APOSTLE EDWARD SSEWANYANA: WHOSE FOOL ARE YOU?

God is still good to His children, just as He has always been. I believe it is a real privilege for us to be called the sons of God. A servant does not know everything that his master does but a son has full privileges and access to all the information of the father. “Henceforth I call you not servants; for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth” (John 15:15), this clearly shows us that we have been elevated above the standard of servants by Jesus Christ. There is an even greater privilege that Jesus points out, which is that we are now the friends of God, “but I HAVE CALLED YOU FRIENDS; for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you” (Jn 15:15b).

“We are FOOLS for Christ's sake, but ye are wise in Christ; we are weak, but ye are strong; ye are honourable, but we are despised” (1 Cor 4:10). A question may be posed at this point: Whose fool are you? The one who engages himself in worldly affairs and lives like the world does becomes an enemy of God and is thus the devil’s fool. “Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God” (James 4:4). The foolishness of God is wiser than men, in otherwords, the things that would appear foolish to God surpass the greatest genius of men. “But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumblingblock, and unto the Greeks FOOLISHNESS; But unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God. Because the FOOLISHNESS OF GOD IS WISER THAN MEN; and the weakness of God is stronger than men” (1Cor1:23-25). Paul makes it very clear that he preaches Christ crucified. He does not merely speak his own message but he preaches or proclaims Jesus Christ. Just like any other higher institution of learning, Makerere University has it’s fair share of individuals who stubbornly refuse to accept the sacrifice that Jesus made for them on the cross because it appears foolishness. Some of them may think, “But I have done so many good deeds and even read the Bible, what more does God expect?” That is when we come to discover that God’s way of salvation is totally different from man’s methods. You will come to recall that under the Old Covenant when a great Syrian general came to Prophet Elisha to be cleansed of his leprosy, he was given a very foolish thing to do. “So Naaman came with his horses and with his chariot, and stood at the door of the house of Elisha. And Elisha sent a messenger unto him, saying, Go and wash in Jordan seven times, and thy flesh shall come again to thee, and thou shalt be clean. But Naaman was wroth, and went away, and said, Behold, I thought, He will surely come out to me, and stand, and call on the name of the LORD his God, and strike his hand over the place, and recover the leper. Are not Abana and Pharpar, rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? may I not wash in them, and be clean? So he turned and went away in a rage. And his servants came near, and spake unto him, and said, My father, if the prophet had bid thee do some great thing, wouldest thou not have done it? how much rather then, when he saith to thee, Wash, and be clean? Then went he down, and dipped himself seven times in Jordan, according to the saying of the man of God: and his flesh came again like unto the flesh of a little child, and he was clean” (2 Kings 5:9-14). We see from this example how men have devised their own ways of getting anything from God. Naaman had a preconception that the man of God would simply strike his hand on the leprous part for the healing to be effected. From this we learn that God has only one way of doing things as He pleases and sometime these ways appear foolish to man. They may appear foolish in the beginning but at the end yield tremendous positive results as Naaman could testify when his leprous flesh became like that of a little child.

This week we are embarking on a new series concerning Evangelism. This is one of the most talked about yet least practiced spheres of the Christian life. We have obviously heard about the itinerant Evangelists who are ever on the road preaching the gospel. But does this mean that they are the only ones supposed to carry out this work or does God expect us all to participate? One of the great deceptions that the devil introduced into the body of Christ in the 3^rd Century A.D. was that the work of God should be the sole responsibility of a few hired professionals. During this time when large scale apostasy was prevailing over the whole Roman empire, a class of Priests was trained in Latin by the Emperor Constantine to propagate the state religion of Christianity. This was a perverted version of the true gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ that emphasized the superiority of the Priesthood and clergy. This deceitful system cast a veil of ignorance over the eyes of the common man since the Priests were solely responsible for interpreting the scriptures. The common man never had access to the Scriptures and had to rely on the interpretations of the Priests, who ended up using this advantage for their own financial gain as they could come up with doctrines that were clearly not in the Bible. Even those who could possibly access the Word of God could not read it since it was written in Latin, which was a language foreign to the common man. It was with this appalling development that the Church of Jesus slumped into the Dark Ages. These were the ages when idolatry and Christianity were intermingled freely to the detriment of humanity. God has surely raised up outstanding men and women over the ages to bring back the light of the gospel to this sin-sick generation. Through roaring reformers, like Martin Luther, God restored truths such as the universal Priesthood of all believers.

The early church never used to throw the weight of the ministry only upon the shoulders of the Apostles. Rather, each of them played their part in spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ in their localities and beyond. Notice that when Saul persecuted the church, the believers were scattered into distant lands. This is what they did when they reached those lands, “Therefore they that were scattered abroad went every where PREACHING THE WORD” (Acts8:4). When these believers were scattered they knew that they had one primary responsibility, this was to obey the command which had been entrusted to them by Jesus Christ to proclaim His message throughout the world. “But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be WITNESSES unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth” (Acts1:8). Jesus promised that we would receive the power of the Holy Spirit that would empower us with the dynamic miracle-working anointing to plunder hell and populate heaven. The power of the Holy Ghost has not been given to the church for us to have Pentecostal picnics and feel goose-bumps, but rather to demonstrate to the world through signs and wonders that Jesus is alive and risen. Jesus makes you His witness. A witness does not need to know all the details about a specific incident that he has observed. The witness simply speaks what he saw on the day of the crime to all those seated in the court. You do not need to know all the details of what you will tell that person whom you are preaching to. In any case the Holy Ghost will give you a word in season and speak through you as you avail yourself. “And ye shall be brought before governors and kings for my sake, for a testimony against them and the Gentiles. But when they deliver you up, TAKE NO THOUGHT HOW OR WHAT YE SHALL SPEAK: for it shall be given you in that same hour what ye shall speak. For it is not ye that speak, but THE SPIRIT OF YOUR FATHER WHICH SPEAKETH IN YOU” (Mat 10:18-20).

God expects you to venture out in boldness and speak His word to your neighbour. God is not going to come down in flesh again to preach to the lost. He expects you to go out and preach the good news as the Body of Christ on this earth. That is the reason why Jesus is seated, “So then after the Lord had spoken unto them, he was received up into heaven, and SAT on the right hand of God” (Mark16:19). Jesus is seated because He expects His body, the Church, to continue what he began. When Jesus went up into heaven, He poured out the Holy Spirit to empower you to continue His ministry on the earth. “And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and PREACH THE GOSPEL to every creature” (Mark16:15). The Lord expects you to fulfill this commandment and not simply wait for the hired professionals and televangelists to preach the gospel. The reason God has put in place Apostles. Prophets, Pastors and Teachers is to equip the saints to fulfill the work of the ministry on the earth. “And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ” (Eph4:11, 12). The five-fold ministers are supposed to equip the saints to do the work of the ministry. You need to step out and proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ without fear or favor because Jesus has commanded you to. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit.