The Fullness of Time

“Spring has sprung,” as someone said, and there seems to be no holding back trees, vines, bushes and flowers as they surge with life during these early days of April 2010.

Not long ago, dogwoods, pines and sweet gums that grow in our yard in Southern Pines, N.C., stood tall and dark as powdery snow rested on their cold, gray limbs. At that time, those trees appeared deaf to any awakening call from nature. But deep inside those sedated powerful pines and hardwoods lay the potential I now see bursting forth.

As I recently drove home from work, I noticed pale-purple Wisteria blooms hanging from pines and thought of my late parents. They years ago planted a Wisteria vine at the edge of their yard in Greer, S.C. Wisteria climbs and entwines and spreads almost like kudzu, I think, and my folk’s Wisteria was hard to control. My father kept the vine from finding a tree to twine around, but that stubborn plant tried to branch out horizontally. Dad had to prune his Wisteria pretty often. I read that the world’s largest known Wisteria vine is located in Sierra Madre, California, and measures more than one acre in size and weighs 250 tons.

Wisteria is largely native to the eastern U.S. and to China, Korea and Japan. I think Wisteria appears “oriental” in the way it droops from trees, and I also associate it with old Southern plantations and white-haired, elderly, lilacs-and-lace kinds of ladies wearing dresses made of fabric dyed to match the color of Wisteria blooms.

I opened our front door the other morning at 6:30 a.m. and heard what sounded like hundreds of birds chirping and chattering. I envisioned them as feathered singers warming up for a concert that would begin at sunrise. Life seemed to pulsate from the woods surrounding our home.

I recently walked to our mailbox and saw that Carol or I had unknowingly squashed an 8-inch corn snake with one of our cars’ tires as Mr. Snake tried crossing our driveway. “Corn snakes” are non-venomous, have maize-like patterns on their bellies and are often found in cornfields.

I hope to soon see a whitetail doe with a spotted fawn grazing in our yard. I often see deer out back of our home. Whitetails tend to breed in the fall when fewer hours of daylight cause hormonal changes responsible for their breeding behavior. Therefore, the majority of fawns are born in the spring “when weather and vegetative conditions are most favorable for their survival,” according to “Whitetail Institute.”

A friend told me that if all people were taken from the world, in 50 years you wouldn’t know man had been on earth. He said nature would reclaim all land cultivated and altered by men. I don’t know about that, but nature is a powerful force, and no one can hold it back. Springtime reminds us of that.

God created the earth’s seasons:

“And God said, ‘Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years’” (Genesis 1:14).

“While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease” (Genesis 8:22).

The Apostle Paul said we sense God through his handiwork. Paul wrote, “For since the creation of the world, God's invisible qualities – his eternal power and divine nature – have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse” (Romans 1:20, NIV).

Observing the arrival of spring this year, I feel overwhelmed by God’s creation. How pitiful I would appear, if I commanded a huge oak to cease growing. I can’t hold back its leaves or the sap rising within it. If man can’t hold back the plant and animal life that bursts forth in springtime, neither will man hold back God’s plan as it unfolds in “due season” and in “the fullness of time.”

God created times and seasons, and he understands “the fullness of time.”

“But when the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons” (Galatians 4:4-5).

“Having made known unto us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure which he hath purposed in himself: That in the dispensation of the fullness of times he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him” (Ephesians 1:9-10).

The Meaning of 'Easter'

The meaning of Easter is Jesus Christ’s victory over death, according to the Bible. The Internet site “allaboutJesusChrist.org” offers the following information about the word “Easter”:

The term “Easter” did not always symbolize Christ’s resurrection. The feast day of Easter was once a pagan celebration of renewal and rebirth. Held in early spring, it honored pagan Saxon goddess Eastre. When Christian missionaries converted the Saxons, the holiday, which fell around the same time as the memorial of Christ’s resurrection, was merged with the pagan celebration and became known as Easter.

I don’t how much of the following is reliable, but here is more Internet-available legendary detail about “Easter”:

Not long after the global flood (Genesis 6-9), Nimrod, a grandson of Noah, turned from following God and became a tyrannical ruler. According to the Bible, Nimrod created Babel, Nineveh, Asshur, Calla and other cities known for lifestyles promoting evil. Nimrod died, and his wife, Queen Semiramis, deified him as the Sun-god, or Life Giver. He became known as Baal, and those who followed the religion which Semiramis created in his name were called Baal worshippers. They were associated with idolatry, demon worship, human sacrifice and such.

The origin of “Easter” involves the birth of Semiramis’ illegitimate son, Tammuz. Semiramis convinced people that Tammuz was Nimrod reborn. People had looked for the promised savior (Genesis 3:15) and were persuaded by Semiramis to believe Tammuz was that savior, even that he had been supernaturally conceived. Before long, in addition to worshipping Tammuz (or Nimrod reborn), the people also worshipped Semiramis herself as the goddess of fertility. In other cultures, she has been called Ishtar, Ashtur and, yes, Easter.

The origin of Easter goes back to the springtime ritual instituted by Semiramis following the death of Tammuz, who, according to tradition, was killed by a wild boar. Legend has it that through the power of his mother’s tears, Tammuz was “resurrected” in the form of new vegetation that appeared on the earth.

In the city of Babel, people created a tower to defy God. Until that time, people on earth spoke one language. God confused their language (Genesis 11:7) to keep them from further unifying in false beliefs. As people moved to other lands, many took pagan practices with them.

The Easter Bunny and Easter eggs can be traced to practices established by Semiramis. Rabbits are prolific and have long been associated with fertility and its goddess, Ishtar. Many ancient Babylonians believed a fable about an egg that fell from heaven into the Euphrates River. Queen Astarte (another name for Ishtar or Semiramis) was “hatched” from that egg, according to fable.

For Christians, the origin of Easter is simply the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ. According to Gospel accounts, Jesus Christ, the true Messiah promised in the Old Testament, was crucified and resurrected at the time of the Jewish Passover. Since that event took place, those who believe Christ is their Messiah have honored that day and often celebrated it with the traditional Passover.

As Christianity spread throughout non-Jewish nations, where Passover had not been celebrated, pagan rites of Easter (“rites of spring” traditions) assimilated into what the Christian church called “Resurrection Day.”

Easter was generally dismissed as a pagan holiday by America’s founding Puritans and was not widely observed in the U.S. until just after the Civil War.

My mother bought small dye packets and dumped their contents into coffee cups in the 1950s. My younger sister and I stained some hardboiled eggs. I held each egg in a little looped wire device and dipped each into a cup of yellow, red, blue or green colored water. The longer I held an egg underneath tinted liquid, the more pastel-colored its shell became.

I doubt that dyeing eggs and eating chocolate Easter bunnies and yellow “sugar chickens” damaged my faith in Jesus Christ. In Sunday school in the 1950s, I learned I needed Jesus as my Savior and learned to worship him and not to worship Baal, Ishtar or seasons the Lord created. At home and in church, I learned the real meaning of Easter and learned to love Jesus’ words found in Revelation 1:18: “I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.”

Palm Sunday and a Cross

Palm Sunday begins Passion Week, which includes The Last Supper, Jesus’ Garden of Gethsemane experience, his crucifixion and his victory on Resurrection Sunday, or Easter.

Sources say Passion Week is so important that three of the gospel writers – Matthew, Mark and Luke – devote a full third of their contents to reporting this week, and the fourth gospel writer, John, dedicates the entire last half of his book to “the week.”

Jerusalem reportedly claimed a population of about 50,000 at the time of Jesus triumphal entry, but many had come to celebrate the Jewish Passover, and Jerusalem bulged with perhaps 150,000 people on Palm Sunday.

Here’s the paraphrased Palm Sunday story (Matthew 21:1-11, 14-17):

As they approached Jerusalem and came to Bethphage on the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two disciples, saying to them, “Go to the village ahead of you, and at once you will find a donkey tied there, with her colt by her. Untie them and bring them to me. If anyone says anything to you, tell him that the Lord needs them, and he will send them
right away.”

This took place to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet: “Say to the Daughter of Zion, ‘See, your king comes to you, gentle and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey’” (Zechariah 9:9).

The disciples went and did as Jesus had instructed them. They brought the donkey and the colt, placed their cloaks on them, and Jesus sat on them. A very large crowd spread their cloaks on the road, while others cut branches from the trees (John 12:13 tells us they “Took branches of palm trees”) and spread them on the road. The crowds that went ahead of him and those that followed shouted, “Hosanna to the Son of David!” “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!” “Hosanna in the highest!”

When Jesus entered Jerusalem, the whole city was stirred and asked, “Who is this?”

The crowds answered, “This is Jesus, the prophet from Nazareth in Galilee.”

The blind and the lame came to him at the temple, and he healed them. But when the chief priests and the teachers of the law saw the wonderful things he did and the children shouting in the temple area, “Hosanna to the Son of David,” they were indignant.

“Do you hear what these children are saying?” they asked him.

“Yes,” replied Jesus. “Have you never read, 'From the lips of children and infants you have ordained praise’?” And he left them and went out of the city to Bethany, where he spent the night.

Jesus had true followers, but the general crowd turned on him when influenced by leaders fearful of losing Rome’s favor. Johnny Cash sang “Jesus was a Carpenter,” which contains these words: “It was on a storming Sunday when he (Jesus) rode to old Jerusalem / And the palms they cast before him / Were the crimes they laid against him.”

Writer Bill Petro says the throngs threw down garments on the pathway to cushion Jesus’ ride – an Oriental custom still observed on occasions – as well as palm fronds, the symbol of triumph and the national emblem of an independent Palestine. Jewish religious officials feared Jesus would cause the Romans to destroy the Temple and their nation. Petro says there had been a dozen uprisings in Palestine in the 100 years previous to Palm Sunday. Most of those revolts were subdued by Roman force.

John 1:11 records, “He (Jesus) came to His own, and His own did not receive Him.” The same crowds that were crying out “Hosanna” were crying out “crucify Him” five days later (Matthew 27:22-23).

I don’t want to be just a “Palm Sunday believer” – a person who’s happy to follow Jesus during good times but ready to disown the Lord when his popularity seems to fade and there are crosses to bear.

Ernest W. Blandly wrote the lyrics to “Where He Leads Me.” That old hymn contains these words: “I’ll go with Him through the waters…I’ll go with Him through the garden… I’ll go with Him to dark Calv’ry…(Refrain): Where He leads me I will follow / Where He leads me I will follow / Where He leads me I will follow / I’ll go with Him, with Him all the way.”

Beggar Images Seen through Glass

No one looking for a handout seemed to stand nearby as my wife and I viewed many of Rembrandt’s etchings of beggars.

Some time ago, Carol and I inspected some of the Dutch artist’s etchings at the N.C. Museum of Art in Raleigh. An etching is produced this way: a drawing is engraved on a metal plate; ink is applied to the plate: paper is pressed against the inked plate to produce an image on the paper.

Standing alongside a few Saturday afternoon museumgoers who appeared well fed, well-cared-for and even well-to-do, I scanned small images that were framed and under glass. They were drawn by Rembrandt between 1629 and 1654 and had become part of a modern-day traveling show called “Rembrandt Van Rijn: Sordid and Sacred, The Beggars in Rembrandt’s Etchings.”

The exhibit featured 35 small prints – one was only slightly larger than two inches by two inches – from the John Villarino Collection.

I doubt that many real beggars – maybe none – saw the traveling art show. Probably no one we would classify as a beggar visited the exhibition and laid weary eyes on Rembrandt’s images of alms seekers.

I doubt that anyone working at a rescue mission or social services office said to fellow workers, “The museum is showing artwork that features beggars. Maybe we ought to take some of our clients to see that show.”

No, I don’t think anyone thought about bussing beggars to review Rembrandt’s renderings.

Dutch society of Rembrandt’s day esteemed work, thrift and self-restraint and looked down on beggars. Artist Hieronymus Bosch, a Rembrandt predecessor and fellow Dutchman, painted beggars as almost indistinguishable from his depicted demons, says writer Gary Schwartz.

Rembrandt often drew and painted pictures of poor people. Critics say he usually portrayed beggars with “sanctity and individuality.” He often used images of beggars to portray Bible characters.

Dr. John I. Durham, in his book “The Biblical Rembrandt,” presents Rembrandt’s intrigue with Christian faith.

“His first artworks were on Biblical themes, as was his last painting,” Durham says. Of Rembrandt’s known work (285-290 paintings, 300 etchings and 1380 drawings), 40 percent involve Biblical themes.

Rembrandt made many depictions of the “return” scene from Jesus’ parable about a lost, or prodigal, son who asked for his inheritance, spent it foolishly and returned to his father’s embrace (Luke, 15).

Perhaps Rembrandt saw himself as a spiritual beggar drawn to the “there but for the grace of God go I” images of street people.

Schwartz suggests that Rembrandt’s humane image of the poor and disabled may have “contributed at some time or other in the course of history to the kinder treatment of real beggars.”

As a child, I heard the thirteenth century nursery rhyme “Hark, hark, the dogs do bark; the beggars are coming to town….” I listened to Bible stories about poor people and knew funds-challenged residents who lived in my rural South Carolina community.

The first street beggar I remember seeing was an African-American man who sat on a sidewalk and leaned against a building fronting the main street in the City of Greenville, S.C. That man wore black leather “holders” to cover what was left of legs amputated close to his bulky torso. I never heard him speak when someone dropped coins into a cigar box sitting in front of his stumps.

My grandparents sold “real cow’s milk and butter” to a few Greenville city folk on Saturday mornings, and I, as a child, often accompanied them. We would make our rounds to customers and then shop at Woolworth’s and other stores. I could hardly pass that main street beggar man without thinking of this line from a poem my childhood pastor, the Rev. James H. Thompson, often quoted: “I complained I had no shoes, until I met a man who had no feet.”

As I stood in an art museum and viewed Rembrandt’s centuries-old images of beggars, I wondered how many of us prefer to see poverty artistically interpreted and viewed through glass – the glass of television screens.

I suppose art still helps us deal with life.

New Body and New Teeth

Michael, probably in his forties, sat recently in the break room of the Gulistan Carpet dye house in Wagram, N.C. As I walked by, he opened his mouth and revealed a set of dentures.

“See; I got my new teeth,” he said.

A schoolteacher taught me this rhyme about teeth: “Thirty-two white horses upon a red hill, prancing and dancing, and now they stand still.”

Michael’s 32 horses escaped from his red hills (his gums), and 32 polished artificial ponies replaced them. He had the last of his teeth extracted at Sexton Dental Clinic in Florence, S.C. That 24,000 square foot clinic boasts that patients “come from all over the world and from all walks of life.”

“I had 15 teeth pulled,” Michael said. “I went out of there with nothing but gauze in my mouth. I ate a lot of soup. My mama said she was about 24 when she lost her teeth.”

Months after his teeth-yanking session, Michael drove to Florence to get his dentures.

Ever see someone inspect a horse’s teeth to determine the animal’s worth by roughly figuring its age? According to Wikipedia, a horse's incisors, premolars, and molars, once fully developed, continue to erupt as the grinding surface wears down. A young adult horse has teeth that are 4.5-5 inches long, but the major parts of the crowns remain below the gum-line. The rest of each tooth slowly emerges from the jaw, erupting about 1/8 inch each year. Upon reaching old age, a horse’s crowns are very short, and the teeth are often lost altogether. When a horse is old, he is said to be “getting a little long in the tooth.”

My mother, Eva, often joined her two sisters, Louise and Edna, in visiting their mother’s house. Our first-born, Janelle, was a pre-schooler when she accompanied Mother on one of those visits. Carol and I laughed when Janelle returned and announced, “Aunt Louise has fox teeth!” We figured the ladies had discussed false teeth.

Unlike other parts of our bodies, teeth won’t heal themselves. Baby teeth “come in,” and then we lose them, and permanent teeth (they often aren’t very permanent) appear. As we age, our teeth need fillings and crowns. Like Michael, some of us might leave this world without any natural teeth.

Christians have hope beyond teeth problems, hope beyond old age and hope beyond the grave. Our hope is in Jesus Christ who promises that believers will receive glorified bodies. I think we also will receive glorified teeth. God can construct or reconstruct body parts that might be missing.

Kenneth B Visscher says, “Take great care of your physical body you live in and cherish it, for it is that very same body which the Lord is coming to glorify. This is the same body that is destined for the appearing of Christ when He comes again and fashions your body like unto His body, which was raised from the dead. Right now, your body is corruptible, mortal, but your very body MUST put on incorruption, this mortality MUST put on immortality. It is the body you were born and live in now which will change. Every portion of your cellular structure and every part of your physical makeup will be brought into a holy image of Jesus.”

Our present bodies are “corruptible,” which means they will decay. “Incorruptible” means “not subject to corruption or decay.”

We read in I Corinthians 15:50-57:

“Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption.

“Behold, I show you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.

“For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory.

“O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

Christians have the promise of receiving glorified bodies. This promise should comfort us all, especially those who are “getting a little long in the tooth.”

Flashlight Batteries and Oil for Lamps

News that snow and ice would visit us last weekend caught me with one of our lamps not “trimmed and burning,” so I drove to Wal-Mart after work on Friday.

My wife, Carol, and I have my late parents’ oil lamp and one big flashlight, but someone gave us a large flashlight equipped with a small radio. I wanted batteries for that light-with-radio device.

In the year 2000, 17 inches of snow left us with no electricity for five days at our home in Southern Pines, N.C. Our electric “heat pump” was down, and we had no gas logs or kerosene heater (and we still don’t have those alternative ways to heat our home). We had enough charcoal to warm soup each noonday for five days. I looked like a hobo, Carol said, when I wore my overcoat and toboggan hat and hovered over a grill located out back of our house. Once in a while, I slogged to the driveway, cranked one of our cars and listened to some news.

Last Friday, I needed “C” batteries for the light-with-radio device. Many checkout aisles in Wal-Mart feature batteries, and not one of those displays had any C- or D-size batteries.

“I should have known not to wait till the last minute,” I told myself. “People have hoarded batteries, and now I won’t have any.”

I hurried to the Harris-Teeter grocery store. What a crowd! Looked like feeding time at a shark tank! I found a few C batteries and thanked the Lord.

I pushed my cart to find charcoal and lighter fluid. “Might have to grill out, again,” I thought.

Lo and behold! Hoarders had emptied a whole shelf of the cheap charcoal. I saw a few bags of a more-expensive brand and bought one, along with a small can of lighter fluid.

When I woke on Saturday morning, snow and sleet covered the ground, and sleet was still falling – but our electricity was still on. Possibly because of a bit of wind that came with the storm, ice had not accumulated on power lines or tree limbs.

Trying to buy flashlight batteries reminded me of the parable Jesus told about the wise and the foolish virgins. Here is that story:

“Then shall the kingdom of heaven be likened unto ten virgins, who took their lamps, and went forth to meet the bridegroom.

“And five of them were wise, and five were foolish. They that were foolish took their lamps, and took no oil with them: But the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps.

“While the bridegroom tarried, they all slumbered and slept. And at midnight there was a cry made, ‘Behold, the bridegroom cometh; go ye out to meet him.’

“Then all those virgins arose and trimmed their lamps. And the foolish said unto the wise, ‘Give us of your oil; for our lamps are gone out.’ But the wise answered, saying, ‘Not so; lest there be not enough for us and you: but go ye rather to them that sell, and buy for yourselves.’

“And while they went to buy, the bridegroom came; and they that were ready went in with him to the marriage: and the door was shut. Afterward came also the other virgins, saying, ‘Lord, Lord, open to us.’ But he answered and said, ‘Verily I say unto you, I know you not.’

“Watch therefore, for ye know neither the day nor the hour wherein the Son of man cometh” (Matthew 25:13).

The wise virgins carried extra oil in separate containers. The foolish virgins took no extra oil.

Jack Crabtree of The McKenzie Study Center offers these thoughts:

“The oil that the foolish virgins found depleted…is analogous to our desire for, belief in, and commitment to the eternal Life which God has promised. Many people will desire it; many will believe God's promise; many will commit themselves to wait for its realization. But only a few will find their desire, their belief, and their commitment in ample supply.

“For those of us who are foolish – in whom the desire does not run deep, the belief is not profound, and the commitment is only superficial and very fragile – our supply will soon run out. When the bridegroom comes, no longer do we really believe, no longer do we really want his Kingdom; long before, we had shifted our commitment to something else this world had to offer. But for those of us who are wise, our desire runs deep, our belief is profound and unshakable, and our commitment is more than superficial.

“Jesus said once, ‘Many are called, but few are chosen.’ He is saying something very similar to that in this parable: ‘Many are invited and will join in wait for the bridegroom, but few will actually remain to follow him to the feast when he comes.’”

A prayer: Lord, give us oil – and extra oil – for our lamps. In Jesus’ name, amen.

Wheat and Tares

“There are 200 million church members in America,” said Dr. Bailey Smith, speaking at Beulah Hill Baptist Church in West End, N.C., in 2003. “If they were all saved, this nation would be in better shape; there are always tares among the wheat.”

Smith of Atlanta served as president of the Southern Baptist Convention in 1981-82. He grew up as a Baptist pastor’s son in Dallas, Texas and “walked an aisle” to receive Christ at age 5 because his “grandfather wanted him to.” He said his conversion really took place at age 10 when he prayed with his father. As a high school senior, he felt called to preach and pastored a church at age 19. He graduated from Quachita Baptist University in Arkansas and Southwestern Baptist Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas.

Smith indicated that many churchgoers think they are “saved” but are not. He asked the Rev. Billy Graham why Graham often hinted that church members might need to accept Jesus as Savior.

Graham replied, “I myself was an unsaved church member.”

Preaching from Jesus’ wheat-and-tares parable (Matthew 13:24-30), Smith said that Jesus compared “the kingdom of heaven” to a wheat field. Jesus said an enemy sowed tares (weeds that appear as wheat) in the field, and workers wanted to pull up those tares. The field owner, fearing some wheat might get uprooted if hired hands tried to eliminate tares, told workers to wait until harvest time. At that time, tares would be gathered and burned and wheat brought into his barn.

“Farmers used to show me wheat and tares,” said Smith, who once lived in Oklahoma. “I couldn’t tell the difference, but if you open up the head and there are kernels of wheat, it’s wheat.”

Smith said some people believe they are Christians because they had “experiences,” were baptized when their friends were baptized, or because their parents keep telling them, “You accepted Christ when you were young.”

“What somebody told you that you did won’t save you,” Smith said. Paraphrasing 2 Corinthians 13:5, he added, “Examine yourself to see if you ever got it (salvation) or not. A lot of you have been inoculated from going to heaven – it’s called ‘walking a church aisle as a kid.’ There’s a lot of difference between a good man and a saved man; the difference is eternity. You can go down a dry sinner (in water baptism) and come up a wet one.”

Smith said that wheat and tares look alike.

“Only God knows the difference,” Smith said. “Can a weed grow? An unsaved person doesn’t grow in Christ but appears to. He can be a busy church member on his way to hell. Wheat and tares are planted together, progress together and are harvested together. Those who are deceived don’t know they’re deceived. The Devil doesn’t want you to doubt your salvation. He wants you to believe you’re saved. The Devil knows you are good, and he is smart. He’d just as soon you go to hell from a church pew as from a bar stool.”

These are Jesus’ words recorded in Matthew 7:22-23 (New KJV): “Many will say to me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’”

Smith said a person might think he’s all right with God because he performs good works, attends a good church and hears good preaching. He told about a 19-year-old woman who confessed that her daddy had prematurely prayed the sinner’s prayer for her when she was young.

“You can believe in soap and die dirty,” he said. “To be 99 percent saved is to be 100 percent lost. The wheat is placed in the father’s house; the tare is bound and burned. We’ve had about 90 pastors get saved, and some music directors. I was a tare; Billy Graham was a tare. I believe all across this building we have tares among us.”

Smith quoted Romans 10:13, “For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.”

As musicians played “Just as I Am,” Smith asked those needing to accept Christ to raise their hands. He led those who responded in repeating a sinner’s prayer.

“Some of you pray that prayer every time because you haven’t prayed it once,” Smith said.

Smith’s sermon challenges us to make sure we have repented of our sins and are trusting Jesus Christ to save us from eternal separation from God.

“But as many as received Him (Jesus), to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name…” (John 1:12, New KJV).