a rock with his staff and they had seen water pour out of the rock. God had given them manna from heaven every morning to eat. They had seen Aaron’s walking staff bud and blossom and grow almonds. They had heard the voice of God from the mountain. But although the Israelites recognized that God was with them, they had not made the leap from recognizing the existence of God to fully understanding that this was not a series of stories or magic tricks that Moses was bringing to the people.
- Perhaps they had been in slavery for so long that they naturally didn’t like being told what to do by anyone, man or God.
- Perhaps they had been so comfortable in their slave huts in Egypt so long that they resented having to walk miles each day, even if an all-knowing God told them it was for their good.
- Perhaps they were so locked into their ways that they just didn’t like to change – not for a man or for God.
- Or perhaps, as slaves do, they simply wanted to understand the rules of this new Master, for they had learned in their slavery that following the rules was what was important. They didn’t understand that this God, this new Master, wanted people to follow Him as a Person – not just to follow His rules.
“The people grew impatient on the way; they spoke against God and against Moses, and said, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? There is no bread! There is no water! And we detest this miserable food!”
The manna - food God had given them from heaven - had become boring! You can just imagine the Israelites trudging along, staring at their feet, the path just a couple of yards in front of them, always looking down as they followed the donkeys and the carts and the oxen ahead of them, dodging the presents the donkeys and the oxen had left in the road. The men and women and children were tired and thirsty and they behaved like five-year-olds. And so God tried again to get their attention.
Then the Lord sent venomous snakes among them; they bit the people and many Israelites died. The people came to Moses and said, “We sinned when we spoke against the Lord and against you. Pray that the Lord will take the snakes away from us.” So Moses prayed for the people.
The Lord said to Moses, “Make a snake and put it up on a pole; anyone who is bitten can look at it and live.” So Moses made a bronze snake and put it up on a pole. Then when anyone was bitten by a snake and looked at the bronze snake, they lived.
What was this? It was a bronze snake on a pole! It was an idol, an image, a statue of the very creature that had started the chain of events that got Adam and Eve tossed out of the Garden of Eden. God wanted people to look at a snake and God would cure them.
What was this all about?
First of all, they were in a desert. No trees. Think about were you would find snakes in a desert. Lying on the ground, crawling on the ground, slithering among the rocks near your toes! You keep your eyes down.
And consider those Israelites. They had been looking down at the dust, at the dung, at the sharp rocks and snakes on the road. They had walked hundreds of miles. They kept looking down.
But God wanted to show God’s power over anything and everything. And so, God told Moses to make a bronze snake and put it up on a pole, and then anyone who looked up at the snake lived. God understood that the people didn’t understand who God was, and so God made a them rule which would once again lead people to think about who God was. Once again, God would enter their lives.
Imagine that you’ve been bitten by one of those poisonous snakes. Your foot is swollen, the red streaks are moving up your leg. You can only hobble and you feel the pain. You remember that the snake was the lying enemy in the Garden and you don’t want to die yet.
And so your family helps you to get to the snake. And because you want to live, you raise your eyes from the dust and the dung and the stones up to the snake, the bronze snake on the pole and then you remember that God told Moses to make this snake, to put it up high, and you stare up at the snake and remember all the other things God has done for you since that night back in Egypt when the lamb was sacrificed and you spread the blood on the door and your family survived. You remember being trapped by the sea and the water clearing out and the mad dash across the bottom of the sea, you remember the manna, you remember the water, and now you remember the God that you are dealing with, the God that has saved you countless times and now you believe God is more powerful than a little snakebite, and and with that belief the swelling starts to go down almost immediately.
You have remembered and honored the God that made you and rescued you from slavery and certain death so many times.
And I wish I could say that all of God’s children remembered God and followed God after that episode, but it would be a lie.
In Israel at the time of Jesus, the principal Jewish authority in Jerusalem was the Sanhedrin, a collection of seventy elders and rabbis, including the High Priest. These men were there principally because they were recognized as the most holy men in the country. The great rabbi Gamaliel was there, a great teaching rabbi who is still remembered to this day and who is quoted in the greatest works on the Jewish law. It is as if the heads of all the major churches in town were gathered together to make law for the city. As much as you might disagree with another synagogue over the interpretation of God’s Law, you had to accept that, on balance, this legislature was focused upon interpreting Holy Scripture in a godly way.
But even though these men read and debated scripture regularly, they were stuck in a stage many people were stuck in – they were focused upon understanding the rules of God rather than focused upon understanding God’s character.
One of these men was Nicodemus, a rabbi, a teacher, a wealthy man.
After dark one evening, he came to visit Jesus, the radical traveling teacher who had come to town. Nicodemus came late because he didn’t want to be publicly seen with the controversial pastor until he understood what Jesus was teaching.
Nicodemus said, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the signs you are doing if God were not with him.”
Jesus replied, “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again.”
And Nicodemus was completely confused. “How can someone be born again?”, he asked.
And Jesus talked to him for a few minutes, explaining that the Holy Spirit needs to come into a person so they can understand God and heavenly things. Nicodemus was still confused, so Jesus stepped back and showed a bit of frustration.
“You are Israel’s teacher,” said Jesus, “and do you not understand these things? Very truly I tell you, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, but still you people do not accept our testimony. I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things?
Sometimes, you see, we can be in the church for decades, we can read and study and even teach scripture, but without the Holy Spirit, we can still miss the point and be stuck outside, never quite understanding, never moving into the inner circle of disciples who learn from Jesus daily…always being an outsider like Nicodemus.
The difference is whether we are trying to understand Christianity – the system that Jesus taught – or understand and follow Jesus – the God-man who walked on earth and still lives. Are we trying to understand Christianity – or Jesus?
Jesus then said, referring to himself, that “Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him.”
Just as that bronze snake had to be made and lifted up in the desert and believed in so people could be healed from the snakebite, Jesus must be lifted up and looked at and believed in so that people would have eternal life.
The purpose of Jesus’ life, sacrifice, and resurrection was so we would stop looking at the Law of Moses, the rules given by God, and look instead at God directly as a Person, a complex personality who loves us – not just another slave master, but our Father, who gave His son’s life so we could escape from our slavery to the drudgery of life, our sins, our addictions, our old dreary life.
And when we look up and believe – the clouds go away, the sun shines, there is hope again!
I once worked with a woman who had had a difficult decade. Her husband had left her, her children wouldn’t talk with her, her health was poor, and she had recently had a car accident, which gave her a concussion and put her on crutches. One day, my wife Saundra came to visit me at work during lunch. Now, many of you know Saundra’s personality – most of the time, she is happy, upbeat, filled with sunshine and God’s love.
I suggested that Saundra might want to spend a few minutes talking with this woman, which Saundra did for about fifteen minutes. I think it was the first time they had met.
That afternoon, the woman came to me and said, “What is it like to be around such joy all the time?” I replied that it was great, for it is great- and pointed out that this is what knowing Christ is like. Saundra usually acts as part of the body of Christ should. And the woman began going to church and the clouds lifted in her life. For the church she chose to attend focused upon God’s love and not on God’s rules.
Sometimes, we just need to be reminded of who the God is that loves us – instead of focusing upon the rules that God has given us to lead us toward Him. It is time to remember that all of the 613 commandments in the Bible are simply the highway. The goal is to understand and fall in love with God, the destination of that highway.
And to do that, we need to move beyond the simple decision to accept Jesus into our heart, we need to move even beyond baptism, that mildly uncomfortable ritual where we bow down before Christ and receive the Holy Spirit with the water, and we need to step on the highway of holiness.
After time, we need to stop studying about Jesus and we need to follow Jesus.
Do you remember when you were in school, the endless days in the classroom? I spent a year of kindergarten, twelve years of elementary and high school, four years of college, and then another five years getting my two and a half master’s degrees. And almost all of that time was spent in the classroom or lab.
I spent a year and a half getting my Master’s in Business Administration in the classroom. But it was the next year, working for Texas Instruments, that taught me business. I spent a year getting half a master’s degree and a certification to teach. But it was the next five years working at Parkersburg Catholic that taught me to teach. I spent three years getting my Master of Divinity degree. But it was the three years pastoring churches in Pleasants County that taught me to be a pastor.
You will learn the basics of Christianity listening to sermons. You will learn more advanced Christian ideas going to weekly bible studies and classes. But you will step on the road which follows Christ when you begin to serve others in a ministry.
If you want to learn to pray, you will need to lead prayers in your family and in small groups – or pray with and for people who come to the food pantry. Pray right there and then with people – don’t say, “I’ll pray for you!”, because you will forget – and you will make a difference with people when you pray with them, then and there.
If you want to see answers to pray, put your prayer requests in a journal and look back over those prayers in 6 months – you will see the hand of God in action.
If you want to understand the love of Christ, drive downtown and tell Chris Mullens at the Clarksburg Mission that you’d like to work three hours a week in the mission. If you want to see joy, tell Tina that you’d like to become a helper in a children’s Sunday school. If you’d like to learn to handle suffering as Jesus did – make it your ministry to visit people in the hospital or nursing homes and read scripture with them. If you’d like to hear testimonies of God in action, come to the Saturday evening AA meeting and just listen.
Or, we could listen right now to some testimonies. Ask some friends today what God has done for them.
And if you truly want to follow Jesus, begin your path by coming to the Lay Servant training in Buckhannon on April 14. See me to register. Or if you are already a Lay Servant, call Mary Ellen up and tell her you’re available to begin serving a small church, leading other people onto the highway of holiness, for nothing pushes you down that highway faster and farther than leading other people, preparing a sermon every week, visiting people and holding conversations about God, leading Bible studies.
If you consider Jesus and His disciples, they did not stop with baptism. He did not hold a classroom study. He taught them with words and example for three years, and then he left them so they could become apostles, telling and showing the world what it meant to be Christ in this world.
There are three key decisions that people must make to truly follow Christ.
- Billy Graham asked everyone who heard him to make a decision to accept Christ into their lives.
- Most of those people later made a decision to become baptized and receive the Holy Spirit.
- But there is a third decision that each of us must make to receive the full benefits of the Gospel. Have you ever wondered why some people just seem to glow with Christ? They have made the third decision and acted upon it. We must decide that since Jesus was God walking around on this earth, His request to “follow me” means something more than “learn about me”. Jesus told people to follow Him over 80 times – but told them to believe in Him only twice. Following Christ means moving into some form of ministry to others.
Three decisions: Accept Christ, be baptized by water and the Holy Spirit, and decide follow Christ into some form of ministry, helping others.
And if you do, like the people in the desert, you will be rewarded by understanding the love of God.
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