Truth Magazine

By Larry Ray Hafley

Question:

From the Philippines: “Will you please explain about the thief on the cross? Was he saved without water baptism?”

Reply:

This is an old question. It is a frequent objection against the necessity of water baptism. Obviously, the denominational world has great confidence in the “thief on the cross argument,” else it would not make the contention that it proves salvation before and without water baptism. Thus, it must be dealt with each time it is presented (2 Tim. 4:2b).

The thief lived and died:

(1) Without believing that God had raised Christ from the dead. Can we (Rom. 10:9)?

(2) Without being a member of the body of Christ. Can we (Eph. 1:22, 23; 2:16; 4:4; 5:23-26)?

(3) Without hearing the gospel as preached by the apostles. Can we (1 Cor. 15:1-4; Eph. 3:3-6; 1 Pet. 1:10-12)?

If the fact that the thief was not baptized means baptism is not essential for us, then the same reasoning also excludes the three items listed above.

Jesus had “power on earth to forgive sins” (Matt. 9:6). He exercised that authority more than once (Lk. 7:50; Matt. 9:2). I believe the thief was saved by this same power. However, this was before the cross, before the preaching of repentance and remission of sins began in Jerusalem (Lk. 24:47-49; Acts 1:1-8; 2:1-5, 36-47). Jesus still has power to forgive sins (Matt. 28:18.20). That Divine right is expressed in the terms or conditions of the gospel. “He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned” (Mk. 16:16).

Jesus is not now on the earth pardoning people as He did then. He is now qualified, certified and verified as Lord at the right hand of God (Acts 2:29,36; 1 Pet. 3:22). We are now living under the new testament system (Heb. 9:16, 17). It is the “new and living way” which He consecrated for us through His flesh, i.e., His death on the cross (Heb. 10:19.22).

Actually, whether the thief was saved with or without water baptism has nothing to do with our salvation. But forget the thief for a moment. Consider the rich, young ruler (Mk. 10:17-22). He could not inherit eternal life without going and selling all that he had. If one demands that salvation be “just like the thief on the cross,” then I shall demand that salvation be “just like the rich, young ruler.” So, we can exclude baptism, but we shall have to go and sell all that we have. Absurd, you say? Yes! Our terms are different from those of the ruler and the thief. One can understand that when he contemplates the ruler, and he ought to be able to do so when he hangs with the thief.

John 3:16

In the letter accompanying his letter, our querist mentioned John 3:16. “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.” John 3:16 does not mention:

1) The necessity of repentance. Must one repent before he can be saved?

2) The command to confess Christ? Can one be saved without confessing Christ (Rom. 10:9, 10; Matt. 10:32, 33)?

If the fact that baptism is not mentioned excludes baptism as essential to salvation, then it excludes repentance and confession because they are not mentioned. Remember, too, that John 3:16 is in the context of John 3:3, 5, where Jesus said that one must be born of water and of the Spirit. That certainly includes baptism (Eph. 5:26; Titus 3:5; 1 Pet. 3:21).

Truth Magazine XXII: 13, p. 210
March 30, 1978

By Dennis C. Abernathy

“For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God” (1 Cor. 1:18). “For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe” (1 Cor. 1:21).

These are very beautiful verses indeed. They show God’s power and His wisdom in the carrying out of His plan in spite of man. Man has always prided himself with his much wisdom. Why the learned men, the philosophers of the day, with all of their investigations, experiences, and etc. knew not God. Some even denied His very existence; some represented Him under some idol form (Acts 17) showing that they had no real acquaintance with the true God.

But the same is still true today. Our society is almost education mad. We pride ourselves with our much learning. We think we know so much. We are so self-sufficient! Therefore “the Bible is put-dated.” “It was fine for those ignorant people back there, but not for our enlightened age.” Men are still denying God in outer space, in the test tube, in the theories of evolution.

But, my friend, God chose His plan (it may not suit the learned of our day) but He is yet pleased with it. It is simple. This, of course, involves His only begotten Son, who left the riches of heaven and made Himself a little lower than the angels and became as man to suffer and die the cruel death on a Roman cross. All of this because you and I were sinners, and this was God’s means of saving us from our sins. It involves the teaching of God’s Son, that is recorded for us to read and understand and then do, so that we may be pleasing to the One who loved us so much and shed His grace forth unto us. It may not be like man would have done it, and man may think he can improve upon it, but it is according to the wisdom of Almighty God and it pleases Him. Therefore it should please us.

1.”The Foolishness of preaching”: Not, by “foolish preaching” but, by the preaching of the cross, which was regarded as foolish and absurd by worldly minded men. God’s plan is wise, but along corner puny man, and esteems it as foolish. Who can believe that we can live or have life through one who died? That we can be blessed forevermore by one who became a curse? That we can be justified by one who was Himself condemned? That we can be saved by one who could not save Himself? That is foolishness to many who do not know any better.

But not only was the preaching considered foolish, but also the manner of preaching the gospel was considered foolish. Not many of the famous men of wisdom and eloquence were employed, just a few unlearned and ignorant fishermen. But my friend, the power was not in the men, but in the message and the one from whom the message came. They had been with Jesus. They could not be discounted as just ignorant and unlearned men. Even the elite of the day marveled and took note of them (Acts 4:13).

Men yet today will scoff at the gospel of Christ, ridicule it proclaimers, and disapprove its precepts. These have never seen the beauty of the cross. They have not humility, and know not greatness through service.

2. It Is The Power of God To Save Them Which Believe: “For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ; for it is the power of God unto salvation-to everyone that believeth; to the Jew first and also to the Greek” (Rom. 1:16). Man may consider it foolish and he may ridicule its proclaimer, but it is God’s power to save man. Man must put self behind, discard his human wisdom, humble himself at the cross and accept the preaching of the gospel-the cross, that he may be saved.

I may trust in my wealth, but it cannot save. I may trust in my wisdom, but it cannot save. I may trust in my popularity, friends, prestige and station in life but they cannot save. But God can save, and He is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance (2 Pet. 3:9). He wants all to be saved (1 Tim. 2:4); but His power to save is in the gospel.

Dear reader and friend, do you think of the gospel as foolishness and trivial? Give it a fair hearing, examine the evidence, and you will see God’s wisdom. It is the foolish one who does not accept the teaching of the Lord. He is as the foolish man who built his house upon the sand. The floods came and the winds blew and that house fell, and great was the fall thereof. A failure to accept the gospel means the loss of one’s soul. Think about it!

Truth Magazine XXII: 12, pp. 205-206
March 23, 1978

By Norman E. Fultz

He was a middle-aged fellow. Accompanied by his teenaged son, he had come across a couple of states from his home to the big city where he hoped to find work to support his family. Being a Christian, he sought out the saints on Lord’s day that he and his son might worship God after the New Testament order. After services they did not hurry away but lingered to meet fellow Christians in this strange metropolis. My wife and I asked them home for lunch and, when they faltered because they would not have much time, we assured them they need not feel obligated to stay longer than they felt they should. The couple of hours proved to be enjoyable.

A few days passed and a letter came from the brother who had settled on the opposite end of the city. The letter expressed gratitude for the hospitality, and on the back of it he had scrawled a poem which appears at the end of this article. Whether he was the original author, I do not know for it was unsigned. Being untitled, after reading and pondering upon the poem, I gave it the title “Mutual Aid.” That was quite a few years ago and I have neither seen nor heard from the brother again, but I have read his poem many times. The point I see in the poem is the point I seek to make in this article.

No man is an island. One man is not a nation any more than one clod is a continent. None lives nor dies to himself. He affects and is affected by others. What he is, he is because of his contact with others, at least in part. And all who have come into contact with him are changed because of that contact. Where is the fully self-sufficient person? Maybe the wild “mountain man” or the hermit is self-sufficient! But God never so intended man’s life to be this way. By nature, he is a social creature depending upon others and being depended upon by others.

Even so it is in the church, a community of believers. It is God’s intention that we aid, comfort, edify and encourage one another; this can best be done by knowing, understanding and communicating with one another. But am I alone in the feeling that with the passing of years, brethren are growing more cold and indifferent toward one another, toward the stranger who comes among us as a visitor or newcomer, or even toward the regular members of the local churches? In a number of places where my work has taken me, I have detected on the part of many what seemed to be a tendency to keep, one another at arm’s length. “Closeness” seems to be feared. At the same time, there are others who seem to yearn for a closeness with kindred spirits from whom strength and encouragement in the Christian life can be drawn. They need help to keep from getting “Sodom-cankered,” and they see that possible help in those whose “spirit . . . soareth tall.”

The Lord’s church is essential. That essentiality is seen in its mission. It is to save souls (1 Tim. 3:15; 1 Thess. 1:8-9; Matt. 28:18-20). Salvation is in the body, the church (Acts 2:47; Eph. 5:23). Both its purchase price, the blood of Christ (Acts 20:28), and the fact that it was in God’s eternal purpose (Eph. 3:10-11) underscore the importance of the church. All that being true, how important then becomes the relationship of those who compose it!

There is a need for “mutual aid” in the local church. When I speak of aid, I do not mean turning the church into a glorified “Red Cross” or social club, though each must stand ready to help a needy brother (1 John 3:17). I refer to a dependence each has on the other. The church is a body composed of many members. Paul uses that figure twice. In Romans 12:4-5 he says, “For as we have many members in one body, and all members have not the same office: So we, being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another.” We are members one of another. Please note that expression and turn in your Bibles to 1 Corinthians 12:20-27 and read it. There Paul further develops the analogy; he said, “God hath tempered the body together . . . that there should be no schism in the body; but that the members should have the same care one for another.” Look at it. We are members one of another and should have the same care for one another.

In other passages, we are taught that the “strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak, and not to please ourselves” (Rom. 15:1), that we should “bear one another’s burdens” (Gal. 6:2), “consider one another to provoke unto love and good works” (Heb. 10:24), and to “comfort one another” (1 Thess. 4:18). We are to “by love serve one another” (Gal. 5:13). In a context speaking of brotherly love, John wrote that “we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren” (1 John 3:16). The first Christians were happy in their association together. Of them it is said they were “breaking bread from house to house, (and) did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart” (Acts 2:46). Are we, because of the hurried pace of our own life, afraid to “open up” and “reach out” in genuine friendship and brotherly love? Are we wary lest we do find someone who needs some help with a burden and lest we be called upon to serve another?

Those who are stronger often fail to realize the needs of the weaker, the need for someone “to rub on” the “balm for aching hearts,” to be near “while God and Christ seem far away.” Even those who are newborn in Christ are often set adrift on their own, and many of them falter and fall whereas they may have been strengthened and saved if some had been “given to hospitality” (Rom. 12:13) and had used it (1 Pet. 4:9). There may be some who “yearn and often cry” for the company of one of like precious faith for his small spirit needs a tall spirit to aid and strengthen him. Ponder the poem and see what I mean.

Mutual Aid

I’ve blundered o’er the paths of life

And had my share of joy and strife.

Some good I’ve done along the way,

But much more bad, I’m bound to say.

The evil thoughts and deeds are mine

To blame another, I decline;

For God, the Father, and His Son,

Are with me always, three in one-

That is, if I myself would take

And purge my spirit for His sake.

So why on earth should you or I

Be aught but good if we should try?

For you, I hope, the task is small;

Your spirit, maybe, soareth tall.

But mine, alas, I blush to say

Gets Sodom-cankered o’er the way,

And for the cure which God supplies

It sorely yearns and often cries,

Not being willing quite, I find

To look ahead and not behind.

In Christ, the balm for aching hearts,

Through His Spirit, God imparts.

But who’s to rub it on each day

While God and Christ seem far away?

You, my brother, sister, friend,

By loving, helping, to the end.

And, oh, the joy and peace untold

That comes to any wandering soul,

When Christians, all, not asking why

God’s balm of love and truth apply!

Yes, brother and sister in Christ, your company with a weaker Christian may be the deterrent to his falling away, and by helping him, you will yourself be strengthened.

Truth Magazine XXII: 12, pp. 204-205
March 23, 1978

By Daniel H. King

M. P. Horban once told the story of a retired businessman who took great pride in his yard. But he had a problem. Try as he would, he could not get rid of the pesky crop of dandelions that ruined his otherwise perfect turf. He used the finest grass seed and the newest weed killers. But the dandelions still appeared, bright yellow over his beautiful lawn. Finally he wrote to a gardening expert. The reply included several suggestions and closed with this advice: “If none of these work, I suggest you learn to love dandelions.”

You know, that simple observation is filled with insight and instruction that we would all do well to comprehend. There are few Christians that I have ever known for any length of time and with any depth of relationship that have not, after a time at least, vouchsafed their gripes and complaints to me. Now, I am not looking down my nose at them in saying this, because I usually took the gracious opportunity which this situation afforded and unloaded a few of my own on them. You see, I am a complainer too. Most of us are. That does not justify me-or you, but it does make us come to grips with the reality of it in our lives. I do not like to look at myself in terms of the Israelites who “murmured, and perished by the destroyer” (1 Cor. 10:10). I had rather turn away from the spiritual mirror with a different perception of myself from what I actually am (Jas. 1:23). But, alas, I go to the mirror often enough that I cannot help but see the real me. It is a harsh reality. For I know that there are many things that are far different from the way that I would like them to be. Sometimes I meet real hardships, problems seem unsolvable, obstacles unmoveable, rifts unbridgeable, and the terror that arises from the simple realization that I cannot do a single solitary thing to change them makes me feel like a cornered animal, crippled and helpless, at the mercy of the Hunter. And the Hunter is God! Or, so I come to think in my moment of depression and desperation. For though I do not point my finger in his majestic face and question His existence or blaspheme His name or make some horrendous charge against His justice-yet I do something very akin to that. I complain.

When I come to my senses and get my feet back on the ground, my eyes focused and my bearings straight, then I realize what an incredibly foolish thing I have done. I am always sorry and repent and determine not to do it again. After a while I push the whole affair to the back of my mind and forget about it. (It is easier to do that when it is my sin than it is when it is someone else’s.) Then when I am sitting alone in my study, turning the pages of the Old Testament, probing its truths and pondering its mysteries, I wonder at the unbelievable stupidity of Israel and her hardness of heart as she wandered through the wilderness, saved from bondage by God’s matchless love and manifest power, and sustained by his benevolent bounty. How could her people have been so incomparably ungrateful as to complain and grumble and murmur as they did? And then I look at myself and I know. I am no better than they. God has bestowed upon me a plenitude of good things, good friends, loved ones, material and spiritual blessings. My way is generally pleasant. Yet when I am faced with one silly road-block that I can not get around, what do I do? I complain.

And so it is with most of us. And so it was with Paul, for a time anyway. Commentators have long puzzled over the exact nature of the “thorn in the flesh” which troubled the apostle because the Bible does not reveal the details. However, Scripture makes several features of the problem crystal clear (2 Cor. 12:7.10):(1) Paul had a problem, a painful and persistent one; (2) The Devil was the perpetrator of this molestation; (3) God, though he certainly had the ability to make this aggravating circumstance disappear, was not disposed to do so and thus took no steps to intervene; (4) Paul complained about the matter to God-not once but three times; (5) For his importunity (Lk. 11:5-8) he received only the mild rebuke. “My grace is sufficient for thee; for my power is made perfect in weakness.” But the simple statement was enough for Paul. As Horban said, “If we can’t change our circumstances, we can change our attitudes toward them.” The profound insight of this reflection is revealed in Paul’s faithful resignation to the will of God which attended it. Assuredly it should make us all ashamed when we complain: “Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my weaknesses, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Wherefore I take pleasure in weaknesses, in injuries, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ’s sake: for when I am weak, then am I strong.” Paul had learned to love dandelions!

How immeasurably hard it is for us to “count it all joy” (Jas. 1:2). Yet in the example of Paul we can derive consolation from knowing that it can be done, and as well, how to do it. It. It does not have to do with our circumstances. Rather, it has to do with our attitudes. If we can fix our attitudes, then our circumstances will not matter as much. Of course, it sounds easier on paper and in theory than it really is, but that should not send us “back to the drawing board.” Instead, it keeps us right where we belong-in the work shop, trying with all of our being to trust those words: “My grace is sufficient for thee . . . .” How can such irksome and unpleasant things as sickness, death, failure, etc., be described as “grace,” a “gift” from God of which we are not worthy? Only when we see them from the perspective that Paul did will we able to call them that and endure their vexations without our usual gripes and complaints. As an unknown poet once wrote:

Strange gift indeed-a thorn to prick,

‘To pierce into the very quick,

To cause perpetual sense of pain.

Strange gift! But it was given for gain.

Unwelcome, but it came to stay;

Nor could that thorn be prayed away!

It came to fill its God-planned place

A life-enriching means of grace.

O much-tried saint, with fainting heart,

The thorn with its abiding smart,

With all its wearing, ceaseless pain

Can be your means of priceless gain.

And so whatever yours may be,

From God accept it willingly.

But reckon Christ-His life, His power

To keep you in the trying hour.

And then your life will richer grow

His grace sufficient He’ll bestow.

In heaven’s glad day your praise will be,

“I’m glad for thorns; they strengthened me.”

Learning to love the dandelions that grow in our own yard is no easy job. But it is a chore that must be done. It will save us from bitterness and resentment and a host of other destructive emotions. Life will be more pleasant for us and those around us. And the service of God even under the most trying of circumstances will take on some semblance of design and purpose, and there is no question but that we will be better people and more profitable servants because of it.

Truth Magazine XXII: 12, pp. 202-203
March 23, 1978