Sunday School Teachers’ Meeting, 2005
The Work Jesus Carries Out Through Us
May 29, 2005
Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God. But made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross. Philippians 2:5-8
When I was a child, I lived in the very first “moim house” in our fellowship. As far as I remember, there was not a single occasion at that time when our whole family of six sat down together for a meal. There were always many elders visiting our house, so at mealtimes, I would hurry to be first in line for fear of the food running out. Then I would eat my food quickly, and run back to get some more. Even now, I tend to be a fast eater, and as a result, I still have a habit of eating and chewing my food too quickly.
The habits you form as a child stay with you all your life; it just comes naturally to you to repeat these habits. When I look back now, I can see I really was not in the habit of chewing my food well when I was a child. Since it was not very long ago that I learned about the importance of chewing food thoroughly, I need to concentrate on this every time I eat a meal. If someone had taught me when I was a child about chewing my food well—and about the matter of properly eliminating waste products from the body—and I had put these things into practice from an early age, I would probably be far more healthy and be able to be more active now.
I see this matter as being related to our Sunday school, which is the topic of our meeting here. I think when we are teaching our children about the Bible, if we stop at that, we are only fulfilling half our responsibility.
So I would like to ask you to think a little more deeply when you are working in the midst of fellowship. There are people who, delighted by the gospel, live only with God’s word. The question is, is that the correct way to live your life? Don’t we need to entrust ourselves completely, both our physical bodies and our thoughts, to God, just as God has control of our hearts?
When God told Abraham that a child from his own body would be his heir, Abraham believed Him, and God accounted it to him for righteousness (see Genesis 15:4-6). As a result of this faith, Abraham received Isaac, the son of promise. Then Abraham’s wife, Sarah, died. Later, Abraham married again in his old age. His second wife’s name was Keturah. Through Keturah, Abraham had several more children. Later, the Midianite Jethro, who would became the father-in-law of Moses, was also born of this lineage. When we consider that Abraham had this physical strength to increase and multiply, we can see that the Bible not only talks of spiritual matters, but also about the power of God that is able to uphold everything about us from our innermost parts to our external shell.
God formed Adam of the dust of the ground (see Genesis 2:7). We may think of “the dust of the ground” as being something like clay that you can knead with your hands, but it is made up of very fine particles. God made man of various elements to be found on this earth, in this world. In other words, man’s physical body was made up of the highest quality organic matter.
Given this fact and knowing the Bible, it is only natural that we should talk about health within our fellowship in the course of our lives. Indeed, it would be strange if we did not. Yet there are people who talk according to the ways of man and ask why we talk about about health in the church. I am concerned about what will happen to our fellowship if those who are teaching the Bible to our children have such attitude. Is it enough just to teach the content of the Bible? Along with the spiritual teachings of the Bible, shouldn’t they also be teaching the message that can bring physical blessings? If we set these matters to one side and continue to teach the content of the Bible alone, I think that later a problem will arise when it comes to understanding the Bible itself.
If you read the letter of James, you will probably understand clearly what I am saying. The letter of James talks about faith without works, but it is not referring to good deeds or acting according to the law. If you read this letter carefully, you will find faith together with works expressed clearly as obedience. Nevertheless, this obedience cannot be understood through our own human thoughts.
God told Abraham to sacrifice Isaac, his one and only son. What would you do if you only had one child in your family and God told you to offer that child as a sacrifice? In Genesis chapter 22, we see how Abraham overcame this situation and received a blessing. The Bible tells us clearly that Abraham received a tremendous blessing when his faith and his works went hand in hand. I think it is the same for us as we are living within this fellowship.
It was the same for Moses. When Moses led the Israelites out of Egypt, there were 600,000 men on foot, so it is estimated that there would have been about two million people altogether, including the women and children. As he led this multitude of people they came to a sea. If, at that time, God had sent along a ship or a cloud to help them, it might have been impressive, but God told Moses to lift up his rod and the waters would part. And that is what happened. How was Moses able to act in that way in such a situation?
We find accounts like this again and again in the Bible. When Gideon went out to war, he left behind all the hoards of his soldiers, and took only three hundred men with him. When David went out to fight with Goliath, he did not take with him weapons such as a sword or a spear; he went to a stream and selected five smooth stones and took those with him. When we read passages like these in the Old Testament, we can understand what the New Testament is saying about obedience.
There are people who read books like the letter to the Romans after they are saved, and they like it so much that they keep reading the New Testament over and over. When people like that hear lectures about health in the church they may think it is not right. The apostle Paul said very precisely, “having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets” (Ephesians 2:20).
He was talking about the church which stands on the foundation of the Old and New Testaments. It is only natural that the apostle Paul who said these words was also able to write “strengthened me” about health in 2 Timothy chapter 4 (see verse 17). The apostle John also wrote about this (see 3 John 1:2). So as teachers who teach our children, are you only going to provide them with knowledge of the Bible, or are you also going to teach them to be obedient, following the pillar of fire and the pillar of cloud when they can see it? This is a matter we need to think about.
Until now we have been through many difficulties as we live in the fellowship. Yet, even i
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