A Moment With Pastor Fred

Donald Grey Barnhouse was a pastor in Philadelphia in the mid-20th century. He tells of speaking to a young lady at the airline desk in Tokyo. She spoke Chinese, Japanese and English, obviously a very educated individual. Pastor Barnhouse asked her if she was a Christian. “No,” she said, she was a Buddhist. He asked more questions. She told him she had heard of Jesus – and a sacred book called the Bible but really knew nothing of the Christian faith. Then Pastor Barnhouse asked, “Do you love Buddha?” The very idea astounded her. “Love?!” She never had thought of that in connection with religion. Barnhouse went on with a brief explanation why Christians love the Lord Jesus.

1 Pet 1:8, “Though you have not seen him, you love him,” The apostle had seen the Lord Jesus, but his audience had not, neither have we. And yet they like us love Jesus. You simply can’t love Jesus too much. You can’t think about him too much, or thank him too much, or depend upon him too much. All our forgiveness, all our justification, all our righteousness, all of our blessings come from him.

Naturally people don’t love God, Oh, many folks love “a god,” but not the God of the Bible. The Apostle Paul states the sinful mind is hostile to God. In order for us to love Jesus a radical change inside us has to occur. “God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit,” Rom 5:5 NIV. One of the proofs of our conversion is that we love God. Our love for        Jesus is simply our response for his love to us. We love him because he first loved us.