I want to expand a little bit in today’s lesson on the previous lesson where we asked the question, what about people who have never heard the Gospel? Of course, we clearly showed from Scripture that God is speaking to everybody, not necessarily through the Gospel. He’s speaking to them, however, through Creation and through their conscience and, sometimes, through calamities. He expects people to seek Him.
Jesus’ promise is that if you seek, you will find (Matthew 7:7). God is not hiding from anybody. In fact, He’s all but shouting at the top of His lungs at everybody, every day, to try to get their attention! But people just stubbornly, blatantly, go on in their sin and rebellion. People are dying by the thousands all around the world and people are living as if it’s never going to happen to them, not contemplating what’s going to happen to them after they die. Are they going to have to give an account for the life that God has given them?
All right. So Scripture says people love darkness. That’s why they don’t come to the light, but the devil can’t stop anybody who starts seeking God sincerely. God’s proven over and over again that He’s there with outstretched arms, just waiting, waiting patiently for people to come to their senses.
There are a number of Scriptures to prove this. One that really comes to mind right off the bat is the story in the Book of Acts about the Ethiopian eunuch (Acts 8:25-40). You might recall that story. He came all the way, apparently from Ethiopia in Africa up into the Middle East, into Jerusalem, because he was interested in seeking God. He had enough money that, while he was there, he purchased a copy of the Book of Isaiah, at least, and he’s reading that in his chariot on his way back to Ethiopia. So here’s a seeker. Here’s a man who’s looking for the truth and just happens to be reading what we would call the 53rd chapter of Isaiah, perhaps the most Messianic prophecy in the entire Old Testament! A prophecy about Jesus, the lamb of God, who would be bruised for our iniquities and crushed for our sins.
God sends Philip, an evangelist, to go join his chariot, and the Ethiopian eunuch asked the question, “Who is the prophet, Isaiah, writing about? Himself or somebody else?” So here’s a seeker and God keeps his promise, I’m going to send someone to tell you the truth. That’s what God expects everyone to be doing. Everybody ought to be seeking for the truth. That’s the least that they should be doing. I can assure you that anyone who sincerely seeks after the Lord, God’s going to make sure that person finds.
Maybe the greatest example of this, although some folks would, perhaps, disagree with me, would be Saul of Tarsus who was out persecuting the Church, but doing it totally in sincerity, thinking that he was serving God. “Seek and ye shall find.” I mean, God is so gracious and so merciful, Paul said, “I’m the chief of sinners, that’s why God showed me mercy, so He could use me as an example for how gracious and merciful He is” (1 Timothy 1:15-16). God met him on the road to Damascus and knocked him down, blinded him, and sent, then, Ananias to go lay hands upon him. Pual received his sight again and received the Holy Spirit.
All right. So there’s another example, and other examples in Scripture could be cited.
We hear these days about people, particularly people in Muslim countries, closed Muslim countries, where it’s very difficult for the Church to exist and evangelists and Church planters to go. Where the Church that does exist is, for the most part, secretive and underground. We hear of many stories of Muslims who are having dreams and visions of Jesus Christ. Quite often, we hear them report that Jesus says to them, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” Well, that’s straight out of Scripture, straight out of the Gospel of John. That’s entirely Scriptural!
Now, I have been in the Middle East, quite often, and I know quite a few Christian leaders in the Middle East. I’ve asked numbers of them this question: why does Jesus appear, do you think, to some, but not all? They always retort and they’ll say, “Well, first of all, you don’t know that he’s not appearing to all because you only hear about the ones who repent. Could he be appearing in dreams to people who, ultimately, don’t repent?” I said, “Well, that’s an interesting thought. That’s a very interesting thought.” So don’t make any assumptions that he’s only appearing to a limited number.
Then, they say, “But here’s our observation. The people, the Muslim people, to whom Jesus is most likely to appear are people that are sincere seekers.” I took note of that. I said, “Wow. That’s really cool, because Jesus promised ‘seek and ye shall find’.” Even if you’re in a closed country or you’re on some remote island somewhere, if you start seeking, do you think that God knows about it? He’s got a million angels, always looking down and seeing everything. The God who knows everything; do you think that the God who knows everything knows who is seeking Him? Sure He knows who’s seeking Him. So He can respond. So no matter where you are, you can’t run from the Holy Spirit. You can’t get away or go somewhere where you can hide from God. And God’s not trying to hide from anybody Himself. He wants everyone to know Him, to love Him, to serve Him and to share eternity with Him in His wonderful kingdom, ruled by Jesus Christ.
If that hasn’t happened to you yet, well, maybe that’s one reason you’re reading this short article right now. This is one more attempt; the Lord’s trying to reach you. Repent and start following Jesus because you believe that He is the Son of God, before whom you will stand one day!
Thanks so much for joining me. God bless!
