Words of Truth

This summer my wife and I got the amazing opportunity to travel inexpensively to Hawaii. I say “inexpensively” because normally if you want to take a trip to Hawaii it will cost you thousands of dollars in airfare, car rental, hotel, food, etc.

We were already on the west coast for a conference, so the airfare was much cheaper, and we have friends on O’ahu that had invited us to stay in their house while we were there. We didn’t realize until later but we weren’t staying in their guest room, they actually gave us their master suite, and we really appreciated that. They fed us part of the time, and let us use their car. So that’s what I mean by “inexpensively.” We were there for almost 10 days and in total it cost us less than $1K.

While we were there they took us to the Dole Pineapple Plantation and we got to try something called “Dole Whip.” This concoction is equal parts fresh pineapple, ice cream, and heaven. I loved it so much I actually drove an hour out of my way on our second-to-last day there in order to get it one last time.

Some time after returning to the Midwestern US I heard that Dole was producing individual cups of Dole Whip and putting them in the freezer section of stores. I got excited, obviously, and waited for months to find it. Finally I found this product at Hy Vee in Des Moines, IA when I was there visiting family. I bought two boxes, and took them out to the car. Imagine my sadness when I opened a cup to find that it was not the ice cream I was expecting, but was a frozen puree of pineapple with almost no flavor.

I thought I wouldn’t get to taste this dessert again unless I went back to Hawaii (or to a Disney park, because I hear they serve it there as well). But a friend pointed out that I could buy “Dole Pineapple-flavored soft-serve mix” on Amazon for $30-$40 per bag. Each bag makes almost 3 gallons of ice cream.

“But I don’t have a soft-serve machine!” I said. The instructions on the bag literally say to mix the entire bag and dump in a machine. I don’t need 3 gallons of pineapple ice cream nor do I have the machine to make it. And then a friend pointed out that I can just cut the recipe and make it in a regular ice cream maker. And so after getting a new Cuisinart ice cream maker (and the bag of mix) as Christmas gifts, I started experimenting.

First I did some math wrong and tried 4 cups of water and 3/4 cup of mix. It came out like pineapple flavored ice. No good.

Secondly, I re-did the math and realized it should have been 3 cups of water (not 4), and 1 cup of mix. This batch was more like pineapple sherbet (not ice cream) but it was still good.

One other change I made in every batch from this point on was that I now open a can of pineapple, drain out the juice, use the pineapple juice in the ice cream (as part of the liquid), and then add the small pieces of pineapple to the ice cream.

For my third attempt, I used the “vanilla ice cream” recipe from the Cuisinart instruction manual, which included whole milk and heavy cream (also vanilla and salt), but I used the Pineapple mix instead of sugar in the recipe. This resulted in a ice cream that was TOO creamy. I really can’t describe what that means, I just knew it was wrong.

And then we come to today. I made my fourth attempt today, and I finally got it right. I tweaked the “Vanilla Ice Cream” recipe by eliminating the heavy cream, and this is what I ended up with. This right here will make Dole Whip that is almost exactly like what you get on O’ahu.

Pineapple Ice Cream

1. Open can of pineapple tidbits, drain juice into measuring cup
2. Add whole milk to the juice until you have 3 cups total liquid.
3. Add 1 tablespoon vanilla and a pinch of salt to the liquid.
4. Pour liquid into bowl that has 1 cup of dry Pineapple Mix in it. Whisk until smooth (doesn’t take long).
5. Pour into running Cuisinart ice cream maker.
6. Fifteen minutes into the 30 minute cycle, add chopped pineapple.
7. After 30 minutes, spoon into bowls or freezer container.

For soft serve: eat immediately. 
For hard ice cream: freeze for at least 30 minutes.
For Sherbet: leave out vanilla and use water instead of milk.

In England in the 1500’s, a group of Christian believers (Calvinists, actually), were being persecuted for their religious beliefs, which were different than the accepted practices in the Church of England. They were being legally forced to worship God the way that the Church of England wanted them to, or face real, life-changing consequences. So they left England and fled to Holland and then to Plymouth, MA. After much hardship, they finally found what they were looking for: a place to worship God according to the Bible and the dictates of their consciences. They understood that, just as Joshua says in Joshua 24:15, each person must choose to serve the Lord for himself or herself. Worship of God cannot be forced.

This principle was foundational for the United States and is enshrined in the first amendment to the Constitution, the first words of the Bill of Rights: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…” In other words, the government is not allowed to create a state religion that forces everyone to legally worship a certain way or to be a certain religion. And the government cannot keep you from the free exercise of your personal religion.” This has been the bedrock religious law of our nation for 234 years.

Fast forward to this year. The Iowa Legislature allows various groups to erect displays in the capitol rotunda if they fill out the proper forms. This year there were several displays including a nativity scene, a Christmas tree, a wish for “Happy Holidays” from the Iowa Atheists and Freethinkers, and yes, a display from the Satanic Temple with a statue of Baphomet.

The display got people upset, which I believe was its intended purpose. People have been arguing with each other about it for over a week. Religious leaders spoke out against it. Finally, Michael Cassidy, a Christian who objected to the display, drove to Des Moines and destroyed it in an act of what he called “Christian civil disobedience.” Such men as John MacArthur and Ron DeSantis have even called for the display to be disallowed. I normally agree with these guys, but not today. 

The question here does not concern the legitimacy or correctness of any particular religion, but is simply one of freedom: do non-Christians (including Satanists) have the freedom to express themselves religiously and worship as they see fit (so long as it doesn’t harm others)? I believe they do.

Does this mean I agree with non-Christians? Absolutely not. I firmly believe that humanity can be divided into two distinct groups: those who have trusted in the death of Jesus Christ the Messiah of God for salvation, and those who have not. The “those who have not” consists of people of varying religious views such as Hinduism, Buddhism, Atheism, Satanism, Mormonism, Judaism, Islam, Shintoism, etc.

The proper response (as evidenced by the Lord Jesus and the apostles) to seeing someone worshipping someone or something other than God is to share the truth with them and leave it at that. We are not called to run around destroying other people’s temples, we are called to be witnesses.

Do I LIKE a Satanic display? Absolutely not. But the goal of Christians is not correction but conversion. We should not be attempting to make sinners less sinful, keeping them from expressing their erroneous faiths, but to share the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ with them so that they become converted and reject their erroneous faith themselves. Destroying a display does not achieve this goal, it only makes Christians look bad.

In Matthew 22:36 an expert in the Mosaic law asks Jesus, “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” And Jesus replies “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the great and foremost commandment. The second is like it, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets.”

“The Law and the Prophets” was a euphemism the Jews used for what Christians call the Old Testament. The Law was the first five books (the “Pentateuch”), and the prophets were Joshua through 2 Kings except for Ruth, and Isaiah through Malachi except Lamentations and Daniel. The third division of the Old Testament is called “the Writings” which is Ruth, and 1 Chronicles through Song of Solomon plus Lamentations and Daniel.

The first letter of each of the three words for Law, Prophets, and Writings (Torah, Nevi’im, and Ketuvim) are used (TNK) to form the word “Tanakh” which is the Hebrew word for what we would call “The Old Testament.”

The entire Old Testament can be summed up in the ten commandments, and the ten can be summed up in two commandments: Love God (commandments 1-4), and Love your neighbor (commandments 5-10). That is what Jesus meant.

So in essence, a Mosaic legal scholar asked Jesus, “What’s the greatest commandment,” and Jesus’ answer was, “Yes.”

“Jesus hung out with sinners, so why can’t you accept gay people?” I’ve heard this statement in various forms over the past few decades and there’s a glaring error in it that I need to point out. Let’s look at what the Bible says.

Matthew 9:10-13 “Then it happened that as Jesus was reclining at the table in the house, behold, many tax collectors and sinners came and were dining with Jesus and His disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they said to His disciples, “Why is your Teacher eating with the tax collectors and sinners?” But when Jesus heard this, He said, “It is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick. “But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire compassion and not sacrifice,’ for I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners.””

So the first part of the introductory statement is indeed correct. Jesus did spend significant time with sinners. Actually, if we got technical about it, Jesus spent His whole earthly life surrounded by people who deserved to go to hell for their sin. Because that’s all of us. But if we set that aside for a moment and use the conventional 1st century understanding of the word “sinner” as it was used to describe someone who rejected God’s rules (prostitutes, adulterers, thieves, etc) then yes, even with that distinction, Jesus did spend significant time with these people.

But the key here is WHY He spent significant time with these people. Was it to affirm their choices? No. Was it to tell them they were acceptable to God “just as they were”? No. Was it to make them feel “loved and accepted for who God made them to be”? No.

“But how can you say that,” I hear you asking me. “Why are you so hateful?” I’m not being hateful. I’m reading what Christ said and applying it as I believe He intended. Our culture today demands to know why we won’t accept sinners as they are. The Pharisees came from the opposite direction. They asked Christ why He didn’t automatically reject these people.

The answer to both parties is to look at what Jesus said, “It is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick.” He tells the Pharisees that these sinners were sick. Doctors spend time with sick people for the express purpose of moving them from sickness to health.

What would you say about a doctor who goes onto a cancer ward and spends all day there telling these patients that having cancer is amazing and they should be happy that God made them with a body that is sick? That’s horrible, I hope you agree. Doctors don’t spend time with sick people to celebrate their illness, but to help them no longer BE sick.

Jesus Christ didn’t “hang out with sinners” because He thought they were fine the way they were, but because they were the ones who needed His healing touch so they could repent, walk away from their lives of sin, and turn to God, trusting in Him for salvation.

If you are living a life of willing, open sin right now, you are rejecting the God of the Bible, and setting yourself up in opposition to Him. That is a very dangerous place to be, and I appeal to you, please read the Word of God, study it, and let God show you that there is a better way: HIS way! Don’t give in to your sickness, because there are consequences for rejecting God. I Corinthians 6:9-10 tells us that “Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God.” That means if you are choosing sin over God and have no intention of fighting against your sin, you are not saved. But the good news is that it’s not too late for you, because Paul writes in I Cor 6:11 “Such were some of you; but you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God.” Such were some of you. In other words, some of you believers in Corinth WERE homosexuals, thieves, adulterers, etc, but you trusted in Christ and have now rejected your sin.

Repent while you still can.