Generational Faith

I got up this morning with the prophet Zephaniah on my mind.  :)

One of the startling things about this Old Testament prophet (like others) is his family tree.
Zephaniah 1:1

The word of the LORD that came to Zephaniah son of Cushi, the son of Gedaliah, the son of Amariah, the son of Hezekiah, during the reign of Josiah son of Amon king of Judah:

Of all these names, you will probably recognize a couple.  Hezekiah mentioned here is the same King Hezekiah mentioned in several books of the Old Testament.  He was Zephaniah's great-great grandfather.  The kingly line of Hezekiah did not extend down through Zephaniah's ancestors, though.  Instead it went through Zephaniah's great-uncle, Manasseh, Amariah's brother.  And then, you may recognize the name Josiah, another godly, benevolent king of Judah.  Josiah was Zephaniah's cousin.  Let me throw another couple of non-relative names into the mix and then draw some parallels: the prophets Isaiah and Jeremiah.

Hezekiah's father was the infamous King Ahaz (not to be confused with Ahab).  His mother was a godly woman, a daughter of the prophet, Zechariah.  Her name was Abijah, often shortened to Abi.

Hezekiah's son, Manasseh, was the most evil king to ever rule over Judah, according to 2 Kings 21:11.  Tradition holds that it was he who murdered the prophet Isaiah, a close friend of King Hezekiah.  Manasseh also sacrificed his own sons on the fiery, pagan altar of the demon god, Molech.

Manasseh 's son was King Amon (who was evil and eventually assassinated), and Manasseh's grandson was King Josiah, another God-fearing king of Judah.

The prophet, Jeremiah, was a contemporary of Zephaniah's.

I guess you are wondering about the point of all this.  Here you go.

Many of us beat ourselves up because our children and/or grand-children and/or great-grandchildren do not embrace the faith in Jesus Christ, whom we dearly love.  We tend to see their wandering or outright idolatry as personal failures on our part.  The Christian community can often be judgmental toward Christian parents similarly.  The lineage I described above, however, points out that God gives no guarantee our offspring will follow Him.

Oh yes, there are general principles in Scripture and these hold true - - namely, that if you raise your children in a loving, God-fearing home, where Jesus Christ is honored the children will eventually embrace the faith.  However, this is not an iron-clad guarantee.  Each of the people mentioned above had the free will to either follow the God of their forefathers, as revealed in the Old Testament writings, or not.  In the sovereignty of God, some chose to do so; others did not.

I have a friend who told me that she prayed for 36 years for her father to come to Jesus Christ.  God answered her prayers and the man did, in old age, accept Christ as Savior.  Hallelujah for that!  Her example is inspirational and should motivate us all to pray for our friends and loved ones who are "giving Jesus the hand" - - - you know, when you hold your vertical palm toward someone as if to say, "Back off!"  These are they who have heard the truth of the gospel, yet have chosen to embrace some version of Satan's lies and deceptions as a poor substitute for the abundant life.

Indeed, prayer, along with living our faith out before them in love, are our only weapons of spiritual warfare in this spiritual battle for the souls of our most beloved.
Yet, there are times where, despite our best efforts and most fervent prayers, our loved ones make the choice to walk away from God's offer of salvation, or to delay it or to ignore it in favor of more enticing pursuits.

So, in a sense, there is no such thing as "generational faith".  Our descendants cannot suck saving faith out of their baby bottles.  Salvation is not automatically conferred, nor can it be assumed.  Parents who lackadaisically make that assumption often awake out of their complacent stupor to find that their children have become mired in deception and/or made the decision (whether overtly or quietly) to reject Jesus Christ.

I don't know what happened in the family line of King Ahaz.  It contains extremes of godliness and ungodliness, which, honestly, I find troubling.  Part of the explanation is that Satan was hell-bent on destroying the Davidic line, God's ordained Messianic line, using whatever evil methods he could employ.  (And, he didn't waste any time.  Have you looked at the sons of King David?!) While the birth of Messiah is not at stake in our family trees, Satan still hates the Christ-honoring family and delights in his attempts to destroy each and every one.

Few really like to read blog posts about intense spiritual warfare.  Yet, such is an indisputable legacy of the committed Christian, along with the rich legacy of God's precious promises.

Father, I can't explain or even discern how or why I was chosen and made the personal choice to follow You.  I was no better or worse a sinner than anyone else.  My parents were good faithful Christians, but they were not paragons of virtue by any stretch.  I am humbly grateful for my salvation because I recognize that You in your sovereignty chose me as much or perhaps even more than I chose You.  And so, I pray that You, in Your perfect will, in Your flawless sovereignty, will draw to Yourself those I love, those whom I long to see made right with You.  Through these prayers of supplication you both humble me and grow my faith in You, as I increasingly recognize that salvation is a work of Your Holy Spirit, not something contrived by the will of any woman or man.  I know this: that I am eternally grateful for Your perfect love for me.  A million thank-yous...In Jesus' name, amen.

Sources:

https://www.gotquestions.org/Book-of-Zephaniah.html
https://www.gotquestions.org/life-Hezekiah.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zephaniah

Behind the Veil: the Beauty of the Unseen

***
Good morning,

Are you burdened for someone today who does not know Jesus?   Perhaps, like me, there are those acquaintances, co-workers, friends, loved ones whom you pray for every day.  How should we pray for them, though?  I was thinking about that this morning in reading over yesterday's passage.  Let's look more carefully at 2 Cor. 4:3-5 again.

3 But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled only to those who are perishing, 4 among whom the god of this age has blinded the minds of those who do not believe so they would not see the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God. 5 For we do not proclaim ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your slaves for Jesus’ sake.

One way that the gospel is veiled by the evil one (Satan) is that people are deceived into believing that they can live "good enough" lives to be reconciled with God.  This prideful deception is at the root of legalistic religions.  Although there are legalists who claim the name of Christ, the root of Christianity is the concept of "grace" - - - that is, man is utterly sinful and completely incapable of by his own actions or will reconciling himself to God.  There was a powerful, little book written a few years ago entitled, How Good is Good Enough?  Answer: there is no one good enough (Rom. 3:23).
We need to pray that our loved ones see themselves as God sees them: lost sinners, in need of the Savior.

Another way that the gospel is hidden is Satan's deception that either
a) God does not exist.
or
b) There is no Heaven or Hell.
or
c) The Bible is just an ancient book.
This is what I call the "fairytale deception", and it is promulgated by academics in America today. The line goes like this:  "Only stupid people believe in Christianity.  You can't be intelligent and believe that." This is an extension of the philosophy of "rationalism".
I heard on the radio yesterday that Hillsdale College is offering to the public a free course on the life of C.S. Lewis, an English professor from Oxford University, England, who was moved to belief in Christ after doing an honest investigation.  No sane person would argue that this man was unintelligent.  99.9% of people who proclaim this lie from the devil have not done an honest investigation of the claims of Jesus Christ, as did Lewis, McDowell, Yuan, Butterfield, Strobel, and many, many others.  It is much more easy and convenient to flow along with certain segments of popular society, even the world of academia, and just .... flow along with the other lemmings.
Paul, himself, was extremely well-educated.
We need to pray that our prayer targets' eyes will be opened to this deception of false intellectualism.

A third way the gospel is hidden is that other people prevent sinners from coming to salvation in Jesus Christ.  Because those who claim the name of Christ (whether that is genuine or not) they are viewed as representatives of Christ.  Therefore, when one of them offends an unbeliever, those actions often "turn unbelievers off" to the message of the gospel.  Whether the offender is truly saved, a true, sincere follower of Jesus Christ, or not, is not the point.  Even true believers struggle with sin, although they don't practice it.  The point is that unbelievers let their impressions of and experiences with other people define (distort) their view of Jesus Christ.
We need to pray that God will open their eyes to the truth of Who Jesus is, and that past experiences don't hinder them to the fact that Jesus is all-sufficient.

These veils can be removed, through the power of the Holy Spirit.  Paul never says that those whose understandings are veiled can never come to a saving knowledge of the truth.  On the contrary, he states the opposite, later on in this chapter: (2 Cor. 3:16-17)

6 but when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed. 17 Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is present, there is freedom. 

You shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free.

John 8:32

Here is another beautiful truth.  Let's apply this to believers for a moment, because it is not just for the lost.  There are few passages that exemplify the Christian walk more than 2 Cor. 4:7-18.  But, let's hone in on the last two verses before we move on into our day.

17 For our momentary, light suffering is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison 18 because we are not looking at what can be seen but at what cannot be seen. For what can be seen is temporary, but what cannot be seen is eternal.

Christ followers, Believers, see things differently.  The reason we do is because we are possessed by Christ and filled with the Holy Spirit.  Accordingly, the Holy Spirit continues to "unveil" to us the beauty and majesty of God.  More and more, we focus on the spiritual, the "unseen".  The reason we do this is because the things easiest to see are only temporary, while spiritual victories (and losses) are forever.  We define "success" in a radically different way from how unbelievers define it.  We collect different "trophies", for different reasons.  The world focuses on how much a person can accumulate, for his or her own glory.  These include: wealth, fame, prestige, pleasure.  The Christian focuses on how much more he or she can know and become like Jesus Christ.  Accordingly, any "trophies" accumulated are for His glory and His alone.  It's a radically different outlook, producing a radically different life.  While the world chases sand, we share the liberating message that frees and feeds the soul.  The late English evangelist, Charles H. Spurgeon, understood this.

Let me give you a parable. In the days of Nero there was great shortness of food in the city of Rome, although there was abundance of corn to be purchased at Alexandria. A certain man who owned a vessel went down to the sea coast, and there he noticed many hungry people straining their eyes toward the sea, watching for the vessels that were to come from Egypt with corn. When these vessels came to the shore, one by one, the poor people wrung their hands in bitter disappointment, for on board the galleys there was nothing but sand which the tyrant emperor had compelled them to bring for use in the arena. It was infamous cruelty, when men were dying of hunger to command trading vessels to go to and fro, and bring nothing else but sand for gladiatorial shows, when wheat was so greatly needed. Then the merchant whose vessel was moored by the quay said to his shipmaster, "Take thou good heed that thou bring nothing back with thee from Alexandria but corn; and whereas, aforetime thou hast brought in the vessel a measure or two of sand, bring thou not so much as would lie upon a penny this time. Bring thou nothing else, I say, but wheat: for these people are dying, and now we must keep our vessels for this one business of bringing food for them." Alas! I have seen certain mighty galleys of late loaded with nothing but mere sand of philosophy and speculation, and I have said within myself, "Nay, but I will bear nothing in my ship but the revealed truth of God, the bread of life so greatly needed by the people." God grant us this day that our ship may have nothing on board it that may merely gratify the curiosity, or please the taste; but that there may be necessary truths for the salvation of souls. I would have each one of you say: "Well, it was just the old, old story of Jesus and his love, and nothing else." I have no desire to be famous for anything but preaching of the gospel. There are plenty who can fiddle to you the new music; it is for me to have no music at any time but that which is heard in heaven, -- "Unto him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood, to him be glory for ever and ever!"
from A Sermon, (No.1910), Delivered on Lord's-day Morning, July 18th, 1886, by

C. H. SPURGEON, at the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington, England

Father, to You, the Godhead Three-in-One, be glory, forever and ever!  Open our eyes, whether we are Yours or yet-to-be Yours, so that we can know the Truth, and so that the Truth may set us free!  In Jesus' name, amen.

Sources:

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_2_23?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=how+good+is+good+enough+by+andy+stanley&sprefix=How+good+is+good+enough%2Caps%2C319

http://redeeminggod.com/gospel-is-veiled-2-corinthians_4_3-4/

http://biblehub.com/library/spurgeon/spurgeons_sermons_volume_32_1886/the_heart_of_the_gospel.htm