Chapter 1 8

This memoir is not strictly chronological; rather it weaves in and out. It is necessary to backtrack now and recall a group of men who made a great deal of difference in my life and in the lives of many others—Evangelical Concerns.

Ted Wise, Danny Sands, Rick Zacks, Jim Dopp, Steve Heathner, Richard Haskell, Lonnie Frisbee, and others began a ministry in the Haight on Page Street, one block from Haight Street, called The Living Room. Quickly after they opened in 1968, I discovered it and began showing up, especially around lunchtime. These were the first Chris- tians of a like mind and passion for evangelism that I encountered in the Haight. Later, after the media began covering the Jesus freaks, lots of Christian groups showed up. Behind Ted and the gang was a group of men who mentored their outreach to the hippies.

Ted, Danny, and most of the others, except for Lonnie Frisbee, were a bit older than the general hippie, even a couple years older than me, and they were all part of a group called Evangelical Concerns, headquartered at the First Baptist Church of San Francisco on Octavia Street. John Streater was its pastor, and John MacDonald was pastor of the First Baptist Church of Mill Valley, where Ted and the rest attended. There was also Howard Day, a leader at the San Francisco Church, and Ed Plowman, pastor of Presidio Baptist Church in the City. All of these were American Baptist Churches.

Soon enough, they invited me to the regular monthly meetings of Evangelical Concerns, which was some time in 1968. Before that year was up, I invited both Dr. Francis DuBose from Golden Gate Seminary and Martin (Moishe) Rosen, who later founded Jews for Jesus, to attend the meetings with me. Before the end of 1968, the three of us
along with David Hoyt, were on the board of directors of Evangelical Concerns (EC).

EC acted as an umbrella organization, especially for Ted’s minis- tries: The Living Room and The House of Acts, which was a Christian commune in Novato, a town in northern Marin County.1 Financial contributions for these ministries were funneled through EC. Larry Hoyt became the treasurer after EC began to connect with Christian World Liberation Front in Berkeley, a ministry headed up by Jack Sparks, Pat Matrisciana, Billy Squires, Brooks Alexander, and others. Soon, nearly all of those who were involved in street ministry to the hippies in the Bay Area were somehow connected with EC.

David Hoyt and I, however, chose not to use EC as an organizational covering; we developed United Youth Ministries instead. Later on, we formed an actual non-profit corporation called Christian House Ministries, and Chuck Kopp of Greenbrae was the attorney who drew up the legal papers.2

As the years have gone by, I am increasingly aware of what EC meant to me. Without it, I might have made a bigger mess of things than I did. These wonderful servants of God were able to prevent some of us freaks from being completely taken over by the Pentecostal/ charismatic emphasis that came to characterize the Jesus Movement. While I am not casting disparagement on charismatically oriented Christians—I was one myself—I was made aware of the dangerous errors that come along when the charismatic is accentuated. For the most part, the EC directors were mainline, solid Christians in the Bap- tist tradition.

In the Long Term

1. John MacDonald wrote The House of Acts, published by Creation House in 1970. It is one of the first stories of the Jesus People Movement.
2. There were so many people who came along side us in those days, and many of them, such as Chuck and Nancy Kopp, were parents of kids that became a part of what we were doing. A flood of names and faces are coming to mind right now, and I realize I will not be able to give them the notice they are due. In my mind, it was the hand of God that brought so many well-meaning people to us during those early days, and most of them did not fully realize what we all were a part of. They just knew that their kids liked us.

An interesting side note is that John MacDonald served as the second pastor of the First Baptist Church of Mill Valley and lived with his wife Marilyn and their children in the parsonage, which was also the home to several of the early leaders of Jews for Jesus.3 Into that same parsonage later came John Streater to pastor the Mill Valley Church after he resigned from First Baptist San Francisco. (Streater, while a student at Wheaton College had introduced Ruth Bell to Billy Graham.) Then in 1984, I became pastor of that very same church, though we changed the name to Miller Avenue Baptist Church of Mill Valley. For twenty-six years I lived in that parsonage, and now the privilege belongs to my son Vernon and his wife Libby. I am still pastor of the church, along with my wife Katie and son Vernon. My goal is to continue doing so until I drop dead!

In October of 1968, John Streater, John MacDonald, Howard Day, Larry Hoyt, Ed Plowman, David Hoyt, Francis DuBose, and Moishe Rosen were the directors of Evangelical Concerns. They and the ministries they served then are now gone, yet their labor was not in vain. Ed Plowman is still going strong and writes for a number of Christian journals and magazines, including one of my favorite publications, World Magazine. Ed visited me some years ago, and I had enough sense of history to arrange for a photo of the two of us.

I must confess that I did not value those men to the extent I should have; I did not know what I had in front of me. Many of us, and espe- cially me, were blinded by the success we were enjoying and had no idea that we were part of a special outpouring of the Holy Spirit. We therefore were unaware that the so-called success had nothing to do with us. It is with some pain that I am recalling this now; I did not esteem those men as I would now. I never even bothered getting a photograph of them.

• Moishe Rosen made First Baptist of Mill Valley his home church during John MacDonald’s tenure as pastor. Some of the founding members of Liberated Wailing Wall also lived in the parsonage.
•  

Were the Crusaders and
Inquisitors Christians?
Yes, No, Maybe

PART ONE: The Crusaders

“Crusader” is a negative word to many, and maybe deservedly so, but we may have to reconsider the negative position. Following is a summary and examination of the history of the crusades themselves.

There were eight crusades in all, from 1095 to 1294. Oddly enough, no Arab tribes played much of a role, if any, in fighting the crusaders. This is not to say that Muslim armies were not involved, but exactly who within Islam actually participated is another issue.

The French initiated the first crusade led by Godfrey of Bouillon. The purpose was to wrest control of Jerusalem away from the Muslim Seljuk Turks, who had taken it in 1070. Jerusalem had previously been part of the Fatimid Empire, composed mostly of Shi’a Berbers from North Africa, and during their control of the Holy City, Christians were allowed to visit their special religious sites. But such was not the case with the Seljuks, who violently persecuted the Christians and desecrated and destroyed churches. After a time, Pope Urban II called for the rescue of the Holy City from the Islamic infidels.

Bouillon, certainly a member of the Roman Catholic Church, managed to murder 70,000 Muslims and even burned down synagogues crowded with Jewish people hoping to escape the violence around them. Despite the slaughter, many of the European soldiers married local Muslim and Jewish women; they settled down, and for at least forty years, the Christians and Muslims lived peacefully side-by-side. The fact remains, however, that Crusaders slaughtered a host of people.

The second crusade in 1144 was undertaken when a Kurdish army from Mosul (now in the modern state of Iraq) attacked a Christian fortress in Edessa (now in the modern state of Turkey). As a result, Pope Eugenius III called for a crusade. Two Christian armies, one French, the other German, were completely decimated by the Seljuk armies while on their way to join the battle at Edessa. A monk named Bernard of Clairvoux was engaged in this one. Following the crusade nearly forty more years of peace ensued. 

The third crusade was called in 1189 by the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick Barbarossa after the army of Saladin (1137–1193), the famous Kurd who became the Sultan of Egypt, defeated the crusader army on July 4, 1187, at the Horns of Hittin, a site just above the Sea of Galilee. It proved to be the most famous of all the battles during the crusade period. Jerusalem surrendered, and Saladin dealt humanely with the survivors; there was no sacking or murdering, and the city was kept open to Christian pilgrims. But Jerusalem’s fall inspired Barbarossa to lead a French army into Turkey, where he died crossing a creek. The Seljuks quickly destroyed his army.

There was, however, more to the third crusade. King Richard the Third of England (the “Lion Heart”) gathered an army of Norman Knights, set off for the Holy Land, and proceeded to capture Acre and Jaffa on the Mediterranean Coast, even defeating Saladin at the battle of Arsuf.

The two commanders treated each other with respect and signed a peace treaty on September 2, 1192, the terms of which left Jerusalem in the hands of the Muslims, while the Christians retained the coastal areas where Acre, Caesarea, and Jaffa are located.

Pope Innocent III in and around 1195 called the fourth crusade. This one had nothing to do with the Holy Land or Muslims, but the goal was to liberate Jerusalem. The French crusaders entered Constantinople, home of the Greek Orthodox Church, who resented the presence of the Roman Catholics and rose up against the crusaders. In the battle that resulted, the crusader “Western” Christians did not kill many Greek “Eastern” Christians, but they did completely pillage the city. After a short period, the crusaders made off with their loot and headed for home. Nothing was accomplished.

Pope Honorius III, Innocent’s successor, could not accept the results of the fourth crusade and called for a fifth crusade. This time mainly Germans and Hungarians marched off to Jerusalem by way of Egypt in 1217. The army spent three years in skirmishes with the Kurdish Ayyubids in Egypt. They failed to make headway and finally called it quits and sailed home.

The sixth crusade’s outstanding personality was the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II, who was the grandson of the famous Barbarossa. Frederick II’s daughter was married to John of Brienne, who now ruled Jerusalem. Thinking that marriage gave him authority over Jerusalem, he called for the sixth crusade in 1225. Due to the knowledge and negotiating skills of the remarkable Frederick, the crusade was peacefully conducted without one battle or casualty.

Frederick had studied a great deal about Islamic literature, science, and philosophy, which gave him a solid platform for interaction with the leader of the Islamic army, Malik al-Kamil, who was the nephew of the great Saladin. The two leaders resolved the confrontation by signing a ten-year treaty in 1229. (Ten years was the maximum time allowed for a treaty according to Sharia Law.) Christians and Muslims alike welcomed the terms of the treaty. Unhappily, the new pope, Pope Gregory IX, hated Frederick and refused to ratify the treaty, denouncing it vigorously.

Things went from bad to worse after Sultan Kamil’s death in 1238, when a maverick Turk from Russia named Baibars led a Mameluk (Muslim) army against Jerusalem, sacking it and slaughtering the citizens in 1244.

King Louis IX of France called the seventh crusade. In 1250 King Louis brought an army to Egypt and sailed up the Nile to Cairo, where Baibars demolished that army. Baibars warred against everyone, Christian and Muslim alike, in an effort to establish his power and authority. His hate and murderous anger were mostly directed toward Christians, and he attacked one city after the other along the Mediterranean coast—Caesarea, Safad, Jaffa, and Antioch. He killed and enslaved thousands of Christians. Jerusalem was now firmly in the hands of Muslims, and the seventh crusade came to an end.

The eighth crusade flowed out of the outrage perpetrated against Christians in the seventh crusade. Louis IX demanded a new crusade in the year 1270. His plan was to come through Tunis on the way to Egypt, but a few days after landing in Tunis he died of dysentery.

Baibars died in 1277 (these crusades could last for years), and his successor, Sultan Khalil, managed to finally defeat the crusaders at Acre in 1291, killing or enslaving some 60,000 Christians there.

Impact of the Crusades

The crusades deepened the divide between the Eastern and Western wings of the Catholic Church, a rift that was already well underway centuries earlier.

Related to that, the crusades greatly weakened the Byzantine Empire, which succeeded the Holy Roman Empire.

The crusades also permanently embittered relations between Christians and Muslims, and they are used to this day to rationalize a continuing hatred that often erupts into violence. The fact that both Christians and Muslims committed horrible atrocities is often forgotten or conveniently submerged. Muslims have cited Christian crusader actions as justification for their own brutality. This is not a surmise, but openly declared by contemporary Islamic jihadists, whose portfolio of rallying cries includes something close to, “Remember the crusades.” They legitimize their call for revenge by pointing to what the Christians did in the crusades. This is, of course, completely disingenuous but nevertheless effective.

Promotion of religion by force of arms demonstrates the weakness of Muslim ideals, ethics, and message. To spread the faith by means of intimidation is the worst possible program, one that no one can respect. Not only the Muslims but also Christians have been guilty here. (This topic will be explored in greater detail in the second section of this essay, “The Inquisitors.”)

As early as the fifth century, and many say long before, becoming a Christian required baptism by an ordained priest of the one Catholic and Apostolic Church. Faith and grace now abandoned, the Church became a power structure and fell into the same tactics employed by many other secular institutions. Some use the word “Christendom” to describe the Church as empire, combining religion with the state.

The crusades marked a departure from the Church’s mission to preach the Gospel to all nations. By picking up the sword, it was giving in to the barbaric culture of that day. The Church was intertwined with the state, the state using the Church and the Church using the state to advance goals and consolidate power.

As a result, the core doctrine of conversion was severely compromised. To coerce a person into leaving one faith for another is absolutely unbiblical. Requiring a choice of whether to convert, die, or pay the tax is not exactly proper evangelism, but the Church was guilty of this just as were the Muslims, and contemporary Muslims still employ these means. It cannot be said today that the Christian Church advances by means of force and fear. (Note: Instances of wrongly motivated attempts to convert so-called “primitive” people groups were occurring well into the nineteenth century, e.g., the forcing of Western/Christian culture and religion on Native Americans on reservations and similar activities by British missionaries in India. Broadening the argument to include these examples or others is not possible in the space allowed, but we acknowledge needing to discuss this elsewhere.)

The same mentality that was seen in the crusades also resulted in the persecution of those we today call evangelical Christians, especially those who reject infant baptism, transubstantiation (Jesus being actually present in the Bread and the Cup), and the necessity of receiving other sacraments in order to go to heaven—in other words, those who adhere to salvation by grace alone, faith alone, and Christ alone.

***

The story of two ancestors of mine might be of interest now. The first concerns Sir John Philpott.

John Philpott was a “Salter and Pepperer” (a grocer) who lived in the latter part of the fourteenth century in London, England, while the One Hundred Years War with France was underway. He relied on his merchant fleet to bring foodstuffs into England from the Continent, but a combination of a weak English king and an aggressive French king meant Philpott’s business was faltering. He was able, however, to convince the English king to allow him to outfit his ships into a navy and be crewed by convicts from London’s prisons, of which there were plenty. The result was a series of victories by Philpott’s navy, and on the strength of that he was elected Lord Mayor of London in 1388 and 1389. He was a faithful Christian, and in his will, he left 100 pounds to be distributed amongst the poor of London at Christmas time each year. In the old city of London there is still Philpott Lane where a plaque commemorating this faithful Catholic and Christian man has been installed.

Then there was another Englishman, again named John Philpott, this time living in the sixteenth century. He was a Puritan, meaning he hoped that the newly founded Church of England that broke away from the Roman Church, precipitated by King Henry VIII, would be purified—that is, would conform more closely to what we see of the church in the New Testament. Philpott was forced into the Court of the Inquisitors and found guilty. Refusing to recant, he was burned at the stake in 1555. (Burning at the stake was desirable form of execution because it was thought the destruction of the body made resurrection impossible.)

PART TWO: The Inquisition

Although the story of the development of the Church in the centuries leading up to the “Dark Ages” (stretching from approximately AD 500 to 1500) is not so easy to uncover, there is evidence that the faith of Jesus and the early disciples was not extinguished. That it was diverted, perverted, and undermined, especially toward the end of the third century, is plain history, at least as evangelicals read it.

During that dark time, the vibrant faith we see in the New Testament gradually shifted to a more formalized, mechanical, ritualistic, even magical understanding of what it meant to be a follower of Jesus. Especially after the so-called conversion of Constantine in the early fourth century, people became members of the Church and were counted among the faithful, despite their never hearing the real Gospel message or knowing much of anything about the core doctrines of Scripture.

The power of the Church over salvation, the only really important issue in life, was under the control of an ecclesiastical hierarchy. Those who rebelled against this were the targets of the Inquisition, the first court of which was formed around the year 1231 and continued for some three or four centuries. From the Church’s point of view, the Inquisition was necessary, because many good Catholics were turning away from the doctrines of the Church, especially after publication of the Bible in common languages, which allowed people to see what the Bible actually taught. For nearly a thousand years it had been hidden in a dark covering of non-intelligible Latin, Greek, or Hebrew.

The renaissance of Biblical understanding forced the established Church to react, and energetically; heresy became the most heinous of all crimes.  There is evidence that many were troubled by the means used to keep the Church pure. Ecclesiastical leaders would often plead with secular authorities for sentences to be carried out mercifully. In the early days of the persecution, Roman Church officials acted ruthlessly. For instance, the Cathari (or Albigenses) and the Waldenses were persecuted, sometimes to death, during the 1220s by the order of Pope Gregory IX.

Fringe Christian groups were not the only ones to be sought out by the Inquisitors. As with John Philpott in 1555, the point at the center of the trials had to do with the elements of the Mass, otherwise known as Communion, Eucharist, or the Lord’s Supper. Along with the Reformers (i.e., Martin Luther and John Calvin), Philpott believed the bread of the Eucharist was just bread and the juice in the cup just juice. But the Church had developed the concept that the bread was transformed by an act of the priest into the actual body, the flesh, of Jesus. Likewise, the juice invisibly, magically, became the actual blood of Jesus.

Two Latin words were pronounced by the priest before the Mass began—hocus pocus—and when the words were pronounced, the magical power inherited from Peter and passed down through the properly ordained priesthood transformed the substances, shazam!

How this came to be is not possible to describe here, but there is an actual history to it. The short version is this: The Church had become far too Western in its understanding of the Middle Eastern document we call the Bible, both Old and New Testaments. And when Jesus said, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink” (John 6:53-55), the Roman Church took His words literally.

To take Jesus’ words literally, however, would have been ludicrous for a Jewish person in the first century. And the early history of the Church clearly reveals that the passage was taken metaphorically—after all, the Church was composed mostly of Jews for the first generation. The point was that the disciples were to trust in and believe in Jesus as the Savior and that His death on the cross, with His broken body and shed blood, was the once-forever sacrifice for sin. Therefore, long after the “Eastern” sense of things was lost, the “Western” mindset misunderstood much of the nature and means of salvation.

The Inquisition was aimed at Christians, but Muslims and Jews were also tried, and many were executed. It is only natural that Muslims and Jews would have a negative reaction to this, and it is certainly possible that it yet lingers as something else horrible that Christendom perpetrated and thus could be avenged in whatever era.

During the period of the Inquisition there were undoubtedly thousands of bishops, priests, and regular members of the Roman Church who sincerely thought they were being faithful Christians to support and participate in what they perceived as a cleansing of their Church from heretical doctrine and practice. Undoubtedly, there were thousands of Christians who were horrified at what was being done in the name of Jesus Christ. And during the period of history when the Church and state were wed, significant resistance was virtually out of the question. Such resistance finally came in 1517 under the inspiration of a Catholic monk named Martin Luther.

PART THREE: Yes, No, Maybe

Were those who conducted the Inquisition real Christians?

Were the crusaders real Christians?

Were the Muslims who fought against the crusaders real Muslims? Or, to put it another way, are those Muslims who engage in violent jihad today the real Muslims?

To these questions the answers are, Yes, No, and Maybe.

Looking at Christians

It must be said that no one could possibly know for sure whether real and actual born-again Christians committed atrocities against Muslims and Jews, in that day or in this. If a group of careful observers had watched the murder of Muslims and Jews at the hands of people known as Christians during the crusades and at other times, would they have known for certain which was the right conclusion? The proper answer would have to be, No!

Why is this so? The core of the answer lies in the mystery of conversion. While one can be baptized, join a church, and even reform his or her life, this is far from genuine Christian conversion. Being a part of a church does not mean one is a Christian. Conversion means that the Holy Spirit indwells the one believing in Jesus, the one who has had all sin removed and forgiven. It is a profound spiritual experience not an intellectual or emotional one. It is something God does completely apart from anything an individual can do. It is miracle and mystery. Every pastor who has ministered to a congregation for ten or more years knows that in that congregation are those who have truly been born again and those who have not.

Not that every real Christian does right and lives right. The Christian life is a growing up into the fullness of Christ, little by little—first as an infant, then a toddler, young child, older child, adolescent, teenager, young adult, adult, older adult, and senior. Still after a lifetime of maturing, the Christian is not anywhere perfect until in heaven and in the presence of our holy God.

Is it possible that a Christian could be deceived into thinking that killing and persecuting others because they believed differently is justified? Yes, it is possible.

Might Christians commit horrific acts because they were told to do so by powerful religious authorities? Maybe. Might Muslims? Maybe.

Would a Biblically literate Christian believe he or she was serving God by persecuting or even killing “infidels”? No, unless there was some unknown source of intimidation going on behind the scenes and/or such Christian had his or her mind bent to the point that they became merely tools of evil.

Perhaps the right answer for all of these questions is, Maybe!

Would persecuting or killing a non-Christian win approval with God? Would it ensure a place in heaven? To both, the answer is an unequivocal, No!

Would defending the cause of Christianity, the Church, a Christian leader, or anything else in all creation by harming others merit the favor of God? Certainly not! Would dying in defense of the God of Scripture assure a place in paradise? In no way!

This is my solemn opinion as a follower of Jesus.

Chapter Two. Passover and Unleavened Bread

The authors’ thesis is that Jesus completed, or fulfilled, both Passover and Unleavened Bread, in that He was crucified, or sacrificed, on Passover and was buried, taking sin away, on Unleavened Bread. Is this warranted on the basis of the biblical material itself?

The very first Jewish holiday in the religious year is the first spring feast of Passover, or Pesach, which is the transliterated Hebrew for Passover. Passover is also the first of the “pilgrimage feasts” along with Pentecost and Tabernacles. On these three holidays male Jews were to travel to the Temple in Jerusalem. Since Passover, Unleavened Bread, and Firstfruits came within the span of three days, most pilgrims would be present for all three.  

The second holiday is Unleavened Bread, or matsot, which is the transliterated Hebrew for Unleavened Bread. We find both feasts in a single section in Scripture.

Leviticus 23:4-8

“These are the appointed feasts of the LORD, the holy convocations which you shall proclaim at the time appointed for them. In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month at twilight, is the LORD’s Passover. And on the fifteenth of the same month is the Feast of Unleavened Bread to the LORD. For seven days you shall eat unleavened bread. On the first day you shall have a holy convocation; you shall not do any ordinary work. But you shall present a food offering to the LORD for seven days. On the seventh day is a holy convocation; you shall not do any ordinary work.”

Notes on the passage:

One. Passover was a one-day feast to be observed during the first month, called Nissan, on the fourteenth day of that month. Numbers are significant in Scripture, especially three, seven, ten, twelve, and multiples thereof. Here the fourteenth is seven doubled. Unleavened Bread came on the fifteenth day of Nissan and was to last seven days.

Two. “Appointed” and “holy”—these words, used for all the feasts, point to the importance of the feasts, which are established by God alone.

Three. No ordinary work was to be done on Passover or Unleavened Bread, so then we see a focus on resting from work. In the short description of the first two feasts we find two statements that no ordinary work was to be done.

Four. Unleavened bread is bread made without yeast. Yeast became a symbol or a metaphor for sin. When Paul the apostle wrote to the Corinthians around A.D. 55, he was able to communicate with a mixed Jewish and Gentile church and rely upon a common understanding that there was a connection between leaven and sin:

Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump? Cleanse out the old leaven that you may be a new lump, as you really are unleavened. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. Let us therefore celebrate the festival, not with the old leaven, the leaven of malice and evil, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.

1 Corinthians 5:6-8

It is important to note that by A.D. 55 Jesus is referred to as the Passover lamb, a lamb that had been sacrificed. This identification probably depends on the words of John the Baptist, who saw Jesus approaching the Jordan River where the baptizing was taking place and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29).

One feast or two?

Passover and Unleavened Bread were so closely connected in the centuries before the birth of Christ and during His ministry that both would be referred to when only one was mentioned. The clearest example of this is found in Matthew 26:17. “Now on the first day of Unleavened Bread the disciples came to Jesus, saying, ‘Where will you have us prepare for you to eat the Passover?’” It was at the traditional Passover Seder when the Lord’s Supper, also known now as Communion or the Eucharist, was instituted. Only unleavened bread was used at that Seder. Other references are Mark 14:1, 12; Luke 22:1, 7; Acts 12:3, 6; 20:6.

In modern times the term “Unleavened Bread” is usually not used, and the designation “Passover” refers to an eight day period incorporating both holidays.

Background to Passover 

The Passover is the story of God bringing His people out of Egypt to fulfill His earlier promise to Abraham (the full account is to be found in Exodus 12). Originally, that promise was given in Genesis 15:12-16, where God said, “Know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs and will be servants there, and they will be afflicted for four hundred years. But I will bring judgment on the nation that they serve, and afterward they shall come out with great possessions” (Genesis 15:13-14). An approximate dating of this event is 2100 B.C.

While Jacob, also named Israel, and the grandson of Abraham, was still living, he brought his whole family to Egypt in order to survive a severe famine. At first they were favored guests due to his son Joseph’s high rank in the Egyptian government, but the Israelites (also called the Hebrew people by this time) were eventually enslaved and lived miserably for four hundred and thirty years until the days of Moses (see Exodus 12:40). The dating of these events varies among biblical scholars, with some dating the exodus about 1446 B.C. and others about 1260 B.C. A discussion of the dating goes beyond our purposes here, but the important point is that God did redeem the people of Israel out of Egypt.

God commanded Moses to go to the Egyptian Pharaoh and demand that he let the Israelites go. Pharaoh hardened his heart and said no. In order to change Pharaoh’s mind and show him that the God of Israel was superior to the Egyptian gods, a series of devastating plagues ensued, and the last one, the tenth plague, threatened death to the first born of each household, both Israelite and Egyptian.

A remedy, however, was provided by God, who instructed the children of Israel through Moses to take one unblemished lamb per family on the tenth day of the month of Nisan and for four days to inspect it to make sure it was a truly flawless or clean lamb. Then at twilight on the fourteenth day of Nisan, they were to slaughter that lamb without breaking any bone, they were to collect the blood in a basin, then they were to take a hyssop stock, dip it into the blood, apply the blood to the lintel (top part) and the side doorposts of their houses. That night, when the angel of the LORD saw the blood, he would pass over those houses, thereby delivering the firstborn of that family from death.

According to Leviticus 23, God’s people were to keep or observe, actually “proclaim” Passover every year. And many centuries later we find that Jesus, accompanied by His disciples, also observed Passover.

The Passover with Jesus and His disciples

It was at a Passover Seder, that meal that occurred the evening of Jesus’ arrest and the day before His crucifixion, where Jesus reinterpreted and applied the meaning embedded in the story of the first Passover in Egypt:

Now as they were eating, Jesus took bread and after blessing it, broke it and gave it to the disciples and said, “Take, eat, this is my body.” And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them saying, “Drink of it, all of you, for this is my blood of the covenant which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. I tell you, I will not drink again of this fruit of the vine until the day that I drink it new with you in my father’s kingdom.”

Matthew 26:26-29

This Seder took place on the evening of the crucifixion. Jesus and His disciples

were going to celebrate the Passover. The bread would have been unleavened bread—matzoh—which He distributed and said, “This is my body.” Then He took the cup, probably the third cup, known as the “Cup of Redemption,” and said, “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.”

            Soon after that supper, Jesus and several disciples went to the Garden of Gethsemane where He was arrested following the betrayal by Judas. He was put through a series of trials, one before the current high priest Caiaphas, one before the former high priest Annas, who was the father-in-law of Caiaphas, then finally before Pilate. The result was that Jesus, though innocent and flawless, was sent away to be executed. He was taken outside the walls of Jerusalem and there crucified along with two others. He was placed on the cross at 9 A.M., the time of the morning sacrifice at the Temple. It was the fourteenth of Nissan—Passover. He died at 3 P.M., the hour of the evening sacrifice at the Temple. But it took some time before Pilate issued the order to remove the body from the cross. It often took days to die on a cross, which is one of the reasons the Romans employed such a horrific method of execution, but Jesus died after only six hours. Pilate needed to ascertain that Jesus was actually dead before releasing Jesus’ body to those who asked for it. We find the story in Mark’s Gospel:

And when evening had come, since it was the day of Preparation, that is, the day before the Sabbath, Joseph of Arimathea, a respected member of the Council, who was also himself looking for the kingdom of God, took courage and went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. Pilate was surprised to hear that he should have already died. And summoning the centurion, he asked him whether he was already dead. And when he learned from the centurion that he was dead, he granted the corpse to Joseph. 

Mark 15:42-45

John’s Gospel contains another account of this, with slight differences:

After these things Joseph of Arimathea, who was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews, asked Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus, and Pilate gave him permission. So he came and took away his body. Nicodemus also, who earlier had come to Jesus by night came bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about seventy-five pounds in weight. So they took the body of Jesus and bound it in linen cloths with the spices, as the burial custom of the Jews. Now in the place where he was crucified there was a garden, and in the garden a new tomb in which no one had yet been laid. So because of the Jewish day of Preparation, since the tomb was close at hand, they laid Jesus there.

John 19:38-42  

Jesus died in time to be buried exactly on the day of Unleavened Bread. There was just enough daylight left for His burial. That burial took place on the fifteenth of Nissan.  

How much did the prophets know?

Long before Jesus was born of Mary in Bethlehem, the Passover was the focus of

the attention of Hebrew prophets. As we read through the Old Testament, it appears that prophets were studying the Passover, looking for clues to what God would do in the future. From the reading of the introduction to Isaiah chapter 53, it seems possible that the prophet had been studying and considering the Passover story as he quoted from Exodus 12:1-6, which talks about the preparation of a lamb. Then in the body of chapter 53, Isaiah introduces that lamb—he describes how God would send a “suffering servant,” one that His people would reject and that would be pierced for our transgressions. This suffering servant would be led like a lamb to the slaughter and die for the sins of the people, die just like the lamb sacrificed in the first Passover in Egypt.  

            How much the Hebrew prophets knew cannot now be fully known. It is plain that they saw the hand of God extended far into the future at least. They knew of the faithfulness and the power of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; it is reasonable to think that they saw the fulfillment of the many promises in those things that God had already revealed, and the yearly holidays might well have been continual reminders of those promises.

Is there a biblical warrant?

Is it possible to state that Jesus completed, satisfied, and fulfilled, in His death and burial something that God had embedded in those holidays and which mark the roadmap of world history?

            Since nothing said here is testable using the scientific method it must be that our conclusions will be based upon faith. But this faith is not without something tangible behind it, some evidence that is clear, consistent, and easily understood. It is undeniable, based on the biblical evidence, that Jesus was crucified on Passover and buried on Unleavened Bread. Is this extraordinary? Yes it is, and there is more evidence to come. Next we will see that Jesus also fulfilled Firstfruits. That would make it three in a row.

Gospel Meditation

Galatians 3:15–29

Find a quiet place, alone and apart from distractions. Be comfortably alert, still, and at peace. Recite the Lord’s Prayer. Sing or cant the Jesus Prayer. Pray for family, friends, neighbors, and yourself. Slowly and carefully read the passage of Scripture.

1. Paul reminds the Galatian believers that they consider human made contracts, that after being endorsed by both parties, cannot be broken.
2. Thus was the agreement between Abraham and to his offspring, and this offspring was Jesus Christ the Messiah, that through him all the promises of God would come.
3. The Law, of Moses, is not a new contract neither does it cancel the contract made with Abraham, which still stands as a promise that is to come.
4. Paul makes it clear that the Law was given to Israel that they would know what sinful behavior was.
5. Keeping the Law cannot “give life” but does point to doing that which was right. Yet the Law could not give life but this only through “the promise of faith in Jesus Christ.”
6. The Law, though not an instrument of salvation, yet it served as a “guardian,” however, and all who are in Christ Jesus are sons and daughters of God, and this through faith and not by Law keeping.
7. Therefore, there is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, no male and female, for all are one in Christ Jesus.
8. And thus, all who are in Christ are Abraham’s seed or offspring.

Chapter 1 7

Charles Simpson in Mobile

Ollie Heath had migrated to California from Mobile, Alabama, where he had attended the Baptist church pastored by Charles Simpson. In the early days of Soul Inn in San Fran-cisco, Ollie invited Pastor Simpson to visit us and preach and teach. This was an experienced pastor who was kind, generous, and encouraging. In no time, he became a mentoring influence for us, especially since he was the first person I knew who actually spoke in tongues.

By that time, I was newly charismatic, the story of which is coming up in the next chapter. Pastor Simpson was one of the few charismatic Southern Baptist pastors at that time, meaning that he claimed to receive the “baptism of the Holy Spirit with speaking in tongues.” The Catholic charismatic movement was still a really big deal in 1968, and, along with the resurgence of the Pentecostal phenomenon, sig- nificantly impacted the fledgling Jesus People Movement. Until then, evangelicals were generally resistant to anything Pentecostal and thus shied away from the tongues-speaking Jesus freaks. Lacking acceptance from mainline evangelicals (with the exception, at least in my own circumstance, of a number of American Baptist pastors and just a few Southern Baptists), the Jesus People therefore listened to the charismatics. Charles Simpson came along side us and was admired and appreciated.

The trip that Paul, Ollie, and I made across the country terminated in Mobile. Pastor Simpson invited me to preach at the church he pas- tored, Bay View Heights Baptist Church. He later joined with others to form the group we called the “Fort Lauderdale Five” that included Bob Mumford, Derek Prince, Don Basham, and Ern Baxter, all men we would learn to value and regard highly. (The details of this, and what came to be called The Shepherding Movement, will be presented in a later chapter.)

It was around this time in 1968 that a dangerous mind-set began to develop in me. Since tongue speakers were, for the most part, not well received by evangelicals and were outright rejected by most fun- damentalists, defensiveness regarding the spiritual experiences took hold of many, including me. Perhaps to counter the rejection, I began to think that those of us who were “baptized in the Holy Spirit” were spiritually superior to those who were not. I and those like me did not necessarily hold that speaking in tongues was the evidence or even a sign of conversion, like many mainline Pentecostals did, but our trouble was more subtle than that. We thought we were moving “in the Spirit” and empowered by the Spirit. A “we-they” mentality developed, which I later admitted to be a cultic or toxic mentality. But I thought there were two types of Christians, those who were being used by God to do miraculous works on the one hand, and the rest who sat in the pews doing next to nothing, on the other. Charles Simp- son did not teach this, but a separation was taking place, a division that grew as time went on.

My own view of the “Baptism of the Holy Spirit” was that it was indeed a second working of the Holy Spirit, but not for becoming holy or for speaking in tongues. My reading of Acts, chapter one verse eight, was that the Holy Spirit empowers the witness of the Christian. The primary work of the Holy Spirit, as I saw it then and continue to believe today, is to convict a person of sin and reveal to the person who Jesus is and what He did, showing the person that they are lost and hopeless without Him. I believed, then and now, that the Holy Spirit works conversion, the new birth, regeneration, and salvation, and that the individual can do nothing to save him or herself.

Awakened by Speaking in Tongues!

The day I began to speak in tongues in 1968 marked a turning point in my witness. I had graduated from seminary, my family was staying with my parents at their house in Sunland-Tujunga, a suburb of Los Angeles, and I lived sometimes at the Anchor Rescue Mission in San Francisco. After joining Lincoln Park Baptist Church, I regularly stayed, keeping my sleeping bag rolled up and stashed inside the pulpit during the day and sleeping on the floor next to it at night. One night at 2 a.m., having spent all day on the street evangelizing, followed by walking all the way back to the deep Richmond District and the church, I awoke loudly speaking in tongues. I was absolutely shocked.

Acquaintances had previously tried to get me to speak in tongues, but I had resisted. The most notable example of this took place some months prior at the Clayton House, a ministry run by Dick Key, who was an Assembly of God minister. I visited there from time to time for fellowship and a cup of coffee and donuts. One day a group of the young people who ran the ministry literally pushed me onto a table and tried to work my mouth to get me to speak in tongues. I had to fight myself away from them, gather my coat and Bible, and flee from the scene. I never came back, and I felt a significant sense of loss, since these Christian brothers and sisters were the only other evangelicals reaching out to the hippies in the Haight-Ashbury at that time. It wasn’t long before Ted Wise and friends opened The Living Room on Page Street, but until then I was alone.

Nonetheless, now I was a tongues-speaker, and I continued to be one for many years, slowing down in 1972 and eventually ceasing all together in the mid to late 1970s. What tongues speaking triggered for me was a dramatic change in my ministry. Prior to this, a steady but small stream of conversions followed my ministry; but now the number began to grow significantly. There was such a marked differ- ence, that I could only account for it by assuming I had been empow- ered by the Holy Spirit that night I woke up speaking in tongues.1 It was Charles Simpson who helped me understand what had taken place.

Writing this book forces me to once again consider what happened then. I am doubtful that the conversions and sometime miracles had anything to do with me. Of course, it could not be so, since only God does these things. Perhaps it is that Acts 1:8 was operational—God’s Spirit empowered the witness, and that is the beginning and end of it.

By Faith, or by Works of the Law? &

The Righteous Shall Live by Faith

Find a quiet place, alone and apart from distractions. Be comfortably alert, still, and at peace. Recite the Lord’s Prayer. Sing or cant the Jesus Prayer. Pray for family, friends, neighbors, and yourself. Slowly and carefully read the passage of Scripture.

1.         The Judaizers, those Jewish Christians, by their insistence that Gentiles who came to Christ must be circumcised and obey the Mosaic Law, caused considerable turmoil among the Galatian believers.

2.         Paul appeals to these by stating they have been foolish to yield to those who denied that salvation was by grace alone. He points out the extreme difference between law keeping and faith in the work of the crucified Christ.

3.         Indeed, the God who gave them the indwelling Holy Spirit did so not by law keeping but through “hearing with faith.” Paul refers to Abraham’s faith, who was accounted righteous and this centuries prior to the giving of the Law.

4.         Therefore, all who believe in Jesus, even the Gentiles, are accounted as “sons of Abraham.”

5.         Those who depend upon keeping the Law are even “under a curse” since none are accounted as righteous by the keeping of the Law. Those who are righteous live by faith.

6.         The “curse of the law,” resulting from our failure to keep the Law of Moses, is removed by the crucifixion of Jesus, who took the curse upon Himself. Thus, salvation extends to the Gentiles, and that on the basis of faith alone.

Chapter One

God rested on the seventh day. For six days God created, then He ceased working and rested.[1] This is a central part of the opening revelation of God to Moses in Genesis.

            Sabbath, in the Hebrew transliterated[2] shabbat, means rest or cease from labor. It is not as though God became tired after creating the universe, but that His resting points to something above and beyond the normal idea of resting. The Sabbath is perhaps the most important key in understanding the Jewish holidays; in fact, as we shall see, it occupies the center of each of the holidays.

            In Leviticus chapter 23, situated before the listing and descriptions of the holidays or feasts, is the following vital introduction.

Leviticus 23:1-2

The LORD spoke to Moses, saying, “Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, These are the appointed feasts of the LORD that you shall proclaim as holy convocations; they are my appointed feasts.”  

Notes on the passage:

One. The word LORD, all capital letters, indicates that the covenant name for God is in the Hebrew text, that name which God gave to Moses as His actual name (see Exodus 3:1-15). It may be transliterated Yahweh, and its pronunciation cannot be known for certain. Attempts at arriving at the meaning of this covenant name of God include but are not limited to “I am that I am,” “I am the only one,” “I am being,” and “I am the unnamable one.”

Two. Moses is the author of the material, originally.

Three. The feasts are directly appointed, determined, authorized, and established by God; they are not of human origin.

Four. The feasts are holy—special and not ordinary.

Five. The feasts are occasions for the gathering of the people of Israel. A synonym for convocation would be assembly. 

 Leviticus 23:3

Six days shall work be done, but on the seventh day is a Sabbath of solemn rest, a holy convocation. You shall do no work. It is a Sabbath to the LORD in all your dwelling places.

Working is normative then and is to be followed by a day of rest. God worked, or created, six days, and then there was a day of rest—this is the pattern. That day of rest, the Sabbath, is therefore special; it is solemn, holy, and set aside, and on it there was to be a gathering of the people of God.

Although by Jesus’ day, the Sabbath came to be tied to a day of worship for

the Jewish people (synagogue attendance and Scripture reading), the primary

purpose of the Sabbath is rest. Although there are still debates in the

church about what day a believer should worship, most arguing for Sunday as

that day, the debates are grounded in a flawed view of the nature and

purpose of the Sabbath. The Mosaic Sabbath was intended as a weekly

reprieve (so to speak) from the curse in Genesis 3, and as a foretaste of

the Messianic Sabbath to come. Thus, believers are free to choose the day

on which they worship, whether that be on a Friday, a Saturday, or a

Sunday–or even a Tuesday. The day of worship, however, should not be

confounded with the Sabbath. Many believers have mistakenly argued that

Sunday is the new Christian Sabbath (the Lord’s Day), and that believers

must worship on Sunday (although nowhere does it say in Scripture that the

Lord’s Day is a new Sabbath). Others insist that the Sabbath is still on

Saturday, and believers must worship on Saturday. But both positions miss

the point of the biblical Sabbath (a one day rest anticipating an eternal

rest), and the clear statement of Paul in Romans 14:5: “One person esteems

one day as better than another, while another esteems all days alike. Each one should be

fully convinced in his own mind.”

The Biblical Sabbath

The Sabbath began on Friday at sunset. It lasted until sunset of the next day, Saturday. The Sabbath was the last day of the week. Six days of work were followed or concluded by one day of rest—exactly the formula for the creation in Genesis chapter one.

On the Sabbath no work was to be done, and to ensure that no work would be done on the Sabbath, traditions were developed by Jewish rabbinical scholars over the centuries; these would sometimes be called the traditions of the elders (see Matthew 15:1-9 and Mark 7:1-8). The Sabbath became overrun by rules and regulations never intended by God, and were almost impossible for the ordinary person to carry out. Much of the conflict Jesus had with the religious authorities of His day had to do with Sabbath observance.

Some Christians still observe the actual biblical Sabbath as their special day of worship, but the majority of Christians began to worship on Sunday, the first day of the Jewish work week. This change may be because the resurrection occurred on a Sunday and also because Jewish believers in Jesus began to be excluded from attending synagogues. Sunday, the first day of the week became known, very early on, as the Lord’s Day (see John 20:19; Acts 20:7; 1 Corinthians 16:2; Revelation 1:10). This however is an historical observation. However, Jesus fulfilled the intention of the Sabbath.

Rest as a view into the nature of salvation

God revealed to Moses that Adam was to take care of the home created for him—the Garden of Eden. All that was necessary for life was in that garden. After The Fall, that willful disobedience to a clear command of God, Adam and Eve were evicted from their home, cut off from fellowship with their God, and were forced to toil, to labor painfully, for their survival. Everything had changed.

            Rest was where God was. God was present in the garden and walked and talked with the first humans created in His image, which probably means that the Creator God actually entered into intelligent communion or fellowship with His creation.

 Rest is always where God is. God was present in the Tabernacle in the wilderness and wherever it traveled before later residing in the temple in Jerusalem, and He dwelt in the place of worship that God directed Moses to build, in the inner most holy place, the Holy of Holies. Away from God there was no rest, only work and labor instead.

The Sabbath—an historical, dramatic, prophecy

Embedded then in the story of rest and work is the story of salvation. God created the Sabbath for His people, and He was present with them. When that paradise was lost, God worked, with the emphasis on worked, so His chosen people would be able to enjoy His rest and cease from their work.

            Long before God’s plan could be fully understood by anyone He put into place the very heart of the nature of salvation—resting in the work of God. The people of God were promised in the creation of the Sabbath itself that there would be a resting. The writer of Hebrews, chapter 4 verses 9 and 10, describes this:

So, then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God, for whoever has entered God’s rest has also rested from his works as God did from his.

Summation

David Baron wrote in Types, Psalms and Prophecies, “The weekly Sabbath was appointed by God as a prophecy and pledge” (page 6). The weekly rest was a reprieve from the bitter effects of the curse described in Genesis 3:17-19. Adam would now find that to survive required hard work and the ground would not easily yield its fruit. A weekly rest would be necessary. There would then be instilled into human beings a desire for something more, something lost—a resting from hard labor.

True rest would and could only come when the curse would be lifted from the whole of creation. The Mosaic Sabbath was a temporary reprieve, but only the Messiah Himself, the seed of the woman, would restore the rest that was lost. (see Genesis 5:29) So it is all the more interesting that Jesus would proclaim, “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28).

            In the description of the feasts or holidays appointed for the people of Israel by God, the Sabbath holds center stage. There was an actual Sabbath day to be observed, but it pointed to something more, a restoration of the rest Adam and Eve had enjoyed in the presence of God. There would always be a Sabbath for God’s chosen people, and the weekly observance continually pointed to it.

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[1]Varying views of the nature of God’s creative act are held. Whatever view one might have will not substantially alter or negate the fundamental underlying concept that God rested or ceased from working (creating), and the Sabbath as a concept entered into the human experience and understanding.

[2] A transliteration is the rendering or spelling of a word with the letters of one language in place of another. In this case, the corresponding English letters are used in place of Hebrew letters, in order to assist in pronouncing the Hebrew words.