Forside Articles ”Are You a Lutheran? Or What Are You?”
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Skrevet af Jørn Nielsen   
Onsdag, 11. april 2012 14:42



The habitual practice of politely inquiring of each other´s denominational identity is relevant to most Americans, but believe me that game will soon be over.  In fact, it is over, but as persecutions for the sake of the gospel will also come this way and hit the spoiled Western world, the urgent question in religious matters will no longer be whether you are a Lutheran, Baptist, Catholic, Orthodox or whatever, but whether you are really a disciple of Jesus Christ or not.  The question will not even be if you are a Christian or a personal Christian (as the Norwegians put it), but whether you are following “the Lamb”?  So we may as well right  now be prepared to face this “provocative” challenge and solemnly adapt ourselves to what is, in the eyes of God, the real issue.

That dawned afresh on me last “silent night” as I was pondering on the word,

“These (i.e. the anti-Christian allies) will make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb will overcome them, for He is Lord of lords and King of kings, and those who are with Him are called, chosen and faithful.”  (Rev. 17:14).

I paused before the words, “those who are with Him”.  This is the crucial question that goes beyond any formal relationship to any “good” church.  Are we with Him or not?  Not if we are with this and that denomination, because that is possible without being with Christ and be “contemporary with Him” as Søren Kierkegaard used to say.  The moment of truth will certainly dawn for our part of the world also and we´ll face up to the real issue of faith.  Or do we think  that our country will be spared?  Do we fantasize about persecutions as some “specialties” only intended for “the third world” far, far away?”

“The Lamb will overcome”, yes, the Book of Revelation does speak of a “happy end” to His glory.  But victory in the lives of His followers is not equivalent to “success”.  The word says, “For your sake we are killed all day long;  we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.”  So the Christian life “with Him” is a death process  (which is what “dying” in 2 Cor 4:10 really means), “yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.”  Rom. 8:36-37.

You and I can´t help that we were not born in North Korea,  Somalia or other tough places, but we are not called to a different, “soft” standard of discipleship just because we happen to be Americans, British, Danes, Norwegians or whatever.

Clovis, CA, March 11, 2012 – jn

 
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