Book Review: Unto the Hills by Billy Graham (1986, 2010)

This may come as a surprise to some, but I have been a Christian for many years and have not been familiar with the writings of Billy Graham until I read Unto The Hills. I have known of his great influence in the hearts of many people and the legacy he is leaving everyday in the lives of Christians. I have seen his overwhelming love for God and unrelenting passion for reaching the lost, yet,  until now, I had never read any of his books.
  With such a reputation as the nation's most beloved spiritual leader, I had very high hopes when I did pick up one of his books, and Unto The Hills did not let me down. It met every expectation I had, and has shown me why he is named the most beloved spiritual leader in our nation.
   In the book, Billy Graham addresses many of the Bible's vast teachings and gives it in hearty portions that you can follow everyday.
   If you are looking for a devotional that will encourage, challenge, and cause you to dig for a deeper relationship with the one true God, then I urge you to pick up Unto The Hills. It has, is, and I'm sure will continue to, impact my life as I read it.

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from the publisher through the BookSneeze.com book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255 : “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

A Man After God's Own Heart

    Acts 13:22b "He also testified and said 'I have found David, the son of Jesse, a man after My own heart, who will do all My will.'"  
  

   In this passage, God is giving us an example of a man after His own heart.
   Now, you might ask yourself, "What does it mean to be a man after God's own heart? How can I possibly live up to that title?" The first step we need to take is look at our hearts, and get them right, before we can see God's. In Jeremiah 17:9 we see what The Bible says about our heart, "The heart is more deceitful than all else, and it is desperatly sick. Who can understand it?"
     So the first thing we should ask ourselves as men of God is "What are the desires of my heart?" or "Is my desire to do God's will?" That is what we will go over first.
     You might think to yourself, "If my heart is so wicked, how can I be a man after God's own heart?" Well, let's look at God's example of David.

- He was a warrior who shed much blood (1 Chronicles 22:8).

- He commited adultry with a woman named Bathsheba (2 Samuel 11:4).

- David later found out that he had gotten Bathsheba pregnant. To solve this problem, David ordered Bathsheba's husband to be put into a forward battle position, where he was killed (2 Samuel 11:5-17).

- David had multiple wives (2 Samuel 3:1-5).

- He was a negligent father, and his family was plagued with strife and tragedy (2 Samuel 13:15-18, 28-29: 18:23).

- Contrary to the Lord's command, David pridefully numbered his troops, causing 70,000 of his people to die in a plague (2 Samuel 24:10,15).

   And yet God's states, "I have found David...a man after my own heart." How can that be? How can God commend a man with that kind of background?
I have three points that I hope will help us find out.

A. God's standard for living.

  

Does God expect perfection? In fact, He demands it (Matthew 5:48-"Therefore you are to be perfect, as your Heavenly Father is perfect.").
   How can we can live up to that when the Bible says that "All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" (Romans 3:23)   Well, what is sin? The Greek word 'αμαρτάνω (Hamartano), most often translated as sin in the New Testament, is a term originally used in archery. This Greek word means "to miss the mark." So, sin, in this verse, is referring to missing the mark that God has set before us, which, according to Matthew 5:48, is perfection.

   Why would God set such an impossible goal? We, by nature, are sinful. Ever since the fall of man in the garden of Eden, sin has been a core part of our beings. If God knows this, why then would He set such an unreachable standard?

   The reason God has the standard of perfection, even though we cannot possibly reach it, is to show just how much we are in need of a Savior. It's shows His glory and lifts Him up.

     So how can we be a man of God? On our own, we can't. Which brings me to my second point.

B. God's saving grace.

   Even though we are not perfect, there was one, and only one, man who was. His name was Jesus Christ, God's only Son. Because Jesus was perfect and knew no sin, He was able to die for your sins and mine and pay the penalty for sin, which is death (Romans 6:23).
   Jesus stood where we belonged and took the full force of the hatred and wrath of God upon Himself. Not only did he just die a physical death, but he took all of God's anger, which we deserve, and took it upon Himself.
   I want to make one thing very clear, it had nothing to do with us.
   In his book, Radical, David Platt addresses a popular view on Christianity, he says, "If you were to ask the average Christian sitting in a worship service on Sunday morning to summarize the message of Christianity, You would most likely hear something along the lines of 'The message of Christianity is that God loves me.' Or someone might say, 'The message of Christianity is that God loves me enough to send His Son, Jesus, to die for me.' As wonderful as this sentiment sounds, is it biblical? Isn't it incomplete, based on what we have seen in the Bible? 'God loves me' is not the essence of biblical Christianity. Because if 'God loves me' is the message of Christianity, then who is the object of Christianity? God loves me. Me. Christianity's object is me... But that is not biblical Christianity. The message of Christianity is not 'God loves me, period,' as if we were the object of our own faith. The message of biblical Christianity is 'God loves me so that I might make Him—His ways, His salvation, His glory, and His greatness—known among all nations.' Now God is the object of our faith, and Christianity centers around Him. We are not the end of the gospel; God is."
   So since when is the Gospel about me? It isn't. In Isaiah 48:9 God tells us, "For My name sake will I defer my anger, and for My praise I will withhold it from you, so that I will not cut you off." For His name sake and for His praise and glory, not ours.
   That grace was by God, for God, so what we have to do is see His glory and accept His Son's sacrifice and praise Him because of our salvation. We have nothing to do with our salvation. It's not because we decided, "Oh, I will except God's gift because I don't want to go to Hell." No. If you are a Christian it is because God called you to Himself so that you would praise Him for eternity. Ephesians 2:8-9 says, "For by grace you are saved through faith; and it is not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: not of works, should any man boast."
   So how does God see us after He saves us? How do we measure up to His standard?
   When God looks on us, He no longer sees our sin. He sees our Savior, His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. He looks at us, and this is what He sees: ‘The blood of Jesus, His Son, cleanses us from all sin’ (1 John 1:7). Through faith in Christ, we are sinners, saved by grace (Ephesians 2:8). This is the beauty the Lord sees in us: ‘There is, therefore, no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus’ (Romans 8:1). This is not our beauty. It’s His beauty!
   But we cannot forget the second part of that verse, "Who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit."
Being a man after God's own heart doesn't end at salvation. We cannot think we can still live the way we did before God saved us, and still be a man of God. We need, as my third point states...

C. A shift in priorities.

   We have read about our sin nature, and our hopelessness to meet God's standards. We've talked about God's grace, and the bridge He gave us to meet those standards. Now we will finish off by talking about the main point of the lesson. What is my heart's desire? Or, put another way, is your heart's desire to follow after God?

   What we need is a radical change, or shift, in our priorities. What I mean by that is we need to have a change from physical, or worldly, things, to spiritual, or Godly, things. Like it says in Romans 8:1, "Who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit."
   In Romans 12:2, the Bible says, "Do not be conformed to the ways of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind." We need to do away with the things of this world and transform ourselves by renewing our mind. Ways we renew our mind are through prayer and the reading of God's word in deep study.
   After we have made a change in our priorities, we then have to be obedient to the callings of God. let's look at more of Romans 12:2, "...So that you may prove what the will of God is."
   We need to have a strong personal relationship with God so that we can know the heart and will of God.
   What did God say about David? "...He will do all my will." So that means if we are to be men after God's own heart, we must humble ourselves, and act as vessels, and be obedient to the leading of God.
   So, what has God been telling you to do? Are you being competely obedient? Do you have that strong relationship with God? Have you fully accepted the sacrifice of the Son? These are the things that lead us to be men after God's own heart.

  

Here is the first sermon I ever wrote and delivered a couple months ago on the date of 9/13/2010. I amazes see how much God has allowed me to grow in the Word in only a few months. It seems as if God is revealing more to me everyday. I hope this paper will be encoraging and challenging as God speaks through it.

     For the glory of God,

                         Zayne Allen

What is my heart's desire?