Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Pastor Charles R. Swindoll has devoted his life to the accurate, practical teaching and application of God's Word. He is the founding pastor of Stonebriar Community Church in Frisco, Texas, as well as the founder of Insight for Living, a leading program in Christian broadcasting since 1979 that airs around the world. Chuck has also served as president and now chancellor emeritus at Dallas Theological Seminary and has contributed more than 100 titles to a worldwide reading audience, books for which he has received the Gold Medallion Lifetime Achievement Award, twelve Gold Medallion Awards, and the Christian Book Award for Bible of the Year.

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simple faith

W Publishing Group

Contents

acknowledgments..........................................................xiintroduction.............................................................xv1 let's keep it simple...................................................12 the qualities of simple faith..........................................213 a simple counterstrategy: shake and shine..............................434 simplicity starts from within..........................................635 simple instructions on serious issues..................................816 simple advice to the selfish and strong-willed.........................997 beware! religious performance now showing..............................1218 prayer and fasting minus all the pizzazz...............................1399 when simple faith erodes...............................................15510 the subtle enemy of simple faith......................................17511 if you're serious about simple faith, stop this!......................19312 the most powerful of all four-letter words............................20913 simple yet serious warnings for complicated times.....................22514 the simple secret of an unsinkable life...............................243conclusion...............................................................257endnotes.................................................................261with gratitude...........................................................269

Chapter One

WHEN IT CAME TO CLEAR COMMUNICATION, Jesus was a master. Children and adults alike had no difficulty understanding His words or following His reasoning. This is remarkable because while He was on earth He lived in a society that had become accustomed to clich-ridden religious double-talk. The scribes, priests, and Pharisees who dominated the synagogue scene in Palestine saw to that. They unintentionally made Jesus' simple style and straight-forward approach seem all the more refreshing. When He spoke, people listened. Unlike the pious professionals of His day, Jesus' words made sense.

This was never truer than when He sat down on a hillside with a group of His followers and talked about what really mattered. Thanks to tradition, this teaching session has come to be known as the Sermon on the Mount-in my opinion, an unfortunate title. His words were authoritative but not officious, insightful but not sermonic. His hillside chat was an informal, reasonable, thoughtful, and unpretentious presentation. He distilled an enormous amount of truth in an incredibly brief period of time, and those who had endured a lifetime of boring and irrelevant sermons sat spellbound to the end.

The result was that when Jesus had finished these words, the multitudes were amazed at His teaching; for He was teaching them as one having authority, and not as their scribes.

-MATTHEW 7:28-29

If we fail to understand the background behind that statement, we will not appreciate the depth of His listeners' gratitude. In short, they were fed up with the manipulation, the pride, and especially the hypocrisy of their religious leaders. Long years of legalism, mixed with the pharisaic power plays designed to intimidate and control, held the general public in bondage. Man-made systems of complicated requirements and backbreaking demands shut the people behind invisible bars, shackled in chains of guilt. They could not measure up; they could not quite keep their heads above water unless they dog-paddled like mad ... and many were losing heart. But who dared say so?

Out of the blue came Jesus with His message of liberating grace, encouragement to the weary, hope for the sinful. Best of all, everything He said was based on pristine truth-God's truth-instead of rigid religious regulations. He talked of faith-simple faith-in terms anyone could understand. His "yes face" invited them in as His teaching released them from guilt and shame, fear and confusion. The Nazarene's authenticity caught them off guard, disarmed their suspicions, and blew away the fog that had surrounded organized religion for decades. No wonder the people found Him amazing! No wonder the grace-killing scribes and Pharisees found Him unbearable! Hypocrisy despises authenticity. When truth unmasks wrong, those who are exposed get very nervous ... like the two brothers in a story I heard.

These brothers were rich. They were also wicked. Both lived a wild, unprofitable existence, using their wealth to cover up the dark side of their lives. On the surface, however, few would have guessed it, for these consummate cover-up artists attended the same church almost every Sunday and contributed large sums to various church-related projects.

Then the church called a new pastor, a young man who preached the truth with zeal and courage. Before long, attendance had grown so much that the church needed a larger worship center. Being a man of keen insight and strong integrity, this young pastor had also seen through the hypocritical lifestyles of the two brothers.

Suddenly one of the brothers died, and the young pastor was asked to preach his funeral. The day before the funeral, the surviving brother pulled the minister aside and handed him an envelope. "There's a check in here that is large enough to pay the entire amount you need for the new sanctuary," he whispered. "All I ask is one favor: Tell the people at the funeral that he was a saint." The minister gave the brother his word; he would do precisely what was asked. That afternoon he deposited the check into the church's account.

The next day the young pastor stood before the casket at the funeral service and said with firm conviction, "This man was an ungodly sinner, wicked to the core. He was unfaithful to his wife, hot-tempered with his children, ruthless in his business, and a hypocrite at church ... but compared to his brother, he was a saint."

The boldness of authenticity is beautiful to behold, unless, of course, you happen to be a hypocrite. That explains why Jesus' words, which brought such comfort to those who followed Him, enraged the Pharisees. Although He never called one of them by name during His hillside talk, He exposed their legalistic lifestyle as no one had ever done before. Count on it: They knew what He was saying.

On the surface, Jesus' words, recorded in Matthew 5, 6, and 7, may seem calm in tone and basic in their simplicity. We can read them in fifteen or twenty minutes, and at first glance they appear to be nothing more than a gentle tap on the shoulder. But to those who had twisted religion into a performance-oriented list of demands and expectations, they were nothing short of a bold expos.

When Moses came down from Mount Sinai centuries earlier, he did not bring Ten Suggestions; likewise, when Jesus delivered His message from the mount, it was no humble homily. To legalists His words represented a howling reproach that continues into the modern age. Jesus' words may be simple, but they are definitely not insipid.

Jesus' Words: A Plea for True Righteousness

Behind Jesus' teaching on the Palestinian hillside was a deep concern for those who had surrendered their lives to the tyranny of pressure that was light-years away from simple faith. Of special concern to Him was the possibility that some had gotten sucked into the...