Hi Friend,

Aimee Semple McPherson is not familiar to most people today even though she was the first of the radio prophets—and THE first female radio evangelist.  In the ‘20’s her sermons were heard across America every Sunday night.

In the early days of radio there was only one frequency. No need for a dial to find your favorite station because every station broadcast on the only frequency available.  As radio gained popularity more stations came on the air with higher wattage, creating the inevitable dilemma.  You can imagine the confusion that resulted when every station was broadcasting on the same frequency.

Herbert Hoover changed all that.  He was not only a President, he was also the first chairman of the Federal Communications Commission.  Before the FCC, radio stations had no limit on their broadcast power—and with only one frequency it became a confused mess. So every Sunday evening small stations shut down and major stations blasted their signals across the country. Stations in Los Angeles could be heard past the Mississippi River.  Literally the entire nation tuned in to hear Sister Aimee.

At the height of her popularity Aimee disappeared.  She was thought to have drowned in the Pacific Ocean and some people died looking for her. Millions of followers were crushed. Over a month later she reappeared in Arizona claiming to have been kidnapped and held in Mexico for ransom.  There was evidence she was actually secluded in a coastal hideaway on a romantic tryst with one of her employees.

The world has no end of false prophets.  More recently 89-year-old Harold Camping gained national significance when he predicted the “rapture” of the saints, meaning the worthy would be whisked away to heaven.  It didn’t happen and, if you are reading this, you’re glad he was wrong because you’re still here.

One wonders about the followers of Camping.  What are they thinking now?  Some invested their life savings to spread the message only to discover that the message was a lie.

A false prophet may do more damage to Christianity than the skeptic does.  The scorner has an audience among fellow doubters.  But the false prophet has killed the spirit of sincere people—followers who have invested more than money to serve God.  Sincere believers are motivated by a pure and altruistic desire to sacrifice for a greater cause.  It’s an awful thing to damage the spirit of a sincere person.

When Jeroboam became king of Israel, God promised him a place of honor alongside King David. But Jeroboam sinned against God and a prophet from a nearby town was sent with a message of chastisement for the king.  God warned the prophet not to eat or drink anything while in route. After faithfully delivering the message, the young prophet was returning home when he was intercepted by an older prophet who invited the young man to his home for a meal. When the younger prophet protested, the old prophet answered, “I too am a prophet, as you are. And an angel said to me by the word of the LORD: ‘Bring him back with you to your house so that he may eat bread and drink water.’” (1 Kings 13:18 NIV)

Then the scripture makes the surprising statement, “But he was lying to him.”  (verse 18)  It’s hard to believe that one prophet lied to another!  God had not told him to invite the younger man home to dinner.  And the younger prophet, after refusing the request of the king, listened to the older prophet which resulted in his death.  He died for following the instructions of the false prophet.

This presents man with a serious dilemma.  Who can you trust? Jesus warned us that there would be false prophets in the days leading up to His return. If one prophet of God can’t trust another, who CAN be believed?

It’s a dilemma that crosses lines.  I trust my doctor—and pay him well—and he may be sincere, but I want a second opinion.  He may be smart, but it’s my body—therefore a wrong decision won’t affect him.  It damages me!  The same can be said for an investment counselor or an educator.

Maybe that’s the way God intended it.  Once the Apostle Paul went through a terrible trial. He had suffered at the hands of religious terrorists to the point that he feared he would be killed.  It taxed his faith to the limit.  He wrote to the Church at Corinth about his experience.  “Brothers and sisters, we want you to know about the hard times we suffered in Asia Minor. We were having a lot of trouble. It was far more than we could stand. We even thought we were going to die. In fact, in our hearts we felt as if we were under the sentence of death.”  (2 Cor. 1:8-9 NIrV)

What did Paul learn from this harrowing experience?  “But that happened so that we would not depend on ourselves but on God.”  (same verse)

Paul just revealed life’s most important lesson.  You can believe God when everyone else is a liar.  It is depressing when the educational system is turned into an indoctrination camp, when government officials rarely speak the truth, when the leading medical professionals promote a political agenda and peer groups become the thought police.  If that were not enough, the prophets claim to deliver a message from God that He never gave.

When all those things happen, we can take heart—Paul is telling us that we are students in the classroom of life.  Today’s lesson is the same as it was for every prophet since Abraham—we are learning to depend on God.  He is Our Father.

Until next time,

Jim O’Brien