“LUDICROUS LOYALTY OR LIFE-BLESSED LOVE?”
By J.Farrell Fisher, JUNE 15, 2018
“Ludicrous Loyalty”? The Random House College Dictionary, published by Random House Inc. in 1975, defines ‘ludicrous’ as follows: “provoking or deserving derision; amusingly absurd; ridiculous; comical; laughable…”. And when I speak or write about ‘ludicrous loyalty’, I do think about what the prophet Ezekiel wrote about in Ezekiel 39:6-8 when he recorded the words of Holy God: “And I will send fire on Magog and on those who live in ‘security’ in the coastlands. Then they shall know that I am the Lord. So I will make My holy name known in the midst of My people Israel, and I will not let them profane My holy name anymore. Then the nations shall know that I am the Lord, the Holy One in Israel. Surely it is coming, and it shall be done,” says the Lord God. “This is the day of which I have spoken.”
Did it ring an alarm or awakening bell in YOUR mind and heart? “I will not let them profane My holy name anymore”? Again, in my Dictionary, I read about ‘profane’ as follows: “irreverence for God or sacred things (like His Holy Word?), NOT DEVOTED to religious purposes…”, on and on about ‘pretenses’, ‘misusing’, ‘irreverence’, even ‘secular’ or ‘opposed to the sacred’…”. “Ludicrous Loyalty!”
It was John Foster Dulles who many, many years ago said: “Christ wanted men to see, to see far and to see truly. To get that kind of vision requires avoidance of hypocrisies and group prejudices which distort the vision and make men imagine they see what is not really there.” WOW! So true!
You do understand that ‘ludicrous loyalty’ IS the “blinding influences of traditional prejudices” so opposite of “Christ IN YOU the hope of glory”! Ludicrous loyalty is birthed in men who easily “strangle truth”, live ‘faith’ by mindful reasoning, or, like early American ‘slave owners’ who self-determined “whose in, whose out”! And the ludicrous-loyal-folk are blinded to “Life-Blessed Love” in and through Christ alone, as they ‘profess’ yet reject what He has determined to BE HIS TRUE FOLLOWER!
You may have read at one time in your spiritual journey the words of Charles Churchill entitled “Independence”, a reference about William Warburton, long-ago Bishop of Glouchester in England. Churchill wrote: “He was so proud that should he meet the Twelve Apostles in the street He’d turn his nose up at them all And shove his Savior from the wall.” HOW EASILY THE LUDICROUS LOYALISTS “SHOVE THE SAVIOR FROM THE WALL”!!
“Ludicrous loyalists”? They take “the pride of the peacock” unto themselves and masquerade the Master in their pretenses! Samuel Taylor, in his writing “The Devil’s Thoughts”, wrote about “the Devil did grin, for his darling sin is pride that apes humility,” and I’m not sure you’ll find a better description of “pretenders”! Are YOU aware of any around you through your life-journey like Thomas Hood’s words in his “Blanca’s Dream”, saying, “But of all prides, since Lucifer’s attaint, The proudest swells a self-elected saint.”
Do you possess a ‘full-grown’ understanding of “flesh-born-slaves” to one’s old “sin-nature” birthed through Satan, Adam, and every man since then? Yet, even “religious men” exchange devotion to the “True and Only God” for the “gods of self-determination and self-will and self-pleasure”, yes, sadly, accepting a demonized, self-glorifying, and ‘flesh-satisfying- fallen nature’, even ‘worshipping’ it!
Jeremiah was so inspired with Truth when in Jeremiah 10:23 he wrote: “O Lord, I know that the way of man is not in himself; it is not in man that walks to direct his steps.” How wise is that! And yet how many do you know who live by “the steps of self-determination” in religious circles?
In Isaiah 26:2-10 the prophet shares about his “hearing and receiving the Song of Salvation”, telling us, “Open the gates, that the righteous nation may enter in (appropriating the “salvation of the remnant”!). You will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on You, BECAUSE HE TRUSTS IN YOU. Trust in the Lord forever, for in Yah, the Lord is everlasting strength. (The Rock of our salvation!).
For He brings down those who dwell on high, the lofty city; He lays it low to the ground, He brings it down to the dust. (The Temple and the city were destroyed! Ck. 70AD and the holy city!). The foot shall tread it down – the feet of the poor and the steps of the needy.”
The way of the just is uprightness; O Most Upright, (That’s King Jesus, yet to come physically!), You weigh the path of the just. (Are YOU ‘justified, sanctified, and glorified’ in and through Christ alone?). Yes, in the way of Your judgments, O Lord, we have waited for You; The desire of our soul is Your name (written on our mind, heart, and new-born spirit!) and for the remembrance of You.
With my soul I have desired You in the night, yes, by my spirit within me I will seek You early; for when Your judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the earth will learn righteousness.( Let me interrupt this passage for a moment and take you to Psalm 27:11-14! David wrote: “Teach me, O Lord, and lead me in a smooth path because of my enemies. Do YOU know YOUR enemies? The world, your old sin-nature, and Satan himself!!). Do not deliver me to the will of my adversaries; for false witnesses have risen up against me, and such as breathe out violence. I would have lost heart unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait on the Lord; be of good courage, and He shall strengthen your heart; wait, I say, on the Lord.” (But in your spiritual pilgrimage, have YOU ‘left the Lord behind’, doing “your best”?). Back to Isaiah 26!
Isaiah 26:10 says: “Let grace be shown to the wicked, yet he will not learn righteousness; in the land of uprightness he will deal unjustly, and will not behold the majesty of the Lord.” (How many “true disciples do you know who continually “behold the majesty of the Lord”?).
It’s not “lofty cities” only, like Jerusalem, that “crucified the Christ”, but modern-cities across the world that substitute “religious observance” for “relational obedience to the King of kings and Lord of lords”! Ludicrous loyalty still embraces the darkness while professing “following the Light”! IS THE TRUE DESIRE OF YOUR MIND, HEART, AND WILL “THE NAME OF CHRIST JESUS” THAT IS HIS LIVING PRESENCE WITHIN YOU?
LET’S LOOK NO LONGER AT ‘LUDICROUS LOYALISTS’ BUT EXAMINE THE TRUTH OF “LIFE-BLESSED LOVE”!
Interesting Verses in John 10:9-10 which YOU must examine and rest in! Jesus says: “I am the door. If anyone enters by Me (into a relationship with Holy God thus earthly and yet possessing a heavenly home!), he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture (to be nurtured and matured by the Living Word!). The thief (Satan) does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that THEY MAY HAVE LIFE, and that they may have it more abundantly.”
That IS “Life-Blessed Love” – life in Christ! Life that is of the Spirit-nature and character! Life that IS ABUNDANT! Life that is ETERNAL! Life that IS RESURRECTION PRESENCE OF THE SLAIN LAMB OF GOD! Life that IS the TRUE, NEVER-FADING LIGHT OF MEN! LIGHT THAT UNVEILS ETERNAL TRUTH! LIGHT THAT BRINGS REVELATION AND UNVEILS THE GLORY OF GOD SHINING BRIGHTLY IN AND THROUGH EVERY TRUE BORN-AGAIN BELIEVER!
Amazing, encouraging, up-lifting-words are found in 1 Peter 5:6-11! The beloved Peter wrote: “Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time, casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you. Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour.
Resist him steadfast in the faith, knowing that the same sufferings are experienced by your brotherhood in the world. But may the God of all grace, who called us to His eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after you have suffered awhile, PERFECT, ESTABLISH, STRENGTHEN, AND SETTLE YOU. To Him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen.”
God’s ‘dominion’ over YOU? That’s His power, His blood-purchased Right to govern over, yes, and ‘to control’ His ‘adopted children, (unless as a ‘pretender’ YOU reserve the right to decide for yourself what is best for you, even over God’s supervision!), Him being the dominant, sovereign, controlling authority! And, dare I say it? Believe I will! Most modern-day ‘believers’ see themselves as ‘co-rulers’ and ‘co-managers’, certainly convinced their ‘faith’ should not include No ‘self-say-so’! How foreign is that to the Lordship of Christ Jesus, King Jesus? Hear me!
True Faith IS “crucified with Christ”, raised up by Christ, indwelt by Christ, yes, ruled and governed by His Holy Presence, blessed by Christ with His chosen gift or gifts, blessed by His tender mercy, blessed by His everlasting love, blessed by His inclusiveness of us in His conquering of a fallen world, blessed by His promises that never fade away, blessed by His gift of the fruits of His Spirit, blessed by His gift of never-ending hope, blessed by His ‘never-disappointing’, everlasting hope, the hope of glory, the gift of steadfast hope, the graciousness of the gift of His righteousness, the hope of glory, the hope of eternal life, the hope that is the anchor of the soul, the gift, yes, of the “living hope”!
I have no doubts that this is why Edward Mote and William B. Bradbury wrote the old hymn, “The Solid Rock”. It says: “My hope is built on nothing less Than Jesus’blood and righteousness; I dare not trust the sweetest frame, But wholly lean on Jesus’ name.
When darkness seems to hide His face, I rest on His unchanging grace; In every high and stormy gale, My anchor holds within the vale.
His oath, His covenant, His blood, Support me in the whelming flood; When all around my soul gives way, He then is all my hope and stay.
When He shall come with trumpet sound, Oh, may I then in Him be found; Dressed in His righteousness alone, Faultless to stand before the throne.
On Christ the solid Rock, I stand; All other ground is sinking sand, All other ground is sinking sand.” Tell me! Are you standing on the Rock of the Sure Foundation or are you still messing around spiritually on “the shifting sands” of “best effort”?