The Real Gospel - By Hal Lindsey -
People love to add their own thoughts to the end of viral emails. Those thoughts can undermine the message of the original writer. One such email started going around several years ago - at least as far back as 2007. In addition to its life as an email, it has been featured in several devotional books and websites.
Somewhere along the way, someone tacked on the phrase, "That's the whole Gospel message, simply stated." One book, written by a Baptist minister, concluded with a slight variation - "That is the whole Gospel Message, simply told."
It's the story of an old man whose good attitude causes a young thug to change his ways. It's inspirational. But many of the people putting it on their websites, in their books, and in their emails, include the line saying it is the "whole Gospel message, simply stated."
That's quite an astounding claim for a story that never mentions Jesus, never speaks of God, and doesn't mention the cross. I have no problem with inspirational stories. But when someone calls it "the whole Gospel Message, simply told," it concerns me deeply.
It reminded me of something we ran on The Hal Lindsey Report in February of 2016. I told about Mother Teresa's decades-long battle with a dark and unrelenting depression, and what I think helped cause it. Here is a portion of that story.
Mother Teresa is officially known as "Blessed Teresa of Calcutta." She will soon be given the title, "Saint." Few people in history did good deeds with more fervor than this woman. She deserved the Nobel Peace Prize and the other honors she received, but her life is also a picture of tragedy.
After she died, we learned that the harder Mother Teresa worked, the emptier she felt. She wrote, "Where is my faith? Even deep down... there is nothing but emptiness and darkness.... If there be God - please forgive me. When I try to raise my thoughts to Heaven, there is such convicting emptiness that those very thoughts return like sharp knives and hurt my very soul."
Her confessor suggested that she write a letter to God. So, to the One who promised never to leave us nor forsake us, she wrote, "Lord, my God, who am I that You should forsake me?" Later she wrote, "I have no Faith."
This wasn't simply a rough patch. This was her life for 50 years. At the time of Pope Pius XII's death in 1958, she felt a renewed spark of faith. But it lasted only a few weeks. Soon she returned to what she called, "the long darkness." The torment, emptiness, pain, and guilt she expressed in her letters are enough to make any feeling person want to weep for her.
I don't point these things out to condemn her, but because we can learn from her sorrow. Paul and Silas sat in prison, their backs ripped apart by flogging, their wounds not cleansed and still bleeding. It was one of those times that Paul would later describe with the phrase, "in stripes above measure." (2 Corinthians 11:23 KJV) Yet in that moment of pain, these men sang joyful praise in voices loud enough to be heard by the whole prison. Acts 16:25 says, "But about midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns of praise to God, and the prisoners were listening to them." (NASB) God then opened the prison doors with an earthquake.
To me, the singing is an even greater miracle than the earthquake. That's what God wants for each of us. He allows us to go through times of spiritual gloom, but He doesn't want us to live there. He wants us to live in His joy.
Why was Mother Teresa so miserable and Paul so joyous? I think the key to Mother Teresa's misery can be found in something she said in 1989 to a group of political and business leaders gathered to honor her at Blair House in Washington.
(At this point, I showed a video clip of her speaking at that event. She said, "We read in the Gospel... 'Whatever you do to the least, my brethren, you did it to...." Then she held up her hand and pointed to a finger for each word as she continued. "'You did it to Me.' Five fingers. The whole Gospel is in five fingers.")
As great as that verse is, it is not "the whole Gospel." That verse exposes our hypocrisy when we say we love Jesus, but don't care for the people He died to save. To say that we find in that verse "the whole Gospel" misses the point of the Gospel. It misses Christ's sacrifice of Himself on the cross for our sins. To say that's "the whole Gospel" negates the cross by making salvation something we earn - not something Jesus earned for us.
Increasing numbers of people today are falling into the trap of the Social Gospel - of believing that we are saved by our works as opposed to salvation by the work of Christ on our behalf. Mother Teresa could not earn God's pleasure no matter how hard she worked. No wonder she was miserable. We must have confidence in the atoning work of Christ, or we will be miserable, too.
Paul and Silas understood the Source of their salvation. In Romans 11, Paul wrote, "Even so then, at this present time there is a remnant according to the election of grace. And if by grace, then it is no longer of works; otherwise grace is no longer grace. But if it is of works, it is no longer grace; otherwise work is no longer work." (Romans 11:5-6 NKJV)
We're either saved by grace or works. It cannot be both. If you make it both, then, according to God's word, "it is no longer grace." And without grace, it is all up to you, and you can expect to be miserable.
The real Gospel is infinitely greater than the social gospel. Romans 1:16 says, "The gospel of Christ... is the power of God unto salvation."
Hal Lindsey -
People sometimes wonder why I bother to talk about the dangers of Islam.
They say, "Why not just present the positive aspects of the Gospel?"
They forget that Jesus Himself warned of dangerous belief systems. And He called them by name!
As a minister of the Gospel, it is my duty to show that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is not just another "religion." It is the very truth of God!
Sometimes that can best be accomplished by revealing the danger of purely human, even demonic, belief systems that claim to compete with the Gospel.
It is also crucial to understand that I serve as a "watchman on the wall." God has charged me to sound a message of warning when I see danger on the horizon.
Islam is one of the truly great dangers facing the world today.
Dr. Peter Hammond is a missionary from South Africa. He has served in Mozambique, Angola, and Sudan. He's seen first-hand the tragedy caused by the Muslim faith.
By necessity, he became an expert on the subject.
On this week's program, I am going to draw from Dr. Hammond's extensive research on how Muslim populations, historically, have impacted the nations which they have entered as refugees and immigrants.
Dr. Hammond breaks down the demographics into easily understood explanations. And the information is stunning.
In fact, we are seeing each of the scenarios he describes played out on the evening news every day. Europe has become the textbook example of Dr. Hammond's findings. America may be next.
In fact, Ingrid Carlqvist, a Swede, is alarmed to see these population impacts manifesting in Sweden. She warns that Islam is not compatible with democracy because it is not simply a religion. It is "a political ideology, a justice system (Sharia), and a specific culture that has rules for virtually everything in a person's life: how to dress; who your friends should be; which foot should go first when you enter the bathroom.... Islam aspires to control every aspect of the human life -- the very definition of a totalitarian ideology."
This is happening in different degrees across Europe and is now beginning to impact our lives here in the United States.
Folks, immigration that is not followed by assimilation is just another name for "invasion."
But Islam is not the only tyrannical ideology troubling America today. The LGBT movement is proving more influential with far, far fewer numbers than Islam.
In fact, the latest ludicrous jackboot tyranny -- the transgender bathroom issue -- is being perpetrated on 99.7% of the American public by a paltry .3%.
That's not 3%, that's .3%. Three-tenths of a percent who identify as "transgender." Yet hypocritical multinational corporations, organizations, governments, and public figures are risking their entire reputations and fortunes in an effort to force their skewed values on every person in the United States. To them, it doesn't matter what the average American believes or thinks!
Why? It makes no sense.
Unless these are the end-times. That is one of the characteristics of the end-times predicted by the Bible prophets -- that the wrong would be called right and the right would be called wrong.
A few months ago, we observed the 50th anniversary of the Six Day War. 50 years ago last June, in 1967, a brief war erupted between Israel, Egypt, Jordan, and Syria. The world has never been the same.
This week, I'll reminisce a bit about that crucial event.
Finally, I want to discuss Christ's authority.
Most Christians have some vague concept of the power and authority that belong to Jesus, but they can't put their finger on just how He got His authority or how it relates to them.
I cannot think of another truth that has been more foundational to my whole understanding of God's working in my life than the truth of Christ's victorious defeat of Satan.
It's impossible to appreciate your position of victory in Christ until you know how He won His victory over your three great enemies: the world, the flesh, and the Devil.
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