December 9 Esight, 2007

Your dead shall live; Together with my dead body, they shall arise. Awake and sing, you who dwell in dust; For your dew is like the dew of the dawn, and the earth shall cast out her dead—Isaiah 26:19.This past Thursday, I awoke early in the morning to the phone ringing beside my bed. I answered to find that one of my dearest, most precious friends in the world, my grandmother, had passed away that night in her sleep. I have spent a considerable amount of time in prayer this week talking to the one to whom my grandmother always referred as “sweet Jesus.” He is sweet, especially in moments like these. I thank Him this week, for He has brought “life and immortality to light through the gospel.” I thank Him because He “died and rose again,” and thus, we have the same hope that “those who sleep in Jesus” will be blessed with the same fate. I thank Him, for “as in Adam all die, in Christ all shall be made alive.” I thank Him because “the hour is coming when all who are in the graves will hear His voice, and come forth.”

My grandmother deserves a large portion of the credit for the life I have chosen to live. She was my first introduction to Jesus. At age six, she would tell me stories of Jesus as I went to bed each night. Each time, when she was finished, she would whisper in my ear as she tucked me into bed, “Jesus has special plans for you, Herbie. He’s going to use you. One day, you’re going to be a preacher.” I do not know whether her words were a self-fulfilling prophecy or she just knew, but what I do know is that I have never met a more giving, more selfless, more forgiving person than my grandmother. I never learned much theology from my grandmother. What she taught me was far more valuable. What she showed me was what it means to live a life dedicated to revealing God’s love to this world through our treatment of others. In the way she treated her fellow man, she was the most Godlike woman I have ever met. In the last few months, I would spend time each week with her, sharing with her testimonies of the many lives God was touching through the work of Renewed Heart Ministries. She would well up with tears each time and say, “I knew it, I just knew God had a special plan for you, Herbie.” (She was one of the few who still got away with putting the “ie” at the end of my name.)

I was privileged to speak at her funeral this week. It is by far, the greatest honor I have received in my twelve years of preaching.

This next week, especially during the holiday season, take time to single out a family member who means something special to you and tell him or her about it. Thank that person for the blessing he or she is to you in your life. For it is in our expressions of love for one another, remember, that we most greatly reveal the character of our God.

I will miss you Nanny, but I know we will see one other again. Death is not a period, but a comma. And so I lay you in the arms of your sweet Jesus, rest well, and I’ll see you on that resurrection morn.

“Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on. Yes,” says the Spirit, “that they may rest from their labors and their works follow them”—Revelation 14:13.

Happy Holidays to you all,

December 2 Esight, 2007

For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given.—Isaiah 9:6

This holiday season, I find that I truly resonate with the words in the verse above as never before. Yet this week I’d like you to sincerely contemplate what this verse states. The very next sentence introduces a curious thought: “and the government shall be upon his shoulders.” What did Isaiah mean when he placed “government” on the “shoulders” of this divine-human infant? The answer, I believe, can be discerned from the following statement.

“Through Christ’s redeeming work the government of God stands justified. The Omnipotent One is made known as the God of love. Satan’s charges are refuted . . . By love’s self-sacrifice, the inhabitants of earth and heaven are bound to their Creator in bonds of indissoluble union” (Ellen White, The Desire of Ages, p. 26).

Ever since Lucifer’s rebellion began, Love and Selfishness have stood face to face. Questions were raised, lies spread, and doubts conceived. Satan represented God as a being whose chief attribute was self-centeredness. Yet “to this sin-darkened earth He came to reveal the light of God’s love” (White, p.19).

“It will be seen that the glory shining in the face of Jesus is the glory of self-sacrificing love. In the light from Calvary it will be seen that the law of self-renouncing love is the law of life for earth and heaven; that the love which “seeketh not her own” has its source in the heart of God . . . .” (White, p.19).

When we truly comprehend the sacrifice of God in the gift of His only Son, we begin to perceive the truth that “God so loves” (John 3:16). But ponder what this means for you personally, dear friend. Through the gift of Christ not only does the government of heaven stand exemplified, but, much more, this gift allows “every son and daughter of Adam [to] understand that our Creator is the friend of sinners” (White, p. 24).

Not only has God been revealed as a God of love. His love has been shown to know no bounds. For God has been revealed to be the friend even of the fallen sons and daughters of Adam and Eve.

He is your friend, dear reader. He’s not against you. He loves you with a love that you will never fully comprehend, a love you can only experience. Will you allow the gift of Christ to awaken in you a deeper encounter with His life-changing love this Holiday Season? It’s more than lights, shopping, gingerbread, and trees. There is nothing wrong with these traditions, but the season simply means much more, for in the gift that this time of year celebrates, the “government of God” stands vindicated, the character of God is revealed, and His attitude toward sinners, His innermost thoughts toward you stand unveiled. Take time this season to meditate on what the gift of Christ reveals about what’s in God’s heart and how it relates to you. In this gift is manifested a love that this world has yet to truly comprehend and believe. Dare we believe it? Will you believe it?

“The earth was dark through misapprehension of God. That the gloomy shadows might be lightened, that the world might be brought back to God, Satan’s deceptive power was to be broken. This could not be done by force. The exercise of force is contrary to the principles of God’s government; He desires only the service of love; and love cannot be commanded; it cannot be won by force or authority. Only by love is love awakened. To know God is to love Him; His character must be manifested in contrast to the character of Satan. This work only one Being in all the universe could do. Only He who knew the height and depth of the love of God could make it known. Upon the world’s dark night the Sun of Righteousness must rise, ‘with healing in His wings’” (Mal. 4:2; White, p. 22).

November 25 Esight, 2007

Enoch lived sixty-five years, and became the father of Methuselah. Then Enoch walked with God three hundred years. —Genesis 5:21-22Last Monday at 1:00 p.m. (give or take a few minutes), my wife gave birth to a beautiful baby son, Christian Journey Montgomery. He came into this world at a whopping 7 pounds and 5.6 ounces. Each time we have had the privilege of experiencing this joy, something inside me clicks, and I begin to feel a depth of love toward this little human being that I have never felt toward any other. Love that words cannot describe. Love that can only be experienced and understood by other parents who have felt the same.

Maybe this is why Moses stated that Enoch became a father then he walked with God. If what Enoch felt toward Methuselah, if what I feel toward my children is anything remotely kindred to what God feels toward me as His little one, then truly I can understand why the Bible states that I am the “apple of His eye” (Zechariah 2:8).

It is also interesting to watch my peers who have not had children yet. They look at all the sacrifices a new little one brings and can’t imagine why we would be so happy. But when love awakens in the heart of a parent, when that mysterious bond surfaces between a little boy or girl and that child’s father, every duty becomes a delight and every sacrifice a pleasure, and I truly can’t imagine my life without them. I begin to grasp why God would make such great sacrifices for me, his son.

“Look upon that wounded head, the pierced side, the marred feet. Remember that Christ risked all; ‘tempted like as we are,’ he staked even his own eternal existence upon the issue of the conflict. Heaven itself was imperiled for our redemption. At the foot of the cross, remembering that for one sinner Jesus would have yielded up his life, we may estimate the value of a soul.” (Ellen White, General Conference Bulletin, December 1, 1895, par. 22)

For me, “God permitted His Son to come … at the risk of failure and eternal loss. The heart of the human father yearns over his son. He looks into the face of his little child and trembles at the thought of life’s peril. He longs to shield his dear one from Satan’s power, to hold him back from temptation and conflict. To meet a bitterer conflict and a more fearful risk, God gave His only-begotten Son. … Herein is love. Wonder, O heavens! and be astonished, O earth!” (Ellen White, Desire of Ages, p. 49).

But God did not take this great risk and make this great sacrifice just for me. He did it for you, too, dear reader. This week, spend some time contemplating the glorious truth that you are God’s little boy or girl and that He is your Daddy. You are the most precious thing in the universe to Him. To save you, He has and will continue to risk all. He will stop at nothing, for He considers “no sacrifice too great” for you. (Ellen White, Christ Object Lessons, p. 282) Wonder, O heavens, and be astonished, O earth.

November 18 Esight, 2007

Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect. —Matthew 5:48.

Thank you so much for your patience this past week. We have received so many emails wondering where their daily and weekly emails were, it was a tremendous blessing to see how many are actually out there reading and being blessed. Sincerely, my wife and I were catching up on some last minute preparations for our soon to be born son. Please forgive the lapse in emails. By Monday we should have a new baby boy!

This week, rather than writing a devotional, I would simply like to share with you one of my favorite selections from a favorite author of mine. May you be blessed by her as I have been. I will be writing again by next week, but until then, please keep my wife and I in your prayers. We will be headed to the hospital Sunday evening. We’ll keep you all posted!

The word “therefore” implies a conclusion, an inference from what has gone before. Jesus has been describing to His hearers the unfailing mercy and love of God, and He bids them therefore to be perfect. Because your heavenly Father “is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil” (Luke 6:35), because He has stooped to lift you up, therefore, said Jesus, you may become like Him in character, and stand without fault in the presence of men and angels.

The conditions of eternal life, under grace, are just what they were in Eden–perfect righteousness, harmony with God, perfect conformity to the principles of His law. The standard of character presented in the Old Testament is the same that is presented in the New Testament. This standard is not one to which we cannot attain. In every command or injunction that God gives there is a promise, the most positive, underlying the command. God has made provision that we may become like unto Him, and He will accomplish this for all who do not interpose a perverse will and thus frustrate His grace.

With untold love our God has loved us, and our love awakens toward Him as we comprehend something of the length and breadth and depth and height of this love that passeth knowledge. By the revelation of the attractive loveliness of Christ, by the knowledge of His love expressed to us while we were yet sinners, the stubborn heart is melted and subdued,and the sinner is transformed and becomes a child of heaven. God does not employ compulsory measures; love is the agent which He uses to expel sin from the heart. By it He changes pride into humility, and enmity and unbelief into love and faith.

The Jews had been wearily toiling to reach perfection by their own efforts, and they had failed. Christ had already told them that their righteousness could never enter the kingdom of heaven. Now He points out to them the character of the righteousness that all who enter heaven will possess. Throughout the Sermon on the Mount He describes its fruits, and now in one sentence He points out its source and its nature: Be perfect as God is perfect. The law is but a transcript of the character of God. Behold in your heavenly Father a perfect manifestation of the principles which are the foundation of His government.

God is love. Like rays of light from the sun, love and light and joy flow out from Him to all His creatures. It is His nature to give. His very life is the outflow of unselfish love.

“His glory is His children’s good;

His joy, His tender Fatherhood.”

He tells us to be perfect as He is, in the same manner. We are to be centers of light and blessing to our little circle, even as He is to the universe. We have nothing of ourselves, but the light of His love shines upon us, and we are to reflect its brightness. “In His borrowed goodness good,” we may be perfect in our sphere, even as God is perfect in His.

Jesus said, Be perfect as your Father is perfect. If you are the children of God you are partakers of His nature, and you cannot but be like Him. Every child lives by the life of his father. If you are God’s children, begotten by His Spirit, you live by the life of God. In Christ dwells “all the fullness of the Godhead bodily” (Colossians 2:9); and the life of Jesus is made manifest “in our mortal flesh” (2 Corinthians 4:11). That life in you will produce the same character and manifest the same works as it did in Him. Thus you will be in harmony with every precept of His law; for “the law of the Lord is perfect, restoring the soul.” Psalm 19:7, margin. Through love “the righteousness of the law” will be “fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.” Romans 8:4.

(Thoughts from the Mount of Blessings, p. 76-77)

November 4 Esight, 2007

May it never be! Rather, let God be found true, though every man be found a liar, as it is written, ‘THAT YOU MAY BE JUSTIFIED IN YOUR WORDS, AND PREVAIL WHEN YOU ARE JUDGED.’—Romans 3:4

As I travel this globe, I am deeply convinced that no one has been lied about, misunderstood, accused, blamed, misperceived, and in need of vindication more than God. Looking at the books of Daniel and Revelation, I sense a pervasive theme surfacing. First, each chapter in Daniel points forward to the final vindication of God’s character:

Chapter 1 – God’s Earthly Kingdom Attacked / God’s Kingdom Vindicated

Chapters 10-12 – God’s Heavenly Kingdom Attacked / God’s Kingdom Restored

Second, the theme of Revelation is very easy to decipher as well, if you will go through and simply read the worship statements therein. Many times, we gloss over these as just flowery statements about God by beings in heavenly places, but go back and reread them. Use them as signposts. Then go back and let the rest fill in the spaces between. What you will begin to sense is that the whole book is about the decimation and then restoration of God’s character not simply on earth, but before the entire unfallen universe as well.

Chapter 8 shares that when the seventh seal is opened, there will be a space of silence in Heaven (Revelation 8:1). I personally believe that this will be when all eyes finally see, in the moments of God’s full, undiluted disclosure, the magnitude of His character of love, when every knee should bow and every tongue will confess that God is what He has always said He was (Isaiah 45:23, Romans 14:11, and Philippians 2:10). Just before the seventh angel sounds his trumpet, Revelation states that the “mystery of God” will be finished (Revelation 10:7)! This is the same time when the angel of chapter 18 will lighten the earth once again with a revelation of God’s character unequalled since the days of Calvary (Revelation 18:1).

In light of all this, I am reminded, in the context of the times in which we live, of those in the scriptures who made a decision to live on intimate terms with the God of this universe. God speaks of these individuals as “My friends” (Isaiah 41:8). Today, I believe we are to “understand the times,” perceiving what we are to do (1 Chronicles 12:32). It is time for the friends of God to cry out, to proclaim from the rooftops, “Behold your God” (Isaiah 40:9).

I have met many people in my life, but none has ever loved me the way I feel loved in the moments when I catch a glimpse, when I receive a glimmer of a right perception of what God was doing for me on the cross. The revelation of God’s love for me at Calvary astounds me. For this and this alone, God is my best friend. Even if there were nothing in it for me, His love has so deeply affected my life that it has won me at such a heart level that I feel resonance when I meditate on this week’s theme. I want to do something for Him! I want to give my life, my all, to Him for His cause! I want to be used by Him to rescue His person from all the lies perpetrated in His name. Especially in these closing hours of earth’s history, I hear God’s whisper in my heart,

“My son, be wise, and make My heart glad, that I may answer him who reproaches Me” (Proverbs 27:11).

God, I hear You, this week. You have my vote. Take my life and use it to “lighten this earth” with Your glory once again.

“Some have been asking how long, and I am telling you, it will not be long.

Truth pressed down to the ground will rise again. No lie can live forever.”—MLK Jr.

October 28 Esight, 2007

For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision means anything, but faith working through love.—Galatians 5:6Oftentimes, in religious circles, there are two ideas hotly debated by separate groups. Are we saved by faith or by works as well? Some focus on works, while others say no, we need to focus on faith. But here in Paul, we find that there are actually three key ingredients to the Christian path: 1) Faith, 2) Works, and 3) Love. Love brings them all together. When we see God’s love, faith responds. We are saved by God’s love, through our faith, which goes to work recreating this love in our life. Thus, we must fix our eyes on God’s love for us, for love produces faith and faith produces works. If our gaze is fixed on God’s love, we will experience both faith and the good works produced by that faith.

This makes perfect sense when you understand that faith is our deep heart’s response to God’s love. God’s love passes through our intellect, but it does not stop there! It travels further and touches our heart, awakening profound appreciation. This deep heartfelt gratitude, arousing within us the desire to love Him back, is what the Bible calls—FAITH! And this can only come as a response to seeing how much He truly loves us!

This is precisely why Paul’s greatest concern for those to whom he ministered was that they would encounter God’s extravagant love for them.

“For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God.”

This week, take advantage of our online resources concerning God’s great love for you. Let the vastness of God’s love awaken the sleeping giant of your faith and set burning within you a heart fully alive!

October 21 Esight, 2007

Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, in our likeness.”—Genesis 1:26What is God like and what does it mean to have been made originally in His image? Godliness is God-like-ness but what is God like? In short, “God is Love” (John 3:16). We were once made in the image of this love, but something happened. “Selfishness took the place of Love,” Deception, the place of Faith, and Lies, the place of Truth (E.G. White, Steps to Christ p. 17). Today, we stand in need of having our pictures of God and what He is like corrected. We have believed so many lies, and these lies themselves prevent us from being able to reach outside of ourselves and live for anything other than self-centered pursuits. But must we settle for the unsatisfying experience of a life centered only on ourselves? Isn’t there something greater to live for than just “what’s in it for us?” Can we truly ever be restored to the image of God’s other-centered love in which we were once made? The answer is an unequivocal yes. But we will never “be able to love others by trying to love others”(E.G. White, Christ’s Object Lessons p. 384). Our bent toward ourselves is based upon lies we have believed concerning God. Therefore the only hope of experiencing conversion from self-centeredness to other-centeredness is through having the Father “explained” to us once again (John 1:18). Only the truth can “set us free” (John 8:32). Only love can awaken love in us once again (E.G. White, Desire of Ages p.22 ) We desperately need a revelation outside of ourselves of God’s extravagant love to turn our hearts outward once more. Thus, we will love again “because He first loved us” (1 John 4:19). It was to manifest this love that the God of this universe died for you, dear reader, that having died for you, you might “no longer live for yourself,” but be restored to the other-centeredness we once enjoyed (2 Corinthians 5:14,15). Do you want to be different? Do you long for change in your life dear reader? This week, take some time to try to learn something new, something deeper concerning God’s great love for you. Open God’s word and allow Him to unfold for you fresh revelations of how much He cares. Love is from Him, and only by His love can love be awakened in you and the image of God’s love in which we were once created be “perfectly reproduced” in us again (1 John 4:7, E.G White, Christ’s Object Lessons p. 69). The theme of God’s love for us will be our science and song throughout eternity (E.G. White, Steps to Christ p. 88). It will be our constant study, our engulfing theme, the purpose of our being. Why not let that eternity begin for you today?

October 14 Esight, 2007

“So through one righteous act, acquittal and life came to all.” (Romans 5:18, New American Bible)This week is Part 2 of our two-part devotional. I’d like you to first get a grasp on some very specific words Paul uses in the first five chapters of the Book of Romans. In order to do this, I have shown below the linguistic origin of the words themselves.

The foundation is the word: Right (Dike, Greek).

On this word, there are three words built: Righteous (the adjective Dikaios), Righteously (the adverb Dikaios), and Righteousness (the noun Dikaiosune).

Then from the adjective Righteous (Dikaios) is built the verb Rightify (or more properly, justify, Dikaioo).

And then upon this verb Rightify (Dikaioo) are built two more Greek nouns: a Decision (Dikaioma) and Acquittal (Diakosis).

Why take the time to trace all these words out? Watch what all this reveals: When Paul uses the verb above Rightify (or more properly, justify), he is referring to a psychological and emotional “making righteous” of the one who has believed. It is a very real experience of one going from a sense of guilt and shame to peace (Romans 5:1), from an overwhelming feeling of condemnation to justification. This is where a person allows God to remove the life-crushing load of guilt from their past mistakes that they’ve been under in their conscience. Before one will ever be set free behaviorally, they must first be set free psychologically and emotionally. But what’s interesting is that this very real experience occurs via faith. But what is this faith built upon? Or rather, what is the person believing that causes them to experience this cleansing of their conscience from sin’s guilt and shame (Hebrews 9:14, 1 Peter 3:21)?

This is where the amazing news comes in. The answer is found in Romans 5:16-19.

Just as Adam’s sin brought mortality or death upon all of us (see last week’s devotional), from Jesus’ death on Calvary, “The free gift arose from many transgressions resulting in justification.” (Verse 16), This word “justification” is Dikaioma. It’s a decision that God has made concerning every person. And this decision is a gift given to all. What is this decision? Paul goes on to say that this decision is a “gift of righteousness” (Verse 17). But what is the decision? The answer is to be found in Verse 18: “So then as through one transgression there resulted condemnation to all men, even so through one act of righteousness there resulted justification of life to all men.” The word here for justification is Diakosis or Acquittal. God has made a decision regarding every man, woman, and child—and that decision is acquittal, charges have been dropped! He has “canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross” (Colossians 2:14). There two definitions for Acquittal: One is that a person who is not truly guilt is found innocent and is therefore acquitted. This definition does not apply to us. The other definition is where the prosecuting part simply drops the charges thus the defendant goes free. What Romans 5 is saying is that God has dropped all charges against us. He has relinquished all rights to repayment and has simply forgiven. He has ripped the charges up and nailed them to the cross!

Yet, this decision is a gift. And like any gift, although it has been given to every person, it can be accepted or rejected. His hope is that you receive it (Verse 16) and let this gift of forgiveness remove our guilt and shame and make us psychologically and emotionally righteous (Verse 19).

But before you rush off to go about your week, I’d like you to consider the fact that we are not innocent. We are guilty; the charges have simply been dropped. And as in all cases where the person who has been wronged lets the offending party off the hook, it costs them something to do so. They must choose to rise above the violation and willingly bear whatever loss the offending party inflicted. The forgiver always pays a price to drop the so-called charges. What I would like you to ponder this week is the question of the ages. It is the question that reveals forever what type of a God we worship. The answer to this question wins us at a heart level and truly changes our lives. The question is, “What did it cost God, the one we have wronged, to let us off the hook, to drop the charges, to forgive, to acquit every person who had ever sinned against Him?” The answer can only be found in closing moments of Calvary. Take time to ponder those closing scenes this week, dear reader, and allow them to reveal to your heart what is truly in God’s heart toward you. Having loved you, He loved you till the end.

October 7 Esight, 2007

Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men—Romans 5:12.Or as Paul states a few verses later, “So then as through one transgression there resulted condemnation to all men . . .” (Romans 5:18). Throughout Christian history, many crazy ideas have existed about God, based on a misunderstanding of what these verses seem to be saying concerning our relationship to Adam and his original sin. This week I’d like you to ponder what I believe these verses are truly saying to us. This is Part 1 of a two-part devotional, so please don’t miss next week’s.

You see, Adam was created with conditional immortality—immortality that he lost through the fall. “Immortality, promised to man on condition of obedience, had been forfeited by transgression” (Ellen White, The Great Controversy, p. 533). Moses shares with us the same picture: “Then the LORD God said, ‘Behold, the man has become like one of Us, knowing good and evil; and now, he might stretch out his hand, and take also from the tree of life, and eat, and live forever.’” Man became mortal. Over and over again in the scriptures, the contrast is made between “mortal man” (Psalm 146:3) and God, who “alone possesses immortality” (1 Timothy 6:16). But what does this mean for us?

“Adam could not transmit to his posterity that which he did not possess” (White, p. 533).

This means that Adam could not pass on what he himself did not have. Thus we are born mortal, destined to die. So why spend time pointing out the obvious? Because we have failed to realize what this means to us. Even if we could live a perfect life, never sinning by even so much as a thought, we would still die. We still would not live forever. We are born having a date with death, and no amount of obedience can make us what we are not. This mortality we got from our predecessors Adam and Eve.

I remember sharing this one day in a class I was teaching, and one of the students could not take it any longer. He finally stood up and blurted out to the rest of the class, “If that’s true . . . then . . . then . . . then, there’s nothing I can do to save myself.” I looked back at him, grinned, and said, “flesh and blood has not revealed this unto you.” Follow carefully.

“Adam could not transmit to his posterity that which he did not possess; and there could have been no hope for the fallen race, had not God, by the sacrifice of his Son, brought immortality within their reach . . . only through Christ can immortality be obtained” (White, p. 533).

There is only one way we can have immortality, and that is to come into possession of the One who alone is Immortal! And praise God, that “One” has been given to the world!

“For God so loved the world, that He gave [to each person in the world] His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life” (John 3:16).

This week, why don’t you take some time to thank Him for that marvelous gift?

September 30 Esight, 2007

In the next few weeks I will be conducting once again our Life Unlimited series which is a gospel centered evangelistic series offered by RHM. I would like to share with you this week some thoughts that are currently on my heart. I am convinced that our evangelism needs to—first and foremost—introduce people to God and His love for them. Through answering their questions and meeting their needs, we need to not only show them His love, but also lead them into deeper and more personal experiences with that love. This is what changes lives. Our Adventist message was never intended to simply spread intellectual, doctrinal facts. This may produce members that are convinced, but it doesn’t necessarily mean they are converted. Conversion happens as we encounter God’s love for us, as we “perceive with [our] hearts.”(John 12:40) Then the miracle of the new birth takes place, through which we “no longer live for ourselves, but for Him”(2 Corinthians 5:15) who loved us and gave His life for us. Our message is to be centered in helping others “see” what God is truly like; and nothing in my life has contributed more to my understanding of God’s love than the truths of the Adventist message. It’s powerful! It’s heart-awakening! It’s life-changing!

Our understanding of the Sabbath teaches us how to “rest” in God’s love. (Hebrews 4:9)

Our understanding of the nature of man teaches not only what happens when we die, but more importantly what happened when Christ “tasted death for us all.” (Hebrews 2:9)

Our understanding of mortality and immortality, points back to the Gospel, through which life and immortality have been brought to light. (2 Timothy 1:10, NLT) For as “in Adam all die, in Christ all will be made alive.” (1 Corinthians 15:22)

Our understanding of the law of sin and death (Romans 8:2), reveals that God did not send Jesus to save us from Himself, but rather to “save His people from their sins.” (Matthew 1:21)

Our understanding of the fate of the lost reconciles the Bible’s teachings on hell with God’s claims to be a God of love.

Our understanding of free will, the Great Controversy, and the cross continues to balance how God could love us so passionately, and yet still cannot guarantee that we will never suffer pain.

All of these truths piece together like a giant puzzle where a picture of a God whose chief attribute is love mysteriously emerges, overwhelming our hearts, answering the questions that prevented our hearts from trusting in His love, and setting us free run in the expanse of His goodness and mercy, to love Him the way He is in love with us. (This may not be the context that introduced you to the Adventist message, but this is the intended purpose of our teachings.)

A wise author wrote, “The sacrifice of Christ as an atonement for sin is the great truth around which all other truths cluster. In order to be rightly understood and appreciated, every truth in the word of God, from Genesis to Revelation, must be studied in the light that streams from the cross of Calvary. I present before you the great, grand monument of mercy and regeneration, salvation and redemption,—the Son of God uplifted on the cross. This is to be the foundation of every discourse given by our ministers.” (Gospel Workers, pg. 315) “Of all professing Christians, Seventh-day Adventists should be foremost in uplifting Christ before the world. The proclamation of the third angel’s message calls for the presentation of the Sabbath truth. This truth, with others included in the message, is to be proclaimed; but the great center of attraction, Christ Jesus, must not be left out . . . The sinner must be led to look to Calvary . . . believing in His mercy.” (Gospel Workers, pg. 156)

Thirty years ago a woman had a child out of wedlock. She was told by her pastor that both she and her bastard son were destined to burn in hell with no hope of eternal salvation. This woman came to me after the seventh meeting of my series in Clarksburg. That night’s topic had been God’s prevenient forgiveness for us. She told me, with tears streaming down her face, how she (for the first time in those thirty long years) truly felt God’s forgiveness and she now believed that both she and her son could go to heaven. We prayed right there and changed that “could” into a “would.”

Dear fellow Adventist, this is what we are to be about! Not just changing people’s minds, but changing their hearts! “Those who wait for the Bridegroom’s coming are to say to the people, ‘Behold your God.’ The last rays of merciful light, the last message of mercy to be given to the world, is a revelation of His character of love.” (Christ Object Lessons, pg. 415)