Small gods are easily controlled. On special occasions they can be dressed up and carried about the streets on floats. Their worshipers may burn incense and sing to them. Some gods are quite cruel and demanding at times. But the handy thing about small gods is that they can be carried back into their temples and forgotten for long spells of time.

But our God Jehovah is great. “Heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain Him” (2 Chronicles 6:18). “It is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers; that stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain … Who hath measured the waters in the hollow of his hand . .. and comprehended the dust of the earth in a measure, and weighed the mountains in scales … the nations are as a drop of a bucket… as the small dust of the balance” (Isaiah 40:22, 12, 15). No one controls Jehovah. It is He that controls. “Our God is in the heavens: he hath done whatsoever he hath pleased” (Psalm 115:3).

Which God do you worship? One you can control? Does he stay where you set him? Or is your God big enough to set you straight?

Modern concepts of God make Him more like an idol than the Lord God. If you can worship him on Sunday and live your life your own way the rest of the week; if he stays meekly at church while you decide whom to date, what car to drive, how to make a living, what home to own, and how to dress, all by yourself, then you are worshiping a very small god. But God will not be whittled down to our size. And only those whom He controls are truly worshiping Him.

A big God is not one to be scared of. Christ invites us to learn of Him, that He is meek and lowly (Matthew 11:29). Isaiah 40:11 describes not only the great God but the personal God: “He shall feed his flock like a shepherd: he shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom, and shall gently lead those that are with young.”

It might seem convenient to have a god we can control while we think we can take care of ourselves. But when it comes time to die, I’m sure we will all want one big enough to see us safely through to the home He has promised to those that serve Him. To have a big God then, we must serve the Great God now.

-by Dallas Witmer

The light changed, then bro-o-o-o-m, there I sat in a cloud of dust fumes. I caught a glimpse of the bumper sticker that read, “The Devil Made Me Do It!”

Whatever did the devil make you do? I murmured to myself. Did he make you buy the red sports car? Or fall for rock music? Or perhaps he made you burn rubber on the road. I’m certainly glad you and the devil didn ‘t cause an accident at the intersection.

That bumper sticker “stuck” with me the rest of that day. Does the devil really make people do the things they do? When I let an idle word slip or think an unkind-ness, is it the devil’s fault?

“The Devil Made Me Do It!” seems like a plausible conclusion, at first. After all, the devil was responsible for tempting our first parents to rebel against God. But on second thought, “The Devil Made Me Do It!” is often nothing more than an empty attempt to pass the blame, to avoid personal responsibility. The devil tempted that fellow in the red sports car to “do it.” The fellow yielded. He could have chosen otherwise.

We say that people bound by habits have no choice but to obey their driving urges; but they did choose to yield that first time. Once they had a choice, and they took the wrong road. Now it seems they have no choice. They are bound by the sins they have succumbed to. Now it is easy to blame it all on the devil.

As I mused over the bumper sticker, I began to wonder about myself. Do I use the same kind of reasoning when I do wrong? I probably would not lay the blame on the devil, but have you ever heard: “That’s just the way I am,” or “That’s only the natural thing to do,” or “I just couldn’t help it”?

These declarations still pass the blame and are little better than “The Devil Made Me Do It!” We are responsible for what we do, and we do have choices to make.

What we do reflects our own desires and not what the devil, mother nature, or anyne else has forced on us. “A good man out of the good treasure of the heart bringeth forth good things: and an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth forth evil things” (Matthew 12:35).

Let’s face it, our actions tell the world our character and who our owner is, the devil or Christ.

Only what comes out of our own hearts will condemn us or justify us before God. “For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned” (Matthew 12:37).

If the devil could make us do something so we had no choice, then God would not hold us responsible. The devil can woo and beg and lie and tempt, but he cannot force us to do evil!

We must admit that the devil’s temptations are oftentimes strong, almost overwhelming. That’s why some people conclude that the devil is responsible if they fall into sin.

But listen to one of the most dramatic promises in God’s Word. “There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it” (1 Corinthians 10:13).

This promise has no exception clause and no loopholes. It doesn’t promise you immunity from temptation nor does it promise that your temptations will be light. It does promise you a sure getaway from the very strongest temptations.

Suppose your big temptation is anger. Your temper rages like a stalking lion. God doesn’t guarantee a dead lion, but He provides some ways to cope with it. He gives you such weapons—prayer, fasting, and devil-defying Bible passages. He may also help you avoid temper-escalating situations, or He might give you presence of mind to keep your mouth shut until you are more calm.

As for the devil, who wants you to blame it all on him, your weapons are prayer, Scripture, and a determined, “Get thee behind me, Satan.” This is not easy to do. It requires submission to Christ, obedience to His Word, and a life of prayer.

“Wait on the lord and he will strengthen your heart.” He won’t let the devil make you do it.

John and Deborah (not their real names) listened attentively as the guest speaker spoke from the Bible. He read from Mark 10: 2-12. He emphasized the fact that Jesus came to restore the original design of marriage that God designed at Creation. Jesus taught that marriage is the joining of heart and hand of one man and one woman in a oneflesh relationship until the death of one or the other. Breaking that bond by either party and marrying another is adultery.

God is interested in the social and emotional stability of the home and family. It is to be a home where moral purity and social interaction can be enjoyed without the confusion of broken promises and corrupted and perverted behavior. The godly home is a one man and one woman relationship of love and fidelity. “Love,” the minister said, “is only true love when it is expressed in the framework of holiness.”

“Be ye holy for I am holy.” This was God’s commandment to Israel when He delivered them from Egypt. This commandment is repeated for us in 1 Peter 1:15, 16. “But as he which hath called you is holy, so be ye holy in all manner of conversation. ” To be holy means to be separate from sin. It is living and walking in the light of truth. It is choosing to live according to the Word of God rather than the world’s or society’s standard.

The speaker went on to explain that holiness in marriage involves a lifelong commitment. It is a commitment to be true to each other regardless of circumstances. We all know that physical beauty is fading; health may fail. Financial reverses may come; friends may prove false. The list goes on. Married partners who are committed to Jesus Christ and each other weather these storms and become the better because of them. This concept of marriage is a commitment of love that transcends all difficulties. To be holy in marriage is to be true.

Divine holiness jealously guards the atmosphere and the home environment. As John and Deborah considered the reality of this truth, they knew they would need to make some changes. These changes took time and serious consideration.

Number 1: They began to see the unholy presentation of marriage, sex, violence, sports, and crime in the media, especially the television. To continue to watch television could only produce more of the same. Would the television need to go? What would their friends think? Would it be hard for the children? They found freedom and peace in avoiding evil.

Number 2: They began to see that free access to the Internet and the pornography found there was dangerous to their marriage and family life. They would seek to eliminate the evils found there. How could they expect their children to develop sound morals if they had access to such moral filth and perversion?

Number 3: John and Deborah soon saw the negative influence the public school system had on their children. They decided that, as Christians, they would be selective with their children’s education. Holiness requires a proper concept of truth. The Bible and Bible-based textbooks and literature would become their source for the educational development of their children. They began by honoring God as their Creator and teaching their children divine precepts. Science and history, math, social studies took on new meaning when they let God enter the picture.

Number 4: In the fourth place, John and Deborah identified with other believers in a church fellowship that followed and practiced Biblical principles. Holiness in marriage, they believed, could best be experienced by association with other people who practiced godly standards. In this way, they could encourage others as well as be encouraged. Holiness, they learned, is letting Christ be the center of their marriage. To their great enjoyment, married life began to be a foretaste of heaven.

John and Deborah were not faultless, of course. They saw that the Christian life involves more than outward standards of holy living. If a person emphasizes “law” over love, then a person can go to extremes. It is possible for a person to be proper in outward obedience to Christ’s commands but be short in love, forbearance, and forgiveness.

John and Deborah sought help and counsel from other faithful believers. They wanted to be free from any wrong emphases in their pursuit of holiness. They prayed for daily guidance and a humble, teachable spirit. Their standard of holiness for themselves and their children was born out of love for God and their Saviour Jesus Christ. They took seriously 2 Corinthians 6:14—7:1 which teaches how necessary it is to be separated from ungodliness and unholiness. They claimed the promise of God and learned to lean on Him rather than their own understanding (Proverbs 3:5).

John and Deborah thanked God for leading them to a fellowship where they heard the truth and could see it lived in the lives of faithful Christians. Above that, they were thankful they could know the blessedness of holiness in their own marriage. They want others to come to the heavenly Father and experience it too. The way of the cross of Christ is not always easy but the rewards of peace and happiness are good now and eternally.

-by J. Luke Martin

However, if your belief in God is founded on a literal acceptance of the Genesis record, you already have a solid background for understanding in both science and theology. You will have no need for the ongoing, ever changing, guessing games of evolutionary debate. What God accomplished in creation provides compelling evidence for the very person and character of God (thus for theology).

The first lesson in Genesis theology for today’s church is that God is powerful. How powerful? “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.”

When my wife bakes a cake, she doesn’t say “Let there be cake.” What she does do is put together the right basic ingredients and slip the mix into the oven for the right amount of time.

But God didn’t do it that way. For example, He didn’t come up with basic raw ingredients for light. What He did do was say, “Let there be light.” The basis for creation was the power of God’s Word. Nine times in chapter one, we find “And God said …” usually followed with, “and it was so.” If you are about to laugh at my naivete, let me remind you of one thing, and then ask you a question.

This is the reminder. We know that all matter consists of molecules, and that molecules consist of energy—electrons, protons, and neutrons. Trees are not made of sawdust bonded with resin, but of energy. Water is not some liquid dropped upon us from some other place in the cosmos. Everything in the universe is packed tight with energy.

Now the question. What source could there possibly be for such power short of Almighty God?

But, we have another problem without God. The reverting of matter into power is not a problem. It is as easy as a lightning strike in a dry forest, or lighting a match at a gasoline spill. In fact, we deliberately convert millions of gallons of gasoline into many millions of highway miles daily. In warfare, bombs are turned into horribly destructive forms of energy. But neither time, nor chance (the evolutionist’s god), nor human intelligence, is able to convert energy back into matter. The factory smokestack never produces a gallon of paint. The burning inferno of a forest never leaves a new house in its wake. The energy expended on highway miles never produce a single shiny new automobile. The bomb that is dropped never produces a new city.

By the way, a process that would compress energy into planets, stars, dogs, cats, trees, mice, kangaroos, apes, and people would not be a “big bang” at all. It would be the exact opposite, a colossal compression of energy. That is why the “big bang” must forever remain an adult fairy tale, only useful to people who have closed their minds against God. God is not merely the only sufficient answer. He is the only answer that doesn’t make a fool out of me.

Do you fear the power of lightning, of the tornado, or of the hurricane? If we find the release of energy fearsome, how much more should we fear God, the power behind it all. The cause is indeed far greater than the effect And the cause is God.

The second lesson in theology for the church is that God has purposeful order to everything. He divided light from darkness, and arranged our solar system with days and nights and with season following season, always in the same predictable order.

In the world of living things, God ordered that everything would reproduce after its kind. We wish men would cease trying to claim otherwise. The fossil “evidences” that would trace slime into simple forms of life and apes into man have come from vivid imaginations and cruel hoaxes. Know this, that true science can not be separated from Biblical theology for the God of Scripture is also the God of nature. Science is nothing more or less than the accurate assessment of created things. It is knowledge derived from repetition of the same consistent results. Thus science is science only in being true to what exists in nature, where dogs remain dogs and babies are human from conception. Science is established in certainty, not in guessing games. But where individuals and churches reject Genesis, guessing is the only game in town.

We live every day in a world of absolutes, a fact that evolution cannot embrace, but one that defines the nature of God.

The third lesson in theology is the revelation of the majesty and glory of God. The Genesis description of Creation is that “it was good.” In fact, “it was very good.” Who could argue the point? Even though creation has been in the “growing-old” mode ever since sin entered into the world, it is at once both functional and beautiful. God obviously made it for us to enjoy. No superlatives are sufficient to describe the wonder and beauty of birds, trees, flowers, or starry heavens. How can anyone study science and biology and fail to see the glory of these things on every hand? Truly, creation is the grand display of the goodness and glory of God.

The fourth lesson revolves around the questions of human and animal order. We are not our own. The Creator is the owner and director of what He created. People and even churches may deny God, and refuse His instructions, but the absolute nature of what He has made is ongoing testimony of His authority. And how does Genesis spell this out? God made man in His own image and appointed Adam as the superintendent of the animal kingdom. Animals are directed by instinct and training. Humanity, on the other hand, is responsible to be true to the commandments of God.

The fifth lesson has the greatest impact on the human family. When Jesus was asked about divorce and remarriage, He referred right back to Genesis and His original intent. God made them male and female. One male and one female are joined together in marriage. They are one flesh. They furnish the context of family. They replenish the earth. “What God hath joined together let not man put asunder.” Only death is the legitimate end to marriage.

Pastors, are you listening? Do you cast your lot with Jesus, or do you sanction the putting away, and taking another while the first partner lives? Do you sanction what the Bible calls adultery? In the zeal to save marriage from the same-sex perversion, it is also time to save the marriages from divorce.

We need one more consideration from Genesis theology. After sin came into the world, and death by sin, Adam and Eve sought to cover their shame with fig leaves. However, God deemed that to be insufficient. He clothed them with animal skins. Our culture today (and sadly, most churches) has cast off both the shame and the protection of modesty in clothing. Tragically this departure, with its sensual display, is a tool of Satan against God’s imperative of sexual purity and of fidelity in marriage. If this were not sin enough, millions of the unborn are slain on the altar of lust.

If we would return to the theology of Genesis, we would restore the standard of God. Otherwise, we rush blindly toward God’s judgment and the final severing of wickedness from righteousness. The God of Creation reigns.

-by Lester Troyer

The latest piece of presumed “superior scholarship” defaming God, His Christ, and the Bible, is a movie released last summer called the Da Vinci Code. The book version has been on the New York Times best-seller list since its release in 2003. The reception of such heresy in our society is revealing—it is also a best-seller in 150 other countries. The book defames Jesus’ character and says Mary Magdalene bore children to Him. It says Jesus never intended to be God and accuses the disciples of cover-up plots to make Jesus look divine. The Bible is accused of having “glaring historical discrepancies and fabrications.” The book is fiction but conveys an aura of factuality. A statement in the beginning of the book says, “Fact: All descriptions of artwork, architecture, documents, and secret rituals in this novel are accurate.”

That is not saying much. The pertinent fact is that the conjecture, inferences, and bold statements made are falsehoods. A character in the book refers to the Dead Sea Scrolls and Gnostic Gospels as the earliest Christian documents. He says, “Troublingly they do not match up with the Gospels in the Bible.”

Perversions from False Sources

First of all, the Dead Sea Scrolls are not Christian documents. The Essenes were a Jewish sect that overlapped the time of Christ. Their writings do not refer to Jesus or Christians. They are, however, amazing confirmations that our Old Testament is accurate. They include parts of all the Old Testament books except Esther. These documents contained only minor spelling and punctuation differences from our Bible today.

The Gnostic gospels (the gospel according to Philip, Thomas, and so forth) come from the Nag Hammadi texts found by an Egyptian peasant in 1945. Authorities date them at 350 A.D., 250 years after the New Testament Gospels. None of the New Testament books are quoted. The Gnostic heresy was a mystic paganism that claimed to have secret superior knowledge (gnosis). They tried to reinterpret Jesus Christ. They denied His deity and said that Mary Magdalene was His companion.

From such materials, author Dan Brown weaves his novel, giving spurious documents more authority than the Gospels. Rather, the Gospels and Jesus’ deity are confirmed by believers and non-believers (Roman soldiers at the cross and tomb, etc.), a multitude of church fathers, archaeological findings, and secular sources. The life, ministry, death, and resurrection of Christ is one of the best-documented facts of history (1 Corinthians 15:1-8)

The Trail and Traits of Heresy

In the 1600s, a period of “enlightenment” called “the Age of Reason” arose. Francis Bacon introduced the experimental method as the science of understanding our world. He believed that by freeing the mind of prejudice, man by knowledge could gain sovereignty over nature. This advanced an objective rather than a subjective view of the universe (drawing conclusions from experiments, observations, evidence, and facts rather than preconceived opinions such as evolution). Objectivity acknowledges the fixed laws, complexity, order, and design of a creator. Many schools, scientific societies, and encyclopedias of knowledge originated in this era. Yale and Harvard were begun as church schools with a creation/flood view of earth history. However, in the mid-1800s, with Darwin’s Origin of the Species many armchair philosophers began to bend and select evidence to fit an evolutionary worldview.

The age of reason also produced the school of “higher criticism” which challenged orthodox Christianity. A typical attitude of “higher criticism” is seen in Spinoza (latter 17th century). He wrote a book supposing to prove that Ezra wrote the Pentateuch instead of Moses. Julius Wilhousen called the Old Testament a fraud. With an aloof flourish, they sweep the facts of archaeology and the testimony of history away. In their pride of heart they hold that authority in religion is in man’s own conscience rather than objectively in the Bible as the revelation of God and the Creator and Sustainer of the universe.

Modernism and postmodernism followed, resting their trust on “the assured results of critical scholarship.” These errors of human wisdom can be traced in every century since the Gnostic heresy of the first century after Christ. The traits are monotonously the same, even to the New Age movement of our day.

1. They claim to have a supe rior view of Christianity.
2. They reject the inspiration of the Holy Scriptures.
3. They imagine that belief in oneself is belief in God.
4. They teach that Christ delivers man by His coming, not by His atonement.
5. They rejected the Virgin Birth.
6. They ridicule orthodoxy.
7. They claim that salvation is by illumination.

Paul’s warning is fitting here. “Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ” (Colossians 2:8).

Heresy’s Source

It is said that, at the start of a humanist convention, a standing round of applause was given for Eve (although they don’t believe the literal account), because she stepped out from under God’s authority to realize her own potential. This is the spirit of radical feminism today.

The origin of these heresies has its roots in the garden with Satan’s question to Eve (Genesis 3:1). “Yea—” He opens with a disarming affirmative and assumes a superior critic’s position. “Hath God said—” a cleverly expressed doubt in question form negating the affirmative. “Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?” He falsifies God’s command that “Ye shall not eat of it” (Genesis 3:3).

This anarchist spirit has manifested itself down through history in men like Voltaire. Voltaire was a Frenchman who denied God and ridiculed Christianity. These “higher critics” rejected any authority but their own. In politics they influenced the bloody French Revolution. In religion they assumed the skeptics’ position. These critics denied the authority of the Scriptures and judged the Bible wrong until proved right. It is as Paul said, “The carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be” (Romans 8:7).

Discerning Spirits

Today we see much of the same tactics of Satan. Professing scholarly superiority, evolutionists and their theistic religious sympathizers sideline those who believe God’s Word with ridicule and verbal defamation. Thus they avoid the facts of the real world that falsify their philosophy.

We must always discern the difference between facts and their interpretation. Some typical statements the public is bombarded with are: “In ten years we may find life in outer space” (a newspaper headline). Why? What did they see? They concluded all this from discovering a star with a wobble, indicating it may have a planet, and perhaps life!

Another newspaper headline says, “This dinosaur was a dwarf.” They seem to know why. “It shrank over time from living on an island when seas rose in Europe millions of years ago.” You would think the evolutionists were there to see it. Surely no one can go back to disprove their speculation.

In more conservative times, people were more careful of what they said about what they didn’t know. But today many are ready to believe the “spin” (a fancy name for falsehoods in the current vernacular) of the Da Vinci Code. They go far beyond the facts they have in hand to speculate on what they want to believe. Like Darwin, beginning with assumptions, by much talk, they work improbability up to possibility, and possibility to probability, and end with what they claim are certainties.

The simple humility of the Christian life is rejected. The “create your own reality” or “you are your only god” beliefs of new-age thinkers are evident. They take to themselves the prerogative of being right until proved wrong. Yet they will not accept the plain truth of “a more sure word of prophecy” (2 Peter 1:19).

We have Peter’s testimony, “For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of his majesty” (2 Peter 1:16).

Resources: Heresies Exposed—Wm. C. Irvine
The Da Vinci Effect — Craig Parshall
Israel My Glory — Jan.-Feb. 2006
World Book Encyclopedia

-by Elvin Stauffer