About the Book
"THE REAL TRUTH" by Zan Poonen is a thought-provoking book that challenges readers to critically examine their beliefs and values. Poonen explores the concept of truth from different perspectives and encourages readers to seek truth in all aspects of their lives. Through personal anecdotes and insightful reflections, Poonen inspires readers to live a fulfilling and authentic life guided by truth.
Smith Wigglesworth
Smith Wigglesworth was born in 1859 to a very poor family. His father did manual labor, for very little pay. Smith himself went to work at the age of six to help with the family income. At six he was pulling turnips and at seven he was working in a woolen mill twelve hours a day. His parents did not know God, but Smith hungered in his heart to know Him. Even as a youngster he would pray in the fields. His grandmother was the critical Christian in his life. She was a Wesleyan Methodist and would take Smith to meetings with her. At one of these meetings there was a song being sung about Jesus as the lamb and Smith came into the realization of God's love for him and his decision to believe Christ for his salvation was decided that day. He was immediately filled with the desire to evangelize and led his own mother to Christ.
Smith has various church experiences as he was growing up. He first went to an Episcopal church and then at thirteen a Wesleyan Methodist church. When he was sixteen he became involved in the Salvation Army. He felt deeply called to fast and pray for lost souls. He saw many people come to Christ. At seventeen a mentor shared with him about water baptism and he decided to be baptized. The Salvation Army was experiencing a tremendous level of the power of God in those days. He describes meetings where "many would be prostrated under the power of the Spirit, sometimes for as long as twenty-four hours at a time." They would pray and fast and cry out for the salvation of fifty or a hundred people for the week and they would see what they had prayed for.
At eighteen Smith left the factory and became a plumber. He moved to Liverpool when he was twenty and continued to work during the day and minister during his free time. He felt called to minister to young people and brought them to meetings. These were destitute and ragged children, whom he would often feed and care for. Hundreds were saved. Smith was often asked to speak in Salvation meetings and he would break down and weep under the power of God. Many would come to repentance in those meetings through this untrained man. At twenty-three he returned back Bradford and continued his work with the Salvation Army.
In Bradford Smith met Mary Jane Featherstone, known as Polly, the daughter of a temperance lecturer. She left home and went to Bradford to take a servants job. One night she was drawn to a Salvation Army meeting. She listened to the woman evangelist, Gipsy Tillie Smith, and gave her heart to Christ. Smith was in that meeting and saw her heart for God. Polly became an enthusiastic Salvationsist and was granted a commission by General Booth. They developed a friendship, but Polly went to Scotland to help with a new Salvationist work. She eventually moved back to Bradford and married Smith, who was very much in love with her.
The couple worked together to evangelize the lost. They opened a small church in a poor part of town. Polly would preach and Smith would make the altar calls. For a season, however, Smith became so busy with his plumbing work that his evangelistic fervor began to wane. Polly continued on, bringing Smith to conviction. One day while Smith was working in the town of Leeds he heard of a divine healing meeting. He shared with Polly about it. She needed healing and so they went to a meeting, and Polly was healed.
Smith struggled with the reality of healing, while being ill himself. He decided to give up the medicine that he was taking and trust God. He was healed. They had five children, a girl and four boys. One morning two of the boys were sick. The power of God came and they prayed for the boys and they were instantly healed. Smith struggled with the idea that God would use him to heal the sick in general. He would gather up a group of people and drive them to get prayer in Leeds. The leaders of the meeting were going to a convention and left Smith in charge. He was horrified. How could he lead a meeting about divine healing? He tried to pass it off to someone else but could not. Finally he led the meeting and several people were healed. That was it. From then on Smith began to pray for people for healing.
Smith had another leap to make. He had heard about the Pentecostals who were being baptized in the Holy Spirit. He went to meetings and was so hungry for God he created a disturbance and church members asked him to stop. He went to prayer and prayed for four days. Finally he was getting ready to head home and the vicar's wife prayed for him and he fell under the power of God and spoke in tongues. Everything changed after that. He would walk by people and they would come under the conviction of the Holy Spirit and be saved. He began to see miracles and healings and the glory of God would fall when he prayed and preached.
Smith had to respond to the many calls that came in and gave up his business for the ministry. Polly unexpectedly died in 1913, and this was a real blow to Smith. He prayed for her and commanded that death release her. She did arise but said "Smith - the Lord wants me." His heartbroken response was "If the Lord wants you, I will not hold you". She had been his light and joy for all the years of their marriage, and he grieved deeply over the loss. After his wife was buried he went to her grave, feeling like he wanted to die. When God told him to get up and go Smith told him only if you "give to me a double portion of the Spirit â my wifeâs and my own â I would go and preach the Gospel. God was gracious to me and answered my request.â His daughter Alice and son-in-law James Salter began to travel with him to handle his affairs.
Smith would pray and the blind would see, and the deaf were healed, people came out of wheelchairs, and cancers were destroyed. One remarkable story is when He prayed for a woman in a hospital. While he and a friend were praying she died. He took her out of the bed stood her against the wall and said "in the name of Jesus I rebuke this death". Her whole body began to tremble. The he said "in the name of Jesus walk", and she walked. Everywhere he would go he would teach and then show the power of God. He began to receive requests from all over the world. He taught in Europe, Asia, New Zealand and many other areas. When the crowds became very large he began a "wholesale healing". He would have everyone who needed healing lay hands on themselves and then he would pray. Hundreds would be healed at one time.
Over Smith's ministry it was confirmed that 14 people were raised from the dead. Thousands were saved and healed and he impacted whole continents for Christ. Smith died on March 12, 1947 at the funeral of his dear friend Wilf Richardson. His ministry was based on four principles " First, read the Word of God. Second, consume the Word of God until it consumes you. Third believe the Word of God. Fourth, act on the Word."
I Lay My Life in Your Hands
Down through church history, Christians have referred to the seven statements Jesus spoke from the cross as the âlast wordsâ of Christ. According to tradition, the very last of these last words, which Jesus cried out before giving himself over to death, were these: âFather, into your hands I commit my spiritâ (Luke 23:46). It was a powerful, heartbreaking, poetic moment. God prayed to his God by quoting God-breathed Scripture. The Word of God died with the word of God on his lips. And it was a word of poetry, the first half of Psalm 31:5. Most of those gathered on Golgotha that dark afternoon likely knew these words well. They were nearly a lullaby, a prayer Jewish parents taught their children to pray just before giving themselves over to sleep for the night. So, in Jesusâs cry, they likely heard a dying manâs last prayer of committal before his final âfalling asleep.â And, of course, it was that. But thatâs not all it was. And every Jewish religious leader present would have recognized this if he were paying attention. For these men would have known this psalm of David very well. All of it. They would have known this prayer was uttered by a persecuted king of the Jews, pleading with God for rescue from his enemies. They also would have known it as a declaration of faith-fueled confidence that God would, in fact, deliver him. For when Jesus had recited the first half of Psalm 31:5, they would have been able to finish the second half from memory: âYou have redeemed me, O Lord, faithful God.â What Was Jesus Thinking? The most maddening thing for the Jewish rulers had always been trying to get inside Jesusâs head. What was he thinking? Who was he making himself out to be (John 8:53)? âThe Word of God died with the word of God on his lips.â Well, he had finally confirmed their suspicions at his trial: he believed himself to be Israelâs long-awaited Messiah (Matthew 26:63â64). It was true: he really did see himself as âthe son of Davidâ (Matthew 22:41â45). Now here he was, brutalized beyond recognition, quoting David with his last breath â a quote that, in context, seemed to make no sense in this moment: You are my rock and my fortress; and for your nameâs sake you lead me and guide me; you take me out of the net they have hidden for me, for you are my refuge. Into your hand I commit my spirit; you have redeemed me, O Lord, faithful God. (Psalm 31:3â5) What had Jesus been thinking? This should have been a moment of utter despair for him. David had prayed, âLet me never be put to shameâ (Psalm 31:1), but there Jesus was, covered in nothing but shame. David had prayed, âIn your righteousness deliver me!â (Psalm 31:1) But Jesus was dying a brutal death. In what possible way could he have believed at that moment that God was his refuge? David proved to be the Lordâs anointed because God had delivered him âout of the netâ of death. David committed his spirit into Godâs hand, and God had been faithful to him by redeeming him. But this so-called âson of Davidâ received no such deliverance, no such redemption. King Who Became a Reproach Yet, as they looked at that wasted body hanging on the cross, with a sign posted above it that read, âThis is Jesus, the King of the Jewsâ (Matthew 27:37), and pondered his final words, might some of them have perceived possible foreshadows of messianic suffering in this song of David? Be gracious to me, O Lord, for I am in distress; my eye is wasted from grief; my soul and my body also. For my life is spent with sorrow, and my years with sighing; my strength fails because of my iniquity, and my bones waste away. Because of all my adversaries I have become a reproach, especially to my neighbors, and an object of dread to my acquaintances; those who see me in the street flee from me. (Psalm 31:9â11) This psalm recorded a moment when David, the most beloved king of the Jews in Israelâs history, had become a reproach. He had been accused, blamed, censured, charged. He had become an âobject of dreadâ to all who knew him; people had wanted nothing to do with him. He had âbeen forgotten like one who is deadâ; he had âbecome like a broken vesselâ (Psalm 31:12). Had this at all been in Jesusâs mind as he uttered his last prayer? David, of course, hadnât died. God delivered him and honored him. Surely he would do the same, and more, for the Messiah! After Death, Life Yet, there were those haunting words of the prophet Isaiah: âWe esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquitiesâ (Isaiah 53:4â5). Pierced. Crushed. Indeed, It was the will of the Lord to crush him; he has put him to grief; when his soul makes an offering for guilt, he shall see his offspring; he shall prolong his days; the will of the Lord shall prosper in his hand. (Isaiah 53:10) It would have been unnerving to recall that Isaiahâs âsuffering servantâ is first âslaughteredâ like a sacrificial lamb (Isaiah 53:7) and then afterward âprolong[s] his days.â After death, life. Not only that, but God himself commends and promises to glorify him for his sacrifice: âBehold, my servant shall act wisely; he shall be high and lifted up, and shall be exaltedâ (Isaiah 52:13). Had Jesus really believed, even as his life drained away, that he was the King of the Jews bearing reproach, the Suffering Servant? Was this woven into the fabric of his final cry? âMy Times Are in Your Handâ This self-understanding would make sense of Jesusâs physically agonizing yet spiritually peaceful resignation to the will of God as he died. Even more, it also would fit with his previous foretelling of his death and resurrection â something these leaders were quite cognizant of at that moment (Matthew 27:62â64). All this again aligned with the childlike faith and hope David had expressed in Psalm 31: I trust in you, O Lord; I say, âYou are my God.â My times are in your hand; rescue me from the hand of my enemies and from my persecutors! Make your face shine on your servant; save me in your steadfast love! Oh, how abundant is your goodness, which you have stored up for those who fear you and worked for those who take refuge in you, in the sight of the children of mankind! (Psalm 31:14â16, 19) If any of the Jewish leaders (and others) had been paying careful attention to where Jesusâs words were drawn from, they would have heard more than a desperate manâs prayer before falling into deathly sleep. They also would have heard a faithful manâs expression of trust that his God held all his times in his hands, including that most terrible of times, and that his God had stored up abundant goodness for him, despite how circumstances appeared in the moment. Let Your Heart Take Courage I can only speculate what may have passed through the minds of the Jewish leaders as they heard the very last of Jesusâs last words. But I have no doubt that the words, âFather, into your hands I commit my spirit,â were pregnant with meaning from the entire psalm when the Word cried them out. âGod can be acting most faithfully in the very moments when it appears heâs not being faithful at all.â Which makes Jesusâs quotation of half of Psalm 31:5 the most profound and powerful commentary on this psalm ever made. We now read it through the lens of the crucified and risen Christ. And one crucial dimension we must not miss is this: at that moment of his death, no one but Jesus perceived the faithfulness of God at work. He shows us that God can be acting most faithfully in the very moments when it appears heâs not being faithful at all. We all experience such moments when we must, like Jesus, sit in the first half of Psalm 31:5 (âInto your hand I commit my spiritâ). As we sit, we can lean into the faithfulness of God to keep his word, trusting that he who holds all our times will bring to pass the second half of the verse when the time is right (âYou have redeemed me, O Lord, faithful Godâ). We can also, with David, sing the psalm all the way to the end: Love the Lord, all you his saints! The Lord preserves the faithful but abundantly repays the one who acts in pride. Be strong, and let your heart take courage, all you who wait for the Lord! (Psalm 31:23â24) Article by Jon Bloom
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