Roots by the River

Is there an upper limit to obedience in the Christian life? Is there a “danger above and beyond the call of duty”? Can we volunteer beyond the highest command of God? What is the greatest command? Jesus said: “And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment” (Mk. 12:30). Now look at it again and see if by volunteering we can go beyond it. The superlatives are all there. God requires all of each of our faculties to love him. In Christian churches today it is normal to hear challenges to greater heights than ever before, but less of the commands. Because the commandments of God are way beyond us—ideals that are not very realistic for the present—we make a graded scale and challenge Christians to follow the graded scale one step at a time. This is because we do not believe God provides the power and love and wisdom to obey His superlative commands as they are given. And since H...

  There is a wonderful example in the New Testament of the enemy’s challenge and the proper response: Acts 4:17–31. The apostles’ response was first according to God’s directive. “But Peter and John answered them: You yourselves judge which is right in God’s sight, to obey you or to obey God. For we cannot stop speaking of what we ourselves have seen and heard” (vv. 19–20). They were then threatened again. The apostles’ response to this second threatening was to present this challenge from the enemy to the Lord: “‘And now, Lord, take notice of the threats they have made, and allow us, your servants, to speak your message with all boldness…’ When they finished praying, the place where they were meeting was shaken. They were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak God’s message with boldness” (vv. 29, 31). The apostles did not respond to the challenge in the flesh; they obeyed God and gained His power to be obedient. Obedience is a willing or an unwilling carrying ou...

  “If ye love me, keep my commandments.” —the Lord Jesus Christ, John 14:15 "Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice” (1 Sam. 15:22). King Saul has just won a battle of annihilation, and now, because of disobedience, Samuel pronounces: “The Lord hath rejected thee from being king” (15:26). Those are hard lines with which to meet a triumphant, victorious king. It was a hollow victory and an empty triumph. Saul had tried to improve upon the commandment of God. We do the same today, only in more subtle ways. There are certain words that command respect. They speak of something held in high regard. Few people hold a negative view of these words. One of them is volunteer! The sound of the word may cause shivers to run through a person. It is used where ideals are at stake, where danger and death are the reward, where sacrifice is necessary. It has the sound of someone above the crowd—the exception—someone of a free will doing something with the consequences clearly in mind. The wo...

“And preach as you go, saying, ‘The kingdom of Heaven is at hand’” (Matthew 10:7). At least in recent Christian history, preaching is something that takes place at a certain place, at a certain hour, not too often, and not too long. It also requires much preparation by the preacher. This, however, does not seem to be what Jesus meant when He spoke of preaching. He said it again in the Great Commission in Matthew 28:19: “ As you go , make disciples of all nations.” Preaching and making disciples should be a normal part of our daily life, not a special part. Nor should it be a normal part for special people. Here is a biblical example: “And on that day a great persecution arose against the church in Jerusalem, and they were all scattered throughout the region of Judea and Samaria except the Apostles… Now those who were scattered went about preaching the word” (Acts 8:1, 4). Everyone except the apostles was preaching as they went. If “all” means “all,” this meant thousands of peo...

  When Jesus sent the apostles as told in Matthew 28:19-20, it was much different from the way we send people on any kind of errand or mission. We send because we cannot or do not wish to go. The sender separates himself from the one sent. The one sent goes alone. This is with mutual agreement, for if the sender said that he would accompany the sent one, the sent one would reply with an accusative question, “Why do you send me if you are coming along? Go do it yourself.” That is not Jesus’ way. He sent, and then He said, “Lo, I am with you always to the close of the age.” Jesus “sent,” and then He “came along.” Isn’t that wonderful? But that is not the first instance of “sending and coming along.” Jesus said, “And He who sent me is with me; He has not left me alone” (John 6:29). The father sent the Lord Jesus, and then He came along. “He who sent me is with me.” He sent us, and now He goes along with us. How great it is to realize that no matter where we are or what our mission...

Two life-changing readings took place in my life in the fall of 1955. The first was my second reading of The Dynamic of Service . The book is a series of lectures on personal evangelism given by A. Paget Wilkes to fellow missionaries from several missions at Karuizawa, Japan, in 1920. It is the best book I have read on the subject. It is currently available on the CCM website , on Amazon , and on Audible . I encourage you to read it. The second was reading and studying Acts 8, 9 and 10. This was brought to my attention by a missionary in Japan. The following is a piece of the teaching: In chapter 8, take the time to see how God led Philip to the Ethiopian and the Ethiopian to Philip. In chapter 9, God led Saul of Tarsus to Ananias and Ananias to Saul. Chapter 10 tells us how God led Cornelius to Peter and Peter to Cornelius. In each of these stories the unbeliever was saved. God knew that each of them was ripe for the harvest. God led them to the harvester and the harvester t...

  This book is a collection of articles written by my wife Bessie for The Hammer  magazine. It was published in print in 2020 and has just been released on Audible. Here is a chapter from the book: Set Our Hearts at Rest “This then is how we know that we belong to the truth, and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence whenever our hearts condemn us. For God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything.” (1 John 3:19–20) What is it that helps us set our hearts at rest in His presence? The preceding verse (verse 18) establishes the context: “Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth.” The immediate context is that if we see a brother in need and we have no pity, the question is, “How can the love of God be in us?” Years ago, just after Mother’s Day, a friend (the wife of a pastor) told me that her young daughter had defied her and gone to a public park. She was wondering how to handle this when the child returned. My friend ha...

  The most effective way to pursue the beaten enemy in physical war is to hit him from his unprotected flanks. If a direct pursuit is carried out, the victors run into the deadly sting of the rear guard and into many roadblocks and blown bridges, and so the retreating enemy gets away. To avoid these, the victors should travel a parallel path, outrun, and intercept the retreating enemy. To continue direct pursuit after the battle is won is to lose the retreating enemy. In order to effect an interception in the pursuit, mobility is needed. If immediate pursuit is undertaken, as many more captives as were taken in the battle can be secured. Prior to the Megiddo battle in September 1918, Allenby promised his cavalry thirty thousand prisoners of war. His staff thought he was presumptuous. In reality he ended with fifty thousand prisoners, having reduced the Turkish Seventh and Eighth armies to a few columns. Let us consider the “how” of spiritual pursuit. First, we must be convinced...

  “The Lord your God is with you, He is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, He will quiet you with His love, He will rejoice over you with singing” (Zephaniah 3:17). This is one of the great verses of God’s character expressed toward us. Host of us know that He is with us, that He saves us, and that He loves us. But there are two additional expressions which cause me to wonder: “He will take great delight in you.” That ought to help any Christian with a “poor self-image.” God delights in me greatly! “He will rejoice over you with singing.” Most of us love to sing praises to Him with joy. Here it tells us that He also sings with joy over us. There is grandeur, wonder, and awe portrayed in Revelation 5:11-14 where a hundred million plus angels and every creature everywhere sing “to Him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb.” That is wonderful, but it is far more wonderful that God will sing with joy over me. This post coordinates with tomorro...

  "Only pursuit of the beaten enemy gives the fruits of victory." —Carl von Clausewitz, Principles of War "Day after day, in the temple courts and from house to house, they never stopped teaching and proclaiming the good news that Jesus is the Christ." —Acts 5:42 In his biography of Field Marshall Viscount Allenby of Megiddo and Felixstowe, General Sir Archibald Wavell gives a very clear picture of the problems of pursuit: “To the uninitiated, pursuit seems the easiest possible form of war. To chase a flying, presumably demoralized enemy must be a simple matter, promising much gain at the expense of some exertion and hardship, but little danger. Yet the successful or sustained pursuits of history have been few, the escapes from a lost battle many. The reasons are partly material, but mainly moral. A force retreating falls back on its depots and reinforcements; unless it is overrun, it is growing stronger all the time, and there are many expedients besides fighting...