Sometimes it appears to me that God’s people believe He will
simply rain pennies or dollars from heaven to meet their needs. In truth God gives us the gifts and callings
to accomplish all His will for our lives and then expects us to use those
talents to His glory while He causes all things to work together for our
good. Every day people cry out in pain
to God while complaining that He doesn’t miraculously do everything for them. He has PREPARED a way for you to travel in
this great walk we call life. In Joshua
3:4 God said Israel was to follow the ark of the Lord because they did not know
the way to go. It was new to them. In like manner we are to follow the Spirit of
God and the Word of God because we do not know where we are going. If we do not seek the Lord and discern His
directions then we can become lost and unprofitable.
Psalm 143:8-9 says, “Cause
me to hear thy lovingkindness in the morning; for in thee do I trust: cause me
to know the way wherein I should walk; for I lift up my soul unto thee. Deliver me, O Lord, from mine enemies: I flee
unto thee to hide me.” All this
brings us to John 14:5 where Thomas asks Jesus how we can know the way to serve
God. Jesus answers and says, “I am the way, the truth and the life: no
man comes to the Father, but by Me.”
This one verse silences every single instance of someone saying, “There
are many ways to come to God.”
Walking with God is not a guess or a blind stab in the
dark. His scripture is clear, concise
and very accurate. 2 Timothy 3:16-17
says, “All scripture is given by
inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for
correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be
perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works.” Scripture is inspired, without error and
perfect. It will never be proved wrong
nor will it ever fail to come to pass.
Chapter 4 of this book goes on to say that in the end people will no
longer ENDURE sound doctrine; but after their own lusts will heap to themselves
teachers who will tickle their itching ears.”
Another way of saying it is, “they will no longer put up with hygienic
and clean doctrine but their own forbidden lusts and longings will lead them into
error. They will accumulate teachers who
will pleasantly tickle their ears.” Is
that problem familiar to anyone in the world today? Notice it also says that it is our own
longings that get us into trouble. God
has said we must live a certain way. He
says we WILL have feelings and desires that are not in line with His commandments. Obedience says, “I will do your will Lord, no
matter my feelings.”
If our own longings drive us into sin…are they bad? Your longings come from your flesh. They are carnal (sarx and sarkikos) the Bible
says (Romans 7:14, 8:7, 1 Corinthians 3:1-4).
Romans says they are enmity with God, hostile toward Him. Our passion toward our wife or husband is
sarkikos but it is lawful because God has made this outlet for our natural
urges. It must however be kept under
control. This is why we are forbidden to
take part in illicit, illegal lusts such as non-marital sexual relations or
homosexual or bestiality. All these are
forbidden by God in the Law and ratified in the New Testament. They are not ‘allowed’ simply because we are
under grace.
The end of Romans 5 explains that the law comes to show us
our sin and says where sin abounds there is more grace. Some have chosen to say this means we are
free to live these forbidden lifestyles because it causes grace to abound. This is false because the beginning of Romans
6 makes it clear that while sin causes grace to abound we are not therefore
free to sin so we might collect more grace.
He explains in verse 2 that we who are dead to sin cannot live in it any
longer. We are baptized into Christ’s
death. Do you suppose Jesus never felt
the desire to embrace a woman and enjoy that particular passion? He was tempted like every one of us (Hebrews
4:15) and yet without sin. Because Jesus
was not a slave to the nitpicking legalists (Pharisees, scribes, Sadducees,
lawyers, etc.) the various sin lobbies would like us to think He is one
of them. Nothing could be further from
the truth.
God gave the law to Moses.
There is no doubt that these lifestyles were condemned by the Law and by
the Lord. Bestiality, homosexuality,
rape, murder, fornication and many others were all death penalty offences
before God. Did Jesus come to make them
lawful? Is Jesus greater than God? Scripture says that God never changes
(Malachi 3:6). It is this
unchangeableness that sinners desperately need and passionately hate and
detest. It is His unchangeableness that
makes His Word perfect. God never tries
to get out of keeping His Word. He
ALWAYS keeps it. So back to my first
question, is Jesus greater than God?
John 1:1, the very first verse of the most spiritually
focused of all the gospels says, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word
was with God, and the Word was God.” We
say God is a triune God because there are three attributes of that godhead. There is the Father (His choice of terms, not
ours), the Word (how we come to know Him), and the Spirit (how we come to
experience Him). These three attributes
all function perfectly and with total agreement with one another. We ourselves are triune but we fight against
ourselves. We are spirit, we reason with
our mind and live in this body. If we
have asked Christ to enter us and be our Savior then our Spirit is perfect,
obeying God. Our minds can only be
renewed by the Word of God, and our flesh…
Our flesh wars against us…every…single…day.
Our spirit says, “You are healed!” Our flesh says, “I’m sick.” Our minds either say, “I’m sick,” or it says,
“I am healed by the stripes of Jesus!”
It all depends upon whether or not we have had our minds renewed by the
Word of God (Ephesians 4). We live in a
constant state of inner turmoil. Is it
any wonder that Paul cried, “O wretched man that I am!!! (Romans 7:24)?
As I said, God is a triune God. We often mention the trinity of God and too
many of us do not understand what that means.
God the Father, God the Word / Son and God the Spirit are ONE. They agree on all things. There is no warfare within His members. If I give you my word that I will come on a
specific day and help you it requires that I choose to keep my word, that I
have the strength or ability to keep my word and that I actually follow through
and keep my word. If God tells you He
will keep His Word He will simply send His Word and His Word will keep
itself. His Word can function
independently and yet with total agreement with the Father. If His Word needs assistance (as happened
often when Jesus became flesh), then the Spirit will come to His assistance. They are yet in agreement.
I’ve said all this to make it clear that Jesus is not
separate from the God who gave Moses the Law.
Jesus is the Law wrapped in grace and human flesh. He came to die as the lamb of God since God
said in the Law that only by shedding of blood might someone’s sins be forgiven
(Hebrews chapter 9 makes this clear.)
Because He came in grace, many believe this grace is a license to sin
and that they will still be forgiven and blessed by God. This is a twisted lie put forth by
Satan. It is constantly thrown into
believing Christian’s faces that Jesus was not bound by religion.
Since religion is how we have chosen to obey God by specific
actions and rules, then Jesus was far less ‘religious’ than the scribes and
Pharisees of His day. Jesus ALWAYS
observed the SPIRIT of the law if not the priests interpretation of it. It’s not that God doesn’t expect us to obey
certain rules and do things certain ways, it is that the scribes, Pharisees and
Sadducees added to the original 613 laws governing Israel, hundreds, perhaps
thousands of nitpicking rules which made even making your bed on a Sabbath day
a sin.
Before we look upon them too harshly lets look into our own
societies. We say that murder (killing
someone in anger or for gain) is a crime.
God had two categories for unlawfully ending someone’s life, accidental
and in anger. If it was accidental they
can run to a refuge city and remain there in safety until the High Priest
died. If in anger it was murder and you
died. We have divided it into accidental
(manslaughter), unpremeditated (got mad and killed them) and premeditated
(planned and killed them) or a new category “Hate Crimes” killing due to race
or some other criteria. We have decided
that the death penalty is cruel and unusual punishment for causing someone
else’s death and so now murderers have no compunction for killing. God’s Word was specific about murders. He understood the psychology of man better
than we do. "Whoso
sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God
made he man." (Genesis 9:6).
Whenever someone is put to death for murder the understanding is that we
have killed someone who destroyed something made in God’s image.
In the world today this makes no sense. The Jews called Christ a stumbling
block. Blood was forbidden to eat since
life was in the blood. Many pagan
religions have the drinking of blood as part of their celebrations. Jesus was the lamb of God and had to be
partaken of for forgiveness. When Jesus
said we must drink His blood and eat His flesh he lost even more converts. That He was speaking in the Spirit did not
matter. The gentiles called the work of
Christ foolishness. Today these
responses to the work of Christ continue.
In the end they commanded the gentiles that they should not partake of
blood, of eating things strangled (due to pagan practices) or fornication
(which includes all forms of lasciviousness (Acts 15:20, 29; 21:25)).
This is why it says in Hebrews 11:6 that we must believe in
God and have faith in Him. Without faith
it is impossible to believe in God.
The freedom we have in Christ is not the freedom to sin; it
is the power of God to free us from sin (Romans 1:16, 1 Peter 1:5). God has empowered us and expects us to follow
His commandments according to His word.
When we fail to do so we are in sin.
We MUST study to show ourselves approved by God (2 Timothy 2:15). We cannot live for God and disregard His
scriptures and live any way we might want to (John 14:15). Your affection for someone does not change or
modify God’s Words simply because we have chosen to call that affection love
(Proverbs 24:19-22). Love is
selfless. Love is not defined by your
passions. Love is defined by your
obedience to God and your concern for others.
Love suffers a long time while remaining kind (1 Corinthians 13:4).
The non-religious world continues to push at us insisting
that we give up our beliefs for the ‘good of the whole.’ They have chosen – against even their own
beliefs and opinions – to accept evil and all it good so they do not appear
politically incorrect. We the body of
Christ must continue to spread the love and grace of God while standing against
perversions and falsehoods. Christianity
is at a turning point here in America.
There is a great falling away as required in scripture (2 Thessalonians
2:3). Many will chose to join the great
ecumenical movement. Many will chose to
abandon their faith. Many will chose to
turn to another religion that they believe is stronger and more likely to
protect them.
In Christ we are sheep for the slaughter (Romans 8:36). Christ stood in this position first (Acts
8:32) and we are to emulate our savior.
If we panic at the thought of this it is because our lives on earth have
become too comfortable for us to faithfully serve God. He is no longer the most important being in
our lives. The foot race is nearly
ended. The horses are at the gate
(Jeremiah 12:5). Will you be able to
keep up? The Jordan is swelling with
Muslims who hate and despise us, with homosexuals who ridicule us for our godly
positions and with those who slay and murder falsely in the Name of the
Lord.
This scripture in Jeremiah continues:
Jeremiah 12:6 For even thy brethren, and the house of thy
father, even they have dealt treacherously with thee; yea, they have called a
multitude after thee: believe them not, though they speak fair words unto thee.
Our own brethren in Christ have begun to mock our
stand. They say scripture is allegory
and story and not to be lived. They say
it is a fable to be gleaned about the corners but not reaped for its depth and
sustenance. They call themselves
Christians and yet they are like Egypt who if a man leans upon it is but a
bruised reed, piercing the hand. There
is no strength.
Jeremiah 12:7 I have forsaken mine house, I have left
mine heritage; I have given the dearly beloved of my soul into the hand of her
enemies. 8 Mine heritage is unto me as a lion in the forest; it crieth out
against me: therefore have I hated it
Finally, these light Christians have forsaken the house of
their God. They give their heritage and
eternal souls into the hand of their enemies through their backslidings and
declarations of fealty to sinful life.
No longer do they find pleasure in the words of God or the blood of the
Lamb. It is as terrifying to them as a
lion in the forest which threatens their peace of natural mind and fills them
with fear. They begin to hate us because
of our faith and our refusal to believe a lie.
In their hatred they will join themselves to the sinner and the giver of
lies (Job 13:4) and they will seek to destroy us.
Like Cain whose deeds were evil they will seek to slay their
former brothers and our blood will stain the ground (1 John 3:12). It will cry out to God and we will begin to
cry, “How long O Lord. When will you
avenge us? (Revelation 6:10)”
Will you stand beloved?
