A Clear View
A Clear View
A) Since 9/11 our country has added many new words, names, and phrases to it’s lexicon, what were once words used only by the intelligence agencies are now quite common in daily newscasts.
B) Al Qaeda, sleeper cells, suicide bombers, internet chatter, things like that. But there is one phrase that commands a little more attention than all others -- that is the phrase credible threat.
C) America gets many threats from many places, most are just as hollow and empty as the heads they come out of. Occasionally there will be something that is worth looking in to, something worth acting on.
D) In the last few days I have learned of a credible spiritual threat -- an insidious evil that is possibly being welcomed into some of the homes represented here today.
E) This threat began way back in 1965, by a Columbia University professor of medical psychology named Helen Schucman. From 1965 - 1971 Mrs. Schucman claims to have been contacted by being (that manifested itself as an her voice) who claimed to be Jesus Christ.
F) This spirit that spoke through Mrs. Schucman said that the bible was in error in teaching us that sin separates us from God, and that he (Jesus) did not die on the cross for our sins.
G) Mrs. Schucman recorded these teachings of her inner voice and published them in a book, that she believed would offer new light and new hope to the followers of Jesus everywhere.
H) This 40 year old new-new testament is the credible threat that I spoke of. Now I know your thinking to yourself “This crackpot old woman is no spiritual threat to me or anyone else, who would believe her?”
I) Let me tell you more of what Mrs. Schucman’s inner voice said (the voice claiming to be Jesus): There is no sin -- A slain Christ has no meaning -- The journey to the cross should be the last useless journey -- Do not make the pathetic error of clinging to the old rugged cross
J) There’s more: The Name of Jesus Christ as such is but a symbol. It is a symbol that is safely used as a replacement for the many names of all the gods to which you pray -- [man] never having sinned, has no need of salvation.
K) This is clearly the worst kind of new age BS there is… Who could believe it? Well, not many people did, and Schucman’s book called A Course in Miracles never became a bestseller. Who could believe it?
L) Who indeed? That is where the credibility lies isn’t it? Credibility comes from those who believe you. If you believe me, then I am credible and trustworthy in your eyes; and if you tell others (people who trust you) -- I’ll be credible in their eyes too.
M) Decades later the inner voice of Helen Schucman would be resurrected and given credibility by the goddess of TV herself -- Oprah Winfrey!
N) A disciple of Schucman’s A Course in Miracles, named Marianne Williamson wrote a book of her own, and it is that book that has emerged as a credible spiritual threat today.
O) It was Marianne Williamson’s appearance on a 1992 Oprah Winfrey Show that really set things in motion. On that program, Oprah enthusiastically endorsed Williamson’s book, entitled: A Return to Love: Reflections on the Principles of A Course in Miracles.
P) Oprah told her television audience that Williamson’s book was one of her favorite books, and that she had already bought a thousand copies and would be handing them out to everyone in her audience.
Q) Oprah’s endorsement skyrocketed Williamson’s book to the top of the New York Times bestseller list. Williamson said: “my deepest thanks to Oprah Winfrey. Her enthusiasm and generosity have given the book, and me, an audience we would never otherwise have had.”
R) Oprah Winfrey’s misplaced faith in Marianne Williamson is indeed sign of the times; but even more indicative of our times is Oprah’s followers misplaced faith in her.
S) Those poor souls who hang on Oprah’s every word, from what books to read, to who to vote for -- have lost sight of the only thing that’s really worth looking at: the Cross of Christ. Their view has been blurred by following Oprah and by following the crowd…
So what is…
The View of the Crowd
A) The crowd views Jesus in a worldly way. As a great cultural icon of Christmas, cute and loving, but never as a judge demanding righteousness or anything else from us.
B) Nor does this culturally correct Jesus (that Oprah is selling) claim for himself that he alone is the way, the truth, and the life—the only way to the Father and salvation!
C) When we view Jesus as a great moral leader, we ask, “What would Jesus do?” but, of course, we can’t do what Jesus did. None of us can raise a dead loved one to life, or live a sinless and perfect life, nor can we die on a cross as the payment for the all the sins of the world.
D) Even some baptized believers who are supposed to be able to recognize the truth sometimes lose perspective. [2 Timothy 4:3-4] the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths.
E) The crowd wants pastors, teachers, and bureaucrats who will twist God’s clear Word into a more comfortable, socially acceptable message that conforms to the views of culture rather than the other way around.
F) The crowd wants those who will say that God has changed his mind about women pastors, and that committed homosexual partners (and even pastors) are okay with him now.
G) The crowd wants those who will say that Christians, Muslims, and Jews all pray to the same god and will all end up together anyway. They want those who will say that our friends and neighbors are good folks; and God will accept them as long as they’re sincere and loving.
H) They want to reconcile all differences because it’s inclusive, because it’s politically correct, and because that is the path of least resistance.
I) But such views are a deception and a lie of the devil. Spiritual and scriptural differences don’t go away just because we want them to or because it would be easier to just close our eyes to them.
The Crowd must stop looking to Oprah, and start looking to God, adopting…
The View of the Christian
A) Christians receive a new godly perspective -- God’s way of seeing himself and other people.
[2 Corinthians 5]16From now on, therefore, we regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, we regard him thus no longer. 17Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.
B) We view Jesus Christ as He reveals Himself to us in the Scriptures: God’s only-begotten Son and the world’s only Savior. Only in THIS Christ are we forgiven, reconciled, and made a new creation!
C) Because He is God, His Word is nonnegotiable, and His gifts of Word and Sacrament alone are able to make us a new creation reconciled to God with new life in Him.
D) God gives gifts to his Church, placing his true, saving, nonnegotiable Word in you so that you may bring the Good News of God’s reconciling work in Christ to every individual you meet!
E) It is this Good News that we must use to rescue the hordes mindless Oprah zombies from her new-age, feel-good grip!
We must teach them to reject the crowd’s view, and to see things with the…
The View of the Creator
A) God says, “I reconciled you to myself” -- God’s view is Him doing all this reconciling, yet doing it now through us.
[2 Corinthians 5] 18All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation;
B) God says, “I reconciled you to Myself on the cross for the whole world to see.”
[2 Corinthians 5] 19that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them…
C) God says, “I made my only-begotten Son to become sin that I might re-create you in my righteousness—not of your own goodness.”
D) God says, “I have placed my life-giving Word in you, so that you might appeal to others on my behalf”
[2 Corinthians 5] 20Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us.
Conclusion
A) A former follower of this new-age Oprah stuff writes this:
I found the Jesus of the Bible to be wholly believable as He taught God’s truth and warned about spiritual deception in His name.
The “Jesus” of A Course in Miracles” reveals himself to be an imposter as he blasphemes the true Jesus by saying a slain Christ has no meaning and that we are all God and that we are all Christ.
It was by reading the Bible’s true teachings of Jesus Christ that I came to understand how deceived I had been by New Age teachings.
B) Where you fix your eyes matters! You must keep the Word of truth always in view, always before you. This is the only clear view!
C) If you loose sight of the truth, you might just begin to believe the bright ideas of some egomaniacal TV personality. And that would be sad.