In the world of 2017, one must
make certain assumptions when it comes to knowing what to believe is truth and
what not to believe. In making those assumptions, one must have a point
of reference which is believed to be absolutely infallible. Otherwise, we
place our decision making about truth on questionable foundations.
I
know all the arguments against the Bible being absolutely truthful. I
listen to my skeptical friends with the typical arguing points (shell-fish
versus no-shell-fish, women cutting their hair, conflicts between the Old
Testament and the New Testament, the earth being billions of years old
versus thousands of years old, etc). Do I know the answers? No. Does
that bother me? NO!
The truth is
our world today is full of lies. Politicians lie virtually every
time they open their mouths. Children lie for fear of punishment. Criminals
lie in hopes of getting away with a crime and not going to jail. Professors
lie because they want to influence their students to believe according to their
belief system. But the worst liar of all is SATAN. He
lies to us because he wants us to believe that God is a liar so we will all end
up not trusting God’s word and, because of that mistrust, refuse to accept
Jesus as His son, and therefore spend all eternity in hell after we die because
of that refusal.
I KNOW the
Bible is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. I
know that sounds like an awfully strong and questionably declarative statement,
but let me explain why I say that, and then maybe others can understand why I
make such a strong position.
In 1972, I
was in Southeast Asia, flying combat missions. I was scared. On
many of the missions I flew, bullets literally flew over my head and over the
wings of my aircraft by what looked like inches. I was looking for
truth in my faith, because I wanted to be absolutely sure that if I was killed
over there, that I would go to Heaven. I had several wonderful
friends that were of the Mormon faith (Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day
Saints), and I admired them because they lived a life that seemed to me to be
what Christians should live. They were kind, soft-spoken, gentle
people who loved their families and others with what I would call the love of
Christ.
I asked one
of my friends, a pilot named Steve, to tell me why the Mormons seemed to live a
more Christian lifestyle that most of my other friends who were Christians, and
as he explained it to me, he told me things that started making me question
whether or not that was really the church I should belong to or not. I
liked what I heard, so they invited me to go through a process where I was
taught about their church and could eventually become a member of that church.
While many
of their beliefs were totally foreign to me, their story about the Book of
Mormon and Joseph Smith at first seemed questionable, they presented historical
facts to me which gave me reason to keep an open mind. I did, until
they told me I would have to be re-baptized by someone in their church that had
hands laid on them with a lineage that traced all the way back to Joseph Smith. At
that, I got a disturbing feeling in my spirit and told them I had to pray about
that, because I had already been baptized twice; sprinkled in the Methodist
Church, and dunked when I converted to the Baptist denomination at the request
of my first wife (at that point, I believed what the preachers told me that
baptism was not a requirement of salvation, but an outward expression of trust
and obedience to Christ’s instructions).
I was very
uncomfortable in my spirit then, and when I later heard about our next day’s
mission, I became even more uncomfortable. We were going to fly our
first mission deep into North Vietnam and attack a base which was the only
North Vietnamese anti-aircraft training school. It was a rather
small base geographically, which made a fairly concentrated target, and around
that base were, if my memory serves me correctly, fifty-seven anti-aircraft gun
sites.
I got very
scared at that point. In my fear, I became convinced that I was
going to die the next day. I had taken anti-aircraft fire before
from a few gun sites down in South Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, and they got
close enough to make me question how we did not get hit, but we never did. Now,
we were going to bomb a concentrated area where they were fifty-seven guns
firing on us. In my mind, I saw no way for us to get through that
much firepower without getting hit and I just accepted in my mind that I would
probably die the next day. But with that acceptance, the question of
whether or not what the Mormons were telling me about baptism became an even
more pressing matter, because when I died I wanted to be sure I would go to
Heaven. The Mormons believe that all other faiths will not go to
Heaven; they were telling me that only those who were Mormons would go to
heaven.
I started
praying harder than I had ever prayed before about what to believe. I
actually fell asleep praying, but at roughly two o’clock in the morning, I woke
up and sat straight up in my bed when I heard these words “Stick with what you
know to be the truth” as clearly as if the person were in the room with me. But
my other three roommates were still sound asleep.
I climbed
out of my upper bunk bed and went down the hall to where Steve and his Mormon
friend whose name I cannot remember were sleeping and woke them up. I
explained to them what had happened, and asked them what they thought about it. They
were very patient with me, and were obviously trying to wake up and gain some
comprehension of what I had said, so they asked several questions of me getting
me to explain again what had happened, and I explained as best I could what I
had been going through all that day after they told me about the baptism
requirement and how I had been praying hard, even falling asleep while praying.
Steve and
his friend really seemed a little befuddled, but finally Steve’s friend said to
me in so many words “sometimes, the devil will put thoughts in our heads in
order to lead us astray, and maybe that is what is happening here.” He
had no more finished his statement when I said to him “Well why would the devil
tell me to stick to the Bible?” They had no response. At
that point, I simply excused myself and went back to my room and started
praying again.
My thoughts
became pretty clear to me at that point. I had not even thought
about what I would say to Steve’s friends statement; it just popped out of my
mouth without my thinking about it. In my prayers, I had not thought
about the question in exactly those terms, but I had prayed hard asking God to
clarify to me whether my prior teaching from the Bible about baptism were true,
or whether what Steve was telling me about the Mormon faith’s beliefs about
baptism were true or not. I had not, to my recollection ever put it
into context about whether the Book of Mormon was true or not because frankly,
I had come to believe it was true until the baptism issue came up.
In the nine
words that I heard that night, I believe that God answered my prayers. I
can state unequivocally that from that time on, I did not fear dying. I
was still afraid on every combat mission, but not of being killed, but of
possibly being maimed or taken prisoner and being tortured. But
death had no hold on me any more. I also realized two very important
things that night:
1. God
confirmed in my heart and mind that the Bible was truthful and to be trusted.
2. God answers
prayers when we question Him about theological issues with a pure heart
searching for truth.
Since that
time, God has revealed to me that He is giving people proof of His existence,
and proof that the Bible is true. Numerous books are available from
people who have had near-death experiences and gone to Heaven and met Jesus. The
most obvious and undeniable proof to me is given in the example of two children,
one a then-three-year-old from a Midwestern state, and a young Russian child
from the Chicago area. Both had experiences where they went to
Heaven and met Jesus. Neither knew of the other, but the father of
the young boy, a pastor of a church in that Midwestern state, kept asking his
son what Jesus looked like, showed him every picture he could find depicting
Jesus, and the boy kept saying no, that wasn’t him. Then, one day a
story of the young girl was being shown on TV. In that story, it was
showing some of the beautiful paintings that this less-than-10-year-old girl
from Chicago had painted, and one of them was a large painting of the Christ. About
that time, the young boy, who at that time was less than five years old, walked
by the TV, and matter-of-factly told his father “That’s Him”, meaning that is
what Jesus looked like.
So, a boy
from the Midwest sees a picture of Jesus painted by a girl just a few years
older than him from Chicago, a girl the boy had never met, and confirms that
the picture is of Jesus as the boy saw Him in heaven in his near-death
experience. Coincidence? No, I don’t think so. When
one becomes a Christian, one soon learns that in the life of a Christian, there
is no such thing as coincidence when it comes to spiritual truths.
To learn
more about the young boy and girl mentioned in the example above, read the
following books: To relieve the concerns of the skeptical, I do not
know any of these people, and am not receiving any kind of financial or any
other compensation for recommending these books. I found them
compelling reading, and the interactions between them, though thousands of
miles apart, is hard to discount as anything but truthful.
1. Heaven is
for Real: A Little Boy's Astounding Story of His Trip to Heaven,
2. Akiane: Her
Life, Her Art, Her Poetry
Any religion
is a belief based on one thing: Faith. Faith is believing
and trusting in something or someone that cannot be seen or proven by empirical
evidence. However, there is another type of proof that overcomes all
the issues of empirical evidence requirements. In the Christian
faith, there is the proof of the Holy Spirit. For those of us who
have accepted Jesus Christ as their Savior, we have been given the gift of the
Holy Spirit, and that Holy Spirit is as real as your next breath. The
Holy Spirit is our interpreter when we pray but do not know how to express
ourselves to our Father. The Holy Spirit is our conscience, guiding
us on our quest for truth as we face the lying society in which we live. It
is our source of the ability to believe and trust in God. We
Christians know that the Holy Spirit is real and trustworthy because it is part
of the Trinity.
Can I prove
what I have told today? No. If Steve and his friend are still
alive, I hope they would confirm at least factually what I have said is true,
whether or not they believe what I have said spiritually is true or not. But
in my own heart and mind I am convinced without doubt that on a hot July night
before my first combat mission into deep North Vietnam I heard the voice of God
speak to me as audibly as I hear anything while awake and tell me “Stick with
what you know to be the truth”. And while I am a confessed sinner,
undeserving of anything but condemnation, through the undeserved grace and
mercy of God, when I close my eyes in death, I will spend eternity in Heaven in
the presence of the one and only God, His son Jesus Christ. I
pray others will read this and if there are any doubts as to whether I speak
the truth or not, do not trust me, but go in earnest, heartfelt prayer to God
and ask for His guidance, and I believe that God is faithful and will reveal
His truth to you.
May God
bless and keep each of you.
