Thriving in a Hostile Culture

Janet Parshall: So we'll just ask the Lord to give us a real spirit of refreshment as we go through this afternoon. I would like to start with prayer, if we could.

Our gracious heavenly Father, we thank You so much for the fellowship that we've had, for the friendships that we're making. But most importantly Father, we thank You for Your Word and we get to open it up and learn more about You, our great and glorious King. Father, we thank You. We're also very aware that coming to a conference like this is a time-out from real life. We left it. It will be waiting for us. And yet You are a great believer in time-out. There were times when Jesus went up to Bethany just to have a time-out. You took Elijah by Cherith Brook and You fed him there so he could have a time-out. And we know that Moses had a time-out for forty years, and Paul had a time-out for three years. So, Lord, we thank You for times-out where we're away with You. So may this be a real refreshing period for our souls. And may we come back more committed to the cross and more bold about the gospel. And we pray this now in Jesus' name. Amen.

I'm going to ask if you'd be so kind to open your Bibles to Jeremiah 29. When Nancy asked me what I'd like to talk about for a workshop, I said I'd like to talk about thriving in a pagan culture, in a hostile culture. And let me just set this by way of background. Let me tell you that a lot of what I'm going to talk about, not that I'm trying to promote a book, but I don't take notes so well, okay? So most of this, a lot of this is going to be from this book Buyer Beware. It just came out. In fact we wrote it with the idea that it would be released just in time for True Woman. We talked about releasing it before. I asked that it be released in time for True Woman so that we all could get into this study together. So don't worry about taking notes. It's in the book. Moody's got a booth out there in our resource center, so you can find most of it there. But I just want to give you some of the highlights. And to be honest with you, I hope it creates a hunger for you to want to dig deeper in this subject.

So let me set, by way of background. And it's a very interesting background because you and I, I would have to say, realize that we live in a pagan culture. So if we turn back the hands of time, the year is 626 B.C. That is ancient culture. There's a young man. The young man comes from a land-owning family. He grew up in a household where God was honored and loved, and his father was a priest. And this is pretty much the background story of Jeremiah.

And it's interesting, because Jeremiah lived in a very, very interesting period of history. He had seen a whole lot going on in Judah. And a lot of it wasn't very good. He had seen King Josiah turn the nation back to God after Josiah's father, Amos, and his grandfather, Manasseh, had fostered widespread idol worship. And I always find a hard time struggling with this when I'm reading the Bible, because I'm thinking, Wait a minute. These were kings that loved God, in theory, and God had put in a position of authority, and yet they turned their back on God. And I think to myself, How ridiculous it that? And then I turn around and I look in the mirror and I go, Yes, how ridiculous is that? Right?

I mean, that's why the Lord often refers to His people as being adulterous, which is kind of a hard word. But it means that we broke our first love—our relationship with Him. That's why my heart breaks for Oprah when she says she couldn't deal with the fact that God was a jealous God. Believe me, I want the unconditional lover of my soul to be jealous. I want Him to want me so bad that He doesn't want anyone else to have me. But, likewise, He wants me to seek after Him like no other.

So what had happened in the land of Judah is that these were men of God, kings of God. God had put them in authority who would eventually turn their back on God because they co-mingled the truth of God with paganistic rituals. And so the country, quite honestly, was in a mess. And then Josiah comes along. And during the period of the King Josiah, Jeremiah gets this message from the Lord. And he's given a ministry assignment. And I have to tell you that on the job listing of ministry assignments, most of us would not run to this one, because the assignment was this—Jeremiah was to remind the people that they were living in sin.

You know, I told Nancy, I said, "I bet you don't get a whole lot of hate mail unpacking the book of James." I said, "But you know, I get an awful lot of hate mail talking about some of the subjects that I do." There are warm and fuzzy ministries. There are not such warm and fuzzy ministries. But they're ministries nonetheless, and you have to go where the Lord calls you. So God calls this young man, a teenager, named Jeremiah, whose job is to say to the people of God, "You are living in sin."

Well, King Manasseh, by the way, and this is such a terrible story, had taken pagan worship to a whole new low. He actually had dabbled in the occult. He allowed the practice of witchcraft among God's people, and he was someone who was calling 1-900-YourPsychicFriends on an ongoing basis. He even practiced infanticide. He got to the point where he was so steeped in paganism that he actually sacrificed his own son to the pagan god Molech.

Now here's what we know from Bible archeologists, and it's absolutely amazing. They have dug up statues of Molech. And this was a huge statue—monstrously tall statue—that had the head of a beast. And then he had a hole in his stomach, and his arms were outstretched. And during their pagan rituals, they would start a fire in the belly of this pagan statue. And then they would throw the infants into the outstretched arms of these statues. Now you talk about barbaric and infanticide—that was exactly what was going on. History says something else. It says that when these actions were taking place, and we, as women, can really relate, drums would be beaten, lutes would be played, and they did that to specifically drown out the sounds of the children screaming as they were burning to death. Horrible!

Now this, by the way, was a king who knew God—the Lord God Jehovah—Yahweh. He knew right from wrong, but he had put his foot so far into the world he got sucked into the vortex of a pagan world. By the way, when these infanticide practices were taking place, the mothers were instructed to stand stoically by and not utter a word of dissatisfaction lest they be seen as disapproving of this sacrifice—just absolutely horrible. So the people of God had turned their back on Him.

King Josiah reversed some of the horrific practices, but Jeremiah knew it would only be a matter of time before they would once again turn their back on what God had taught them and they would go back to their wicked ways. So the Bible says that God appointed Jeremiah to be a prophet. Note the word "appointed." Now that's pretty good when you get your assignment for your job directly from God. And he was actually told by God, "You are going to do this."

Now God is not asking Jeremiah's permission when He gives him this appointment. And I think it's important for those of us when we're responding to the call that God has placed on our lives—and by the way, God has placed a call on every single one of our lives. You realize that every single one of us in on mission for God. And here's the problem with our thinking as daughters of the most High King. We think that we're not on mission for the Lord unless we are serving in the plains of Africa or we're serving in the jungles of New Guinea. The mission field, dear ones, is the ground between our own two feet, and we need to remember that when God calls us on mission for Him.

So God is not asking Jeremiah's permission. He's telling this teenager, "This is what you're going to do. You're going to take a message to My people that My people are living in sin. And if they continue to live in sin, there's going to be a very profound consequence." Now God does something else to Jeremiah. And He's really talking to us. He reminds Jeremiah that He knew him even when he was still living snuggled under his mother's heart. In other words, before Jeremiah had breathed his first, God knew him.

Do you know that truth applies to us? You know sometimes we think we are a nobody. I was talking before about our search for significance. We are so significant to our heavenly Father that He knew us before we were. That's pretty amazing, isn't it? You know it's not a religion. It is in every sense of the word a relationship. And we have a relationship with the living God who knows us by name, and He certainly knew Jeremiah. And God wanted to use him. So He appoints him to this task.

Jeremiah does what a whole lot of us do when God calls us outside of our comfort zone. He starts arguing with God. He starts telling God his credentials—like you have to tell God your credentials, right? But we do this on an ongoing basis. He starts offering up excuses why he's not the right man for the job. And you know, I think we do that on a regular basis. So Jeremiah says to God, chapter one verse six, "I do not know how to speak, for I am only a youth." Translated, modern translation, partial version: "Lord, I'm a teenager. I can't do this."

Now God doesn't care about his credentials. God cares about whether or not he is going to respond to the call in his life. The question before Jeremiah—as it is always the question before us when God calls us—is not the question of our age or even our eloquence. It is the question of obedience. Obedience. Are we being obedient to something that God has asked us to do?

But we're dug in. We're not doing it. We're telling God why our curriculum vitae, why our credentials don't qualify us for the job. And so we end up debating with Him; we end up offering excuses. And Jeremiah says, "I can't do this. I'm too young." And you and I might say, "I'm too young. I'm too old. I'm too uneducated. I'm too educated. I'm too rich. I'm too poor." We offer all of these excuses. And because He is so gracious with us, He sits and waits, and there are times when I can hear the Lord saying, "Janet, I'll wait. Are you done yet?" And then when I finally offer up the rest of my excuses, God will go back again and say, "Here is what I'm asking you to do." And then the question becomes, like it is for all of us, friends, is whether or not we are going to be obedient when He calls us.

So Jeremiah says, "Look. I don't know what I'm going to say." God, being slow to anger, is gentle but firm. And He says to the young man in verse seven of chapter one, "Do not say, 'I am only a youth'; for to all to whom I send you, you shall go, and whatever I command you, you shall speak. Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you to deliver you, declares the LORD'" (vv. 7–8).

Now God does something amazing—really and truly amazing—and I have to tell you as someone who sits in front of a microphone on an ongoing basis, I am particularly amazed by this. Because Jeremiah is grumbling about the fact that he says, "Look I'm a teenager, I can't do this." And then he's also concerned because he really isn't sure what he's going to say to the people. I mean it's really not a tough message. "You're living in sin. If you don't turn away from sin, the consequences are going to be dire." But he doesn't know what he's going to say. So God does something amazing.

The Bible says that God bent down and touched the lips of the prophet. Isn't that awesome? Talk about that intimate connection with the King. He literally touches—He didn't have to touch him. He could have boomed a voice from heaven. But that contact—that touching from God on the lips of Jeremiah was just another way of comforting this boy who was in obedience going to respond and say, "Yes, Lord." So he said, "Yes, Lord." Puts His hands on the lips of the teenager, and it's a reminder to us that God always, always equips us when He calls us.

"I am with you to deliver you," He said. That's important for us to remember. When we start offering up those excuses, those reasons for not being obedient, just stop and take a deep breath and understand that old saying that so many of us have heard for so many times in our life—God always equips whom He calls. So just trust Him. And I don't know about you, but I am so unbelievably grateful that God only uses fractured jars—fallen, frail people. I mean there are so many times when I think, Lord, You're God and I am not, as Dr. Henry Blackaby says. But boy, You want us to deliver Your message?

And 1 Peter talks about this. We are referred to as those cracked, earthen vessels, and yet we carry among ourselves—those of us who've accepted Jesus as our personal Lord and Savior—what the Bible calls "an imperishable message." Oooo, I get goosebumps just thinking about that. So we have the privilege, the overwhelming privilege of telling somebody the good news of Jesus Christ. And even though God knows that sometimes we're going to get in the way—that we are anything but good ambassadors for Him—He opens the door again and again and again for allowing the opportunity for us to be His ambassadors.

C.S. Lewis was right. He said, "Christians are the best argument for and against Christianity." And there are times when I know I besmirch His name by my behavior. My sinful nature gets in the way. But I will tell you that being an ambassador is a high calling. I often share this on the air, but we have a whole section of my town of Washington, D.C. called "Ambassador Row." They are the swankiest houses. They drive fancy cars who have drivers, and they've got license plates that say "Diplomat." They get the best seats in the House of Representatives for the joint session when they do the State of the Union. They get the best seats at the restaurant. But their primary job is to advance the values of the country they represent.

That's us! Our primary job is to advance the principles and the message of the gospel of Jesus Christ. And He chose us. I mean that, to me, is amazing. I am so unqualified! And yet, what we read in Jeremiah is, "It's not about you. It's about Him." And in our lack of qualification, we are utterly qualified every time we say, "Yes, Lord."

So Jeremiah says, "Yes, Lord." And he ends up having a rather interesting time—remember just a teenager when he starts this out. And there had to be times when he thought, Lord, you know, thanks for calling me, but.... You know it's kind of like that wonderful line out of Fiddler on the Roof where Tevye is having one of these marvelous conversations with the Lord. And he said, "God, I know we are a chosen people, but couldn't You have chosen someone else?" And I'm sure there were times when Jeremiah said, "Couldn't You have chosen someone else?" So he's got this basically "repent or die" message. You know the guys with the sandwich board? That's pretty much what his calling was.

So he obeyed. Along his journey, he's attacked by his brothers. He's beaten by a priest, put in stocks. He's publically humiliated by a false prophet. He's put in prison by a king. He's threatened with death by government officials, and he's thrown down a cistern where he almost drowns in the mud. Now following Jesus—note to file—nowhere in this precious book does it say, "Following Jesus is going to be the easiest thing you have ever done." And if you find that verse—JanetParshall@gmail.com. Would you send it to me, please? Because I'd love to be able to follow that verse.

In fact, it says exactly the opposite. Jesus reminds us that in following Him we might be persecuted for His namesake. And then He says, "And if that happens, guess what? It's a blessing." And then He said, "In this life we were going to have tribulation." And then He said, "If you're going to follow Me, deny yourself." That's tough in a self-centered world! "Deny yourself. Take up your cross and follow Me." Nowhere does it ever say, "It's going to be easy." But it will always be glorious.

Stephen Curtis Chapman did a song years ago that just resonated with me called "The Great Adventure." And that's what this is. This is the great adventure of following Jesus Christ. Never boring. Never without adventure. Never without challenges. And the end, it doesn't get any better than that. We are absent from the Body and present with the Lord. That's pretty amazing.

So Jeremiah could have run fast in the opposite direction, but when God called him, he didn't. Instead he obeyed, just as we must. A.W. Tozer said something so good. He said, "The true follower of Christ will not ask, 'If I embrace this truth, what will it cost me?' Rather he will say, 'This is truth. God help me to walk in it. Let come what may.'" Wow! Good stuff. We need to go back and read those saints of old. They've got great lessons for us.

So Jeremiah didn't look back. God used this teenager in a magnificent way. And this youth loved God more than he loved the world. And into the world he went in obedience for the God he loved. It's pretty neat. The same challenge is for us. You know, we read about all of these figures in Scripture and we think, Well, those were spiritual superstars. No they weren't. They were ordinary people that were used sometimes with extraordinary means to serve a supernatural God. And the opportunities they were afforded are exactly the same opportunities we are afforded if we will simply say, "Yes, Lord." That's the question. So he said, "Yes, Lord."

Well, so I want to talk about thriving in a hostile culture, because here's what happens. They end up being taken captives. Right? They turn their back on God exactly as God said they would do. Jeremiah preached this message. They get taken off to Babylon. And they're taken captives for what is going to be a very, very long period of time—seventy years in a foreign land with foreign buildings and foreign food and foreign customs and a foreign language and foreign gods. And it was not home at all. "Dorothy," they could have said, "we're not in Kansas anymore." And it was very difficult for them.

Now if you turn back the hands of time, don't go far back to Jeremiah. Fast forward. We'll go up in the timeline a little bit and we'll look at the time period between 354 and 430 A.D. Enter a man by the name of Augustine. Augustine had a mom that was a Christian, but he had a dad who was a pagan. And he, as a result, was a man in conflict. He went to the finest schools. He loved the world very, very much, and he became engaged to a woman, carried on a long-term love affair with another woman while he was engaged. She had his son. And then started an affair with yet another woman, and he had an insatiable sexual appetite—but his soul was starving. So Augustine had a mind that loved to embrace philosophy, and he had a body that sought sin.

He was not the only one, by the way, to struggle in this area. I take great comfort in reading what the great Rabbi Paul said. He said, "For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. . . . Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?" (Rom. 7:18–19, 24). Ooo. Been there, done it, right? I mean, can you not feel that warfare going on all the time? You want to do the right thing and you find yourself and then you go, "Oh. Oh!"

And I'm going to be honest with you. I'm going to be transparent, because we're on our pilgrim's progress together. This is where Satan gets a toehold into my life. When I have a sin, like Paul does—when you have that warfare and I fall down and I go boom and I do what I'm not supposed to do and I ask the Lord to forgive me—I keep thinking truly there is some point when the Lord is going to say, "You've used up your allotment." Right? That's a lie from the pit of hell.

Can we encourage one another in that area? Because "if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness" (1 John 1:9). And there is no footnote in any version of the Scripture that says, "Only up to 114 times." So we need to remember that that promise is there so when we do, we go back to Him, and we can say, "Lord, quicken me. Help me from falling. Renew in me a right spirit. Complete in me the good thing which You have begun. Give me the strength to overcome." And that's that breathing in and out—that intimacy with Him to be able to go to Him and say, "Daddy, I'm sorry. I blew it again. Give me strength and wisdom." And Lord willing and with His enabling and the power of His Holy Spirit, as we progress in maturity as women of the Word, true women, perhaps we'll see ourselves having victory in that particular area of our life. But sisters, it's a process. So don't allow Satan to whisper in your ear, "Are you kidding? You've maxed your credit card of forgiveness." That's from hell. That's not from the Word.

So Augustine is sitting in a garden one day. And he hears a little girl chanting, "Take and read. Take and read. Take and read." And he opens up a Bible that he has, and he immediately turns to Romans 13. This is all documented history. And he reads Romans 13 and it says, "Let us behave properly as in the day, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual promiscuity and sensuality, not in strife and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, in regard to its lusts" (vv. 13–14).

Dear Augustine. Love, Jesus. Wow! Well, that resonated in his heart. This is what the Word does, doesn't it? Sometimes it could have your name, "Dear Janet. Love, Jesus." I mean when you read His Word, so much of that just goes right to your heart. Well, immediately he became a follower of Jesus. This heathen has repented, followed Jesus Christ, eventually becomes the Bishop of Hippo—again, this will all be on the test, by the way—in 395. So when the Visigoths sacked Rome, the question arose as to whether or not Rome would have survived if it hadn't been such a hub of paganism. Interesting question. If the Christian God was real, why didn't He protect Rome from the invading barbarians? And here was the first rumblings of the question, "How does a Christian define the relationship between the Church and the secular world around them?" The writer of Ecclesiastes is right. "There is nothing new under the sun." So here it is 354 A.D., and it's that whole idea of what is the Church's relationship with the world. And now we are in the twenty-first century, and we are still asking ourselves the same question.

So out of that struggle, Augustine penned an extremely important classic called The City of God. And in this book, he describes not one but two cities. One he calls the "City of God" and the other he calls the "City of Man." And the City of God is obviously our eternal home when we accept Jesus Christ as our personal Savior. It is our real home, and that is when real life begins as C.S. Lewis says, "We will finally be out of the shadowlands and in the presence of our glorious King." But the City of Man represents the temporal kingdoms and cultures and societies of this life.

Now the cities are different, but they're not cut off from each other. And that's an important point. Augustine said that the City of Man was made up of both sinners and saints, those of us who have accepted the Lord as our Savior. One group was heaven bound. The other was bound for hell. And if you check your passport, if you're saved, it says "Home destination: heaven." But in order to get to "Home destination: heaven," you need must pass through this world. We can't go around it. That's where we are called to go. So in Hebrews we read, "But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God; for he has prepared a city for them" (11:16). Isn't that marvelous? So there is a City of God, but right now we are temporarily residents in the City of Man. "How then," Frances Schaffer said, "shall we then live?"

Augustine defined the interaction between the believer and the fallen world on the basis of two Scriptures. First Timothy 2:1–2 says, "First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgiving be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way."

If you look that verse up, I double, triple dare you to find an asterisk in your Bible notes that says, "Only if he belongs to your political party. Only if you like the way he or she voted on a particular piece of legislation. Only if he or she belongs to the same political party that you belong to." Not there. Irregardless. Immaterial. We are to pray for those in authority. And I think we needed a little extra nudge here, so when Paul is giving his tutorial to his young student Timothy, he reminds us that there is a benefit for us when we do that. "We, then, get to lead peaceful and quiet lives, godly and dignified in every way." In other words, "Yes, you are praying for those in authority. But there is a benefit for you when you do it. So do it."

So let me encourage you, particularly as we are starting a very interesting election cycle—I have no notes on that whatsoever—that we pray for those in authority. It doesn't make any difference. We pray for them. That is an admonition. It is not an opt in/opt out clause. The women of the Word pray for those in authority. And by the way, I don't think that's relegated just to the United States. I think we need to be praying for those in authority. I think the new president of Egypt needs to be prayed for. I think the leader of Syria needs to be prayed for. I think Benjamin Netanyahu needs to be prayed for. I think Vladimir Putin needs to be prayed for. I think the list goes on and on and on.

So Augustine knew that even an unbeliever wanted personal peace, and an external peace could bring calm and order to a society. So Paul instructs Timothy to pray, even if they are bad leaders. Christians, by the way, interestingly, when Paul penned this letter to Timothy, Christians didn't have a single role in government at the time. So no Christian was serving in the Roman Empire at all, but the Church nonetheless was told to pray for those in authority—which meant Nero. Nero was in authority in Rome at that time.

Do you know who Nero was? I mean if you have ever studied any of the leaders of Rome, oh my goodness. Nero blamed the Christians for everything! When a fire started in Rome, you've heard the old saying when we were little kids, "Hey, he fiddled while Rome burned." Well, he did a whole lot more than that. He blamed the Christians on starting the fire in Rome—made them the scapegoat. And when he took prisoners out of the Christian community—and he did that on a regular basis—history records that he would lash their bodies to a stake, he would pour pitch on their bodies, and then he would set them on fire, and he would use them as lamp lights as he drove his chariot naked through the streets of Rome. And Paul says, "Pray for those in authority." Wow. Wow! That begins to understand the gravitas, the weight of that admonition to pray for those in authority.

Well, Augustine's second verse comes from Jeremiah 29:7 where the children of God are told to "seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the LORD on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare." We believers are to seek the welfare of the city. What does that mean? I'll unpack that in a little bit. Augustine was right when he noted that for the time being the two cities were intermingled—City of God, City of Man. And he said, "As long as the two cities are intermingled, we also make use of the peace of Babylon." What did he mean by that?

By the phrase "by the peace of Babylon," he meant the temporal peace of the meantime, which is shared by the good and the bad alike. So if Christians can help those in authority by praying for them, if they can live lives of personal peace and in so doing create a cultural peace, it is advantageous not only to the saints but to the sinners as well. So you see this interconnection. We have dual citizenship. We travel through this world as aliens and strangers. We recognize the intermingling between the two cities—the two kingdoms. We can't shun this temporary kingdom for the sake of the eternal kingdom to which we are bound.

Now we hear the phrase oftentimes "politics and religion don't mix." Couldn't agree more. Couldn't agree more. Change the verbiage. Does my relationship with Jesus Christ have an impact on the kind of people I'd like to see elected to office and the type of public policy I would like to see passed? Answer: Yes. Yes. So I think Satan has done a marvelous job of paralyzing the Church thinking that somehow it's "us" and "them." And we forget this idea of the intermingling. Listen friends, we know that we're in but not of the world. And yet that world is the very mission field He called us into.

You know when Jesus is having that marvelous prayer up in the upper room in John 17—and how I thank God that He allowed you and me to peer into that conversation. It's a conversation between Jesus and His Abba. He could have left that out, and He didn't. And Jesus is praying for His disciples, and He's praying for us. And He says something profound. He said, "My prayer is not that you take them out of the world. Protect them from the evil one. Sanctify them with thy word. Thy word is truth." So here's Jesus telling His Dad on His way to Calvary, "You're not going to take them out of the world. Just protect them, and let them know My word when they go out there."

That's our admonition today. And yet we don't prepare for the transcultural missionary experience of telling that person over the back fence or down the street or in the carpool or in the office about Jesus Christ because they're of the world and I'm not. When you think about it, there's a kind of arrogance in that. And I think the reason why we've lost that zeal is because our heart is no longer broken for people who are on their way to hell. Now that's old-fashioned, uncomfortable, not particularly encouraging talk for the twenty-first century. But it broke God's heart so much He was willing to give up His own Son. So we need to get serious about that again.

So are there practical ways to thrive in a hostile culture? Yes. And the answer to that obviously is found in God's Word. So now we're at Jeremiah 29. And Jeremiah 29 is this marvelous letter. Emissaries are being sent to Babylon. Through the Holy Spirit, Jeremiah takes this dictation, and he is to give a letter to the captives. These captives are going to be in Babylon for over seventy years, and there are 3,023 Jews who were taken to Babylon in 597 B.C. as captives. This letter dictated by God, entrusted to Jeremiah, was a set of instructions of how to live and not just survive but thrive while in captivity.

Friends, I don't think you and I need to take much time convincing each other that we live in a pagan society. We live in a sin-sick, fallen world. And for all intents and purposes, you could say, "We've been taken captive as well." Now we belong to the City of God but we're currently and temporarily living in the City of Man, and those are exactly the people that God calls us to minister to. Seems very bizarre from a mortal's perspective, but that is God's good and perfect plan, isn't it? So our job is to go, and we can go not just by telling but by living such lives of distinction. The Bible says, "Live such good lives among the pagans that they may see your good works, and it will honor and glorify your Father on the day He comes to visit us" (1 Pet. 2:12).

I've been down in the catacombs in Rome, and do you know that fish we put in the back of our car? We kind of like that. You know it identifies us as Christians. They did that because if they openly in the first century identified themselves as Christians, they'd be eaten by the lions or they'd be lashed to those posts by Nero. So they would make the mark of the ichthus as a way of quietly identifying, "Are you one, too? Are you one, too? Me, too." They'd draw it, and they wouldn't say anything. And they weren't called "Christians." They were called "Followers of the Way" because Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth and the life. No man comes to the Father but by me." They were so distinctive in their lifestyle, but the world knew whose they were. Pretty dramatic.

So the instructions are very practical in this letter. They're just as applicable today as they were when the Babylonians held the people of God captive in a pagan, fallen culture. In chapter 29 verse 5 we read this first instruction to the captives, and it says simply: "Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce." "Really, God? I'm a captive, and You want me to plant a garden? Really? And I'm supposed to eat what I plant? I'm a prisoner. Why am I planting a garden?" Well, God has some very practical ways. Why would He tell His people who are held captives to plant a garden?

Well, let me start first with some general principles. God loves gardens. Did you know that? He loves gardens. His Book starts out in a garden. His Book ends in a garden. Did you realize that? His Son offers Himself up to His Father in a garden. I mean gardens are huge. When you go through the Bible there are spice gardens, herb gardens, fruit tree gardens, enclosed gardens, ones with fountains, gardens for idol worship, gardens for burial. The list goes on and on and on. That Tree of Life was in the garden at the beginning. It's going to be in the garden at the end. God loves gardens.

Now I have to tell you. Craig and I had a very interesting experience. We were invited to meet His Royal Highness, the Prince of Wales, Prince Charles, because he was into the environment and he is actually trying to co-opt Christians in the environmental movement. But that's a topic for another day. I got a chance to see his gardens. And it was interesting to see at Highgrove. He comes in on a helicopter. Now what kind of a footprint did that leave on the environment there? I digress. (laughter)

So we got to walk through his gardens, and they are absolutely stunning. He has a Muslim garden. He has a Buddhist garden. He has a garden that has a little house that was actually put there in the year 2000 as a way of thanking God for the year 2000. He has all kinds of gardens that look like something out of Alice in Wonderland. He's got spice gardens. They are manicured like really you think you've gone down the rabbit hole. It's Alice in Wonderland. It's absolutely unbelievable—it's breathtaking. And he's proud. He is very proud of his gardens and the work that he's done. And all I could think of was, Pfft! This is just a prince. Wait till I see what the King's gardens look like. Amazing. So God loves gardens.

But God is also a very practical God. I love this about our Father. The apostle Paul writes to the church at Thessalonica and says to "attend to your own business and work with your own hands, just as we commanded you, so that you may behave properly toward outsiders and not be in any need" (1 Thess. 4:11–12). Oops. Oops. Interesting, because what it's saying is "you're supposed to look well to the ways of your household." And I understand tough economic times. But let's just start with God's principles first and don't superimpose your circumstances for the moment. Start with the transcendent principles.

Very simply what it says is "you don't work, you don't eat." And work is a blessing; it's not a curse. Work is a mission field. It's an opportunity to honor and glorify the Lord. "But you don't know my job." I don't care. It's a mission field, right? It's where God's got you for the moment. And we can turn that job that we don't want. "Oh, more data. Oh, this is so exciting." Oh, really? Well, take the girl next to you out to lunch. And start listening to what she wants to talk about, and be like Phillip in his encounter with the Ethiopian eunuch and listen with the ears on your heart and ask the Lord to open up more opportunities to share with her, to listen, to meet her where she's at so you can gently take her where she needs to go. All kinds of opportunities.

So that was what God was saying to the Babylonian captives, to the believers of the church at Thessalonica, and that's what God is saying to us today. God wants His children to work, to produce and provide, and He says that gardening and harvesting go hand in hand. So how do you practice the principle of the harvest?

Well, you know, we have this saying, "You reap what you sow." And we almost always cast that in a negative light. But sometimes you sow good stuff, and you want to reap the good stuff that you sow. One in ten Christians give regularly to the Lord. That's one in ten. That's "giving to the Lord a tenth" to a whole new level, isn't it? We should be giving abundantly. We need to consider work a blessing regardless of what it is, and we should be preparing at the same time for famine.

There's an interesting individual in Acts 11 named Agabus. You don't know much about him other than the fact there's a famine that is coming to Jerusalem. And so the church in the first century is told to prepare. And the famine hits the church in Jerusalem harder than any other church. So it's a beautiful picture of the church today, because some churches gave overwhelmingly to support the church in Jerusalem in the famine and others went, "No, the famine might hit us. So, no, no. Next time." They didn't give. And the Lord watched all of that. And sure enough there was a huge famine. But the church at Philippi was exemplary. They gave again and again and again. So I want to encourage us, again. Are we not followers of the Way? Are we not daughters of the Most High King? Are we not ambassadors for the Lord?

So here we are. Newsflash. We're going into some really tough economic times. We've been doing a downward spiral and honestly, the way the wind's blowing, it's probably going to get worse before it gets better. They are going to sneeze in Spain and the Dow is going to fall. I mean, that's how interconnected it all is. Right? So the bottom line is: Famine is coming.

Now we're women of the Word. We've got one of two responses. "Help!" is not one of them. So what we do is we say, "Okay, Lord. You've given me a peace that passes all understanding—not like the world gives. It's a completely different and distinct peace. Lord, You said You would supply all my needs—not wants—needs according to Your riches in glory through Christ Jesus. Father, I trust You. And You're my Daddy. You said that if I asked You for bread You wouldn't give me a stone. So, Father, I don't know where my next meal is coming, but I'm trusting You."

This is "faith walking," ladies. And yes, it is scary stuff, but you know if we could see, why would we need Jesus. "I'll get back to You. I can take it from here." It's when we can't see that next step that we have to fall into His everlasting arms of love and say, "Carry me. I don't know where I'm going, but I trust You completely." Ladies when you cannot see the hand of God, learn to trust the heart of God.

So we're in famine. And so plant. Part of the harvest of our gardens even if we are planting in captivity, and you and I are in captivity, is to go directly to the work of the Church regardless of where our finances are. Whether culture is under the weight of famine or not is immaterial. Plant your gardens. Be good stewards of the harvest. Plan, plant, and prepare.

Now imagine what the Babylonians thought watching the people of Judah put down roots while planting gardens. That must have been an interesting site for them. Imagine what the modern Babylonians of today think of us—a people held captive by a hostile, pagan culture, as they watch us live our lives. Are we conveying a message of complete and total trust in God even under the weight of the crushing economic famine? So plant our gardens and eat the produce and be obedient.

So then Jeremiah gives the second instruction to the captives. He says, "Marry and have sons and daughters; find wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage, so that they too may have sons and daughters. Increase in number there; do not decrease" (29:6). Whoa! You're in captivity, and He wants you to get married and breed. Okay, that's interesting. "Why would He want—but that's more captives, isn't it God? Why would we want to do that?" And yet they are going to be there so long that a generation will come and go—seventy years. People will be born in captivity. People will be dying in captivity. And yet He says, "I want you to get married. And I want you to have children. And then I want you to tell your kids to get married and have children." Think about it. Foreigners in a strange land held captive for seventy years, a generation comes and goes, and they're being told, "Get married and have kids."

So now, fast forward to the twenty-first century. We, the Church, held captive in a pagan, hostile society. Newsflash—marriage is under attack in this country. Unbelievably. It's ridiculed on TV, I mean, really. Unbelieveable. Sex in the City—pfft—who needs a man, right? Married with Children. I mean the list just goes on. A Normal Family. I mean this stuff is just reprobate. The divorce rates in this country through the roof. Books like Fifty Shades of Grey fly to the top of the bestselling list. It's called—you know what the word for this is? It's called "mommy porn." Oooh. Mommy porn. By the way, do you know where she got this idea? From the Twilight series. That makes perfect sense. Start with the demonic, and it only gets more demonic, you know? So it starts with the Twilight series, and its being mostly read by women over the age of thirty. And now they are talking about turning it into a movie. So what is horrific will become even more horrific.

Co-habitation at an all-time high; abortion rates off the charts. Now we raise our fists toward heaven like Nimrod, and we challenge God on the very definition of family. We're having a robust debate in this country as to whether or not family is made up, as God said, of one man and one woman. And now we're making up our mind as we go along. Did you hear what they did in Brazil? Brazil's notary public has granted Brazil's first civil union to a trio. One man, two women, they are calling it—now this has got to be a made-up word, so be patient with me as I try to say this—polyfidelitous union. That means you are faithful to many? That would be an oxymoron, wouldn't it? I mean how can you be faithful to many? But you know, you are making it up as you go.

Isn't it interesting how we take this? Dwight L. Moody calls this "the straight stick of truth." Isn't it interesting every time we pick up that stick and man does what is right in his own eyes, that stick gets closer and closer and closer to the gates of hell? We never move it closer to heaven. We always do it closer to hell. Why? Because we have a spirit of rebellion. "Hath God said?" It's still the same lie, isn't it? "Did God say it's a man and woman? Who cares? Right?"

Now we've got this three—and by the way it's only a matter of time. Do you know there is a brand-new film coming out now on incest? Oh, you know that this is coming, right? Incest. Here's what the director of the film said: "I have no experience with incest. We've heard a few stories where brothers and sisters were completely absolutely in love with one another. You know, what? This whole movie is about judgment and the lack of it and doing what you want. Who gives a 'blank' if people judge you. I'm not saying this is an absolute. But in a way, if you're not having kids, who gives a 'blank.' Love who you want. Isn't that what we say? Gay marriage. Love who you want. If it's your brother or sister, it's super weird. But if you look at it, you're not hurting anybody except every single person who freaks out because you are in love with another person."

Closer and closer to the gates of hell. Now the minute you take God's model and you start redefining it, there is no stopping. So you need to go back and you need to look at why marriage is so crucial and why this is not a political debate. It may be argued in the halls of Congress. It may be battled in the State House. It may be adjudicated by American judges. Dear ones, this is a spiritual battle. Oh it is a battle royale. And we need to understand the primacy of marriage to the heart of God.

You hardly wade into Scripture up to your ankles and God institutes marriage. He does it before business, before education, before government. The first institution—and He does it in a place of perfection. Hint number one: pretty close to the heart of God. And He defines it for us so we didn't have to make it up and stumble in the dark. "Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path." And He says marriage is one man and one woman. His Son reaffirms that model again.

Marriage, it has been said, is how the Bible begins and how the Bible ends. It is paramount to the heart of God. And it is about a whole lot more than about companionship and procreation. It is about the very model of Christ's love for us. He is the Bridegroom. We are the Church, His bride. And if you study the old Hebraic rules for weddings, it follows jot and tittle what Jesus is doing. He goes to prepare a place for us. He's coming back to claim His bride. He loves us so much He was willing to lay down His life for us. So step back, put on your spiritual glasses, and now look at the battle for marriage in a completely different way. It isn't about winning points or political party platform. It's about Satan still asking the same question, "Hath God said?" And we need to understand the attack. (applause)

When we see that Satan doesn't want marriage to exist—he wants marriages to fall apart. He wants it to be radically defined. Because if he does that in his growling, he thinks what he's doing is promoting the lie that Christ really didn't love the Church. Can you see it? Suddenly now it all changes. Now you're going, "Well, okay, so maybe it looks sometimes like it's wearing a costume of politics and sometimes it looks like it's wearing the robe of the judge, but it's still the enemy seeking whom he may devour. "Hath God said?" So he goes after this model of marriage. This is spiritual warfare.

Jeremy Taylor, great clergyman from the 1600s said, "Marriage is the mother of the world. It preserves kingdoms and fills cities and churches and heaven itself." Jeremiah tells the captives to marry and have children to create stability—marriage does that. Social science data—through the roof—cornerstone of any society, creates stability, keeps women out of poverty. I mean I could give you social science till the sun sets. All the data is there that affirms and affirms and affirms how marriage is beneficial to a culture. And God knew that way before there were think tanks in Washington. Part of the reason why they are to marry and have children is to create stability for a captive people and for the culture at large. That's what our marriages should do.

Oh, dear ones, you talk about being an ambassador for Christ. Can we start in our homes? I am tired of debating homosexual activists who go, "Look at the divorce rate in your world." And guess what? I don't have a retort for that. I want our answer to be "that we live lives with such distinction, we silence the mouths of our accusers." (applause) So we look well to the ways of our own household. And that's tough stuff. When you think about it, you put two sinners under a roof and say, "Now live happily ever after." Right! Right! I like what Ruth Graham said. "Did you ever consider divorcing Billy Graham?" "No. Murder, yes. Divorce, no." I understand that!

It's also about reminding the world that children are and always have been a blessing. That's profoundly important. I hear young people today saying, "Well, you know, I don't know if I want to bring children into a sin-sick world." What part of giving birth did we never bring kids into a sin-sick world? Every one of us gave birth in a sin-sick world. Our mommas gave birth to us in a sin-sick world. And should the Lord tarry, our grandkids and their kids will give birth in a sin-sick world. We live lives of distinction. We are living ambassadors for a King in a hostile culture. And children are and always will be a blessing. A Christian marriage can and must be a witness for God. His sovereignty and His imminent return to a sin-sick world turned upside down.

So plant gardens, eat what you produce, marry and have kids, and then He gives the next directive. "Seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the LORD for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper" (Jer. 29:7). Welfare is an interesting word. It comes from the old English word welfaren. It means being or doing good. And here comes the cultural engagement part that is so challenging. Jeremiah is not asking for the captives to go hide in their holy huddles. The call to seek the welfare goes out to all the captives. If you're going to seek the welfare of the city, you have to have some sense of what the city needs. And you can't do that without going out there.

Frances Schaffer said that we should start with what he called "pre-evangelism." He meant you started on the outside of the culture, and you moved in. So what that means is just because you're in the carpool, you don't necessarily have to give them a copy of the Four Spiritual Laws. When you're in the carpool, you can say, "Hey, did you see that TV show last night? Wow! The guy said that he died. And I started thinking myself, What happens when I'm going to die? You know, what's going to happen when you die, do you think?" And we listen for these opportunities.

Let me share one that I had, because I certainly don't have all the answers by any stretch of the imagination. But as I shared with you earlier, I don't know why God keeps calling me into these debate formats. There are a lot smarter people out there, and they're probably sharper on their toes than I am. And I get this call and my response, truthfully, is "Lord, here am I. Send Aaron." (laughter)

But I can't tell you that when God calls you, trust Him for the equipping unless I truly believe that, and I've seen that in my own life and it's true. So I get this call from Barry Lynn who's the executive director of American's United for Separation of Church and State, and he says, "I want you to be a part of the panel discussion (which is code for debate). And I want you to discuss a couple of new films that the actor Matthew Modine has made. And we're going to have a few other panelists and yourself" (which meant, yet again, the deck is stacked, it always is).

So I get there, and on the platform is the executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union, the former head of the National Council of Churches now the head of Common Cause—both very left of center groups—and Barry Lynn and the actor Matthew Modine. Matthew Modine has just made three new films, including Jesus Was a Communist. I'm called to debate whether or not Jesus was a communist. (laughter) And my first thought was, Lord, You've got to be kidding! I mean really. Jesus was a commie, and I laugh. I mean this is what I'm telling you. When I tell you this about the Lord, these are my conversations with my Father and I'm sure He's sitting there going, "Talk to me when you're done, Janet." (laughter)

So when I'm finally done laughing and chortling and thinking how utterly ridiculous this is, oh boy, the Lord, as He always does, just touched my heart in such a tender way and He said, "Janet, most of these people have never met a born-again Christian. They talk about them. They write letters about them. They write public policy against them. But how many of them have ever met a believer? Right? You go, and you represent Me." And I thought, Okay. Well, Lord, I don't know necessarily that it's going to be a pleasant experience. But to live is Christ, to die is gain. (laughter). So okay.

So I go, and of course they're all brilliant. They're all Harvard and Yale-eze, you know, and I'm going okay. They're off the chart—fifteen initials after their name. And I watch this crowd, and you know they're cheering on the ACLU and the National Council of Churches and they're saying "Jesus was an egalitarian and equal distribution of the wealth, and He was absolutely a communist." And when it was my turn to respond, I said, "Well you know, I don't see anything in God's Word that says He was a communist. So I really think the question that we have to ask ourselves today is 'What do we do with this Jesus?' Because He said He's the way, the truth, and the life, and nobody comes to the Father but by Him. So it seems to me, in the words of C.S. Lewis, we are left with one of three options. He's either a liar—and a fabulous deceiver. Or He's a lunatic—He's absolutely lost His mind. Or He's Lord. Those are our three choices: He's a liar, He's a lunatic, or He's Lord. And every person in this room must answer the question, not 'Was Jesus a communist?' but 'What do we do with this Jesus?'"

When it was over, Matthew Modine came up to me and he's a very tall man—very tall man. And he came up to me and pulled me aside on this stage and he said, "Janet, I don't have the answers. I make these films because I'm looking for the answers." And I patted him on the hand and I said, "Matthew, that's okay." I said, "Everybody's journey starts out by asking some questions." And I said, "My hope and my prayer is that someday you'll discover the answer because His name is Jesus." (applause)

So we seek the welfare of the city, not because it's comfortable, not because it's easy. Oswald Chambers says, "God doesn't care about your comfort. He cares about your character." So we go for the cause of Christ even though we'll be called a knee-jerk reactionary homophobic member of the religious right. It doesn't make any difference. We are ambassadors for Christ and daughters of the most-high King. May there be grace and love on our lips and may we proclaim His truth.

Quickly, let me go to the last directive. This one bothers me the most. The last directive to the captives is, "'Do not let the prophets and the diviners among you deceive you. Do not listen to the dreams you encouraged them to have. They are prophesying lies to you in my name. I have not sent them,' declares the LORD" (Jer. 29:8–9). False prophets in the church; diviners outside the church.

Now when you realize what the definition is of a false prophet, you realize they are not sent by God; their message isn't from God; they have deceptions in their own mind; they delude themselves. So we've got things like "The Jesus Seminar" where they take colored beads today, and they throw them on the table, and based on the color of the bead either Jesus did say it or He didn't say it. And they think we're uneducated, right? I mean . . .

You've got John Shelby Spong who's a champion of what he calls "inclusive faith." He says, "Sins can no longer be considered as sins in a modern context." You have Rob Bell telling us that "a good God would never send anybody to hell and on second thought there probably isn't even a hell." Jesus talked more about hell than He did about heaven. Hath God said? You betcha!

And the diviners, psychics, they used to read entrails; they'd read the stars; they'd interpret dreams in the pagan temples in Babylon. Jeremiah says, "Your diviners." Do you know what that means? That when the captives came, they brought their diviners with them and their pagan practices. So today we've got Deepok Chopra and we've got Neale Donald Walsch and unfortunately we also have Oprah who has led people astray—all of her power. She brings on Eckhart Tolle who talks about "one consciousness" and says, "We are the truth. The very being that you are is truth. Jesus tried to convey that when He said, 'I am the way, the truth and the life.' Those words uttered by Jesus are one of the most powerful and direct pointers to the truth if understood correctly. If misunderstood, however, they have become a great obstacle. Jesus speaks of the innermost 'I am,' the essence identity of every man and woman, every life form, in fact. He speaks of the life that you are—the 'I am.'" Hath God said? Wow!

Then there was the Re-Imagining Conference in Minnesota in 1993. A bunch of women from the church got together, and they decided they'd practice something called "Sophia Worship." Sophia was a Greek goddess. She stood for wisdom. And then they would pray, "Bless Sophia. Dream the vision. Share the wisdom deep within." They called themselves mainline Protestant Christian feminists. That is an oxymoron. One of the professors said, "I don't think we need a theory of atonement at all. Atonement has to do so much with death. I don't think we need folks hanging on crosses and blood dripping and weird stuff. We just need to listen to the god within." All of this goes to the great and effective lie.

So I can sum up the letter this way:

Dear Captives in Exiles,

Build houses. Live in them. Plant gardens, and eat from them. Get married. Have kids. Tell your children to have kids. Seek the welfare of the city. And one more thing—watch out for those liars and deceivers in your midst. Yours, in His name.

Signed, 
Jeremiah the Prophet

There it is. We can survive in a hostile culture. (applause).

I'll quote Charles Spurgeon as we close our time together:

My brethren, let me say, be like Christ at all times. Imitate Him in "public." Most of us live in some sort of public capacity—many of us are called to work before our fellow men every day. We are watched; our words are caught; our lives are examined—taken to pieces. The eagle-eyed, argus-eyed world observes everything we do, and sharp critics are upon us. Let us live the life of Christ in public. Let us take care that we exhibit our Master, and not ourselves—so that we can say, "It is no longer I that live, but Christ that lives in me."

We are heaven bound. We're going home. We're captives today, but we are free women none-the-less. Thanks be to God. We have been set free. Now go and thrive. God bless you. (applause) To God be the glory! Thank you!