No Reason to Hide

I was getting beat up as a young pastor in my first church. At some point, I concluded that enough was enough. It was time to give up and do something else. Anything else. I just had to get through one event.

We were celebrating the church’s anniversary. My pastor (every pastor needs a pastor) was scheduled to speak at the event. The following Sunday, I would submit my resignation, effective immediately. I strategically hid my plan from my pastor. He would have tried to talk me out of it. Yet as he preached that evening, I felt like he was speaking directly to me and that I was the only one in the room.

Pastor Wade’s sermon text was Daniel 3. As a preacher who listened to sermons as a student and a sinner, I was surprised. What would my pastor do with this Sunday school story? He entitled the sermon “Don’t Stoop at Standing Time.” I have forgotten most of the details of that message. But the Lord used it to save my ministry at a critical time.

I pray the Lord will use this book in your life and ministry the way He used that sermon in mine!

I hope and trust that it is not breaking news to you that we are living in “times of difficulty” (2 Timothy 3:1). The path of righteousness has been abandoned for the dead ends of sin (Proverbs 14:12). The straight and narrow way that leads to life has been ignored. Are people even looking for it? Every day, more and more are going the broad, crowded way that leads to death and destruction (Matthew 7:13-14). The treasures of wisdom and knowledge that are found only in Christ have been cashed in for the worthless trinkets of sinful folly. Many are playing marbles with diamonds.

As troublesome as these realities may be, the idolatries of the cultural moment are not the most significant crisis we face. We often act and react as if the climate of the culture is the most critical factor of the day. It is not. The world is the world. And it is the height of absurdity to expect non-Christians to think and act like Christians. The world gladly bows before the golden image that Nebuchadnezzar has set up. The problem is that the church is stooping at standing time.

In No Reason to Hide, Erwin Lutzer urges followers of the Lord Jesus Christ to ignore the siren music that bids us to bow the knee to false gods. There are few voices in our day that are as clear and courageous as Lutzer’s. He is a true gift to the church. With godly wisdom, he understands the times in which we live. With biblical conviction, he addresses the contemporary philosophical shifts from a Christian worldview that contend for the faith once and for all delivered to the saints. With a pastor’s heart, he speaks the truth in love—guilty of neither denying the truth in the name of love nor withholding love in the name of truth.

Decades ago, pastors were advised to preach with the Bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other. Of course, there is flawed and faulty logic in such an approach. The Word of God is timeless truth. The newspaper is fleeting propaganda. But the spirit of the statement was a clarion call to bring the truth of God’s unchanging Word to bear upon the changing philosophies of the day. In classic Lutzer fashion, No Reason to Hide wisely counsels us to live in our faithless generation with heroic faith.

I am occasionally asked what challenges future preachers will face. While I am not a prophet nor the son of a prophet, I have a ready answer to that question. It is no sage reflection. The signs of the times are obvious for all to see if they would only pay attention.

I believe the enemy of our souls is at work to undermine the authority of Scripture. The veracity and authority of the sacred Scriptures are attacked to thwart and threaten the truth of the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. The enemy seeks to sabotage the biblical proclamation of Christ to stop the advance of the message of the gospel to all the nations (Matthew 28:18-20).

I sincerely believe No Reason to Hide provides basic training for the spiritual warfare we must fight. If the Lord tarries His coming and spares us to live, every Christian will face the moment of truth when the rulers of the false value system of this world will begin to play their music. By God’s grace, strength, and wisdom, do not bow down to worldly philosophies that are false gospels.

Be a hero who does not stoop at standing time.

—H.B. Charles Jr.