Reaching for Heaven’s Doorframe

When I was a little boy I had a dream. The fulfillment of this dream would mean something so significant to me that I couldn't begin to describe the feeling. If I could just do what I had been dreaming about, it would mean that I was a man; that I had grown up.

Now this dream wasn't about getting married, although I love my wife Martha and she makes me feel better than anyone or any other thing in this world ever could. It wasn't about buying a car, although I've had several vehicles since then. It wasn't even about moving out of my parent's home, although I did feel the weight of responsibility when they left me alone for the first time in my dorm room.

It wasn't any of those. Instead, this dream was much simpler. It's almost comical now when I look back on it. I wanted to be able to jump and reach the top of a door frame with my hand.

Chuckle if you will, but this was important to me! I had always been a little shorter than all of my peers (some would argue that I still am). In fact, I had a teacher that used to say the old adage, "Dynamite comes in small packages" around me all the time. The cool guys, though, were the ones who could jump up and reach the door frame in 4^th grade. I couldn't do that then, and I still couldn't for most of my 5^th grade year. I remember walking down the hallway after my school lunch, all of our class lined up single file, and as we passed by this particular door frame every boy in the class would jump up and touch it. I can't explain why. It's just something that little boys do.

I would practice this at home. I would take a running start in the hallway of our house, leap toward the door frame leading into the kitchen, and stretch my arms out as far as I could to try to touch it. Finally, one day, I did.

For a moment it was an amazing feeling! I couldn't believe I had actually done it! I couldn't wait to show the other boys at school that I could join in on this rite of passage.

I was on top of the world for a few months, because every time I jumped to touch that frame, I made it. I thought I was growing up! One event, though, would bring that concept in my mind back down to the ground. We had a visiting preacher one Sunday, and his son and I were about the same age. We were both jumping up and touching the tops of door frames in the church building. Finally, as we were all getting ready to leave, I jumped up and touched an awning for an exterior door as we all walked by. I made some silly childish statement like, "this is freedom". Then the preacher walked past that frame, and standing flat footed slapped the door frame in a higher spot than I could ever reach at the time. He then said, "No, this is freedom." I realized then that I had more work to do.

Can you think back to something that you wanted so bad that you couldn't help but think about it all the time. What did you do to try to make that thing happen? Isn't it amazing what lengths we go to in order to make our dreams, however silly, a reality? I spent so much time running, jumping, and stretching to be able to reach the top of that door frame. Now that I look back on it, why did I do that?

In all of this I'm reminded of what Paul writes in Philippians 3:12-14 (ESV) about something much more important than touching the tops of door frames:

(12) Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own.(13) Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead,(14) I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

 

It's so important what Paul writes here. Paul affirms that while he is in a state of salvation, that even after all the suffering he has endured he hasn't come to a point of full completion in his spiritual life! He has more to do, more to grow in, more to live for! Notice that he says that he is forgetting the things that were behind him. He's leaving all the things of the past, whether good or bad, in the past. Why? Because he's moving forward. He's even straining toward those goals. It's work for him to move toward what lies ahead! But he's pressing on, pressing upward.

Don't ever think that just because you've been immersed [baptized] and you attend services on a fairly consistent basis that you have "attained". And if you haven't done those things, then you haven't even begun! I thought that since I could jump and reach the door frame that I had made it, but that preacher showed me I had a lot more growing to do. The same may be true for you. How much more growing do you need to do?

If only we could concentrate on worthwhile goals with the same passion children have for the things that are important to them. Especially the goal that I'm sure all of us have in common: going to heaven. How important is heaven to you? Are you reaching for heaven's doorframe?

In Need of Repair

I do the best I can to take care of our vehicles, but sometimes it just seems like things pile up and "pile on" as far as repairs. In the past week I have spent several hundred dollars getting things fixed on my wife's Explorer that were in dire need of repair. Now it's not that I'm irresponsible, but in the past I did have a way of letting the little things go. I've come to find, though, that many of those things that don't seem so big at the moment can get big in a hurry.
Such was the case last year when I let the "check engine" light stay lit for a few months, ignoring it. Some people would say that the little orange (or red) light coming on isn't that big of a deal, as long as things seem to be running okay. That was how I felt about it. The Explorer ran just fine – until one day, it didn't.

I was pulling a trailer with our booth setup for a bridal show we were part of. About half way during the 70 mile trip to Chattanooga, the Explorer suddenly lost most of its power. I managed to get the Explorer to limp down the road to the next town. When I made a quick assessment of things, I realized that there was nothing I could do to repair it at the moment, so the best I could do was keep on limping down the interstate at a miserly pace of 35 mph. Oh how I wish I had checked the light out!

From that experience I have decided not to mess around with those sorts of things any more. Even though it cost me a few hundred dollars this time, it's worth it in my mind to have a vehicle that functions properly. The peace of mind is priceless. Now, at the first sign of an odd sound or a warning light, I will check out the problem. If it needs fixing, to the best of my ability I will attempt to repair it (or take it to someone who can). I no longer turn a blind eye or a deaf ear to problems that need to be addressed. It is the only way I know that I will have a vehicle that will serve me faithfully.

When we turn to 2 Chronicles 29:3, one of the first things we see that Hezekiah did when he came to power is open the doors to the house of the Lord, repair them, and then proceed to clean out the temple and prepare it for service to God (vs. 16-18). He set about putting things back in order and fixing things that were broken so that God could be served in the proper way. But notice why he had to do all of that work in the first place; he says the following:

"For our fathers have been unfaithful and have done what was evil in the sight of the LORD our God. They have forsaken him and have turned away their faces from the habitation of the LORD and turned their backs." – 2 Chronicles 29:6

We see this happening in the previous chapter when Ahaz, a wicked king, shuts up the doors to the temple as he begins making sacrifices to idols (28:24). It's as though Ahaz, and those who joined him, simply wanted to put all of the problems they probably knew needed to be fixed out of their minds, and forget about them. They turned their backs on God, and failed to see all of the things in need of repair. We even seen from verse 24 that Ahaz went to the point of destroying things that belonged to the temple, thus creating even more things in need of repair. It was all of these things that Hezekiah and the Levites came along and fixed later.

We need to do periodically in our own lives what Hezekiah and the Levites did for the temple and in service to God. We know that we can't serve God to the best of our abilities if we have problems that need to be addressed. If someone has a problem with sin in their life, or has just simply become unfaithful like Ahaz did, they need to realize that there is no way they can be pleasing to God and serve Him properly with those things floating over their head. In fact, that sin causes them to be separated from God (Isa. 59:1-2), and any attempt to serve God in this state will not be well received by Him (see Proverbs 15:8; fix things first, Matthew 5:23-24). Continuing to ignore the problems associated with sin will not make them vanish. Sin needs to be met head on, and fixed. For the non-Christian, that means obedience to the gospel plan of Salvation. For the Christian, that means repentance (Acts 8:22) confession (1 John 1:9), and prayer (Acts 8:22; James 5:16).

Let us all take stock, and examine ourselves (cf. 2 Corinthians 13:5). If we need to fix something, we shouldn't turn a blind eye to it. Fix it now so that it doesn't get any worse, and get to serving God in a right relationship with Him!

Rounding Up in Religion

I was listening to Jon Townsend this morning, the preacher for the Atwood Church of Christ in Atwood, Tennessee and was inspired by some things he said. You can visit their Ustream page by going to the following link: http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/6276631.

If you know me at all you know Atwood is where I grew up, and a part of me still considers it to be home. I don't know how many thousands of trips we took to Milan, which is just a few miles away. You see, in order to go to Wal-Mart, get groceries, or just about anything else, we had to drive those miles. I remember seeing one sign in particular every time we turned to go home. It was posted with the phrase "Atwood – 5 Miles".

You know, I always took that number for granted. I knew that it was five miles to go home from Milan. That equated to about five minutes. It felt good to know that I was close. How dare anyone mess with the idea in my mind of five miles to Atwood.

As I was listening to Jon Townsend, the present preacher for the Atwood congregation, I was shocked to find out that what I had "known for a fact" all of my childhood was a lie. Jon was using his GPS to travel home during a much longer trip. Of course he knew how to get from Milan to Atwood, but he still had the GPS turned on, and it was telling him how far away he was from home. As he passed the "five miles" sign he noticed that the GPS (which is much more accurate) was listing something different. He discovered that it's not five miles from that sign to Atwood, it's really 4.6 miles!

It's the old mathematical principle of "rounding up" that is on display here. You probably remember from your elementary school math class what it means to "round up". A number like 9.6 can be "rounded up" 10, or 1,637 can be rounded up to 2,000. The number that comes from this method qualifies as an estimate, not an exact representation.

Now there are a number of ways of looking at the situation with our road sign. The bottom line, though, is that there is roughly an 8% difference in the distance between what that sign says and the reality of things. Someone who actually does travel the listed 5 miles instead of the 4.6 is going to go too far! They'll run right out of town, and believe you me; Atwood is small enough to do that. That sign is rounded up, and we understand what it means in a navigational sense. But if that distance is taken too literally, someone will "miss the mark" of going to Atwood. This is especially true if someone is trying to go somewhere that they have never been before, and are extremely dependent upon distances. Can someone be 92% right in their action and 8% wrong and still get where they are trying to go? No, they simply can't.

Jesus said what John records in chapter 14 and verse 6 of his gospel: "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." There Jesus plainly states that HE is the way, and that the only way to get to God is through Him. In other words, it's HIS way or the highway. Our way has nothing to do with the matter. It's all up to how Jesus wants things to be done.

There are a lot of people today putting up religious signposts that are "rounded up". They make all kinds of unauthorized additions to worship, they bind loads on men's backs that are difficult for them to bear, or they are simply crossing the bounds set by Christ himself. We read the following words, though, that we ought to deeply ponder. In 2 John 9 the NKJV translates it this way:

"Whoever transgresses and does not abide in the doctrine of Christ does not have God. He who abides in the doctrine of Christ has both the Father and the Son."

I personally like the way this verse is rendered in the English Standard Version for the purposes of this article (similar to the ASV):

"Everyone who goes on ahead and does not abide in the teaching of Christ, does not have God. Whoever abides in the teaching of Christ has both the Father and the Son."

The NASB renders the first part of that verse as "anyone who goes too far", which is interesting in this context. All of these renderings have something in common: a boundary. At least as far as doctrine is concerned, there are certain things that we can do outside of the boundary which Christ has set.

Now before you think that these things only apply to the "red letter words" in your Bible, ponder the meaning of John 16:14, where Jesus says that when the Holy Spirit comes he will "take what is mine and declare it to you". Paul writes to Timothy that "all scripture is given by the inspiration of God" (2 Timothy 3:16), that "it is profitable for doctrine" (3:17), and that he personally wrote as things were revealed to him (Ephesians 3:3). Peter has a couple things to write about it, too. In 2 Peter 1:20-21 he affirms that scripture is not open to private interpretation since it didn't come to man that way, it came through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Later on (in 3:15-16) he would essentially confirm that even the things Paul wrote qualified as… scripture. The things these men wrote were directions, guidance, and boundaries set by Jesus Christ himself.

If we cross those boundaries, John plainly states that we do not have God. Likewise, one can infer that we don't have the Son, Jesus, either. If we don't have God or Jesus, and Jesus is the only way to the Father to begin with, how could we ever expect to make it to heaven by crossing the lines he set for doctrine? It would be foolish to expect such things. Still, people continue on, every single day, in this mis-guided, "rounding-up" direction.

The distance from Milan to Atwood hasn't changed since I left, and neither has God's Word changed since it was written down. I also always could have found a way to the truth of the distance between the two towns, but I never cared to dig deeper. If you haven't, will you likewise be content to follow those religious road signs, or are you willing to dig deeper as well?

The honest truth seeker needs to beware of those who would preach the "rounding up" religion (Matthew 7:14). After all, sin can be defined as "missing the mark". Now the question is, are you rounding off the numbers in your spiritual life, and thus, missing the target? There's only one way to get home (John 14:6) and I pray that you find it, if you need to, before it is too late.

~Daniel Howell

Re-Think Church?

There is a Chinese buffet in Chattanooga that I like to visit sometimes. It boasts well over 100 items for someone to choose from. Now I normally only want about 5 or 6 of them, but the benefit of going to this restaurant is that I could have something else if I so desired. Not that I want to, but it's there. What's good for Chinese food is not good for the Lord's church, though (see Ephesians 4:4).
The concept of "church" has been so polluted over the past few years that it has caused many people to become disillusioned with what "church" is and how it is somehow supposed to benefit them (notice how God is never really part of that discussion). "Church" in many people's eyes has long been associated with a mere social gathering. Sometimes "church" is also an indicator of social status. To others, "church" is something they do to entertain themselves. Strangely, there is even "church" for those who don't like "church" (I can't quite figure that one out myself). How could anyone ever think that the current state of "church" is what Jesus had in mind when he said "upon this rock I shall build my church" (Matthew 16:18)?

The division and line of misunderstanding comes in people's minds when "church" is not seen as THE church. It comes when people look at "church" as being a social event or gathering, whereas Jesus saw HIS church as a kingdom. That kingdom belongs to HIM. So, what is it that he had in mind?

Join us May 1-2 to find out!

Hope to see you here!

-Daniel

Is the Door Ajar? – Part 2

Last time we looked at Colossians 4:3, and learned a little bit from the example of Paul and how he went about preaching the gospel. He asked the Colossian brothers to pray that "God may open to us a door for the word". Surely we need to petition God with the same request in our prayers. Let's continue…

If you have a newer car you are probably familiar with a little light that comes on sometimes that says "door ajar". I've found it to be helpful from time to time when I had opened a passenger door to the car, but not shut it completely. I've also had it warn me whenever I leave the truck door or the rear door on our Explorer open. It keeps me from driving away with a door that may appear to be shut, but really isn't and could open while I'm traveling down the road.

What if we had a "door ajar" light for the gospel? Instead of being warned about the door being ajar so that we can shut it, what if we had one that let us know when it was slightly cracked so that we could open it? I would suggest that each one of us needs to develop a perception of when the door might be open to share the gospel with someone.

This is by no means a detailed list, but merely a beginning. Feel free to comment on this and add your own. In fact, comments would be appreciated.

1. Sometimes the door is ajar during a time of grief. As sad as it is, death has a way of putting things into perspective for many people. Its finality and the reality of the judgment to come some day (Hebrews 9:27) get people to think about their own mortality. While it isn't wise to go about during a time of grief trying to be militant in discussing spiritual matters (compassion is needed), the right words and scriptures, gently spoken, can bring a broken heart to a point at which it desires the truth. Be patient, and don't kick the door shut.
   


2. Sometimes the door is ajar during a time of pain. When people are suffering physically, or even emotionally, they are often open to relief wherever they can find it. As Christians we understand the relief that comes from God and the comfort of His word (Psalm 119:50). We also know the refuge that comes from obeying God (Nahum 1:7). Pain affords a time to provide comfort and an opportunity to direct a soul to a right relationship with God.
   


3. Sometimes the door is ajar during a time of need. When Jesus read from the prophet Isaiah (61:1-2) as we have recorded for us in Luke 4:18 one of the things prophesied about Him was that he was sent to "proclaim good news to the poor". Peter and John took advantage of an opportunity presented by a lame beggar (Acts 3:6) to walk through an open door not only to this man, but also to all of those who gathered together to see this man because of the healing done (3:11ff). We are often presented with occasions to help someone who is in need. We need to realize that just as many of these people have physical needs that we ought to help them with (Matthew 25:34-40) they will very likely have spiritual needs. Remember that this time of need is a perfect opportunity to fulfill both, and often both will be welcomed.
   


4. Sometimes the door is ajar during a time of curiosity. Many a person has come through the doors of our building, simply curious about what we are teaching. Almost all of us have had questions about the truth from co-workers or friends. These are all people who are just curious. We read of a similar case in Acts 17:29 and following where many people were curious about what Paul was saying. We see that it is likely most of them didn't believe what Paul said (vs. 32) but there were some who did believe and followed him (vs. 34). Our lesson? While many of these people simply seek to satisfy their curiosity, some of them are actually looking for the truth. It's nearly impossible sometimes to tell which is which. Let us not think it a waste of time to discuss these matters with them.
   


5. Sometimes the door is ajar________________ - what do you think?
   

May we always be aware of when the door is ajar and ready for us to open it a walk through. Let us make sure that we are opening doors to walk through, not kicking them shut because we don't see them! What times do you see the door ajar?

Is the Door Ajar?

I have ever been fascinated with the concept of a door barely ajar. When I was growing up, there was something tempting about a door that was just barely cracked open. It just seemed like to me it was waiting to be opened! What was on the other side? Well, I never knew until I walked through it.

In Colossians 4:3-4 Paul writes the following:

"At the same time, pray for us, that God may open to us a door for the word, to declare the mystery of Christ, on account of which I am in prison – that I may make it clear, which is how I ought to speak."

Of course you probably remember that the epistle to the Colossians was one of the letters that Paul wrote while he was in a Roman prison. He is a man who desperately desired to spread God's word to those around him, and he wanted more opportunity. He expressed this by desiring an open door. He knew it was what he "ought to do".

Notice that at the beginning of that verse Paul asks the brothers in Colossae to do something for him: pray for him. It wasn't just an aimless prayer, either. It had a goal. Paul wanted them to pray for opportunity to share the gospel with others. Surely we need to add this petition to our prayers as well. A couple other things to note from Paul's writing:

1. Paul had a desire to work for the Lord no matter his situation. He had learned to be content with the situations that life presented to him (Philippians 4:11-12). Simply stated, it means that he could deal with the situations of life properly. Also, Paul knew that despite the situation presented to him, he had responsibilities. He knew that the strength to carry on and fulfill those responsibilities came from God (cf. Philippians 4:13, also 1 Corinthians 3:6). Now for us: If we sit around waiting for a situation to get better so that we can share the gospel with someone, we will never find it! We need to discuss these matters, ones of eternal importance, with people while it is called today (2 Corinthians 6:2)! We must not allow a situation that seems difficult to stand in our way. God will always be there (Hebrews 13:6).
   


2. He was willing to declare the message of the gospel at all costs. We can see the effect that preaching the truth had on Paul's life (begin reading in Acts 21:27, also 2 Corinthians 11:16ff). This didn't matter to Paul. Persecution and imprisonment became his way of life. Never do we read of Paul being deterred from preaching. Rather, Paul sums it up in 2 Corinthians 12:10 when he writes that for the sake of Christ he was content with "weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong." What about us? Are we then willing to take the perceived hardships on ourselves? Will we lose some friends? Maybe. Will we scare some people? Possibly. Will people look at us like we are strange? Probably. But what really matters to you: This life, or the one to come (1 Timothy 4:8)?
   

Have you seen any doors ajar lately?

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Next time = "What is Our Spiritual Door Ajar Warning Light?"

Someone Might See It!

When I was growing up I had the privilege of helping my dad restore an old house that my mom was going to use for her frame shop and art gallery, Fine Line Designs. Now notice that I just said it was a privilege. I didn't exactly feel that way when I was actually working on it.

You see, because of my size there were a lot of things that were just easier for me to do. It was easier for me to crawl through the holes to get underneath the house to work on the plumbing. It was easier for me to squeeze through the hole that led to the attic, so that I could run electrical wiring and work on the gas lines we were installing. Now it's not that my dad couldn't fit, it was just easier for me to do it.

There are a lot of things I learned over the course of working on that old house. Of course I learned a lot about working with my hands. I also learned a few other things which have stuck with me until today.

 

It was one of the days not long after we had just started working on the house. I remember thinking that the "fun" had ended, because there was no more brick to demolish from the front porch. Over time, the area where the porch had been would be transformed into a "sun-room", but before we could do that the floors in the front of the house had to be leveled.

The house was just like any older house. After 80 or 90 years the foundation begins to settle. Unfortunately it settles at different heights in different places. It was going to be my job to crawl underneath the house and start leveling things out.

Now before you think my dad was a "slave-driver" (a term we affectionately called him at the time), realize that he did the first couple spots so that I knew what I was supposed to do. I set out to do the work that he wanted me to do. I had the jack with me, and would jack up the beams to the point of being level. I would then place various sizes of bricks and other things underneath the spot that I had jacked up. If I set everything up the right way, the floor would be raised up to level.

As I was working along, though, I remember that I was being a little haphazard in the way I was setting up those extra supports. I wasn't giving any particular care as to how things looked under there. I thought as long as the work seemed to hold its weight, I was doing alright. Some of the supports that I had built up were pretty ugly.

It's about that time that my dad poked his head underneath the house and looked around. I remember him looking at a couple of the spots I had been working on and saying the following:

"Son, you need to fix some of those up. What if somebody were to come along after you and look at that? Have a little pride in your work!"

I thought he was crazy. Who is going to come along and look at what I had done underneath the house? After a moment of thought, though, I realized something. I don't know whether you have ever been underneath a house built in the late 1800's or early 1900's, but the underside of these homes didn't get much respect. In fact, much of the building waste was simply pushed underneath the home and buried there. The whole time I had been crawling around through the mess that someone else had left behind.

Would someone else ever see my work? Well, I was seeing the work of the men were who had built the house! I don't think they ever imagined that I would be crawling around looking at the underbelly of their handiwork. That's why they didn't mind leaving quite a mess behind under the house!

Sometimes people do things that they think no one else is going to see. They are thoroughly convinced that the things that they do in the privacy of their own home will never come to light. We especially buy into this in our country. "What a man does in his own home is his own business and nobody else's" I once heard a man I knew say. It's this line of thought that causes us to relax on our righteousness when we think no one will ever see what we have done. People bury their spiritual "trash" in a place that they think no one will find it instead of disposing of it properly.

Moses warns the tribes of Gad and Reuben in Numbers 32:23 that if they fail to follow through on their promise to help take the land of Canaan that their sin would "find them out". In other words, there would be consequences. This is a general rule about sin. The Israelites didn't even make it past Ai before they figured this out. Ironically, a man (Achan) had tried to do the same thing that the builders of my mom's frame shop did with the things they didn't want people to see: Hide them under a house! Achan hid the things he had stolen from the Lord in the earth in his tent (Joshua 7:20-21). I would imagine that he never thought anyone would know about or miss these things. Boy was he wrong!

Can we always strive to have the highest character possible? That means doing what's right even when we think no one will see the trash or consequences of our sin. The next time that you think you can get away with something, the next thought needs to be the realization that you can't.

1 Corinthians 4:5, ESV – "Therefore do not pronounce judgment before the time, before the Lord comes, who will bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart. Then each one will receive his commendation from God."

 

Hebrews 4:13, ESV – "And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account."

 

-Daniel Howell

 

J-E-S-U-S

I was working on my sermon series for April, Jesus: The Best Friend, and during the preparation of my PowerPoint I noticed a problem. Can you?

Here's a closer look:

Those of you who use Microsoft Office products probably immediately spotted that jagged little red line underneath the name Jesus. You know what that means. It means that I misspelled "Jesus". So I went back to it, looked over it, and said it out loud to myself.

J-E-S-U-S

Yep, all the letters are there. I retyped it. Still, that annoying little line appeared underneath it.

Now this happens from time to time. I'll type in the name of an obscure Bible city or person, and that little line shows up. I understand why in those situations. It's as simple to fix, though, as "right-clicking" and selecting "Add to Dictionary" to resolve. But this one had me perplexed. Hasn't Microsoft heard of Jesus?

Now before you go off to war against Microsoft, let me explain why this happened. I had my text set to type in "ALL CAPS" within the PowerPoint software. Because of that I didn't hit the "Shift" key when I spelled the name of Jesus. It was trying to tell me that I was wrong because I didn't type His name starting with a capital "J". Of course I couldn't see that because of the disconnect between what I was typing on my keyboard and what my computer was telling the text to be. If I hit "ALL CAPS" in the software, shouldn't it just make the letter a real capital letter instead of appearing to be a capital letter, but not really being one?

Still, it got me to thinking. In light of these things, ask yourself these questions:

1. Do I really know Jesus? John writes in 1 John 2:1-5 what it takes to "know" Jesus. It's not as simple as clicking a menu option. It takes first obedience, then courage and endurance. "And by this we know that we have come to know Him, if we keep His commandments." So, do you?
   


2. Am I making a difference in other people's lives so that they can answer the above question to the affirmative? How am I helping others to "know" Jesus?
   

As Christians we understand the responsibility to make sure that others know about Jesus and His Gospel (Mark. 16:15; Matthew 28:18-20; 2 Timothy 4:1-5). Remember, though, that the day will come when everyone will know with a surety the name of Jesus, and that he is Lord!

(9) Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name,(10) so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth,(11) and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. - Philippians 2:9-11 ESV

 

(10) Why do you pass judgment on your brother? Or you, why do you despise your brother? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God;(11) for it is written, "As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God."(12) So then each of us will give an account of himself to God.- Romans 14:10-12 ESV