THE TRENTON BULLETIN

THE TRENTON BULLETIN

Trenton Church of Christ, Trenton, Florida

The human body is composed in such a way that without daily nourishment, weakness, disease and death will follow. It will be a gradual process but one that if not altered will result in a horrible death of starvation. Pictures of emaciated children bring tears to the eye; parents who also suffer from the depravation of proper nourishment raise the anger of society to seek correction. A greater need is found in the lives of people who have little or no spiritual nourishment.

As in the physical body, the spiritual man requires daily nourishment. Paul declared that our faith is determined by our knowledge of the word of God (Romans 10:17). The word of God is shown to be as the manna provided Israel in the wilderness (Exodus 16). Jesus taught the Jews that what they had in the wilderness did not give them lasting life but He was the manna from heaven that gave eternal life. "I am the bread of life. Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. This is the bread which comes down out of heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread that came down out of heaven; if anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever; and the bread also which I will give for the life of the world is My flesh” (John 6:48-51)

Without the nourishment of Jesus Christ in our lives, we cannot live. Each day must be filled with the desire and the filling of our hearts, minds and souls to partake of the “bread of life.” The word of God is as necessary in our day-to-day lives as physical nourishment to our mortal bodies. Without it; we die!

The Psalmist declared that he languished for salvation in the Lord and he waited for the word of the Lord to revive him (Psalm 119:81-88). He loved the law of the lord and it was his mediation all the day (Psalm 119:97). Psalm 1 shows the value of meditating on the word of God daily: “His delight is in the law of the LORD, and in His law he meditates day and night” (v2). The measure of our faith is proportionate to the measure of our daily nourishment of the word of God. Little contact with the Lord will offer little hope in the Lord. Little hope in the Lord will starve your spiritual life to death.

Do you struggle daily with the challenges of life? Are the temptations of life overwhelming your courage to fight off sin? Spending time in the everlasting manna will give hope and victory to your lives. How sad that so much is available to us from the word of God and how little we use in our lives. Paul declared the gospel was the power of God (Romans 1:16). This power is the manna of our lives that gives us hope, vision, courage, faith and the ability to fight off the disease of sin. Without it we are doomed.

The people of God were destroyed for lack of knowledge (Hosea 4:6). Living without the nourishment of the knowledge of the grace of God will cause our lives to wilt away in a miserable agony of spiritual death. Make your commitment to live with the word of God each and every day of your lives as much as you commit to taking care of your mortal bodies. Our fleshly bodies will pass away but our inward man must be renewed daily. “Therefore we do not lose heart, but though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day” (2 Corinthians 4:16). “Put on the new self who is being renewed [daily- keh] to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him” (Colossians 3:10). Don’t go hungry. Your life depends on it!

"Thou art weighed in the balances and found wanting" was the warning God gave the King in the long ago as He wrote the message upon the wall of the dining hall where the feast was in progress. Have you ever considered what God would write today if he were warning his people? Of course, it would be folly to speculate. We have no idea what he would write. But I know what I would write if I should be asked to write a sentence upon the church house walls all over the world. I would write, "It's Time To Wake Up." Paul wrote, "That now it is high time to awake out of sleep" (Romans 13:11), and it is that message that I would write, if I could, where it would remain to be read until the walls of the church building crumble down into the dust.

They used to tell the story about a Missouri farmer who would call his four sons very early Monday morning with these words: "Hurry! Today's Monday, tomorrow's Tuesday, the next day's Wednesday and the week is half gone and nothing done yet." Today we might urge: "This is 1955, next year will be 1956, the next will be 1957 and the century is over half gone, and so little done yet!"

Indeed, it is time that Christians everywhere awake to the necessity of saving the lost by preaching the pure, unadulterated truth to them. Think of the millions in Europe who know not the truth; think of the 100,000 in South America without the help of one, even one, gospel preacher; think of millions and millions in Africa and Asia who have not even heard that Jesus lived and died—yes millions who, if you mention Jesus Christ, would not know if he were stabbed with a butcher knife or if he were hanged on a cross. Then think of the millions of lost souls in our own dear America! Do you realize that about six million lost souls live within thirty miles of my residence (I live in suburban Chicago). Think of it—more people within 30 miles of me than live in New Mexico, Nevada, Arizona, Utah, Idaho, Wyoming and Montana, all combined! Not just souls, BUT LOST SOULS! And, they are everywhere; in your neighborhood, too!

Preachers need to wake up. We quote the "great commission" almost every week. Do we mean it—-for ourselves? Oh, that the words might sting our lips and burn our tongue every time we quote it until we intend to listen to it ourselves! Elders need to wake up to their responsibility in rescuing those wayward souls under their care. Indeed, they should become so concerned with their duty that they would not rest until they had done their very best to guide every wandering sheep back into the fold of safety.

Teachers need to wake up to their opportunities to prepare themselves so as to be able to sow some seed in each class and make some impression, even if it is upon the youngest child, that will last for eternity. They should be so concerned with this responsibility that they let nothing hinder their preparation and presentation of great lessons in truth to those tender minds whom they teach. Song leaders need to wake up to opportunity to make the song service really edifying. Christian parents need to wake up to the task that is theirs alone, to mold and make character and, as Hannah of old, to give their children to the Lord.

Christian people must wake up to the danger of division. To close our eyes to such danger does not make it less real, but only more actual. Division does not have to come, but if we do not awake to its possibility—yes, probability—then we will surely be rudely awakened by its actuality some of these days. Differences of opinion will not divide us, but attitudes about those differences may! At least, the gravest danger, now, is not differences, but attitudes. Closed minds that will not study objectively, and dictatorial attitudes that bind and loose, quarantine and boycott, vilify and slander, will hasten division today as has been true in other days.

If division comes in our day, it seems evident that it will come as a result of abandonment of the New Testament as a complete, perfect, infallible authority. If or when brethren refuse to be limited by the scriptures then division is imminent. Let us wake up to the necessity of being guided entirely by precept and example in God's word. Let us be willing to abandon all that is not thus authorized, just as we should be determined to zealously pursue all for which there is a "thus saith the Lord."

We need to wake up to the dangers of worldliness. Let us be fully aware of the fact that divorce, dancing, gambling, drinking, etc., are becoming too common among professing Christians. The cause of truth is stifled because the world cannot tell the difference between the sinner and the saint. We must remember that sin is just as soul-destroying today as it was four thousand years ago. Because God does not punish sin with immediate death today does not mean that He smiles upon sin any more today than He did when He destroyed sinners in the long ago. (See Leviticus 24:10; Joshua 7; Numbers 15:33; 2 Samuel 6:3-7; etc.) When "grace and truth came by Jesus Christ" (John 1:17), it was forgiveness of sin that came, when we meet his conditions, and not license for sin.

Many people don't become Christians because they say there are too many hypocrites in the church. And, the sad thing is that they are right! (They are not right in staying outside the church, for if all others are lost, they can still be saved, while if they stay out of Christ they will certainly be lost, but they are right in that there are too many hypocrites in the church). One is too many, and there just may be more than one!

A grave danger in worldliness is posed in the fact that it is getting to be so hard to find many Christians who will oppose it or who will endorse the preacher who opposes it. Worldliness hangs as a heavy shadow over the cause of truth today. Our light does not shine as it ought! Let us not be deceived into thinking that many members (perhaps a million strong or more) large congregations, great buildings and cultural lectures from our pulpits will make us a true light unto the world. Godliness, holiness and purity must characterize Christians if our light is made to shine brightly for Christ (Matthew 5:13-16).

We must wake up to the danger of apostasy. It has happened in other generations, and it can happen again in ours. Ten preachers who once preached in churches of Christ in Chicago-land are now in various denominations! Think of it! Ten from one city! And, we hear of others all over the nation who thus depart from the faith month after month. Such news has come to us from New York, California, Missouri, Tennessee, Ohio, and from foreign lands. It is not only true that some preachers go astray, but other Christians follow them. Preachers do not take that long step into apostasy without taking others with them. Let me give an example of a need for wakefulness. One preacher left the church in this area in 1954, but one week before he departed, he was the most popular preacher among our brethren within 200 miles of his home. Brethren refused to be warned that he was dangerous!

Another sign of our grave danger is seen in the fact that many brethren deny that those preachers who went to the denominations have departed from the faith. Many continue to extend fellowship to them. Some brethren advocating that the church is another denomination among the sects of the land, and if we don't wake up, it will be! Indeed, if brethren think the church is a denomination, they will make it such, if others do not militantly fight to keep it pure.

If I cannot write "It's Time To Wake Up" on your church house wall, please allow me to write it in your mind just now. Christian, WAKE UP! The welfare of the cause of Christ is in our hands. With God's help we can do everything he expects us to do. Without our help God's hands are tied. We are commissioned to "preach the word." God doesn't perform miracles today to bring the truth to lost souls. We are his hands, his mouth, his means. If we are asleep, truth will be stifled. If we will wake up, truth will continue to win.

[Editors note: I found the preceding article of great interest in reference to time. Brother Diestelkamp wrote the article 53 years ago and yet the cry still must be made today. The church struggles with the same issues and will continue to battle the influence of worldliness, apostasy, apathy and disregard for authority. Our greatest lesson for today that will help us see our future is to understand our past. Knowing how brethren faced the challenges of the past will show the truth of the word of God as found in Ecclesiastes 1:10, “Is there anything of which one might say, ‘See this, it is new’? Already it has existed for ages which were before us.” Let us promise to devote ourselves to make the proper changes today to secure the future of the church. Let us stand for the truth of the word of God with courage. Let us read the writing on the wall. Kent Heaton]

4 And Jesus came up and spoke to them, saying, "All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. "Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age" (Matthew 28:18-20).

4 And He said to them, "Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. "He who has believed and has been baptized shall be saved; but he who has disbelieved shall be condemned” (Mark 16:15-16).

4 And He said to them, "Thus it is written, that the Christ would suffer and rise again from the dead the third day, and that repentance for forgiveness of sins would be proclaimed in His name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem” (Luke 24:46-47).

4 Now when they heard this, they were pierced to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, "Brethren, what shall we do?" Peter said to them, "Repent, and each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. "For the promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off, as many as the Lord our God will call to Himself." And with many other words he solemnly testified and kept on exhorting them, saying, "Be saved from this perverse generation!" So then, those who had received his word were baptized; and that day there were added about three thousand souls. (Acts 2:37-41).

4 But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory, both now and to the day of eternity. Amen. (2 Peter 3:18).