daily java

Daily Java:

Jesus came and told his disciples, “I have been given all authority in heaven and on earth. Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age. (Mathew 28:18-20).
It’s true that some are preaching out of jealousy and rivalry. But others preach about Christ with pure motives. They preach because they love me, for they know I have been appointed to defend the Good News. (Philippians 1:15-16)

Someone was talking the other day about the atrocities the early missionaries were supposed to have inflicted on the American Indians, making them into slaves and abusing them.

While there may have been isolated cases of this, I do not believe the major part was like that. I think that the reality was much different than what the historians would have us believe. There are several reasons for this.

First is the fact that, as a Christian, I have know personally many missionaries. I have not known one who was mean natured and would do something like this. There is a certain heart, a certain love that makes someone give up his or her life with family to become a missionary. When you become a missionary, you have to give up so much, especially if you are a missionary to primitive cultures like the early missionaries to the Indians were. That can only be done out of love, because desire to control people can only be maintained so long. And people will not be willingly dominated like that for only so long before they rebel.

Second is that historians are writing histories from their own perspectives and their own biases. Many historians, especially modern ones, are haters of our culture and are trying to figure out how to make us the bad guy. Read many history books today and all of our wars become imperialist aggressions, all of our foreign aid become blood money, all of our reaching out becomes guilt motivated of our “past sins.”

Look at what President Obama did when he came in office. The first thing he did was to go throughout the world and apologize for America. That same idea is common in most histories. And it is also portrayed in movies. Dances with Wolves (a good movie in many ways) and Avatar (not as good) are two recent movies that portrayed the Indian as wonderful, kind, decent human beings who were being oppressed by American soldiers, all of which were either stupid, brutish or greedy. Having been a soldier trying my best to be a good one, I resent the portrayal and consider it false.

The third is that it doesn’t take too much inspection of the Indian culture to see that these were people who were filthy, cruel and whose honor consisted of how many horses they could steal or how well they could endure torture. They had almost no sense of modesty or morality.

One could say, “Well, they just didn’t have what you consider modesty and morality.” And that is true. But what I consider modesty and morality is what I get from the Bible, so I will admit that I am somewhat biased.

It is also curious that this emphasis on the “bad American” has not come up until lately in our history. Much of it stems from the oikaphobia (hatred of oneself or people like you) that is so prevalent in the American liberal philosophy. Having heard so many talk about how good it would be if we had lost the Gulf War that we engaged in in the early 2000’s, it became apparent that many in this country do not like this country and wish it to fail. And one way they can do that is to rewrite the history books and make movies about how bad our soldiers and our missionaries are.

Yes there are times when our soldiers have not been their best. But those were the exception, not the rule. And to make one’s portrayal of soldiers based on the exception is wrong. That would be the same as saying all liberals are dirty, freeloading hippies because that was a picture given back in the 1960’s.

Missionaries had to have a certain heart, one of service, sacrifice and love, to do what they did in the first place. And those who write the histories do not like Christianity in the first place. But we have the mandate, whether others like it or not, of bringing the gospel to others. We do not do anyone a disservice by telling them about Jesus and his grace. If we do, the Bible is false and Christianity is worthless.

I suppose that is the main sticking point. These people do not want the gospel brought so they will do anything they can to impugn those who bring it. To them, it is as 2 Corinthians 2:16 says: To those who are perishing, we are a dreadful smell of death and doom. But to those who are being saved, we are a life-giving perfume. And who is adequate for such a task as this?

And we do the Lord and the memory of that huge crowd of witnesses to the life of faith (Hebrews 12:1) a great disservice when we buy into this inaccurate portrayal of missionaries.

daily java

Daily Java:

We will not hide these truths from our children;
      we will tell the next generation
   about the glorious deeds of the Lord,
      about his power and his mighty wonders.
 For he issued his laws to Jacob;
      he gave his instructions to Israel.
   He commanded our ancestors
      to teach them to their children,
 so the next generation might know them—
      even the children not yet born—
      and they in turn will teach their own children.
 So each generation should set its hope anew on God,
      not forgetting his glorious miracles
      and obeying his commands.
 Then they will not be like their ancestors—
      stubborn, rebellious, and unfaithful,
      refusing to give their hearts to God. (Psalm 78:4-8)

in the old days, there was one person whose job it was to pass on all of the stories. He or she did it orally. They would just sit and talk and the rest would listen and absorb what they had to say. This was the way they passed down their history, their philosophy, their who way of thought.

Without the story tellers, the next generation would not know anything about where they had come from and would, in essence, be cast adrift.

There is a move afoot in the educational world to release us from our history, to rewrite it in such a way as to make us different from those who came before us. This takes away our background and makes us more like they want us to be rather than like those who came before us would have us to be.

But we need to know what came before us. It puts our own lives into context.

George Santayana (1863–1952) said: “Progress, far from consisting in change, depends on retentiveness…. when experience is not retained, as among savages, infancy is perpetual. Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it…. This is the condition of children and barbarians, in whom instinct has learned nothing from experience.”

We need to know what came before. And that is the whole purpose of the Old Testament: to show us what came before, where we came from, why we are here, who this God the Bible speaks of is.

Romans 15:4, in talking about the scriptures which came before, said: Such things were written in the Scriptures long ago to teach us. And the Scriptures give us hope and encouragement as we wait patiently for God’s promises to be fulfilled.

Our children need to know who we are, where we came from, why we are here. And we need to tell them, not only about our personal families, and about our country, but about our God.

Our history as a people of God is too valuable to be forgotten.

daily java

While Pilate was sitting on the judge’s seat, his wife sent him this message: “Don’t have anything to do with that innocent man, for I have suffered a great deal today in a dream because of him.” (Matthew 27:19)

Years later, when she looked back on that day, she was filled with a combination of both grief and joy. It was a strange mixture considering the appalling events of the day.

She remembered it clearly 30 years later.

Her husband had been about his business as usual. He was Pontius Pilate, the governor of Judea, one of the hardest places on earth to govern. These people were maniacs. They didn’t listen to reason or accept authority in any way except their own. They went, not to the wisdom of the emperor for their advice on living, but to some old tattered scroll written gods knew how many years ago.

It was just plain silly. And Pontius had had nothing but trouble from them from the first day he came in. That first time he entered Jerusalem with all of his trappings, all of his standards and representations. He told them that this was the beginning of a new day, that he would bring them, kicking and screaming if need be, into the new order.

They could take it or he would kill a few. That would show them.

However, to our utter astonishment, the older leaders first and then after a moment all of them knelt down, bared their necks and invited him to go ahead and kill them. They said they would rather die than disobey their god’s law.

Of course, Pontius backed down. They were like rabid dogs.

And now, they had this guy who was a teacher of some kind that they hated. And they brought him to Pontius to see if he would kill him for them. He said no, of course. He hadn’t done anything much wrong except teach. It wasn’t like he led an insurrection or anything.

But they insisted, even hinting that they would tell the emperor that he was disloyal. He didn’t need that. The reason he was here in the godforsaken country in the first place was because the senate and all were mad at him for some things he had done and were punishing him. He didn’t deserve these people, but what could he do? Either resign or go here.

And now, there was almost a full scale revolt right in front of him.

But this afternoon, I had a dream. I am not sure what it was, but it left a large fear in me, fear on behalf of this man, this Jesus.

I told Pontius not to do anything with him, that he was innocent. I do not think I could stand it if you killed him. I thought he might even be an emissary of the gods.

And sure enough, Pontius washed his hands of the whole mess and told them to go do what they wanted. He wasn’t responsible for other people did, was he? They had their own minds. And they were crazy. He sure couldn’t do much there.

I was disappointed in him that he gave Jesus to the soldiers to beat and torture. They are horrible men.

So the Jews did kill him. Along with the help of the soldiers, they killed him in a horrible way. I have never liked crucifixion. It is messy and it looks so painful. You hear the guys screaming and moaning. It destroys my appetite every time there is a mass crucifixion.

But this time, I thought and thought about it. It almost destroyed my soul.

Fifty days later, I was near the temple – we don’t live far from it anyway – and a group of people began to talk about the man, about Jesus. They told what he had done and where he had come from.

He had not come from the gods, which is what I had expected. He was from The God, and he was not only from The God, he was the Son of The God.

And I believed it and gave my heart to him right there.

Of course, no one would let me go to their church, since I was Roman, so I worshipped in the governor’s palace. Soon I had several that were believers with me. We were Christ-followers.

It wasn’t long before Pilate left Judea. He was never the same. He died not long afterwards. By that time, Gentiles (which is what I found out I was to my surprise) were welcomed into the church.

We had decided to retire to our villa in Rome. After Pontius died, I helped a number of people find the Christ, the Lord.

And now, 30 years later – who can believe it – I am part of his church here in Rome. One of the apostles, Matthew, wrote about me in a letter that is circulating through the churches. That was a pleasant surprise, although it also brought up again the disappointment in preventing what happened.

But then again if it had been prevented, I would not know the Lord now.

So every time I think about that day, it is with a mixture of grief and joy. Grief that he had to die, joy that he did anyway and gave me life.

It is a long was for the daughter of a vineyard owner from Rome and the wife of a federal governor to come. Praise God that I have.