Editor’s Note: The AMI QT devotionals from Jan. 18-22 are provided by Pastor Ryun Chang (Ph.D.) who is the AMI Teaching Pastor. He and Insil have been married for 28+ years and they have three children: Christy (teacher), Joshua (grad student) and Justin (college freshman). They live in Philadelphia.
Devotional Thoughts for Today
Acts 2:4-12
All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them.5 Now there were staying in Jerusalem God-fearing Jews from every nation under heaven. 6 When they heard this sound, a crowd came together in bewilderment, because each one heard their own language being spoken. 7 Utterly amazed, they asked: “Aren’t all these who are speaking Galileans? 8 Then how is it that each of us hears them in our native language?
I wonder how Jerry Rankin, then-President of the International Mission Board, felt as the vote was being counted. In 2005, the board members of this Southern Baptist Convention organization voted on whether to accept anyone who speaks in tongues as its missionary candidates. The board overwhelmingly decided against it. Rankin, who had been speaking in tongues for 30 years, couldn’t have felt too comfortable.
I, too, have been speaking in tongues for a long time; in fact, I received that gift on the day I became a believer in 1981. Actually, I had stopped praying in the gift of tongues for a time while attending Talbot Seminary that taught that tongues disappeared in the 1st century. But I resumed, after studying the Scripture and finding that it doesn’t say anything to that effect.
One vocal opponent against the gift of tongues is the renowned John MacArthur, a graduate of Talbot. As a mega-church pastor and seminary president, MacArthur has many arguments against tongues, one of which is, whereas the tongues spoken in Acts were real languages, the tongues spoken today aren’t.
MacArthur has stated, as agreed by many theologians, that “the only teaching in Acts that can be called normative (absolute) for the church are those that are doctrinally confirmed elsewhere in Scripture.” In other words, the Epistles by Paul or John should have the final word. If this is so, then shouldn’t MacArthur put more weight on the writings of Paul? In 1 Corinthians 14:2 Paul writes: “For anyone who speaks in a tongue does not speak to people but to God.” Whereas the onlookers in Jerusalem from the nations understood what was being spoken, no one understood the tongues spoken by the Corinthians because it wasn’t a real language; and that’s the tongues spoken by people like Rankin and me.
And I second Rankin who said that tongues as a private prayer language has been a tremendous help in his relationship with God. You may or may not speak in tongues, but ultimately, what matters is whether we have a consistent prayer life to sustain our intimacy with God. If not, start today.
Prayer
Lord, You are the God of redemption, and for that, I am infinitely grateful. Like useless and rusty junk, we could’ve easily been discarded for our sins, but You saw fit to send your Son to take our place to redeem us. Thank You that we can be close to You through prayer. Help me seek to You always. Amen.
Bible Reading for Today: Genesis 16
Lunch Break Study
Read Acts 19:11-2: God did extraordinary miracles through Paul, 12 so that even handkerchiefs and aprons that had touched him were taken to the sick, and their illnesses were cured and the evil spirits left them.
Acts 5:3-5: Then Peter said, “Ananias, how is it that Satan has so filled your heart that you have lied to the Holy Spirit and have kept for yourself some of the money you received for the land? 4 Didn’t it belong to you before it was sold? And after it was sold, wasn’t the money at your disposal? What made you think of doing such a thing? You have not lied just to human beings but to God.” 5 When Ananias heard this, he fell down and died. And great fear seized all who heard what had happened.
Acts 5:15: As a result, people brought the sick into the streets and laid them on beds and mats so that at least Peter’s shadow might fall on some of them as he passed by.
Question to Consider
- Solely based on these passages from Acts, what should be happening today?
- Without necessarily saying that these things can never happen again, what justifies the view that these occurrences are not normative for the church today?
- Ultimately, why is thinking in this manner (putting epistles ahead of Acts when theologizing) important?
Notes
- The sick people should be healed by the shadows and handkerchiefs of some powerful, anointed people of God. Everyone who lies to God should be dying soon thereafter.
- These things shouldn’t be normative experiences for the church today because none is taught or advocated in the Epistles, which are instructions for the church (1 Thess. 4:8; 2 Thess. 3:14).
- Paul says to Pastor Timothy, “Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers” (1 Tim. 4:16). While not all doctrines are same in importance, some are more crucial to our salvation (i.e. salvation by faith, the deity and humanity of Christ, etc.). We must be careful and thoughtful when theologizing, doctrines being its outcome.
Evening Reflection
Close your eyes and think about any ongoing conflicts (small or large) with someone at work and at home. Review the way you have been arguing. Are you being principled or talking out of both sides of your mouth? Perhaps an apology is due. Perhaps you have been arguing for the sake of winning! Pray.
Surely, no likes to wait in line—especially for a long time. However, if we want something bad enough, we’re willing to put up with a sleepless night, shiver in the cold, and wait in order to get that thing—in my case (1980), it was to purchase a ticket to the Bruce Springsteen concert. But it was pure elation once I had the ticket in my pocket, even though it cost me a night’s sleep.
What’s harder than replacing Tom Brady as the quarterback for New England Patriots? Try replacing the father of a teenager girl. That’s the predicament an old friend faced when he married a woman with a daughter in the middle school. Unfortunately, to the daughter he was never more than an unworthy replacement—it didn’t end well.
Ironically, the Civil Rights Movement, led by Baptist minister Martin Luther King, wasn’t the most popular movement then, even among African-Americans. That honor was shared by the militant Black Panther Party that launched violence against the white power structure, and the Nation of Islam that aimed, not for racial desegregation, but a complete separation from whites. Its leader Malcolm X even called King a “‘chump’ and other civil rights leaders ‘stooges’ of the white establishment.’”
Over the holidays, I spent time with my extended family that included a little boy who is about to turn two. One activity he enjoyed was building with magnetic tiles. He made a tower taller than himself, but it was top-heavy and started swaying. We expected him to delight with glee when it fell over with a big crash; possibly tears when it fell over because his creation was no more. What we didn’t expect was for him to hang on to the tower, standing on his tiptoes to support it. He whimpered, on the verge of tears, because he clearly did not want the tower to fall and was holding it up with his own strength.
Over the holiday break, my husband and I visited Los Angeles with my parents. Our only non-food related destination was the Getty Villa, along the Pacific coast. It is a museum established by the late oil tycoon J. Paul Getty that showcases ancient artifacts from Greece and Rome. Among the many artifacts, we saw statues of household gods found in Roman empire from the first century. It was amazing to see what we had read in the Bible come to life before our eyes.
Seeing statues of golden calves, sacrificial altars and tangible likenesses of deities at the museum made me think of the things we bow down to in our modern day that may not be made of gold or wood. In our day, we can worship our careers, relationships, success in the eyes of the world as defined by money or approval, or even righteousness through religious duties. This happens when we let good things become the ultimate thing. It can happen when hard times that we don’t understand come our way and we decide God doesn’t know best, but we do. The Israelites struggled with this too, when they complained about their time in the desert and made the golden calf. Maybe we aren’t so different after all. Let us come to the Lord with humble hearts, asking Him to reveal our idols and the help of the Holy Spirit to return to our first love (Rev. 2:4)
Moody Bible Institute and Wheaton College are leading institutions of higher learning for evangelicals. So, upon noting that the New Testament scholar Bart Ehrman studied there, we would expect to learn a great deal from him. That, unfortunately, is not what you will get from Ehrman, who heads the religious-studies department at the University of North Carolina.
This isn’t a forum for an in-depth discussion, but many Christians have erroneous notions about the inspiration of the Scripture. While no one is certain about what inspiration exactly entails, it doesn’t mean superseding differences in each writer’s observation, depending on the perspective taken and culture. It is quite plausible that “Judas hanged himself and that the rope broke, causing him to fall” (Baker). Regarding the field, Judas, in effect, bought it since the chief priest purchased it with his money. Evidently, Matthew accentuated the tragic end of the betrayer (suicide) while Luke focused on its irony: Judas was the first to be buried in the accursed field. Had Ehrman been taught right, perhaps he wouldn’t have taken that fatal road.
The TV show 48 Hours deals with murders involving middle-class Americans who have good jobs and live in nice houses. Viewing just a few episodes is all it would take to notice two repetitive themes regarding whodunit and why. As to who, likely your spouse; as to why, money! In one episode, a young professional with an M.B.A. kills his beautiful wife, even shooting himself 4 times to make the police believe that it was a robbery gone bad. But once the police discovered the $2 million life insurance on the wife, they had the motive to go with his inconsistent testimony.
The Bible, however, gives a simpler reason why Judas “served as guide for those who arrested Jesus”: greed. After all, Judas said to Jesus’ enemy, “What are you willing to give me if I deliver him over to you.” By all account, “thirty pieces of silver” was a large sum of money then (as much as $15,000 today). An older John, recalling the events that occurred some 50 years earlier, wrote, “. . . [Judas] was a thief; as keeper of the money bag, he used to help himself to what was put into it” (Jn. 12:6). In other words, betraying Jesus for a small fortune was too good of an opportunity for this small-time thief to pass up.
When I told my father, who was not even a churchgoer at the time, of my desire to enter the ministry, he was relieved, hoping that perhaps my partying days were over. On the other hand, the parents of my seminary roommate “Daniel,” who were good Christians by all accounts, weren’t happy when their MIT-attending son, whom they hoped would become a physician, told them the same. So to calm their displeasure, Daniel applied to several medical schools and prayed that none would accept him; God obliged, and that’s how he ended up in seminary.
This past December, I got to see an NBA game between San Antonio Spurs, a five-time champion, and Philadelphia 76ers, the league’s worst. Predictably, the game got of control fast and the Spurs won by 51 points!
Upon examining each roster, Jesus’ disciples would be more like the overmatched 76ers than the Spurs. It is said that, besides a handful of Philadelphia players with raw potential, the rest don’t belong in the league. And that’s who the disciples were. Being described by their detractors as “unschooled [and] ordinary” (Acts 4:5, 13) was merely scratching the surface. The disciples were initially divided not only from the rest of society but even among themselves. Simon belonged to a militant group called Zealots who violently opposed the Romans and those who worked for them, like tax collectors, among whom Matthew was one. The disciples’ favorite pastime was arguing about “who was the greatest” (Mk. 9:34); once, John and James sought to kill an inhospitable Samaritan (Lk. 9:51-5).