TSIYON NEWS - NOT irrelevant
Tsiyon Messianic Radio Newsletter - Vol 19.02 - 10/28/6023 TAM - 01/10/2024 AD
From Eliyahu
About forty years ago someone told me "the resurrection is irrelevant." Forty years ago - and I was so shocked by the statement I still remember it vividly. There is a story behind this that I would like to share with you.
In the early 80s (I was in my early 30s then) I was introduced to two Quaker missionaries by my friend, Blake. At the time I knew very little about the Quakers. Actually, when I met them I didn't know that Quaker missionaries even existed. When I asked them about it they said the Quaker community was their mission field. This seemed strange to me because missionaries usually evangelize outsiders into their denomination - they don't normally evangelize their own people.
What was up with that? I was puzzled and asked the missionaries to explain. They said that to understand I would need to know something about the Quakers. As it happened, the Quakers were having a convention in an auditorium at a local university. The missionaries invited me to attend, and I accepted.
As I entered the large auditorium I observed a lot of people, mostly men, milling about. So I'm thinking 'this is great, to see so many believers all gathered here to lift up the Lord.' The missionaries urged me to just go speak randomly with people and mill around myself, so I set out on my own. Before long I was talking with another man about my own age. He told me who he was and where he was from, but I don't remember any of that. He also told me why he chose to become a Quaker, having something to do with non-violence and peace.
Peace is good, but that isn't really what I wanted to know about. His views on Scripture were my real interest, so I went right to the heart of it - "How does the resurrection of Christ fit into your life?" I said. That's where I heard the answer that so completely shocked me that I still remember this encounter four decades later: "the resurrection is irrelevant" he said.
At first I was so taken aback that I literally could not speak. When my voice returned to me I said something like 'How can you say that? If Christ was not raised then you are still in your sins and you have no hope for eternity. If Christ was not raised then He is not alive, then that would mean you can't personally know Him. That would mean He is not your Lord and Savior ... and you are not His disciple' I said.
In response, I heard something like 'there is no need for the resurrection - all good people go to heaven, and always have.' I was flabbergasted. That belief in eternity for 'all good people' in heaven is a faith killer when it comes to the Resurrection.
Of course, I went to speak with the Quaker missionaries to tell them of the shocking encounter. They said something like 'now you know why we are evangelizing our own group. Most of them know nothing of their true heritage as Quakers. In the beginning Quakers knew the Lord and they believed the Bible. Some still do, but many, probably most, are completely estranged from the central teachings of the founder of Quakerism, George Fox.' Time to look at some research.
George Fox (1624 – 1691) of Britain founded the Religious Society of Friends, better known to the public as the Quakers or Friends. George's father was a successful businessman who would eventually leave his son a substantial financial legacy when he died in the late 1650s. This would afford George time and opportunity to fulfill his calling. As valuable as that might have been, George's father left his son a far greater spiritual legacy that guided him for the rest of his life.
George's father was Christopher Fox, known as "Righteous Christ-er" among his neighbors, which should tell you a lot about the household George grew up in. His father was known as a man who knew Christ, and followed Him as a doer of the Word. In such a household George learned from his father the difference between actually knowing and following the Lord, and dead religion. George never forgot those lessons.
George is quoted as saying: "When I came to eleven years of age I knew pureness and righteousness; for, while I was a child, I was taught how to walk to be kept pure. The Lord taught me to be faithful, in all things, and to act faithfully two ways; viz., inwardly to God, and outwardly to man" ... "The Lord taught me to be faithful in all things ... and to keep to Yea and Nay in all things." This training as a child from both his father and his Father prepared him for his life-long ministry of turning the hearts of men to the living Lord. This explains why he never pursued formal education, whether secular or religious. Neither could add anything to his training that was not provided as needed by Divine Providence.
George Fox did not set out to start a movement. He simply spoke the truth as he saw it. He was critical of formal church, especially the pomp of the Church of England. He wasn't fond of the excesses and evils of the secular government either. Some saw him as a rebel, but he really wasn't. He was simply a truth-teller, who laid it out before others as he saw it. In other words, as he taught from the Scriptures, he made application to the world he lived in. The righteous responded and the evil persecuted him for exposing them in the light of the truth.
Unsurprisingly, he was thrown in prison on multiple occasions, even condemned to death and miraculously delivered. He may not have been right about everything, but he has all the hallmarks of a true and faithful disciple walking in the Spirit of the living God. When common people who accepted the message of George Fox gathered together they waited on the Holy Spirit to move in their midst. When He did, some of them trembled from His presence. Because of this deeply felt effect they came to be called "Quakers."
So how did the Quakers go from that - to a group where the living Christ is seen by many as "irrelevant"? George Fox died. Time went by. Other voices rose up with new interpretations of Fox's message. The movement morphed into an empty caricature of itself, which some in the movement are still trying to revive.
This is what happens with every group that comes to view the Resurrection as "irrelevant" because "all good people go to heaven." No, they don't. If He wasn't raised from the dead you won't be raised from the dead either.
"Now if Messiah is preached, that he has been raised from the dead, how do some among you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? If Messiah has not been raised, your faith is vain; you are still in your sins. Then they also who are fallen asleep in Messiah have perished."
(1 Corinthians 15:12, 16-18)
See "Looking for the Blessed Hope" tonight at 8 PM, Central Time, at Tsiyon.Net on our live stream. You can also find it on other platforms using the search term T S I Y O N. This is central to a living faith, so come and be blessed.
In His Name,
Eliyahu
