My dear readers,

Questions Posed at CPBPC’s Annual Church Camp (10-15 June 2019) – Part 9

Question: I've been having difficulties at my workplace for a long time, where colleagues are unkind and the workload is very heavy. How do I know if this is a trial from God, or if I should flee this situation?

Reply: The first thing to do is to establish the reasons for the unkind treatment. If it is for the reason of your holy witness and testimony such as diligence, honesty, Christian ethics and principles, etc. then you are suffering for Christ. You should pray and continue to trust in the Lord and remain a holy witness for Christ. This is Christ’s counsel to all His disciples who are suffering for Him. Matthew 5:38-42: “ Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth: But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloke also. And whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain. Give to him that asketh thee, and from him that would borrow of thee turn not thou away.” By this life of non-retaliation and continual good works, they will see Christ in your life and God may use you to bring salvation to them. This is also applicable to the workload increment. As a witness and servant of the Lord in the workplace this is what all of us are supposed to do, constrained by the love of Christ (our motive) for faithful service and not mammon.

If the workload is beyond your ability to cope or you cannot do the work well, then change to a job that is according to your ability. When a believer is not able to do what he is supposed to do, he is a bad testimony for Christ. The colleagues will see him as incompetent. It is important to know one’s talent and ability. This is also true for service in the church. We need to know our spiritual gifts and serve in areas directly related to these spiritual gifts. Otherwise the witness for Christ will be badly affected and the ministry and lives of others will be hurt, and sometimes beyond repair.

Question: Do you think we should have more pastors and elders in Pandan? Why are there so few leaders?

Reply: It is not a situation of simply adding more people into the fulltime ministry but a matter of the right people. The right people, with the right spiritual gifts to minister, are called by the Lord. When the wrong people are brought in just for the sake of lightening the workload, disasters will surely happen. We had in the past fulltime people who created more headaches and heartaches in the church ministries. Their presence did not lighten the ministerial load but compounded it even more. Many hours were spent trying to help and deal with them and sadly they refused to be helped. Some of them were very willful and idiosyncratic in behaviour to the point of embarrassment that resulted in hurting the testimony of the church and stumbling many. Relationships were badly affected because of them whereby some people left the church.

Just as members come to the church for worship and service because the Lord has moved and called them, and not because of any ulterior motives, how much more true it is to wait upon the Lord to send the right individuals when it comes to ministering the Word of God to God's people. Many churches have compromised and were destroyed because the wrong people were placed in positions of leadership in the church. Churches have split within a year or two because wrong leaders were placed in positions of leadership. To get them out was like extracting four wisdom teeth at the same time and without pain killers. Lives were destroyed, families were split and the church was never the same again. The church belongs to the Lord. Waiting on the Lord to send is the best and biblical way because He knows best. Biblical guidelines must be strictly followed in evaluating them to ensure that they are truly called in order to protect and take care of God’s flock. Due biblical diligence is very needful to distinguish between a hireling and a good shepherd who is prepared to die for God's flock.

Question: We have many rules. No movies, computer games, contemporary music. I try to honour God but I fail often in these and other areas. I fear to be baptized lest I smear Christ's name. What do you advise?

Reply: The Bible says God gives to all His children liberty in Christ. All believers are free to do whatever they desire on earth and will never lose their salvation in Christ. This is the promise of the assurance of a truly born-again believer’s salvation. You must not live your life for Christ by thinking in terms of “many rules.” This way of thinking will result in frustration and a loss of joy in Christ. Although we can do all things and not lose our salvation, it does not mean that we should do all things, especially things that harm our witness for Christ.

As children of God, we CHOOSE NOT TO DO many things because they will contaminate our walk with the Lord and ruin our holy witness for Christ. This is the main reason believers avoid these activities. When a believer rejects these activities, he does so with joy and delight. He is passionate about not doing them as he knows they will damage his witness for Christ. He loves to not do them. However, if the reason for not doing them is a perfunctory and legalistic observance of a “set of rules,” then murmuring and complaining will soon follow. Transgression will result. Backsliding and even turning his back on Christ and embracing the world might be the result.

This means that the person’s salvation was not real in the beginning. For example, smoking, drinking and gambling are vices that all believers stay away from because they are passionate about staying away from them. These vices will destroy their holy witness for Christ. Movies and computer games are 21^st century inventions that believers have to contend with. There is nothing wrong with watching movies but what movies we watch is crucial. Children watch Christian movies at church camps. During the FEBC Mersing retreat the students and lecturers watched Christian movies. The biblical reasons behind the things we do, and do not do, are very important.

Honouring God does not mean sinless perfection. A believer honours God when he lives in holiness. This is what God demands. 1 Peter 1:13-16: “ Wherefore gird up the loins of your mind, be sober, and hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ; As obedient children, not fashioning yourselves according to the former lusts in your ignorance: But as he which hath called you is holy, so be ye holy in all manner of conversation; Because it is written, Be ye holy; for I am holy.” Holiness is not sinless perfection. Holiness means to be humble to admit one’s own transgressions and repent before God with all sincerity. All believers are able to do this because the indwelling Holy Spirit helps them. Christ’s Name will not be smeared when we repent. Christ’s Name is restored when we repent.

Christ’s Name is smeared when professing believers refuse to repent of their sins. They choose to remain in sin and continue to sin. These are the people who ought not to be baptized. But if you have truly accepted Christ as your Lord and Saviour, then you must seek baptism. The believer's baptism is his public confession that he belongs to Christ and will live for Christ from henceforth. He is telling the world that they will see Christ in his life and hear the words of Christ from his lips. Not to seek the sacrament of baptism when he is able to do so is a denial of Christ. Some do not wish to anger their parents and so they would rather please them than Christ. Denying Christ is a serious transgression. Their confession of Christ will be suspect. Matthew 10:32-38: “ Whosoever therefore shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father which is in heaven. But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in heaven. Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law. And a man's foes shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me.”

Question: If God can see into the future, and is all knowing, why didn’t He just not create Satan? Then He wouldn’t have to go through the trouble of sending His only begotten Son to earth and punishing Him.

Reply: It is precisely because of the omniscience of God that what happened in history happened the way it did. To ask “if God can see into the future, and is all knowing, why didn’t He just not create Satan?” is like asking “why must there be a Sun, a universe?” or “why must the earth be round and not square?” Such questions come from a preconceived idea of how God must behave. This is foolishness. The fact that all of history, and the future of the universe and all in it, including sending His only begotten Son Jesus Christ to die for us, happened exactly the way that God had intended is because He is not only omniscient but also omnipresent and omnipotent. It is the clearest testimony of His immutable omniscience. He knows all things all at the same time and He created all things including all the angels according to His omniscient will. He knows all things and works all things out EXACTLY according to His sovereign will and desire. In other words, God’s children must see the omniscience of God that confirms all that has happened in heaven and on earth rather than question or doubt. Mankind has to accept and not question it. God answers to no man and all mankind answer to HIM.

Romans 9:20-24: “Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour? What if God, willing to shew his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction: And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory, Even us, whom he hath called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles?” Any man who denies that he answers to God is hurting himself. Anyone who rejects that God created man and all things in this universe is condemning himself deeper into sin. Sinful man must believe in God and be saved in Christ from his sins. The Bible says this about man in Psalm 9:19-20: “Arise, O LORD; let not man prevail: let the heathen be judged in thy sight. Put them in fear, O LORD: that the nations may know themselves to be but men. Selah.” Man must know his place in relation to God, for God certainly knows His omnipotent position in relation to man. Man answers to Him, and not the other way round!