PASTORAL CHAT
My dear Readers
By coming to Rev Errol Stone’s Church we have come into close fellowship with the Aboriginal Evangelical Fellowship Bible College of West Australia. It happens to be their 20th Anniversary. Its Principal is Clive Hayden. One of its volunteer lecturers is Rev Errol Stone who takes a stand with us for a 100% perfect Bible without any mistake.
God has His witnesses like us who when they declare themselves Evangelical use only the KJV. When we visited them on one occasion we met a member of the Trinitarian Bible Society. So there are strong Evangelicals, opposing Liberals and Modernists to the point of running an Evangelical Bible College for the last 20 years.
Rev Paul Contento, my good friend since I was a student in Nanking under Dr Chia Yu Ming said, “Without a Bible College the Church would die.” How true it is with the Aboriginal Church. Because they have an Aboriginal Bible College they have a sizable Church in Perth where the Aboriginal Bible College can celebrate their 20th Anniversary. At its celebration Principal Clive Hayden declared, “College Training is a must in these days to prepare the men for ministry. God is looking for ordinary men to do extraordinary work in the Church.”
We have visited the College and seen 5 graduating students. But the College needs to build to provide more living quarters for next year. They need $500,000. The College does not receive Government funding for operation costs. The College is supported by Evangelicals in the Churches.
Here is a graduating student’s testimony. “My name is Brendon Garlett. I am a fulltime student of two years. I will be graduating this year. I praise the Lord very much for what He’s done for me whilst at College. We live by faith and God has met my every need so far, with finance, food, clothes, just to name a few. I have learnt so much and the lectures have been really enjoyable. The staff, students and lecturers have also been a great encouragement to me. The classes have helped me to be more confident. We have been through the Old Testament and the Gospels, Memory Verses and Public Speaking is important in my Christian life, as it helped me in my preaching. Doctrine and Church History has given me a better understanding of those who suffered for our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Your affectionate pastor
T. T.
Jesus Our Only Help
(Message delivered by Dr Jeffrey Khoo at the True Life Church 10.30 am Service, Dec 4, 05)
Text: Matt 15:21-28; Mark 7:24-30
Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ is the sinner’s only Help. Although Jesus is ever ready to help all who are in need, not everyone will be helped by Him. Only those who sincerely seek His help with all their heart will be helped. Jesus will not force His way into our lives. He offers His help, but if we refuse or reject His offer, He leaves us alone to our self-destructive ways. And if we are punished and destroyed because of our sins, we have only ourselves to blame. We cannot blame Jesus on the day of judgement.
Jesus is still ever ready to help. The day of judgement has not yet come. “The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance” (2 Pet 3:9).
Who will receive the help of Jesus? The true story of Jesus and the Canaanite woman teaches us the kind of people Jesus will help. If we want Jesus to help us in our need, we must approach Him in our hopelessness, in our helplessness, and in deep humility.
I. JESUS HELPS THE HOPELESS
The Bible describes this woman in 3 ways: She was (1) of Canaan, (2) a Greek, and (3) Syrophoenician by nation. In other words, she was Gentile in every way. These 3 descriptions of her background tell us that she was (1) completely outside the circle of God’s special blessing experienced only by the chosen people, and (2) paganistic in every way—a worshipper of idols and practitioner of the occult. Know that the Canaanites had a very extensive pantheon of gods. They worshipped chiefly Baal and Baal takes on different forms. There were male and female versions of Baal with many other gods and goddesses of sex and war, and other sorts of deities. It was a religion that appealed to the lusts of the flesh. Their temples were filled with priestesses who served as prostitutes. They also offered human sacrifices.
Serving her gods has left her totally without hope. Instead of being helped she has been destroyed by her religion. It is not surprising that such dark heathen practices have resulted in her daughter being demon-possessed. It is possible that she had asked her pagan priests to save her daughter but evidently none of them was able to help. She was left totally hopeless. That is what Satan does, he seduces us to worship him, and finally when we take the bait, we are done for—he leaves us for dead.
II. JESUS HELPS THE HELPLESS
This woman was greatly troubled and deeply depressed. Every attempt to find help for her demonised daughter ended with a zero. No one could help. She was at her wits’ end. Her daughter, perhaps her only one, was very dear to her. Mark tenderly tells us that she was “a young daughter” or “a little daughter”— just in primary school.
Note that at first she identified her sorrow with that of her daughter—“Lord, take pity on me and my daughter.” But that appeal became more and more intense when she finally dropped all mention of her daughter and just cried out, “Lord, help me!” This tells us of her utter desperation. Not only her daughter, she too was in great pain and suffering. She realised her total helplessness in the situation—flesh could not conquer spirit. To fight the demons we need supernatural power that only God can give. She realised that Jesus was her only help.
Not only must a person who wants to be saved from sin and death consider himself totally hopeless, he must also see himself totally helpless. If we think that we can somehow save ourselves, or we have some strength but not enough, and simply need God to top up whatever strength we think we lack, we will not receive God’s help. God wants us to be 100% dependent on Him for our spiritual salvation. “Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us.” Spurgeon said, “If my garment of salvation requires only one stitch from me, I am lost.”
But being hopeless and helpless is not enough—for there are those who feel like that but instead of humbling themselves before the Lord to seek His salvation, their pride drives them to murder and suicide. Pride is self-destructive.
III. JESUS HELPS THE HUMBLE
The woman’s humility was displayed in the following ways: (1) She confessed who Jesus was. Look at her confession, “O Lord, thou Son of David.” For this to be uttered by a Canaanite woman was quite remarkable. If she had just called Jesus “Lord” that would not be so surprising, but she added, “Thou Son of David!” In other words, she acknowledged that Jesus was the Messiah, the King whom God promised David would come from his line. She was not an Israelite and yet she could know who Jesus truly was. She must have done a lot of homework and study. And through deep study and more importantly faith, she finally understood and realised that Jesus was the Messiah—God Himself who has come to save her from her sins.
(2) She worshipped at His feet. She humbled herself to the ground. She did not see it fit to speak to Jesus face to face, but fell at his feet. And (3) she was willing to be called a dog. Jesus said, “…it is not meet to take the children’s bread, and cast it unto the dogs.” The “dogs” Jesus referred to were pet dogs. In those days, the good bread was set on the table, but the spoilt bread would be set aside and used as cloth to wipe away dirt and this bread is then thrown to the ground for the dogs to eat. The Canaanite woman humbled herself to that level—“Lord, I understand that I am not among the chosen ones of Israel; I am willing to be like a dog in the house of the Jews, please at least feed me with these crumbs.”
Why did Jesus do all these? Not helping her immediately, and saying all those things to her? For 2 reasons: (1) to test her faith, and (2) to teach His disciples that non-Israelites had greater faith than the children of Israel.
Look at Jesus’ very loving and tender words to her, “O woman, great is thy faith.” Just one word from Jesus, and the demon was cast out of her daughter.
How much should we humble ourselves before God? 50%? 80%? 99.9%? No! God demands 100% humility and submission from us. If you are an unbeliever and you want God to save you, you must humble yourself to the dust just like this woman. If there is just a fraction of pride in you, you are lost.
As Christians, if we want the Lord to help us in our daily lives and answer our prayers, we must be totally dependent on Him to do His will and obey His Word. Sunday is the Lord’s day, but instead of coming to church, we go out to work or to play; how can the Lord bless us?
Conclusion
Do we humble ourselves before the Lord to confess that without Him we are indeed hopeless and helpless people? If we want Jesus to help us, we must come to him totally hopeless, totally helpless, and totally humbled!
