Month: July 2013 (Page 10 of 10)

Are We Responsible to God?

About all that seems to flow from the various religious venues today is how much God will do for us. God is presented as being indebted to us and the measure of our faith forces Him to pay up. The most popular teaching today declares that God exists for our pleasure and nervously sits on edge waiting to do our every bidding. Modern teaching and preaching have depicted God as so fearful of losing us that He attends to our smallest needs. This doctrine is taught with such romanticism that people flit about in life as human angels chirping about the goodness of God that insures that they will be blessed and untouched by the problems of life. The contradiction of this idea is that it is not matched with reality. The truth is that in this world we have much tribulation and declaring otherwise isn’t going to change the fact. A believer’s faith should be in the truth that Jesus has overcome the world. What this means is that we have peace in Christ in spite of tribulation because we know that God is in control of our lives. We are not without hope, not without promises and we are not without the power and help of God, yet we are not exempt from tribulation. Instead, we are enabled to endure and overcome it. There is no victory without a battle and nothing to overcome unless adversity exists. In the same sense, there is no healing without sickness, no deliverance without bondage, no provision without a need, and no quickening without death. We were created to please God, not to be pleased and pampered by God. Not understanding this basic premise of life is to live irresponsible and uncommitted to the will of God. Understanding this premise helps us to realize that our petty complaints and desires are unimportant in the light of eternity.
God clearly makes us responsible for the way we live while residing in this temporal sphere. Although it is wonderful to know the benefits and privileges of being a child of God, it is of far greater importance to understand that they are not given as toys for a worthless display of self aggrandizement. Everything God gives us has responsibility attached that insist those gifts must be used wisely and carefully to bring glory to God and light to the lost. We must personify Christ through our lives because many people live in unreality, their minds drenched in deception, or short-circuited by drugs and alcohol, and others are simply lost in a denial of eternity and the God who rules over it. Other people deflect the knowledge of God with willful ignorance of who He is and what He declares to the world through His Word.

God has executed a plan to reach them. First, He sent His Son Jesus to die for the world’s sins. Then He sent the Holy Spirit to disseminate the gospel so that all might know that they are in need of a Savior. Finally, He instructs those who receive Jesus as Savior to reflect His image into a world blinded by Satan. Lost souls cannot “see” spiritually and neither can religious hypocrites. They can read the Word, but do not grasp its meaning. They can hear the Word, but not understand. Therefore, Christians who both hear and understand must allow the Spirit and the Word of God to conform them to the image of His Son so that they might see. However, something has gone wrong with our part of God’s plan. The modern church, for the most part, seems to have morphed from Christlikeness into a religious genre that is more preoccupied with luxury than sacrifice. Ritualism has replaced spirituality, program has replaced prayer, [i]twist-ology[/i] has replaced theology and all that is required to be counted among the redeemed is to claim the position. Professing Christianity of today is far removed from the practiced Christianity of early Church.

We will one day leave this temporal realm and be judged for the way we have lived on earth and that thought escapes the grasp of youthful minds. When we are young and full of vigor, we laugh at death and use our strength and security in youth to enjoy life with its volume and variety of pleasures. I spent some time a few months ago in the hospital room of a dear friend who is dying of cancer. I looked at her emaciated body and realized that the final entries in her book of life were being recorded. I considered what she had done and could possibly do if she were to live a few more years instead of dying. Then I wondered what was going through her mind as she lay there awaiting the terrifying finality of death. I also wondered what would be going through my mind if I were in the same situation. Would I race back in memories to the good times I had, the pleasures and honors? Would I carefully consider the things I had accumulated and recount the many times I had wasted both time and money on vanity? Would I reminisce about my best golf shots, the largest fish I’d caught, my favorite television shows, the different sports events I attended, or the other experiences I’ve had in life? The reality hit me that when one approaches the eternal, one-way, door of death, the first thought would be how to stay alive. We would make many promises to God for a few more years of life. We would give up all our possessions to live a little longer. We would void every memory of every past pleasure as if we had never enjoyed them, if we could just remain among the living. When the time came for us to realize that we were going to die and that there was no hope to live beyond a few more days, we would search our memories for the things that were done for God. The reality of imminent death has a way of enhancing what really matters in life.

The greatest waste of a life begins when a person is convinced that life is unimportant and spend it on frivolous living. We’ve been given an allowance of days that is seldom added to, although there are Biblical accounts where God has done so. Every day we live, we cash a 24-hour time-check and spend it. At the end of the day there will be nothing carried over to the following day. We will spend it somehow, even if we lay in bed all day sleeping and then sit up half the night watching television. We should recognize each day how we have spent our allotment and determine what we will do with the balance. Wasting life is a sin.
The apostle Paul lived his life as if his life could end any moment. When he said, I die daily, I do not believe he meant just dying to the fleshly nature, but also living as though his life could end any moment and his opportunity for serving God would be over. Such an idea, when preached today, is considered to be negative and oppressive. Many consider the idea of full surrender to God a legalistic notion unsupported by the Scriptures, so they capitulate to the hypnotic call of the World System and manage to keep their ears and minds free from anything that would convict them to do otherwise. This keeps the secular realm busy today filling the empty hearts of those who have left God’s gift of truth, or never approached it in the first place. As a result, many professing Christians are subject to hopelessness and may battle feelings of emptiness and unworthiness. This self-inflicted disorder keeps vain religion in business as psychological support for people with collapsing faith systems. They must be constantly told that God loves them and is there to serve their every need.

God does not require that we perform various religious rituals as the fulfillment of our responsibility to Him. Church service attendance is good, but it is a privilege more than a duty. Owning a few Bibles or being identified with a Christian group or organization is also good, but of no value if one is convinced godliness is unnecessary. We have been given a great gift—the gift of salvation—that comes with divine privileges and benefits, but also responsibilities. Our primary responsibility is to appropriate and then employ biblical principles in our lives until we become examples of Christ. Failure to fulfill this responsibility makes our profession of faith in Christ nothing more than unconvincing rhetoric. The simple truth is that no one is truly living until they are living for God and the effectiveness of our Christian witness depends on our submission to that truth.

A Prophetic Warning to the Church (March 4, 2003 1:56 pm)

In my opinion every true follower of Jesus Christ needs to be completely aware of the time that we are living in. If we are not in the last-days, then it is a trial run that is so close that the dangers are nearly identical. Therefore, we need to take heed of the many warnings in God’s Word concerning the great time of deception.

First, we need to recognize how powerful that the deception will be. It will be so powerful that the only means of surviving it will be the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.
(Mat 24:24 NKJV) “For false christs and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect.

Satan will pull out all the stops, hold back nothing, pour out everything in his bag of dirty tricks, and the spiritual atmosphere will be too strong for people who have not spiritually prepared themselves to resist it.
(2 Th 2:9-12 NKJV) The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, {10} and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved. {11} And for this reason God will send them strong delusion, that they should believe the lie, {12} that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.

The spiritual atmosphere will be diametrically opposed to the atmosphere of a great revival. During times of great revival even lost people feel the effects of the renewal of passion for God. During great revivals, sin is driven back into the darkness. Evil workers are exposed for the charlatans that they are. False doctrine is denounced. Prayer meetings and church services take precedence over secular activities. Even the laws of the nation are reflective of the revival.

Today, there are deep doldrums in Christianity. Liars and other phonies are honored while at the same time people who speak the truth are dishonored and persecuted. Homosexuals are ordained as Christian ministers and professing Christians are accepting their ministry. There is little passion for God or His Word manifested publicly. Sodomites not only are pouring out of the darkness to stand proudly in public view, but they have infected our government, public education, and almost every other area of society. False doctrines pour from pulpits, out of religious television, lining the bookshelves of religious bookstores, and inundate the entire religious realm. Practically no one will attend a prayer meeting. Even a school event can replace a church meeting. Our nation’s laws are becoming increasingly reflective of the satanic activity in our government.

I personally know pastors who have given up trying to pastor in this atmosphere. I know other pastors who appear to be just barely hanging on. Many professing Christians are simply flowing with the degradation of the great apostasy; marching to the cadence of Satan. Other Christians are feeling the overwhelming effects of it all. They cannot find an honest assembly of true followers of Christ. Every day they fight feelings of discouragement and depression. The joy of the Lord is very difficult to express and they battle daily with feelings of hopelessness, emptiness, and isolation.

This is the time that we have been warned about. We should understand that every godly act and characteristic is going to be more difficult to perform and maintain. Prayer is a battle. Temptation to loosen ones grip on eternal life is constant and pressing. Urges to relax and roll with the flow, follow the herd, do what everyone else is doing, never ceases the attempt to infiltrate our spirits. Evil workers of unrighteousness appear as workers of righteousness. In fact, it is difficult in some cases to tell the difference on the surface. They appear as ministers and people of righteousness. One should remember to listen to the Holy Spirit warning signals in their spirit. Consider their fruit. What have they ever done for Christ? Ignore how they make you feel or their flattering words and comforting ways. Reject the sensationalism of lying signs and wonders. Remember that few people are driven to hell. Most of them are led there by deceptive spirits.
(2 Cor 11:12-15 NKJV) But what I do, I will also continue to do, that I may cut off the opportunity from those who desire an opportunity to be regarded just as we are in the things of which they boast. {13} For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into apostles of Christ. {14} And no wonder! For Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light. {15} Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers also transform themselves into ministers of righteousness, whose end will be according to their works.

God’s Word declares that the one act that will doom people to deception and delusion is rejecting love for the truth. The very thing that could save those who are deceived is the thing that they reject. The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of truth. If He is in us, we will not be deceived. We can walk through barrenness and never thirst or hunger. We will be filled with righteousness. We can master the deceptive time and rise above the clouds of evil lying signs and wonders.

When people reject love for the truth, the Holy Spirit will depart. They will be left to their own devices to defend themselves against the great deception of the last-days. God will not permit them to be shocked into returning to the truth. If they will not receive His love, His Word, His Son, and His Spirit, they do not deserve heaven. Neither do they deserve to be driven into heaven by specter of fearful calamities. Instead, they will be sent a strong delusion so that they will believe the lie and be damned.

In times past, when catastrophic events occurred, people flocked to church services in fear for their souls. Oklahoma City churches reported huge increases in attendance after the Murrah building was bombed. In a few months, the attendance was back to normal. Evidently, those people went back to their old ways of living under the cloud of deception. The very striking fact about the aftermath of 9-11-01 was that many people did not look to Christian leaders for comfort and answers. Instead, they flocked to events where an evil ecumenical mixture of wizards, witches, and other evil workers of darkness joined with professing Christians to pray for the nation. We saw no increase in attendance in our Fellowship.

This may indicate that the great delusion has been delivered to the earth and the package may be opened. If so, people who stand in the shadows, who are trying to live on the fringes of true Christianity, who play on both sides of the fence, who fail to develop passion and intimacy with God, are in deep, serious, trouble. We were warned by God’s Word and His prophets that this time would come. In my opinion, it is here. I encourage everyone not to settle for a casual relationship with God. Don’t settle for a passionless, nonchalant, church meeting where you are not inspired or challenged to stay fresh in your relationship with God. Don’t let your guard down. The hour is late and the time is short. Stand your ground and keep your armor on.

It is going to get very difficult in the last of the last-days, but the most dangerous time is during this initial wave of deception. The reason is because we have gotten used to the blessings of Christianity in a democratic nation. We can get in our vehicles on Sunday morning and there are many church buildings within a short drive from our homes. Someone else preaches to us, teaches us, and does almost every other thing for us. All we have to do is show up. What kind of Christians has this type of “Churchanity” produced? I do not mean to be offensive here, but for the sake of clarity I must be blunt with my answer. In most cases it has produced people that cannot take care of themselves spiritually. Instead, they depend on the three-per-week (or less) church services to keep them spiritual and inspired, and most of them only attend occasionally. They are weak, pampered, religious at the best, and at the worst they are lost, malformed and mutated by years of lack of growth and a viable experience with God. As such, they are no threat to the kingdom of darkness and no benefit to the kingdom of light.

Now, we are going to have to adapt steadfastness of faith to the harshness of the time that we are in. Christians should have been building themselves spiritually during the times of peace. If we had been actually assimilating and applying the Word of God that we have been inundated with, then we would have more than been prepared for this evil time.

We’ve been taught to be weak, to live weak, to need church meetings to a degree that God never intended. Certainly we find strength in fellowship and it is a tremendous blessing to hear the Word of God taught or preached by someone who is anointed. But if we have not developed the practice of feeding ourselves, what are we going to do in the tough times? Paralyzed people and babies have to be fed, but healthy and mature people feed themselves.

Men need to become and remain strong in the Lord and begin taking responsibility for their spiritual duties. The time is coming when men will have to teach their own families. We need to get tough, knowledgeable, and spiritually strong. All of us need to become prayer intercessors. I believe that it is time to consider what is eating up our time and make some serious choices about our activities. If it comes to the point that we cannot find a church building to meet in where God is present and people are sincere, then the only option is to meet in our homes. However, there were times when the Church was even denied that privilege. They had to meet in catacombs and other places that do not even remotely resemble a church building.

I believe we are nearing the time of persecution in our nation. When the only public voices for Christianity are apostate religious church leaders and organizations, I believe that the net of persecution will then fall on the American Church very swiftly. The true Church is being scattered—slowly and systematically. Right now I do not know of one medium or even small Church of true believers that is standing against the current apostasy. I also do not know of any highly visible professing Christian that is doing so.

I could say a lot more, but let me conclude with one more point. The key to understanding that this current apostasy is not going to be resisted by most professing Christians is in the way most of them perceive Christianity. The only way that so many hirelings could be in pastorates is if most of the people want it to be this way. I heard one of the deadest sermons I have ever heard one Sunday morning while visiting a church meeting. A toxic religious mixture oozed from the pulpit and entered the hearts of people who loved to be poisoned so. The sad thing about that church is that it is growing steadily in number. I thought the man might be sick, but I was informed that he was in good health. In other words, he preached that way on purpose. This is the standard for most church meetings today. It does not resemble biblical Christianity. What it is I cannot tell. What it is not is a meeting of true Christians who are aware of the time and striving for intimacy with God. May God help us to understand what is happening!
The prophets prophesy falsely, And the priests rule by their own power; And My people love to have it so. But what will you do in the end? (Jer 5:31 NKJV)