GOD’S CALLING TO

REMAIN FAITHFUL

By J. FARRELL FISHER

Revelation 2:10, “Be faithful until death…”

INTRODUCTION

Revelation 2:10 is a powerful word by God’s “angel” or messenger when he said, “Be faithful until death, and I will give you the crown of life.”

Biblical faithfulness is not an option that one holds but a biblical command by Heaven itself! Yet, many are programmed by false teachers that obedience would be “salvation by works” rather than eternal evidence that biblical salvation has occurred!

It was Jesus Himself who said in Luke 6:46, “But why do you call Me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and not do the things which I say?” Lordship IS the Hallelujah Chorus of a redeemed life expressing love and faithfulness and thanksgiving to the “Savior” and “Master” of the “new-born life”!

You are aware, I assume, that there are many who ‘hear’ the Master’s words, ‘believe’ His words, yet do not walk in the spirit of obedience and faithfulness to what He has said. To them, acting on what Jesus has said would be ‘self-effort’ reconciliation, rather than the evidence that “His word is our command”!

In Jeremiah 25:15-18 God spoke through Jeremiah a word that should awaken and sober up any man or nation that has turned away from Holy God! It says:

For thus says the Lord God of Israel to me: “Take this wine cup of fury from My hand, and cause all the nations, to whom I send you, to drink it. And they will drink and stagger and go mad because of the sword that I will send among them.”…

Then I took the cup from the Lord’s hand, and made all the nations drink, to whom the Lord had sent me; Jerusalem and the cities of Judah, its kings and princes, to make them a desolation, an astonishment, a hissing, and a curse, as it is this day…”

God “treading grapes” is not a good thing, God giving the wicked “to the sword” is not a good thing, “disaster” as a “great whirlwind” is not a good thing, God “plundering their pastures” is not a good thing, turning “the lions loose” is not a good thing!

And the one thing you should learn as you read a prophet like Jeremiah is: “Fear God, and surrender to Christ alone!”

In Luke 23:36-43 we read about Jesus as He hung on the Cross before His death and the reactions of those around the Cross and on their crosses:

The soldiers also mocked Him, coming and offering Him sour wine, and saying, “If You are the King of the Jews, save Yourself.”

And an inscription also was written over Him in letters of Greek, Latin, and Hebrew: THIS IS THE KING OF THE JEWS.

Then one of the criminals who were hanged blasphemed Him, saying, “If You are the Christ, save Yourself and us.”

But the other, answering, rebuked him, saying, “Do you not even fear God, seeing you are under the same condemnation? And we indeed justly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds; but this man has done nothing wrong.”

Then he said to Jesus, “Lord, remember me when You come into Your kingdom.” And Jesus said to him, “Assuredly, I say to you, today you will be with Me in Paradise.”

Confronted with Eternal Truth, the dying criminal found grace, mercy, and love, resting in the dying Savior, soon to be resurrected! The “crown of life” was soon placed on his dying head as he trusted in, yes, his Sacrificial Savior and Lord! This man truly sensed, “King Jesus, Lord over life, Lord through death, and Lord in Resurrection power and eternal hope!” Tell me of your eternal hope or your hopeless life!

Do you see “Today” as “Kingdom Living” in full surrender unto His Lordship with “faithfulness” daily to God’s calling for You to “remain faithful”?

OUTLINE

CHAPTER ONE: “SELF-DETERMINED ALLEGIANCES OR A SOVEREIGNLY-DETERMINED ALLIANCE?”

CHAPTER TWO: “STONES OF STUMBLING OR LIVING STONES OF HOLY PRESENCE?”

CHAPTER THREE: “FAITH THAT FALTERS OR FAITH THAT ENDURES?”

CHAPTER FOUR: “FAITH AND GOD’S FAITHFUL PROVISIONS”

CHAPTER FIVE: “FALSE IDENTITY OR TRUE FAITH ‘IN CHRIST’?”

CHAPTER SIX: “FAITH AND THE FAITHFULNESS OF MASTERED MEN”

CHAPTER SEVEN: “SAVING FAITH AND THE CONVERTED’S WORK”

CHAPTER EIGHT: “UNFORGIVENESS-UNFORGIVEN OR FAITH AND FORGIVENESS?”

CHAPTER NINE: “FAITH AND THE REALITY OF KINGDOM TRANSLATION”

CHAPTER TEN: “FAITH AND THE FULLNESS OF CHRIST”

CHAPTER ELEVEN: “FAITH AND THE FAITHFULNESS OF SPIRIT-IDENTITY”

CHAPTER TWELVE: “FAITH’S VERBAL FAILURE OR FAITH’S VICTORIOUS FINISH?”

CHAPTER THIRTEEN: “FAITH AND ITS EVIDENCE OF THE FATHER’S FRUITFULNESS”

CHAPTER FOURTEEN: “FAITH AND ITS MAGNETIC, DRAWING POWER!”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN: “THE FAITH JOURNEY AND FOUL WATERS”

CHAPTER SIXTEEN: “FAITH’S FIRST LOVE – FOLLOWERS’ FAITHFUL OBEDIENCE”

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: “FAITH’S CALL OR FAITH’S COMMITMENT?”

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: “TRUE FAITH – YOUR THOUGHTS OR GOD’S TRUTH?”

CHAPTER NINETEEN: “A FAULTY FAITH OF DEPARTURE OR FAITH THAT SUSTAINS, FEEDS, AND PROVIDES!”

CHAPTER TWENTY: “FLESHLY FAITH OR GOD-GIVEN FAITH?”

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE: “TRUE FAITH – ITS DESPISERS AND ITS FOLLOWERS”

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO: “TRUE FAITH – TRIUMPHANT WARS!”

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE: “FAITH’S PROBING – FAITH’S PROVING” – CONCLUSION

CHAPTER ONE

“SELF-DETERMINED ALLEGIANCES OR A SOVEREIGNLY-DETERMINED ALLIANCE?”

Do you remember Moses and Aaron going in to Pharoah of Egypt in Exodus 5:1-2, saying to him, “Thus says the Lord God of Israel: ‘Let My people go, that they may hold a feast to Me in the wilderness.’”? And Pharoah said, “Who is the Lord, that I should obey His voice to let Israel go? I do not know the Lord, nor will I let Israel go.” I’ll never forget many, many years ago witnessing to a young lady to tell her about Christ Jesus, and she responded, “Who is she?” I don’t know if I’ve ever been more shocked!

Allegiance to one’s ‘flesh-life’ without any consideration of divine purpose is, without a doubt, the most serious spiritual disease one can ever face, yet the Holy Word of God is clear concerning those who have determined for themselves that darkness is better than Light, that the blackness of one’s soul is better than a “blood-washed” life, and that ‘self-effort’ is more rewarding than God’s divine blessing!

But, of course, most who settle in to “self-determined allegiances” don’t even know that they are “bound” by Satan himself! In 2 Thessalonians 2:9-12 Paul told the Thessalonians and us: “The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish, BECAUSE they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved. AND FOR THIS REASON God will send them strong delusion, that they should believe the lie [that’s “you can sin and not die”!], that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.”

“Self-determined allegiances” overflow in and through the life of unbelieving men who are controlled and dominated by faithless minds and selfish wills that Paul told Timothy (1 Timothy 6:5) erupted in “useless wranglings of men of corrupt minds and destitute of the truth, who suppose that godliness is a means of gain.”

But how many worldly men do you know who would even admit that corrupt minds need redeeming or especially that in their sinfulness they are not destitute of the truth! Oh, they have some “truths” but not the Way, the Truth, and the Life of God! In reality, they are truly spiritually poverty stricken, alienated and separated from Holy God!

Temptations, snares, foolish and harmful lusts, deceiving spirits, even doctrines of demons, consciences seared with a hot iron out of Hell, uncontrolled desires for wine or whiskey or evil drugs, puffed up with fleshly pride, lawless, insubordinate, a blasphemer against Holy Truth, rebellious men and women, unholy and profane, fornicators, sodomites, liars, perjurers, and, yes, haters of God – with Paul, inspired by the Holy Spirit, warning his spiritual son Timothy in 2 Timothy 3:1-5, “But know this, that in the last days perilous times will come: for men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having a form of godliness [that’s attempting the ‘religious route’!] but denying its power. And from such people turn away!”

Are you aware of your surroundings of godless people whose intent is to be “a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense” to your “Sovereignly-determined alliance” with the Lord Jesus Christ?

I was reading recently Arthur Bennett’s “The Valley of Vision,” [The Banner of Truth Trust, PO Box 621, Carlisle, Pa.,, 17013, USA], and was stopped in my tracks strongly as I came to a chapter entitled “Self-Knowledge,” addressed to the Searcher of Hearts, and I KNEW that was Holy God Himself! Bennett wrote:

SEARCHER OF HEARTS, It is a good day to me when You give me a glimpse of myself; Sin is my greatest evil, but You are my greatest good;…

I have cause to loathe myself, and not to seek self-honor, for no one desires to commend his own dunghill. My country, family, church fare worse because of my sins, for sinners bring judgment in thinking sins are small, or that God is not angry with them…

Let me not take other good men as my example, and think I am good because I am like them, For all good men are not so good as You desire, are not always consistent, do not always follow holiness, do not feel eternal good in sore afflictions…

Show me how to know when a thing is evil which I think is right and good, how to know when what is lawful comes from an evil principle, such as desire for reputation or wealth by usury…

Give me grace to recall my needs, my lack of knowing Your will in Scripture, of wisdom to guide others, of daily repentance, want of which keeps You at bay, of the spirit of prayer, having words without love, of zeal for Your glory, seeking my own ends, of joy in You and Your will, of love to others…

And let me not lay my pipe too short of the fountain, never touching the eternal spring, never drawing down water from above.” [p.122-123].

Did awesome God alert you to anything in you that may shame our loving Lord? You do understand that the author of the above words was examining himself as to defiled areas in his life that didn’t honor King Jesus, even speaking later of “chambers of foul images within my being,” with a prayer of thanksgiving, [p.131], saying to Father-God, “But You have given me another Master and Lord, Your Son, Jesus, and now my heart is turned towards holiness, my life speeds as an arrow from a bow towards complete obedience to You. Help me in all my doings to put down sin and to humble pride. Save me from the love of the world and the pride of life, from everything that is natural to fallen man, and let Christ’s nature be seen in me day by day.”

From ‘self-determined allegiances’ to a “Sovereignly-determined Alliance,” the above author knew the conviction Spirit of Holy God and His desire to draw him to Christ, away from the world, the flesh, and the devil, and, yes, turn him to full surrender to the Lordship of Christ and His saving grace and mercy!

Are you aware of how tiring ‘self-determined allegiances’ can become? Do you acknowledge the reality of secret mental rooms where you’ve “played” around with locked rooms of lower-natured vain imaginations, wading in the world’s fleshliness, opening doors at times of sickly dreams, wading in cesspools of filthy imaginations, finally realizing the need of God’s sovereign mercy, grace, and love? And what a day of enormous, eternal victory when that man cries out, “God, be merciful to me the sinner!”

‘Self-determined allegiances’ are men bound to ‘fleshly houses’, men who are unholy priests of a deadly faith, who on the altars of their deadly hearts offer up sick, sensual, sordid thoughts, deeds, or actions that shame the very Name of Christ Jesus. The ‘self-determined’ are men fueled by the very ‘bait’ of their own fallen, depraved, warped sin natures, deformed by the very powers of darkness out to enlarge the boundaries and numbers of their ‘kingdom’ of snares, fleshly, sensual, dusty and dirty defilements that are ‘award winners’ in the devil’s theatrics of “shames” before Holy God!

It was Peter who said in 1 Peter 2:11, “Beloved, I beg you as sojourners and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul…”, and that was to ‘true believers’, and if true believers war against their souls, where does that leave unbelievers, doubters, enemies of the Cross of Christ? And, oh, how easy it is for unbelievers to indulge themselves in malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy, evil speaking, even cursing God for His amazing grace and undying love!

“Self-determined allegiances”? Do you sense how easy it is for finite men to walk away and turn their backs on “Infinite God” Who never changes, but the kingdoms of men fall fast in an evil world, lapse deeper into a pit of denial and unbelief, paint louder and louder their colors of defiance, rebellion, and fleshly uncertainties, saying to Holy God: “Let us alone! Leave us with our nakedness, our vainness, our uncertainties, our spiritual ignorance – silence the preachers, the evangelists, the witnesses of Your saving grace – we’re not interested!!”

“Self-determined allegiances”? That’s the spiritually blinded who refuse to “see” the “Light of the world,” satisfied by their sensual desires, their spiritual ignorance of “God’s Eternal Love” for them, and satisfied to settle for “self-will” rather than the Eternal Will of God! I wrote the following words a few years ago as I contemplated the end result of a Christ-less life. It says: “All hail the power of a worldly man’s name, Let demons prostrate fall, let sinners prostrate fall; Bring forth a false diadem, and crown us lord of our own lives…

You chosen seed of the devil’s clan, You prisoner of the Fall, Hail him who captured by his lies, crown him lord of the fallen world…

Let every family, every tribe, On this disastrous fall, yes, on this disastrous fall, To hail the devil all misery release, crown him lord of the Fall…

O that with young devilish clans, who at the devil’s feet will bow, we’ll join that off-key chorus, and celebrate godlessness as our call.”

Though ‘fallen humanity’ does not know it, they are under Satan’s control, yes, guided by his many sub-creatures called ‘demons’ who major on spiritual blindness, fleshly ignorance of their imprisonment in the devil’s army, encouraging a strong ‘self-will’ void of any leaning toward divine will, emphasizing hardened consciences to even hear one word from Holy God; rather than an abhorrence of evil, Satan paints sinful malignances as ‘supreme master-pieces’, spiritual wounds because of disobedience to God as ‘stars’ of a Four-Star general in his army of the deceived!

“Self-determined allegiances”? Are you aware of fallen humanity’s “modern-day’s mobilization” of all to be free to choose to follow the voice of the “deceiver”, and to be delivered over to one’s selfishness, sensing ‘unrighteousness’ as a ‘blessing’ and not a ‘curse’, sympathizing with indolence, rebellion, meanness, and unbelief as the ‘true nature’ of a blessed individual? Yes, to them, spiritual adultery is a virtue, not a victimization of fallen creatures alienated and separated from Holy God!

Are you aware of how much flaunting there is in modern-day cultures with no shame or sorrow over separation from Holy God? In fact, it’s as if modern-man and modern-woman’s vain imaginations have ushered in award-winning performances for their monuments of pollution, un-ashamed-ness, and indifference to God’s Holy Truths!

In Revelation 16:10-11 we read about a “bowl” being poured out filled with darkness and pain! It says: “Then the fifth angel poured out his bowl on the throne of the beast, and his kingdom became full of darkness; and they gnawed their tongues because of the pain. They blasphemed the God of heaven because of their pains and sores, and did not repent of their deeds.” But, maybe, today – maybe YOU will be one of those who fall before the King of kings and Lord of lords to repent of YOUR “self-determined allegiances”!

But rather than “self-determined allegiances”, why not consider for yourself a “Sovereignly Determined Alliance”? As Paul was intent on discipling young Timothy, he wrote to him in 1 Timothy 2:1-5, “Therefore I exhort first of all that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks be made for all men, for kings and all who are in authority, that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and reverence…

For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God and one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time, for which I was appointed a preacher and an apostle – I am speaking the truth in Christ and not lying – a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth.”

Paul became, by the grace and mercy of Holy God, God’s appointed, anointed earthly representative of God’s divine intent of reconciling the lost world unto Himself! What did Paul say God’s intent was? “…God our Savior, who desires all men to be saved [redeemed, regenerated, re-born, reconciled] and to come to the knowledge of the truth.”

But here is the everlasting Truth that you may have missed: Revelation 13:8 speaks of those who ‘worship’ “the beast” – not God but the devil’s leaders! And Verse 8 says, “All who dwell on the earth will worship him, whose names have not been written in the Book of Life of the Lamb [of God] slain from the foundation of the world.” Yes, the Lamb of God slain in the mind and heart of God from the very foundation of the world! Several thousand years later Emmanuel came, “God with us”, to be God’s sacrifice on the Cross for our sins!

Are you aware that in Genesis 3:8 we find Adam and Eve “hiding themselves from the presence of the Lord”?

And then in Verse 9 we read of the Lord God calling to Adam and saying to him, “Where are you?” And I certainly don’t believe it was God asking Adam about his exact geographical location in the Garden, but did Adam now know where he was spiritually before God, exposed in his nakedness? “Where are YOU”?

In Verse 7 we read: “Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves coverings.” And we have the establishment of “Fig-Leaf Religion” authored by fallen mankind, but you’re not sure that it still stands? Give me a break!

“Hiding from God” becomes ‘fallen nature’s’ diversified deceptions with multiplied sorrows and pains because rebellion against Holy God always produces “cursed grounds with thorns and thistles”!

In James 1:12-15 the brother of Jesus shares the blessing and the curse: “Blessed is the man who endures temptation; for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love Him. Let no one say when he is tempted, ‘I am tempted by God’; for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone. But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed. Then when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, brings forth death.” And then James said in the very next verse, “Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren.”

A “Sovereignly-Determined Alliance”? In Genesis 6:5-6 we discover the broken heart of Almighty God! The Word tells us, “Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. AND THE LORD WAS SORRY THAT HE HAD MADE MAN ON THE EARTH, AND HE WAS GRIEVED IN HIS HEART.”

But two verses later, Verse 8, “But Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord,” and God determined hope remains! The Ark of Safety became a divine reality! And since that time God still searches for men who become tools in extending God’s life, expressing God’s love, and proving His power to save, heal, and deliver!

In this “sovereignly-determined alliance” how could one overlook Abram! In Genesis 12:1-3 the Lord said to Abram: “Get out of your country, from your family and from your father’s house, to a land that I will show you. I will make you a great nation; I will bless you and make your name great; and you shall be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse him who curses you; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”

And if you didn’t know it, Abram was used of God to prepare the way of the Coming Messiah with Jesus even saying during His earthly pilgrimage, “Abraham rejoiced to see My day, and he was glad!” Genesis 15:6 says, “And he [Abram] believed in the Lord, and He accounted it to him for righteousness.”

Are there Moses-men leading the “chosen” out of ‘slavery’ to Egypt? Are there anointed, appointed, assigned-by-God men ordained with an eternal calling to lead people out of ‘bondage’ to the true freedom of oneness with Holy God, to the blessing of transformation from ‘flesh’-living to Holy Spirit guidance, to the divine assignment of “witnesses” to Heavenly living on earth in and through oneness with the Resurrected King of kings and Lord of lords? Are there truly men throughout human history who become so aware of the futility of self-awareness and come to self-despair, and hearing of the preciousness of Christ Jesus the Lord, turn from their sinfulness to His divine forgiveness, washed clean by the blood of the Lamb of God?

“Sovereignly-Determined Alliances” are so numerous throughout both the Old and the New Testaments of sovereign grace and mercy! Consider prophets raised up by God to confront, expose, and convict a wayward people! In Hebrews 1:1 we read: “God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets…”

We find an amazing Verse in Jeremiah 1:5 when the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah saying, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you; before you were born I sanctified you [‘set you apart’]; I ordained you a prophet to the nations.” Isn’t it amazing to you that Holy God “formed men to be His servants,” turning men and nations back to the Lord with prophetic utterances, challenges, even warnings, restoring men and nations to God’s intended purposes? He gave prophets “as a light to the Gentiles”! They came with “repent or else,” with “turn or burn,” with the call to “set the captives free,” with “forsake darkness and come to the Light,” with “inherit the desolate heritages” and restore them as “highways of holiness.”

Holy God and blessed prophets! How great were those men anointed of God to turn nations, families, individuals, back to Him! How anointed men were tools in God’s hands to turn vain men to victorious, eternal living! How the prophetic Word exposed empty dreams and fleshly vanities and shameful insensibilities to God’s holy love! How ‘fatal enchantments’ binding men and women in reckless, ungodly affections, were turned by the Blood of the Lamb to eternal life and everlasting blessing and to forever, overcoming, conquering victorious living in the Resurrection Life of Christ Jesus!

“Sovereignly-Determined Alliances”? Have you ever considered why Paul said, “Preach the Word”? Didn’t Christ Jesus magnify, “Man shall not live by [physical] bread alone, but by every Word that proceeds out of the mouth of God”?

It was the author of Hebrews who said, Hebrews 4:12, “For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.”

One’s reception or denial, feeding on or avoiding, trusting in or resisting, the Holy Word of God, is a clear picture of one’s true salvation or fleshly lost-ness and separation from Holy God! Do you understand or grasp the imprisonment of worldly dispositions OR the freedom and liberty the blood of the Lamb gives to a repentant heart, surrendered mind, and submissive will to God’s salvation ministry? Are you familiar with the words from the song that says, “Amazing love, how can it be, that You my God should die for me?” But He did – on Calvary’s Cross!

As Jesus instituted the Lord’s Supper with His disciples, Matthew 26:26-29, And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and blessed and broke it, and gave it to the disciples and said, “Take eat; this is My body.” Then He took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, “Drink from it, all of you. For this is My blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the remission of sins. But I say to you, I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it new with you in My Father’s kingdom.” THE KINGDOM HAS COME! KING JESUS REIGNS! FEED NOW ON HIS WORD!

“Sovereignly-Determined Alliance”? Are you fully aware of the ministry of the Holy Spirit through YOU? In Acts 1:8 Jesus commissioned His disciples, “But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”

There is no doubt that in this day and age, in and through the American church, there must be a fresh ‘baptism’ of Holy Spirit anointing! Holy Spirit anointing is the overflowing of the very fruit of God Himself in His love being shed abroad through His disciples to touch a lost world with His amazing love and grace and mercy! Through you, as a born-again believer, reconciled to God, now you are commissioned as His “royal ambassadors”, no longer bound by callous indifference, but in-filled, in-fused, empowered by Holy Spirit anointing to touch the world with His love!

It’s time for Spirit-conviction, Spirit-anointing, Spirit-authenticity, to reach out through you as you open your heart wide to His unveiling of God’s redeeming love through His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ! It was Jesus Himself who said in John 16:8 about His earthly departure and the Holy Spirit’s earthly residence – “And when He has come, He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment…”

The Holy Spirit enlightens your darkness without Christ, illumines the deceit of your sin, exposes the tricks and treachery of your old sin nature and its perverse ways, gives one vision of the vastness of separation from Holy God and what eternity will be like in one’s life without God’s saving grace, mercy, and love, and paints the dark and foreboding heart of a Godless life, unveils one’s fleshly insensibility to God’s Holy Presence, His eternal desire, and what the Way of the Cross is as it relates to God’s love of fallen mankind.

Are YOU aware of ‘fatal enchantments’ that can so blind one to Calvary’s love, encouraging one devotion to their old sin nature is not a bad thing, when in reality, under the mask of pretense is both captivity to evil affections and the fleshly love of that God-less life?

But then there comes the Holy Spirit in the forever cloud of God’s Holy love for the ‘sinner’ for whom Christ died! Eternal grace has opened the door to divine reconciliation! And a heavenly chorus of divine singing begins to surround the needy sinner with songs of God’s redeeming love, with Master-pieces of blood redemption, with the Spirit of the King of Life overshadowing, opening a new door and saying, “Welcome Home”! The Spirit comes and leads you to repentance, leads you to faith, leads you to justification, sanctification, and the daily glorying in the divine life of Resurrected Jesus, ruling through His victory, and by His Spirit daily releasing the Victorious Life of the King of kings and Lord of lords!

Are you aware that day by day you are clasped with the loving hand of eternal friendship as Christ Jesus faithfully takes you to God’s throne, rejoicing that YOU are one with Jesus, with the Father, and with His precious Holy Spirit? Are you living in the “new day” of the eternal divine life Jesus gives to all who are of repentant hearts and willful surrender to His Lordship? Do you understand, “Christ in you the hope of glory”? Christ the Giver is the Author of all blessing, unveiling more and more of Himself daily as His children mature in their faith, obedience, and reception of all He is!

Does His revealing Himself to you assure you more and more of a blessed life, a purposeful existence overflowing with eternal callings and ministries, unveiling the vastness of His goodness, His mercy, His love and grace, glorifying Himself through US as we lean not to our own understanding but in all our ways we give Him His rightful, redemptive, and reigning place as Victorious Conqueror through us? DO IT – in Jesus’ precious Name above all names!

CHAPTER TWO

“STONES OF STUMBLING OR LIVING STONES OF

HOLY PRESENCE?”

In 1 Peter 2:4-10 we find vital words of eternal purpose for every life on the face of the earth, but sadly some refuse the ministry of God’s Holy Word to reveal to them His plan! It says:

“Coming to Him as to a living stone, rejected indeed by men, but chosen by God and precious, YOU ALSO, AS LIVING STONES, ARE BEING BUILT UP A SPIRITUAL HOUSE, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. Therefore it is also contained in the Scripture,

‘Behold, I lay in Zion a chief cornerstone, elect, precious, and he who believes on Him will by no means be put to shame.’ Therefore, to you who believe [trust in, rely upon, adhere to], He is precious; but to those who are disobedient, ‘The stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone,’ and ‘a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense.’…

They stumble, being disobedient to the word, to which they also were appointed. BUT YOU are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light; who once were not a people but are now the people of God, who had not obtained mercy but now have obtained mercy.”

“They stumble…”, sad words for human lives who see “the call of God” on their lives as unimportant, unnecessary to their life-journeys, and ill-conceived by warped minds with no fleshly dreams, plans, or earthly ambitions – “just satisfy your flesh, your old sin-nature, your total self-promotion, and like Solomon keep building your self-worship centers or tabernacles!”

It was Stephen, in Acts 7, who exposed Israel’s rebellion against Holy God and His eternal purpose, calling them “stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears! You always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, so do you.” When one considers Old Testament history of Judaism, one finds only a remnant who obeyed Holy God in submission, surrender, and a true servant-heart! Are you aware of how easily spiritual deception can come over a group of people like the scribes and Pharisees of Judaism who were so blinded to themselves and their false standing before God? One of the dangerous places to be in a spiritual journey is to be spiritually blinded to the slavery of a sin-blackened heart, yet boastful of self-preeminence in their journeys of a blinded faith!

Even religious Pharisees of today are ‘self-assured’ rather than Sovereignly redeemed, delivered, and empowered in living the Christ-honoring life! They really have no awareness of their fallen sin-natures or the necessity of “crucified with Christ” and “raised” up to eternal privileges in and through His resurrected life and Holy Presence in a true believer!

“Strangers to God”? “Why, we’re His best friends, His most religiously trained and equipped generation”, when in reality they’re strangers, foreigners, outcasts, and enemies, knowing nothing of full surrender and loyalty to the very Spirit of the King of kings and Lord of lords! The absence of Christ from religious self-promotion is a life gripped in the stronghold of a trembling shame, darkened spiritual eyes, and blinded minds, with no true rest, no peace that passes all understanding, and no “joy in the Lord” but a hellish happiness that deceives and enslaves and infects more and more in the deadly diseases of Hell itself as the ‘religious crowd’ celebrate their devilish brilliance!

How “easy” the fallen, the wayward, the unbelieving, the barren trees, the fruitless vineyards, the worldly, the ‘self-promoting’ denounce, ignore, and deny the amazing grace and love of God so brilliantly shining on the hill called Mount Calvary – they ‘flow’ in the river of an unexhausted stream of sin, in the river of a fouled stream of denial of the need of God in their godless flow, in the powerful movement of Satanic delight overflowing with waves of self-despair, waves of strong denials of the need of saving grace and mercy, and waves of indifference concerning the “crucified Christ” and His resurrection, ascension, and soon-coming!

To the “strangers”, “you must be born again” is to them ‘religious garbage’ when in reality it’s the miracle of grace, love, and mercy, that shines brilliantly in the darkened heart and mind of unbelief, that unveils to the spiritually bankrupt the very wealth of Heaven’s treasures reserved in their names, and opens Heaven’s Door to the Resurrected King, in the repentant one’s heart and life, Jesus’ abiding presence, amazing power, His ‘all in all,’ and, yes, His eternal faithfulness to the Father’s will, Word, and way, through us as we choose to yield to Him daily in His eternal devotion to “obey” that Father, even through the Cross!

“Strangers to God”? Did Peter tell us that “strangers to God” are ‘disobedient to the Word of God’? That’s 1 Peter 2:8! It was Paul who wrote to Titus in Titus 3:3 saying to him and us, “For we ourselves were also foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving various lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another,” and that was a Jewish Rabbi and leader before his “new birth” in and through Christ Jesus!

But Peter, in 1 Peter 4:3, said: “For we have spent enough of our past lifetime in doing the will of the Gentiles [unbelievers] – when we walked in lewdness, lusts, drunkenness, revelries, drinking parties, and abominable idolatries.”

And isn’t it amazing to you that in Old Testament Judaism much of Judaism allowed idols in the temple in which they professed loyalty to God as they bowed before their idols? But isn’t it true also that in our modern-day acknowledgement of Christianity that many profess being “partakers of the divine nature” of Christ as they hold onto the corruption that is in their world through lust? Do you ever encounter, in the church, “those who walk according to the flesh in the lust of uncleanness and despise authority, presumptuous, self-willed, [those who are] spots and blemishes, carousing in their own deceptions while they feast with you, having eyes full of adultery and that cannot cease from sin, enticing unstable souls”? [2 Peter 2:10,13b-14].

But aren’t YOU thankful that “stones of stumbling”, by God’s grace, can and do become “Living Stones of Holy Presence”? I was reading in Acts 16:16-19, overjoyed as I saw a slave-girl to Satan freed by God’s divine grace! It says: “Now it happened, as we went to prayer, that a certain slave girl possessed with a spirit of divination met us, who brought her masters much profit by fortune-telling. This girl followed Paul and us, and cried out, saying, ‘These men are the servants of the Most High God, who proclaim to us the way of salvation.” And this she did for many days.” Paul prayed for her deliverance – and it happened!

And are you familiar with what happened next in Paul and Silas’ lives? The masters of the delivered young lady saw “that their hope of profit was gone” and dragged Paul and Silas to the local ruling authorities with the two servants of Christ ending up imprisoned! [Whoever said ‘peace and safety’ is assured to all New Testament disciples bought deception rather than the reality of, yes, troubles, oppositions, enemies, even sufferings for the faith at times!].

In Acts 17:5-8 we find more assaults on faithful disciples! “But the Jews who were not persuaded, becoming envious, took some of the evil men from the marketplace, and gathering a mob, set all the city in an uproar and attacked the house of Jason, and sought to bring them out to the people. But when they did not find them, they dragged Jason and some brethren to the rulers of the city, crying out, ‘These who have turned the world upside down have come here too. Jason has harbored them, and these are all acting contrary to the decrees of Caesar, saying there is another king – Jesus.’ And they troubled the crowd and the rulers of the city when they heard these things.”

Elevated to divine living in the life of Christ as a faithful disciple is to open the door to fleshly and demonic and worldly opposition! Even one’s own redeemed life will face battles between the old man and the Spirit-man! But also the ruler of the world of darkness rallies his forces as a new child of saving faith is birthed. And the powers of darkness are intent on displacing, distressing, and demoralizing the young servants of Christ, seeking to erect in them monuments of doubt, fears, and failures, reminding them often of their evil ways when they were without Christ as Lord and Savior, and seeking to cover over the realities of them “in Christ” becoming monuments of divine mercy and grace with Christ raising them high as eternal trophies of His triumphant power and might!

“Strangers to God”? How easily unbelievers become “stones of stumbling” as those around them trip over, stumble, and are led astray by one another in their clouds of rebellion and disobedience and the absence of redemptive faith in them and through them! Even their spiritual famine becomes a deadly influence and their spiritual nakedness exposes their unbelieving identity, and they take others down with them; their unbelieving identity produces deadly fruit with their lives governed by sinful passions, bondage and captivity, producing in them corrupted minds and hearts, and the devil himself finding a comfortable abode of darkness, indifference to God, and weak individuals through whom he enlarges his hell-bent domains!

“Stones of stumbling” become objects of shamefulness as their sinful hearts become rivers of corruption, their minds darkened in wretchedness and continual wavering, their iniquitous ways making stronger in them the very gates of Hell to keep them in chains, their spiritual blindness assuring them that what is wrong is right, what is darkness is light, what is misery is mercy, what is a lie is truth, and what is their sinfulness is their God-given right to “do as you please” without any consequences or end results! Tell me! “How does one ever get to the place he/she feels they can live without and survive apart from God’s saving grace, mercy, and love?”

But rather than choosing to be a participant in “Stones of Stumbling,” what about the eternal blessing of choosing to be one of God’s “Living Stones of Holy Presence”? What was it Peter said in 1 Peter 1:4-5? “Coming to Him [the Lord Jesus] as to a living stone, rejected indeed by men, but chosen by God and precious, you also, as living stones, are being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.”

“Living Stones of Holy Presence”? What did we see in 1 Peter 2:9-10? “But you [in Christ] are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light; who once were not a people but are now the people of God, who had not obtained mercy but now have obtained mercy.”

That’s the blood-bought redeemed whose victorious faith is in the Lamb slain whose name is Christ Jesus. God told Israel of the Coming Messiah but they substituted ‘self-effort’ for the Savior’s sacrifice! It’s why God said to Israel through Hosea the prophet in Hosea 6:4b-6, “For your faithfulness is like a morning cloud, and like the early dew it goes away. Therefore I have hewn them by the prophets, I have slain them by the words of My mouth; And your judgments are like light that goes forth. For I desire mercy and not sacrifice, and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings.”

God then, one verse later, Verse 7, alarmingly said, “But like men they transgressed the covenant; there they dealt treacherously with Me.” That’s truly unbelievers who treat God through a sad state of rejection, self-will, and denial, but born-again believers are the “new creations” who walk in submission and obedience and faithful trust in what God says, demands, and expects!!

This is why Paul enlightens, challenges, and expects the true followers of Christ to not be ‘unequally yoked together with unbelievers. For what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness? And what communion has light with darkness? And what accord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has a believer with an unbeliever? Or what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God.’ [2 Corinthians 6:14-16].

As a result of the love, mercy, and grace of God, repentant hearts are described by God as NOW a part of the Heavenly, Royal, Eternal Family of God! 2 Corinthians 6:18 tells us, God speaking, “I will be a Father to you, and you shall be My sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty.”

I’ve been so blessed lately reading Arthur Bennett’s book, “The Valley of Vision,” [published by The Banner of Truth Trust]. In the writing entitled “God The All”, [p.5], Bennett wrote: “I know that You are the author and finisher of faith, that the whole work of redemption is Yours alone, that every good work or thought found in me is the effect of Your power and grace, that the sole motive in working in me to will and to do for Your good pleasure. O God, it is amazing that men can talk so much about man’s creaturely power and goodness, when, if You did not hold us back every moment, we should be devils incarnate. This, by bitter experience, You have taught me concerning myself.”

Aren’t YOU thankful God unveils Himself in every good and perfect and perfecting work, but He allows us to be His vessels of containment of ALL HE IS AND DOES THROUGH US?

Did Peter tell us [1Peter 1:4-5] that “having come to Him…chosen by God…[declared] living stones…are being built up by Him…[first] as a spiritual house…”? Judaism decided, Solomon decided, “God needs a beautiful, gorgeous temple,” when God’s plan was to establish His residence in the hearts and lives of trusting men and women!

We read in Acts 7:48-50 the following: “However, the Most High does not dwell in temples made with hands, as the prophet says: ‘Heaven is My throne, and earth is My footstool. What house will you build for Me? says the Lord, or what is the place of My rest? Has My hand not made all these things?’” God declared further in 2 Corinthians 6:16b, “For you are the temple of the living God.”

You understand – it’s so much easier building physical temples and buildings rather than being aware of His desired Holy Presence in you as His earthly dwelling place! Do you consider that earthly temples are easier to maintain than understanding of Him in YOU requires “cleansing ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness [in us] in the fear of God…”?

God’s revelation to His saints? In Colossians 1:27-28 we read, “To them God willed to make known what are the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles: which is CHRIST IN YOU, THE HOPE OF GLORY. Him we preach, warning every man and teaching every man in all wisdom, that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus.”

That’s not “imitation living” but a divine reality; that’s not the best of common flesh but “the presence of Him WHO IS our All in All;” that’s not cheap, counterfeit ‘likenesses’ but the Living, Resurrected, Reigning Life of Christ Jesus or Emmanuel, ‘God with us’; true manhood is the awareness of eternal emptiness in the best effort of ‘flesh’ but faithfully accepting that I know that truthfulness best when I find myself fully surrendered to His Lordship and accepting the crucifixion of my old life and nature when Christ Jesus took me to the Cross with Him – as He died, so did I!!

God’s revelation to His saints? I’d address that like this: “To be Heavenly relevant is to be earthly radical in willing obedience to all our Lord says to us as His disciples!” “Come…Follow Me!” “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever desires to save his life [for himself] will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it.” “Seek FIRST the kingdom of God and His righteousness…”. “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, BUT HE WHO DOES THE WILL OF MY FATHER IN HEAVEN.”

And God’s desire for every child of faith who has decided to follow Christ Jesus as Lord, Savior, Master, Ruler, King over his heart and life? God looks for the man who recognizes his emptiness and willing to rest in Christ’s fullness, He looks for the man who clearly understands the voids in his old heart and life but recognizes the fullness of the blessing of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, God looks for the man who willingly submits the ‘clay’ of his earthly life to be transformed by God into the very likeness of the Lamb, and who senses that God Himself is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all one asks or thinks, transforming the repentant one into a son of God, into the very image of Heaven and Earth’s adored Savior and Lord, dramatically, dynamically, and eternally determined by His Almighty Power to raise up sons and daughters of faith in the Son’s exact likeness as those who walk with Him in Heaven’s “glory-cloud”!

“Heirs of the kingdom, raised up in Christ; sons of faith resurrected from death into life; chains now broken from devilish enslavements, freed in Christ to bold eternal service!

Sons of flesh in sinful domination, but the blood of Jesus ushering in eternal resurrection; self-serving men becoming vessels of Holy Presence, repentant hearts becoming Heaven’s rejoicing chorus.

From temporal slaves to eternal servants, God’s love and grace “new sons” to reveal God’s place; no foreign idol before a ‘stone’ to bow, but eternal presence in the here and now!

The chorus of angels continually call, and receptive hearts willingly fall, bowing before Him in full surrender, joyfully submitting to Holy God’s splendor!

Earth and heaven joined as one, bowing before Him in the brightness of His Eternal Son; the beams of His presence enlighten one’s thoughts, so deeply aware His life is not bought, but graciously given the breaking of chains, that He as their Savior eternally reigns!

Grant me a vision of Christ on His throne, ruling in peace of a life Word-sown; show me assurance of His Life fully present as I die daily to myself that His glory may glow in radiant skies as we give to Him no alibis!

Circumcised hearts and yielded minds, right spirits within of the heavenly kind; dead to sin daily that His Name may be honored, no confusion or sins or self-glory even pondered; ruling our hearts as King of our lives, willingly choosing no fleshly deployments, but soldiers of Christ in Spirit-anointings!

Though my body may weary as the older I get, His Spirit-anointing has me graciously set, ready to live, ready to die, ready to serve faithfully even in the sweet by and by. No out-doing God – it could never be done, but in His hands we’ve already won – victors in Christ, servants of the Master, death in Him is no disaster!

A finished salvation so graciously revealed, a forever uniting purposefully sealed; one cry we hold and daily are bold, to say to others, “In Him, Behold!” Grace after grace, gift after gift, our “Sabbath Rest” says in Him we’re forever blessed! A finished salvation so graciously given, His abiding presence so faithfully enlivens, His peace of heart in me will not depart, His Word is true and assures God’s part!”

“Living Stones of Holy Presence”? Paul so enlightened, encouraged, and elevated the new Corinthian church when in 2 Corinthians 3:17-18 he told them, and us, “Now the Lord is the Spirit [the Holy Spirit]; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.”

God’s ‘amazing grace’ in Christ is supernatural power that ‘raises the dead’ into sons and daughters of everlasting life in Him! Your “treasure-gift” from God? In 2 Corinthians 4:7-12 Paul enlightens us even more when he wrote: “But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us. We are [often] hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed – always [always, always, always] carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body. For we who live are always delivered to death for Jesus’ sake, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh.”

Earlier, in 2 Corinthians 1:9-11, Paul proclaimed, under the anointing of the Holy Spirit, what should be every disciple’s daily ‘discipline’: “Yes, we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves but in God who raises the dead, who delivered us from so great a death, and does deliver us; in whom we trust that He still will deliver us, you also helping together in prayer for us, that thanks may be given by many persons on our behalf for the gift granted to us through many.”

Life’s serenity in Christ is a disciple’s eternal gift that encourages, uplifts, and strengthens him/her, whether in one’s celebration days or a day’s distresses, whether a day of defeat or one of unchangeable victory, whether in one’s fears and cares of temporary loss or the eternal awareness of His perfect peace because of the gift of eternal gain He gives to every true believer! Do you receive the Word daily? “THE LORD OUR GOD REIGNS OMNIPOTENTLY IN OUR BEHALF AND FOR HIS GLORY!” “Our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, is our Shepherd, the Good Shepherd, who gave and gives His life for the sheep!” “Christ Jesus? Our Savior, our Lord and Master, our Defender, our Provider, our Strengthener and Helper, our Blessing and Blesser, our Ever-Present Ruler and Protector, my Door to everlasting delights and unimaginable inheritances and Heavenly rejoicing!”

CHAPTER THREE

“FAITH THAT FALTERS OR FAITH THAT ENDURES?”

In Hebrews 10:19-25 the writer, directed by the Holy Spirit and unveiling the very heart of God for each of us as true followers, was inspired to tell us about “holding strongly your confession.” And he wisely encourages us to “draw near [to God, to our Lord and Savior, and to the Holy Spirit, guided by His eternal Word]] with a true heart in full assurance of faith…”! Follow His precious Word:

“Therefore, brethren, having boldness to enter the Holiest [place] by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which He consecrated for us, through the veil, that is, His flesh, and having a High Priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful. And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.”

From this scripture on in the chapter the author emphasizes “the just [living] by faith” – and that continually, not short-term! He then closes out Hebrews 10 saying in Verse 39, “But we are not of those who draw back to perdition, but of those who believe to the saving of the soul.” Drawing back to perdition? If you didn’t know it, you should! There are those having begun their spiritual journey with Christ Jesus who have “turned back, turned away, yes, even voiding their commitment to the Savior and Lord!” [If you are unsure about this, examine carefully Luke 12:39-46!!].

The disease of sin is deadly, not only for unbelievers, but true believers! And isn’t it sad that some ‘sick folks’ refuse the physician’s care? Some ‘believers’ doubt the dangers of sin’s diseases! Some ‘believers’ doubt watchfulness is necessary in the journey of faith! Some ‘believers’ have no true understanding of the necessity of one’s detachment from the influence of their ‘old man tendencies’ or even the strong influence of ‘new man’ temptations unaware of the devil’s tests or the world’s drawing power!

It’s so interesting to read Mark 1:12-13 where the Word tells us, Immediately the Spirit drove Him [Jesus] into the wilderness. And He was there in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan, and was with the wild beasts; and the angels ministered to Him.” [Thank God for ministering angels, yes, in your wilderness temptation experiences!].

Paul was testifying about his conversion experiences before King Agrippa and the scribes and Pharisees in Acts 26 testifying of his encounter with Christ, his calling and ministry under God, and alerting him to all he would face. Verses 15-18 tells us: ‘So I said, Who are You, Lord?’ And He said, “I am Jesus whom you are persecuting. But rise and stand on your feet; for I have appeared to you for this purpose, to make you a minister and a witness both of the things which you have seen and of the things which I will yet reveal to you. I will deliver you from the Jewish people, as well as from the Gentiles, to whom I now send you, to open their eyes, in order to turn them from darkness to light, and FROM THE POWER OF SATAN TO GOD, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who are sanctified by faith in Me.”

Hypocrisy IS “play-acting”, but in the walk of redemptive faith it is eternal reality of oneness with Christ which includes spiritual warfare with the devil and the powers of darkness. Hypocrisy is the devil’s plan in any ‘believer’ to issue cheap imitations of the Lord’s “golden crowns”, to grant fleshly masks that at least give the appearance of one’s spiritual leanings but unworthy and unfit as the true reflection of Christ, or clearly and purposefully misusing the sacred and the holy without any guilt or remorse as long as they are acknowledged as spiritual! And that, my friend, is demonic and devilish influences directing one’s journey!

“Faith that falters”? Without a doubt, in most cases, it is a life ungrateful of saving grace and mercy, because, seriously they like ‘religion’ apart from repentance toward God and faith in the finished work of Christ at the Cross. That’s folks out to approve ‘image’ apart from reconciliation to Holy God by way of personal brokenness, godly sorrow, and true confession as to the need of Christ Jesus as Lord and Savior and Master of their lives. That’s the independent clan who sense no need to be a part of the Family of God; who needs God’s arm of omnipotence when he/she is so strong in and of himself/herself?

“Faith that falters”? That’s the life, when the masks are off, that reveal dangerous weeds of the poisonous sin nature they refuse to let go of: self-righteousness, self-adoration, self-sinner-ship which is doing as one pleases, not what God requires, self-pride, self-concern only of ‘me, my, mine,’ self-love and the satisfaction of every sinful tendency, a life more concerned about man’s opinions than God’s omnipotence; “evil?” –“ that’s just a dark cloud that flies by occasionally, not something one should be concerned about” – Have you ever heard someone say who ‘professes faith’ without any concern for God’s tent of grace and mercy, “I have no need of Sovereign help – I’m able even though weak, I’m able even though frail, I’m able even though infirmed and deficient, I’m able though I live a discouraging ‘life-journey’, I’m able though I know my self-seeking brings no glory or honor to God; yes, “My profession is without possession, my self-importance is empty, my outward glow doesn’t give the true picture of my sin and guilt, discouragement is Hell’s award-winner for me, my walk is tasteless, embittered, unrefined,, unreformed, and spiritually infirmed!”

“Faithless disciples”? In Luke 17 a man came to Jesus, kneeling before Him and saying, Verses 15-21, “Lord, have mercy on my son, for he is an epileptic and suffers severely; for he often falls into the fire and often into the water. So I brought him to Your disciples, but they could not cure him.”…

Then Jesus answered and said, “O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I bear with you? Bring him here to Me.” And Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of him, and the child was cured from that very hour…

Then the disciples came to Jesus privately and said, “Why could we not cast it out?” So Jesus said to them, “Because of your unbelief; for assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith as a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move; and nothing will be impossible to you. However, this kind does not go out except by prayer and fasting.”

I pray you didn’t float over and around, never landing on a “faithless and perverse generation,” even empty of healing grace “because of your unbelief”!

Are you familiar with the parable of the sower in Luke 8:11-15? Jesus said, “Now the parable is this: The seed is the word of God. Those by the wayside are the ones who hear [Have YOU heard the word of God?]; then the devil comes and takes away the word out of their hearts, lest they should believe and be saved…

But the ones on the rock are those, who when they hear, receive the word with joy; and these have no root, who believe for a while and in time of temptation fall away. Now the ones that fell among thorns are those who, when they have heard, go out and are choked with cares, riches, and pleasures of life, and bring no fruit to maturity…

But the ones that fell on the good ground are those who, having heard the word with a noble and good heart, keep it and bear fruit with patience [or steadfastness].”

“Faithless men of the world.” Are you aware of Cain and his ‘fallen countenance’? [Genesis 4:6]. Verse 16 speaks of Cain “wandering” or Going “out from the presence of the Lord.” Oh, and then only by Genesis 6 there is a dramatic heart-breaking of God Himself! Genesis 6:5 tells us, “Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.”

Scattered men because of fleshly towers being built “to make a name for ourselves,” and you don’t believe that attitude still exists today? Are “Esaus still selling “birthrights” today? Of course, no worries today about people worshipping and serving their “golden calves”, right? Solomon’s Temple instead of Holy Presence in the heart? No true Sabbath Rests? No interest in the budding of God’s rod? Desert years in place of disciples’ yieldedness? Religious idols in place of a covenant with Holy God? False gods rather than Holy God, Loving Savior, and the Holy Spirit? Scornfully denying the Rock of one’s salvation?

In Joshua 23:14-16 there is an awesome word of warning for people all over the world because God never changes!! “Behold, this day I am going the way of all the earth [one is born, he lives, he dies!!]. And you know in all your hearts and in all your souls that not one thing has failed of all the good things which the Lord your God spoke concerning you; not one word of them has failed…

Therefore it shall come to pass, that as all the good things have come upon you which the Lord your God promised you, so the Lord will bring upon you all harmful things, until He has destroyed you from this good land which the Lord your God has given you…

When you have transgressed the covenant of the Lord your God, which He commanded you, and have gone and served other gods, and bowed down to them, then the anger of the Lord will burn against you, and you shall perish quickly from the good land which He has given you.”

Faithless men of the world, a faithless and perverse generation, faithless disciples, possessors of a faith that falters or the full assurance of the true faith that endures? In Jude, Verses one and two, we read of Jude, “a bondservant of Jesus Christ, and brother of James, To those who are called, sanctified by God the Father, and preserved in Christ Jesus: Mercy, peace, and love be multiplied to you.”

Then, in Verses 20-21, Jude tells those of true, enduring faith: “But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life…”. Oh, and then Jude said in Verses 24-25, “Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to present you faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy, To God our Savior, who alone is wise, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and forever. Amen.” Amen means agreement or “so be it!”

It sounds to me that “building one’s self up on your most holy faith” is to be the strong foundation in every true believer’s life! In 1 Timothy 1:12, 14-17, Paul told Timothy, a spiritually young son in the faith, “And I thank Christ Jesus our Lord who has enabled me, because HE COUNTED ME FAITHFUL [or credited to Paul’s account full, finishing, infinite faith!], putting me into the ministry…

Verses 14-17, And the grace of our Lord was exceedingly abundant, with faith and love which are in Christ Jesus. This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief. However, for this reason I obtained mercy, that in me first Jesus Christ might show all longsuffering, as a pattern to those who are going to believe on Him for everlasting life. Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, to God who alone is wise, be glory and honor forever and ever. Amen.”

“Faith that endures”? In Mark 11:22 Jesus laid the strong, eternal, life-changing faith to His new disciples when He said to them simply, “Have faith in God.” That’s the eternal God, the Author of His creation, God Almighty who speaks and the worlds are framed, who speaks and rivers, seas, and oceans flow, who speaks and there’s the bright sun and the shining moon and beautiful stars, who speaks and human beings inhabit His new world, who authored life unto Himself but fleshly men crowned human existence under their domain and reign of darkness! “Faith in God”?

Yes, that’s Holy God who creates, the God whose very Name is hallowed, the God whose strength, life, and creation is of the Almighty’s handiwork, “the Lord your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome… a God to be feared, a God to be served, a God to bow before and yield all to His Holy Sovereignty, a God who is to be YOUR praise, your adoration, your surrender, and your total yieldedness!”

In fact, Paul, so anointed by the Holy Spirit, wrote strong foundation support of the necessity of the Holy Spirit in one’s spiritual journey of faith. In 1 Corinthians 2:4-5 he wrote, “And my speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, that your faith should not be in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.” Paul’s speech, his preaching, his declaration of redemptive faith, was primarily on the foundation of saving faith that saves, sustains, strengthens, and sends out as true missionaries, witnesses, proclaimers of biblical faith!

In Romans 4 we learn more of Abraham’s saving faith! Romans 4:13-5:1 is Paul’s declaration of faith on the foundation of God’s promises to him and to us. He wrote: Don’t miss this revelation from God!!

“For the promise that he would be the heir of the world was not to Abraham or to his seed through the law, BUT THROUGH THE RIGHTEOUSNESS OF FAITH. For if those who are of the law are heirs, faith is made void and the promise made of no effect, because the law brings about wrath; for where there is no law there is no [known] transgression…

Therefore it is of faith that it might be according to grace, so that the promise might be sure to all the seed, not only to those who are of the law, but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all, (as it is written, “I have made you a father of many nations”) in the presence of Him whom he believed – God, who gives life to the dead and calls those things which do not exist as though they did; who, contrary to hope, in hope believed so that he became the father of many nations, according to what was spoken, “So shall your descendants be.” …

And not being weak in faith, he did not consider his own body, already dead since he was about a hundred years old, and the deadness of Sarah’s womb. He did not waver at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strengthened in faith, giving glory to God, and being fully convinced that what He had promised He was also able to perform. And therefore “it was accounted to him for righteousness.”…

Now it was not written for his sake alone that it was imputed to him, but also for us. It shall be imputed to us who believe in Him who raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead, who was delivered up because of our offenses, and was raised because of our justification. [Romans 5:1], Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ…” AMEN? We were “dead in Adam,” but made alive in Christ and declared ‘righteous’ by the mercy of God!

Do you understand “helplessness” when it comes to one being confronted by God to live the overcoming life of sin and death? Without Christ Jesus one is “without strength, without hope, without even, yes, faith” – but redemptive faith IS the gift of loving, merciful, gracious God, who so loved you and me, desiring we be reconciled to Him through the blood of Christ; so God “gives” saving faith to any who desire to be reconciled to Him!

In fact, in Romans 5:8-11, we read joyfully, “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, having now been “justified by His blood”, we shall be [being] saved from wrath through Him. For if when we WERE ENEMIES we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be [being] saved by His life. And not only that, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation.”

Do you even comprehend or understand how many “teachers” of the Bible go about teaching about “then,” “out there,” “someday,” “in the sweet by and by,” and leave out “our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we HAVE NOW RECEIVED the reconciliation”?

Look at Romans 5:15-17!! “But the free gift is not like the offense. For if by the one man’s offense many died, much more the grace of God and the gift by the grace of the one Man, Jesus Christ, abounded to many. And the gift is not like that which came through the one who sinned. For the judgment which came from one offense resulted in condemnation, but the free gift which came from many offenses resulted in justification. For if by the one man’s offense death reigned through the one, much more those who receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ.”

Is your spiritual journey a matter of fleshly performance or the position of the grace of God? Are you ‘gritted’ or graced? Are you ‘climbing’ as best you can or resting in our Lord’s ‘finished work’ at Calvary? Is your walk of faith a matter of self-determination or God’s free gift of righteousness in and through Christ’s resurrection victory over sin and death?

Are you aware of God’s surpassing greatness and mercy, His amazing grace, His awesome goodness, and His faithful favor, in blotting out man’s sin and guilt through the blood of His Son and our Savior at the Cross, with you either accepting or rejecting what the Lord Jesus did at Calvary?

Are you ruled by ingratitude and unbelief or continual thanksgiving and trust in the Calvary sacrifice and death in your place? Are you able to say to Holy God, “Father, it was my sin, my rebellion, my self-centeredness that placed Jesus there to die – He took my place. I repent, and I rest in His finished work and His available resurrection life and eternal hope.”

Are you aware of your guiltiness, pardoned by the blood of the Lamb? Have you grasped the eternal salvation through Him available now to the repentant heart and trusting will? Do you rest now in His “present salvation”? Do YOU know of available graces and eternal blessings that never fade away? Are you ready to forsake the world’s foolishness and rest in our Lord’s eternal wisdom? Will you ditch and bury your fleshly vanities and swim in the sea of His mercies, blessings, and eternal privileges? Are you a ‘flesh-promoter’ or a life yielded to the glory of God alone? “Fleshly pursuits” or Divine intent? False and fleshly dreams or His immortal goals? The vanity of sensuality or the victory of sins forgiven? Present intent or forever privilege? Inexpressible sorrow and pain or eternal blessing? A life of empty nothingness of eternal meaning or a life surrendered, yielded, placed in the clouds of heavenly glory and Godly intent?

CHAPTER FOUR

“FAITH AND GOD’S FAITHFUL PROVISIONS”

How rich is God’s Word in providing every disciple understanding, awareness, blessing, and insight to every provision Holy God makes available to each son or daughter of true faith! Paul said in Philippians 4:19, “And my God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus.”

Sometimes young, immature, childish believers, are unaware of God’s Fatherly faithfulness – they’re unsure at times of what God as Heavenly Father faithfully provides! Did Paul say God “supplies all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus”? Wasn’t that what you just read? But you’re not sure? Hebrews 4:16 challenges every believer, “Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”

What did the Lord Jesus say to those early disciples? In Matthew 7:7-11 our Lord said, “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened. Or what man is there among you who, if a son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask Him!”

Do you remember the leper in Matthew 8:2 as he came to Jesus and worshipped Him, and then stated, “Lord, if You are willing, You can make me clean”? Verse 3 says, Then Jesus put out His hand and touched him, saying, “I am willing; be cleansed.” Immediately his leprosy was cleansed.

Have you read lately about the ‘fig tree’ withering when Jesus spoke to it in Matthew 21:19-20? And seeing a fig tree by the road, He came to it and found nothing on it but leaves, and said to it, “Let no fruit grow on you ever again.” Immediately the fig tree withered away. And when the disciples saw it, they marveled, saying, “How did the fig tree wither away so soon?”…Verses 21-22,

So Jesus answered and said to them, “Assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith and do not doubt, you will not only do what was done to the fig tree, but also if you say to this mountain, ‘Be removed and be cast into the sea,’ it will be done. And whatever things you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive.”

But the ‘faithless’are many, many men who are so opposite to the true believer’s understanding of “Faith and God’s Faithful Provisions.” Too many men are not only ‘birthed’ spiritually blind, but live void of any understanding of the blessing of true redemptive faith and all of God’s faithful provisions! Even from the author of the Hebrews writing we learn of the once enlightened who fall away – [Hebrews 6:4-6], “For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted the heavenly gift, and have become partakers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, IF THEY FALL AWAY, to renew them again to repentance, since they crucify again for themselves the Son of God, and put Him to an open shame.”

Earlier, in Hebrews 3:12-19, the anointed writer reveals even, yes, the danger of “brethren” becoming victims again of sin’s deception and destructive power. It says, “Beware, BRETHREN, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God; but exhort one another daily, while it is called “Today,” lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin…

For we have become partakers of Christ if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast to the end, while it is said: ‘Today, if you will hear His voice, Do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.’ For who, having heard, rebelled? Indeed, was it not all who came out of Egypt, led by Moses?…

Was it not with those who sinned, whose corpses fell in the wilderness? And to whom did He swear that they would not enter His rest, but to those who did not obey? So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief.”

Do you see that ‘unbelief’ IS disobedience? Or has a spirit that hardens a believer’s heart already made steady advances in you? But the “faithless” are not only believers falling away, but unbelievers born into a sin-nature society, regardless of what nation one is born in! Human births, from Adam and Eve onward, were, are, and will be still birthed in the Adamic sin nature, necessitating repentance toward God and faith in the finished work of Christ Jesus in and through the Cross, the tomb, and its emptying through Resurrection Life, Resurrection Power, and Resurrection Hope!

I’m sure you remember Paul’s writing to the Corinthians, in 1 Corinthians 2:14, “But the natural man [unredeemed, unbelieving] does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” And then, in Verse 16b Paul said, “But we have the mind of Christ.” That’s the true, born-again, Spirit-filled man in Christ Jesus! [But the sad truth is, even true believers will or may, at times, “behave like mere men”!] But who did Christ Jesus shed His innocent blood for as the Lamb of God?

Men, without Christ as Savior and Lord, are ‘unrighteous,’ unholy, unclean, unbelievers, unwise, untaught, totally incapable of redeeming themselves apart from the blood of the Lamb of God! Religious activity has no power of forgiveness, no resurrection hope, and no promise of Heaven’s life, except in a repentant sinner’s confession to Christ of his/her need of Him – in Acts 16:30, after a great earthquake, with Paul and Silas imprisoned for their faith, the keeper of the prison, fearful for his own life because of escaping prisoners, was ready to kill himself, but Paul called out to him with a loud voice, “Do yourself no harm, for we are all here.” Running in to Paul and Silas, he brought them out, saying, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” Acts 16:31 then says, they said, “Believe on [trust in, rely upon, adhere to] the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved, you and your household.”

But poverty-stricken men, spiritually, of the sinners’ hellish clan of unbelievers are as clear and distinct as dark is to day and darkness is to light! A world of unbelievers live unworthy lives, defiant to God and His Holy Word and Will, are truly senseless, fleshly opposition to “the Savior”, unbelieving of Gospel Truth, being spiritually destitute, diseased, with a darkened heart, living under the dark cloud of spiritual bankruptcy, irreconcilable in a determined heart and mind of chaotic rebellion to God’s loving grace and mercy, unkind, no thirst for God, no desire for spiritual meat or the eternal Bread of God’s Word, wells without the water of life, like a city with no lights, homes with no desire for the heart of God redeeming them, individuals with total fleshly independence, satisfied with their old sin natures and their consequences, blinded by the world, the flesh, and the devil.

Are you aware of, yes, how undeserving a sinful world is of God’s mercy? Do you weep over fallen humanity’s infirmities, their spiritual blindness, their bondages to their old, vile, darkened sin natures, and does it trouble you how far, how deep and dense the darkness is in rebellious societies to the Light of God? How do you respond to the smells from the wells of the fountains of human pollution called ‘respectable rebellion’ or ‘sinful satisfaction’ or ‘personal pleasure in spite of God’?

Satanic traps and snares are so numerous as an educated, modern world demonstrates how to live ‘successfully’ apart from God with no understanding of the end result! Even a godless life competes for ‘bragging rights’ against those snares of the devil as one lives ‘proud’ of their rebellious rags before Holy God! The modern-day ‘Hollywood’ crowd is found ‘lusting’ after applause as they parade obsceneness before warped minds and deceived hearts. “Master-less lives” are matted in the miseries of mis-focused wills and misguided, fleshly dreams and ambitions – no God, no blessing; no Savior, no salvation; no Divine Lord, no demon-deliverance; no redemptive faith, no Sovereign deliverance; no Master, no re-made life in Christ!

Don’t you find it so amazing that a godless world is totally blind to “the dark guest” of bondage, whether a sinful self or a devilish army? Have you witnessed mortal sinfulness, fleshly ill-will, even against Holy God and His Holy Word? Sinful hearts come so cheap on Satan’s auction block, even “a dime a dozen’, and many, trapped, cuffed, slave-like to his demands, surrender to his dangerous ways, his daily shame, and his imprisoned sinfulness in demonic minds and hearts blinded to the love, grace, and mercy of, yes, the Loving God, Savior, Deliverer, Healer, Redeemer, Master, King of kings and Lord of lords!

How aware are YOU that the Savior’s ‘shed blood’ is abominable to the world, the flesh and the devil? Do you know how resentful “God’s Pleasure and Will” is to a godless world that has meaninglessly-mastered “lies” and the devil’s atrocious rebellion and disobedience? ‘Lostness’ is a strange word to a world’s unbeliever; ‘bound’ in the devil’s chains appears ludicrous to doubters of God’s eternal Word; ‘prisoner’ to Satan and his army of demons is for ‘brain-dead believers’ who follow Jesus! And the world, the flesh, and the devil himself, will go on celebrating their independence, satisfied with dust, displeasure, defilement, degradation, deformities of heart, soul, and life itself, delighting in unbelief until they begin to hear the awful sounds of Hell’s prisoners!

Hate is held onto in Hell! Ill-will reigns from the top down; malice is a never-ending ringing of Hell’s bells; forever slaves to Satan’s diabolical will continue to spread more and more in sin-bound, satanic bondage; scars, shames, sad indifferences to God’s Holy Kingdom dominate; life-long rebellion against Holy God and His Holy Word is amplified and extended ten thousand times in every disgraced citizen of Hell; ‘self-knowledge’ forever deteriorates into ‘self-loathing’ as one is disgracefully ‘programmed’ more and more by the devil himself; ‘evil’ becomes an acceptable title or description of Hell’s residents; sin’s deformity becomes a sad mask one must wear; ‘enemy of God’ daily identifies one’s roll-call; and all of a sudden, in a flash, Hell’s residents realize their eternal bondage and utter stupidity! But another word of warning before “shifting” to the grace of God: “The day is coming when “sinners” will be exposed in the hands of an angry God!”

THERE IS ANOTHER WAY THAT GOD HAS USHERED IN FOR A MAN TO WALK IN – IT’S CALLED “TRUE FAITH AND GOD’S FAITHFUL PROVISION”! The Apostle Paul said it so strongly, powerfully, and redemptively! Romans 3:4, “…let God be true but every man a liar.” It was John the Baptist who said in John 3:33, “He who has received His (Jesus’s) testimony has certified that God is true.”

Do YOU bow before “Truth” or yield to unbelief, disobedience, and rebellion to Holy God’s Way of the Cross and the empty tomb? I want to share with you what true faith and God’s faithful provision is about – it centers on “the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world!” I want to emphasize about six Truths that have stood forever!

FIRST: DO YOU SEE AND SENSE AND CELEBRATE GOD’S AUTHENTICATION OF HIS ETERNAL SALVATION PLAN BIRTHED IN HIS MIND AND HEART BEFORE THE WORLD AND MAN EVEN CAME INTO BEING?

The Random House College Dictionary, published in 1975 by Random House Inc., defines ‘authentic’ as “entitled to acceptance or belief because of agreement with known facts or experience; reliable; trustworthy…not false or copied; genuine; real…”. Ask any true born-again believer and follower of Christ if God’s eternal salvation plan has proven to be false, brain-dead thinking, a figment of a darkened mind of some false god, or eternal, pure Truth with error in the least, and you’ll find a celebration symphony of praise in every born-again life!

Spiritually dead without Christ as Lord and Savior is evident even without the vocal resistance to His eternal truths – “by their fruits you shall know them”, because lives born again are evident by the visibility of the fruit of the Spirit, or in an unbelieving life by fleshly fruit that radiates no evidence of the Life of Holy Presence or any divine fruit!

“In Christ” is alive and well because a new-born life radiates the Lord’s reign even in the decisions one makes! Choices made by a true born-again believer reflect a life of divine peace, a life bound in the cords of Calvary’s love, a spirit of thanksgiving and joy that never diminishes but intensifies with every new discovery of God’s eternal dimensions in their hearts and lives, and a walk that visibly reveals “Christ in me the hope of glory,” Christ through me the release of Heaven’s unending power, and Christ around me as the never-changing evidence of Holy God’s eternal blessings for one’s bowing daily as a devoted son or daughter of true faith in our Lord’s salvation gift!

Do you understand “surety” in our Lord and Savior’s promises and Word? “I’ll never leave you nor forsake you,” “surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life,” “surely He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows!”

In 2 Peter 1:16-19 Peter wrote: “For we did not follow cunningly devised fables when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of His majesty. For He received from God the Father honor and glory when such a voice came to Him from the Excellent Glory: “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” And we heard this voice which came from heaven when we were with Him on the holy mountain…

And so we have the prophetic word confirmed, which YOU do well to heed as a light that shines in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts…”. HAS JESUS RISEN IN YOU AS GOD’S ETERNAL STAR AND SAVIOR? Jesus is “the bright and morning star” radiating the wreath of God’s eternal glory, honor, and authenticity!

SECOND, CONCERNING GOD’S ETERNAL PLAN THROUGH CHRIST JESUS, HAVE YOU ACTIVATED HIS HOLY PRESENCE THROUGH THE OPEN DOOR OF REPENTANCE AND FAITH IN HIS FINISHED WORK ON THE CROSS? Have you become aware that three times in Matthew 6:5-7 Jesus said, “when you pray,” and then in Verse 9 Jesus said: “In this manner pray…”! And what was the prayer?

“Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come, Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen.”

Has there ever been a human being on the face of the earth who didn’t need to fall on their faces before Holy God, the Father, and pray for forgiveness? But, sadly, many men never fall before the Throne of God in confession, asking for sins to be forgiven and resurrection life in Christ becoming their only hope for a blessed life on earth. Didn’t Jesus say, “Few there be who find it,” which was Him as “the Door” into the Holy Presence of God?

But there are those who do find “the Door,” desire “the Door,” and willingly walk through the only “Door” into God’s Holy Presence! When earthly kings found the eternal kingdom of Christ, their fleshly empires became as nothing, worthless, fleshly, but in Christ Jesus they found, not flesh’s religions, but “Christ in them the hope of glory.” Having repented and rested in Christ, “new life” was rooted in His Word; eternal understanding of a divine relationship was unfolded day by day; new hearts through Him became expressive in divine affections that were both holy and heavenly; life’s intent was purified with the desire to please and honor Christ Jesus in all things; a “new heart” became passionate in exalting Christ as Lord over all in their daily journeys; deliverance came from evil desires, from the darkness of a natural, earthly, sinful mind; the Great Physician dissected the evil corruptions of an old, disgraceful, rebellious heart, and implanted the “peace that passes all understanding”; through Him temptations became toothless, high mountains became easy climbs, even darkened trials were exposed to His eternal Light!

THIRD, Authentication, Activation, IS FOLLOWED BY A MIRACULOUS ATTITUDE CHANGE FROM FLESHLY DOUBTS OF ONE’S LIMITATIONS TO ACKNOWLEDGEMENT OF GOD’S FAITHFUL PROVISION OF OVERCOMING POWER! Are you aware of what took place in the lives of the first twelve disciples who walked with Christ Jesus, most of them for the three years of His earthly ministry? I’m sure you’re aware Judas “sold” Jesus for thirty pieces of silver, falling away.

But then we read in Matthew 28, after the Resurrection, and right before His Ascension, Verses 16-17, Then the eleven disciples went away into Galilee, to the mountain which Jesus had appointed for them. When they saw Him, they worshipped Him; but some doubted.” [And I’m convinced this is often a result of ignoring the very Words of Christ for one’s ‘fleshly’ insight, or maybe blindness would be a better term!]

If “the fullness of the blessing of the Gospel of Jesus Christ” is every true believer’s rightful inheritance in Christ, where does doubt come from? In Him is the treasure of grace and mercy and love; in Him is the forever fountain flowing with Heaven’s glory; in Him a true believer is settled on His Solid-Rock foundation; Christ-like certainties are a disciple’s heavenly currency; even His name flows with awesome power and authority; I may be weak but He’s forever strong, I may be limited in the ‘brain’ but I’ve been blessed with the mind of Christ; I may be threatened but in Him I’m eternally triumphant; and when I even cry out to Him, “Help me,” I have the blessed assurance of an ever-present availability of divine power and heavenly armies! We overcome by the blood of the Lamb!

FOURTH, WOULD YOU ACKNOWLEDGE THAT YOUR “AIM” IN FOLLOWING CHRIST ALONE IS TO HONOR HIM, BLESS HIM, LOVE HIM, AND TO LAY DOWN YOUR LIFE THAT HE MIGHT BE SEEN THROUGH YOUR JOURNEY?

All I can say here is, “Why try to intellectualize historical, biblical truth when God’s Word has so elevated divine truth for us to a heavenly level that has an earthly lifting? In 2 Corinthians 4:7-11 Paul, so divinely anointed by the Holy Spirit, wrote: “But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us. We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed – always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body. For we who live are always delivered to death for Jesus’ sake, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh.” Glory to the Living God of love, grace, and mercy!

How do YOU pray today as you understand your ambassadorial ministry in His name and for His honor and glory? How about: “Holy Father, I proclaim Christ Jesus as my Lord, Savior, and Master of my earthly life. He is my salvation, my reconciliation with You, my earthly body as His earthly residence, living in me, living through me, and living to honor You! I know that only as I take the sentence of death daily to myself and yield to His indwelling presence will Your power and authority and eternal purpose find fertile ground. I daily yield to Jesus to reign in me on earth as He gloriously and as He in His beloved way and character reigns in Heaven. I openly declare that Christ Jesus is my Rock, my following faith and sure arrival of His foreordained home forever, my eternal life and my Heavenly Authority. He’s my forgiveness, my everlasting future, my strong fortress and defender, my glorious life that never dies, my eternally significant ministry of daily exalting, proclaiming, leaning on His everlasting arms, completed in Him lacking nothing, graciously blessed with the dynamic Presence of the Holy Spirit that energizes me, enforces and defends my faith, and grants me the Holy Spirit’s Sovereign leadership to glorify Christ Jesus through my journey of faith!

FIFTH, IS ADORATION, WORSHIP, AND PRAISE THE FOREVER CALLING OF GOD UPON ALL TRUE BELIEVERS? In Psalm 29:1-2 David said: “Give unto the Lord, O you mighty ones, give unto the Lord glory and strength. Give unto the Lord the glory due to His name; worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness.”

Worship? How about as a way of life? How about the ministry of verbally blessing His Holy Name? How about lifting up thanksgiving and praise in one’s “house of prayer”? How about blessing the Name above all names? How about “calling upon Him” because you know He will answer? How about “bowing” before Him in full surrender, even moment by moment, in the attitude of heart of full surrender? How about the true attitude of surrender and yieldedness and confession when bad desires or fleshly, misguided, devilish entertainments begin to darken one’s soul, even diluting true faith to Satan’s level of ‘error’ as a way of life, personal pride as the devil’s goal in you, rebellion as just a rest from attempts at godliness, and fleshly passions as: “It’s YOUR life; do with it as you please!” NO! We worship, bow before, confess God’s eternal attributes, including forgiveness if we fail, even for a second!

SIXTH, ARE YOU WILLING TO “PUT ON THE WHOLE ARMOR OF GOD” THAT YOU MIGHT LEGITIMATELY FIGHT AND WIN YOUR BATTLE OF FAITH? How about “the armor of faithful promises”? In Psalm 18 is an awakening to the awareness of God’s availability in the times of spiritual warfare with the enemies of true faith. David said in Psalm 18:4-6, “the pangs of death surrounded me, and the floods of ungodliness made me afraid. The sorrows of Sheol surrounded me; the snares of death confronted me. In my distress I called upon the Lord, and cried out to my God; He heard my voice from His temple; and my cry came before Him, even to His ears.”

But you’re not sure God will hear your cries? I’m telling you, God is faithful, and especially, lovingly, mercifully responds to the man in need of Him! Verses 13-14 of Psalm 18 tells us, “The Lord thundered from heaven, and the Most High uttered His voice, hailstones and coals of fire. He sent out His arrows and scattered the foe, lightnings in abundance, and He vanquished them.”

Are you aware that “some trust in chariots, and some in horses; but we will remember the name of the Lord our God”? [Psalm 20:7]! Amen?

CHAPTER FIVE

“FALSE IDENTITY OR TRUE FAITH ‘IN CHRIST’?”

Are you aware of how often the Holy Word of God speaks about ‘false words, false professors, false identities, false teachings or false teachers’? But I’m convinced also that through the Word of God we find those who, “not [only] bear false witness against your neighbor”, but many bear false witness TO the neighbor, professing one thing but diametrically are opposed by their lifestyles to what they professed falsely to their neighbors!

But this spirit goes deeper! Proverbs 17:4 says, “An evildoer gives heed to false lips; a liar listens eagerly to a spiteful tongue.” The author of Proverbs went on to say in Verse 7, “Excellent speech is not becoming to a fool, much less lying lips to a prince.” Dare I tell you that lying lips are not becoming to the true believer, but they are ‘natural’ to the one of a “false identity”!

There are narcissistic ‘nobodies’ who ‘think’ they are superior beings to everyone around them, even in church settings, who are truly ‘fleshly neutered’ as to the God who made them and void of redeemed reality by the blood of Christ, but are vocal as to their ‘false identity’, so sure they are God’s greatest gift in a religious world setting!

In 2 Peter 2:10 Peter spoke about “those who walk according to the flesh in the lust of uncleanness and despise authority. They are presumptuous, self-willed. They are not afraid to speak evil of dignitaries.” In Verses 13b-15a Peter also said of the ‘false identity crowd’, “They are spots and blemishes, carousing in their own deceptions while they feast with you, having eyes full of adultery and that cannot cease from sin, enticing unstable souls. They have a heart trained in covetous practices, and are accursed children. They have forsaken the right way and gone astray, following the way of Balaam…who loved unrighteousness…”

It’s a sad reality but the Bible is totally aware of “pretenders,” “play actors,” “dramatists who can ‘act’ fashionably,” yet they have no solid foundation but live their profession with the dark tint of the devil’s forces trying to impersonate the divine life of Christ Jesus! It’s amazing to me but there are lots of governmental leaders and workers who have no godly foundation, and you know them by their works, words, and ungodly lifestyles, while they play the game of political representatives of Holy God! And if we “know them by their works”, we discern they are spiritually diseased!

I was reading this week the publication entitled “Bottom Line,” [Vol.36, Number 18, Sept. 15, 2015 – a gift from my dear friend, Dr. C.A.Kile, of Cleveland, Tennessee]. The front page article was titled, “How to Live to 100 – Best Ways to add Healthy Years to Your Life!” But, I thought, what is one hundred healthy years physically if one has no faith, trust, vibrant relationship with the God who created and blessed them physically?

Do you sense degeneracy exploding around you? Do you see human races running from Holy God? Does it frighten you when you see the death pattern of divine spirituality in many young students in schools and universities across our nation? Are you aware of the destructive self-will that leads many to wander away from Holy Truth and the Loving Savior and the Caring God and shuts the door to Holy Spirit guidance?

How bad and how serious do you discern the disease of sin, rebellion, and disobedience to be concerning your city, state, nation, even the vast world around you? How are you responding to the societal sickness that grows around you? Have YOU been commissioned by God to touch your rebellious world with the love and grace of God? Do you travel the “main highway” that leads you to Holy God or are you content with the “back roads” of discontent with holy living? How familiar are you with graceless living, or the road entitled “estrangement from God”, or the pathway of permissiveness to perilous perverseness that so poisons an attempt at a walk of faith and obedience?

“False Identity?” Does “pretense” raise doubts about one’s true identity? The Random House Collegiate Dictionary says of ‘pretense’ that it is “feigning, make-believe, false show of something…alleging falsely…an insincere or false profession… an unwarranted claim.” It was Paul, in Romans 3:4, who wrote: “Indeed, let God be true but every man a liar.”

How bold was Jesus Himself as He confronted the religious leaders of Judaism in John 8:42-47?!? Jesus said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love Me, for I proceeded forth and came [out of or] from God; nor have I come of Myself, but He sent Me. Why do you not understand My speech? Because you are not able to listen to My word…

You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it…

But because I tell the truth, you do not believe Me. Which of you convicts Me of sin? And if I tell the truth, why do you not believe Me? He who is of God hears God’s words; therefore you do not hear, because you are not of God.”

What a sick identity is the soul that possesses no desire to hear the Voice of our Savior and Lord! Later, in John 10:22-31, the Lord Jesus further exposed the “false identity crowd”!! Now it was the Feast of Dedication in Jerusalem, and it was winter. [Side-bar! Winter as a season or winter identifying “cold hearts” to Eternal Truth?]. And Jesus walked in the temple, in Solomon’s porch. Then the Jews surrounded Him and said to Him, “How long do You keep us in doubt? If You are the Christ, tell us plainly.”…

Jesus answered them, “I told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in My Father’s name, they bear witness of Me. But you do not believe, because you are not of My sheep, as I said to you. My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me…

And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father’s hand. I and My Father are one.” Glory!

How do YOU respond to Christ Jesus’ words about the “crowd” who made false declarations about their “false identity”? Many said then, and still do now, “Let Him be crucified!”

Are you aware of what Holy God truly hates? In Proverbs 6:16-19 the “wise man” wrote: These six things the Lord hates, Yes, seven are an abomination to Him: A proud look, a lying tongue, hands that shed innocent blood, A heart that devises wicked plans, feet that are swift in running to evil, A false witness who speaks lies, and one who sows discord among brethren.”

Are there ‘modern’ Sodoms and Gomorrahs today? In Isaiah 1:4 and 7-20 Holy God sends another “shock-wave’ to awaken nations, including the U.S.A.!! Verse 4, “Alas, sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a brood of evildoers, children who are corrupters! They have forsaken the Lord, they have provoked to anger the Holy One of Israel, they have turned away backwards.”

Then Verses 7-20 sounds God’s ‘alarm system’! “Your country is desolate, your cities are burned with fire; strangers devour your land in your presence; and it is desolate, as overthrown by strangers, so the daughter of Zion is left as a booth in a vineyard, as a hut in a garden of cucumbers, as a besieged city…

Unless the Lord of hosts had left to us a very small remnant, we would have become like Sodom, we would have been made like Gomorrah. Hear the word of the Lord, you rulers of Sodom; give ear to the law of our God, you people of Gomorrah; “To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices to Me?” says the Lord. I have had enough of burnt offerings of rams and the fat of fed cattle. I do not delight in the blood of bulls, or of lambs or goats…

When you come to appear before Me, who has required this from your hand, to trample My courts? Bring no more futile sacrifices; incense is an abomination to Me, the New Moons, the Sabbaths, and the calling of assemblies – I cannot endure iniquity and the sacred meeting…

Your New Moons and your appointed feasts My soul hates; they are a trouble to Me, I am weary of bearing them. When you spread out your hands, I will hide My eyes from you; even though you make many prayers, I will not hear. Your hands are full of blood…

Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean; put away the evil of your doings from before My eyes. Cease to do evil, learn to do good; seek justice, rebuke the oppressor; defend the fatherless, plead for the widow. Come now, and let us reason together, says the Lord, Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall be as wool…

If you are willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land; But if you refuse and rebel, you shall be devoured by the sword. For the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”

How many cries are you hearing around you because of fallen man’s rebellion and disobedience? How often do you hear someone truly praying, “God, be merciful to me the sinner”? How many do you know who believe God is insufficient to meet their sin-problem’? Does ‘despair’ over one’s sinful nature and their ‘closed ears’ to redeeming grace build the separation from God bigger and wider because they refuse “Amazing Grace”? Does ‘mourning’ over one’s fallen nature away from God get wider and broader every day because of a cursed, defiant response to His love, grace, and mercy?

Are you aware of how resentful some unbelievers are to “the fountain filled with blood, drawn from Emmanuel’s veins,” as if they’ve totally rejected Calvary’s love? To them ‘sin’ and the ‘sin nature’ is not a curse but a fleshly blessing! There is no satisfaction in one’s attempt at “law observance”, because all it is is a pat on the back of fleshly effort, that closes the door to God’s imputed, imparted, implanted righteousness! Abusing sinners of the grace of the gospel of Christ is just deepening the hole of their burial inside the gates of Hell! For many it is not an abhorrence of all God calls evil, but a ‘fleshly love-song’ about their self-indulgence and a love of the devil’s deadly fruit!

In Isaiah 1:28 the ‘shock wave’ should carry one to the shore of God’s throne of mercy! “The destruction of transgressors and of sinners shall be together, and those who forsake the Lord shall be consumed,” maybe said more clearly, ‘being consumed with hell’s fire that never stops the burning’!

“FALSE IDENTITY OR ‘TRUE FAITH’ “IN CHRIST”? Yes! Thank God, there is biblical faith that is eternally true and transforms even one who tasted ‘false identity’ and reached out to ‘True Faith’ “In Christ”!! That’s faith in the Father-God of the blood covenant of Christ Jesus and His redeeming, reconciling, reigning, overflowing River of Eternal Life and Forever Hope! That’s anchored in the Sea of Calvary’s Blood Redemption! That’s breathing in through repentance and faith the very Resurrected Life of the Lord Jesus Christ! That’s willingly submerging one’s life and new being in Christ and His ocean of omnipotent power to raise the dead to Divine Life and Divine Purpose! That’s glowing with His heavenly glory! That’s the true, eternal, blessed faith of eternal hope and eternal helpfulness, keeping Heaven’s fire burning in a yielded heart and life daily!

‘True Faith’ “In Christ”? That’s the love of God brought to earth to abide in the redeemed heart, embraced by the very arms of God, enveloped and indwelt in the fullness of the Holy Spirit, enjoined with Christ’s resurrected presence, and the eternal significance of being extensions of His life, expressions of His love, and the proof of His awesome power to manifest Heaven through you and me!

If “the Lord is in His holy temple,” are you aware that through your repentance and faith in Christ Jesus, that 2 Corinthians 6:16 declares, “And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? FOR YOU [in Christ] are the temple of the living God. As God has said: ‘I will dwell in them and walk among them. I will be their God, and they shall be My people.” Have you, in Christ Jesus, been made aware that YOU are His earthly temple, having received His Holy Presence?

Yet, how casually indifferent are most believers about the awesome truth on their lives, by God’s own declaration, that they are the temple of Christ’s earthly dwelling? Have YOU, as a true believer, assumed the awesome responsibility of honoring Him who chose to make you His temple of holy presence?

‘True Faith’ “In Christ”? The last paragraph you just read is interpreted greatly by Paul in Colossians 1:24-29 when he wrote: “I now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up in my flesh what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ, for the sake of His body, which is the church, of which I became a minister according to the stewardship from God which was given to me for you, to fulfill the word of God, the mystery which has been hidden from ages and from generations, but has now been revealed to His saints [saints? Lives ‘set apart’ for the glory and honor of Holy God!]. To them God willed to make known what are the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles: which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. Him we preach, warning every man and teaching every man in all wisdom, that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus. To this end I also labor, striving according to His working which works in me mightily.”

Are you aware of how ‘brutally’ at times the lost world around you will put disclaimers of your ‘professed faith’ out to unbelievers you seek to influence ‘for Christ’ because that turns attention away from their unbelief to what they hope the world around you sees as ‘hypocrisy’ in you as a true, born-again believer? But ‘true holiness in Christ’, kindled to a great flame of glory, cannot, will not, be suffocated out by an unbelieving world! Infinite, holy, divine love and amazing grace in you may be crucified by a rebellious world, but “three days later there is Resurrection Life” out of God’s eternal power!

Are YOU identified with Christ in His Resurrection Life as a born-again believer? In “My Utmost For His Highest,” [p.233], Oswald Chambers wrote: “The Christian worker has to be a sacramental ‘go-between’, to be so identified with his Lord and the reality of His Redemption that He can bring His creating life through him. It is not the strength of one man’s personality being superimposed on another, but the real presence of Christ coming through the elements of the worker’s life. When we preach the historic facts of the life and death of Our Lord as they are conveyed in the New Testament, our words are made sacramental, God uses them on the ground of His Redemption to create in those who listen that which is not created otherwise. If we preach the effects of Redemption in human life instead of the revelation regarding Jesus, the result in those who listen is not new birth, but refined spiritual culture, and the Spirit of God cannot witness to it because such preaching is in another domain. We have to see that we are in such living sympathy with God that as we proclaim His truth He can create in souls the things which He alone can do.” Amazing Truth!

In Matthew 18:3 Jesus said, “Assuredly, I say to you, unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven,” with Jesus also saying in Verse 4, “Therefore whoever humbles himself as this little child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.” Does ‘child-like faith’ speak to you in convicting fashion or does fleshly pride carry your torch? Do you ‘try’ or do you truly ‘trust’?

Paul was so on target with God’s heart when he wrote in Romans 12:1-2, “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be [being] transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”

Aren’t you thankful for the divine mercies of God – plural?!! And His mercies are as His faithful sun arising to dispel the darkness from all around! Darkness condemns – His Light enlightens, fleshly darkness imprisons – His Light frees, the sin-soiled spirits of a sinner’s bondage hold one captive – Jesus’s shed blood washes white as snow, Satan deforms – Christ Jesus transforms, a world spirit accuses the true believer – the Savior atones, re-aligns, restores, and releases God’s pre-ordained heavenly design!

Fleshly debacles, life-styles, and devilish deceptions, bring on and further push one away from God’s eternal intent, with Satan’s celebrations, but the Holy Spirit reminds us of why Christ Jesus came and suffered and died on that cruel Cross, and that by God’s love, power, and purpose was raised from the dead! Out of YOUR sin-death new life in Christ is knocking at your heart’s door! Your sin-guilt can be pardoned through the shed blood of the Lamb of God, your bondages can be broken and severed, your choices of unholy living can be transformed to God’s eternal intent, a poor spiritual condition can be divinely changed into His Resurrected Life in Heaven’s eternal wealth – and that by the convicting and converting and consecrating power of the Holy Spirit!

It was George D. Moore and H.L. Gilmore who wrote the old hymn, “The Haven of Rest.” It says: “My soul in sad exile was out on life’s sea, So burdened with sin and distress, Till I heard a sweet voice saying, “Make Me your choice,” And I entered the haven of rest…

I yielded myself to His tender embrace, And, faith taking hold of the word, My fetters fell off, and I anchored my soul: The haven of rest is my Lord…

The song of my soul, since the Lord made me whole, Has been the old story so blest, Of Jesus, who’ll save whosoever will have A home in the haven of rest…

Oh, come to the Savior, He patiently waits, To save by His power divine; Come, anchor your soul in the haven of rest, And say, ‘My Beloved is mine.’..

I’ve anchored my soul in the haven of rest, I’ll sail the wild seas no more; The tempest may sweep o’er the wild stormy deep, In Jesus I’m safe evermore.”

‘True Faith’ “In Christ”? There is a strong, convicting, self-examining verse in 2 Corinthians 7:10 that says, “For godly sorrow produces repentance leading to salvation, not to be regretted; but the sorrow of the world produces death.” Self-sorrow that is concerned only about what others have witnessed in you but there is no concern or true sorrow about what God knows and reveals doesn’t produce salvation but only fleshly sorrow!

Have you known those who “weep” over their sin, but not for breaking the heart of God, but because they’ve disappointed their family and friends or employer? Then you find those absolutely heart-broken, spiritually troubled, even publicly ashamed, because they’ve come to the true understanding that it was “my sin that nailed Christ Jesus to Calvary’s Cross” – and “godly sorrow” prevails!

1 Pater 2:24 declares: [speaking of Christ Jesus first, then truly convicted sinners], “who Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live for righteousness – by whose stripes you were healed.”

‘True Faith’ “In Christ”? Are you aware that God has no interest in the eternal death of even one unrepentant life? In Ezekial 18:30b-32, God has spoken! “Repent, and turn from all your transgressions, so that iniquity will not be your ruin. Cast away from you all the transgressions which you have committed, and get yourselves a new heart and a new spirit. For why should you die, O house of Israel? [Why should you die, Oh American, or citizen of India, or European citizen?]. For I [Holy God] have no pleasure in the death of one who dies,” says the Lord God. “Therefore turn and live!”

And Christ Jesus tells you, “I am divine forgiveness, I am the Door to reconciliation, I am the Resurrection Life and Eternal Hope, I am God’s plan for your eternal destiny, I am divine perfection for the repentant heart, I am the blood atonement that washes away all your sin and guilt, I am your wisdom, your righteousness, your sanctification, and your eternal hope, I am your justification, your sanctification, and your glorification, I am the Christ who carried your old sinful flesh to the Cross with all of its infectious affections and lusts and put them to death through My Cross offering…I AM AND FOREVER WILL BE!!” But you have a better explanation for true Godly living? “The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God IS eternal life in (and through) Christ Jesus our Lord.”

OH! “Hear me!” Romans 5:8, “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” Justified by His blood, sanctified or made holy by His blood, and glorified by His blood!” But you have a better way?

Has the Truth penetrated, positioned you, and dynamically empowered you to receive and walk in the overcoming life of Christ, whether sin, warfare, or death, empowering you in the “Victory In Jesus”? It’s not that I am now ‘religious, but re-born, not that I appear ‘holy,’ but I’ve been reconciled, not that I’ve abandoned the world but died to it and made my life Through Christ a Living Witness of His amazing grace, and though I truly love the world I am a part of, my affections, my devotion, my goal, my ministry, is to honor Him in all things, even dying to the flesh daily with its foolishness, it’s foul smell, and its fleshly vanities, becoming by His grace His earthly reservoir of grace, mercy, and love, putting on His armor and fighting the good fight of faith!

CHAPTER SIX

“FAITH AND THE FAITHFULNESS OF MASTERED MEN”

I personally love what Oswald Chambers once said in his book, “My Utmost For His Highest.” [p.252], “When once you are rooted in Reality, nothing can shake you. If your faith is in experiences, anything that happens is likely to upset that faith; but nothing can ever upset God or the almighty Reality of Redemption; base your faith on that, and you are as eternally secure as God.” Glory!

Do you remember when men brought to Jesus a man who was paralyzed? The story is in Luke 5:19-26. And when they could not find how they might bring him in, because of the crowd, they went up on the housetop and let him down with his bed through the tiling into the midst before Jesus. When He saw their faith, He said to him, “Man, your sins are forgiven you.”…

And the scribes and the Pharisees began to reason, saying, “Who is this who speaks blasphemies? Who can forgive sins but God alone?” But when Jesus perceived their thoughts, He answered and said to them, “Why are you reasoning in your hearts? Which is easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven you, or to say, ‘Rise up and walk’? But that you may know that the Son of Man has power on earth to forgive sins” – He said to the man who was paralyzed, “I say to you, arise, take up your bed, and go to your house.”…

Immediately he rose up before them, took up what he had been lying on, and departed to his own house, glorifying God. And they were all amazed, and they glorified God and were filled with fear, saying, “We have seen strange things today!”

There is no doubt that ‘faith and the faith of Mastered men” IS a strange thing for multitudes who do not know the God who is able “even to subdue all things to Himself.” Most finite men are faithless concerning infinite God because to them there is no fear of God, but to the man who genuinely fears Holy God, you are aware that man is a spiritual learner of life and God’s Holy Word, he’s blessed by the divine presence that surrounds him, he is fearful of holy God because he’s wise, he knows ‘God is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all he asks or thinks’, he’s aware of his own weakness but extremely aware of God’s heart and God’s able-ness, and he knows where and with Whom to yield his heart, his life, his eternal destiny, and with Whom to yield his trust and faith and future!

Psalm 25:12 asks, “Who is the man that fears the Lord? Him shall He [God] teach in the way He chooses,” and God sets the path of that man’s present and future, even eternally!

What an enormous difference between faithless men and men of true faith! In Hebrews 12:22-28 the Lord speaks about a “glorious company of men” of redemptive faith and faithfulness: But you have come to Mount Zion [your spiritual house, your holy temple, your divine residence] and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem [in you!], to an innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly and church of the firstborn who are registered in heaven, to God, the Judge of all, to the spirits of just men made perfect, to Jesus the Mediator of the New Covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling that speaks better things than that of Abel…

See that you do not refuse Him who speaks. For if they did not escape who refused Him who spoke on earth, much more shall we not escape if we turn away from Him who speaks from heaven, whose voice then shook the earth; but now He has promised, saying, “Yet once more I shake not only the earth, but also heaven.” Now this, “Yet once more,” indicates the removal of those things that are being shaken, as of things that are made, that the things which cannot be shaken may remain…

Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us have grace, by which we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear. For our God is a consuming fire.”

‘Serving God with reverence and godly fear’? Our biblical text for this chapter is from Luke 5, Verses 19-26, about men bringing on a bed a man who was paralyzed and laid him before Jesus. It is an amazing, God-honoring story of both spiritual healing as the Lord forgave his sins and physical healing as Jesus told him to rise up and walk! The scribes and Pharisees discussed, “Who is this who speaks blasphemies? Who can forgive sins but God alone?” And in Verse 24 we read, “But that you may know that the Son of Man has power on earth to forgive sins” – He said to the man who was paralyzed, “I say to you, arise, take up your bed, and go to your house,” and the man did, glorifying God Almighty!!

But do you see and sense a holy message in this REALITY OF SPIRITUAL PARALYSIS AND THE ETERNAL NEED OF THE GREAT PHYSICIAN, Christ Jesus, to raise up men paralyzed by Satan’s deceit that one can sin and not die? But here came Jesus! That’s the Son of Man who has the power on earth to forgive sins!

‘Spiritual paralysis’? I pray you face it, if you haven’t as yet in your earthly journey, but there is the “danger” of a spiritual sickness that can limit eternal potential, detour one from a divine destiny, blind one to the highway of holiness, and subvert Christ Jesus’s desire for presence in and through their redeemed lives – but they ignore Him! The FIRST paralysis? You should know!

THERE IS THE SPIRITUAL PARALYSIS OF DESTRUCTIVE, DEMEANING, DEATHLY SIN! Romans 6:23 announces what YOU already know! “For the wages of sin is death..” not life, not lasting pleasure, not super-human, demonic activity to give you blessing in your life but vain emptiness and ‘doctored-appearances’ by the devil himself!

Are you aware of Holy God’s desire to redeem lost men and use them then to honor Him by touching their lost and dying world with “redemption’s glorious message” of forgiven life in Christ? Isaiah 6:1-8 tells us: In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lifted up, and the train of His robe filled the temple…

Above it stood seraphim; each one had six wings: with two he covered his face, with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And one cried to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of His glory!”…

And the posts of the door were shaken by the voice of him who cried out, and the house was filled with smoke. So I said: “Woe is me, for I am undone! Because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts.”…

Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a live coal which he had taken with the tongs from the altar. And he touched my mouth with it, and said: “Behold, this has touched your lips; your iniquity is taken away, and your sin purged.” Also I heard the voice of the Lord saying: “Whom shall I send, and who will go for Us?” Then I said, “Here am I! Send me.”

Holy God spoke to men in Old Testament days AND in New Testament days, but He continues to speak throughout human history since Bible-days, exposing the ‘undoneness, uncleanness, and irreconcilable attitude of many who ARE ungodly’! The sinfulness of mankind that produces ‘death’ is utter self-consciousness that has no room for God, body, soul, or spirit! What does Romans 5:12 tell us? “Therefore, just as through one man [Adam] sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned…”

Oswald Chambers wrote in his book, “My Utmost For His Highest,” [p.206], “The disposition of sin is not immorality and wrong-doing, but the disposition of self-realization – I am my own god.” Death in sin breeds fleshly stupidity and indifference to God’s revelation and His offer of reconciliation, re-birth, and His heavenly identity described as: “I’m a child of the King” whose name is Jesus! Are you aware of God’s pleasure celebrated through your conversion from death to life? Paul said in Galatians 1:15-16, “But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother’s womb and called me through His grace, to reveal His Son in me…,” and the same applies to you!

SECOND, THERE IS THE SPIRITUAL PARALYSIS OF DISINCLINATION! Have you ever been around those, even someone in particular very close to you, but you have no question about their disinterest in spiritual realities and especially no interest in spiritual re-birth through the shed blood of Christ? They are spiritually paralyzed! They are DISINCLINED! They are unwilling to pick up the Holy Word or to hear it read to them. Their attitude is a distaste of anything that relates to “salvation,” the “Savior,” “New Birth,” and totally ignore your heart-felt desire to share eternal truth with them.

Godlessness is a spiritual disease birthed in the mind and heart of one who is an ‘unbeliever.’ That’s those who are described as “faithless” – and, sadly, many are not even ashamed of that state of mind, heart, and fleshly will – they are content in separation from God.

In Matthew 17:17 Jesus made a strong, convicting statement: “O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I bear with you?” And what they couldn’t do in their faithlessness, Jesus did, casting out the demon from a child!

The spiritual paralysis of disinclination of spiritual re-birth is also a reality because of the sad condition of a strong love of self, sin, satisfaction with the sickness of one’s rebellion toward God, and sold out to one’s independence from Holy God. When Jesus said in Matthew 16:24, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me,” and you immediately begin to hear the ‘self-idolaters’ saying, “Is He serious? Why should I walk away from what I am in love with?” Haven’t you heard it as you witnessed to the “lost,” – “Why should I give up what I am totally in love with,” not even knowing their “love” of their sin nature is devilish infatuation with no eternal blessing!

Spiritual disinclination of not seeking after Eternal God’s purpose is because of the “disease” of an evil sin nature, a life filled with evil possibilities and distractions from True Life and Eternal Purpose, and blinded by the devil’s darkness, not knowing one’s enemy, called the devil or Satan, is the master of loving evil and abhorring Divine Truth!

THIRD, THERE IS THE SPIRITUAL PARALYSIS OF DREADED FEARS! Hear me! “Fears in the ‘flesh-walk’ are of the unwise, unrighteous, unholy, and unredeemed – fleshly fears bind faith, blind one to God’s presence,, and block God’s revelation of freedom from fleshly fears because He is able!”

There are those who get up in their morning dreading the day because of the heavy weight of the fears about what might happen, that they are crushed by its weight, enslaved by its chains, and weakened more and more by fear’s ability to chain one to their slavish fears!

That’s why in Deuteronomy 31:8 Moses said, “And the Lord, He is the One who goes before you. He will be with you, He will not leave you nor forsake you; do not fear nor be dismayed.”

Yet many walk on in the pilgrimage of their earthly journey enslaved to their ‘fears’! It’s as if there is no available heavenly help! If the Lord is your Helper, then why is one ruled by fleshly fear? Do you understand ‘dreams of apprehension’ by the powers of darkness? Does ‘faltering faith’ say anything to you when you sense, maybe, you are about to be consumed by the world, your flesh, and the devil? If “God has said,” why fret about the devil’s empty words? We ought not fear because God has said, “I am with you!” What about, “Leaning on the everlasting arms?”

If there’s legitimate fear, it ought to be “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom”! Even King David sang in Psalm 19:9, “The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring forever!” Jeremiah wrote in Lamentations 3:22-24, “Through the Lord’s mercies we are not consumed, because His compassions fail not. They are new every morning; Great is Your faithfulness. “The Lord is my portion,” says my soul, “Therefore I hope in Him!” God is not a non-entity! He’s your ALL IN ALL, even standing between you and your fears!

FOURTH, THERE IS THE SPIRITUAL PARALYSIS OF DOUBTS! Uncertainty of the authenticity of the Word of God is promoted by many. Uncertainty even of your testimony of faith is declared by some. And uncertainty surely arises when one who has been vocal becomes silent, indifferent, even rebellious to what he/she once professed!

Security “in Christ” is God’s divine gift, but if one’s spiritual journey becomes faith in themselves, one should get ready to envision a horrible falling away! There is NO ASSURANCE in self-determination, but only release of your surrendered life to our Lord’s Sovereign care!

A declaration of reduction in one’s self births doubts because one wrestles with the fact that the old self was “crucified with Christ” – and a flood of doubts about the redemptive faith through Christ intensifies! Being “made holy” by the blood of Christ is the eternal matter of sanctification, which IS the very impartation of His Resurrection Life, not my attempts at imitation!

In John 7:17-18 Christ Jesus speaks, saying, “If anyone wills to do His will, he shall know concerning the doctrine, whether it is from God or whether I speak on My own authority. He who speaks from himself seeks his own glory; but He who seeks the glory of the One who sent Him is true, and no unrighteousness is in Him.” Oh, and then in John 8:28-29, our Lord and Savior said, “When you lift up the Son of Man [to crucify Him!], then you will know that I am He, and that I do nothing of Myself; but as My Father taught Me, I speak these things. And He who sent Me is with Me. The Father has not left Me alone, for I always do those things that please Him.”

Are you “paralyzed” by spiritual doubts or empowered by Him as you obey what He tells you to do? And is this because “you are not your own, because you were bought with a price”? The price of liberty, freedom, and deliverance from doubt? YOU DIED AND YOUR LIFE IS HIDDEN IN CHRIST!

Receive Oswald Chambers’ brilliant words! [“My Utmost For His Highest,” p. 228], “The Lord does not give me rules, He makes His standard very clear, and if my relationship to Him is that of love, I will do what He says without any hesitation. If I hesitate, it is because I love someone else in competition with Him, viz., myself. Jesus Christ will not help me to obey Him, I must obey Him; and when I do obey Him, I fulfill my spiritual destiny,” unless you settle in to yourself and what your sin nature tells you!

FIFTH, THERE IS THE SPIRITUAL REALITY OF DESPONDENCY! Things are not going as one thinks they should, and when that ‘spirit’ turns from fleshly success to failure, a spirit of despondency can begin to rule rather than “resting in the Lord.” If Jesus says, “Take no thought for your life,” is it possible one majors on ‘self’ rather than on ‘resting in Him’?

Do you remember Jesus’ Word about “the cares of this world” in Matthew 13:22? He said, “Now he who received seed among the thorns is he who hears the word, and the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and he becomes unfruitful.” And remember, Jesus also said, “By theirs fruits you shall know them,” so, if there is no fruit in us from Christ, what is He telling us?

Isn’t true faith the death to the ‘natural’ and redemptive faith in God to “care” for us? Often, despondency is disappointment in ourselves, which means that for many there has not been the choice daily of death to self for the manifestation of our Lord’s “Resurrection Life” but a yielding to what is sure will produce dark clouds over, around, and even in us!

Have you ever dealt with “taking the sentence of death daily unto myself that Christ’s Resurrected Life may be manifested in my mortal flesh”? Didn’t Paul say, “I die daily”? But then there is the fleshly reality of overlooking the Holy Spirit’s reign in us because, the truth is, sometimes one chooses that old ‘fountain of pollution’ from which he/she once drank! Dangerous choices, dirty chambers, defying imaginations, can be awakened, if daily one is not purposefully yielding to Christ, His Word, and to the promise of the abiding Holy Spirit!

How did Paul address this dilemma? In Romans 6:14-18 he wrote, “For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law but under grace. What then? Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace? Certainly not! Do you not know that to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey, whether of sin leading to death, or of obedience leading to righteousness? But God be thanked that though you were slaves of sin, yet you obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine to which you were delivered. And having been set free from sin, you became slaves of righteousness.”

Let me paraphrase what Oswald Chambers said about this dilemma, at times, in one’s spiritual journey or pilgrimage: [“My Utmost For His Highest,” p.53], “Yield in one’s spiritual childhood walk to self-indulgence, and you’ll find personal bondage, fleshly imprisonment, and enchaining tyrannies in your spiritual life’s pilgrimage!” But, remember, we serve the King of kings and the Lord of lords who still preaches ‘deliverance to all captives.’ Amen?

CHAPTER SEVEN

“SAVING FAITH AND THE CONVERTEDS’ WORK”

Don’t you find it amazing at times when you come to the Word of God, and you read one thing in one place, turn to another passage of Scripture, and you find a word that “seems” to contradict?

In Philippians 2:12-13 Paul wrote, “Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure.”

Working God, and the Converted’s Work”! I can’t help but point you to Oswald Chambers who wrote: [“My Utmost For His Highest,” p.115], “In a regenerated man the source of will is almighty. ‘For it is God which works in you both to will and to do His good pleasure.’ You have to work out with concentration and care what God works in; “not work” your own salvation, but “work it out”, while you base resolutely in unshaken faith on the complete and perfect Redemption of the Lord.”

In Colossians 2:8-10 we read, “Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men, according to the basic principles of the world, and not according to Christ. For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily; and you are complete in Him, who is the head of all principality and power.”

If ‘the world, the flesh, and the devil’ are God’s enemy and your enemy, are you equipping yourself in fighting the good faith of faith as you are opposed, even with yourself and your ‘old man, sin nature, and fleshly desires’? “Self-introspection” and “self-love” are a strong enemy IF you don’t know that your old man was ‘crucified with Christ’ on the Cross two thousand years ago! Sometimes the ‘independent spirit,’ a strong self-will, an obstinate attitude, a heavy pull from unintelligent spirituality, will tempt, entice, build wedges of indifference in a compromising faith, and work hellish havoc in one’s walk of faith.

Are you aware of what we read in John 6:66? “From that time many of His [that’s Christ Jesus!] disciples went back and walked with Him no more.” Are you aware that there ARE “disciples” who, yes, decide to walk with Jesus no longer? What happened in those minds and hearts of disciples who once ‘walked’ with Jesus, but then they decided, “No more”!

Rebellion to the Living Word is deadly! Determining ‘self-rights’ is already seen in God’s Holy Word as a personal death-sentence related to eternal faith! Disobedience is destructive, defiant to Holy God, and puts a stamp of approval of “drying up” and “wasting away” in what could have been intimate, personal relationship with Father-God! Haven’t you witnessed that man in his early days of faith who came to Christ with such a devoted heart, life, and witness, but then began to be “successful”, made a name for himself, made a lot of money – and then he fell away, yes, into an ungodly lifestyle? How many have you known who became involved in sexual immorality and faded away? Any “believers” you have known who descended into a spiritual attitude of “decrease” rather than “increase” into our Lord’s image and likeness and were distracted from “pressing in” to Christ and yielded to the flesh?

No days pass that you are not in the scope of Satan to bring about your demise from eternal faith and obedience! Satan wants you so deceived because of your sinful indiscretions that you come to believe there is no spiritual hope for you – the devil will tell you: “You are a lost cause to God; come join my crowd”! The devil doesn’t really know how much God loves you and how willing He is, and able, to empower you to overcome the flesh’s greatest failure! God is merciful!

Holy God is omniscient, aware of your lack of understanding of spiritual warfare and the schemes of Satan, but His patient ‘Fatherhood spirit’ will walk with you, pick you up when necessary, and even step in to provide you with the victory that overcomes the world, your flesh, and the devil and his demons; God is merciful with His children! If Christ Jesus is your “Master”, are you aware of His oversight ministry, care, and supply of every need you have according to His riches in glory?

In Psalm 103:17-22 we need to evaluate our understanding and appropriation of God’s mercy or evaluate our failure to rest in His mercy if we don’t! David said: “But the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear Him [reverential awe!], and His righteousness to children’s children, to such as keep His covenant, and to those who remember His commandments to do them…

The Lord has established His throne in heaven, and His kingdom rules over all. Bless the Lord, you His angels [‘messengers?’], who excel in strength, who do His word, heeding the voice of His word. Bless the Lord, all you His hosts, you ministers of His, who do His pleasure. Bless the Lord, all His works, in all places of His dominion. Bless the Lord, O my soul!”

If YOU are “complete in Christ,” does that mean God sees you as He sees His Son and our Savior, and the release in us and through us of all Christ Jesus is as a merciful and faithful High Priest? In Arthur Bennett’s book “The Valley of Vision,” he quoted one of the Puritan age disciple’s prayer that said: [p.17],

“I deny them not, [his former sins AND sin-nature!], frame no excuse, but confess, ‘Father, I have sinned’; Yet still I live, and fly repenting to Your outstretched arms; You will not cast me off, for Jesus brings me near, You will not condemn me, for He died in my stead, You will not mark my mountains of sin, for He levelled all, and His beauty covers my deformities. O my God, I bid farewell to sin by clinging to His Cross, hiding in His wounds, and sheltering in His side.”

Examine your full and unending grasp of God’s mercy illumined for you in Christ’s shed blood! It was Thomas Watson who once wrote: “Mercy is not for them that sin and fear not, but for them that fear and sin not.”

“Saving Faith AND THE CONVERTED’S WORK”? Is it visibly seen, continually affirmed, and exercised in you as the fruit of saving faith and your recognition of the true disciple’s faith, ministry, care, and conquest, knowing the converted’s work is not finished until we allow His Full Life demonstrated through us?

In the Psalm 25 passage David answered “Who is the man who fears the Lord?” 1) The blessed man is a learner. Psalm 25:12 says, “Him (the learner) shall He (God) teach in the way He chooses.” 2) The learner is blessed. Verse 13 says, He himself shall dwell in prosperity, and his descendants shall inherit the earth. 3) The learner IS fearful of Holy God! That man is filled with reverential awe! “The secret of the Lord is with those who fear Him, and He will show Them His covenant.” 4) The learner learns, “God is able!” David said, “My eyes are ever toward the Lord, For He shall pluck my feet out of the net.” 5) David was so aware of his own weaknesses! Verses 16-17, “Turn Yourself to me, and have mercy on me, for I am desolate and afflicted. The troubles of my heart have enlarged; bring me out of my distresses!” 6) David discovered and knew God’s heart! Verses 18-19, “Look on my affliction and my pain, and forgive all my sins. Consider my enemies, for they are many; and they hate me with cruel hatred.” 7) He knew where and with Whom to yield himself! Verses 20-21, “Keep my soul, and deliver me; let me not be ashamed, for I put my trust in You. Let integrity and uprightness preserve me, for I wait for You.”

If one truly waits on “God’s eternal remedy”, “God’s saving grace, and mercy,” and senses, receives, and walks in our Lord’s perfect, imparted plan, what do WE learn from Him about “Saving Faith AND THE CONVERTED’S WORK OR MINISTRY”? In Philippians 2:1-8 we read, “Therefore if there is any consolation [or encouragement] in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and mercy, fulfill my joy by being like-minded, having the same love, of being of one accord, of one mind. Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself. Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others. Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.” And we must decide what it is we are to give to God!

Dare I tell you that God isn’t interested in what YOU might give to Him! “Well, how about my gladness, even my sadness, or my goodness, or my best for Him?” And, if you didn’t know, what you in your flesh would like to give to God, GOD CRUCIFIED IT ALL when Christ shed His blood on the Cross! And, if you receive that Word from God, then forgiveness begins to RISE, hope begins to emerge, strength and empowerment from God’s Holy Spirit takes up residence in you, and your heart and mind-understanding increases to infinity!!

“Saving Faith AND THE CONVERTED’S WORK OR MINISTRY” erupts like an erupting volcano! Your NEW IDENTITY IN CHRIST puts your feet on the SOLID ROCK AND ETERNAL FOUNDATION that cannot be shaken, Your NEW ATTITUDE becomes overriding joy and thanksgiving for the grace and mercy of God, Your NEW CALLING AND MINISTRY as a royal ambassador of Christ overjoys your daily walk, Your LIFE IN CHRIST becomes an Overflowing Walk in and through His divine presence within you, and you enter a NEW TIME PERIOD OF YOUR LIFE OF ETERNAL CONFESSION OF HIM AND HIS GLORY, thankful the “old, unbelieving, sinful, reckless, careless life” was crucified with Him!!

“Saving Faith AND THE CONVERTED’S WORK OR MINISTRY”? If Paul tells us in Philippians 2:12c,“work out your own salvation with fear and trembling,” how do we even begin? First, how about our thanksgiving offered to God because the blood of Jesus has obliterated our indictment as number one sinner before Holy God! Do you remember what the Lord said in Isaiah 1:18? “Come now, and let us reason together,” says the Lord, “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall be as wool.”

Second, how about the yielding to the Promised Holy Spirit who empowers us to live a Christ-honoring, overcoming, blessed life by the short-circuiting of Satan’s testing of us? Are you aware of what Galatians 5:16 tells us? “I say then: Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh.” Christ Jesus’ Emancipation Proclamation was and is: “Go and sin no more,” even promising the Holy Spirit as our spiritual “vest of protection”!

In Romans 8:1-5 Paul tells us, “There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but [walk] according to the Spirit. For the ‘law’ of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death. For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, GOD DID by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh, that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit.” Are you ‘walking’ yielded to the Holy Spirit?

Third, if “Saving Faith” is real, genuine, God-honoring, Christ-devoted, and led by the Holy Spirit, there is a radical change of affections and loyalties! The “godless sinner”? He/she is a ‘bond-slave’ to the old sin nature, covered over with that dark cloud of an evil sin-nature, even deeply in love with that sin and devoted to it in a greedy fashion, even unconcerned about its ultimate ‘prize’ of eternal separation from Holy God!

But then one learns of “the blessed ones through the blood redemption” in and through Christ Jesus only! In Ephesians 1:3-6 God’s eternal Word tells us: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, JUST AS HE [GOD] CHOSE US IN HIM [CHRIST JESUS] BEFORE THE FOUNDATION OF THE WORLD, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He made us accepted in the beloved.”

Did I say, “If ‘Saving Faith’ is real, genuine, God-honoring, Christ-devoted, and led by the Holy Spirit, [that] there is a radical change of affections and loyalties? Do YOU walk before Holy God as ‘rejected’ or “accepted in the beloved”? Do YOU walk as the ‘godless sinner’ or blessed as the “graced saint”? Is your worldly pilgrimage as a slave of sin and Satan or as the “glad, joyful, blessed, fulfilled servant of Christ as a genuine ‘foot-washer’ like Christ”?

I thank God for the testimony of Paul to Timothy and us in 1 Timothy 1:12-16, “And I thank Christ Jesus our Lord who has enabled me, because He counted me faithful, putting me into the ministry, although I was formerly a blasphemer, a persecutor, and an insolent man; but I OBTAINED MERCY because I did it ignorantly in unbelief. And the grace of our Lord was exceedingly abundant, with faith and love which are in Christ Jesus. This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief. However, for this reason I obtained mercy, that in me first Jesus Christ might show all longsuffering, as a pattern to those who are going to believe on Him for everlasting life.”

I know you are not “shocked” because some haven’t learned of the blessing of believing on Him for everlasting life, but I’m sure you are “shocked” at times when you learn of the depths of depravity many have sunk to – unbelief in God is enough to awaken most “sinners”, but when astonishment is awakened in them to the radical demise of many, even those “sinners” stand dumb-founded!

And one of our greatest testimonies to the radical unbeliever is our testimony of our own deliverance from fleshly, demonic, worldly bondage and the change in us of abominable affections and degraded loyalties!

Fourth, “Saving Faith”, and “The Converted’s Work and Ministry”? Do you realize the vast change between “sinners” and “saints”? Have you been discipled as to the ‘identity difference’ between a man of the world and a man of God? What’s the difference between one who lives for the “temporary” and one who lives for the “eternal”? Does “escaping fleshly corruption in the world” ring a wake-up call to you?

In 2 Peter 1:2-4 Peter wrote: “Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord, as His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us by glory and virtue, by which have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.”

But, sadly, even some “professing believers” have not come into full understanding of “fighting the good fight of faith” in themselves. They haven’t received fully what Jesus has delivered them from, and they still give in, at times, to the world, the flesh, and the devil!

Oswald Chambers, in his book, “My Utmost For His Highest,” [p.9], wrote: “Jesus does not take us alone and expound things to us all the time; He expounds things to us as we can understand them. Other lives are parables. God is making us spell out our own souls. It is slow work, so slow that it takes God all time and eternity to make a man and woman after His own purpose. The only way we can be of use to God is to let Him take us through the crooks and crannies of our own characters. It is astounding how ignorant we are about ourselves!” [Have you been in any tight, testy, troubling ‘time zones’ lately?]

In John 8:34-36 Jesus spoke to some Jews who believed Him, “Most assuredly, I say to you, whoever commits sin is a slave of sin. And a slave does not abide in the house forever. Therefore if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed.” What did Paul tell us in Romans 6:7? “For he who has died has been freed from sin.” Physical death, physical casket, physical funeral service – “Joe died, and so we have a funeral service”? No! That death Paul told us about IS “our sinful lives crucified with Christ! The old, sin-natured man was crucified with Him!”

In “The Valley of Vision” Arthur Bennett of “The Banner of Truth Trust”, [2012 printing], has given us a major, major writing of prayer through several hundred years. One, [p.100], is entitled “Freedom.” Consider it in the Spirit!

“O Holy Father, You have freely given Your Son, O Divine Son, You have freely paid my debt, O Eternal Spirit, You have freely bid me come, O Triune God, You have freely graced me with salvation…

Prayers and tears could not suffice to pardon my sins, nor anything less than atoning blood, but my believing is my receiving, for a thankful acceptance is no paying of the debt…

What did You see in me? that I a poor, diseased, despised sinner should be clothed in Your bright glory? That a creeping worm should be advanced to this high state?…

That one lately groaning, weeping, dying, should be as full of joy as my heart can hold? That a being of dust and darkness should be taken like Mordecai from captivity, and set next to the king?…

Should be lifted like Daniel from a den and be made ruler of princes and provinces? Who can fathom immeasurable love? As far as the rational soul exceeds the senses, so does the spirit exceed the rational in its knowledge of You?…

You have given me understanding to compass the earth, measure the sun, moon, stars, universe, but above all to know You, the only true God. I marvel that the finite can know the Infinite, here a little, afterwards in full-orbed truth;…

Now I know but a small portion of what I shall know, here in part, there in perfection, here a glimpse, there a glory. To enjoy You is life eternal, and to enjoy is to know. Keep me in the freedom of experiencing Your salvation continually.” Amen?

“Saving Faith and the Converted’s Work And Ministry”? I tell you that I am absolutely amazed and awed that Holy God continues to enlarge redeemed man’s capacity to grasp, celebrate, and walk in “the fullness of the blessing of the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ”! Thank God for our liberation from the bondage of sin and unbelief through the shed blood of Christ! Thank God that He saves us from ourselves and raises us up in Christ in His eternal identity! From sons of the flesh to sons of the Spirit, from sons of darkness to sons of the Light, from sons of self-bondage to sons of liberty and freedom, from sons of a fading world to sons of God’s eternal Kingdom and rule!

Fleshly life’s highest pinnacle cannot even begin to approach God’s eternal throne in the human heart where the Resurrected King of kings and Lord of lords reigns! We’re not called to reach out for “self-realization”, but called to abandon “self-worship” so that our eternal ministry is “That I may know Him, and the power of His Resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings”! “In Christ” our journey of Faith is the full understanding of and our appropriation of “the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ,” [Ephesians 4:13b].

Do you understand? It was Christ’s “guiltless blood” that was shed on the Cross of Calvary that each of us as guilty sinners might be eternally forgiven and freed!

CHAPTER EIGHT

“UNFORGIVENESS – UNFORGIVEN OR FAITH

AND FORGIVENESS?”

It sounds like an extremely harsh title of a sermon or teaching, but His Word is truth and that is what His people are to stand upon. And I’m convinced, whether husband and wife, pastor and people, employer and employee, friend to friend, God’s Word is clear.

Come first to Matthew 6;12, 14-15! Get Ready! Verse 12, “And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.” Verses 14-15, “For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.”

But please look at the nature and character of Christ as we read Luke 23:33-34, “And when they were come to the place which is called Calvary, there they crucified Him, and the malefactors, one on the right hand, and the other on the left. Then Jesus said, ‘Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.”

Sinless Jesus nailed to a Cross as a common criminal, but He says, ‘Father, forgive them.’ Holy Jesus crucified as an unholy man, but He says, ‘Father, forgive them.’ Pure Jesus brutalized as an impure sinner, but He says, “Father, forgive them.”

There are some things you must wrestle with and come to a clear understanding about: Forgiveness is far better for any man than bank accounts filled with earthly riches – especially the forgiveness of God – but unforgiveness is self-imposed personal bankruptcy!

Forgiveness is of the spirit and nature of God Himself, while unforgiveness reveals the frailty and failures of fallen flesh. Forgiveness is the revelation of the indwelling nature and character of Christ, while unforgiveness is the unveiling of the malignant, sick nature of “the old man,” “the “first Adam,” “the “fallen nature and sickness of the sinner” at odds with God Himself.”

Forgiveness is freedom in and through the Indwelling Holy Spirit, while unforgiveness is the living picture of a despairing soul, locked in a self-imposed cage of vanity and vindictiveness.

Forgiveness is peace and the portrait of the indwelling Christ, while unforgiveness is an enslaved, dying sinner, maybe even with sorrow and remorse but dreading to face the prospect of their future because they have an inkling their attitude is horribly wrong and even inexcusable, and even sense a bleak, dark future if things aren’t made right!

I read Spurgeon recently who said, because of unforgiveness: “You will bewail in everlasting misery the mercy that through your willfulness was unavailing.”

Religion without reality of the nature and character of Christ Jesus is, yes, a professing believer walking without eternal purpose to be conformed to the image of Christ but captured by his old sin nature and willfully walking in unforgiveness, bitterness, anger, resentment, holding grudges and determined to have his selfish way and refuses to bear witness to the spirit of Christ and His saving grace!

Relationships – and it doesn’t matter what the relationship is: marriage, business, church, friend to friend, family member to family member, parent to child or child to parent – relationship is not a matter of winning or losing, BUT…is God glorified in any of this or ‘flesh’ magnified? – what matters is whether or not we decide to walk in the nature and character of Christ and glorify Him in the good and the bad, in the down and the dirty, even ‘flesh’ activity or ‘Spirit’ activity.

Sometimes I wonder if God allows, permits, yes, difficult events or circumstances, to expose us as to how and where and why and with whom we choose to walk: with the forgivers or the unforgivers, flesh folk or Christ’s fullness, sweet Jesus or sour grapes?

And Lamentations 3:32 gives me a challenging word: “Though he brings grief, he will show compassion, so great is his unfailing love.”

Oswald Chambers really hit a ‘grand-slam homerun when he wrote in “My Utmost For His Highest,” [p.241]: “Beware of the pleasant view of the Fatherhood of God – God is so loving and kind that of course He will forgive us. That sentiment has no place whatever in the New Testament. The only ground on which God can forgive us is the tremendous tragedy of the Cross of Christ; to put forgiveness on any other ground is unconscious blasphemy. The only ground on which God can forgive sin and reinstate us in His favor is through the Cross of Christ, and in no other way. Forgiveness, which is so easy for us to accept, cost the agony of Calvary. It is possible to take the forgiveness of sin, the gift of the Holy Ghost, and our sanctification with the simplicity of faith, and to forget at what enormous cost to God it was all made for us.”

Hear me! Forgiveness is the testimony of the Cross, the unveiling of the indwelling Christ, and the power that transforms circumstances and sets the captives free! Unforgiveness denies God, closes the door on eternal relationships with Him, honors the devil, and blemishes the name of Jesus!

I know you’re familiar with Stephen and his prophetic stand and preaching to Israel. Acts 7:51 says, Stephen speaking, “You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears! You always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, so do you.”

And, remember, they took him out of the city and stoned him, as he was calling on God and saying, ‘Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.’ Then in Acts 7:60, it says, that Stephen knelt down and cried out with a loud voice, “Lord, do not charge them with this sin.” And when he had said this, he fell asleep.”

True believers walk in forgiveness. True believers choose the attitude and actions of their Savior and Lord because to do otherwise shames the holy name of Jesus. They’d rather take stones snuffing out the breath of life than deny the Lord’s spirit and grace and mercy!

And the one thing I want you to see out of Stephen’s testimony is its impact on one called Saul of Tarsus. After the stiff-necked Israelites stoned Stephen to death, Acts 7:58 says, “And the witnesses laid down their clothes at the feet of a young man named Saul.” Acts 8:1 says, “Now Saul was consenting to his death.”

But then Saul met our Lord on the Damascus Road – he’s redeemed, saved, transformed, set aside as a mighty witness of the True Faith. In 2 Corinthians 2, the converted Saul – now Paul – has to deal with the church at Corinth who had to exercise church discipline but then failed to walk in loving forgiveness toward the brother. Look at 2 Corinthians 2:1-11,

“But I determined this within myself, that I would not come to you again in sorrow. For if I make you sorrowful, then who is he who makes me glad but the one who is made sorrowful by me? And I wrote this very thing to you, lest, when I came, I should have sorrow over those from whom I ought to have joy, having confidence in you all that my joy is the joy of you all. For out of much affliction and anguish of heart I wrote to you, with many tears, not that you should be grieved, but that you might know the love which I have so abundantly for you. But if anyone has caused grief, he has not grieved me, but all of you to some extent – not to be too severe. This punishment which was inflicted by the majority is sufficient for such a man, so that on the contrary, you ought rather to forgive and comfort him, lest perhaps such a one be swallowed up with too much sorrow. Therefore I urge you to reaffirm your love to him. For to this end I also wrote, that I might put you to the test, whether you are obedient in all things. Now whom you forgive anything, I also forgive. For if indeed I have forgiven anything, I have forgiven that one for your sakes in the presence of Christ, lest Satan should take advantage of us; for we are not ignorant of his devices.”

Does Paul talk about forgiveness exercised in church discipline? You need to realize ‘restoration’ is always God’s intent in the necessity of church discipline. My wife Sue and I celebrated our 50^th anniversary June 10,2006, which now in 2015 means 59 years of marriage! Friends from Temple, Texas, had come to our 50^th celebration and gave us a print that said: “A successful marriage is the union of two great forgivers.” I’m sure if Sue were before you today she’d say: “We never thought about divorce – the word ‘divorce’ was never allowed to be mentioned by any of our four children, but murder? That is on the table!”

Daniel 9:9 says, “To the Lord our God belong mercy and forgiveness, though we have rebelled against Him.” And that’s true – but don’t stop reading there! Look at Daniel 9:10-13! “we have not obeyed the voice of the Lord our God to walk in His laws [His Word]!], which He set before us by His servants the prophets. Yes, all Israel has transgressed Your law, and has departed so as not to obey Your voice; therefore the curse and the oath written in the Law of Moses the servant of God have been poured out on us, because we have sinned against Him. And His has confirmed His words, which He spoke against us and against our judges who judged us, by bringing upon us a great disaster; for under the whole heaven such has never been done as what has been done to Jerusalem. As it is written in the Law of Moses, all this disaster has come upon us; yet we have not made our prayer before the Lord our God, that we might turn from our iniquities and understand Your truth.” [Is that a relevant passage for today?].

A number of years ago my son, Scott, and I were in the Phillipines doing pastors’ conferences and on a weekend an open-air crusade outside Manila in a city park. Before the service our Filipino organizer asked me, “I know you’ll give an evangelistic invitation after your message, but will you also pray for the sick?” And, of course, I said ‘Yes.’

There were four Americans and four Filipino pastors that formed eight lines to pray for healing grace on the sick. A young mother stood before me after I’d prayed for several others. When she came I said, “Young lady, how can I help you?”

She said, “I’ve been sick for several weeks but I don’t know what it is.” Immediately I heard the Lord say to me, “Ask her about her husband.” And when I did, I saw the demons manifest all over her – her face began to contort, her teeth began to grind back and forth, anger began to boil over – and she said: “My husband left me and our three children three weeks ago for another woman – and I hate him.”

I said, “Young lady, I’d like to pray for you, but I can’t. God will not heal your sickness by accepting your hatred, bitterness, anger, and unforgiveness.” It rang a bell within her! She said, “What must I do?” And I said, “If you promise me, after I pray, that you go find your husband and ask his forgiveness for your hatred and anger and bitterness and unforgiveness toward him, I’ll pray for you – and God will heal you.” She said, “Yes”! I prayed – brokenness came, tears began to flow, Christ Jesus began to radiate all over her and in her. Though I never saw her again, I believe her new-found spirit and attitude even brought a wayward husband home to a new wife and three children!

Come to Matthew 18:21-35! “Unforgiveness – Unforgiven!” Read it carefully at least five times! Forgiveness is the heart-cry of Jesus for Peter and all disciples! It’s not an option! I see several vital, important, life-altering truths from the lips of Jesus:

1} Forgiveness is without limit! Matthew 18:22

2} God Himself settles accounts – there is a reckoning! Matthew 18:32, “wicked servant”!

3} God calls a ‘spade’ a ‘spade’ and nothing less! Matthew 18:32 “wicked servant”

4} There are things God is ‘angry’ about and unforgiveness is one of them! Matthew 18:34

5} An unforgiving servant of God causes God to deliver that one to ‘the torturers’ – that’s delivered over to the demons, the powers of darkness, for hopefully correction, forgiveness, and a God-honoring life. Matthew 18:34

6} Because of unforgiveness God reinstates the debt! Matthew 18:34

7} God gives an unfailing promise – if one does not forgive from his heart his brother, God will not forgive him. Matthew 18:35!

It’s important that you see how God uses the Deceiver, yes, the devil, the demons, the powers of darkness to discipline and hopefully bring correction to His own children. Come first to Isaiah 5:24-30: “Therefore, as the fire devours the stubble, and the flame consumes the chaff, so their root will be as rottenness, and their blossom will ascend as dust; BECAUSE they have rejected the law of the Lord of hosts, and despised the word of the Holy One of Israel. Therefore the anger of the Lord is aroused against His people; He has stretched out His hand against them, and the hills trembled. Their carcasses were as refuse in the midst of the streets. For all this His anger is not turned away, but His hand is stretched out still. He will lift up a banner to the nations from afar, [“THAT’S THEM – the demons!], and will whistle to them from the end of the earth; surely they shall come with speed, swiftly. No one will be weary or stumble among them, no one will slumber or sleep; nor will the belt on their loins be loosed, nor the strap of their sandals be broken; whose arrows are sharp, and all their bows bent; their horses’ hooves will seem like flint, and their wheels like a whirlwind. Their roaring will be like a lion, they will roar like young lions; Yes, they will roar and lay hold of their prey; they will carry it away safely, and no one will deliver. In that day they will roar against them like the roaring of the sea. And if one looks to the land, Behold, darkness and sorrow; and the light is darkened by the clouds.” What an awesome passage!

But look also at Isaiah 7:18-19! “And it shall come to pass in that day that the Lord will “WHISTLE” for the fly that is in the farthest part of the rivers of Egypt, and for the bee that is in the land of Syria. They will come, and all of them will rest in the desolate valleys and in the clefts of the rocks, and on all thorns and in all pastures.”

How illuminating is God’s Holy Word! See if you’ve seen before or witnessed in churches what Job saw in Job 12:16-25!!: “With Him are strength and prudence. THE DECEIVED AND THE DECEIVER ARE HIS. He leads counselors away plundered, and makes fools of the judges. He loosens the bonds of kings, and binds their waist with a belt. He leads princes [priests?] away plundered, and overthrows the mighty. He deprives the trusted ones of speech, and takes away the discernment of the elders. He pours contempt on princes, and disarms the might. He uncovers deep things out of darkness, and brings the shadow of death to light. He makes nations great, and destroys them; He enlarges nations and guides them. He takes away the understanding of the chiefs of the people of the earth, and makes them wander in a pathless wilderness. They grope in the dark without light, and He makes them stagger like a drunken man.” “OH, God, help us!”

One last Scripture: Come to Joel 2:4-13, and Verses 25-29! God tells the prophet about a people coming, great and strong, then He tells the prophet what’s coming down the highways of life! “Their appearance is like the appearance of horses; and like swift steeds, so they run. With a noise like chariots over mountaintops they leap, like the noise of a flaming fire that devours the stubble, like a strong people set in battle array…

Before them the people writhe in pain; all faces are drained of color. They run like mighty men, they climb the wall like men of war; every one marches in his own column. Though they lunge between the weapons, they are not cut down…

They run to and fro in the city, they run on the wall; they climb into the houses, they enter at the windows like a thief. The earth quakes before them, the heavens tremble; the sun and moon grow dark, and the stars diminish their brightness…

The Lord gives voice before His army, for His camp is very great; For strong is the One who executes His words. For the day of the Lord is great and very terrible; who can endure it?…

Now, therefore,” says the Lord, “Turn to Me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning.” So rend your heart, and not your garments; return to the Lord your God, for He is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness; and He relents from doing harm…

Then, Joel 2:25-29, “So I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten, the crawling locust, the consuming locust, and the chewing locust, My great army which I sent among you…

You shall eat in plenty and be satisfied, and praise the name of the Lord your God, who has dealt wondrously with you; and My people shall never be put to shame. Then you shall know that I am in the midst of Israel; I am the Lord your God and there is no other. My people shall never be put to shame…

And it shall come to pass afterward that I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions. And also on My menservants and on My maidservants I will pour out My Spirit in those days.”

And why is this? What’s the difference between the Isaiah passages we read and the last few verses of Joel we just finished reading? Because we choose to walk in FORGIVENESS, not unforgiveness; we choose to walk in the Spirit, not futile flesh; we choose to die to sin, not celebrate it as under the blood, so we can live and act and do as we please!

Let me close with a true story I experienced. I was in Madras, India, now Chennai, India, having finished a pastors’ conference during the week, then preaching on a Sunday morning for the host pastor, Pratap Singh, a graduate of Lee University in my hometown of Cleveland, Tennessee. Pratap Singh is a visionary and our Lord has blessed his ministry phenomenally and powerfully!

I preached that morning on “How Shall We Escape If We Neglect So Great A Salvation?” When I gave the invitation, a man in his mid-forties came forward, absolutely broken, weeping uncontrollably. As Pratap was taking me to my hotel after the service, I said: “Pratap, tell me about the man who was so broken at the invitation.”

He said, “He’s married to one of the ladies in our church with two grown children. Thirteen years ago he left his wife and children to go to California with a new engineering job. In 13 years he never talked to his wife or children, never sent one dime of support. In that 13-year period he lived in an adulterous relationship.

His wife never ceased to love him or pray for him. She went back to school, finished her degree, became a teacher, taught the children daily to pray for their father, honor him, love him, because one day he was coming home. She taught only love, respect, and confidence in God to hear and answer their prayers.

Pratap then said: “Last week the husband and father called the wife from the U.S. to see if it was alright for him to come home to see the children. She said, “Oh, yes! They are going to be so happy and pleased that you are coming home. You are most welcome!”

He came – and they received him as if he’d never been away! When he came during the invitation, he told Pastor Pratap, “Please tell me of this Jesus who built such a loving, forgiving heart in my wife and children!” SAVED BY THE GRACE OF GOD – because of a wife who walked in forgiveness!

I think the year was the time period between 2002-2003. I had gone to be interim pastor of Calvary Baptist Church, Winter Haven, Florida, a church I had pastored previously. I told Pratap’s story.

Next morning my fishing buddy and I had launched our boat in a prime lake for big bass. I was ready to catch my lunker. About 30 minutes into our fishing extravaganza, I heard crying in the back of the boat –

“Bob, what’s the problem?” Bob Davidson said, “Pastor, I heard that story yesterday – I haven’t spoken to my 80-year-old father in over a year. Sorry, but we’ve got to go in – I need to be forgiven and reconciled to my father!” We did – and he did – and God was honored!

Have you seen the picture? Forgiveness – forgiven! Unforgiveness – unforgiven! What will YOU do?!?

CHAPTER NINE

“FAITH AND THE REALITY OF KINGDOM TRANSLATION”

It is so amazing to me to hear a lot of ‘church folk’ talk about “The Faith”, but they seldom mention the Kingdom of our Lord God and their citizenship in the Kingdom of His Sovereign rule over their lives. And I wonder if their “faith” has any awareness of the reality of “Kingdom Translation” out of earthly, fleshly, man-made kingdoms into the Kingdom of the King of kings and Lord of lords.

There was a scribe who told Jesus, after Jesus had responded to Him about “commandments” in Mark 12:32, “Well said, Teacher. You have spoken the truth, for there is one God, and there is no other but He. Verse 33, And to love Him with all the heart, with all the understanding, with all the soul, and with all the strength, and to love one’s neighbor as oneself, is more than all the whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.”

Oh, and then Verse 34 tells us, Now when Jesus saw that He answered wisely, He said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” Do you understand that “not far from” doesn’t mean the scribe had kingdom citizenship, but that he was near, without having abandoned all and yielded his life and allegiance to the King of all Eternity?

In John 16 the Lord Jesus talked about the ministry of the Holy Spirit, saying in Verse 13-15, “However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, [which a lot of people do today!], but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine, and declare it to you. All things that the Father has are Mine. Therefore I said that He will take on Mine and declare it to you.”

Question! Are you SURE that what you hear in a lot of American churches is the undiluted Truth of Holy God? Oswald Chambers, in his book, “My Utmost For His Highest,” [p.248], wrote: “The pietistic movements of today have none of the rugged reality of the New Testament about them; all that is required is a pious attitude and prayer and devotion. This type of experience is not supernatural nor miraculous, it did not cost the passion of God, it is not dyed in the blood of the Lamb, not stamped with the hall-mark of the Holy Ghost; it has not that mark on it which makes men say, as they look with awe and wonder – “That is the work of God Almighty.” That and nothing else is what the New Testament talks about.”

But when there is bestowed grace, there IS blessed victory! This is why Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 15:10, “But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me was not in vain…”. When it’s the victory of the Risen Christ through the Cross, His burial, and His Resurrection, and our surrender, yielded-ness, and appropriation of His Holy Word, then “new life” is blossoming!

Paul put it like this in Romans 14:17, “For the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.” And he then called that, “serving Christ in these things is acceptable to God and approved by men.”

Righteousness isn’t earned – it’s a holy gift through true faith. Peace isn’t fought for – it’s Holy Presence. Joy isn’t juiced up – it’s Christ Jesus in you that is the hope of glory!

Again, in Arthur Bennett’s book entitled “The Valley of Vision,” [pps.240-241], it’s another Puritan prayer from the 1800’s through the 1900’s. It’s title? “Divine Promises”! Read it with an open mind and heart, even with the content so far in this book!

“GLORIOUS JEHOVAH, MY COVENANT GOD,” All Your promises in Christ Jesus are yea and amen, and all shall be fulfilled. YOU have spoken them, and they shall be done, commanded, and they shall come to pass…

Yet I have often doubted You, have lived at times as if there were no God. Lord, forgive me that death in life, when I have found something apart from You, when I have been content with ephemeral things. [Ephemeral? “short-lived”!]…

But through Your grace I have repented; [That’s the ‘lost’ stepping stone to Holy Presence!]. You have given me to read my pardon in the wounds of Jesus, and my soul does trust in Him, my God incarnate, the ground of my life, the spring of my hope..

Teach me to be resigned to Your will, to delight in Your law, to have no will but Yours, to believe that everything You do is for my good…

Help me to leave my concerns in Your hands, for You have power over evil, and bring from it an infinite progression of good, until Your purposes are fulfilled…

Bless me with Abraham’s faith that staggers not at promises through unbelief. May I not instruct You in my troubles, but glorify You in my trials; Grant me a distinct advance in the divine life;…

May I reach a higher platform, leave the mists of doubt and fear in the valley, and climb to hill-tops of eternal security in Christ by simply believing He cannot lie, or turn from His purpose…

Give me the confidence I ought to have in Him who is worthy to be praised, and who is blessed for evermore.” Yes! That’s the WORK of Glorious Jehovah, Our Covenant God!

“Faith And The Reality Of Kingdom Translation”? But earthly, fleshly, man-made kingdoms are void of true faith and even the knowledge of the reality of “”Kingdom Translation”! But there’s “the remnant”, always has been “the remnant”, and the gathering around the Eternal Throne will be the “remnant” forever and forever! This is why King David prayed to Eternal God and Father, Lord and Savior, in Psalm 25:1-5,

“To You, O Lord, I lift up my soul. O my God, I trust in You; Let me not be ashamed; let not my enemies triumph over me. Indeed, let no one who waits on You be ashamed; Let those be ashamed who deal treacherously without cause. Show me Your ways, O Lord; teach me Your paths. Lead me in Your truth and teach me, for You are the God of my salvation; On You I wait all the day.”

How familiar are you with Paul’s statement in Galatians 5:1 when he wrote: “Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage.”? Are you aware that there are many “pretenders” who know the Bible from cover to cover but are void of true oneness with and in Christ, void of deliverance from the bondage and captivity of the old sin nature, but fully acquainted with the devil’s style of impersonation? Are you aware that there exists a large group of “professors of faith” who sincerely believe that “Christians can’t do anything but sin until they get to heaven”? And that’s with Jesus saying to His disciples, “Go, and sin no more!”

“Faith and the Reality of Kingdom Translation”? In Hebrews 10:19-23 we read with a joyous and thankful heart, “Therefore, brethren, having boldness to enter the Holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which He consecrated for us, through the veil, that is, His flesh, and having a High Priest over the House of God [which is the true disciple of faith!], let us draw near with a true heart IN FULL ASSURANCE OF FAITH, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. [Water of the Word?]. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering for He who promised is faithful.”

Did Verse 19 tell us, “having boldness to enter the Holiest by the blood of Jesus”? Entering ‘the Holiest’ is the Holy of holies in His tabernacle which is the abiding presence of Holy God, and He says that through Christ YOU ARE ‘the temple” of God! I sense day by day through the Word of God that true discipleship is the awareness of "Christ in you the hope of glory”, and our pilgrimage becomes one of absolute awe and greater yielded-ness as we recognize His Presence within us!

I’m convinced one of the true believer’s great discoveries is what Paul told us in 2 Corinthians 5:7 when he said, “For we [true believers] walk by faith, not by sight,” but the ‘faith-walk’ for some is faith in themselves, their abilities, their dreams, their personal inspiration and attitude about their own abilities, and totally miss God and leave Him out of the pilgrimage. Oswald Chambers was truly a wise spiritual father in England for many years. He said once: [“My Utmost For His Highest,” p.88], “How many of us have laid ourselves by, as it were, and said – “I cannot do any more until God appears to me.” He never will, and without any inspiration, without any sudden touch of God we will have to get up. Then comes the surprise – “Why, He was there all the time, and I never knew it!” Never live for the rare moments, they are surprises. God will give us touches of inspiration when He sees we are not in danger of being led away by them. We must never make our moments of inspiration; our standard is our duty.” And our duty before Holy God and the Lord Jesus is His revelation through His Word!

In 1 Corinthians 2:11-14a, plus verse 16, we read: “For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but [in Christ] the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God. These things we also speak, not in words which man’s wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual. But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him…”.

“Faith and the Reality of Kingdom Translation”? But the Word is so very, very clear if one receives it, but apart from “new birth” men never even get the Holy Book opened by the Holy Spirit! The Spirit resides in true believers; in fact, Jesus said in John 3:5, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.” Are you ‘flesh-led’ or ‘Spirit-led’ as you come to the Holy Word of God?

It was Peter in 1 Peter 1:22-23 who, inspired of the Holy Spirit, wrote: “Since you have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit in sincere love of the brethren, love one another fervently with a pure heart, having been born again, not of corruptible seed but incorruptible, through the word of God which lives and abides forever…”.

Divine conversion through the Word by the Holy Spirit translates us from our own fleshly kingdoms and desires to Life IN the Kingdom of God! ‘Obeying the truth’ of the Holy Word of God is the eternal biblical evidence of divine conversion – no obedience, no salvation; no feeding on the Word – no spiritual maturing out of ‘babyhood’ to spiritual full-grown men and women of faith; no standing in the Word – no armor or heavenly weapons to ward off demonic powers against the sons of faith!

You know that Hebrews 4 talks about God’s Promise of “eternal rest,” but in Verse 2 the author wrote: “…but the word which they heard did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in those who heard it,” and God then said, “they shall not enter My rest.” In naming the Name of Christ, does that naming build in you a strong foundation of Biblical Faith or does that come as one faithfully “feeds” on the Word of God? Didn’t Jesus say, “Man does not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God”?

[Every conference I led in India over twenty-five years was a strong emphasis on the discipline of the Holy Word daily, even stressing , beginning in Genesis and Matthew, five chapters from the Old Testament and five chapters from the New Testament every day until they met Him at Heaven’s throne in the “after-life”!]

“Faith and the Reality of Kingdom Translation”? Do you, as I do, find Hebrews 5:8-9 a challenging unveiling of the very process of our salvation walk? It says, “though He [Jesus] was a Son, yet He learned obedience by the things which He suffered. And having been perfected, He became the author of eternal salvation to all who obey Him,…”!

“The author of eternal salvation to all who obey Him”? In Romans 16:25-27 Paul tells us: “Now to Him who is able to establish you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery kept secret since the world began but now made manifest, and by the prophetic Scriptures made known to all nations, according to the commandment of the everlasting God, FOR OBEDIENCE TO THE FAITH – to God, alone wise, be glory through Jesus Christ forever. Amen.”

As you’ve read the Scriptures I’ve shared in this chapter, has there been in you a strong awakening to the “new beginning” from rebellion to submission, from disobedience to obedience, from ‘my way’ to His Way in and through Christ alone, that as He obeyed the Father, so we submit ourselves to His Kingdom rule through us as we reject ‘self-will’ and yield to our Lord and Savior’s divine will? Can you, right now, say without hesitation, “Lord Jesus, I sense Your abiding love for my life because You took my sins to the Cross with You, suffered, bled, and died, that my life would be free from bondage and discovering “life-change” through the Victory of Your Cross on my behalf! You took my sin unto yourself, exposing through my sin, the necessity of re-birth in Your Spirit, nature, and character, and as You are, so am I! In me it is no longer ‘a form of godliness’ but the very Faith of God-likeness because of my “second birth” through my faith in Your sin-sacrifice! I thank You for Your purifying blood, for Your Resurrection Life, and for the gift of the Holy Spirit to honor You through my journey!”

It was Paul again who said in Galatians 4:19, “My little children, for whom I labor in birth again until Christ is formed in you.” It’s certainly not natural birth that Paul was speaking of, but the reality of the “Seed-Birth” of the Word of God in us and through us, and from birth spiritually, to growing spiritually, feeding on the milk of the Word of God, we come to maturity in the faith through that daily yieldedness to the Word of Christ!

Earthly kingdom or the Kingdom of God? Exchanged devotion to the sinful self or exchanged devotion and submission to the Word and will of God? Adapted or converted? Natural birth only or the blessedness of spiritual birth in repentance toward God and faith and surrender to Christ’s Lordship? A temporary ‘religious spasm’ or eternally birthed in the “new man”? I’m sure, even as a true spiritual child of God, that you’ve wrestled with the war between spiritual reality and the natural affinities that you’ve seen, yes, in the worldly man/woman that seem so appealing, and yet can be that sinister trap of Satan to lead you astray! The walk of the true disciple is “being conformed to the image of Christ,” not taking on what appears to be ‘good human traits’.

There is a challenging, freeing, completing Verse in Luke 21:19 when the Lord Jesus said, “By your patience [steadfastness] possess your souls.” In the process of maturing into the image of Christ, there is to be the claiming, the forming, the acquisition of Christ-likeness, yes, even the warfare of ‘possessing’ the “new-man in Christ” and daily dying to the old man – it’s not at times an easy pilgrimage! Have you ever watched someone dealing with pulling out ‘wild hairs’ both physically and figuratively? If the “Kingdom way and the Kingdom life” is to be first in the true disciple, the ‘care’ of our lives must be ‘what honors God’ and not ‘what pleases or satisfies one’s ‘flesh-nature’!

It was Matthew Henry who once wrote, [probably in one of Matthew Henry’s New Testament commentaries!], “Extraordinary afflictions are not always the punishment of extraordinary sins, but sometimes the trial of extraordinary graces. – Sanctified afflictions are spiritual promotions.”

How about John Brown’s word in his writing entitled, “Barbarossa,” [Act 5, Sc.3], “Now let us thank the eternal power, convinced That Heaven but tries our virtue by affliction: That often the cloud which wraps the present hour, Serves but to brighten all our future days!” But YOU don’t see Calvary’s Cross as meaningful to you in your journey of life?

“Faith and the Reality of Kingdom Translation”? Remember, if you need to be reminded, that there is the ‘kingdom of this world’ or the Kingdom of God; there is the fleshly kingdom of self-will and self-promotion or the spiritual Kingdom of God Almighty; there is the demonic, Satanic kingdom or, Yes, the Ruling Kingdom of Holy God, the Lordship of Christ Jesus, and the very Power and Authority of the Holy Spirit!

And whether a life, a family, a government, or a church, it is never to be by ‘fleshly efforts’, as good as they can be at times; it must be by Spirit-anointing, yes, by the very “hall-mark” of the Holy Spirit as He is allowed to work through us in honoring Christ, as Christ Himself said, “And when He, the Spirit of Truth is come…He shall glorify Me”; so we submit, surrender, and daily celebrate the Holy Spirit’s presence in us to honor Christ through us!

The Holy Spirit doesn’t come to affirm YOUR celebration of Christ in you, but His affirming of Christ through you! He unveils the Lord Jesus in you that you might be captured by God’s eternal intent and able-ness to unveil Him through you!

It was William Knox, in his “Oh, Why Should the Spirit of Mortal Be Proud?”, who wrote: “Oh, why should the spirit of mortal be proud? Like a swift-flitting meteor, a fast-flying cloud, a flash of lightning, a break of the wave, he passes from life to his rest in the grave.” The writer of Proverbs tells us wisely in Proverbs 25:28, “Whoever has no rule over his own spirit is like a city broken down, without walls.”

The “religion of self-centeredness” is a world-wide dilemma and dangerous trend! Do you sense, understand, been enlightened by the terrible dilemma of multitudes of lives, families, governments, schools, businesses, who so easily close the door on God Himself and lock Him out? If a man has determined to rule himself, he becomes more than a fleshly king of his own kingdom – he’s opened the door of his life to be ruled, dominated, controlled, and blackened even more in his heart by the devil himself and destined for the devil’s eternal house in Hell!

“Faith and the Reality of Kingdom Translation”? ‘Flesh,’ ‘the old sin-nature,’ ‘the temple of self-righteousness’, ‘the selfish reign of one’s demonic up-bringing’, ‘the bridled reverence of self unbelievers ride upon is the bucking mustang that continually, ultimately, will put sinners down where they don’t want to be’!

Selfish, sovereign power is the ‘rule’ of unbelieving men who crowned themselves as rulers over the fallen sin-nature, and proud of it – it’s the kingdom of selfishness rather than the kingdom of selflessness ruled over by the Indwelling Christ who is both Savior and Lord or Master of the Eternal Kingdom – and if there is in you true faith and the reality of Kingdom Translation, there has been, yes, self-denial, self-renunciation, self-interest, and glad Jesus took it with Him to the Cross, and as He died, so what diseased and dis-eased YOU! Tolstoy once talked about, “Everybody thinks of changing humanity and nobody thinks of changing himself.” Well, Christ Jesus thought of YOU and declared YOU were only deserving of death with Him on Calvary’s Cross!

When that awareness sinks in by the conviction of the Holy Spirit and one receives the divine gift of repentance toward God and faith in the finished work of Christ at Calvary, repents, confesses, yields, and dedicates the life to glorifying his Lord and Savior, the journey begins as Jesus said, “When He the Spirit of truth is come…He shall glorify Me” through YOU!

What did John say in 1 John 1:7? “But IF we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin.” [Are you even aware of what sin is?] [Are you aware of Who and What God IS, and are YOU lining up with Him with no diversions or separations from Him?] Is His loving nature at work in you as you grow in faith and understanding of what honors Him in your pilgrimage? Did YOU receive righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit?

And, thank God, we serve the God who fulfills His promises to all who receive them! Standing on the promises is not a matter of a spiritual determination to please God by ‘self-filled pride’ and ‘mustered up determination’, but, “Lord, You said…I receive; Lord, You determined…I depend on You; Lord, You spoke…I have surrendered to let Christ BE Christ in me!”

There is nothing in our walks, lives, opportunities, that is redemptive apart from the shed blood of the Lamb of God! There is to be, not even a thought, about ‘me’ being able to walk in a way on my own that would honor and bless and exalt His Name! But in Him, through Him, by His Holy work, my house of clay becomes His Holy Temple; my self-deception was crucified and Jesus’ Resurrection Presence graced me with His infinite wisdom; my fleshliness of darkness, my spirit of mental deficiency about Him, my limitless infirmities by the absence of the divine nature, my weaknesses void of Spirit-power and authority, my personal imperfections like visible scars, my powerlessness against the powers of darkness, did a work in me that Christ took to the Cross and translated me out of the kingdom of the devil, the flesh, and the world, translating me, now and forever, in the Eternal, Spiritual Kingdom of Holy God!

It was H.L. Gilmour and Rev. H.J.Zelley who wrote the old hymn, “He Brought Me Out.” It says: “My heart was distressed ‘neath Jehovah’s dread frown, And low in the pit where my sins dragged me down; I cried to the Lord from the deep miry clay, Who tenderly brought me out to [His] golden day…

He placed me upon the strong Rock by His side, My steps were established and here I’ll abide; No danger of falling while Here I remain, But stand by His grace with the crown I gain…

He gave me a song, it was a new song of praise; By day and by night its sweet notes I will raise; My heart’s overflowing, I’m happy and free, I’ll praise My Redeemer, who has rescued me.” Amen?

CHAPTER TEN

“FAITH AND THE FULLNESS OF CHRIST”

Pride never entered into the heart and mind of Paul the Apostle, but only deep and sincere and celebratory confidence in the gift of God through Christ Jesus. He said in Romans 1:5-7a, “Through Him [Christ Jesus], we have received grace and apostleship for obedience to the faith among all nations for His name, among whom ‘you also’ are the called of Jesus Christ; To all who are in Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints…”. Is it ‘you also’ that Paul would consider a ‘saint’?

Saints are not “the holier than you” but those “set apart by God for the glory of God.” And if you are unsure about saints, it’s those who know how to take soap and towels, and wash someone’s feet! It’s the “servant spirit and heart” that Christ Jesus so dramatically portrayed as He knelt and washed and served and blessed others, even sacrificing His eternal life and body to the Cross for our Eternal Redemption!

Again, Paul the Apostle, hit the “life-winning” home-run when he wrote in Philippians 3:7-10, “But what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ. Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith; that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being confirmed to His death…”.

Life’s excellence has nothing to do with human achievements that come because, more likely than not, most ‘achievers’ have set aside divine blessing of a life to show their ability to do it “on my own”; “who needs God”?

But then, you “see” those who count self-achievement as total loss that they may gain Christ as Lord of their lives. Christ Jesus already determined, even before we were born, that “the crucified life” was necessary if one was to be reconciled to God, which was each of us wrapped up ‘in Christ’ and put to death with Him that we might inherit by faith “the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death…!”

In 2 Corinthians 5:20 Paul tells us, “Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us; we implore you on Christ’s behalf, be reconciled to God. For He [God the Father] made Him [Christ Jesus the Son] who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” “In Him” is the true definition of every born-again believer! Oh, and then Paul told us in Colossians 2:9, “For in Him [“in Christ”] dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily; and you are complete in Him, who is the head of all principality and power!”

What did the Lord Jesus say in Matthew 11:28-30? “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.” “In Him” dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily! “In Him” you’re reconciled to God – there’s no other way! “In Him” you’re seen by the Savior as His completed work, molded in His loving image by His strong hands of revealed Truth!

But, sadly, there are multitudes all across the world who live with the blockage of spiritual impertinence and sick rebellion and self-soulish importance, with an unwillingness to submit themselves to His Lordship because their fleshly independence demand allegiance to “Number One,” the warped self who sees no need of the love, grace, and mercy of God!

One of the greatest blunders of unsaved mankind is that they don’t need a Savior and Lord – they can oversee their own lives, but they cannot redeem themselves from soulish bondage, they cannot in themselves break the chains of the devil off of their lives, they cannot birth or implant for themselves even a semblance of God’s righteousness, and they cannot on their own be a perfected example of God’s eternal purpose through Christ!

I am awestruck when I read what God said about men who rejected Him but then magnified the true faith and follow-ship of Caleb in Numbers 14:20-24! It says: “Then the Lord said: ‘I have pardoned, according to your word; but truly, as I live, all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord – because all these men who have seen My glory and the signs which I did in Egypt and in the wilderness, and have put Me to the test now these ten times, and have not heeded My voice, they certainly shall not see the land of which I swore to their fathers, nor shall any of those who rejected Me see it. But My servant Caleb, because he has a different spirit in him and has followed Me fully, I will bring into the land where he went, and his descendants shall inherit it.”

Do YOU look beyond your walk of faith and obedience “in Christ” to see the faithful journeys of your descendants? What did Moses say earlier in Numbers 14:18? “The Lord is longsuffering and abundant in mercy, forgiving iniquity and transgression; but He by no means clears the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation.” In no way is God unkind or unforgiving, but He sees the deadly ‘fruit’ that comes from godless, disobedient, rebellious fathers! And, “what you see is what they get”, who follow the life-styles of the unbelieving, even generational curses!

Again, I remind you of what Paul wrote in Romans 1:5-7a, “Through Him [Christ Jesus], we have received grace and apostleship for obedience to the faith among all nations for His name, among whom YOU ALSO ARE THE CALLED OF JESUS CHRIST; To all who are in Rome, beloved of God, CALLED TO BE SAINTS…!” Do YOU know that through Christ Jesus a “saint” is one “set apart” to honor the Lord by daily death to self and dependence upon His Resurrection Life in and through you to reveal Him to an unbelieving world that surrounds you? “In Him” you are the called to extend His grace and mercy and peace to a troubled majority of the world’s societies who presently are the unredeemed, alienated and separated from the God of Calvary’s Cross, in need of “blood atonement”!

“Faith and the Fullness of Christ”? Examine carefully John 1:14-16 as we see God’s intent and eternal purpose “in Christ Jesus” to reconcile a sinful world to Himself! “And the Word [Christ Jesus] became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth…

John bore witness of Him and cried out, saying, “This was He of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me is preferred before me, for He was before me.’” And of His fullness we have all received, and grace for grace.” Faith in the fullness, not some freakish, minimal faith!

The author of Hebrews builds an eternal foundation under the house of faith that is true, strong, and eternally blessed. He wrote: Hebrews 10:19-23, “Therefore, brethren, having boldness to enter the Holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which He consecrated for us, through the veil, that is, His flesh, and having a High Priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart IN FULL ASSURANCE OF FAITH, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us HOLD FAST the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful.”

Faith and the Fullness of Christ is a God-given gift – we don’t buy it, earn it, or imitate it! “For by grace are you saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.” [Ephesians 2:8-9]. Through faith, the God-given gift, one then appropriates its fullness, living the blessed, overcoming, victorious life in and through Him!

It’s so amazing to me that I read in the Word that our Lord and Savior, Christ Jesus, shed His blood on the Cross, not only for the sins of believers, but, yes, unbelievers! In 1 John 2:1-2 we read, “My little children, these things I write to you, so that you may not sin. And IF anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only BUT ALSO FOR THE WHOLE WORLD.” Separation from God comes, not because of sin forgiven, but faithlessness in His Lordship and Sovereign Rule over, in, and through their lives!

Do you remember the testimony of John in John 1:29,34? He said, first, in John 1:29, The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, ‘Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” Verse 34, “And I have seen and testified that this is the Son of God.” Are you aware that “growing in faith” is a heart and mind that “says what God says”? Faith is the free gift of God, and then there is the process, the battles, the warfare of “learning to stand on the promises” rather than just sitting around on His premises!

What was Paul speaking about when he wrote in 2 Corinthians 10:4-5, “For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ…”. Do YOU see that ‘faith and the fullness of Christ’ is unveiled, demonstrated, appropriated, yes, in the personal warfare of the faith between your ‘old man’ and the “new man in Christ”?

Warfare? Is it ‘sinner’ or “saint”? Is it bound by the curse or blessed by His blessing? Is it the daily experiencing of death in the flesh or Resurrection Life, Power, and Hope in Him? Is your life a testimony of spiritual poverty or the richness of God’s continuous provisions? Is it doubts and fears that dominate you or dependence upon God’s revelation concerning a growing faith? Are you a “slave to your flesh [your old sin nature]” or a servant under God’s Holy Spirit’s administration of your walk?

Is your walk EMPTY or filled in His “All in ALL!” Are you presently hiding in disappointment and frustration or abounding in Holy Spirit discipline and His Holy Fire? Are you governed by your ‘feelings’ or guided by the Faith in what God says? Is it bondage for you or the blessing of Christ’s on-going gift of liberty and freedom and fulfilment in Him?

Do you live with a clouded mind about your identity or a renewed mind of your unending identity in and through Christ? Are you ‘of the world’ or are you “a citizen of God’s Kingdom?” Are you AIMLESS in your discipleship walk or understanding of your “ambassadorial ministry”? Is it for you a “down-in-the-mouth”, sad, “pity-me-state of spiritual-affairs” or do YOU rejoice in the Lord always and OR again I say rejoice? In your mortal body are you being swallowed up by defeat, discouragement, disappointments, defilements, OR are you being swallowed up by His Life knowing YOU ARE MORE THAN CONQUEROR THROUGH CHRIST JESUS?

“Faith and the Fullness of Christ”? Do you remember the role, the function, the ministry of the Holy Spirit in your spiritual journey? Didn’t Jesus talk about ‘born again’ through the water [of the Word] and the Spirit, because without the ministry of the Word and the Holy Spirit one cannot enter the kingdom of God? [John 3:5]. Then Jesus said in John 3:6, “That which is born of the flesh is flesh, but that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” And we praise God for “new birth”!

But also, understanding “Faith and the Fullness of Christ”, it was never God’s intent to birth babies who would remain babies, but babies who would mature into Christ-honoring servants! And does the Holy Spirit have a vital ministry in our maturing from babies to, yes, spiritually adult men and women? In John 14, two vital passages related to one ‘born-again’ and by God’s grace receiving the Holy Spirit:

John 14:15-18 says, “If you love Me, keep My commandments. And I will pray the Father [Holy God], and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever – the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for HE DWELLS WITH YOU AND WILL BE IN YOU. I [the Lord Jesus] will not leave you orphans [spiritually]; I will come to you.” And He does so in Holy Spirit Presence within you!

Then, John 14:25-26, our Lord and Savior tells ALL born-again believers: “These things I have spoken to you while being present with you. But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you.”

John 16 has two extremely important teachings every believer must rest in as he/she grows in the Faith. The first is John 16:7-8 where Jesus said of the Spirit, “Nevertheless I tell you the truth. It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I depart, I will send Him to you; and when He has come, He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment…”

And then in John 16:12-14, Jesus trains and equips and unveils more truth about our need of the Holy Spirit! He said: “I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He WILL GUIDE YOU INTO ALL TRUTH; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine, and declare it to you.”

What is the Holy Spirit up to in you after your spiritual conversion? Did you read and receive also John 16:14, convicted by the Holy Spirit of the greatness of Christ’s ministry in your behalf? Jesus told us, “He will glorify Me [that’s through YOU!], for He will take of what is Mine, and declare it to you!”

And He glorifies Christ, not by your best efforts, but by the Holy Spirit’s empowerment and anointing on your life, your testimony, your daily pilgrimage, and your witness to an unsaved world!

“Faith and the Fullness of Christ”? Did John tell us in John 1:16 that, “And of His fullness we have all received [as true believers], and grace for grace.” But you would question the fullness of Spirit-anointing as different from the fullness in Christ? There is not the weakest of saints who cannot come into Spirit-fullness because of the saint’s weakness! God gives the Spirit’s anointing and empowering because all new children in the Faith are weak, and the Spirit’s anointing is a must! You’re not aware the Holy Spirit illumines God’s heavenly truths to you and through you?

Do you remember reading in the Book of Acts Paul’s declaration in Acts 1:1-8 of things pertaining to “the kingdom of God” AND the promise of the Holy Spirit? Receive His words to the glory of God!! “The former account I made, O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to do and teach, until the day in which He was taken up, after He through the Holy Spirit had given commandments to the apostles whom He had chosen, to whom He also presented Himself alive after His suffering by many infallible proofs, being seen by them during forty days and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God…

And being assembled together with them, He commanded them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the Promise of the Father, which, He said, “you have heard from Me; for John truly baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.” Therefore, when they had come together, they asked Him, saying, “Lord, will You at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?”…

And Jesus said to them, “It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has put in His own authority. But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”

A word of personal testimony: I pastored churches for about twenty-two years, and then something very dramatic happened spiritually to me. Our Lord and Savior opened my heart to the missions – need worldwide, saying to me, “The church in America will no longer be the leader in world evangelism and missions. I’ve opened the door for you to ‘missions and evangelism and teaching my pastors in India’, because India will become now “the spiritual nation and servants” who will touch My vast world with the Redemption message of Christ Jesus!” And it is happening right now!

But, also, for every born-again believer, there is a vital word of blessed assurance you must receive and walk in: Ephesians 1:13-14 is a necessary word of encouragement, enlightment, and energizing to the true believer who rests in God’s unveiling of the Holy Spirit’s ministry in YOU! Paul said: “In Him [Christ] you also trusted, after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed [trusted in, adhered to, relied upon], you WERE SEALED WITH THE HOLY SPIRIT OF PROMISE, who IS the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, to the praise of His glory.”

Were you ‘discipled’ concerning the Holy Spirit’s ministry to empower YOU “in Christ” to be a faithful witness of our Lord’s saving grace? Have YOU received, surrendered, welcomed the Holy Spirit’s ministry in you and through you to honor Christ Jesus, not by your natural gifts and fleshly abilities, but by the very “power” of God that resurrected Jesus from the dead? It’s not your educational degree or degrees but the discipline of complete yieldedness to the manifestation of the Holy Spirit in you and through you, and you trusting the Holy Spirit’s power to manifest the reality of our Lord’s Resurrected Life, Liberty, and His faithful Love through us with God’s faithful promises to our needy world!

Have you personally grasped, held onto, surrendered to the Spirit’s control? Are you allowing Him to fulfill His eternal ministry in honoring Christ in and through you in His supernatural way?

Follow Oswald Chambers’ words in “My Utmost For His Highest” [pages 194-195], “The expression of Christian character is not doing good, but God-likeness. If the Spirit of God has transformed you within, you will exhibit Divine characteristics in your life, not good human characteristics. God’s life in us expresses itself as “God’s” life, not as a human life ‘trying’ to be godly. The secret of a Christian is that the supernatural is made natural in him by the grace of God, and the experience of this works out in the practical details of life, not in times of communion with God. When we come in contact with things that create a buzz, we find to our amazement that we have power to keep wonderfully poised in the center of it all.”

Would you say that YOU are poised in pleasing God or a prisoner of self-pleasure in indulging the ‘flesh’ or your old sin nature? Paul told Timothy, 2 Timothy 3:5, about those who are “lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God,” with some “having a form of godliness but denying its power.”

Or, would YOU say, you are consumed with the passion of living your redemptive faith in the divine providence of the Holy Spirit honoring Christ Jesus through you? The Holy Spirit of God is the Almighty Teacher and Instructor guiding us, girding us, governing us in honoring our Savior and Lord through us, even moment by moment, hour by hour, and day by day! Have you received, invited in, fully surrendered yourself to the Holy Spirit’s sovereign control?

CHAPTER ELEVEN

“FAITH AND THE FAITHFULNESS OF SPIRIT-IDENTITY”

If you are blessed of God, through Christ Jesus, with an eternal calling, and it relates to you having an assignment in your world around you, is there ever a danger of the world impacting you rather than you impacting the world around you with the example, gospel truth, His abiding Presence, and His message proclaimed through you as to His saving grace, mercy, and love?

There is an enriching and encouraging and eye-opening word from Paul in Romans 15:13 when he wrote, “Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.” Abounding believers or dejected ‘sons’ who rebel? The hope-filled or the hopeless? Neglecters of biblical truth or devoted disciples of the eternal truth?

In Ephesians 2:11-13 is a necessary reminder of where we were without Christ and where and who you are in Him NOW! “Therefore remember that you, once Gentiles in the flesh – who are called Uncircumcision by what is called the Circumcision made in the flesh by hands – that at that time you were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.”

One without Christ as Lord and Savior and the Sovereign over his life is known by his ‘flesh-identity’ and ‘hopeless dreams and aspirations’ and ‘self-conceit’ – and that one who owns biblical faithlessness is seen by God as one without hope, without redemptive faith, without passion for God, as he lives deceived by his unbelief and rewarded for it only with despair, disappointment, and darkness, as he dies more and more daily under the devil’s horrendous administration.

Are you aware that goodness without God is the seed of godlessness? How many have you witnessed in your journey who genuinely believed that doing evil was sometimes necessary to bring about good? For instance, examine Arthur Hugh Clough’s statement from his “Dipsychus,” [Part 1, sc.3], “What we all love is good, touched up with evil – religion’s self must have a spice of devil.” Do you realize how reckless man-induced religions and ‘faiths’ can be as they oversee people’s lives and families and indoctrinate them with death-delivering indoctrinations without any comprehension of “new birth,” “new identities,” and the “new hope” of eternal life now and forever because of the “new life” through the shed-blood of the Lamb of God?

Most ‘religions’ approve and try to excuse the deceitfulness of sin, affirm loving one’s perverse nature, deny Jesus’ plea of “You must be born again,” have no disappointments in one’s spiritual failures, explain away the fleshly powers of one’s soul that degrades, destroys, and darkens what ‘little light’ one may have held, and will call the true preacher irresponsible and irrelevant if he preaches “The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

If you look at Jude, a bondservant of Jesus Christ, and brother of James, you’ll find a man who was “called of God, sanctified by God, and preserved in Christ Jesus!” He authored Jude 20-22, saying, wisely, “But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life…

And on some have compassion, making a distinction; but others, save with fear, pulling them out of the fire, hating even the garment defiled by the flesh [or old sin-nature].”

“Faith and the Faithfulness of Spirit-Identity”! That’s not a man-made faith or the fleshliness of self-identity in its foolish demonstrations of what some call, “Just a temporary demonstration of one’s good and evil, which is all God expects of us!” How wild an imagination is that, how far from divine truth is that, how foreign to the nature and character of God is that?

What did Isaiah the prophet say in Isaiah 5:20-21? “Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; who put darkness for light, and light for darkness; who put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter! Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight!”

Human minds and deceived hearts, willingly and unwillingly, cloud the hearts and minds of “the fallen away from God crowd”, yet, at times, will parade themselves in the pretense of righteousness, self-deceived that they are as ‘holy as Jesus and His followers’, when in reality it is ‘hole-li-ness’ in both the head and heart, deceived by the devil again and again that “one can sin and not die”! In far too many lives across the world there is no shame of insensibility to the love and mercy of Holy God.

In the centuries of the past, even in the Garden of Eden onward, and still being modeled in our present day, there is an acceptance of ‘evil’ by many as an acceptable way of life, holding adverse reactions to God saying, “You shall be holy for I am holy.” The reality of the modern world, with sunlight and the nights of darkness, is the picture of the need of ‘fallen men’ who often promote their good and evil nature as a mixture of both, and there is, for them, no problem with a little of both, not realizing their ‘little light of goodness’ is as compromising as their ‘dark nights of the soul’!

It was Spurgeon, in his writing on “Holiness”, who said, “Holiness is the architectural plan upon which God builds up His living temple,” and that’s the born-again believer, not some architectural spiritual genius with sticks and stones! And with “true believers” it is not the self-determination with a “little light of goodness” and with the powerful hold of “dark nights of the soul”, but from the Apostle Paul we read of his encounter with the Resurrected Christ after saying to Him, “Who are You, Lord?” And Jesus said to him [and us!], “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. But rise and stand on your feet; for I have appeared to you for this purpose, to make you a minister and a witness both of the things which you have seen and of the things which I will yet reveal to you. I will deliver you from the Jewish people, as well as from the Gentiles, to whom I now send you, to open their eyes, in order to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who are sanctified BY FAITH IN ME.” [Acts26:15-18].

As we consider “Faith and the Faithfulness of Spirit-Identity”, the question that we MUST genuinely face and deal with is whether or not in our spiritual relationship with Holy God our true foundation is Holy God’s provision of eternal scriptural awareness that, [John 4:24], “God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship Him in spirit and truth,” which is the result of “Spirit-birthing,” “Spirit-guidance,” and “Spirit-unveiling of Holy Truth” to settle our lives and faith on the strong foundation of Eternal Truth, and “Spirit-empowerment” to fulfill our divine calling as His witnesses, His proclaimers of divine truth, and raising ‘eternal trees’ of divine life producing the very “fruits” of the Spirit of God!

Our Savior and Lord gave us a powerful warning and then gracious encouragement in Matthew 7:15-20 when He said: “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves. YOU WILL KNOW THEM BY THEIR FRUITS. Do men gather grapes from thorn-bushes or figs from thistles? Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Therefore BY THEIR FRUITS YOU WILL KNOW THEM.”

If a true disciple of Christ is known by his fruits, and the Holy Spirit IS the “Fruit-Producer”, then what is that Spirit-germinated ‘fruit’ in the life of a disciple? In Galatians 5:22-25 Paul’s Spirit-anointed letter tells us, trains us, teaches us, that “the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, fruitfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law. And those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.” Don’t grieve the Holy Spirit, don’t quench the Holy Spirit, and if there is no hunger in you to be led by the Holy Spirit, don’t you be grieved when He becomes silent toward you, but repent and yield yourself truly and completely, willing to be led by Him alone, not your own quirky conscience! Especially ‘repent’ before the Holy Spirit of God when you know He’s witnessed your disobedience and allowed bondage to disappoint your sin-leaning when He calls you to holiness, submission, and obedience!

Beyond the Holy Spirit glorifying Christ in us and through us, beyond His fruit-production in us, I personally rejoice and thank God for ‘Holy Spirit helps’! In Romans 8:26-27 we read, “Likewise the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself MAKES INTERCESSION FOR US with groanings which cannot be uttered. Now He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, BECAUSE HE MAKES INTERCESSION FOR THE SAINTS ACCORDING TO THE WILL OF GOD.”

Thank God for the mighty Holy Spirit that indwells, anoints, guides, convicts, enlightens every true believer, glorifying Christ Jesus through us by His Presence, His Power, His Purpose, His Passion of exposing sin’s darkness, old self’s captivity to spiritual infirmities, the ‘flesh’s’ unruly passions and reckless, senseless, God-dishonoring, disordered, defiling lusts, and even deceiving the wisest of men about the devil’s power over his life, his body, his mind, and his spirit! The devil wants fallen men totally blind to his nature of evil, his hatred of Holy God, and his power to destroy, while the Holy Spirit convicts of sin, honors Christ Jesus, and in a true believer heightens the glory of God, unveils God’s Holy Purpose, exalts and honors the Resurrected Christ in His Royal Family, guides them in holy Truth, in the vibrant life of the Garden of His Holy Presence with the fragrance of Heavenly fruit, radiant with the rich taste of the wine of His Word, radiant with the shining light of the immenseness of Calvary’s love, and loosing believers’ new minds to the voluminous Victory of Christ’s “It is finished,” and with the Holy Spirit’s power, we “rest in Jesus’s love and grace and mercy” for us!

Every single day of true believers’ lives are to be witnesses and affirmers of Holy Spirit presence within them as they “lean not to their own understanding, but in all their ways, walks, and witness,” yield themselves to Spirit-control! This is why Paul instructs every believer in Romans 8:1, “There is therefore now no condemnation to those who ARE IN CHRIST JESUS, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.” And I’m sure you are aware of “the flesh of one’s old sin nature” and “The Spirit’s power to honor Christ through your new divine nature”!

The Holy Spirit converts, the Holy Spirit characterizes a “new creation” distinctively, the Holy Spirit infuses the rich treasures of Holy Presence, converts one’s despair from the old life to delight in the divine life, the Holy Spirit manifests eternal fruit, melts fear and pours in faith, buries one’s doubts, fears, tendencies of rebellion and enriches one’s true confidence in God and God’s fullness in him with eternal life, heavenly treasures, abiding hope, the Prince’s peace that passes all understanding, God’s glory that glows within and without, and gives the Hand that holds us peacefully as we even walk through the very shadow of the valley of death!

How thankful are YOU for the Holy Spirit’s, Yes, divine intervention in your life and walk AND circumstances of life you face, often wondering if it’s possible you’ll survive?!? In Romans 8:26-27 we read about the Holy Spirit that ‘comforts,’ ‘comes alongside of,’ “intercedes,” “searches,” “prays” for Christ’s true disciples! It says, “Likewise the Spirit [the Holy Spirit] also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, BUT THE SPIRIT HIMSELF makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. Now He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God.”

If our ‘bodies in Christ’ are the very temples of God, which is what He tells us, I pray you’ll remember, be reminded of, or taught for the first time in your spiritual life and journey: “Your body IS the temple of the Holy Spirit”! [2 Corinthians 6:16b]. But beyond that unveiling of Holy Truth to you, what about what Jesus told us through the spiritual mountain of His Holy Word in Matthew 5:8 when He said, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God;” and Oswald Chambers called all believers to account when he said, [“My Utmost For His Highest,” p.61], “If the spiritual bloom of our life with God is getting impaired in the tiniest degree, we must leave off everything and get it put right. Remember this vision [“you shall see God”] depends on character – “the pure in heart” see God.”

In John 16:7-8a the Lord Jesus teaches us about the awareness of our need of the Holy Spirit and His ministry of Spirit-assistance in honoring Christ in us:

Jesus speaking, “Nevertheless I tell you the truth. It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I depart, I will send Him to you. And when He has come, He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment…”. Have you ever witnessed ‘spiritual folks’ who say, “I don’t need the Holy Spirit in my life and walk – I’m able!” And sadly they never learn what the Spirit is up to in guiding them in all truths of the Holy Word!

“Oh, Holy Spirit, we come to You, knowing your conviction has exposed us to our sinful natures; you’ve opened our minds and hearts to our desperate state of life without Christ; you’ve eternally revealed to fallen mankind their need of the Savior and, through the anointing of God’s Holy Word, the need of daily partaking of “the bread of life”, and the need of the discipline of Holy Spirit control in glorifying Christ in us and through us, opening the gift of understanding of the Word of life, through it all magnifying Jesus and honoring Holy God through us, as You, Holy Spirit, graciously guide us into all Truth. Spirit of God, plant the seed and watch over it, until the Seed of Christ is fully formed, and His fruit abounds. Spirit of God, “water us faithfully with the water of the Holy Word, watch over us daily until Christ’s deliverance of us from the old sin nature and until Your eternal work in us finds the fullest, eternal, complete expression of Christ Jesus, and we are able to say to our Lord God, ‘Father, it is finished in me the work of Christ finished on Calvary’s Cross, that through His sacrificial death, You put to death my old sin-nature, and raised me up in His Resurrection Life. Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to You, oh, Holy Spirit!”

Do you remember what Jesus said in John 16:14-15 Jesus said, “He [the Holy Spirit] will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine, and declare it to you. All things that the Father has are Mine. Therefore I said that He will take of Mine and declare it to you.” A daily walk in Christ is the daily ministry of the Holy Spirit in us, testifying, illuminating, inspiring the perfect will of God for every believer! “You’ll never walk alone,” is not a trite song but an eternal declaration of God to assure YOU the Holy Spirit will in-fill your life, inform your mind, and integrate God’s eternal purpose in your life fully, completely, and so reverently! The angels see the Spirit’s ministry in and through you, singing a song of rejoicing!

I.H.Meredith wrote the old hymn, “Seal Us, O Holy Spirit”. It says: “Seal us, O Holy Spirit, Grant us Your impress, we pray; We would be more like the Savior, Stamped with His image today.

Seal us, O Holy Spirit, help us His likeness to show; Then from our lives unto others, Streams of rich blessings shall flow.

Seal us, O Holy Spirit, Make us His own from this hour; Let me be useful, Dear Master, seal us with witnessing power.

Seal us, seal us, Seal us just now, we pray; Seal us, O Holy Spirit, Seal us for service today.”

What a source of great encouragement the Word of God truly is! In Romans 12:1-2 Paul taught “the brethren,” “I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be [being] transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.” Didn’t Paul tell us earlier also in Romans 8:2 that “the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made [us] free from the law of sin and death”? And if you profess “faith” in Christ, what are you doing now with the law of sin and death, that so strangles one’s “professing testimony”?

I tell you, it’s time the church-at-large worldwide sets aside ‘sin in the flesh’ and have fulfilled in us now, no longer walking in the likeness of sinful flesh, but walking in the very likeness of Christ who came to glorify Christ in YOU! Let the Holy Spirit have His way in you honoring Christ Jesus, your Savior and Lord!

Will YOU look to Calvary’s Cross and witness the abounding love of God for you as He allowed the Cross, because of the amazing grace and awesome preciousness of the Lord Jesus’ shed blood, and hearing God say for yourself, “My Son’s shed blood has blotted out the guilt of your sin and selfish nature, and every sin-soiled man across the world, can now be free!”

It was P.P.Bliss who wrote the old hymn, “Once for All.” It says: “Free from the law, O happy condition, Jesus has bled, and there is remission; Cursed by the law and bruised by the fall, Grace has redeemed us once for all.

Once for all, O sinner, receive it; Once for all, O brother believe it; Cling to the cross, the burden will fall, Christ has redeemed us once for all.”

Are you aware of “divine freedom”? And if it is divine freedom through Christ’s blood from sin, from bondage, from separation from God, then why would any man spout so sickly, “You can’t but sin as long as you are in your mortal body”? Eternal life in Christ is not the bondage of sin again, it was broken; He is not the free ticket through His blood to allow you to go on sinning because He understands, the bondage was broken; His blood shed was not Satan’s license to allow him to deceive you, but the Savior’s atonement to set you free from the law of sin and death, the bondage was broken!

What did our Lord tell us in John 8:36? “Therefore if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed!” And Paul’s word in Galatians 5:1 is so essential and necessary for every true believer: “Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage.”

It’s a sad day in America, whenever you turn on your television, to be blasted by ungodliness, defiance to Truth, denial of sin or denial of the godly opposition to its expression , blasted by heresy, or demonstrations of godlessness, perversion after perversion, and think that that is freedom, when sadly, it’s the awakening to Hellish living and devilish bondage that bleeds, drains, fouls even the veins in one’s brain, with no comprehension of the love of God!

Let me close this chapter with a serious reminder from Galatians 6:7-8! “Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. For he who sows to his flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to the Spirit will of the Spirit reap everlasting life.” AMEN?

CHAPTER TWELVE

“FAITH’S VERBAL FAILURE OR FAITH’S VICTORIOUS FINISH?”

Have you ever heard someone say, “What you say is not necessarily what you do”? And I don’t know it ever being plainer than when Jesus said in Matthew 7:21-23, “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’”

Is there ever a time that God’s grace is purely revealed, but compromising men will proclaim their ‘salvation’ when His amazing grace becomes self-defiance to that amazing grace, and becomes altered ‘grit’ as one tries to prove his salvation and sanctification through his fleshly, self-determined abilities?

Are there “professors of faith” who have no evidence at all that they are “possessors” of the fullness of His Indwelling Life? Are there, in this modern world of a religious nature, men who are affirmed by men as ‘religious’ as they are, but one who has never identified or walked in the Gospel he/she professes to believe in? In 2 Peter 2:9-10c, we read, “then the Lord knows how to deliver the godly out of temptations and to reserve the unjust under punishment for the day of judgment, and ESPECIALLY those who walk according to the flesh in the lust of uncleanness and despise authority. They are presumptuous, self-willed,” but they have declared “faith in Christ”!

How on target and truthfully illustrative was Jude when he wrote to us a description of ‘faith’s verbal apostates’ in Jude 3b-7? Jude said, “…I found it necessary to write to you exhorting you to contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints. For certain men have crept in unnoticed, who long ago were marked out for this condemnation, ungodly men, who turn the grace of God into lewdness and deny the only Lord and our Lord Jesus Christ…

But I want to remind you, though you once knew this, that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who did not believe. And the angels who did not keep their proper domain, but left their own abode, He has reserved in everlasting chains under darkness for the judgment of the great day; as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities around them in a similar manner to these, having given themselves over to sexual immorality and gone after strange flesh, are set forth as an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.”

In 2 Corinthians 13:5 there is an eternal awakening verse that must be received. It says: “Examine yourselves as to whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Do you not know yourselves, that Jesus Christ is IN YOU? – unless indeed you are disqualified.” Verbally it is so easy for multitudes to state, “Why sure I am a Christian – it goes back a long way in the family-line that we always say that we’re a Christian family. We attend church some, usually Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter, but otherwise, we’re so busy with a lot of things that we enjoy that takes a lot of time.” How does that fit with the Word telling us, “Not forsaking the assembling of yourselves together as the manner of some is?”

Is there a “Judas” that you have witnessed betraying Christ? In Matthew 16:14-16, we read, ‘ Then one of the twelve, called Judas Iscariot, went to the chief priests and said, “What are you willing to give me if I deliver Him to you?” And they counted out to him thirty pieces of silver. So from that time he sought opportunity to betray Him.’ Greedy Judas betrayed God’s Son, just as it happens today when what the world has to offer people is more important to the ‘flesh’ than what Christ instills through the Spirit!

In Philippians 3:10-11 Paul shared the divine will of God for every man concerning Christ Jesus when he said, “that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, if by any means, I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.” And, certainly, as Paul took “the sentence of death daily that Christ’s resurrection life would be manifested daily,” so true disciples today appropriate “God’s Way of victorious living”!

But, ‘saying’ and ‘doing’ are two totally different things when it comes to faith and allegiance concerning submission to Christ’s Lordship, authority, and Example! How did Peter describe ‘pretenders’? “They are presumptuous, self-willed”, being loud and boisterous in their fleshly declarations!

“Faith’s Verbal Failure”, sadly, is usually found within the church community, even as Paul warned the church at Colossae about those cheating true believers there with their philosophies, empty deceptions, traditions of men, and the basic principles of men, not according to the Resurrected Christ! [Colossians 2:8]. I would not be shocked if you, as a faithful pastor in a church over-loaded with ‘pretenders’, said to me, “Pastor Fisher, as pastor, I’ve sought to be faithful in the preaching and teaching of the Word of God, but I’m shocked, shattered, almost disillusioned by members of the congregation angry with me, saying to me, ‘That may be what the Bible says, but that’s not OUR belief!’ And I don’t know what to do.” REMAIN FAITHFUL UNTO DEATH!!

“Faith’s Verbal Failure” is often because of one’s own bias or limit to what they want to receive from God in His Holy Word! And many times it is because of a particular ‘mind-set’ apart from a yielded heart to the God of All Truth! Do you think that attitude could be the result of what the author of Hebrews meant when in Hebrews 5:12-14 he wrote: “For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the first principles of the oracles of God; and you have come to need milk and not solid food. For everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe. But solid food belongs to those who are of full age, that is, those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil.”

Are you aware of “the once enlightened” who “fall away”? Do you remember Paul opening his letter to the church at Rome, saying in Romans 1:1b, “separated to the gospel of God”? And, Who does the separating – spiritually immature men or Holy God Himself? But if I verbally declare allegiance in my ‘infancy’, I can ‘say’ without any anointing to ‘do’ what I say on my own! Far too many ‘professors of faith’ are inward bound to their own abilities and estimations of their own self-will to honor their Savior, and decide for themselves what they need without God’s help! Even Israel NEEDED the Savior, Emmanuel –“God with us” – but they crucified the Lord Jesus, maintaining their ‘religious fervor’ for their ‘verbal faith’!

But “Faith’s Verbal Failure” has no transformation power to transform a ‘sinner’ into a ‘saint’, which is “set apart to the glory of God alone”, not to a man’s fleshly abilities to make a name for himself! And what you see in a person’s independent walk in “wanting to honor the Lord Jesus” is the spirit of tiredness that leads to indifference that leads to abandonment! Do you remember Psalm 87:7? “All my springs, my fresh, renewing, restoring, reinvigorating, rehabilitating rivers of living water are in the Living Lord and Savior, my Mighty God”, who then, by His own power and purpose releases His own empowering streams! The best of human flesh falls far short of renewing in the Spirit of the Lord!

How on God’s beautiful earth can ‘fallen men’ even think they have a fleshly ‘prescription’ that will heal or make new a blackened heart diseased by the ‘heinousness of sin’ or miraculously exchange it for a “new heart”? If it’s “by His stripes we are healed,” then fleshly efforts for redemption fall eternally short and void of the “Great Physician’s” healing grace and mercy!

At least if one attempts a faithless walk to honor God, even if “short-term” or foreign to His Way, it reveals one who has surfaced who has a general idea that his/her fallen state needs ‘repair’, but believes he/she is “able”, and don’t understand they ARE NOT GOD, though they want to be! Religious people who are self-guided are spiritually blinded to the degree of their “fall away from God”, but sincerely believe they can overcome the damage, cure the sin-sickness, and arise as ‘one of God’s greatest servants’, when in reality they’ve become a tool of God’s enemy the devil! Do you understand or sense at times that “Faith’s Verbal Failures” is because of a man’s extreme reverence of himself apart from the unveiling of Christ or possessing a desire to please and honor the Holy God who created him by ‘flesh’s best effort’?

“Faith’s Verbal Failures” are implemented by ‘shells’ with no evidence in them of divine will, divine power, or the divine miracle of love and grace able to resurrect the dead. Irrational souls are godless beings who think their ‘fleshly faith’ is more than enough to resurrect dead sin natures into living monuments of a man’s best efforts. Irrational souls can be strong creations evidencing the best of ‘fallen sin-natures’, unveiling the fleshly vanity of a proud, self-centered, warped mind and heart, able to compete with the most wicked, but assured they do things better than God Himself with more ‘pleasures, rewards, and devilish pay-offs’! Are you aware of the vanity, pride, self-worshipping creatures, who depend solely upon themselves because they are self-assured their ‘faith’ in themselves out-does the Redemptive Faith of Holy God? They are not interested in God unveiling their rebellious heart, defiant mind, and self-centered ‘religion’ – they have no interest in God exposing the dunghills of hollow hearts and maddening minds – their faculties are faithless, their wills in bondage to the devil, their hearts blinded to the love of God for them; so they celebrate their independence with the demons!

“Faith’s Verbal Failures”? “I celebrate my faith in God, but cower down before His eternal Word; I profess that I’m no enemy of Jesus as I celebrate with His enemies; I believe that the Bible is Truth, my meat, milk, and bread every day, but who needs to partake of it since I know in my own mind what truth is without ever partaking of it with thanksgiving!” And, sadly, many ‘professors of faith’ will violate daily the very spirit of the Holy Word as they profess allegiance!

A lot of ‘professing believers’ have no desire to be warned by God – “God wouldn’t terminate my relationship with Him if I set aside His Bread of Life, He wouldn’t shut me out if I ‘praise Jesus’ and at the same time celebrate with the devil’s dark nights of the soul and flesh, Jesus may have taken every man’s sin-nature to the Cross but that doesn’t mean I have to die to it, sin crucified but not willfully mortified by my own death to sin is excusable.” Oh, really?

Wild hearts can speak religious language while they tell how moved they are by what Jesus did on the Cross for them, but never hear His Word, “Go and sin no more,” while they play the ‘flesh-games of a fallen society’, believing everything is OK between them and the Crucified Christ and Resurrected King of kings and Lord of lords! Consciences may have been white-washed by mere sentiment, but guilt before Holy God still reigns as they join hands with the world, the flesh, or the devil, or all three at the same time!

“Faith’s Verbal Failures”? I was so strongly awakened to the need of revival, renewal, and re-awakening in our nation when in the “Valley of Vision” book I read the following: [“Valley of Vision,” pps.128-129], as one writer stated: “Of all hypocrites, grant that I may not be an EVANGELICAL HYPOCRITE, who sins more safely because grace abounds, who tells his lusts that Christ’s blood cleanses them, [‘as they keep on sinning?’],who reasons that God cannot cast him into hell, for he is saved, who loves evangelical preaching, churches, Christians, but lives unholily.” I tell you, it’s TIME for brokenness in America, and especially in churches nation-wide!

Prophetically, God called to Israel through His prophet Isaiah, who had a deep love for God’s chosen people as well, but recorded for Israel and us a warning about “Faith’s Verbal Failures”: Isaiah 65:11-12, “But you are those who forsake the Lord, who forget My holy mountain, who prepare a table for Gad, [a foreign god or idol], and who furnish a drink offering for Meni. [Another foreign idol of “destiny”.] Therefore I will number you for the sword, and you shall all bow down to the slaughter; Because when I called, you did not answer; when I spoke, you did not hear, but did evil before My eyes, and chose that in which I do not delight.” And in Verse 15, God said to Israel and all who speak verbally but walk rejecting all that God stands for, “For the Lord God will slay you,” and earthly existence is over while the guilty “dance with the devil!”

“Faith’s Verbal Failures”? Are you aware that “service to God” can be reality for some because they see and say that, even serving as sinners, should be acceptable to God? They ‘glory’ in themselves, they ‘glory’ in their own strength, they glory in their own fleshly dreams and visions, assured in themselves of their valiant, brilliant, self-effort, certain they’ll be acceptable to God, yes, apart from His blood sacrifice through Jesus’ death on the Cross!

Is there such a thing as “vain service” that pumps ‘flesh’ but brings no glory to God Almighty? Is ‘patting one’s self on the back’ an acceptable applause from God’s throne? Are “mere men” the tools Almighty God is interested in using or “men Mastered by Christ for His glory alone”?

I’m telling you with all my heart and soul, “Holy God wants vessels of unconditional surrender to His omniscience and His omnipotence; Holy God wants emptied hearts of ‘self-love, self-pleasure, self-will’ that He might fill with the Glory of His Resurrection Power and Eternal Hope in the able-ness of God Almighty; God is looking for ‘gardens of life’ He can plow through, prepare the soil, and plant the eternal seeds of His awesome love, grace, and mercy, and watch the fields of divine ownership, divine provision, divine labor, sprout with the “fruits of His Spirit”, plus He longs to change the house of your fleshly soul into the Holy Temple of Divine Presence in the Resurrection Life of His Son and our Savior, and through YOU touching the world around you with His mercy, grace, and love!

Let me ‘shift’ gears as we change life’s highway from “Faith’s Verbal Failures” to “Faith’s Victorious Finish”! And no better way to “do” that than standing firm on the divine revelation of Hebrews 10:19-25! It says:

“Therefore, brethren, having boldness to enter the Holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which He consecrated for us, through the veil, that is, His flesh, and having a High Priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful. And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.”

“Faith’s Victorious Finish”? Living in “the Holy Place” is not by one’s good or best effort, but by the divine recognition that through God’s grace YOUR body has become the temple of our Lord’s resurrected presence because of the historic shedding of His own blood on the Cross of Calvary, with us crucified with Him, and repented and rested in His blood redemption, now owned and made one by His grace and mercy, we’re never left alone but live in boldness to rest in Him and in boldness appropriating all He is to honor and glorify Him as we ‘lean not [even] to our own understanding [fully,yet], but in all our ways [at all times] acknowledge His Holy Presence and yield to Him’ to lead us, empower us, and give Him His rightful place in us as King of kings and Lord of lords! The old heart of ‘fallen man’ was spiritually dead, but through repentance toward God and faith in Christ Jesus’s finished work at the Cross, new disciples or true followers of the Lord Jesus Christ have been sovereignly and miraculously chosen as “the holy and beloved of God,” and according to Philippians 2:15-16 [NKJV], are learning to “become blameless and harmless, children of God without fault in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world, holding fast the word of life…”!

If God says, and He still does, “Choose you this day whom you will serve,” what has been YOUR choice? And, of course, Holy God understood, even before the foundation of the world, that created mankind, blessed with ‘free will’ would “fall away” to be rulers and saviors of their own destiny and missing out on oneness with God Himself! But, then, “God so loved the world…!” And we see the Cross!

And 2 Corinthians 5:17 tells us, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.” Upon the basis of repentance and faith, it is not a man altering his life through “best effort adjustments”, but the “new birth” through the Son of God who loved me and gave Himself for me at the Cross!

And when the “new birth” occurs, the battle begins, the warfare starts, the struggle between ‘flesh and Spirit’, intensifies, and only when one understands the sanctification journey, that he/she is “set apart” to the honor and glory of his Savior and Lord, and he/she puts on the whole armor of God and fights the good fight of faith is he/she matured, not of possibility but eternal reality, that he/she IS “more than conqueror through Him who loved us”, and fully assured, divinely blessed, in the revelation that “we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us” because, we are persuaded by divine revelation, (Romans 8:38-39), “that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” The emancipation proclamation IS “Christ in you the hope of glory!”

I pray that YOU understand that Almighty God loved YOU as if you were the only one who ever lived, and what He did for the whole world would have been done for YOU individually, to His glory, honor, and praise!

Receive the Word of God! Romans 10:9-10 says, “that if you CONFESS with your mouth the Lord Jesus and BELIEVE IN YOUR HEART that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.” And the evidence of “Faith’s Victorious Finish”?

Examine carefully Romans 6:15-18 with rejoicing and thanksgiving! “What then? Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace? CERTAINLY NOT! Do you not know that to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey, you are that one’s slaves whom you obey, whether of sin leading to death, or of obedience leading to righteousness? But GOD BE THANKED that though you were slaves to sin, yet you obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine to which you were delivered. And having been set free from sin, you became slaves of righteousness.”

If you’ve been delivered from captivity to the bondage of sin, then why are you feeling it’s OK to go on sinning? Who told you that? Not God’s Holy Word! Through Christ’s blood the debt of your sinfulness was paid for; because of the Master’s willingness to die IN YOUR PLACE the debt and penalty of your sin has been washed away by His own precious blood; and “in Christ” we’ve been set apart, being anointed by Him, “to preach deliverance to the captives”!

God’s true people sing the eternal song of Revelation 5:9-10! “You [Lamb of God] are worthy to take the scroll, and to pen its seals; for You were slain, and have redeemed us to God by Your blood out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation, And have made us kings and priests to our God; AND WE SHALL REIGN ON THE EARTH.” Are you reigning, rejoicing, resting, releasing the Worthy Lamb through you to touch our needy world with Christ’s amazing love?

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

“FAITH AND ITS EVIDENCE OF THE FATHER’S FRUITFULNESS”

Question: “How is one’s faith determined, even if searched out by unbelieving communities or people or family or friends?” As Christ Jesus differentiated between “false prophets” and “true prophets”, between “bad fruit” and “good fruit”, what did He say in Matthew 7:20? “Therefore by their fruits you will know them.”

You are aware, I’m sure, that there are those who “claim” the name “Disciple of Christ” who have no intent of following obediently but ‘professing’ verbally only, while there are those who have truly identified themselves as “crucified with Christ” and have been raised to “new life.”

Is there an unseen war between ‘imitation’ and “immortal presence and power and purpose that truly honors and glorifies Christ only”? If I insert Christ Jesus into Joseph Addison’s “Cato,” [Act V, sc.1], I see hope and blessing in true faith and its evidence! He wrote: “The stars shall fade away, the sun himself grow dim with age, and nature sinks in years, But you shall flourish in immortal youth, Unhurt amidst the wars of elements, the wrecks of matter, and the crush of worlds.”

Fleshliness has nothing but bad fruit, but God’s Spirit births faith and its evidence of the Father’s fruitfulness! It was Edward Young, in “Night Thoughts,” [Night V111, l.704], who wrote: “A foe to God was never true friend to man, Some sinister intent taints all he does.” And if you didn’t know, fallen mankind and, yes, true disciples of Christ have spiritual foes who are out to bring both down! It was Oswald Chambers, in his book, “My Utmost For His Highest,” who wrote: [p.194], “The temptations of Jesus continued throughout His earthly life, and they will continue throughout the life of the Son of God in us. Are we going with Jesus in the life we are living now?”

Examine carefully the words of Walter Rauschenbusch in his writing, “The Little Gate to God.” He said: “When I am with God my fear is gone in the great quiet of God. My troubles are as the pebbles on the road, My joys are like the everlasting hills.”

And, we are on the road of life determined by “flesh” or determined by true faith and its evidence of the Father’s fruitfulness in us! “Flesh”, man’s old sin nature, crashes with sad consequences. “Flesh”, man’s devilish-influenced, cavalier attitude of haughtiness toward God Himself, corrupted by its selfish ways, at peace with compromise, calloused, colored with the deceptions of the devil, will even sign up with God but never show up, even declaring but never delivering, announcing but never applying!

I’m sure if you’re reading this book that you are one who is beyond satisfaction with your old ‘flesh’ nature and, yes, desiring or desperate for “spiritual depths within” that you’ve never experienced! In you, there is no satisfaction with where you’ve been or where you presently are; you want more of what you know God has to offer you! You agree: “Restore a right spirit within me!” There must be a person’s ‘will’ involved, which is exactly what John was talking about when in 1 John 1:7 he wrote: “But IF [in other words, are YOU choosing? Have you NOW chosen – no more desiring to walk in sin!] we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin.”

True Faith, living faith, the faith that is the gift of God, the faith that generates God’s work of grace in me to radically transform me from sinner to saint, from world-prisoner to heaven’s freed son, from earthly bondage to a place around our Lord’s eternal throne, from spiritual emptiness to the fullness of blessing of the Godhead bodily – that’s the pricelessness and the eternal evidence of Holy God’s Master-full heart of love, grace, and mercy! And we find ourselves “grafted in” to His true “tree of life”, amazed at the eternal “fruit” He produces in us and through us!

You are aware that “bad fruit” is the testimony of many, many people who are enslaved to their old sin natures, even if they are ‘professors’ of a ‘faith’ that is totally un-redemptive, Christ’s name stitched on their outer garments; but then there are the “good fruit” bearers, taken over by the Resurrected, Indwelling Christ Jesus – He knocked and you opened the door with the key of repentance toward God and faith and surrender to the Lordship of Christ in you! Yes, you received by grace through God-given Faith the new heart! What did Paul write in Romans 3:23-24? “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being ‘justified freely’ by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth as a propitiation by His blood, through faith, to demonstrate His righteousness, because in His forbearance God had passed over the sins that were previously committed…”.

Jesus made it clearly plain when He said in Matthew 12:33, “Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or else make the tree bad and its fruit bad; for a tree is known by its fruit.” When it comes to fallen mankind, they resent, ignore, explain away, even ridicule those who trust God and His Word and who rest in His redemptive grace and mercy, because they are satisfied with independence from God, possessing no desire to know Him or serve Him, addicted, enslaved, imprisoned in the slavish patterns of their old sin natures!

If fallen men were really truthful, they would have no problem or resentment in saying they genuinely hate the good and love the evil; ‘fleshly’ love is selfish and self-centered and opposed to God’s ‘agape’ love of a “laid-down, loving, serving, yes, faithful love”, more concerned about others’ blessing more than themselves! [Look at 1 Corinthians 13!].

Do you remember Jesus drawing near to Jerusalem and weeping over the city? I have no doubt as He approaches world-leading cities today all He can do is weep! Luke 19:41-44 tells us, “If you had known even you, especially in this your day, the things that make for your peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. For days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment around you, surround you and close you in on every side, and level you, and your children within you, to the ground; and they will not leave in you one stone upon another, because you did not know the time of your visitation.”

How many around you know nothing about “their time of visitation” – it comes, and they have no concerns, until “Hell-fires” begin to consume them with the death that will not die?!?

“Faithlessness”? What did the Lord Jesus say? “If YOU had known…!” But deafened ears to the voice and truth of God birth fields of life with “no seed of Holy Truth” to sprout in one’s heart and mind! “If You had known…!” But massive numbers do not have a clue of “their day and its opportunity to know, serve, and love the King of kings and Lord of lords”! “If YOU had known…!” What might have been never is because unbelieving people are more committed to satisfying fleshly lusts than loving and serving the God who gave His own Son for their salvation!

“Faithlessness”? Do you understand “fields” unfit for the seed of the Word of God because of neglect, annoyance of the need of “field preparation,” no desire to consider the cost at all, no projection of even confidence by the grace of God or in the grace of God that in their field an abundance of divine fruit can come forth, but no acceptance of God’s plowing, God’s planting, God’s watering, or God’s harvest, because of a life devoted to one’s eternal barrenness, yielded to human potential without God, and bound by the devil’s chains of narrowness, bound by the dark spirit of scorning anything that has to do with “God-likeness,” and bound to the devilish and fleshly spirit of unbelief!

“Faithlessness”? That mind-set of fallen men leads men on the highway of inner spiritual blindness to God, produces deeper darkness in the inner man, destroys human potential implanted in the Christ-follower and leaving humans in charge of the divine destiny they really know nothing about. Faithlessness encourages godless emotions, compromising willfulness, corrupted consciences, man’s pagan philosophies, superstitions rather than revealed Truth, abusive responses to any Word shared, loving and serving “self,” “sinful, sensuous, separated from God patterns of living,” traveling on a highway of flesh’s choosing with no interest in God’s highway of holiness, or His “Lighted Path,” or His “fresh springs,” or His “rivers of living water”!

Have you encountered it? “No moral godly law for me – I’m in charge of my own destiny!” “So? I sell my soul to the world, my flesh, and the devil himself? What’s that to you? I don’t care what you think about my sin-enslaved life!” “Let it be known: I willfully choose to defy God! Religious faith is a farce; if I’ve been “sold as a slave to sin, what is that to you Christians? I could care less about what you believe?” It was Oswald Chambers who once wrote: “As long as our eyes are upon our own personal whiteness we shall never get near the reality of Redemption.” “Let it be known to you Christians: I’m guided by my own affinities, not your atoning message!” “The peril I find myself in, separated from God, is my own maddening pleasures, and I choose to hold onto what pleases me!”

“Faithlessness”? At 79 years of age I look back at personal encounters with all kinds of descriptions about people concerning their aims, attitudes, loyalties or lack of them, and without a doubt, the most alarming, most enslaving, and most destructive power separate from God’s power and His anointings is extreme, enslaving, entrapping “selfishness or total self-centeredness”! And only Christ Jesus “forgives, frees, and faithfully breaks the chains that bind a person”!

Having lived in Florida for a number of years as a pastor in several cities, our young kids, then, enjoyed the beaches around the Daytona area. One of the things we had to always alert our kids to were the “under-currents” that could trap, ensnare, and sweep someone away. In life’s spiritual realm of faith, yes, there are strong “under-currents” to sweep one away from his/her devotion to the Lordship of Christ! Hold on to “kept by the power of God” every day!

Now, what about “Faith And Its Evidence of the Father’s Fruitfulness”? Laying the foundation for the next few pages, I’m convinced it’s important that you and I determine what “tree” it is that unveils for us “fleshly choices” or “Divine choice”! You’ll remember that as God unveiled His “Garden” he gave to Adam and Eve trees that could bless them or trees that would put them under ‘the curse’! In Genesis 2:8-9 we read, “The Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden, and there He put the man whom He had formed. Out of the ground the Lord God made every tree to grow that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life was also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.”

Please read and reflect with me Verses 15-17! Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it. [Just an insert question: Are you tending and caring for the garden He has chosen for you?] And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “Of every tree of the garden you may eat freely; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”

When you come to Genesis 3 you find Satanic, demonic, devilish deception to lead Adam and Eve and, yes, you and me to the “Fall or Falling Away From God”! Genesis 3:1-9 explains what has happened in every life, every family, since God birthed Adam and Eve in the Garden of Opportunity to glorify Him and yet they yielded to ‘flesh bondage’! The Word says:

Now the serpent was more cunning than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, “Has God indeed said, ‘You shall not eat of every tree of the garden’?” And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat the fruit of the trees of the garden; but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God has said, ‘You shall not eat it, nor shall you touch it, lest you die.”

Then the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate.

She also gave to her to her husband with her, and he ate. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves coverings. And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. Then the Lord God called to Adam and said to him, “Where are you?”

Fallen men are in the spiritual condition of ‘death’ because the wild serpent cast doubt on the revealed will of the Word of God, twisted and distorted His Truth, confused the man and the woman, clearly lied to them as Satan still does today, and made ‘unbelief’ a digestible enticement! All of a sudden, having sinned, their eyes physically and spiritually were opened, became aware of their nakedness, established what I call “Fig-Leaf Religion” as they tried to cover themselves, and hearing the sound of the coming of the Lord, they hid themselves from His presence – but you don’t think that goes on today? Then there is God’s voice, God’s Word, God’s calling! “Adam, where are you?” The clear calling was not to define his physical location or proximity, but to challenge Adam’s awareness of his rebellion to the Holy God who made him! “What spiritual state of life, mind, will, do you now find yourself ? Disobedience or submission to My will?”

There is a term still used today in many places called “backsliding”, but for Adam and Eve it was “frontsliding”, an exposure by God of desperateness when one genuinely sees his rebellion and disobedience, and how desperate it really is to become aware of your “nakedness” before Holy God!

And, the ‘fruit of the tree’ from which they chose to eat after God graciously warned them? The fruit of the tree that God warned them not to partake of – but they did? Spiritual death emerged though they were physically alive! Are you personally aware of the difference between “shrubs in the deserts of life” that give no fruit of divine sustenance or have you truly settled in to God’s spiritually evident trees manifesting ‘the eternal blessing’ of “Christ-manifesting fruit”? It’s amazing to me that in Judges 9:7-15 there is a parable that related to who men wanted to reign over them, which gave choices by ways of the trees before them – sweet, tasty, good fruit, OR the ‘bramble bushes’ easily flaming!

Oh, the multitude of God’s promises related to our Lord’s fruitfulness available to every born-again believer and follower of the Lamb of God! In John 1:14 and verse 16 we read, And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth…Verse16, And of His fullness we have all received, and grace for grace.”

Don’t you find it so amazing and so uplifting and so encouraging when you read Paul’s words in Romans 15:29 as he wrote to the Roman believers, “But I know that when I come to you, I shall come in the fullness of the blessing of the gospel of Christ”? What a dramatic and blessed encounter when Paul met Christ Jesus on the Damascus Road! Divine transformation – Divine calling – Divine provision – Divine vision – Divine empowerment in living the overcoming, serving, blessing others style of life!

We’ll see “fullness” in the next few pages, but understand: There is “blessing after blessing in Christ”, there is the gospel or “good news”, and there is “Christ Himself indwelling YOU as God’s hope of glory”, expressed in you and through you as daily you die to yourself and allow the unveiling and expression and revealing of THE LORD JESUS CHRIST IN HIS FULLNESS!

A few words I wrote in this very moment of looking unto Jesus, the Author and Finisher of our faith in Him:

“Father, You unveiled Christ Jesus to me, as the Spirit you divinely lent, to show me the Way our Savior was sent, to reconcile the world to You.

God, in your goodness and mercy, You took our sinfulness and placed it on Christ; and through His shed blood You brought Your mercy before our sight.

You took sinful lives, placed them on Christ, and challenged their death, and gave us new life. For our emptiness, you gave us Christ’s fullness; of our bondage, you denied the devil’s rudeness.

Wisdom to enlighten, fear of death to no more frighten, by Your Word You enlighten, and our love for You has been gratefully heightened.

Your fullness so free in the bountifulness of Your goodness, so amazing to me because, toward You, the world lives in rudeness.

Your strength so able by Your grace to sustain me, Your wisdom so blessed to eternally guide me, Your Resurrection Life forever enlightening me.

At the throne of Your grace, all fears, all doubts, all worries are erased, as in the awareness of Christ’s presence, I rest in divine life’s eternal place.

What marvelous blessings in partaking of Your love, knowing by Your grace, I’m welcome in the Throne-room above.

You draw me daily to Your calling, so blessed by Your mercy and grace so enthralling; it’s to You I cleave and never will leave, because Your forgiveness and love I forever receive.

Yes, my Lord and Savior is Jesus Your Son, the work of Redemption has been fully done; Your Son You sent and He gladly went, even knowing the suffering, that His body would be rent!

You are God All-Sufficient, and with no hesitation, as Your Son was sent, You made sure the world knew , through divine revelation, and without hesitation, Your love and grace would give us restoration!”

“Faith and Its Evidence of the Father’s Fruitfulness”? In Romans 7:4-6 Paul gives us an eye-opening and mind and heart enlightment when he declared: “Therefore, my brethren, you also have become dead to the law THROUGH THE BODY OF CHRIST, that you may be married to another – to Him who was raised from the dead, “that we should bear fruit to God.” For when we were in the flesh [dominated by that old sin nature!], the sinful passions which were aroused by the law were at work in our members to bear fruit to death. But NOW we have been delivered from the law, having died to what we were held by, so that we should serve in the newness of the Spirit and not in the oldness of the letter.”

The “newness of the Spirit” is the reality, because of repentance toward God and faith in the finished work of Christ on the Cross as our substitute, of The Spirit’s indwelling within every new, repentant, surrendered, yielded life!

And “the newness of the Spirit” in Christ is no longer bearing fruit to death, but fruit that honors Christ as we die to the old self and live unto our Lord and Savior’s honor, glory, blessing, exaltation of His Name, and adoration of His life-changing presence in us and His outreach through us to touch our world with His grace! Doesn’t Romans 8:14 tell us, “For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God”? Born of the Spirit, in-filled by His Spirit, anointed by the Spirit, convicted by the Spirit, guided by the Spirit, glorifying Christ in us by the Spirit! But you think “best effort” is the answer for you?

What did Peter tell us in Acts 2:38? “Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.” Amazing grace so freely bestowed! God’s graciousness grants every true believer the gift of His Holy Spirit! Verse 39 says, “For the promise is to you and to your children, and to all who are afar off, as many as the Lord our God will call.”

To the Ephesian church then and the church worldwide today, Paul tells us in Ephesians 5:17-21, “Therefore do not be unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is. And do not be drunk with wine, in which is dissipation; but be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord, giving thanks always for all things to God the Father, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, submitting to one another in the fear of God.”

“Faith and Its Evidence of the Father’s Fruitfulness”? In the realm of God’s Kingdom and our citizenship in it, there is the absolute necessity of KNOWING HIS TRUTH AND WALKING IN IT! And, thank God, Jesus said in John 16:13, “However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth…Verse 14, He will glorify Me, for He will take of Mine and declare it to you.”

Do you remember the question that is so essential to every true believer? “Have you received the Holy Spirit since you believed?” Have you yielded to Him daily as you seek to honor Christ through your walk of faith? Godlessness is a chaotic lifestyle, but the Holy Spirit comes and “convicts the world of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment to come!” There’s “new birth,” and divine fruitfulness erupts like an exploding volcano! Spirit-anointing brings “Light” where the awful darkness of unbelief had prevailed, unveiling for us through God’s inspired Word our “new identity,” and imparting to us the understanding of eternal Truths!

In fact, God’s Holy Word is so enabling for every true believer in understanding God’s desire that we see, sense, and secure ourselves in the very “fruit of the Spirit”: Galatians 5:22-25, “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law. And those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. “

Our Heavenly Father IS “fruitful,” birthed for the world physical fruit, and for His spiritual family released the Holy Spirit to see that eternal fruitfulness abounded in every child of faith!

As a true disciple of Christ Jesus, have you surrendered to the fruitfulness of God’s Life, His Word, His will, His ministry in you and through you being fulfilled by the evidence of the Spirit?

Doesn’t the Word declare [Galatians 6:7-8] the danger and the Victory every believer faces? “Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. For he who sows to his flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to the Spirit will of the Spirit reap everlasting life.” Tell me about your crop, your harvest, your fruit, in your walk in the Spirit! Amen?

I close this chapter with words Paul wrote in Ephesians 5:8-14, “For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light (for the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness, righteousness, and truth), finding out what is acceptable to the Lord. And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them. For it is shameful even to speak of those things which are done by them in secret. But all things that are exposed are made manifest by the light, for whatever makes manifest is light. Therefore He says:

“Awake, you who sleep, Arise from the dead, And Christ will give you light.” Glory!

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

“FAITH AND ITS MAGNETIC, DRAWING POWER!”

The wise man of Proverbs was inspired by God in all his writings, but several verses hit me hard recently as I was reading through Proverbs and came to verses in Proverbs 24:9-12 that erupted instantly in seeing our society today in the U.S.A. with deep sorrow and contemplation of what might happen if there is no “Spiritual Awakening” through God’s Sovereignty and eternal time-schedule! It says:

“The devising of foolishness is sin, and the scoffer is an abomination to men. If you faint in the day of adversity, your strength is small. Deliver those who are drawn toward death, and hold back those stumbling to the slaughter. If you say, ‘Surely we did not know this,’ does not He who weighs the hearts consider it? He who keeps your soul, does He not know it? And will He not render to each man according to his deeds?”

How are you responding right now, and especially, when you see the calling: “Deliver those who are drawn toward death, and hold back those stumbling to the slaughter”!? Those drawn toward death need to be ‘delivered’? Those stumbling toward the slaughter need to be redeemed, born-again, in-filled with Christ Jesus’s Resurrection Presence, celebrating His gift of eternal life?

And, I pray, the one thing YOU grasp and hold on to is the eternal Truth AND possibility of what Paul said under the Holy Spirit’s inspiration when in Galatians 2:20 he wrote: “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.”

In Matthew 25:34 we read, Then the King will say to those on His right hand, “Come, you blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world,” but one thing is very sure: It is not only eternal Faith offered by Christ with its magnetic, drawing power, but the reality of Satan as the master-deceiver who offers his magnetic, drawing power to satisfy your sinful lusts, and give you a ‘costly ticket’ to his eternal abode – and there are major differences between the Kingdom of God and the kingdom of darkness! Didn’t we just read in the previous chapter, Ephesians 5:8-12? “For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light (for the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness, righteousness, and truth), finding out what is acceptable to the Lord. And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them. For it is shameful even to speak of those things which are done by them in secret.”

Almighty God knew and knows now the awfulness and consequences of the devil’s ‘drawing power and constant allurements and enticements’ and his ‘gift’ of bondage and enslavements with a “big, red bow” tied around them, but then, Jesus said in John 12:32, “And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all peoples to Myself.” But much of fallen humanity, by God’s gracious gift of life in the human body with ‘freedom to choose his/her loyalties’, determine ‘sinful flesh’ is more profitable to them than loyalty in the spirit-realm to Holy God – and they end up with ‘counterfeit currency’ from Satan himself!

It was Thomas Adams who long ago wrote: “The devil is no idle spirit, but a vagrant, runagate walker, that never rests in one place.- The motive, cause, and main intention of his walking is to ruin man.”

What was it Jesus said in Matthew 7:26-27? “But everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand: and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell. And great was its fall.”

Holy God, the Loving Savior, the Holy Spirit, isn’t interested in you constructing your life without a solid foundation, or on a life journey for the unfruitful works of darkness, or participation with evil men and imposters who grow worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived, or yoked together with unbelievers and the devil’s degraded, deceived, damned eternally crowd, or not even knowing that the eternal Master of all life, the Lord Jesus Christ, will come when you aren’t looking for Him and at an hour when you’re not aware, and for deceived people, He will cut them in two and assign them their portion with the unbelievers! [Luke 12:46].

Foolish men, partakers in foolish deception, captives of a self-centered world philosophy, are men who walk ‘in the futility of their mind, having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God,’ ‘because of the spiritual and scriptural ignorance in them, blinded in their hearts and minds, given over to lewdness, to work all uncleanness with greediness’, and who often refuse Christ’s knock at their heart’s door, and deny “Faith and Its Magnetic, Drawing Power,” satisfied with “the old man which grows corrupt according to their deceitful and selfish lusts”!

Unbelief is a powerful, devilish, and fleshly frame of mind and heart that closes the doors of men’s minds and hearts to the graciousness, kindness, mercies, and love of Holy God – just look at Calvary’s Cross, and you’ll know why: “God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son”! Of unbelief, Friedrich Wilhelm Krummacher once wrote: “Unbelief does nothing but darken and destroy. It makes the world a moral desert, where no divine footsteps are heard, where no angels ascend or descend, where no living hand adorns the fields, feeds the birds of heaven, or regulates events.” Unbelievers wander in the wildernesses of silence, sin, sorrows, sensuality, superstitions, and shadowy sources, and he/she doesn’t know or understand why! True believers challenge them with Christ’s message of eternal hope in Him! Why? Because they were once darkness, but now they are light in the Lord for the blessing of fallen humanity through Christ Jesus our Lord and Savior and Master of Eternal Life!

Do you sense that spirit, right now, whether across the world or in our own nation of the past, God-Blessed U.S.A? But in 2 Timothy 3:1-5 Paul challenges Timothy and believers today, true believers – “Be careful where you walk!” He said, “But know this, that in the last days perilous times will come: For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having a form of godliness but denying its power. And from such people turn away!” [And that’s not touching the lost with the love of Christ, but avoiding the nature of their fallen existence in your own daily disciplines!]. The ‘unfruitful’ are enslaved to the “unfruitful works of darkness”, sickened by their sin and darkened in their minds and hearts, and, Yes, we are commissioned by Christ and anointed by His confidence, and we will “Not be ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes…!”

In John 6:44 there is a powerful word from Jesus when He said, “No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him…”. And, what does 2 Peter 3:9 tell us? “The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.” But do ‘all’ come to repentance and faith? Sadly, No! Why? 1 Corinthians 1:18 declares, “For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.”

This particular chapter that you are now reading? “Faith And Its Magnetic, Drawing Power”! And did Jesus tell us that no one came to Him apart from that magnetic, drawing power of God? In fact, in Psalm 14:2-3 King David wrote about “A Fool’s Paradise”, and said, “The Lord looks down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there are any who understand, who seek after God. They have all turned aside, they have together become corrupt; there is none who does good, No, not one.”

If “none seek,” how did those of redemptive faith find Him? They didn’t! God Himself found them, drew them, and longed, by His love and grace and mercy, to draw them, you, me, to Himself! In 2 Corinthians 4:6-7 Paul wrote: “For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to GIVE the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” Have you sung it? “Amazing grace! How sweet the sound, That saved a wretch like me! I once was lost, but now am found, Was blind, but now I see. It was grace that taught my heart to fear, And grace my fears relieved; How precious did that grace appear The hour I first believed!”

Do you understand ‘inheritance’? In 2 Peter 1:3-4, we catch a glimpse of true inheritance when Peter wrote: “as His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him “who called us by glory and virtue,” [not our glory and virtue, but God’s!], by which have been given to us [given to us, given to us, given to us – let it be repeated by you over and over and over!], exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.”

“In Christ” we are not ‘versions’ of Him, but vessels of His very Resurrection Life and vessels of Holy Spirit presence and power! We’re not “in Christ” detachments from who He is but people aware of our own ineptness that the Inspired Christ through us can be Himself! Again, “Christ in us the hope of glory!” What did Paul tell us in 1 Corinthians 2:4? “And my speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit [of Christ] and of power [of the Holy Spirit], that your faith should not be in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.” [Even overcoming is not by some special human gene but by the Word and Presence of Christ in you, “Be of good cheer, I have overcome the world!”]

“Faith And Its Magnetic, Drawing Power”? People of true faith, through repentance toward God and faith in the finished work of Christ, are available vessels to all Christ Jesus is in His reigning and ruling everlasting Kingdom, and it’s not our “best” for Him but our availability to all “He desires” to do through us! This is why Paul trains and equips true followers with “the Truth”! Romans 14:17 says, “For the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit,” which is His overflow of Himself through available vessels!

Charles Wesley, in his “Psalms and Hymns” of the year 1738, wrote “And Can It Be?”, which is one of the richest, most valuable hymns ever written. Two verses I want to share:

“Long my imprisoned spirit lay, Fast bound in sin and nature’s night; God’s eye diffused a quickening ray – I woke, the dungeon flamed with light; my chains fell off, my heart was free, I rose, went forth, and followed Thee…

No condemnation now I dread; Jesus and all in Him is mine; Alive in Him, my living Head, and clothed in righteousness divine, Bold I approach the eternal throne, And claim the crown, through Christ my own. Bold I approach the eternal throne, And claim the crown, Through Christ my own.”

Christ Jesus had been brought up in Nazareth, and as was His custom, He went into the synagogue on the Sabbath, stood and read from Isaiah the prophet6: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He has anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to the captives…”! There’s more, but I want to impress upon you Christ’s coming “to preach liberty to the captives…!”

Have you accepted the divine truth that in your sin you are a ‘captive,’ a ‘prisoner’ detained in the limitation of a corrupt nature, but in Christ, through blood redemption, YOU ARE FORGIVEN AND SET FREE? Look at Psalm 146! “Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord, O my soul! While I live I will praise the Lord; I will sing praises to my God while I have my being…

Do not put your trust in princes, Nor in a son of man, in whom there is no help. His spirit departs, he returns to his earth; in that very day his plans perish. Happy is he who has the God of Jacob for his help, whose hope is in the Lord his God, who made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them; who keeps truth forever…

Who executes justice for the oppressed, who gives food to the hungry. The Lord gives freedom to the prisoners. The Lord opens the eyes of the blind; the Lord raises those who are bowed down; the Lord loves the righteous. The Lord watches over the strangers; He relieves the fatherless and widow; But the way of the wicked He turns upside down. The Lord shall reign forever – Your God, O Zion, to all generations. Praise the Lord!”

Are there spiritually blind who need the Lord to open their spiritual eyes? Are there the ‘crushed’ who need to be raised up? Are there hopeless who need our Lord’s gracious gift of hope? Are there fatherless children who need God the Father? Are there widows who need the Eternal Husband? Are there those around you whose plans have perished, and only the Lord can help their downcast, forlorn, deserted, desperate spirits? And how would you find yourself if you had to say like Paul, “but all forsook me.” But God says, “I will never leave you nor forsake you!”

“Faith and Its Magnetic, Drawing Power”? John Greenleaf Whittier, in his “The Eternal Goodness,” wrote: “I know not where His islands lift their fronded palms in air; I only know I cannot drift beyond His love and care.”

When a man has been “saved by grace through faith, and faith is the gift of God,” the convicted man, the repentant man, the transformed man, the man inhabited by the Resurrected Christ and the fullness and abiding presence of the Holy Spirit, is blessed by Holy Presence, Holy Power, Holy Privilege, Holy Persuasion that needs no argument, Holy Peace even in the midst of life’s greatest storms, and through Holy Providence is divinely blessed; and Edward Garrett once said, “To doubt the providence of God is presently to wax impatient with His commands,” which is why there are defyers of God, deniers of God, deflectors of God, degraders of God, and even departees from God!

Isaiah 26:3-4 says, “You [God] 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.” And you’re not sure what drawing power you should attach yourself to? Paul told the Ephesians, Ephesians 6:10, “Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might.”

Do you remember, as early as Genesis 5:24, that we learned of Enoch when we were straightened, alerted, guided, inspired, even convicted, that in the early days of human history, here was a man “who walked WITH GOD”! I so appreciate what Oswald Chambers wrote about Enoch when he said, [“My Utmost For His Highest,” p.211], “The worth of a man is revealed in his attitude to ordinary things when he is not before the footlights,” or ‘not on stage performing or imitating,’ but living out a united Life under Jesus’ Lordship, simply available to all He is and all He desires to do through you, even if it’s a casual walk together in sweet harmony and heavenly blessing being in His Presence!

I was given a gift years ago by dear friends from the Dayton, Ohio area, where many, many years ago I led a Bible conference. A number of years later these precious friends sent me Arthur Bennett’s book entitled “The Valley of Vision,” which was a collection of Puritan prayers and devotions, some probably back in the 1700’s and 1800’s. It has been such a blessing!

One writing is entitled “Love-Rest In God.” [pps. 332-333]. Follow with opened heart and mind! “My Dear Lord…I depend wholly upon You, wean me from all other dependences. You are my all, You overrule all and delight in me…

You are the foundation of goodness, how can I distrust You? How be anxious about what happens to me? In the light of Your preciousness the world and all its enjoyments are infinitely poor: I value the favor of men no more than pebbles…

Amid the blessings I receive from You may I never lose the heart of a stranger. May I love You, my Benefactor, in all my benefits, not forgetting that my greatest danger arises from my advantages…

Produce in me self-despair that will make Jesus [more] precious to me, delightful in all His offices, pleasurable in all His ways, and may I love His commands as well as His promises…

Help me to discern between true and false love, the one consisting of supreme love to You, the other not, the former uniting Your glory and man’s happiness that they may become one common interest, the latter disjointing and separating them both, seeking the latter with neglect of the former…

Teach me that genuine love is different in kind from that wrought by rational arguments or the motive of self-interest, that such love is a pleasing passion affording joy to the mind where it is. Grant me grace to distinguish between the genuine and the false, and to rest in You who are all love.” Amen & Amen!

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

“THE FAITH JOURNEY AND FOUL WATERS”

The first three verses of Hebrews 12 really highlights for us this ‘journey of faith’ true believers are a part of with a challenge of being alert, informed, and ready for the battles and circumstances of the faith walk we’ll find ourselves in at times. It says, “Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.”

Christ Jesus Himself, on His journey of redemption of fallen mankind, experienced the reality of ‘heavy weights,’ the ‘temptations of sin,’ the ‘bitter waters’ of the surrounding world population enslaved to demonic passions and fleshly desires.

If you go to the Book of Ezekiel, you’ll find challenging words AND convicting words that relate to the “faith journey.” In Ezekiel 2:8 God told Ezekiel, “eat what I give you,” and he ate, and Ezekial 3:3b tells us, Ezekial speaking, “So I ate, and it was in my mouth like honey in sweetness.” Then God told Ezekial that he was being sent, not to a people of unfamiliar speech or of hard language, but to the house of Israel, a people who then would not listen to God or receive His Word, a people who rejected the “faith journey” and drank “foul waters”, and found no joy in partaking of God’s sweet word that Ezekial said “tasted like honey”!

I’m sure you remember the journey of God’s people, Israel, in bondage in Egypt for about 400 years! Then deliverance, freedom, and the journey back to the Promised Land began. God miraculously opened the waters of the Red Sea and they, Israel, walked on dry land! In Exodus 15:21 Miriam said, “Sing to the Lord, for He has triumphed gloriously! The horse and its rider He has thrown into the sea!”

Then Exodus 15:22-25 tells us, “So Moses brought Israel from the Red Sea; then they went out into the Wilderness of Shur. And they went three days in the wilderness and found no water. Now when they came to Marah, they could not drink the waters of Marah, for they were bitter. Therefore the name of it was called Marah. And the people complained against Moses, saying, ‘What shall we drink?’ So he cried out to the Lord, and the Lord showed him a tree. When he cast it into the waters, the waters were made sweet.”

[Would you dare consider that the ‘tree’ Moses showed them related, previewed, represented the Cross of Calvary?].

You, no doubt, at least were awakened from the singing and dancing of Miriam as they celebrated freedom and deliverance from the bondage of Egypt! And then they came to “bitter waters”! Have you experienced that high swing and celebration of your freedom in Christ, but then experienced a moody, an emotional, and a changeable frame of mind and spirit, finding yourself hanging by a thin thread of hope, joy, and faith?

About sixty years ago I was a running back at Baylor University in Waco, Texas, and back then you played both offense and defense. I can tell you, there were times in certain games that “catching your second breath or wind” was a must – but at least we had “good water” to arouse us at times. Israelites? They had a long, long journey, got to Marah, and found “bitter waters” – they wanted to go back to Egypt! [Was that a test from God?].

They complained against Moses: “What shall we drink?” And thank God for those who know to cry out to Holy God! Thank God for those who know He “changes things”! Thank God for those who lean not to their own understanding, but in all their ways, paths, problems, appointments and disappointments, call out to Him, and, Yes, even find miraculous things that can and do occur!

Then, you read further in Exodus 15 and verse 27 tells us, “Then they came to Elim, where there were twelve wells of water and seventy palm trees; so they camped by the waters.” Where are YOU camped? How many do you personally know who are camped by their dry river-beds of their intellectually genius and never camp by the “rivers of living waters” called the Holy Word of God? “God so loved the world,” and they don’t even know it! “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son,” and they could care less! They choose the fleshly life evidenced by “no waters of Life in Christ”!

If the Lord God Almighty showed Moses a tree to toss in bitter waters and make those waters ‘sweet’, will God not do the same for you and me? And if the Lord Jesus Christ can say from that “tree”, “It is finished,” has His finished work on Calvary’s Cross made YOUR “bitter waters” sweet? Several truths I want you to see:

FIRST, IN THE “FAITH-JOURNEY” WE LEARN QUICKLY THAT WE ARE NOT IMMUNE FROM TROUBLES, TRIALS, AND TESTINGS! Dare I tell you that ‘wilderness journeys’ are not occasional ‘way-side events’ but even the norm for every true believer? Were you surprised when you read Matthew 4:1-10? Then Jesus was led up BY THE HOLY SPIRIT INTO THE WILDERNESS TO BE TEMPTED BY THE DEVIL…

And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterward He was hungry. Now when the tempter came to Him, he said, “If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.”…[Lust of the flesh!]

But Jesus answered and said, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.’”…

Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, set Him on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down. For it is written: ‘He shall give His angels charge over you,’ [Boastful pride of life!], and, ‘In their hands they shall bear You up, lest You dash Your foot against a stone.’”…

Jesus said to him, “It is written again, ‘You shall not tempt the Lord your God.’” Again, the devil took Him up on an exceedingly high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to Him, “All these things I will give You if You will fall down and worship me.” [Lust of the eyes!].

Then Jesus said to him, “Away with you, Satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only you shall serve.” Oh, and by the way, I truly love verse 11 which says, Then the devil left Him, and BEHOLD, angels came and ministered to Him. [And I thank and praise God for ministering, caring angels of mercy!].

In John 16:33 we read Jesus saying to us in this day of tribulation, temptation, even torment for some, and troubles that are fleshly, worldly, and demonic, “These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.” And in Christ Jesus you are or can be “more than conquerors”!

I can’t tell you exactly what your troubles, trials, or testings, may be exactly, but be assured, one, two, or three, are on your path, following close and ready to move in for your encounter with ‘reality’! No water, some water but excessively bitter to the taste, and then God grants them “miracle water” through His Sovereign touch!

But be assured: Faith journeys are not exempt, immune, or separated from what will shape us or break us, define us, or discipline us, enrich us in faith or declare us ‘poverty-stricken’ in faith! God “births” sons not snakes, God “transforms” not tolerates, God “writes” your faith-story not fiction, God “breaks” not belittles, God “exercises mercy” not madness, God “enriches” not bankrupts, God “atones” not annihilates, God “feeds faith” not starve, and God comes to you not as a growling bear but “the precious Lamb of God”!

If the Lord Jesus was despised and rejected by men, a Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, [Isaiah 53:3], as a follower of Christ, committed to His Lordship, do you think that your ‘faith’ has removed trouble from you? I am so enriched by what Oswald Chambers wrote in his “My Utmost For His Highest,” [p.127]. “Sin has made the basis of things wild and not rational. We have to recognize that sin is a fact, not a defect; sin is red-handed mutiny against God. Either God or sin must die in my life. The New Testament brings us right down to this one issue. If sin rules in me, God’s life in me will be killed; if God rules in me, sin in me will be killed. There is no possible ultimate but that. The climax of sin is that it crucified Jesus Christ, and what was true in the history of God on earth will be true in your history and in mine. In our mental outlook we have to reconcile ourselves to the fact of sin as the only explanation as to why Jesus Christ came, and as the explanation of the grief and sorrow in life.”

SECOND, IN THE “FAITH-JOURNEY” WE LEARN BY HUMAN EXPERIENCE AND RELATIONSHIPS THAT COMPLAINING HAS NO EFFECTIVE RESULT!

Israel was on a God-blessed journey from bondage in Egypt to the blessing of the God-ordained “Promised Land,” but the trip was to encourage complaining rather than heighten thanksgiving and praise to Almighty God?

Do you remember Job losing everything, even family, and then falling to the ground, he WORSHIPPED? Job 1:21 says, “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return there. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord,” with verse 22 then saying, In all this Job did not sin nor charge God with wrong. Then, in Job 13:15, we read Job saying, “Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him.”

The disciples were with Jesus in a boat when a great ‘storm’ arose, which is so possible in any believer’s journey, and they came to Jesus saying, “Lord, save us! We are perishing!” Matthew 8:26 then says, Jesus speaking to His troubled disciples, “Why are you fearful, O you of little faith?” Then, Jesus arose and rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm.

At times I wonder when terrible storms naturally, socially, politically, spiritually, arise in America with terrifying ‘winds’, what will the people of America do, and especially the “faith-troopers”? “Why are you fearful, O you of little faith?”

Is it possible that believers misplace ‘faith’ and put it in themselves rather than full confidence and trust in Who Christ Jesus truly is? There are times, events, circumstances, that happen, coming on many as a test of faith, but they don’t know it is, don’t appreciate at all what God has allowed, and don’t even know that they should not lean on themselves, but they do – God intended for true believers to lean on Him, trust Him, wait on Him, call on Him! So they complain with no calling upon Holy God!

Have you experienced “faltering faith” because it was faith in yourself and not faith in God? Have you received God’s Word that He will never leave you nor forsake you? Hebrews 13:6 says, “The Lord is my helper; I will not fear. What can man do to me?”

Did you catch the last part of Hebrews 13:5 that says: “For He Himself has said…”. If God “has said”, where do your doubts and fears come from? If God “has said”, is your ‘faith’ without a trustworthy foundation? Dare I tell you that one of the greatest treasures you can ever hold onto in your life is the fact that “God never fails”! He never falls short, and His ears are always open to your needy cries! You may say at times, “No man cares for my soul,” but never, ever, can you say, “God doesn’t care!” Just look at the Cross – and if YOU were the only man to ever live, what Christ Jesus did 2000 years ago for the whole world, He would do for your soul alone if you were the only one God allowed to be created! GOD LOVES YOU!

THIRD, IN THE “FAITH-JOURNEY” UNAFFLICTED LIVES NEVER SENSE THE NEED OF GOD’S HELP! Oh, it may be an unafflicted life physically, but one void of the very spiritual, eternal Life of Holy God, is sick and needs the touch of the Great Physician!

Do you remember Moses and Aaron, sent by God delivering a message to the Pharoah of Egypt? [Exodus 5:1-2], “…Moses and Aaron went in and told Pharoah, “Thus says the Lord God of Israel: ‘Let My people go, that they may hold a feast to Me in the wilderness.” And Pharoah said, “Who is the Lord, that I should obey His voice to let Israel go? I do not know the Lord, nor will I let Israel go.”

If the “fruit” one partakes of is from the “tree of good and evil,” affliction in the spirit-realm is immediate! And like Pharoah, they can only ask, “Who is the Lord God?”, because their supposed ‘unafflicted life’ is already in the state of spiritual death, desiring only the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil, which is a ‘curse,’ and places one in the state of condemnation! In John 3:18-21 Jesus alerts the unbelieving! “He who believes in Him [trusts in, relies upon, adheres to, OBEYS!] is not condemned; but he who does not believe is CONDEMNED ALREADY, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. And THIS IS THE CONDEMNATION, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil…

For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, because their deeds were evil. For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God.”

Is YOUR ‘walk of life’ a sad drama of godlessness or is your “walk in Life” that of the Resurrection Life of the Lord Jesus Christ, King of kings and Lord of lords, and is your walk to the honor of Him prophetically named as Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace, upon whose shoulders all life is supposed to rest! Are you ‘resting in Him’ or being ravished by the devil himself?

From what ‘cup’ are you drinking? The cup of God’s indignation or the cup of His inspiration? The cup of the devil or the cup of Christ? The cup of the curse or the cup of the Lord’s blessing? The cup of New Testament life in Christ or the devil’s cup of constant deaths? The cup of devilish celebration for evil or the cup of Jesus’ suffering for your salvation and your suffering for His honor and glory alone?

Oh, hear me!! Christ Jesus’ Resurrection Life within the penitent heart and yielded body, mind, and soul, is worthy of all honor, glory, and praise! As Jude finished his brief writing, he said in Verses 24-25, “Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to present you faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy, To God our Savior, who alone is wise, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and forever. Amen.”

A bitter life for a blessed life! A cursed life for a converted life in Christ! A dead life for Resurrection Life and Resurrection Power and Resurrection Purpose! A separated life from Holy God to a united life as One in the Spirit! A meaningless life for the Master’s Life of ministry, loving, caring, blessing others as He has blessed you! The bitterness of a mortal life for eternal presence united with God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit! An in-bondage life chained by the devil for the Life of eternal freedom in Him! A Satanic owned life but bought by Christ with His own precious blood! A life ticketed for Hell but raised up to be seated with Christ in heavenly places! Marah’s bitterness for the Master’s blessing! The heathen transformed into the heavenly one! The woefulness of fleshly despair for the wonder of Faith’s delight!

The dark places of devilish bondage for the Light that never grows dim and shows us His Highway of Holiness! Self for the Savior. Earth’s bitterness for Heaven’s unending blessing! World hatred for Heaven’s sacrificial love and grace! Passing words of intellectual meaninglessness for Eternal Truth from the Throne of God! Hell today – Heaven forever! Separated to self, selfishness, diabolical sensuousness, a slave of the flesh Or servant of God separated to the very life, work, and ministry He calls us to! Amen? Bitter waters sweetened! And it is so good, so blessed, so thrilling, so exciting, so fulfilling, so redemptive, so rich in the grace of God for His glory, honor, and praise!

Why “foul waters” when Jesus gives you “streams of Living Water”, “seas of Holy blessings,” and “oceans of His omnipresence and omnipotence”? Amen?

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

“FAITH’S FIRST LOVE – FOLLOWERS’ FAITHFUL OBEDIENCE”

I’m sure that you’ve been deeply impressed, convicted, and inspired by Paul’s early words in Romans 1:8-12 when he wrote: “FIRST, I thank God through Jesus Christ [good place for any man of faith to begin any day in his life’s journey of faith!] for you all, that your faith is spoken of throughout the whole world. For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of His Son, that without ceasing I make mention of you always in my prayers, making request if, by some means, now at last I may find a way in the will of God to come to you. For I long to see you, that I may impart to you some spiritual gift, so that you may be established – that is, that I may be encouraged together with you by the mutual faith both of you and me.”

Faith, first, followers, faithful? These are words of eternal importance interpreted by the Presence and Power and Promises of God, but heightened, strengthened, expanded, enlarged, when we read John’s precious words in 1 John 4:19, “We love Him because He FIRST loved us.” And if Paul says he wrote to the church in Rome, and us today, “so that you may be established,” or ‘made to stand’, there is no better beginning in the “faith journey” than taking hold of “Faith’s First Love” and exercising “Followers’ Faithful Obedience”!

“We love Him because He FIRST loved us”! Without awareness of God’s FIRST loving us, I’m not sure of fallen men loving Him without knowing what door of faith and obedience would have been opened! But fallen mankind was and is forever blessed by the “Father’s love” and awareness that it was He who knocked on our heart’s door and illumined our minds with the brightness of Heaven’s Light gloriously shining on the reality of God’s love demonstrated through Christ’s Cross!

Is it any wonder to you that Psalm 119:64 tells us, “The earth, O Lord, is full of Your mercy; teach me Your statutes”? Oswald Chambers wrote in his book, “My Utmost For His Highest,” [p.272], “Our yesterdays present irreparable things to us; it is true that we have lost opportunities which will never return, but God can transform this destructive anxiety into a constructive thoughtfulness for the future. Let the past sleep, but let it sleep on the bosom of Christ.”

Neither fallen man’s guilt or his goodness was a strong consideration in the sacrifice of Christ, but the reality of redemption came as the overflow of the powerful heart of the God of eternal love! Reflect upon John’s statements in John 1:10-13,16: “He [Christ Jesus] was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him. He came to His own, and His own did not receive Him. But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name [trust in, relies upon, adheres to]: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.” Verse 16, “And of His fullness we have all received, and grace for grace.” Grace? Undeserved, unmerited favor of God Almighty because of HIS GOODNESS, not ours!

If there is any love in humanity, it’s because love comes from God! If there is any kindness in humanity, it’s because God is kind and it flows, at times, even through the unredeemed! If there is any goodness in unbelievers, it’s because “God is so good”! And, if God’s love is a proven eternal reality, is that the door that opens our true love of Him and the spreading of His love through us to a loveless world and its deprived humanity?

“FAITH’S FIRST LOVE – FOLLOWERS’ FAITHFUL OBEDIENCE”? Whether we consider ourselves personally or a ‘lost world’ collectively, OUR FIRST CONSIDERATION OR EVALUATION OF OURSELVES AND THE WORLD AT LARGE MUST BE THE AWARENESS OF OUR NEED OF HIS ETERNAL LOVE RECEIVED AND RELEASED BY THE REALITY OF RE-BIRTH AND THE “REST” OF SAVING FAITH!

If Christ Jesus tells us in John 3:3 as Jesus said to Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews, is it optional for us? “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God,” and then in John 3:5, Jesus compassionately declared, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water [that’s the ‘water of the Word!’] and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God,” because flesh IS flesh and the Spirit is the necessity of the spirit of fallen men!

In 1 John 4:7-11 John also said, “Beloved, let us love one another, for love IS OF GOD [not fallen flesh!]; and everyone who loves [agape love or God’s love of the ‘laid-down life spirit’, not simply phileo or friendship love!], is born of God and knows God. He who does not love does not know God, for God is love. In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.”

Consider the lost, alienated from God world around you – what do you see, not only before your very eyes across America, but worldwide, in every area of every nation, large or small? Vainness foments, viciousness fights, vice poisons, venom penetrates, victims retaliate, vagrants wander through life with no consideration of Holy God or His purpose for their lives, vanity pumps ‘flesh’ without any consideration of eternal value ‘in God’ or His plans for human existence, a constant veering away from God rather than running to Him, and as He speaks loudly to them, they then run to find their own locked vault ‘where God cannot see me and I don’t have to hear Him!’

You’ll remember as you read Adam and Eve’s experience in Genesis 3 about what I called their “Fig Leaf Religion”, when their ‘eyes’ were opened and they realized their nakedness before God, that they sewed fig leaves together to cover themselves, and then hid themselves from the presence of the Lord, understanding that today unbelievers are creative in hiding themselves from Holy God, but He keeps coming because of His deep and abiding love for every one of His created beings!

Are there ‘loveless beings’ in the world of God WHO IS LOVE AND LOVING? In 1 John 4:8 we read, “He who does not love does not know God, for God is love.” Love received is love given, but when you find a ‘loveless society’ of fallen away beings, you find a society of individuals who neither love themselves, others, or even Holy God Himself! “God SO LOVED THE WORLD that He gave His Son…”, but you could care less about even those around you? And what does 1 John 4:11 tell us? “Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.”

Didn’t Hebrews 12:2 tell us, “looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God”? Do you believe that faith is submission to the Father’s will? You say, “I love God,” but you refuse, and occasionally, as it fits YOUR desires, yield yourself to Master Jesus, Lord Jesus, Submissive Jesus to the Father’s will, but for you, as a believer, to obey would be you saving yourself? What DECEPTION!

What does Hebrews 11:6 tell us? “But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.” You seek, but you don’t have to submit? I tell you, true faith knows the Father’s will, and does it! This is why we’ve already seen Jesus saying, “Why do you call Me ‘Lord, Lord’, but you do not do what I say?” Oh, but there are those who truly are aware of the Great God they serve and know their need of Him every day, good and bad days, days when trouble seems to reign, one’s God-given strength seems to weaken, sorrow stings like it’s a non-ending pain and loss, afflictions emit bitterness, and this “valley” brings one to a place he/she must decide: me or the Master, grit or His grace, resentment for my dilemma or rest in His promises?

And, thank God, we read in John 20:29, “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” You as a disciple of Christ Jesus are not called to reason but to revelation of who He is and what He has said – and you “rest” in Him!

SECOND, From “Faith’s First Love” to the FOLLOWERS’ FAITHFUL OBEDIENCE, WE DISCOVER THE ETERNAL LOVE OF GOD BEING EXPRESSED THROUGH US TO THOSE WHO NEED SAVING GRACE, NEED DIVINE BLESSING, AND NEED HIS FAITHFUL PROVISIONS!

1 John 3:14 lays it out in a consecrated way, a way of conviction, and a way that converts and calls one TO the love of God! It says: “We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love the brethren.” Apart from Christ, fallen mankind lives in the state of spiritual death, alienated from God, unaware of the eternal extent of His love, bound by the chains of the old sin nature, poisoned by the infection of a ‘fleshly’ love, blighted by the scorn and indifference of God’s amazing love, darkened in the mind to the very Light of God and His liberty to every repentant man who trust in the shed blood of Christ!

Loving the brethren, loving the lost, loving the alienated and separated from God, loving the indifferent, loving the spiritually ill, loving the town’s number one sinner, loving the very enemies of God, loving the guilty, the misguided, the mean, the hard-hearted, the decent and the indecent; God’s love is boundless, even immeasurable, abundant; loving others for the honor of Christ is the dynamic of bringing God and His love into human hearts and seeing the reality of divine transformation!

“Arise, shine” is the Old Testament version of “Arise, love” as an act of obedience, as an expression of His presence in you and through you, as a heart-felt belief and a mind renewed by God Himself, as the divine reality it is, reaching out to touch His world with His very own spiritually implanted heart, reaching out to raise the dead, uplift the fallen, restore not one’s imagination but his inheritance of the very wealth of God’s eternal love, sharing with the unloved the constraining power of divine love envisioned in Christ suffering on the Cross, unveiling for them the ‘paradises’ on earth enveloped in the fullness of Holy Love!

Do you remember Peter’s instruction in 2 Peter 1:5-11, following his declaration in Verse 3 that “His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness,” saying, Verses 5-11, “But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love…

For if these things are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For he who lacks these things is shortsighted, even to blindness, and has forgotten that he was cleansed from his old sins…

Therefore, brethren, be even more diligent to make your call and election sure, for if you do these things you will never stumble; for so an entrance will be supplied to you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.”

But Paul calls us ALL to spiritual evaluation of where our allegiance really lies. In Galatians 1:10 he stated, “For do I now persuade men, or God? Or do I seek to please men? For if I still pleased men, I would not be a bondservant of Christ.”

In my Holman Edition of the New King James Version of the Bible, Luke 14:26-33, highlights four calls to true discipleship in following Christ:

• Undivided Devotion – Luke 14:26, 2) Costly Commitment – Luke 14:27, 3) Costly Analysis – Luke 14:31, 4) Awesome Surrender – Luke 14:33

Who or what truly has your heart and mind? And, if Jesus says, “This man cannot be My disciple because…,” and in the Holy Court of King Jesus, some are warmly welcomed while others hear, “Depart from Me, I never knew you,” is there a response you have that would change the King’s mind?

It was Frederick William Robertson who once wrote: “Sacrifice alone, bare and unrelieved, is ghastly, unnatural, and dead; but self-sacrifice, illuminated by love, is warmth, and life; it is the death of Christ, the life of God, and the blessedness and only proper life of man.” Didn’t Jesus tell us about the man who saves himself for himself, then loses his life that he so treasured?

THIRD, From ‘Faith’s First Love” to the “Followers’ Faithful Obedience,” Consider THAT SELF-DENIAL IS THE FULLNESS OF THE BLESSING OF THE GOSPEL OF JESUS CHRIST!

What did Jesus tell us in Matthew 16:24-25? “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it.”

But what if “self-pleasure” rules in a man’s heart and life, and denying himself is like a foreign language he cannot understand? Rather than “We ought to obey God rather than men,” you find those who obey themselves as fallen men in disrespect of God’s divine will? The world, the flesh, and the devil consume many who only know spiritual deception, and Holy God must come like a mighty wind, blowing down those walls of deception that ‘the lost” may be “found” fully convicted, sick of their sin and sin nature, and fully desirous of God’s graciousness and kindness and love as they discover that Christ Jesus took their sin and guilt with Him as He shed His own blood in obedience to Father-God’s command, and set the “captives” free!

Though God had declared us ‘unclean’ before the Cross, the heart of Father-God led in the establishment of “the Fountain filled with blood drawn from Emmanuel’s veins,” and convicted by the Holy Spirit of our sin, that same Holy Spirit unveiled Christ to the darkest of sinners that they might discover the “Light of life” in and through Him! Men bound in the temporal were freed to rest in the Eternal! Men bound in the wells of emptiness discover life in the fullness of God’s blessings! Men fully attached to “shadows” are delivered from them to the very substance of Christ’s Resurrection Life and Hope! Men deceived in their world by “good and best efforts” discover Christ Jesus as their “All in all!”

And to that man of faith, what did the Lord and Savior say? “I will never leave you nor forsake you!” Would YOU dare to say daily, “I personally choose to live under the awesome administration and the ruler-ship of His omnipotence” without any hesitation? Are you a true believer who lives in an attitude of praise because you know what you were saved from and what God intends to do through you as His representative of “Amazing Grace”, unveiling, exemplifying, even demonstrating your recovery from “the fall” and from “the chains Satan used to bind you with”, revealing gladly the freedom, the inheritance, and the marvelous wonders of love and grace poured out on you? “We love Christ Jesus because He “First” loved us!”

FOURTH, IF A FOLLOWER”S FAITHFUL OBEDIENCE IS COMPROMISED, DECEIVED, OR FALLS AWAY FROM FULL DEVOTION, IS THERE HOPE OF RENEWED FAITH AND A RETURN TO THE WAY OF BLESSING?

There are highly interesting and significant verses in 1 Corinthians 3:1-3 when Paul has learned of spiritual immaturity in some lives within the Corinth fellowship. He said, “And I, brethren, could not speak to you as to spiritual people but as to carnal, as to babes in Christ. I fed you with milk and not with solid food; for until now you were not able to receive it, and even now you are still not able; for you are still carnal. For where there are envy, strife, and divisions among you, are you not carnal, “AND BEHAVING LIKE MERE MEN?”

“Behaving like mere men?” Is that resurrecting the old ‘animal instincts’ of the fallen sin-nature? Is that tearing God from His throne in us and assuming “I’m able to choose for myself what pleases me; God knows it’s just a child’s ‘play-time’, not permanent.” Rather than understanding absolute dependence upon God Himself for one to live the victorious, over-coming life, many feel “I’m able”, and fall away quickly.

It was A.G. Lawson who once said, “Usually he is most empty who is most full of himself.” Are you aware of why Paul chose daily to “die to himself” taking the sentence of death that Christ’s Resurrection Life would reign supreme? I’m convinced one of the major ministries in discipleship training is over-viewing for all new disciples that, apart from the devil and the world, their old self can be very deceiving and lead one to “play” with sin, getting burned! If YOU are out to satisfy yourself, you’re pouring ice-cold water on your devotion to honor Christ!

Have you read Jeremiah lately? In Jeremiah 3:11-13 God spoke to the prophet about ‘backsliding’: Verse 12-13, Go and proclaim these words toward the north, and say: ‘Return, backsliding Israel,’ says the Lord; ‘I will not cause My anger to fall on you. For I am merciful,’ says the Lord; ‘I will not remain angry forever. Only acknowledge your iniquity, that you have transgressed against the Lord your God, and have scattered your charms to alien deities under every green tree, and you have not obeyed My voice,’ says the Lord.

If you are a ‘backslider’, God loves you enough to come to you and tell you the Truth! “Repent, or else!” Gross rebellion of a son or daughter of the “faith-in-God-family” CAN find mercy and grace if the repentant heart is resurrected; and God loves “the remnant”, even of Israel that turned their backs on Him – the “remnant” were delivered, saved, washed clean, returned to give God His rightful place as Sovereign Savior and Lord! Doesn’t 1 John 2:1b tell us, “And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.”

That should intensify your love and devotion to the God of your salvation! Renewed faith and a return to His blessing ministry, to His awesome presence, to the Throne of a Godly rule that compels you to bow, to renew, to yield to the God who loved YOU before you’d even be born?

A.J. Gordon wrote the old hymn entitled, “My Jesus, I Love Thee,” which needs to be restored to our modern-world worship! It says:

“My Jesus, I love You, I know You are mine, For You all the follies of sin I resign; My gracious Redeemer, my Savior You are; If ever I loved You, my Jesus, it’s now.

I love You because You first loved me, And purchased my pardon on Calvary’s tree; I love You for wearing the thorns on Your brow; If ever I loved You, my Jesus, it’s now.

I’ll love You in life, I will love You in death, And praise You as long as You lend me breath; And say when the death-dew lies cold on my brow, If ever I loved You, my Jesus, it’s now.

In mansions of glory and endless delight, I’ll ever adore You in heaven so bright; I’ll sing with the glittering crown on my brow, If ever I loved You, my Jesus, it’s now.”

Tell me about YOUR love-song to Christ Jesus, your Savior and Lord! Are you singing right now?

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

“FAITH’S CALL OR FAITH’S COMMITMENT?”

How do you respond when you hear Christ Jesus say, as He did in Matthew 16:24-25, Then Jesus said to His disciples, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it.” Denying self? But don’t you know?, “Why, my individuality is mine to express it as I please! Why God says, ‘deny yourself,’ I’ll never know!”

I have no doubts that this is why Oswald Chambers wrote in “My Utmost For His Highest,” [p.257], “Individuality counterfeits personality as lust counterfeits love. God designed human nature for Himself; individuality debases human nature for itself.”

As a reminder, do you remember Samson’s story of many, many years of strong exploits to the glory of God, but then a day came when his physical strength was overshadowed by darkness in the mind, playing with fire and being burned, overcome by Delilah’s enticements, and chained like a prisoner? He knew “Faith’s Call” and for years and years honored the Lord, but ‘the calling’ took a backseat apart from “Faith’s Commitment”, and the enemies of God brought temptations, snares, evil opportunities to disgrace initial faith and obedience, and lead him down what appeared to be “primrose paths of pleasure” but became hellish shame!

But opposite of Samson’s “fall”, I want you to see “Faith’s Commitment”! [I challenge you to read all of the Book of Esther before continuing!]. Here is a young lady, beautiful in appearance, chosen to become the wife of the King, Ahasuerus, a very strong leader. Among the “support team” was a man by the name of Haman, a man very opposed to the Jewish people, who got a door opened to bring about the very destruction of Esther’s people.

There was a man by the name of Mordecai who went to Esther, challenging her to go and seek to persuade the king to ‘save the Jews.” Esther 4:5-7 tells us, Then Esther called Hathach, one of the king’s eunuchs whom he had appointed to attend her, and she gave him a command concerning Mordecai, to learn what and why this was. So Hathach went out to Mordecai in the city square that was in front of the king’s gate. And Mordecai told him all that had happened to him, and the sum of money that Haman had promised to pay into the king’s treasuries to destroy the Jews.” [And don’t you wonder, pause, think, “Why such hostility?” Was Christ Jesus to be born through the Jewish line? Would even in Esther’s days there be an undercurrent of resistance to the birth of the Lamb of God?]

In Esther 4:13-14 we read, And Mordecai told them to answer Esther: “Do not think in your heart that you will escape in the king’s palace any more than all the other Jews. For if you remain completely silent at this time, relief and deliverance will arise for the Jews from another place, but you and your father’s house will perish. Yet who knows whether you have come to the kingdom for such a time as this?”

Then Esther told them to reply to Mordecai, “Go, gather all the Jews who are present in Shushan, and fast for me; neither eat nor drink for three days, night or day. And so I will go to the king, which is against the law; and if I perish, I perish!” Later, in Esther 8:5-6, Esther arose and stood before the king, saying, “If it pleases the king, and if I have found favor in his sight and the thing seems right to the king and I am pleasing in his eyes, let it be written to revoke the letters devised by Haman, which he wrote to annihilate the Jews who are in all the king’s provinces. For how can I endure to see the evil that will come to my people? Or how can I endure to see the destruction of my countrymen?”

“If I perish, I perish!” In the sovereignty of Holy God, was God, Holy God, simply granting her the position of queen because she was beautiful or so she would become known as a glorious queen as a prize picture in the king’s court? I don’t think so! In His sovereignty God chose Esther as Queen to save her people in her outreach to Holy God! [Who are you reaching out to God for concerning their salvation, deliverance, or healing?]

In Esther 7:6, before the king, when asked who it was, she said, “The adversary and enemy is this wicked Haman!” Verse 8 then tells us, “So they hanged Haman on the gallows that he had prepared for Mordecai. Then the king’s wrath subsided.”

But, what if Esther had no desire to defend her own countrymen? What if Esther thought only of herself? What if her ‘individuality’ was uppermost in her mind, spirit, and heart, closing herself off to the consideration or possibility of the massacre of her own people, the Jews? And Esther did what? She stepped up to do a work of compassion, love, and faithfulness, in seeing her people saved from Haman’s heartless, selfish, and devilish plan!

And, how thrilling, encouraging, uplifting is the word we find of Christ Jesus’ intervention to save us out of the death throes of spiritual disappointment when He went to the Cross in our place? Paul told us and the world, in Romans 6:4, “Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.” That’s His resurrection life, resurrection power, and resurrection hope!

You do understand that Haman operated his life from “darkness” while Esther walked and served in the “Light”, and “Light” does expose and expels ‘darkness’ wherever Esther or YOU find yourself!

In Ephesians 4:17-19 Paul calls to our attention the ‘role’ the fallen sin nature played in Haman’s self-centered existence and in all of fallen man’s history when he wrote: “This I say, therefore, and testify in the Lord, that you should no longer walk as the rest of the Gentiles walk, in the futility of their mind, having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart; who, being past feeling, have given themselves over to lewdness, to work all uncleanness with greediness.”

If Haman walked in darkness and Esther walked in the “Light”, have you wrestled with your own existence up until now? Darkness or Light, ‘myself’ or ministry unto the needy, self-preference or dead to self that our Lord’s resurrection ministry may be manifested through your mortal flesh, self-concern or Kingdom rule? Didn’t Paul add in Ephesians 5:15, “See then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil.” Circumspectly? Would that be godly observance, caring watch-care, prudent and wise and holy observance, with awareness of how one intercedes to the glory of Christ?

Many years ago Archibald Alexander made this wise statement, “All my theology is reduced to this narrow compass – Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.” And when it comes to “Kingdom living” today, have you invented or accepted a different way of life than “Christ in you the hope of glory”? And how does it come to pass that an Esther can say, “If I perish, I perish”?

First, A Redeemed Life Sees Life Lived No Longer Unto Themselves But Unto The Eternal Purposes Of Holy God And King Jesus! What did Paul tell us in Galatians 6:14? “But God forbid that I should boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.”

I’m really not sure if the modern-day, professing church has ever heard much about the word, the spirit of, the actual participation in “consecrated”. In Hebrews 10:19-23 we read, “Therefore, brethren, having boldness to enter the Holiest by the blood of Jesus, by A NEW AND LIVING WAY which He consecrated for us, through the veil, that is, His flesh, and having a High Priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the ‘confession’ of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful.”

That “New and Living Way” that we just read about IS “the laid-down life” in service unto others! Whatever honors and glorifies Christ Jesus through true believers is acceptable, even if it is the pains and agonies of physical persecution for the Lord’s honor and glory! What about “lions” dens? Are they acceptable to you if necessary? What about isolation, even imprisonments for the faith, or even loss of job or income, or ‘bearing in your body the marks of suffering for Christ’?

But, you are aware that, rather than consecration many, like Israel in the Old Testament, live in desecration without a thought of holy allegiance and honor and blessing of their Savior, Master, and Lord, through the life they live as “professors of the faith”! But not a true disciple like Paul the Apostle! In Acts 20:18-24 Paul, having called for the elders of the church in Ephesus, said to them, “You know, from the first day that I came to Asia, in what manner I always lived among you, serving the Lord with all humility, with many tears and trials which happened to me by the plotting of the Jews; how I kept back nothing that was helpful, but proclaimed it to you, and taught you publicly from house to house, testifying to Jews and also to Greeks, repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ. And see, now I go bound in the spirit to Jerusalem, not knowing the things that will happen to me there, except that the Holy Spirit testifies in every city, saying that chains and tribulations await me. But none of these things move me; nor do I count my life dear to myself, so that I may finish my race with joy, and the ministry which I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of the grace of God.”

Are you aware of the calling as a “royal ambassador of Christ”? 2 Corinthians 5:20-21 we read, “Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us: we implore you on Christ’s behalf, be reconciled to God. For He [God] made Him [Christ Jesus] who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.”

Second, A Redeemed Life, Set Apart To Honor Christ And Extend His Earthly Witness Is A Man/Woman Empowered By God’s Spirit! The “best” of fleshly effort in the warfare for the souls of men is like a soldier sent into battle without guns or ammunitions for his guns – he either dies young or spends his life behind bars, but never as “more than conqueror”!

But in 2 Corinthians 3:1-6 the Apostle inspires true believers saying, “Do we begin again to commend ourselves? Or do we need, as some others, epistles of commendation to you or letters of commendation from you? You are our epistle written in our hearts, known and read by all men; clearly you are an epistle of Christ, ministered by us, written not with ink but by the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of flesh, that is, of the heart.

And we have such trust through Christ toward God. NOT THAT WE ARE SUFFICIENT OF OURSELVES TO THINK OF ANYTHING AS BEING FROM OURSELVES, BUT OUR SUFFICIENCY IS FROM GOD, who also made us sufficient as ministers of the new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, BUT THE SPIRIT GIVES LIFE.”

Have you been “commissioned by Christ,” “anointed by and in the Spirit,” “empowered by Heaven’s authority,” knowing “that the Lord has set apart for Himself him who is godly; the Lord will hear when I call to Him,” [Psalm 4:3]. Set apart in the sovereignty of God are “chosen vessels”, and Acts 1:8 tells us, “But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”

Empowered by God’s Spirit? Jude 20-21 says, “But you, beloved, building yourselves up ON your most holy faith, PRAYING IN THE HOLY SPIRIT, keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.” And, I say to you, a prayerless man is an impotent servant who ‘tries’ but seldom trusts! Believers are powerless seeking to honor Christ by “best efforts” – Your Savior and Lord longs for you to daily empty yourself and daily yield, surrender, abide in, even WAIT upon the Spirit’s leadership! We don’t ‘walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit’! [Romans 8:1]. We are sons of God who are to be led daily by the Spirit of God!

Third, A Redeemed Life, Set Apart To Honor Christ And Extend His Earthly Witness Is A Man/Woman Who Will Be Cornered, Challenged, Confused, Condemned By The Devil And His Evil Forces Called Demons!

Dare I tell you that one of the devil’s battle plans is to “pump your ego” as to all you have to offer God in your service for Him? Yet Paul talked about you taking the sentence daily to your old man so the Resurrection Life of Christ, by His Spirit, might be manifested in your mortal flesh!

Are you ever wondering about the “self, back-slappers” who are certain God couldn’t get by without them? That, my friends, is demonic deception at an extreme high level!

You are aware that our Savior, the Lord Jesus, encountered satanic opposition as He walked those three years of ministry before His death, burial, and resurrection. Over and over Satan was driven to bring Him down, but Jesus stood strong. Satan would leave Him alone for a period of time, looking for a more opportune moment to bring Jesus down! Jesus won! And His triumph over the powers of darkness is your victory-present to enjoy, walk with, and stand tall with in your walk in honor of Christ!

But are you aware that the self-indulgent who ‘profess’ allegiance to Christ are the easy targets of satanic soldiers representing Hell and its head, the devil? And the reason? Self-indulgence is, at times, unseen forces at work, encouraging and opening door after door to satisfy the ‘flesh’ and seek to suffocate the Spirit! All of a sudden delight in satisfying the flesh breeds even ‘the delight of despair’, with the victim deciding, “I might as well go Hell’s way and have some fun,” not realizing Satan is a faithful pay-master with illegal currency!

There were those that John told us about that our Lord would not commit Himself to them, because He knew what was in them and who was directing their steps to the slippery slopes, descending downward, not upward toward God!

The devil’s intent is to deceive us and lead us away from God, not toward Him! And without the healing, the deliverance, the saving of our souls by His blood, men are in a state of utter helplessness because of unbelief, with severe wounds that put them, without our Lord’s grace and mercy and gift of faith, in a hopeless condition! It’s so tragic to see, sense, and sorrow over man’s sin-sickness, yes, physically, spiritually, emotionally, mentally, and walking downward with the devil’s deceptions on a reckless, irresponsible path, easily scarred, tragically deformed, like “the whole creation groaning and travailing in pain together until now.”

It was E. Stanley Jones, a very strong, anointed missionary to India many years ago who wrote the following: [“The Christ of the Mount,” New York: Abingdon Press, 1931,p.9], “Loosed from the moorings that have held life, many are now adrift. They claim to be free. They have thrown overboard the chart, the compass, the steering wheel, and the consciousness of destination. They are free from everything – except the rocks, and the storms, and the insufferable inanity of being tossed from wave to wave of mere meaningless emotion…The modern man is ‘left by science without a goal; by exploded humanitarianism without a hero; by logic with an impasse’ – he needs a way out;” Dr. Jones then shared our Lord’s words from John 8:31-32, speaking to the Jews who had believed Him,

“If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed. And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”

I pray that YOU are not surprised that Christ Jesus said in John 14:6, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.” But how many do you know who “profess” devotion to Christ by baptism and church membership without even a hint of understanding the truth or opening His Word as their “daily bread” and “meat of the Word”? That, my friends, is deadly deception!

Closing this chapter, I want to use a small section of Oswald Chambers’ “My Utmost For His Highest,” [p.262-263], entitled “The Test of Loyalty.” He quoted Romans 8:28, “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, [Check out the Book of Job!!], to those who are the called according to His purpose.” Chambers said:

It is only the loyal soul who believes that God engineers circumstances. We take such liberty with our circumstances, we do not believe God engineers them, although we say we do; we treat the things that happen as if they were engineered by men. To be faithful in every circumstance means that we have only one loyalty, and that is to our Lord. Suddenly God breaks up a particular set of circumstances, and the realization comes that we have been disloyal to Him by not recognizing that He had ordered them; we never saw what He was after, and that particular thing will never be repeated all the days of our life. The test of loyalty always comes just there. If we learn to worship God in the trying circumstances, He will alter them in two seconds when He chooses…

Loyalty to Jesus Christ is the thing that we “stick at” today. We will be loyal to work, to service, to anything, but do not ask us to be loyal to Jesus Christ. Many Christians are intensely impatient of talking about loyalty to Jesus. Our Lord is dethroned more emphatically by Christian workers than by the world. God is made a machine for blessing men, and Jesus Christ is made a Worker among workers…

The idea is not that we do work for God, but that we are so loyal to Him that He can do His work through us – ‘I reckon on you for extreme service, with no complaining on your part and no explanation on Mine.” God wants to use us as He used His own Son.”

Are YOU available to Him as the vessel through whom He pours Himself!!??

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

“TRUE FAITH – YOUR THOUGHTS OR GOD’S TRUTH?”

Studying the Book of Jeremiah recently I was challenged by God’s words through his chosen prophet in Jeremiah 6:13-16, “Because from the least of them even to the greatest of them, everyone is given to covetousness; and from the prophet to the priest, everyone deals falsely. They have also healed the hurt of My people slightly, saying, ‘Peace, peace!’ when there is no peace…

Were they ashamed when they had committed abomination? No! They were not at all ashamed; nor did they know how to blush. Therefore they shall fall among those who fall; At the time I punish them, they shall be cast down,” says the Lord..

Thus says the Lord: “Stand in the ways and see, and ask for the old paths, where the good way is, and walk in it; then you will find rest for your souls. But they said, ‘We will not walk in it.’” Does that sound familiar in our modern-world?

And the result of strong rebellion to Holy God? Verses 17-19 enlightens us about what a nation will visibly see as Holy God brings judgment on unrepentant nations, even the U.S.A.! “Also, I set watchmen over you, saying, ‘Listen to the sound of the trumpet!’ But they said, ‘We will not listen.’…

Therefore hear, you nations, and know, O congregation, what is among them. Hear, O earth! BEHOLD, I will certainly bring calamity on this people – “the fruit of their thoughts”, because they have not heeded My words nor My law, but rejected it.”

Contemplate what you’ve just read, examining your own heart, mind, walk, and your pilgrimage of faith’s journey: Are YOU being reconciled to God through the witness of Christ Jesus in you and through you? What does 2 Corinthians 5:9 say to us through Paul’s inspired word? “Therefore we make it our aim, whether present or absent, to be well pleasing to Him,” Paul saying, “When I’m with you, my aim is to honor Christ in a yielded walk before you, and when I’m absent from your presence, I’m guided by the same commitment: I want Christ Jesus to be honored through me at all times!”

But how tragic do you find the story of Israel’s history as God had set them apart to prepare a lost world for the coming of “Promised Messiah, Redeemer, Lord and Master, Emmanuel – God in the flesh,” but they rejected Christ Jesus, even their ‘religious’ Judaizers leading in Jesus’ crucifixion and rejection, with only a slim minority like Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, resting in Messiah’s coming!

So God brought judgment on their thoughts? “Oh, I know God resists my sin and sinful ways, but He also condemns and brings judgment on my sins that are in my mind?” In Genesis 6:3 the Lord said, “My Spirit shall not strive with man forever, for he is indeed flesh…Verse 6, Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually…Verse 8, But Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord,” BECAUSE GOD FOUND A MAN WILLING TO WALK IN GOD’S WAYS, NOT HIS OWN! And in that early time period, related to mankind, we see the beginning of the unfolding of the mercy and grace and love of God!

But what should catch your ‘eye’ and enlighten your mind is GOD SEEING “that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually”! Even King David’s prayer should enlarge your understanding when in Psalm 51:3-5 David prayed, “For I acknowledge my transgressions, and my sin is always before me. Against You, You only, have I sinned, and done this evil in Your sight – that You may be found just when You speak, and blameless when You judge.”

But I want you to know that in the spiritual realm of all humanity, the Word calls us to attention to consider God’s intent that all men, through repentance toward God and faith in Christ alone for His sacrificial death to restore us all to our callings, which Revelation 1:5-6 reveals, with John saying, “Grace to you and peace from Him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven Spirits who are before His throne, and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler over the kings of the earth. To Him who loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and has made us kings and priests to His God and Father, to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.”

God’s desire? God’s intent? God’s sharing of Kingdom rule on earth as it is in Heaven? God’s will for men to rule, but evil thoughts assume leadership in men’s minds and hearts rather than submitted to the authority of God? Satan’s intent? Satan’s plan? Satan’s scheme? Building his own kingdom in opposition to Holy God and His Kingdom! And the tragedy erupted, sin spawned in the hearts and minds of men, and rebellion, disobedience, unbelief, fleshly intent, swept over all mankind, with the fallen world becoming dominated by Satan’s ‘friends’, thinking they’ve won the spiritual war for the souls of all men – but then there was the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ Jesus, and He began to reign, build His Kingdom, looking for the final days of spiritual warfare to be brought to a glorious victory “in Jesus”! But the “war” is on right now!

First, Let’s Look At False ‘Faith,’ False ‘Fruit,’ ‘True Finality’! Thank God for a Jude who was a contender for the true faith! Jude 5-7,11, divinely recorded, tells us: “But I want to remind you, though you once knew this, that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who did not believe. And the angels who did not keep their proper domain, but left their own abode, He has reserved in everlasting chains under darkness for the judgment of the great day, as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities around them in a similar manner to these, having given themselves over to sexual immorality and gone after strange flesh, are set forth as an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire…Verse 11, Woe to them! For they have gone in the way of Cain, have run greedily in the error of Balaam for profit, and perished in the rebellion of Korah.” [It would be to your spiritual benefit to study Verse 11 thoroughly!].

In Matthew 24:24 Christ Jesus said: “For false christs and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders TO DECEIVE, if possible, even the elect. See, I have told you beforehand.”

Vain thoughts in a vain ‘professor’s life’ produce vain images of ‘self-righteousness’, again ‘pumping flesh’ or the old sin-nature, thinking they are honoring God Almighty, when all they’ve done is to promote themselves!

You do understand that ‘fallen men’ have always lived with ‘self-pretense’, aware of it or not, like the scribes and Pharisees that Jesus called ‘hypocrites’ in Matthew 23:14-15! He said of them, “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites [“play-actors”]! For you shut up the kingdom of heaven against men; For you devour widows’ houses, and for a pretense make long prayers. Therefore you will receive greater condemnation. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel land and sea to win one proselyte, and when he is won, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves.”

Hypocritical thoughts? Self-promotion thoughts? Coveting thoughts? Proud thoughts? Pumping flesh thoughts? Self-vindication thoughts? Frothy thoughts with no true substance? Mill-stone thoughts? Haughty thoughts? Thankless thoughts? Unbelieving thoughts? Bitter thoughts? Resentful thoughts? Unforgiving thoughts?

In Galatians 6:3 we read, “For if anyone thinks himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself.” Just how dangerous do you believe self-deception to be? What did Paul tell Timothy in 2 Timothy 3:13? “But evil men and imposters will grow worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived.”

Is “sin” a sinister plot even in many believers to take them down? It is truly such a blessing to have men like Paul who reached out to young disciples like Timothy to warn them of the dangers of “false fruits”! Or even the author of Hebrews who rose up so valiantly to warn “professing believers” of the dangers of deception. Hebrews 3:12-13 tells us, “Beware, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God; but exhort one another daily, while it is called “Today”, lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.”

Second, What About The Dangers Of Slothfulness Or Spiritual Laziness? Come with me to Ecclesiastes 10:18 (NKJV), where Solomon wrote: “Because of laziness the building decays, and through idleness of hands the house leaks.” The old King James Version says, “By much slothfulness the building decays…”. Did Solomon ‘profess’ and not fully ‘possess’?

I love Moffatt’s translation of James 1:4 that says, “Let your endurance be a finished product, so that you may be finished and complete, with never a defect.”

But some older believers, sadly, and some immature young believers, drift from devotion to the Faith to complacency, and find themselves in a “falling away” cloud of indifference, at least for a time, until a caring, mature believer challenges them as to their sincere faith or lack of it.

There are ‘believers’ who are spiritually deceived and fail to understand the true warfare against them by the world, the flesh, and the devil, and find spiritual “armor” unnecessary until they are slammed to the ground by the powers of darkness!

Paul told Timothy, 2 Timothy 2:15, and us, “Be diligent to present yourself approved to God, a worker who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.” Diligence? Can you fathom an athlete who doesn’t see the necessity of diligence in game preparation, and so he goes into the game and gets his untrained, unequipped, uninformed ‘butt’ kicked from one goal line to the other! Diligence? It’s the Obama socialist excuse of wasting funds on soldiers he could give to the soldiers’ enemies! No diligence in the medical profession? No diligence from the teachers of your children’s education?

And is there to be diligence in the spiritual community as followers of Christ Jesus? Diligence of taking up His Cross daily for the holy appropriation of His power and authority or unconcern about the warfare of the old self, the sin of rebellion, worldliness calling us, even throwing aside The Savior’s word: “Without Me you can do nothing;” so not wanting to be strapped by allegiance to honor Him, many are setting diligence aside and desecrating the life He redeemed by His own blood!?!

Third, Does ‘Fleshly Pride’ Hang Around To Heighten “Falling Away” From The Faith? In 2 Thessalonians 2:3-4,7-12, you’ll find verses that, no doubt, referred to Israel’s “falling away” from their divine appointment to bringing in, yes, the birth of “Emmanuel”, but, at the same time, understanding “flesh,” “religious flesh,” and the reality of divided allegiance between “flesh” and Spirit, ‘fleshly pride’ does become the lightning rod of ‘falling away’ from the Faith!

2 Thessalonians 2:3-4 says, “Let no one deceive you by any means; for that Day will not come unless the falling away comes first, and the man of sin is revealed, the son of perdition, who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God or that is worshipped, so that he sits as God in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God….

Verses 7-12 then says, “For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work; only He who now restrains will do so until He is taken out of the way. And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord will consume with the breath of His mouth and destroy with the brightness of His coming. The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved. And for this reason God will send them strong delusion, that they should believe the lie, that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.”

That’s ‘fleshly’ Israelites, ‘fleshly’ church folk, prominent ‘fleshly’ leaders of churches, denominations, major or minor religions across the known world! But the “Remnant” stands strong, faithful, devoted, leaning on Christ alone! Do you think this might be why Paul said in Galatians 5:1, “Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage”? Do you think the calf, the cow, or the bull would ever say to its ‘owner,’ “I don’t need your yoke – I can handle my own responsibility and calling”?

Is there the ‘test’ in believers’ walks of faith when they must decide, “Who is in control in this time of testing? Myself or King Jesus?” But, sadly, some never consider, they commit to what their ‘flesh’ cries out! But Jesus says, “Come to Me, and I will give you rest; take My yoke upon you…!!!”

Fourth, Is Unawareness Or Unbelief In The Devil’s Attempts To Take You Down A Major Concern In the Faith Journey AND Faith Warfare? In 1 Peter 5:8-9 Peter lays out for us the enemy, besides ‘flesh,’ that so desires to take down committed, yielded, strong OR weak followers of Christ. He said: “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.”

Of course, unbelievers have no awareness concerning spiritual warfare involving the devil himself because of their engrained unbelief, but ‘believers’, having reported for duty under Christ’s Lordship, are not void of understanding of wars, battles, conflicts with the devil, because they learned from their Lord’s Life experiences and encounters with the powers of darkness. But even do ‘believers’ or ‘true Life in Christ disciples’ face spiritual warfare with their enemy, and at times yield to ‘darkness’ rather than to the “Light”? I’m afraid they do, but healing and deliverance can come, by the grace of God, to those who fall into a trap! “Yell for Help to the Keeper of your life and soul – don’t surrender, fight the good fight of faith!”

In Luke 4:13 we read, “Now when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from Christ Jesus until an opportune time.”

But what about unawareness or unbelief in the ‘demonic’ activity against, especially, those who are the true followers of Christ? If you read further in Luke 4, in Verse 33, we read, “Now in the synagogue there was a man who had a spirit of an unclean demon. And he cried out with a loud voice, saying, ‘Let us alone! What have we to do with You, Jesus of Nazareth? Did You come to destroy us? I know who You are – the Holy One of God!” Jesus cast the demon out, and the crowd around Him were amazed, talking among themselves, saying, Verse 36, Then they were all amazed and spoke among themselves, saying, “What a word this is! For with authority and power He commands the unclean spirits, and they come out.”

I’m not sure I should even mention demonic deliverance in a book for American Christians and even the mission stations across the world where I’ve ministered and taught since the mid-1970’s. Why? Because I’m not sure how many “professing believers” are walking equipped in discipleship training in all phases of ministry, and especially ‘deliverance’, ending up wounded, scarred, even in danger of walking away because they find themselves bitterly wounded by the “spirits” and don’t even know what is going on! It was Michael Drayton, in “The Owl”, who stated, “Better sit still, than rise to meet the devil.” No doubt true for those ‘professing faith’ but never equipped to take the demons on!

It was an Anonymous writer in Frank Meads’ “Encyclopedia of Religious Quotations”, [p.107], who wrote, “Talk of devils being confined to hell, or hidden by invisibility! – We have them by shoals in the crowded towns and cities of the world. – Talk of raising the devil! – What need for that, when he is constantly walking to and fro in our streets, seeking whom he may devour.”

But, of course, you are aware that through the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ Jesus that ‘the devil’ IS a defeated enemy, not only of Christ but of every true believer! So…resist him steadfast in the Faith!! His victory over Satan is your victory through Christ!

I don’t know who wrote the following sentence, but it jumped off the page and touched my mind, heart, and will: “But tasks in hours of insight willed Can be through hours of gloom fulfilled.” Your task? Resting in the finished work of Christ Jesus at the Cross and the Empty Tomb!

“Truth Faith – Your Thoughts Or God’s Truth”? Romans 8:37-38 lifts us high to the mountain-top of our Lord’s High Mountain of forgiveness, freedom, fulfilment, and forever winning the battle over the world, the flesh, and the Devil! Paul said, “Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” AMEN?

CHAPTER NINETEEN

“A FAULTY FAITH OF DEPARTURE OR FAITH THAT SUSTAINS, FEEDS, AND PROVIDES”

Come with me to Matthew 14 and follow carefully Verses 13-21 that relates to the Lord Jesus feeding the five thousand! It says: When Jesus heard it, He departed from there by boat to a deserted place by Himself. But when the multitudes heard it, they followed Him on foot from the cities. And when Jesus went out He saw a great multitude; and He was moved with compassion for them, and healed their sick…

When it was evening, His disciples came to Him, saying, “This is a deserted place, and the hour is already late. Send the multitudes away, that they may go into the villages and buy themselves food.” But Jesus said to them, “They do not need to go away. You give them something to eat.”…

And they said to Him, “We have here only five loaves and two fish.” Jesus said, “Bring them here to Me.” Then He commanded the multitudes to sit down on the grass. And He took the five loaves and the two fish, and looking up to heaven, He blessed and broke and gave the loaves to the disciples; and the disciples gave to the multitudes…

So they all ate and were filled, and they took up twelve baskets full of the fragments that remained. Now those who had eaten were about five thousand men, besides women and children.

If there were five thousand men, plus women and children, would it be safe to say that the total was ten thousand at a minimum? “Five loaves and two fish”? “They need to go to surrounding villages and buy themselves food, because how can one miss a meal when all they’re doing is listening to a man teach?”

“They’ve got to take care of themselves, because, even if it is a man representing God, their natural tendencies have to be met, and can God meet our food needs? We’ll go elsewhere for that need to be met; five loaves and two fish can’t meet the needs of ten thousand people!”

But is it possible when you read this event that it arouses in readers, not simply physical hunger because they’re about to miss a meal, or does it go beyond physical hunger to the, yes, spiritual hunger of the souls of men who are without a living relationship with the God who created them? And, if YOU are spiritually hungry, why look to worldly communities to meet your need? Yet, our world is overflowing with “hungry people” who don’t know of God’s desire to meet their every need according to His riches in glory in and through Christ Jesus, the Eternal- Food Blesser and Provider!

In fact, in Psalm 37:25, David tells us, “I have been young, and now am old; yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his descendants begging bread.” Does it mean the ‘righteous’ never have hunger pains? The human body does alert us when it is time to eat, but even with that alert, some deprive themselves of food occasionally because their ‘busy-ness’ substitutes for a ‘sit-down meal’! You probably have encountered a number of friends or acquaintances that are “too busy” to eat!

What about though when Jesus said to those disciples in Matthew 14:16, after His disciples came to Him to encourage the crowd to leave and go find food, “They do not need to go away. YOU give them something to eat.” The disciples responded, “We have here only five loaves and two fish.” And you must ask, “Did His disciples not understand that the huge crowd’s greater need was the “Living Bread”?

In Matthew 14:18 we read, He [Christ Jesus] said, “Bring them here to Me.” And a supernatural miracle occurred before their eyes as Jesus blessed what they had and exploded it to care for multitudes! Verse 20 says, “So they all ate and were filled,” with left-over fragments totaling twelve baskets full!

What are the eternal, practical, personal, spiritual lessons Holy God would have each of us to learn from this demonstration of Christ’s awesome power and authority and love concerning “hungry lives and hungry hearts”?

YOUR INNER HUNGER IS NOT TO BE A DISTRACTION FROM CHRIST BUT THE OPEN DOOR TO CHRIST! Do you remember Satan testing Jesus right after He had begun His public ministry? In Matthew 4:1-4 the Holy Word tells us: Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted [tested] by the devil. And when He [Jesus] had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterward He was hungry. Now when the tempter came to Him, he said, “If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.”

But Jesus answered and said, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.” In the main text of this chapter, Matthew 14:16, our Lord and Savior was so very clear: “They do not need to go away.” The ‘going away’ was from Him to find food when He is “food’s inventor”!

In our day to day living in this modern world, most men are drawn away from Christ, not to Christ, because their appetites are strictly ‘fleshly’ and not spiritual as to one’s eternal life and relationship to Holy God! Their main emphasis is satisfying their sin nature and what it calls for, or the world’s chief emphasis, or, yes, the tempting, twisting, troubling activity of the devil to draw men away from God’s bidding and following the deceptive emphasis of Satan himself!

Life in the modern world today is no different than life 2000 years ago with occupations, responsibilities, interests, callings, or ministries – the problem is that the deceived heart of men today is just as enslaved to the devil as the men in Christ’s day, and He came to set the captives free where they begin to discern, whatever their calling, task, or responsibility, what it is God would have them be and do, not deceived by the powers of darkness to work for darkness, the flesh, and under demonic control rather than Christ control, living in honor of Him who created them, loved them, and assigned them His ministry calling through them whether a carpenter, an educator, a pastor-teacher, medical profession, or whatever, but it IS to the glory of God alone, not satisfying ‘fleshly’ appetites!

YOUR INNER HUNGER IS NOT TO BE AN ATTEMPT AT SATISFACTION BY IMITATION OF A FALLEN WORLD AROUND YOU! But, of course, blinded sinners by the powers of darkness have no explanation for their “fall” because those powers of darkness excuse the fallen world by deceiving men, “This is just the way you are; look around you; join yourself to those who have a ‘happy’ identity in their state of life!”

Paul, in Ephesians 4:17-19, explains this “fallen, away from God, imitation life” by saying, “This I say, therefore, and testify in the Lord, that you should no longer walk as the rest of the Gentiles walk, in the futility of their mind, having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart; who, being past feeling, have given themselves over to lewdness, to work all uncleanness with greediness.”

But, understand, “God so loved the world…,” and is not willing for greedy people, blinded people spiritually, those with the futility-mind-disease, comfortable in darkness, no problem with alienation from God the Creator, Lord, and Savior, sadly, blinded by their sin-state, and at home with lewdness, uncleanness, and alienation – So God Himself, by the Spirit, by the Savior and Lord, by the true family of Holy God stands tall and vocal:

Ephesians 5:14, Therefore He says: “Awake, you who sleep, Arise from the dead, and Christ Jesus will give you light.” That isn’t human initiative though human initiative is an unspoken of religion all over the world; when the anointed Word and the Spirit of God, yes, even through His redeemed family, is spoken in love, grace, and mercy, we “Arise” and follow our Lord and Savior! If the Savior says to YOU “Arise from the dead”, do you think that’s an option you hold or a command to respond immediately to in honoring King Jesus!

When you consider the Old Testament prophets, why did Holy God raise up the true prophets in challenging His chosen, holy people called Israel who were to be those who were chosen to usher in the Messiah? – it happened, He came, but then the religious elite of Judaism, not the “remnant”, but the chief priests and the Sadducees had Christ Jesus crucified because they imitated the fallen world around them without any consideration of the prophetic Word!

Isaiah 59:20 says, “The Redeemer will come to Zion, and to those who turn from transgression in Jacob,” says the Lord,” but the majority of Israel bought “the lie” of Satan, “You can sin and not die,” but they sinned and they died without Emmanuel and His ministry to them and through them!

YOUR INNER HUNGER IS NOT TO BE MAN’S BEST EFFORT BUT THE ACTUAL DISCIPLINE OF SPIRITUAL ENDURANCE! It’s highly important and effective in sharing with young converts the reality of the necessity of discipline and especially as it relates to spiritual endurance.

The walk of a true disciple is never easy because, though saved, re-born, and in-filled with the Holy Spirit, the highway of holiness is a demanding walk! I know this is why Paul said in 2 Corinthians 4:7, “But we have this treasure [that’s Christ’s Light and knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, now shining in us and through us who have been “born again”] in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not us.”

Oh, and then in Verses 8-11, Paul challenges us about “resting in Christ”! He said, “We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed – always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body. For we who live are always delivered to death for Jesus’ sake, that the life of Jesus also MAY BE MANIFESTED IN OUR MORTAL FLESH.”

That’s the choice of daily death to yourself that Christ’s life is revealed through you! Question! Through YOU is it His nature and character or your best effort? Through YOU is it His spirit, His sure confidence, His sweetness and toughness, His strengths or your weaknesses, His manifested presence within you or your mental premises of a good Christian?

YOUR INNER HUNGER IS NOT BY THE RECOGNITION OF ONE’S PERSONAL RELIGIOUS INCLINATIONS BUT THE INSPIRATION OF ENLIGHTMENT OF SCRIPTURAL TRUTH AND ONE’S CONTINUOUS APPROPRIATION OF THAT TRUTH! In Ephesians 1:17-19 we gladly receive, trust, and walk in the revealed truth of one’s victory in Christ alone! It says: “that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His mighty power.”

How does this revealed Word speak to your personal examination of your present relationship to Holy God? Best effort or blessed Presence? Trying or trusting? Adapting or appropriating? Your resilience or His “rest”? What YOU say or feel or what Christ Jesus declares?

If Christ Jesus is the “Great I Am”, how does that relate to YOU “in Christ”? In Galatians 2:20 Paul wrote: “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.” Important question to follow! “Do YOU frustrate or set aside the grace of God, and give your best or rest in Christ’s Resurrection Life in you?

In 1 John 4:17 John deciares, “Love has been perfected among us in this: that we may have boldness in the day of judgment; BECAUSE AS HE IS, SO ARE WE IN THIS WORLD.” Your past IS OVER, crucified with Christ 2000 years ago – it is not you but Christ in you as the hope of glory that’s makes the difference! And do you understand why Paul would say, “I take the sentence of death in me daily that the resurrection of Christ is manifested in my mortal flesh”? If your old man was crucified with Christ, then why do you give the crucified life so much attention? Why do you degrade the old self of yours that He allowed to die with Him?

I want to close this chapter with “My Testimony”, written by Milton Green of Cleveland, Tennessee, written over thirty years ago. I don’t think Milton ever finished the 8^th Grade, early into service in the army, returned home and began, I believe, a window-washing business, married, I believe it was three times. His third wife was a friend of mine and Sue’s, Joyce Samples, who begin a positive influence in his life. He was led to the Lord by someone I do not know, went to his home pastor asking for the pastor to disciple him – but the pastor was too busy, and ignored him. My wife and I moved back to Cleveland from Tempe, Arizona, and met Milton – the first thing he said was, “Farrell, would you disciple me?” As I was traveling doing revivals and evangelism conferences, I told Milt that when I was in town, I’d train him every Wednesday night at 9pm after our church’s prayer meeting. After about a year and a half of that, my wife I moved to Dothan, Alabama, where I served as pastor of First Baptist Church. On a Sunday evening service sometime after the move there, Milton and Joyce entered for the Sunday evening service. They stayed in our home for two or three nights – and Sue and I saw a divine transformation! It was so encouraging to see what our Lord had done in Milton’s life – a powerful miracle of grace! Milton ended up teaching in conferences all over the world, many times with 10,000-20,000 seekers after Truth! It was a phenomenal ministry of encouragement to see what God Almighty did through the “carpenter- cleaner’s life”! The following is Milton’s Testimony!:

“MY TESTIMONY”

I cried out to the Lord and He heard my cries. He lifted me up out of a pit of destruction, out of the miry clay, and He set my feet on a rock – making my footsteps firm. He put a new song in my mouth – a song of praise to my God. Many will see and fear and trust in the Lord. And blessed is the man whose trust is the Lord, who has not turned to the proud or to those who have lapsed into falsehood. Many Oh Lord my God are the wonders You have done – and yet Your thoughts are toward me. There’s none to compare with You! My ears were opened and then I said, “Behold, Lord, I come to You. In the scroll of the book it is written of me. I delight to do Your will, O my God. Your Law is written upon my heart.”

Because I’ve been born again unto a living hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead…to an inheritance that is incorruptible, undefiled, fadeth not away, is reserved in heaven for me. I’m kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last times.

Although I’ve never seen You – I love You. And although I don’t see You right now I believe You and I trust You and I rejoice with a joy unspeakable full of glory, receiving the end of my faith – even the salvation of my soul.

Because I’ve been redeemed. I’ve been redeemed by the precious blood of Jesus – without blemish or without spot. I’ve been born again not of corruptible seed, but incorruptible seed – by the Word of God that liveth and abideth forever.

Jesus Christ is my cornerstone. He’s rejected of men but chosen of God and precious. And I’m a lively stone. I’m a lively stone that makes up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God in Jesus Christ.

I’m a chosen person, a royal priesthood, a holy priesthood, a peculiar person – to show forth praises unto Him who delivered me out of darkness – into the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom I have redemption, the forgiveness of All my sins. He took all my sins in His own body on the tree, that I, being dead to sin, would live unto righteousness – by whose stripes I was healed, in Jesus’ Name!

Now who is going to harm him who follows after that which is good? Who is going to get him?

I sanctify the Lord God in my heart and I’m ready to give an answer to every man that asks me, with meekness and fear. Casting all my cares on Him – because He cares for me!

Jesus Christ is the exact image of the invisible God. He’s the first born of all creation. And in and through Jesus Christ all things were created, visible and invisible, whether thrones, dominions, rulers or authorities – Everything has been created through Jesus Christ and for Jesus Christ.

Jesus Christ is before all things. And in Jesus Christ all things hold together. Jesus Christ is also head of the body – the Church. For He is from the beginning – the first born from the dead – that He should have first place in everything. For it was the Father’s good pleasure that all His fullness and goodness should dwell in Him.

And God has reconciled me to Himself. Having made peace through the blood of the Cross. And although I was formerly alienated from Him, I was hostile in my mind. I was engaged in evil deeds – Jesus Christ reconciled me to Himself to appear before Him holy and blameless.

For in Christ Jesus the fullness of the Godhead dwells bodily. In Jesus Christ I’ve been made complete. All my sins have been blotted out and nailed to the Cross. In Jesus Christ I’m sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise!

God, after He had spoken long ago to the Fathers through the Prophets in many portions and many ways, in these last days has spoken to us through His Son Jesus – Whom He appointed heir of all things, and through Whom He made the world. He’s the radiance of His glory – the exact representation of His nature – and He upholds all things by the power of His words, and after He had made purification for sins He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high!

And because of His great love for me, He has raised me up to be [seated] with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus – just as He has chosen me before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless before Him.

And He has taken every weakness, infirmity, sickness, cures, sin and disease – and by His stripes I am healed in Jesus’ name!

I am the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. I’ve been blessed with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.

Oh, the riches of the glory of the inheritance of the saints, and exceeding riches of His glory to us who Believe, according to the riches of His mighty might – which He performed in Christ Jesus when He raised Him from the dead and sat Him at His own right hand. He placed all things under His feet and gave Him to be head of all things to the church, which I am a part of, the full ness of Him who fills all in all.

The Son of God appeared for this reason – He has already destroyed the works of the devil. He disarmed him, He made a public display of him, triumphing over him at Calvary. You know of Jesus of Nazareth who went about doing good and healing all those who were oppressed by the devil.

He has given me authority to tread on serpents and scorpions and over all the power of the enemy and nothing shall by any means harm me. These signs will follow those who believe: In His name I will cast out demons. I will lay hands on the sick and they will recover. The Lord works with me – He confirms His word and signs follow. I let the high praises of God be in my mouth, a two-edged sword in my hand to execute vengeance upon the heathens, punishment on the peoples – to bind their kings with chains and their nobles with fetters of iron, to execute upon them the judgment written. This is an honor that belongs to every saint.

My weapons are mighty in God to tearing down strongholds, casting down imaginations, and every lofty thought that exalts itself against the knowledge of God. And I take every thought captive to the obedience of Jesus.

My Father’s word is forever settled in heaven. My Father’s word is the fixed authority. My Father watches over His word to perform it. Heaven and earth will pass away – but my Father’s word will never pass away. My Father’s word is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

My Father’s word is life to those who find it and health to all their whole flesh. My Father’s word doesn’t return without accomplishing what He desires and succeeding in the manner in which He sent it.

My Father’s word sanctifies me, renews my mind, separates me from the world into righteousness. And I rule and reign in life through the gift of righteousness in the grace of God through Jesus Christ.

I’m MORE than a conqueror in Jesus’ name! God is my Father – Jesus Christ is my Lord – and I’m a product of His love!” I have love, I have joy, I have peace, I have patience, I have longsuffering, I have goodness, I have gentleness, I have meekness, I have temperance, I have faith. I can do ALL things through Christ who strengthens me.

Greater is the Lord Jesus in me than he who is in the world. I overcome by the blood of the Lamb and the word of my testimony. Old things have passed away – All things have become new. As Jesus Christ is in the world – So am I!

The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me. Because the Lord has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has anointed me to bind up the brokenhearted; to proclaim liberty to the captives and freedom to the prisoners. To proclaim the favorable year of the Lord and that day of vengeance of our God. To comfort those who mourn.

It was the Father’s good pleasure to give me the kingdom. And His Son Jesus has given me the keys to the kingdom. So that whatever I bind on earth will be bound in heaven – and whatever I loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.

I am a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God – which is just my reasonable form of worship. I’m not conformed to this world. I’ll not walk and talk and act like this world! But I’m transformed by the renewing of my mind – that I’ll not only know, but prove what is the good, perfect, and acceptable will of God.

I rejoice greatly in my God. I’ve declared the glad tidings of Your righteousness in the great congregation. Behold, I’ve not restrained my lips. Oh God, You know. I’ve not hidden Your righteousness within my heart. I’ve spoken of Your righteousness and Your salvation. I’ve not concealed Your truth from the great congregation.

Now let those who seek the Lord rejoice and be glad in Him. Let those who love Your salvation continually say, “Let the Lord be magnified”!

For You are our help and our deliverer. I rejoice greatly in my God. My soul exults in my God. He has clothed me with garments of salvation. He has wrapped me with a robe of righteousness. Like a bridegroom who decks himself with a robe of righteousness. Like a bridegroom who decks himself with a garland and like a bride who adorns herself with jewels – He keeps me from stumbling. He makes me stand in the glory of His presence – holy, blameless, without reproach – with great joy, the only wise God is my Savior – who is Jesus Christ. To You alone be glory and majesty, dominion and authority before all time, now, and forevermore.

I fight the good fight of faith. I lay hold of eternal life to which I’ve been called by Your grace – and I make the good confession before many witnesses.” Amen?

And your testimony? “A Faulty Faith of Departure” OR “A FAITH THAT SUSTAINS, FEEDS, AND PROVIDES?”

CHAPTER TWENTY

“FLESHLY FAITH OR GOD-GIVEN FAITH?”

There are two verses of Scripture in Psalm 9 that I want to alert your attention to as we continue this study about fleshly faith or God’s God-Given Faith. Psalm 9:10 says, “And those who know Your name will put their trust in You; For You, Lord, have not forsaken those who seek You.”

And then Psalm 9:17 says so clearly, “The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God.”

I really don’t know where you are personally in your faith journey as I write this, but I know the passion of my heart is that “God-Given Faith” is the true foundation of your spiritual journey and not a “Fleshly Faith” that comes from vain imaginations, false prophets, or even governmental religious control and fabrication!

Are YOU aware of the human tragedy of men who preach a “salvation” because of men’s best efforts without any regard to the sin that dominates, alienates, and dispenses an eternal poison in the human blood flow, and never relates at all to the “blood flow” of Christ on Calvary’s Cross? Are you aware of men’s inventions of world religions that have no relationship at all to the true Savior of mankind from sin and death? Are there religions of men’s mental capacities that have nothing to do with blackened hearts and devilish bondage?

It’s really interesting that even in Peter’s day that there was the presence of scoffers who believed themselves to be highly religious and ought to be first in line as God opens His door to Holy Presence! But Peter said: “that scoffers will come in the last days [of Judaism], walking according to their own lusts…” and possessing no awareness of the absolute necessity of being “born again”!

In John 12:32-33 we read Jesus speaking. He said: “And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all peoples to Myself.” This He said, signifying by what death He would die.” But drawn by Him doesn’t mean automatic human response! “Sad He died, but I’m able on my own to be of highly religious quality without the shedding of His blood!” And so they ‘go to Hell’ instead!

But if Jesus said, “I will draw all peoples to Myself,” isn’t it heart-breaking to realize the vast rejection of the “blood-bought Atonement” of Christ? Oswald Chambers, in his book, “My Utmost For His Highest,” wrote: [p.264], “When you are face to face with a soul in difficulty spiritually, remind yourself of Jesus Christ on the Cross. If that soul can get to God on any other line, then the Cross of Jesus Christ is unnecessary. If you can help others by your sympathy or understanding, you are a traitor to Jesus Christ.”

Do you remember what Jesus said in Matthew 5:8? “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.” But purity of heart is not by what one refrains from but by the sacrificial, sovereign grace and mercy of God Himself through the shed blood of God’s Son on Calvary’s Cross! Religious people all over our known world are people who’ve grown up with a degree of intellectual understanding of their ‘man-made’ faiths, but sadly never understood surrender to the Resurrected Lord and Savior!

Do you even have any awareness of the degree to which fallen men have fallen when they would mar God’s character by insisting He is wrong if He cannot, will not accept their best efforts to please Him by their “genius inventions” of their religious steps to God? And if He doesn’t, then “He is unkind, unmerciful, unfaithful to Himself,” so they’ll just go their own religious way!

Is there ‘unfaithfulness’ because of the reality of ‘unfaith’, if there is such a word, which I believe is a mind and heart void of true biblical faith in what God says and what He does – and you trust or have ‘faith’ in His awesome eternal work in and through Christ Jesus?

The Random House College Dictionary of 1975 says of ‘unfaithful’: “Not faithful; false to duty, obligation, or promises; faithless, disloyal..(even) guilty of adultery, (Are there adulterous ‘believers’?}..not accurate or complete; inexact. Unbelieving, infidel.”

And if a man has settled into a state of life called ‘unbelief,’ which is evidence of “Fleshly Faith,” it is because of one accepting unbelief without knowing that literal unbelief is belief in the ‘lie’ that the devil promoted with Adam and Eve, “You can sin and not die”, when the Word declares that “The wages of sin is death”! Isn’t it interesting that in Proverbs 23:7 we read, “For as a man thinks in his heart, so is he”?

There is an Old Testament example of true believers and true unbelievers that Paul tells us about in 1 Corinthians 10:4-13! He said, “For they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them, and that Rock was Christ. BUT WITH MOST OF THEM GOD WAS NOT WELL PLEASED, for their bodies were scattered in the wilderness. Now these things became our examples, TO THE INTENT that we should not lust after evil things as they also lusted. And do not become idolaters as some of them were. As it is written, “The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play.” Nor let us commit sexual immorality, as some of them did, and in one day twenty-three thousand fell; nor let us tempt Christ, as some of them also tempted, and were destroyed by serpents; nor complain, as some of them complained, and were destroyed by the destroyer. Now all these things happened to them AS EXAMPLES, and they were written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the ages have come. Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall. No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it.”

You do clearly understand that biblical faith is far more than most modern-day churches or ‘preachers’ (?) have made it to be. Acknowledging “Truth” is not one’s surrender and yieldingness to that Truth! Edward Young once wrote: [The Encyclopedia of Religious Quotations, by Frank S. Mead, Fleming H.Revell Com., Westwood, New Jersey], “Faith is not only a means of obeying, but a principal act of obedience; not only an altar on which to sacrifice, but a sacrifice itself, and perhaps, of all, the greatest. It is a submission of our understandings; an oblation of our idolized reason to God, which He requires so indispensably, that our whole will and affections, though seemingly a larger sacrifice, will not, without it, be received at his hands.” Are YOU a man or woman of true biblical faith?

In his book printed in 1973 entitled “Sent To Be Vulnerable,” by Creath Davis, [Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids, Michigan,], he wrote, [p.19], “We can break His heart [that’s God’s heart] by our stubborn refusal to open ourselves to His truth and love, or we can cause Him to rejoice by responding enthusiastically to His promptings.”

In Dallas Willard’s book entitled “Renovation of the Heart”, published in 2002 by Navpress, [PO BOX 35001, Colorado Springs, CO 80935], Willard said: “External manifestation of “Christlikeness” is not, however, the focus of the process; and when it is made the main emphasis, the process will certainly be defeated, falling into deadening legalisms and pointless parochialism. That is what happened so often in the past, and this fact is a major barrier to whole heartedly embracing Christian spiritual formation in the present. We know now that peculiar modes of dress, behavior, and organization just are not the point.”

Much of “Fleshly Faith” is a promotion of ‘self,’ even demanding by some that God accept their best efforts when He crucified them with Christ! Isn’t that the ‘self-righteousness’ of the scribes and Pharisees?

“Fleshly Faith”? In James 1:12-15 the brother of Jesus wrote: “Blessed is the man who endures temptation; for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love Him. Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone. But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed. Then, when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, brings forth death.”

Did Paul, after his deceptive journey in Judaism, even as a rabbi, learn of “God-Given Faith” after being a devout proponent of “Fleshly Faith”? Listen to his words in Romans 2:4-11! “Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance? But in accordance with your hardness and impenitent heart you are treasuring up for yourself in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God, “who will render to each one according to his deeds”: eternal life to those who by patient continuance in doing good seek for glory, honor, and immortality; but TO THOSE WHO ARE SELF-SEEKING and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness – indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish, on every soul of man who does evil, of the Jew first and also of the Greek; but glory, honor and peace to everyone who works what is good, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For there is no partiality with God.”

“Fleshly Faith” is evident when one determines for himself what ought to be acceptable by God, because, in themselves, they’ve determined their own pattern of self-righteousness which ought to be acceptable by God, even if it is counter to the very revelation of Holy God! Romans 12:1-2 tells us, “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be [being] transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”

Haven’t we seen already about the serious nature of the influences of the world, the flesh, and the devil? But often the “pretenders” are in the forefront, the “play-actors” put on a good performance, the “dramatists” operate with no biblical foundation at all because they are smarter than God Himself, and even many “governmental leaders” are void of a Godly foundation while professing allegiance to Him, being physical in nature strongly but spiritually diseased, narcissistic nobodies fleshly neutered as to devotion to the God who made them!

“Fleshly Faith” is the promotion of a self-sanctified individual who has determined for himself/herself what is righteous, holy, and sovereign – the governance of their lives is by self-effort, self-love, self-promotion, and, yes, very religious! They don’t need to be saved from themselves because their nature and character is of a self-defined religious orientation – so, who needs God? [The man who is nearest to God is the man who knows the treachery of a selfish nature!]

“Fleshly Faith” today has large numbers on television promoting how you ought to feel good about yourself without an inkling that self-promotion and self -worship promotes one to a greater distance from God than he/she has ever known! I love what St. Augustine wrote centuries ago, “You have made us for Yourself, O God, and our souls find no rest until they find it in You.”

Augustine leads us into a greater awareness of “God-Given Faith” than we’ve ever known! In Romans 5:1-5 Paul wrote: “Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. And not only that, but we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance; and perseverance, character; and character, hope. Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us.”

Did you notice, “justified by faith” or accepted “just-as-if-I’d-never sinned”? But does the “God-Given Faith” also ‘sanctify’ or set one apart for the glory of God alone? And does true faith also glorify? Does one of God-given faith radiate the Holy Presence of the Indwelling Spirit of God? Yes! It does! “By their fruits you shall know them!”

“God-Given Faith”? If you didn’t know: “Heaven’s reality is Earth’s redemption!” And ‘earth’s redemption’ is one ‘blood-bought’ through Christ Jesus’ own shed blood on the Cross in 33AD, ‘the year of our Lord and Savior’! “God-Given Faith” that does not center in the source of divine forgiveness through the Lord’s shed blood is nothing more than religious idiocy brought on by those living in total rebellion to the love of God, convinced their sin is not serious enough to require the divine intervention through ‘that cruel cross’! But it does require Jesus’ shed blood or all mankind would remain under the demonic control of the ‘father of lies,’ the devil, facing eternity forever separated from Holy God, experiencing the devilish tribulation of fallen mankind, and eternally separated from the God of Calvary’s supreme love, grace, and mercy!

It was Oswald Chambers who once wrote: “The calling of a New Testament worker is to uncover sin and to reveal Jesus Christ as Savior, consequently he cannot be poetical, he must be sternly surgical. We are sent by God to lift up Jesus Christ, not to give wonderfully beautiful discourses.”

“God-Given Faith”? How familiar are you with Paul’s anointed letter to the Corinthians? Follow his anointed Word in 2 Corinthians 7:1, followed by Verses 8-10: First, Verse One, “Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of the Lord.” [Knowing that ‘word’ today will create heavy resentment in a self-righteous ‘church’!]

Verses 8-10 then tells us, “For even if I made you sorry with my letter, I do not regret it; though I did regret it. For I perceive that the same epistle made you sorry, though only for a while. Now I rejoice, not that you were made sorry, but that your sorrow led to repentance. For you were made sorry in a godly manner, that you might suffer loss from us in nothing. For godly sorrow produces repentance leading to salvation, not to be regretted; but the sorrow of the world produces death.”

Just how sorrowful were you, are you, over your sin that ushered in the shed blood of the Lamb of God? But, be assured, there is a world of people who have no recognition of “sin” in their lives that would require the crucifixion of the Son of God – they are so ‘pride-filled’ in themselves, they’d just as soon crucify you also for even repeating such an ‘untrue’ statement!

“God-Given Faith”? In John 12:27-37 you’ll find the Lord Jesus Christ predicting His own death on that cruel Cross! He said: “Now My soul is troubled, and what shall I say? ‘Father, save Me from this hour? But for this purpose I came to this hour. Father, glorify Your name.”

Then a voice came from heaven, saying, “I have both glorified it and will glorify it again.” Therefore the people who stood by and heard it said that it had thundered. Others said, “An angel has spoken to Him.”

Jesus answered and said, “This voice did not come because of Me, but for your sake. Now is the judgment of this world; now the ruler of this world will be cast out. And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all peoples to Myself.” This He said, signifying by what death He would die.

The people answered Him, “We have heard from the law that the Christ remains forever; and how can You say, ‘The Son of Man must be lifted up?’ Who is this Son of Man?’

Then Jesus said to them, “A little while longer the light is with you. Walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake you; he who walks in darkness does not know where he is going. While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may become sons of light.” These things Jesus spoke, and departed, and was hidden from them. But although He had done so many signs before them, they did not believe in Him.”

It is a sad and devastating thing for a man/woman not to believe, trust in, rely upon, or adhere to the very claims of Christ as to their “redemption”, even ‘good men’ who are not Godly, or ‘striving men’ who never trust in God’s eternal help, health, or holy purpose, or highly educated men in man’s worldly philosophy but never understanding or grasping God’s reach for their blood redemption! That is human tragedy in the highest level!

Do you understand the reality of the Eternal, Righteous, Powerful, Holy God, and His ‘down-reach’ for your eternal salvation? Have you ever wrestled with the reality of being “saved from yourself”? Have YOU been confronted with the ‘deceitfulness of your sin,’ or the vastness of your perverse nature and what you are capable of in your ‘fleshly’ state? Are you aware of Holy Presence, and without Christ, being one of constant rebellion to the God who loves you? Are you aware of the end result of a Christ-less life that walks through a vast tunnel of destruction in companionship with the devil and his demons and all unbelievers who omit Christ from their lives?

Are you at all ashamed that you have been totally insensitive to the love of God fully demonstrated at Calvary’s Cross? Is it just plain easy for you to forget God, neglect God, ignore God and His “Amazing Grace”? Have you ever confronted “the fatal enchantments” in your own mind and heart that cloud God’s amazing, personal love for you?

Have you ever stood before the Cross of Christ to say, “I just don’t care You died for me, because I don’t consider my heart, my life, my selfish dreams and selfish ambitions, to cause You to be ‘made a curse’ in my behalf! But I do acknowledge the reality of ‘sin’ in my life, however You want to define it, but to humble myself before Your Cross? Humble myself in the suffocating throes of personal humiliation, saying I need someone, something, outside of myself to ‘save me’? I don’t think so.”

‘Dead in iniquities’? Captured by the devil? Blinded by the old sin nature? A lustful rebel? A polluted person in the mind and heart? Vile passions like continuous nails in the mind and heart?

Yet, Jesus says, “Come unto Me, and I will give you rest,” and He forgives sin, He reconciles men to Holy God, He indwells the repentant heart, He births a “new creation,” He instills eternal, holy, Spirit-anointed living, He blesses me with His everlasting, eternal love, He dresses me in His eternal robes of righteousness, He releases the eternal stream of peace like His mighty river that never runs dry, I suffer – He comforts, I cry – He weeps with me, I find myself in a dark period of life and He releases the bright rays of eternal presence, I doubt – He unveils more and more and more of His eternal truths and releases the rays of His eternal Light upon me.

I’m not a ‘performer’ on a stage ‘play-acting’, but an individual who through repentance toward God and faith in the finished work of Christ at the Cross, has become His “new man” by grace, mercy, and love!

“God-Given Faith”? Here’s how Paul related it for his journey in Philippians 3:12-14, “Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected; but I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me. Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.”

“But one thing I do…”; “forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead…”! What’s ahead in your everyday pilgrimage with Christ? How about “the fullness of the blessing of the gospel of Jesus Christ”?

What did Paul tell us in 2 Corinthians 12:9-10? And He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ’s sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”

Do you understand that your “God-Given Faith” is to be firmly established, resting in, and fully dependent upon God’s omnipotence to reign through you by your full surrender unto Him, not that “I’m able!” He’s the Great Shepherd who leads the sheep; He’s the Author of Truth who keeps me from deception; He’s the constant, available, “renewer” of my soul, spirit, ambition, and eternal purpose as I lean not to my own understanding but in all my ways acknowledge Him; He’s the One never ashamed of the eternal Truth of His Gospel, and neither will I be!

“God-Given Faith”? Dare I tell you that 2 Corinthians 1:20-22 we learn, “For all the promises of God in Him [in Christ Jesus] are Yes, and in Him Amen, to the glory of God THROUGH US. Now He who establishes us with you in Christ and has anointed us is God, who also has SEALED US and given us the Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee.” I feel so sorry, so heavy, so saddened by those who ‘live in the Faith’ but have never received the seal of the Spirit and His guarantee in their hearts! That, my friends, is delusional!

Is it possible through the Word that Holy God has given you an amazing advance in faith in the “Christ-life” by His mighty wave of eternal Truth that dispels fear, doubt, and uncertainty about your eternal security in Christ Jesus? It’s there! Not a lie, but His revealed Truth; not deception, but divine revelation – Christ Jesus doesn’t lie!

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

“TRUE FAITH – ITS DESPISERS AND ITS FOLLOWERS”

There is a word from our Lord and Master that should cause strong self-examination in the mind and heart of every professing believer when Jesus said in Luke 6:40, “A disciple is not above his teacher, but everyone who is perfectly trained will be like his teacher.”

So what did the Lord Jesus find as He came to unveil Himself to a lost, perishing, rebellious, man-centered existence? I’m sure you know! There was rejection, resentment, bitterness toward Him, and eventually His crucifixion, resurrection, and then His bodily ascension to the right hand of God the Father! But He had a passion, a prayer, an eternal mission and the spiritual fortitude to stand strong among His despisers.

In John 17:20-23 we read about our Lord and Savior praying for all believers in all parts of His created world and for all unbelievers, even those who despised Him and those who still do! He said: “I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word; that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me. And the glory which You gave Me I have given them, that they may be one just as We are one. I in them, and You in Me; that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved me.”

I find it so thrilling to be reading the Psalms and come across a passage that so emphasizes and magnifies the very spirit of what you just read from John 17! It’s Psalm 133, and across the number of the chapter I had written, “Unite our hearts to show reverence for Your name.” Psalm 133 says:

“Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell in unity! It is like the precious oil upon the head [anointing oil!], running down on the beard, the beard of Aaron, running down on the edge of his garments. It is like the dew of Hermon, descending upon the mountains of Zion; For there the Lord commanded the blessing – Life forevermore.”

Do you remember Psalm 86:11? “Unite my heart to fear Your Name!” But for the “despisers” of God, that is a ridiculous request! There are men with divided hearts, careless hearts, compromising hearts, callous, even cruel hearts, and they do despise the very mentioning of His Precious Name!

2 Timothy 3:16-17 is such a vital passage for grasping, understanding, and relying upon the Word of God! It 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 complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.”

When you come to Luke 21:7-to the end of the chapter, you’ll find passages that truly related to “the signs of the Times and the End of the Jewish age” in 70 AD in the capture, overthrow, and destruction of Jerusalem. So… it has no meaning for all the rest of the world, even modern-day U.S.A? They asked Jesus in Verse 7, “And what sign will there be when these things are about to take place?” Follow carefully in your Bible!

Verse 8, “Take heed that YOU not be deceived!” Great deception! Verse 9, “…when you hear of wars and commotions, do not be terrified!” Great conflict! Verses 10-11, “Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be great earthquakes in various places, and famines and pestilences…fearful signs and great signs…” Great natural catastrophes! Verse 12, “Great persecution”. Verse 16, “Great animosity…hated by all for Jesus’ name’s sake! Great anticipation! Verse 25, “Great confidence…”. Verse 34, “Great importance!” “Take heed to yourselves!”

[And notice Luke 22:3, “Then Satan entered Judas…”] Do you fathom the danger of deception and, yes, the very terror “despisers of the faith” can stir up?

You do remember from Old Testament history that Israel was divided between the Northern Kingdom and the Southern Kingdom. In Jeremiah 4 there is revealed the ‘backsliding Israel’ and ‘her treacherous sister Judah’! In Jeremiah 4:11-13 we read: Then the Lord said to me, “Backsliding Israel has shown herself more righteous than treacherous Judah. Go and proclaim these words toward the north, and say: ‘Return, backsliding Israel,’ says the Lord; I will not cause My anger to fall on you. For I am merciful,’ says the Lord; ‘I will not remain angry forever. Only acknowledge your iniquity, that you have transgressed against the Lord your God, and have scattered your charms to alien deities under every green tree, and you have not obeyed My voice,’ says the Lord.”

If I said to you, about ‘remaining faithful’ in your walk of faith, what would you think would be the response of many ‘professing believers’ in the Christian world? If I said to you, “To be Heavenly relevant is to be earthly radical in willing obedience to all our Lord says,” what would be YOUR response?

In Psalm 22 you’ll find one of the most powerful Messianic messages you’ll ever read, relating to the Lord Jesus’ rejection from men and even mentioning the ‘silence’ of God as He had to walk the path to the Cross alone. This is how the Messiah felt as He walked the Calvary Road! Verses 1-2 says, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me? Why are You so far from helping Me, and from the words of My groaning? O My God, I cry in the daytime, but You do not hear; and in the night season, and am not silent…[Notice, next: Verses 6-8!],

But I am a worm, and no man; a reproach of men, and ‘despised’ by the people. All those who see Me ridicule Me; they shoot out the lip, they shake the head, saying, ‘He trusted in the Lord, let Him rescue Him; Let Him deliver Him, since He delights in Him!’

Are you aware that it was the ‘religious elite’ that highly opposed the King of kings and Lord of lords? Yes, even “despised” by the people? Are you aware of the “martyrs” for the faith, slain by ‘religious’ promoters of one’s ‘sick’ opposition to the Living Lord, yes, the One God resurrected from the dead after His crucifixion? I think it was Spurgeon who once preached, “Reproach is the common heritage of the godly.”

Do you remember Jude’s challenge in Jude 3-4? “Beloved, while I was very diligent to write to you concerning our common salvation, I found it necessary to write to you exhorting you TO CONTEND EARNESTLY FOR THE FAITH which was once for all delivered to the saints. FOR CERTAIN MEN HAVE CREPT IN UNNOTICED, who long ago were marked out for this condemnation, ungodly men, who turn the grace of God into lewdness and deny the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ.” But, in the good-old U.S.A, we don’t have to be concerned about the “despisers of True Faith”, right?

“True Faith’s Despisers”? Christ Jesus didn’t have to wait long in His journey, even from among the inner circle of His first twelve disciples. In Luke 22:47-48 we read, And while He [Jesus] was still speaking, behold, a multitude; and he who was called Judas, one of the twelve, went before them and drew near to Jesus to kiss Him. But Jesus said to him, “Judas, are you betraying the Son of Man with a kiss?”

Do you understand that many of the despisers of Jesus come from within what one might call “the family of faith followers”? And do you understand that Christ Jesus reads us all like an open book? In John 2:23-25 we read, “Now when He was in Jerusalem at the Passover, during the feast, many believed in His name when they saw the signs which He did. But Jesus did not commit Himself to them, because He knew all men, and had no need that anyone should testify of man, for He knew what was in man.” And He KNOWS you and me intimiately?

Are you familiar with the stoning of Stephen in Acts 7:51-60? He came on strong under the anointing of the Holy Spirit to expose those who professed but rejected Holy Truth! “You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears! You always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, so do you. Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? And they killed those who foretold the coming of the Just One, of whom you now have become the betrayers and murderers, who have received the law by the direction of the angels and have not kept it.”

When they heard these things they were cut to the heart, and they gnashed at him with their teeth. But he, being full of the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God, and said, “Look! I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God!”

Then they cried out with a loud voice, stopped their ears, and ran at him with one accord; and they cast him out of the city and stoned him. And the witnesses laid down their clothes at the feet of a young man named Saul. And they stoned Stephen as he was calling on God and saying, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” Then he knelt down and cried with a loud voice, “Lord, do not charge them with this sin.” And when he had said this, he fell asleep.”

Oh, but then look at Acts 8:1, Now Saul was consenting to his death. At that time a great persecution arose against the church which was at Jerusalem; and they were all scattered…! Do you see it? Absenteeism opens the door to “making havoc of the church Jesus loved and gave Himself for”!

I tell you, I was so devastated this morning as I read Robert Burns: “The Cotter’s Saturday Night”, in which he wrote: “Compared with this, how poor Religion’s pride, In all the pomp of method and of art, When men display to congregations wide, Devotion’s every grace, except the heart!”

And how penetrating and convicting do you perceive Shakespeare’s Hamlet, [Act 111, sc.1 L.47]? “’Tis too much proved – that with devotion’s visage And pious action we do sugar over the devil himself.”

Rather than ‘devotion to’ there is denial of, rather than receiving there is rejecting, rather than submission there is rebellion, rather than yieldedness there is self-will, rather than divine conversion there is pretense, rather than trust there is fleshly betrayal, rather than “laying down one’s life to the glory of God” there is the looking out for number one, rather than true endurance there is ‘falling short’, rather than the witness of the Spirit there is the unveiled witness of the ‘old self’, rather than Christ-consciousness there is the self-indulgence, rather than divine will there is the spirit of self-satisfaction, rather than the delight in doing God’s will there is the disturbing intent of “my will”, and rather than the full surrender of obedience to God’s Word many choose to live under the dark-cloud of self-willed determination!

But NOW, WHAT ABOUT “TRUE FAITH AND ITS FOLLOWERS”? How clear and to the point about God, true faith, and His followers, is what Jeremiah 10:6-7 tells us? “Inasmuch as there is none like You, O Lord (You are great, and Your name is great in might), Who would not fear You, O King of the nations? For this is Your rightful due. For among all the wise men of the nations, and in all their kingdoms, there is none like You.”

True Faith, True Followers, because of the reality of the One, True God! And remember, it was John the Baptist who came blessing, preaching, teaching, exalting Christ Jesus as the Savior and Lord of all life! In John 3:27-36 John promotes the Name, the ministry, the answer of God for all mankind’s spiritual deliverance from bondage through Christ alone! He said:

“A man can receive nothing unless it has been given to him from heaven. You yourselves bear me witness, that I said, ‘I am not the Christ,’ but, ‘I have been sent before Him.’ He who has the bride is the bridegroom; but the friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly because of the bridegroom’s voice. Therefore this joy of mine is fulfilled. HE [Christ Jesus] must increase, but I must decrease.

He who comes from above is above all; he who is of the earth is earthly and speaks of the earth. He who comes from heaven is above all. And what He has seen and heard, that He testifies; and no one receives His testimony. He who has received His testimony has certified that God is true. For He whom God has sent speaks the words of God, for God does not give the Spirit by measure. The Father loves the Son, and has given all things into His hand.

He who believes in the Son [trusts in, relies upon, adheres to, obeys] has everlasting life; and he who does not believe the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him.” And God’s ‘wrath-cloud’ is slowly moving in over the lives of unbelievers who reject, disbelieve, and share in His crucifixion rather than exalting Him as Lord and Savior of their lives!

What did God say in Jeremiah 45:5? “And do you seek great things for yourself? Do not seek them; for behold, I will bring adversity on all flesh, says the Lord.” An introspective life, concerned only about fleshly ideals and achievements apart from full surrender to God’s Sovereignty, is “flesh” and not the spirit of surrender and yieldingness to Holy God!

Oh, but the psalmist tells us in Psalm 19:7-11, “The law of the Lord is PERFECT, converting the soul; the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple; The statutes of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes; the fear of the Lord is clean, enduring forever; the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether. More to be desired are they than gold, Yea, than much fine gold; Sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb. Moreover by them Your servant is warned, and in keeping them there is great reward.”

Notice, Psalm 19:9, “The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.” True and righteous judgments of the Lord! Take note!

John 1:6-9 says, There was a man SENT FROM GOD, whose name was John. This man came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all through him might believe. He was not that Light, but was sent to bear witness of that Light. That was the true Light which gives light to every man coming into the world.” Before YOU is the TRUE LIGHT!

Luke 16:10-11 Jesus said, “He who is faithful in what is least is faithful also in much; and he who is unjust in what is least is unjust also in much. Therefore if you have not been faithful in the unrighteous mammon, who will commit to your trust the true riches?” For you: “false riches or true riches”?

John 3:33 is John again, so bold, so on target! “He who has received His [Christ Jesus] testimony has certified that God is true.” Tell me about your life certification of Christ’s eternal person and purpose and pleasure!

John 4:23-26, WOW! GET READY! Christ Jesus declared, “But the hour is coming, and now is, when the ‘true worshippers’ will worship the Father in spirit and in truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him. God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.” The woman said to Him, I know that Messiah is coming (who is called Christ). When He comes, He will tell us all things.” Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you am He.” So…as Josh MacDowell once said, “Is Jesus a liar, a lunatic, or the Lord God”?

Do you remember those who said to Jesus in John 6:28, “What shall we do, that we may work the works of God?” Jesus responded in John 6:29-35 saying, Jesus answered and said to them, “This is the work of God, that you believe [trust in, rely upon, adhere to, obey] in Him whom He sent.”

Therefore they said to Him, “What sign will You perform then, that we may see it and believe You? What work will You do? Our fathers ate the manna in the desert; as it is written, ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’”

Then Jesus said to them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, Moses did not give you the bread from heaven, but My Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is He who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”

Then they said to Him, “Lord, give us this bread always.” And Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me shall never hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst. But I said to you that you have seen Me and yet do not believe.” But, listen carefully: IT IS “BROKEN BREAD AND POURED OUT WINE” that Christ Jesus is able to use for His glory, His honor, His praise!

Question! Are YOU ‘broken bread’ and ‘poured out wine’ to the honor, glory, and praise of Christ Jesus only? In Colossians 1:24 Paul wrote, “I now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up in my flesh what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ, for the sake of His body, which is the church…”. Tell me about ‘your’ sufferings for the sake of the Body of Christ, the church He loved and gave Himself for!

Please come with me to John 15:1-2 where Christ Jesus tells us, “I AM the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser. Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit He prunes, that it may bear more fruit.” Oh, and then in Verse 4 Jesus said, “Abide in Me and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me.”

Our Lord then said in John 15:8, “By this My Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit; so you will be My disciples.” That’s ‘grapes’ for the wine of eternal Truth pressed, crushed, and poured out for His honor, but, ‘why not just be a good church member’?

How did Paul address the Ephesian church, yes, and those of us in the modern-day church? Look at Ephesians 4:17-24!! “This I say, therefore, and testify in the Lord, that you should no longer walk as the rest of the Gentiles walk, in the futility of their mind, having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart; who, being past feeling, have given themselves over to lewdness, to work all uncleanness with greediness.

But you have not so learned Christ, if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught by Him, as the truth is in Jesus; that you put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and that you put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness.” [How much do you hear in modern churches about ‘true righteousness and holiness’?]

Do you clearly understand and receive and walk in what Peter talked about in 1 Peter 5:12 when he said, “exhorting and testifying THAT THIS IS THE TRUE GRACE OF GOD IN WHICH YOU STAND.” Oh, then, there must be a ‘false grace’ in which some stand? True Grace perfects, establishes, strengthens, settles one into a state of life of living in God’s glory and His dominion forever and ever!

Oh, but there is more concerning True Faith and True Followers! John put it like this in 1 John 2:8, “Again, a new commandment I write to you, which thing is true in Him and in you, because the darkness is passing away, and the true light is already shining.”

Please understand: John says “the darkness is passing away”; in Christ every day is a new day, and what was total darkness in every unbeliever, because of Christ’s resurrection presence in us, the darkness is fading away and His true light grows stronger in us moment by moment!

It gets more exciting and encouraging and uplifting for Christ’s true disciples! In Revelation 19:11-13 John wrote: “Now I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse. And He who sat on him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and makes war. His eyes were like a flame of fire, and on His head were many crowns. He had a name written that no one knew except Himself. He was clothed with a robe dipped in blood, and His name is called The Word of God.”

True Faith and True Followers? False Faith and False Followers are presumptuous, proud, pointing to “Self-Effort” and determination to be their ‘shining qualities’ when it is nothing more than deception that leads to despair. Despair is deceit when one is dominated by the old sin nature rather than full surrender to what the Word describes for you who, in Him, are “more than conquerors”!

I have no doubts that this is why James wrote in James 1:21, “Therefore lay aside all filthiness and overflow of wickedness, and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls.”

I had a book-gift given to me after major surgery some years back, sent to me by Ken and Stephanie Hunley, entitled “The Valley of Vision.” [Published by The Banner of Truth Trust, PO Box 621, Carlisle, PA 17013, USA, 2012]. I so want you to receive this prayer entitled “The Gospel Way,” [pps.62-63, Author unknown.]:

Blessed Lord Jesus,

No human mind could conceive or invent the gospel. Acting in eternal grace, You are both its messenger and its message, lived out on earth through infinite compassion, applying Your life to insult, injury, death, that I might be redeemed, ransomed, freed.

Blessed be You, O Father, for contriving this way, Eternal thanks to You, O Lamb of God, for opening this way, Praise everlasting to You, O Holy Spirit, for applying this way to my heart.

Glorious Trinity, impress the gospel on my soul, until its virtue diffuses every faculty; Let it be heard, acknowledged, professed, felt. Teach me to secure this mighty blessing; Help me to give up every darling lust, to submit heart and life to its command, to have it in my will, controlling my affections, moulding my understanding; to adhere strictly to the rules of true religion, not departing from them in any instance, nor for any advantage in order to escape evil, inconvenience or danger.

Take me to the Cross to seek glory from its infamy; Strip me of every pleasing pretense of righteousness by my own doings. O gracious Redeemer, I have neglected You too long, often crucified You afresh by my impenitence, put You to open shame.

I thank You for the patience that has borne with me so long, and for the grace that now makes me willing to be Yours. O unite me to Yourself with inseparable bonds, that nothing may ever draw me back from You, my Lord, my Savior.” Amen?

Even with that attitude of heart and mind, I must remind you that the True Faith and the True Followers WILL FACE DIFFICULT TIMES, DIFFICULT STRUGGLES, AND EVEN DIFFICULT INTERFERENCES, ATTACKS, AND TEMPTATIONS, TRIALS, AND TESTINGS! But don’t forget: “You are ‘more than a conqueror through Christ Jesus’!”

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

“TRUE FAITH – TRIUMPHANT WARS!”

I find Hebrews 12:1-3 some of the most uplifting words in all the Bible because they are so challenging, comforting, correcting, and even caressing us with the very arms of Holy God as we face “True Faith – Triumphant Wars!” It says, “Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the AUTHOR AND FINISHER OF OUR FAITH, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” And, “where He is, so we are”? Absolutely!

If what you’ve just read is ‘eternal truth,’ and it is, what about Verse 3 that says, “For consider Him who endured such hostility from sinners against Himself, lest you become weary and discouraged in your souls”? Do you consider ‘hostility’ to be a part of spiritual warfare concerning redemptive faith? Is weariness or discouragement spiritual ‘naturalness’ for a true believer or an abnormal response since the Word declares “we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us and gave Himself for us”?

If our Lord and Savior says, “Come unto Me, and I will give you rest,” what is going on in our spiritual journeys or spiritual ‘wars’ if ‘tiredness’ is our testimony rather than spiritual resilience and divine strength? Our Savior and Lord never called us to a spirit of self-determination – He crucified it! He never called us to a spirit of self-dependency – He nailed it to the Cross voluntarily!

Oswald Chambers said in his book, “My Utmost For His Highest,” [p.169], “Am I willing to be destitute of the sense that I am destitute? [That’s one without Christ Jesus!]. This is where discouragement comes in. Discouragement is disenchanted self-love, [or] self-love may be love of my devotion of Jesus.” If I am ‘one in Christ’, that’s crucified daily ,taking the sentence of death daily to ourselves, that His resurrection life is fully manifested every moment of every day, then this is why Paul said, “I die daily!”

But ‘faith’ can be adulterated, and one begins to feel “useless and unstable” [Bonhoeffer], and ‘fleshly faith’ experiences spiritual warfare defeat one after another! It was E. Stanley Jones, great missionary in the past to India, who wrote: [“The Christ of the Mount”. New York: Abingdon Press, 1931, p.9], “Loosed from the moorings that have held life, many are now adrift. They claim to be free. They have thrown overboard the chart, the compass, the steering wheel, and the consciousness of destination. They are free from everything – except the rocks, and the storms, and the insufferable inanity of being tossed from wave to wave of meaningless emotion…The modern man is ‘left by science without a goal; by exploded humanitarianism without a hero; by logic with an impasse’ – he needs a way out.” [I believe I would say, “he needs a way up”, and that’s through the Reigning Christ, King of kings and Lord of lords!]

In Matthew 3 John said to the ‘religious Pharisees and Sadducees’, Verses 7-8 first, “Brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Therefore bear fruits worthy of repentance,” and then in Verse 11 John said, “I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance, but He who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.”

Modern-day ‘church’ response? “Who needs the Holy Spirit and who needs purified by fire?” So many willingly accept ‘false faith’ and ‘continuing smoke’ without the fire of God in their bones! I’ve often wondered how many have become a part of a local church fellowship absolutely enamored with the feeling of how that church ought to be ‘blessed’ by their presence because they serve in ‘self-pride’ and personal admiration for their fleshly abilities, rather than Christ Jesus extending His life, expressing His love through them, and demonstrating His awesome, available, atoning presence and heavenly power!

If ‘following Christ Jesus’ means bearing the Cross faithfully in death to self but life in Him, when the enemies of Christ, enemies of the Cross, enemies of the Way, the Truth, and the Life, rise up against you, do you, as Christ, trust Father-God to deliver you because God sees that YOU delight in Him, rejoice in Him, yes, even sees you willing to die for the honor of His name?

Do you remember Jesus, in bodily form, considering the penalty, cruelty, suffering, and death of the Cross, initially saying, “Lord, if it’s possible, let this cup pass from Me; nevertheless, not My will, but Your will be done”? That wasn’t doubting the Cross but being fully aware of the physical, bodily pain, as David highlights the suffering of the Promised Messiah in Psalm 22:1-21!

Verse 1 and following: “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me? Why are You so far from helping Me, and from the words of My groaning? Oh My God, I cry in the daytime, but You do not hear; and in the night season, and am not silent.

But You are holy, enthroned in the praises of Israel. Our fathers trusted in You; they trusted, and You delivered them. They cried to You, and were delivered; they trusted in You, and were not ashamed.

But I am a worm, and no man; a reproach of men and despised by the people. All those who see Me ridicule Me; they shoot out the lip, they shake the head, saying, He trusted in the Lord, let Him rescue Him; let Him deliver Him, since He delights in Him!”

But You are He who took Me out of the womb; You made Me trust while on My mother’s breasts. I was cast upon You from birth. From My mother’s womb You have been My God. Be not far from Me, for trouble is near; for there is none to help.

Many bulls have surrounded Me; strong bulls of Bashan have encircled Me. They gape at Me with their mouths, like a raging and roaring lion. I am poured out like water, and all My bones are out of joint; My heart is like wax; it has melted within Me.

My strength is dried up like a potsherd, and My tongue clings to My jaws; You have brought Me to the dust of death. For dogs have surrounded Me; the congregation of the wicked has enclosed Me. They pierced My hands and My feet; I count all My bones. They look and stare at Me. They divide My garments among them, and for My clothing they cast lots.

But You, O Lord, do not be far from Me; O My Strength, hasten to help Me! Deliver Me from the sword, My precious life from the power of the dog. Save Me from the lion’s mouth and from the horns of the wild oxen! You have answered Me.” You’ve just read a prophetic Word hundreds of years before Christ’s death on Calvary’s Cross! It’s called “the grace of God”! And Christ Jesus rested in that grace even if an unbelieving world would, and did, crucify Him!

“True Faith – Triumphant Wars”? Follow Colossians 2:13-15! “And you, [Does that You include YOU?], being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He has made alive together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses, having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. Having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it, [or the Cross!!].”

Is your faith, your trust in anything else, but not the Cross? Then, if so, your life of a sinner’s ‘faith’ is in yourself, best efforts, striving to improve your standing, on your own before Holy God – and He neither sees you, acknowledges you, nor welcomes you into the “blood-bought” family of God!

But “true faith” in the midst of “triumphant wars” is perfect peace because that is the awesome holiness of God, even if you face the enmity of the caustic nature of the devil himself and his deceiving demons! Peter extended a warning to everyone he knew in 1 Peter 5:8 when he wrote: “Be sober, be vigilant; because your ADVERSARY the devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. Verse 9, Resist him, STEADFAST IN THE FAITH, knowing that the same sufferings are experienced by your brotherhood in the world.”

And, “the brotherhood in the world” are prime examples of “true faith” who know, understand, and exercise ‘the fight’ or “the good fight of faith, laying hold on eternal life, to which you were called and have confessed the good confession in the presence of many witnesses.” [1 Timothy 6:12!].

How easy is it for many “professing believers” to have no clear understanding of the demands of true discipleship in our modern world, just like Peter in Mark 8:31-38? It says: And He [Jesus Christ] began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.

He spoke this word openly. THEN PETER TOOK JESUS ASIDE AND BEGAN TO REBUKE HIM. But when He had turned around and looked at His disciples, He rebuked Peter, saying, “Get behind Me, Satan! For you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men.”

When He had called the people to Himself, with His disciples also, He said to them, “Whoever desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake and the gospel’s will save it.

For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul? For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him the Son of Man will be ashamed when He comes in the glory of His Father with the holy angels.”

Are you aware of how ‘stinging’ these words are to one without clear understanding of the cost of true discipleship? It’s absolutely amazing to me that in Mark 8:29 Jesus had said to the disciples, “But who do you say that I am?”, with Peter answering “You are the Christ,” the anointed and promised Messiah, Emmanuel; and moments later He had to rebuke Peter for not being mindful of the eternal intent of Holy God through the “laid-down life”!!

Was Peter, in the infancy of his following Jesus, unaware of the fact of suffering, even rejection, and then the Cross? So, this young disciple wanted to correct Jesus, taking Him aside to say, “Jesus, this isn’t what You’re here for, ease up!” And then, WOW!, Jesus said, “Get behind Me, Satan!”

But how many today, like Peter then, have no comprehension of the eternal plan of God in reconciling the lost to eternal reconciliation through “shed blood”? How many today want “the crown” without “the cross,” how many today reject the “sentence of death to the old man, old sin nature” with Peter, because the path of a ‘laid-down life,’ the path of ‘suffering servant,’ the path of ‘a crucified life’ daily, was to be the willful choice daily of death to one’s aim of self-centered living! Kingdom living, in Christ, is “self-denial” daily, which some find totally unrealistic to the way of life they want for themselves!

What did Jesus say in Mark 8:34-38? When He had called the people to Himself, with His disciples also, He said to them, “Whoever desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever desires to save his life [for himself, for his fleshly dreams and ambitions, for the satisfaction of his fleshly lusts] will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake and the gospel’s will save it. For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul? For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him the Son of Man will be ashamed when He comes in the glory of His Father with the holy angels.”

Is ‘today’ different from the ‘day’ of our Lord’s public ministry? Jesus spoke of “this adulterous and sinful generation” that were “ashamed of Me and My words”; and then in Mark 9:1 Jesus said to them, “Assuredly, I say to you that there are some standing here who will not taste death till they see the kingdom of God present with power.” For you, how current is “seeing the kingdom of God present with power”?

“True Faith” in the midst of “Triumphant Wars”? “True Faith” is so very, very personal! In Matthew 10:32-39 Jesus tells us about open confession, open division, and open allegiance for His sake. He said: “Therefore whoever confesses Me before men, him I will also confess before My Father who is in heaven. BUT whoever denies Me before men, him I will also deny before My Father who is in heaven.

Do not think that I came to bring peace on earth. I did not come to bring peace but a sword. For I have come to ‘set a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law’; and ‘a man’s enemies will be those of his own household.’ He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me. He who finds his life will lose it, and he who loses his life for My sake will find it.”

Is “the declaration of allegiance to the Lordship of Christ” as vital today as it was when He walked this earth? Is “open testimony” as important today as when Peter and John and other disciples then faced imprisonment for their avowal of His Lordship? When a nation, like the U.S.A, begins to ‘deny the faith, squeeze the testifiers, even promote lawless unbelief and put the unashamed behind bars,’ how does that relate to YOU? What will your response be?

In Acts 9 Saul of Tarsus, who became Paul the Apostle, was journeying near Damascus when “suddenly a light shone around him from heaven.” Being awed, he fell to the ground, and heard a voice saying to him, Verse 4, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me?” “Who are You, Lord?” Then the Lord said to Saul, “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. It is hard for you to kick against the goads.” Verse 6, So he, trembling and astonished, said, “Lord, what do You want me to do?” Amazingly, in Verse 20, we read: “Immediately he preached the Christ in the synagogues, that He is the Son of God.” Amazing grace!

I so love Jesus’ words in Luke 12:8-9, at least that which tells us about His confession of our faith before the angels! “Also I say to you, whoever confesses Me before men, him the Son of Man also will confess before the angels of God. But he who denies Me before men will be denied before the angels of God.” I don’t think ‘hiding in the hedges’ as a follower of Christ is what He calls us to!

I’m so thankful for what we read in Hebrews 10:39 which says, “But we are not of those who draw back to perdition, but of those who believe to the saving of the soul.” “True Faith” in the midst of the “Triumphant Wars”! Faith and world foundation, Faith and the dawn of historical humanity, Faith and the strong men of biblical obedience, Faith and eternal, heavenly hope, Faith and the advancement of Sovereign Rule, Faith and the overcoming gift, then telling us in Hebrews 11:39, “And all these, having obtained a good testimony through faith, did not receive the promise, God having provided something better for us, that they should not be made perfect apart from us.”

Of course, there are large numbers of unbelievers who look at people of Biblical Faith, considering them folks of weak minds, battered brains, foolish wills, strange beliefs and behaviors – but “True Faith” and “Triumphant Wars” still stand strong as the world, the flesh, and the devil “go to Hell”!

Charles Spurgeon, in his book, “Spurgeon’s Sermons,” [Memorial Library, Vol.15,p.307], wrote: “Faith in God is a thing to be reverenced rather than reviled. True religion is sanctified common-sense. It is the most common-sense thing in the world to put your trust in One that cannot lie. If I trust myself, or trust my fellow-man, I am thought to be in the first case self-reliant, and in the second case I am judged to have a charitable disposition; yet in either case I shall, sooner or later, prove my folly; but if I trust God, who can bring a reason against my confidence? What is there to be ridiculed in a man’s trusting his Maker? Can He fail that created the blue heavens, that settled the foundations of the earth and poured out the waters of the great sea? Can the Almighty retract His promise because He is unable to fulfill it? Can He break His word because circumstances master Him and prevent His performance of it? ‘Trust in the Lord forever; for in the Lord Jehovah is everlasting strength.’”

Do you remember Jesus asleep in the boat with His disciples when a storm arose? Matthew 8:25-27 says, Then His disciples came to Him and awoke Him, saying, “Lord, save us! We are perishing!” But He said to them, ‘Why are you fearful, O you of little faith?’ Then He arose and rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm. So the men marveled, saying, ‘Who can this be, that even the winds and the sea obey Him?’”

Stormy seas of life, turbulent winds of opposition and oppression, hurricanes of demonic, devilish hatred of true believers, critical crisis of enormous consequences, troubles that torment, dark clouds that are the darkest of threatenings, and one wonders if there is a way of escape, and then we read, Psalm 46:10, “Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth!” The question of this very moment? Is He exalted in YOUR life and circumstances this very moment? And in Verses 1-7 the psalmist says to us, “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, even though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea; Though its waters roar and be troubled, though the mountains shake with its swelling. There is a river whose streams shall make glad the city of God, the holy place of the tabernacle of the Most High. God is in the midst of her, she shall not be moved; God shall help her, just at the break of dawn. The nations raged, the kingdoms were moved; He uttered His voice, the earth melted. The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge.” Glory!!

Oh, and then what does Psalm 46:10 tell us, as a reminder? “Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth!” The question in this moment is: Will He be exalted through YOU?

In Philippians 2:5-11 Paul challenges us all with God’s eternal intent! “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross. Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”

It was Fanny J. Crosby and Robert Lowry who wrote the old hymn, “All The Way My Savior Leads Me.” It says: “All the way my Savior leads me; What have I to ask beside? Can I doubt His tender mercy, Who through life has been my Guide? Heavenly peace, divinest comfort, Here by faith in Him to dwell! For I know, what-e’er befall me, Jesus does all things well.

All the way my Savior leads me, Cheers each winding path I tread, Gives me grace for every trial, Feeds me with the living bread. Though my weary steps may falter, And my soul athirst may be, Gushing from the Rock before me, Lo! A spring of joy I see.

All the way my Savior leads me; Oh, the fullness of His love! Perfect rest to me is promised In my Father’s house above. When my spirit, clothed immortal, Wings its flight to realms of day, This my song through endless ages: Jesus led me all the way.”

Are you aware of the awesome word in Genesis 24:27? “As for me, being on the way, the Lord led me…”! Do you understand the reality of ‘divine consistency’? That’s, “the Lord led me”!

But beyond, “the Lord led me,” are you able to say, yes, joyfully, “I followed, and was glad”? If our Lord says, “Follow Me,” is that an option one holds or the command HOLDS YOU? Have you put your hands to the plow and you don’t look back?

Doesn’t it amaze you? God told Peter, “You [and those of true redemptive faith] are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light; who once were not a people but are now the people of God, who had not obtained mercy but now have obtained mercy.” Glory! Glory to God in the Highest! I’m His – He is mine!

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

“FAITH’S PROBING – FAITH’S PROVING”

In John 20:24-30 you’re going to be reading powerful verses about disciples then and now and the challenges of “Faith’s Probing – Faith’s Proving.” It says, Now Thomas, called the Twin, one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. [Resurrected!]. The other disciples therefore said to him, “We have seen the Lord.” So he said to them, “Unless I see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe.”

And after eight days His disciples were again inside, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, “Peace to you!” Then He said to Thomas, “Reach your finger here, and look at My hands; and reach your hand here, and put it into My side. Do not be unbelieving, but believing.”

And Thomas answered and said to Him, “My Lord and my God!” Jesus said to him, “Thomas, because you have seen Me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”

And truly Jesus did many other signs in the presence of His disciples, which are not written in this book; but these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His name.

“Unless…”! What are your conditions of accepting what seems to you to be impossible rationalization, or wishful thinking, or speculative considerations, or uncertainties in one’s life, even if you don’t know or expect what may be coming your way in the near or far future?

Have you ever been around those who live with the clouds of uncertainties and are never at peace for today because they don’t know what tomorrow holds? Oh, and then there are those, as someone said, who see their torturous days now, and forget both present and future, unsettled at every turn or event of life.

At the same time there are those so cemented in the present, even locked into it, that they never think about the eternal ‘after-life’!

What did Thomas say? “Unless..I see, I will not believe!” He saw – and he believed! But, have you ever been around a ‘prober’ intent on searching out, delving into, examining carefully, because he/she is one who wants to know, receive, be blessed by, and forever changed by the discovery of eternal Truth authored by God Himself?

What did Thomas say? “I saw, I believed, and I’ve been forever changed, ‘born again,’ raised up from spiritual death to eternal life, raised out of ‘religion’ to spiritual re-birth, raised out of the temporary to the eternal!”

How did Paul the Apostle explain this eternal phenomenon of spiritual re-birth and the promise and security of your appearance with Him ‘in glory’? In Colossians 3:1-3 he wrote, “If then you were raised with Christ [crucified, buried, raised up], seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth. For you died, [Did you? Were you crucified with Christ?], and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is our life appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory.”

“In Christ” we are not to be ‘earth-bound’ but “earth-blessed” because we’ve become One with Him, and we’re sharing in His eternal intent to so love this world that we see the world, the flesh, and the devil bound and limited by lies of darkness, but freed by His eternal truths and brought into the Light, and as “free men and women” we live the blessed life of Holy Presence, Eternal Purpose, and Powerful Ministries of sharing His Life and Expressing His love to the spiritually needy around us!

And, if we are “earth-blessed”, what does that entail? One of the things Paul had to say to the church in Corinth is just as vital for churches today as it was then. In 1 Corinthians 15:34, Paul wrote: “Awake to righteousness, and do not sin; for some do not have the knowledge of God. I speak this to your shame,” and especially when much of “modern-day Christianity” promotes, “we can’t do anything but sin until we get to Heaven,” a lie from the devil himself!

But in Galatians 6:14 Paul also wrote, “But God forbid that I should boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.” The cross was ‘death for sin and death to sin,’ but you want to excuse sin in the life of true believers when Jesus said, “Go, and sin no more”?

The eternal reality of victory over sin and death is because one accepts God’s love for him/her through the Cross of Christ as an expression of His eternal love and His power to raise the dead, freeing them from the weight and penalty of sin, through Christ’s shed blood, putting to death one’s interest in the sin nature and its deathly, destructive influences, and letting us know, when Jesus was nailed to the Cross to die, we were there on the Cross with Him! “But God forbid that I should boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ!!”

“Faith’s Probing”? Self-made men have a hard, hard time accepting that their fleshly lives and fleshly allegiances brought on the death of Christ Jesus! Self-made men are out to “find themselves”, and all their worth and value in what they are able to accomplish becomes a “noose” around their necks, yes, even choking out the Holy Spirit’s conviction of their eternal need!

No doubt this is why Jesus said in Matthew 10:39, “He who finds his life will lose it, and he who loses his life for My sake will find it.” Eternal consequences to ‘self-determination’, empty of any desire to be reconciled to God, or answer from God’s point of view, “What is your life?”

I want you to come with me and examine Psalm 38 and Psalm 39 as we read about God Almighty confronting, convicting, conforming David through self-examination of his own heart and what in him brought about the disciplines of Loving God, like a faithful, true parent!

In my Holman’s NKJV, Psalm 38 is entitled “Prayer in Time of Chastening”, as David was bringing to the forefront of his spiritual evaluation his sad state of mind and spirit as Holy God brought him into account for his open and hidden sins. Notice, in Verse 3, David acknowledged “willful rebellion” because of ‘my sin.’ In Verse 4, he acknowledged “weighty results”, ‘like a heavy burden they are too heavy for me.” In Verse 5, David revealed a “wounded spirit”, saying, “My wounds are foul and festering because of my foolishness.” Oh, and then in Verses 6-8 David revealed a “warped walk,” saying, “I am troubled, I am bowed down greatly; I go mourning all the day long. For my loins are full of inflammation, and there is no soundness in my flesh. I am feeble and severely broken; I groan because of the turmoil of my heart.”

Are YOU aware of “Faith’s Probing”? In Psalm 39:4-5 David truly evaluated himself as he dealt with every man’s uncertainty of the length of his days – and then the judgment seat before Holy God! He said in Psalm 39:4-5, “Lord, make me to know my end, and what is the measure of my days, that I may know how frail I am. Indeed, You have made my days as handbreadths, and my age is as nothing before You; certainly every man at his best state is but vapor.”

As I’ve been writing this chapter, we’ve been experiencing the last day or two strong southern winds out of the Gulf, moving up quickly to the Dallas-Ft.Worth area on in to Oklahoma; they’re here, they pass, and then they’re gone! Does it surprise you that that is how our earthly lives are, and sadly, some never consider their standing before Holy God’s Eternal Throne of, yes, Judgment!

In Revelation 6:15-17 the sixth seal is opened and John is given a ‘last days’ vision! He wrote: “And the kings of the earth, the great men, the rich men, the commanders, the mighty men, every slave and every free man, hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains, and said to the mountains and rocks, ‘Fall on us and hide us from the face of Him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb! For the great day of His wrath has come, and who is able to stand?”

Let me ask you: “Is the word of the Lord being sounded forth from you or through you? In 1 Thessalonians 1:5-10 Paul wrote: “For our gospel did not come to you in word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Spirit and in much assurance, as you know what kind of men we were among you for your sake. And you became followers of us and of the Lord, having received the word in much affliction, with joy of the Holy Spirit, so that you became examples to all in Macedonia and Achaia who believe. For from you the word of the Lord has sounded forth, not only in Macedonia and Achaia, but also in every place. Your faith toward God has gone out, so that we do not need to say anything. For they themselves declare concerning us what manner of entry we had to you, and how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, and to wait for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, EVEN JESUS WHO DELIVERS US FROM THE WRATH TO COME.”

Who stands when the day of God’s wrath comes? Who is protected when the day of God’s wrath comes? In the midst of our vast world with resources everywhere, why is it that the majority of the world lives in spiritual bankruptcy? But in the midst of tragic unbelief there are vast numbers of people who have moved out of spiritual bankruptcy to eternal wealth, from spiritual death to eternal life, from the fearful face of deathliness, bondage, and Satanic oppression, to the eternal glow of Heaven’s Glory!

“Faith’s Proving”? In Romans 12:1-2 Paul wrote, “I beseech you therefore, brethren, BY THE MERCIES OF GOD, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be [being] transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”

In “faith’s proving,” are you aware of the “Resurrection Factor”? In Acts 1:3, Luke’s Gospel, anointed by the Holy Spirit, he wrote: “to whom He also presented Himself alive after His suffering by many infallible proofs, being seen by them during forty days and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God.”

Do you remember, after His Resurrection, Jesus appearing to two disciples on the road to Emmaus, “their eyes restrained, so that they did not know Him”? They said to the Resurrected King of kings, Luke 24:21, “But we were hoping that it was He who was going to redeem Israel.” Initially there was disappointment in Him! Then, in Luke 24:25-27, Jesus said to them, “O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken! Ought not the Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into His glory?” And beginning at Moses and all the Prophets, He expounded to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself.” Glory! Glory, Hallelujah!! From Genesis to the end of Revelation there is the UNVEILING OF CHRIST JESUS, the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world!

“Faith’s Proving”? Jesus not only ‘entered into His glory”, He opened Heaven’s Door to every child of faith who truly knows ‘repentance toward God and faith in the finished work of Christ at the Cross’! His purpose? Hebrews 2:9-10 tells us, “But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, that He, by the grace of God, might taste death for everyone. For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings.”

Didn’t Peter tell us in 1 Peter 2:24, “who Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live for righteousness – by whose stripes you were healed.” The Cross? God’s judgment on sin! The Cross? God’s sacred triumph over Hell’s foundation! The Cross? The eternal unveiling of the very heart of God! The Cross? The gateway of fallen mankind to an eternal relationship with Holy God! The Cross? 2 Peter 1:3-4, “as His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us by glory and virtue, by which have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, THAT THROUGH THESE [PROMISES] YOU MAY BE PARTAKERS OF THE DIVINE NATURE, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.”

The “way of salvation”? The Way of the Cross leads home [to God]!! Romans 6:6 declares: “knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin.” But unaware of the “way of salvation, unaware of the ministry of the Cross, unaware of the slavish bondage to one’s sin nature”, only through the death of Christ on the Cross, does one find freedom from sin’s guilt, sin’s slavish bondage, and sin’s result of spiritual death and eternal separation from Holy God!

Paul went on to say in Romans 6:7-11, “For he who has died has been freed from sin. Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him, knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, dies no more. Death no longer has dominion over Him. For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God. Likewise YOU ALSO, reckon yourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

How clear for you was Paul when in Romans 6:5 he said, “For if we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection…”. Here’s how Oswald Chambers describes it in his book, “My Utmost For His Highest,” [p.74],

“The idea all through the apostle Paul’s writings is that after the moral decision to be identified with Jesus has been made, the resurrection life of Jesus invades every bit of my human nature. It takes omnipotence to live the life of the Son of God in mortal flesh. The Holy Spirit cannot be located as a Guest in a house, He invades everything. When once I decide that my “old man (i.e.,the heredity of sin) should be identified with the death of Jesus, then the Holy Spirit invades me. He takes charge of everything, my part is to walk in the light and to obey all that He reveals. When I have made the moral decision about sin, it is easy to reckon actually that I am dead unto sin, because I find the life of Jesus there all the time. Just as there is only one stamp of humanity, so there is only one stamp of holiness, the holiness of Jesus, and it is His holiness that is gifted to me. God puts the holiness of His Son into me, and I belong to a new order spiritually.”

Yes, in Christ we become the “King’s kids”!! E. Edwin Young, in the early 1930’s, wrote the hymn, “Jesus, Revealed in Me.” It says: “Christ, the Transforming Light, Touches this heart of mine, Piercing the darkest night, Making His glory shine.

Here, Lord, I bring my heart, My love, my strength, my will; Cleanse me in every part, With all Your Spirit fill.

Life is no longer mine, I yield it all to Thee; Fill me that I may shine Until Your face I see. Triumphant peace is mine, Now Jesus reigns within; He gives me joy divine, And victory over sin.” Amen?

CONCLUSION

You’ll remember that John 17 was Christ Jesus’ prayer as His betrayal, His arrest, and His impending crucifixion was weighing heavy on His mind and heart. But as you read that prayer you find Jesus “praying” for His disciples then and now!

In Verses 14-19 Jesus said to the Father, “I have given them Your word; and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. I do not pray that You should take them out of the world, but that You should keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth. As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world. And for their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they also may be sanctified by the truth.”

“Sanctify”? That means “set apart for the glory of God alone”! When Jesus said in Verse 18, “I also have sent them into the world,” every disciple has Jesus’ calling on their lives to be ‘Salt’ and “Light”! That is DIVINE COMMISSIONING!!

And I often have wondered, “Lord, do You have de-commissioning days when ‘professing believers’ are ‘black pepper’ and ‘burned out bulbs’ rather than strong, vocal, faithful witnesses of the Message you entrusted to Your people?”

Silent churches do not touch the lost world with saving grace and mercy! Silent witnesses have lost the blessing of proclamation to the needy! Small hearts have little, if any, affection for the unsaved. Limited minds concerning Holy Scriptures live in a sad state of mind basically saying by their indifference to the lost and alienated, “We could care less; we’re fine, and that’s all we care about!”

Their eyes are closed to the ‘spiritually dead’, their ears are shut to the painful cries of the enslaved, they’re gripped by ‘darkness’ rather than “The Light,” and it’s as if their lips are stitched by the deceit of the devil! It isn’t “Christ Alone” but whatever their ‘flesh’ calls for!

But there is the “Eternal Call of God” upon true believers to be His witnesses to the utter-most parts of our world! Christ’s calling to be His witness, His ambassador, should be the greatest response given by every true believer’s spiritual journey and pilgrimage!

Christ Jesus IS the Eternal Savior of mankind! He comes with forgiveness, unfailing love and compassion, tender mercies for the most rebellious man on the face of the earth! He pardons, He atones, He redeems, He washes one clean and pure, He heals the sick, He casts out demons, He impresses the divine image of Holy God upon every repentant heart!

He implants Holy, Resurrection Presence, Eternal Power of the Godhead, He soothes the extreme sorrow-filled man because he weeps over his sinfulness, He indwells every repentant life, establishing His Sovereign Throne within us, He sets us free from the devil and the powers of darkness, He gives eternal understanding about mapping your Christ-honoring Life in your pilgrimage, He opens the Word of full-orbed Truth and shows you the Way, He’s the Divine Redeemer who ushers in “Victory In Jesus,” He washes us clean in the blood of the Lamb, fills our minds and understandings with the blessed consolations of His Resurrection Life and Eternal Hope! His “Victory” is our ever-present blessing, conquering our foes, our enemies, even transforming our fleshly extremities into Spirit-Excellence!

Christ Jesus authors our blessings, our hopes, our eternal aspirations – He gives us the gift of faith and His faithfulness, He proves in us and through us the power of His blood, He bestows the Power of His Holy Spirit, He opens wide the door on ministry service and blessing, and, oh, He builds strong foundations under us, and radiates His glory all around us!

Hear me! “You are loved with His everlasting love! You are dressed, by Him, in His eternal robe of righteousness, He gives you joy unspeakable and full of glory, He writes on YOUR eternal ledger seat: Justified, Sanctified, Glorified! And as you embrace His declarations, you begin to hear the angels’ song and the song of the redeemed! “Glory, Glory, Hallelujah, I go to Him marching in!!”

Fast approaching my 89^th birthday as of June 12, 2016, I’m disturbed to see a nation and people founded, yes, by God Himself as “one nation under God” but fast becoming, especially among leadership nation-wide as a nation by the people, of the people, and for the people – and, as in life, so in governments, the absence of God releases men to their own control, their own godless philosophies, their own reckless abandonment of “self, ‘my way or the highway,’ and certainly ‘less God because I want to govern myself, my family, my city as I damn well please’”, which reveals a people and nation on the fast road to fleshly decline!

To them, spiritual government is not ‘the American way’! Really? And, of course, they want the Holy Word of God out of government, out of schools and universities, out of homes and families and their own minds, and less and less and less of local and state over-sight – “Who or what government needs the advice or counsel of what some call Holy God, our Creator, Lord, Savior, and Master, because we can govern ourselves as we please, which to us means: keep the Bible out of our public domain and ways of godless living; He has no place telling us what we individually or as families, schools, businesses, or governments ought to be doing!”

It was King David, ruling over Israel by the grace of God, who, in Psalm 67:1-4, wrote: “God be merciful to us and bless us, and cause His face to shine upon us, That Your way may be known on earth, Your salvation among all nations. Let the peoples praise You, O God; let all the peoples praise You. Oh, let the nations be glad and sing for joy! For You shall judge the people righteously, and govern the nations on earth.”

But do you hear a ‘modern-society’ saying more and more: “God is not necessary in our governments, politically, morally, spiritually, individually or corporately – leave God out of our governments and out of our schools, out of our lives!” Oh, and they mean it – “To us, God has no place in our affairs because ‘good government’ (?) is allowing us to do as we please!”, which means: “less Faith, less guidance, less watch-care, less protection, less blessing of God, less Sovereign-Rule, less divine love, less of His omnipotence and more of our impotence – with many of the warped opinion that, ‘yes, we’re smarter then God Himself’!”

I know that the people of our formerly ‘great nation’ have set aside any “fear of God”. But Psalm 25:12-15 tells us, King David speaking, “Who is the man who fears the Lord? Him shall He teach in the way He chooses. He himself shall dwell in prosperity, and his descendants shall inherit the earth. The secret of the Lord is with those who fear Him, and He will show them His covenant. My eyes are ever toward the Lord, for He shall pluck my feet out of the net.”

A “net of Godless rule” is a strong, powerful net that wraps itself around people so powerfully that they end up with spiritual curses, spiritual bankruptcy, spiritual ignorance, and a spiritual destiny they really should not desire. Numbers 22:31-34 is a wake-up call for some people, but, sadly, many national, state, and local leaders have plotted their course, omitting God, His Word and His will.

In Numbers 22:31-35 we read, Then the Lord opened Balaam’s eyes, and he saw the Angel of the Lord standing in the way with His drawn sword in His hand; and he bowed his head and fell flat on his face. “Why have you struck your donkey these three times? Behold, I have come out to stand against you, because ‘your way’ is perverse before Me. The donkey saw Me and turned aside from Me these three times. If she had not turned aside from Me, surely I would also killed you by now, and let her live.” And Balaam said to the Angel of the Lord, “I have sinned, for I did not know You stood in the way against me. Now therefore, if it displeases You, I will turn back.”

Do you sense today in America, in Texas, in the Bedford, Texas, area a political climate that is, by some, “perverse before Me”, Holy God, the Founder of government to be Sovereignly ruled by Him – not proud, fleshly, independent of and separate from His Holy Word, wiser than God men and women?

How clear are you about Peter’s words in 2 Peter 1:2-4 that so relates to God’s people as His instruments impacting ‘godless governments’ and lives in every community? Peter wrote:

“Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord, as His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us by glory and virtue, by which have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.”

Isn’t it a shameful position that some take, “Keep God and His Word and Truth out of OUR governments – we’ll take care of ourselves in our own way!”

But then, there are those with Peter’s wisdom and understanding! 2 Peter 1:10-11, “Therefore, brethren, [true sons and daughters of the Eternal Faith!], be even more diligent to make your calling and election sure, for if you do these things you will never stumble; for so an entrance will be supplied to you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.”

You hear it in all political elections: “No God in our government – we do it our way, man’s way, the way of godlessness, and the way of fleshly compromises, alienating God and Truth from us!” Destructive heresies will seek to gain control, keep control, and hold onto man’s control and ways without heeding the Holy Word! “Alienate Truth and promote ‘our way’, which is the absence of God in our governments!”

Didn’t Peter go on to say in 2 Peter 2:19, “While they promise them ‘liberty’ [from being governed by God or His Truth!], they themselves are slaves of corruption, for by whom a person is overcome, by him also he is brought into bondage;” Verse 22, But it has happened [does happen, will happen!] to them according to a true proverb: “A dog returns to his own vomit,” and, “a sow, having washed, to her wallowing in the mire.”

Are you aware of how many “professing believers”, having escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Savior, find themselves easily entangled again in them and overcome, [that their] latter end is worse for them than the beginning?

In 2 Peter 2:21 the servant of God tells us: “For it would have been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than having known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered to them.”

Now? Prayerful intercession that Holy God, once again, will teach men, political leaders, “the way in which God chooses” – not their supposed “grass-roots” electorate! Accounting Day does come before Holy God at the Judgment Seat for, yes, their ‘political decisions’ (?)! So, newly elected politicians: Will YOU be led by Holy God and His Eternal Word?

By J.Farrell Fisher

AUGUST 20, 2014

It’s, yes, astounding to me that as I read Spurgeon for his pastoral insights and phenomenal handling of God’s Word, I come across statements that birth a new direction of preparation in preaching or teaching God’s Word. He said, [Spurgeon’s Sermons, Memorial Library, Vol.19, p.274], “The flesh sees honey in the drink, but faith at once perceives that there is poison in the cup.”

And there certainly is an eternity’s difference between man’s ‘flesh’ [his old, fallen sin nature] and God’s biblical faith. Spurgeon spoke about ‘flesh’ or ‘This sin is a very pleasurable thing, why should I not enjoy it? Surely I may eat this fruit which looks so charming, and is so much to be desired.” And you realize:

‘Flesh’ is blind to God and His Word. ‘Flesh’ is blind to sin, twisting Truth, distorting human personality and divine potential, grieving and gripping the inner man in Satanic slavery, promoting self-potential apart from divine intent, brutalizing divine purpose and plan, enslaving the ‘flesh’ to a godless life, omitting FAITH as THE DIVINE REMEDY OF AN IMPRISONED SOUL, substituting sin as the open door to true freedom when in reality it leads to chains and bondage and a cell or existence of fleshly limitation. ‘FLESH’ IS LIFE WITHOUT GOD!

Spurgeon went on to say so profoundly: “Faith spies the snake in the grass, and gives warning of it. Faith remembers death, judgment, the great reward, the just punishment, and that dread word – eternity. Faith sees the end as well as the beginning. Faith, while the feast is going on, reminds the revelers of the reckoning. Faith feels that she cannot buy the transient joys of earth at the countless cost of an immortal soul. ‘What shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?’

Blindness to God and His salvation is hopelessness with faithlessness as the uncertain foundation of one’s existence. Self-trust, self-determination, self-will, and self-rule are the four cornerstones of our empty dwellings but faith is the solid and sure foundation.

Without biblical faith, one is void of understanding of the very heart of God. In Ezekial 18:31-32, God speaks today to you personally: “Cast away from you all the transgressions which you have committed, and get yourselves a new heart and a new spirit. For why should you die…? For I have no pleasure in the death of the one who dies,” says the Lord God. “Therefore turn and live!”

That’s the very heart of the Lord God of Eternity – and He knows you, loves you, and wants you to be one with Him! It was John Calvin, in his “Institutes of the Christian Religion,” who wrote: “Faith is a knowledge of the benevolence of God toward us, and a certain persuasion of His veracity.”

It was Edwin Hubbell Chapin who said: “Skepticism has not founded empires, established principles, or changed the world’s heart. The great doers of history have always been men of faith.” So true!

And when it comes to human existence that is passionate for more, it’s only by faith that human existence is changed by Divine Presence through repentance toward God and FAITH in the finished work of Christ at the Cross! Truth-faith is “looking up to God,” “looking in to one’s heart-need,” and “looking around as to where one is to settle in serving and sharing our Lord and Savior”!

But, of course, multitudes live by ‘superstition’ rather than faith in God’s finished work. Others live by their mental superiority to the less fortunate because it’s ‘education’ that makes a man – not repentance and faith! Others have settled in to proving their own worth and value by what they do – not what has been done at Calvary’s Cross. It was Napoleon Bonaparte who once said: “All the scholastic scaffolding falls, as a ruined edifice, before one single word – faith.” It was Jesus who said in John 20:29, “Blessed are they that have not seen, and yet believed.”

Faith! What an intriguing, inspiring, entrusting word, that calls by personal examination, inward acknowledgement, and mind and heart full surrender to the God who blesses one with SAVING FAITH! Look at Ephesians 2:8!! “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God…”

Romans 1:16-17 is so clear! It says: (Paul speaking), “For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes, for the Jew first and also for the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, ‘The just [or justified or ‘just as if I’d never sinned’] shall live by faith.”

We WERE dead in our trespasses and sins, the Gospel is preached, the Spirit convicts and convinces, and by grace through faith, repenting, believing, and trusting, we are born to new life in Christ!

It was J.P.Scholfield who wrote the hymn, “Saved, Saved!” It says: “I’ve found a friend who is all to me, His love is ever true; I love to tell how He lifted me And what His grace can do for you…

He saves me from every sin and harm, Secures my soul each day; I’m leaning on His mighty arm. I know He’ll guide me all the way…

When poor and needy and all alone, In love He said to me, ‘Come unto Me and I’ll lead you home, To live with Me eternally…

Saved, by His power divine, Saved, to new life sublime! Life now is sweet and my joy is complete, For I’m saved, saved, saved!”

We’re SAVED BY FAITH, but I believe also that there is SECURITY IN FAITH! How could one ever believe that God saves, and yet His salvation is ‘insecure’?

It may be Old Testament scripture but it is the Word of God, and the prophet Isaiah, in Isaiah 26:2-4, said: “Open the gates that the righteous nation which keeps the truth may enter in. YOU [God] 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.”

In John 17:3 Jesus prayed to Father-God for us! He said: “And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.”

Oswald Chambers, in “My Utmost For His Highest,” [p.93], wrote: “God has ventured all in Jesus Christ to save us, now He wants us to venture our all in abandoned confidence in Him. There are spots where that faith has not worked in us as yet, places untouched by the life of God. There were none of those spots in Jesus Christ’s life, and there are to be none in ours…The real meaning of eternal life is a life that can face anything it has to face without wavering. If we take this view, life becomes one great romance, a glorious opportunity for seeing marvelous things all the time. God is disciplining us to get us into this central place of power.”

For the true believer there is to be that steadfastness of hope in us that what God has started, He will finish! In Job 13:15 Job told his ‘friends’: “Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him.” The process of faith requires the patience of faith, yes, patience with yourself!

Robert Browning, in “The Ring and the Book,” wrote: “There is but one way to browbeat this world, Dumb-founder doubt, and repay scorn in kind – To go on trusting, namely, till faith Move Mountains.” That means “hold on” in the journey of faith; “don’t let go” in the stressful times; “eyes on the goal” as you press in to Jesus!

In Revelation 3:10-13 Jesus speaks to us who are in His ‘church’ today: “Because you have kept My command to persevere, I also will keep you from the hour of trial which shall come upon the whole world, to test those who dwell on the earth. Behold, I am coming quickly! Hold fast what you have, that no one may take your crown. He who overcomes, I will make him a pillar in the temple of My God, and he shall go out no more. I will write on him the name of My God and the name of the city of My God, the New Jerusalem, which comes down out of heaven from My God. And I will write on him My new name. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.”

WE’RE SAVED BY FAITH, WE’RE SECURE IN FAITH, BUT ALSO THE JOURNEY OF FAITH IS A TEST OF CHOICE IN BEING EITHER INFLUENCED BY THE WORLD AROUND US OR OVERCOMING, YES, WORLDLY TESTS AND TEMPTATIONS BY EITHER REFUSING TO INDULGE IN THE FLESHLY STANDARDS IN THE WORLD OR TO LIVE SURRENDERED DAILY TO THE LORDSHIP OF CHRIST! And I’m sure it’s both!

In I John 2:15-17 the beloved John challenges every believer: “Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him…

For all that is in the world – the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life – is not of the Father but is of the world. And the world is passing away, and the lust of it; but he who does the will of God abides forever.”

It’s really interesting that Paul challenges all believers in 2 Corinthians 10:5 to “bring every thought captive to the obedience of Christ” when, sadly, too many professing believers will yield to a world spirit that will dishonor Christ, but the Holy Spirit emphasizes one daily being transformed “by the renewing of the mind.”

There is a vast difference in human existence between those enslaved to their old sin natures or freed by the blood of Christ and birthed into “a new creation” that is, yes, divine in nature! In Ephesians 2:1-3 Paul described those in bondage to the “old man”: “And you He made alive, who were dead [spiritually dead to God] in trespasses and sins,

In which you once WALKED ACCORDING TO THE COURSE OF THIS WORLD, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience,

Among whom also WE ALL ONCE CONDUCTED OURSELVES IN THE LUSTS OF OUR FLESH, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, just as the others.”

The ‘world spirit’ is powerful, tempting, lying, attractive and addictive with deadly alternatives and outcomes, enslaving, binding and bruising, contagious, producing sick spirits in the mind and heart, destroying, poisoning, entrapping, stripping of even common decency, which is what Paul was describing to Titus when in Titus 2:12 he spoke the opposite of worldly teaching that ‘covers’ or ‘denies’ ungodly and worldly lusts, but that true faith, saving faith, transforming faith, teaches us “to live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age.”

Worldly people are aware of ‘spiritual failure’ or ‘spiritual darkness’ or ‘spiritual emptiness’ which drives them to find ‘something’ or ‘someone’ to fill them up with something, but what they seek and find never satisfies because true satisfaction in life only comes by our Lord’s Resurrection Presence!

And guess what? His Holy Word tells us: I John 1:7, “If we walk in the light as He [Jesus] is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ God’s Son cleanses us from all sin.” GLORY TO GOD!

I love Oswald Chambers’ statement in “My Utmost For His Highest” when he said: [p.268], “The evidence that I am delivered from sin is that I know the real nature of sin in me.”

WE’VE SEEN THE FACT THAT WE’RE SAVED BY FAITH, WE’RE SECURE IN THE FAITH, WE FACE A TEST OF CHOICE IN OUR WALK, BUT ALSO WE ARE INSTRUCTED TO BUILD OURSELVES UP ON “YOUR MOST HOLY FAITH,” WHICH IS JUDE 20-21! It says:

“But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most Holy Faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life…”

You do understand “new birth” which tells us there are infants in the faith walk, children learning about the faith, teenagers tested about their allegiance to truth, young adults, maturing adults, senior adults, all growing in grace and gripping the truth practically of a sanctifying faith, understanding maturely they’ve been “set apart” in honoring our Lord and Savior!

I’m sure that much of our salvation -walk as infants in the faith and energetic children of faith is based upon, mostly, head faith, but as one matures in the faith-walk a person begins to discern ‘heart-faith’, that is, one willing to be led by the Holy Spirit of God and matured by faithfulness in and to God’s Holy Word.

No doubt this is why Hebrews 11:6 tells us, “But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.”

Saving, sanctifying faith is not in what I do, but what has been done through the sacrificial life of Christ and my absolute certainty and acceptance of His finished work on the Cross where He took me to the Cross with Him, and I was there crucified with Christ, and now He lives again and through my available body! It’s not “us” – it’s “Christ in us the hope of glory”!

There is such an illuminating word Jesus spoke in Luke 21:16-19. It says: “You will be betrayed even by parents and brothers, relatives and friends; and they will be hated by all for My name’s sake. But not a hair of your head shall be lost. By your patience [steadfastness, disciplined walk] possess your souls.”

Does that relate to believers “putting on the whole armor of God”? Does that mean “seeking,” “searching,” “claiming,” “dressing,” “receiving,” all that our Lord has promised? I love Chambers’ words when he said: “Faith is not a pathetic sentiment, but robust vigorous confidence built on the fact that God is holy love.” WOW! What are you building your life of faith upon?

The journey of faith is a joyous journey, but sometimes there are those who “depart from the faith” – and it’s you and Jesus only! In 2 Timothy 4:16-18 Paul told his spiritual son, “At my first defense no one stood with me, but all forsook me. May it not be charged against them. But the Lord stood with me and strengthened me, so that the message might be preached fully through me, and that all the Gentiles might hear. Also I was delivered out of the mouth of the lion. And the Lord will deliver me from every evil work and preserve me for His heavenly kingdom. To Him be glory forever and ever. Amen!”

I wrote a message last week entitled “Dark Nights – Bright Lights.” Redemptive faith is not a dark night, but the “Bright Light” of Jesus Himself – His Light never grows dim!

I pray you understand that at times a militaristic call to arms does arise for true believers, but without a doubt, I believe, Paul is talking here about a war against your own flesh, a war against the world spirit of unbelief, and a war against Satanic and demonic activity!

Discern Matthew 24:3-14 as you personally choose to do so, but don’t ignore or try to ‘sugar-coat’ our Lord’s words as He talked about the signs of the times and the end of the age! Jesus said: Now as He sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to Him privately, saying, “Tell us, when will these things be? And what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the ends of the age?” And Jesus answered and said to them: “Take heed that no one deceives you.

For many will come in My name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and will deceive many. And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet.

For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places. All these are the beginning of sorrows. Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and kill you, and you will be hated by all nations for My name’s sake. And then many will be offended, will betray one another, and will hate one another.

Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many. And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold. But he who endures to the end shall be saved.”

I hope you understand that what has been spoken by Jesus is to alert ALL of “perilous times.” Our Lord and Savior high-lighted some very vital truths about these particular times called “last days”. He said: 1]. It will be a time of great deception. Verses 4-5. 2]. It will be a time of great conflict. Verses 6-7. 3]. It will be a time of great suffering. Verses 8-10. 4]. It will be a time of open sin. Verses 11-12. 5]. It will be a time of great opportunity. Verses 13-14.

Are you prepared? Are you alert? Are you well-trained? Are you equipped? Are you prayed up? And, I would ask, ‘Are you ready to die for your faith?’

In Ephesians 6:16 Paul tells us, “above all, taking the shield of faith, with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one.”

LASTLY, HAS ‘YOUR’ FAITH LED YOU TO AN UNDERSTANDING OF HOW TO STAND FAST AND STRONG? In Galatians 5:1 Paul wrote: “Stand fast in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage.”

You do know that if Jesus sets you free, you are free indeed – no more bondage, no more slavery, no more chains, no more fear of an eternal hell, no more entanglements of poor choices.

It was Robert J. McCracken who wrote: “We on this continent should never forget that men first crossed the Atlantic not to find soil for their ploughs but to secure liberty for their souls.” Oh, that once again true American history be restored to our classrooms!

Again, Galatians 5:1, “Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage.” I’m telling you, “standing fast in the liberty by which Christ has made us free,” is why John recorded Jesus’ word for us in Revelation 3:10, “Because you have kept My command to persevere, I also will keep you from the hour of trial which shall come upon the whole world, to test those who dwell on the earth.”

It’s more than enduring and persevering – it’s standing tall before Holy God with a heart of thanksgiving and joy for His gift of FAITH!! “For by grace you have been saved THROUGH FAITH, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God!” Glory!

Ray Palmer and Lowell Mason wrote the hymn, “My Faith Looks Up To Thee.” It says:

“My faith looks up to Thee, Thou Lamb of Calvary, Savior divine! Now hear me while I pray, Take all my guilt away, O let me from this day Be wholly Thine!

May Thy rich grace impart Strength to my fainting heart, My zeal inspire; As Thou hast died for me, O may my love to Thee Pure, warm, and changeless be, A living fire!

While life’s dark maze I tread, And griefs around me spread, Be Thou my guide4; Bid darkness turn to day, Wipe sorrow’s tears away, Nor let me ever stray From Thee aside.

When ends life’s transient dream, When death’s cold, sullen stream Shall o’er me roll; Blest Savior, then, in love, Fear and distrust remove, O bear me safe above, A ransomed soul!”

PART 3 (by J. Farrell Fisher, November 17-19, 2016)

Are “true disciples of Christ” known by what church they attend or does the Holy Word of God express and interpret ‘true discipleship’ in a totally different manner or unveiling and revelation? Are “true disciples of Christ” mentally confused or the visible explanation of “Life IN Christ”, dead to ‘self-realization’ but alive to the purpose, presence, and promises of God? Are “true disciples of Christ” the ‘compromisers’ with ‘flesh’ and ‘the world around them’, OR the “committed” to the Lordship of Christ, the guidance of the Holy Spirit, evidenced by the Spirit’s “fruit” and anointings, and evidenced by God’s gift of “blood-washing”, God’s gift of heavenly declarations of His grace, mercy, and love, to birth you to “new life in Christ” that is pure, spotless, recognizable, no longer recognizable by the old sin-nature but recognizable as “new-born” into the Kingdom rule and reign of the Resurrected Christ?

I’ve often thought that one day I want to search out a “message” or Biblical teaching, on “irresponsible ‘self-impregnation’ of one’s identity as a disciple of Christ, or the “Sovereign-Birthing of the Spirit of God”, because there is a difference between physical birth and Born of the Spirit! There is a vast difference between one’s ‘self-awareness’ of his/her spirituality and one’s “New Life in Christ”, or one’s ‘spontaneous originality’ of his/her spiritual adequacy in himself/herself, or the divine intervention of the Holy Spirit, convicting, convincing, converting, and consecrating a ‘new life’ before the very Throne of Almighty God and King Jesus!

It’s so interesting, encouraging, convicting, and relieving to read of Isaiah’s awesome experience after the death of King Uzziah. He said in Verse one, “I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lifted up, and the train of His robe filled the temple, and, two seraphim, seeing the Lord, covered their faces, crying to one another: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts’ the whole earth is full of His glory!” Then when Isaiah saw that Holy event of divine presence before him, he said: “Woe is me, for I am undone! Because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts.” Having encountered the Holy Presence of the King of kings, been convicted about himself and all fallen humanity before Holy God, God stepped in to say to Isaiah, you, and me, (Isaiah 6:7), “Behold, this has touched your lips; your iniquity is taken away, and your sin purged.”

But, be assured, God’s Promise only becomes reality in those who know their iniquitous ways, sorrow over it, confess it, and rest in the finished work of the Blood of the Lamb of God! And “true disciples” with Isaiah, then say as they become aware their sin is purged, and having heard the Voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send and who will go for Us (God the Father, God the Son, and God the Spirit)?”, Isaiah said, as every true disciple does, “Here am I! Send me.” And God said: “Go, and tell this people…!” (Are you telling life’s spiritual opportunities of receiving Christ or rejecting Him?).

As the Lord Jesus was instructing His disciples, in John 4:34-38, He said: “My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me, and to finish His work. Do you not say, ‘There are still four months and then the harvest’? Behold, I SAY TO YOU, lift up your eyes and look at the fields, for they are already white for harvest!

And he who reaps receives wages, and gathers fruit for eternal life, that Both he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together. For in this the saying is true: ‘One sows and another reaps.’ I sent you to reap that for which you have not labored; others have labored, and you have entered into their labors.”

“True Disciples of Christ”? They understand and are committed to the Master’s mandate and commissioning to “plow, sow, and reap,” to “plow, sow, and reap,” to “plow, sow, and reap”, because true disciples have heard, received, and respond to the Master’s Holy instruction, “Go, and make disciples!” And, of course, we KNOW it’s in every man’s mind, and , when confronted by Christ and His Word and will, as to whether he/she is even interested in obeying or closing their eyes and ears to the eternal beating of His compassionate, merciful heart, they will respond in faith and obedience or ‘walk away’ from God’s heart, mindful only of that which satisfies what they have set their minds and hearts to be or to do! Some respond positively, while others turn and walk away from His callings, gifts, and ministries!

It should excite you greatly and motivate, inspire, and encourage you as a true disciple of Christ to hear Him say to YOU in John 15:11-16, “These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full. This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends. You are My friends if you DO WHATEVER I COMMAND YOU. No longer do I call you servants, (as Jesus Himself was!), for a servant does not know what his master is doing, but I have called you friends, for all things that I heard from My Father I have made known to you. You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask the Father in My name He may give you.”

But there is the “cost of Christ’s choosing you and me”! John 15:19 clearly says, “If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.” [Is it possible that YOU don’t sense ‘the hate of the world’ because there is that in you that says: “I want the ‘best’ of both worlds: ‘flesh’ and Spirit, compromise and convenience the world gives me AND the ‘calling’ with the ‘commissioning’ – why not the “best” (?) of both worlds?”

You do understand that there are even ‘unbelievers’ who are ‘pious’ unbelievers who hold, at least, a ‘dutiful spirit of reverence for God’, but not to the point of repentance or recognizing their sinful nature, their religious ‘feelings’ only about God, or their, sometimes, ‘religious indulgences’, as they continue in ‘pious deception’ about themselves and their need of God’s “saving grace” through Christ! BUT, TRUE DISCIPLES OF CHRIST?

FIRTST, TRUE DISCIPLES BEGAN OR NOW BEGIN THEIR JOURNEY OF FAITH WHEN CONVICTED, CONVINCED, CONVERTED, AND CONSECRATED BY AND THROUGH THE HOLY SPIRIT’S MINISTRY! In Romans 8: 12-17 we read of God’s gracious promise of the Holy Spirit’s ‘overseeing ministry’ of the lives of the true disciples of Christ! It says: “Therefore, brethren, we are debtors – not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh (your old sin nature and trying your ‘best’ by it!). For IF YOU LIVE ACCORDING TO THE FLESH YOU WILL DIE; BUT IF BY THE SPIRIT YOU PUT TO DEATH THE DEEDS OF THE BODY, YOU WILL LIVE (Victorious, overcoming , and conquering!).

For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these ARE sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, BUT YOU received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, ‘Abba, Father.’ The Spirit BEARS WITNESS with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs – heirs of God and JOINT HEIRS WITH CHRIST, if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together.”

‘Flesh’ never has, never will, never can bear witness that we’re ‘children of God, children of faith, children of the royal family of God’, but Christ Jesus was so very clear when He said to Nicodemus in John 3:5-6, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water (the water of the Word of God) and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.”

There is another interesting, convicting, and life-identifying word from Jesus in Luke 13:22-27 that certainly, initially, related to the ‘religious, Jewish community’ who were not a part of the True Remnant of repentant and ‘faith-trusting’ Jews, but only religious, traditional ‘back-slappers’! It says:

And He went through the cities and villages, teaching, and journeying toward Jerusalem. Then one said to Him, “Lord are there few who are saved?” Jesus said to them, “Strive to enter through the narrow gate, for many, I say to you, will seek to enter and will not be able…

When once the Master of the house has risen up and shut the door, and you begin to stand outside and knock at the door, saying, ‘Lord, Lord, open for us,’ and He will answer and say to you, “I do not know you, where you are from,’ then you will begin to say, ‘We ate and drank in Your presence, and You taught in our streets.’ But He will say, ‘I tell you, I do not know you, where you are from. DEPART FROM ME, all you workers of iniquity.’”

Did John say, “…that which is born (or birthed by) of the Spirit is spirit,” with Paul the Apostle affirming also in Romans 8:13-14, “For if you live ACCORDING TO THE FLESH you will die; BUT if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.” And what an awesome, identifying unveiling of “true disciples”!

The Holy Spirit of God, living IN the life of every true born-again believer, is there to initially bear witness to our “Blood-bought redemption”, then assuming, as one allows Him, to guide and direct their every step toward maturity, from birth to childhood, from childhood to youthfulness, from youthfulness to young adults, from young adults to adults, and from young adults to ‘senior’ adults IN SPIRITUAL MATURITY TO THE FULLNESS OF THE BLESSING OF THE GOSPEL OF CHRIST! Oswald Chambers said, in “My Utmost For His Highest” (p.219), not witnessing ‘to our reason,’ but “the Spirit witnesses (in us) only to His own nature, and to the work of Redemption, never to our reason.”

The ministry of the Holy Spirit in YOU? CONTINUING THE UNVEILING OF THE REALITY OF YOUR OLD MAN CRUCIFIXION WITH CHRIST ON THE CROSS, UNVEILING MORE AND MORE YOUR AWARENESS OF YOUR “NEW CREATION” STATUS, AND NOT ALLOWING THE “OLD MAN” TO CAPTURE YOUR INTEREST AGAIN, BUT MAGNIFYING THE UNENDING BLESSINGS OF YOUR ONENESS IN CHRIST! We’re not, under the Holy Spirit’s leadership, defined as simply a “refined order”, but a “new-born” son or daughter God’s Holy Family! And because of the Word AND the Holy Spirit, we can truly say with Paul, (2 Corinthians 2:14), “Now thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph in Christ, and through us diffuses the fragrance of His knowledge in every place (stage of life or circumstances!)” – and THAT by the Spirit, with Jesus telling us, in John 16:13, “When the Spirit of truth has come, He will guide you into all truth…Verse 14, He will glorify Me…(that’s the Lord Jesus)! And the Spirit “glorifies” Jesus in that faithful ministry THROUGH YOUR LIFE AND MINE, BORN AGAIN BY THE GRACE AND MERCY OF GOD AND INDWELT IN US BY HIS HOLY SPIRIT! And the Spirit’s continuing ministry in us and through us?

SECOND, TRUE DISCIPLES ARE IDENTIFIED AS THEY REFLECT, REST IN, RELY UPON, AND RESPOND TO THE WILL OF FATHER-GOD IN THEIR LIVES AS JESUS DID IN HIS! In Matthew 20:20-28 there is, for the young disciples before Christ, the eternal truth of ‘greatness’ in being the servant unto others. Jesus said: “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and those who are great exercise authority over them. Yet it shall not be so among you; but whoever desires to become great among YOU, let him be your slave – JUST AS the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.”

Superiority is NOT the calling of Christ for His disciples but the servant-spirit as He told His initial disciples in Luke 22:24-27 after His chosen disciples began to argue “as to which of them should be considered the greatest”, Jesus responded, “The kings of the Gentiles exercise lordship over them, and those who exercise authority over them are called ‘benefactors’. (That’s, according to The Random House Collegiate Dictionary, “one who confers a benefit, a kindly helper”). But not so among you; on the contrary, he who is greatest among you, let him be as the younger, and he who governs as he who serves. For who is greater, he who sits at the table, or he who serves? Is it not he who sits at the table? Yet I am among you as the One who serves.”

Certainly the Apostle Paul clearly understood the spirit, nature, and character of Christ in himself after his conversion and transformation from a Jewish ‘Rabbi” to a ‘servant’ that Christ Jesus exemplified! He wrote, in 2 Corinthians 12:15, “And I will very gladly spend and be spent for your souls; though the more abundantly I love you, the less I am loved.”

“Very gladly spend and be spent for your souls”? Is that not the spirit of Christ, our Lord, our servant, our example? “The Son of Man did not come to sit on a throne to be served and to be ministered to but to lay down His life in caring for others!”

But as one reads passionately Paul’s writing in the Letter to the Romans, especially in Romans 9 and Romans 10, you see Israel rejecting Christ, rejecting God’s purpose for them, even as we witness those today who turn deaf ears and blind eyes to the call of Christ to “Follow Me and I will make you fishers of men.” In Romans 9:6-8 we read, “But it is not that the word of God has taken no effect. For they are not all Israel who are of Israel, nor are they all children because they are the seed of Abraham; but, ‘In Isaac your seed shall be called.’ That is, those who are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God; but the children of the promise are counted as the seed.”

But as you continue into Romans 10:1-4, you see unfolded before you, not only Israel’s need of the Redeeming, Reigning Savior and Lord, but all of fallen mankind, void ‘in the heart’ as well as the mind, even “the religious” who are “ignorant of God’s righteousness”! Paul wrote, “Brethren, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they may be saved (re-born, regenerated, redeemed by the blood of the Lamb of God). For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and seeking to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted to the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes (trusts in, relies upon, adheres to).”

Paul went on to say in Verse 8 that ‘redeeming faith’ is “the word of faith which we preach” Verse 9, that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.” How needful is that message for today?

THIRD, TRUE DISCIPLES ARE IDENTIFIED AS THEY HAVE THEIR EARS OPENED TO HEAR GOD AS JESUS OPENED HIS EARS, YES, TO HEAR, RECEIVE, AND WALK IN THE REVEALED WISDOM OF GOD! Wasn’t it Stephen, in Acts 7:51, speaking of, yes, ‘unbelieving Israelites’ saying, “You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears! You always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did so do you.”

In Romans 10:8, as the judgment of God came upon ‘the unbelieving’, Paul said: Just as it is written: ‘God has given them a spirit of stupor, eyes that they should not see, and ears that they should not hear, to this very day.’

Yet, over and over, in the Four Gospels, Jesus said often, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear!!” Paul, in Acts 28, encountered resistant Israelites who didn’t believe what they heard from the Apostle, but also, Verse 24, reveals: “And some were persuaded by the things which were spoken, and some disbelieved.”

If you open your Bible to 2 Thessalonians 2:9-16, you’ll see the “unbelievers” and the true disciples of Christ! It says: “The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, AND with ALL UNRIGHTEOUS DECEPTION among those who perish, BECAUSE they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved. And for this reason God will send them strong delusion, that they should believe the lie, that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.

But we are bound to give thanks to God always for you, brethren beloved by the Lord, because God from the beginning chose you for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth, to which He called you to our gospel, for the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, brethren, stand fast and hold the traditions which you were taught by word or our epistle.

Now may our Lord Jesus Christ Himself, and our God and Father, who has loved us and given us everlasting consolation and good hope by grace, comfort your hearts and establish you in every good word and work.” Are YOU established, gifted, standing in, firmly rooted in Christ Jesus and His resurrection life, power, and hope?

FOURTH AND LAST, FOR THIS CHAPTER, ARE YOU A TRUE FAITHFUL DISCIPLE OF CHRIST WITH A HEART, MIND, AND SPIRIT TURNED TO DO AS JESUS DID IN “PLEASING FATHER-GOD”? In Mark 1:9-11 we read, It came to pass in those days that Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee, and was baptized by John in the Jordan. And immediately, coming up from the water, He saw the heavens parting and the Spirit descending upon Him like a dove. Then a voice came from heaven, “You are My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”

So, is this not why Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 1:9, “Yes, we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves but in God who raises the dead…”? The sentence of death in ourselves? Yes! Because it is so easy to pretend, to imitate, to do as best as we know how to ‘in the flesh’ – and as a result to miss the anointing and indwelling of the very Spirit and Life and Anointed Presence of the Resurrected Christ and the fullness of the Holy Spirit! Be through with yourself – Jesus crucified it – and promised the fullness of the Holy Spirit! Holy God has no desire to see you professing Christ, then trying your “best” as an “illuminated, imitation version”! God wants Christ, in and through His Spirit, indwelling, infilling, overflowing with Resurrection Life and Resurrection Hope! AMEN?

The Christ-like walk of discipleship is not a “sand-box life” of playing, but devotion to His Presence, His Lordship, His will! Didn’t Jesus say in John 15:4, “Abide [or remain] in Me, and I in you. As the Branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me.” Have YOU resolutely determined to abide or remain IN CHRIST?

By J. Farrell Fisher, May 29, 2017

There’s an interesting verse in John 4:4 about Jesus “needing to go through Samaria.” He came to Sychar, a city in Samaria, and came to “Jacob’s well.” Jesus, because of His journey was tired and thirsty. He sat down by a well – physical necessity or an eternal appointment? Verse 7 then tells us that “a woman of Samaria came to draw water” and Jesus said to her, “Give Me a drink.”

The woman of Samaria was shocked! She said, Verse 9, “How is it that You, being a Jew, ask a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?” For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans. In Verse 10 Jesus answered and said to her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.”

The woman said to Him, “Sir, You have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where then do You get this living water? Are You greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well, and drank from it himself, as well as his sons and his livestock?”

Jesus answered and said to her, “Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.”

Jesus asked the woman at the well to “believe Me,” saying in John 4:23, “But the hour is coming, AND NOW IS, when the true worshipper will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him. God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.” NO WONDER JESUS SAID TO THE ‘RELIGIOUS’ NICODEMUS: “YOU MUST BE BORN AGAIN!”

“If you knew the gift of God…”! Do YOU? Sadly, many have determined for themselves that to earn a gift from God one must work for it, slave for it, earn it by one’s best effort and positive attitude of ‘self-determination’, but I love what Elizabeth Barrett Browning said in her writing long ago entitled “Sonnets From the Portuguese”, (no.26), “God’s gifts puts man’s best dreams to shame.” So true!

I remember a few years ago recording a publicized statement by an ‘active’ homosexual sick man named Mitchell Gold who publicized a diatribe against the Word of God and churches, pastors, and faithful disciples who stand on the Word of God in opposing homosexuality who said: “[They} must be made to take homosexuality off the sin list,” with a New York Time’s writer, Frank Bruni, affirming Gold’s obscene opposition to Holy God’s declaration of the Holy Word, saying, “His commandment is worthy – and warranted.” Gold and Bruni’s ‘word’ or Holy God’s unchanging, eternal declarations in Holy Scripture?

I’m sure you remember when Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. You’ll remember , in Matthew 4:3, when the tempter came to Him, he said, “If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.” But in Verse 4, Jesus answered the devil, “It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.” The devil today still wants men believing the ‘stone of sexual immorality, yes, even homosexuality’, can, and is for them “living bread”, when in reality it is the ‘stone of suffocation and self-annihilation’!!

Muddy ‘creek-water’ of men’s fleshly indulgences is not the same as “LIVING WATER” out of the very throne and heart of God! In Matthew 7:13-14 the Lord Jesus said: “Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it. Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it.”

Difficult is the way which leads to life? The word ‘difficult’ comes from a word meaning, “pressed or crushed” like a grape, but is that the way only for modern-day believers or ‘church-folk’, or have they ignored, even denied, dying to the old man that resurrected life in Christ may be manifested in mortal flesh to the glory of God, not to please ‘flesh’ but to live honoring the King of kings and Lord of lords in obedience to His Word? Don’t you find it strange that much of ‘church life’ today ignores “Take up your cross and Follow Me”?

Didn’t Paul, in 2 Corinthians 1:9, tell us about taking the sentence of death to the old man? It says, “Yes, we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves but in God who raises the dead…”?

“If you knew the gift of God…”? That’s words out of the mouth of King Jesus! I find it so illuminating, convicting, and convincing when I read the Word and hear John say in 1 John 2:28-29, “And now, little children, abide in Him, that when He appears, we may have confidence and not be ashamed before Him at His coming. If you know that He is righteous, you know that everyone who practices righteousness is born of Him.”

Is there ‘confidence’ and ‘unashamedness’ in the life of one who ‘compromises’ His Word and leads a life of, yes, scriptural shame, living without the sentence of death in one’s old flesh, but allowing it to exist in daily allegiance to that ‘flesh’ rather than allegiance to the Indwelling Christ?

“If you knew the gift of God…?” Do YOU? In 1 John 3:1-3 the beloved John highlights truth like a former Babe Ruth hitting one home run after another! He said: “Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us, that we should be called children of God! Therefore the world does not know us, because it did not know Him. Beloved, now we are children of God; and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. And everyone who has this hope in Him purifies himself, just as He is pure.”

Are YOU called as a child of God, or is it that you ‘just try to be’? Is that ‘trying to be worthy of His gift’ or is it one resting in thanksgiving for His blessed gifts? ‘Trying to be worthy’ is so foreign to one living in thanksgiving because God has blessed him/her beyond measure! The ‘trying-to-be-ers’ are like Martin Luther’s statement: “Therefore God commonly gives riches to foolish people, to whom He gives nothing else.”

“If you knew the gift of God…!” The gift of God? Has the need of divine forgiveness ever surfaced in your spiritual journey? If one is alienated from God because of his/her sin, has there been birthed within that one the awareness of the need of being reconciled to God? In 1 John 1:8-2:2 we read: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us. 2:1-2, My little children, these things I write to you, so that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.”

“If they knew the gift of God…”! The penalty for the sins of all of mankind was paid for by the shed blood of Christ on Calvary’s Cross – forgiven is an eternal, divine reality, but reconciliation to Holy God still remains for men and women everywhere to exercise! Forgiveness has cleansed the dark side of fallen mankind, but ‘opening the door for His entrance into the hearts of the forgiven’ still remains for every man to act upon! Revelation 3:20-22 says, Jesus speaking, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me. To him who overcomes I will grant to sit with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.”

What was it James said in James 1:17-18? “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning. Of His own will He brought us forth by the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of His creatures,” adding in Verses 21-22, “Therefore lay aside all filthiness and overflow of wickedness, and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls. Be DOERS of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.” One doesn’t keep the Word of God in order to be saved, but he/she keeps the Word because he/she has been saved!!

“If they knew the gift of God…”! In Acts 3:19-20 Peter declared: “Repent therefore and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and that He may send Jesus Christ who was preached to you before…”, and if God promises on the basis of one’s repentance that He will send Jesus Christ, dare I tell you that the times of ‘refreshing’ is His Holy Presence living within the repentant, re-born life? “Christ in you the hope of glory!”

I would ask you: Have YOU been convicted of your sin, convinced of your old sin nature, horrified that that has produced alienation and separation from God, and also you’ve been made fully aware that without Christ, YOU ARE HOPELESS, related to His eternal purpose of a vessel, temple, tabernacle of Holy Presence? I’d say it’s time to look at God’s offer of repentance toward God and the gift of faith in the finished work of Christ! Maybe Paul’s declaration in 2 Corinthians 9:15 could be your confession and celebration: “Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift!” I find Acts 11:16-18 so powerful as Peter declared: Then I remembered the word of the Lord, how He said, “John indeed baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit.” If therefore God gave them the same gift as He gave us when we believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could withstand God?’ When they heard these things they became silent; and they glorified God, saying, “The God has also granted to the Gentiles REPENTANCE TO LIFE.” Do YOU know “repentance to life”?

“If they knew the gift of God…”! Yes, praise God, there Is reconciliation through Christ with God the Father, sins washed away by the blood of Christ! But in our journeys of faith there must be THE AWARENESS THAT WE ARE TO BE FILLED WITH ALL THE FULLNESS OF GOD!

In Ephesians 3:14-19 Paul illuminates our understanding in our journey of faith! He said: “For this reason I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; [Does the Lord Jesus feel at home in you?]; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height – to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.”

Is the Lord Jesus, in you, able to do exceedingly abundantly above all you ask or think, according to the resident power of the Holy Spirit that lives in you? Did Paul just tell us that you are “to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man”?

Oswald Chambers wrote in his book, “My Utmost For His Highest,” (P.151), “When the Holy Spirit comes in, He brings into the center of my personal life the very Spirit that was manifested in the life of Jesus Christ, viz., HOLY Spirit, which is unsullied purity.” What was it Jesus said in Matthew 5:8? “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.”

I tell you, my heart breaks when I hear ‘professing Christians’ talking about their, yes, self-willed journeys as professing disciples! I want to remind them, as I’ve done many times: “The true faith is all because of the gift and grace of God! We don’t achieve, we receive, we don’t merit – we’re MERCIED, we don’t earn – we have credited to our account ALL that Jesus is and desires to do through us, we aren’t primed or pumped up but are those who through repentance toward God and faith in Christ’s finished work have divine life, divine presence, and divine power poured into us, not a purchase we make but a price paid for our freedom through His shed blood, not a talent we’ve mustered, but His presence that MASTERS through us, not entering man-made doors but allowing the Door to be opened by Christ Himself, not personal initiative but the Prince of Peace’s divine intervention!”

There is a powerful, awakening, enlightening verse in Proverbs 22:11 that says: “He who loves purity of heart and has grace on his lips, the king will be his friend.” And, of course, the Lord Jesus takes us up into heavenly places when He said in John 15:11-16, “These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full. This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down his life for his friends. You are My friends IF YOU DO WHATEVER I COMMAND YOU. No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I heard from My Father I have made known to you. You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask the Father in My name He may give you.”

In the old “The American Hymnal” published in 1933, I came across an old hymn entitled “Friendship With Jesus” authored by Major Ludgate. It says: “A friend of Jesus, O what bliss, That one so vile As I should ever have a friend like this To lead me to the sky . A friend when other friendships cease, A friend when others fall, A friend who gives me joy and peace, A friend when foes assail.

A friend when sickness lays me low, A friend when death draws near, A friend as through the vale I go, A friend to help and cheer.

A friend when life’s short race is o’er, A friend when earth is past, A friend to meet on heaven’s shore, A friend when home at last.

Friendship with Jesus, Fellowship divine, O what blessed, sweet communion, Jesus is a friend of mine.”

Thomas Gray, in “Elegy in a Country Churchyard, The Epitaph”, (st.20), wrote “Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere, Heaven did a recompense as largely send: He gave to misery (all he had) a tear, He gained from Heaven (‘twas all he wished) a friend.” Aren’t you thankful, and don’t you rejoice, that you have a Friend in Spirit-Land though you still dwell on earth, content that your Friend is also your Lord, Savior, Protector, Guardian, and the Lover of your soul?

“A YEAR’S ENLIGHTMENT

FOR PASTORS, TEACHERS, AND DISCIPLES”

BY: J.FARRELL FISHER

April-May, 2017

INTRODUCTION

At 80 years of age, I look back over 60 years of pastoring, teaching, evangelizing, spending 25 years after pastoring traveling primarily across India, but other nations as well, inspired and led by God in sharing the Word.

I’ve been so encouraged by other nations across the world that have witnessed anointed messengers proclaiming, teaching, preaching, and evangelizing, when, at times, I’ve wondered what the American church has been ‘busy’ about – the Truth or their opinions?

There is an interesting observation by the author of Proverbs when we read in Proverbs 11:24 a convicting passage. It says: “There is one who scatters, yet increases more; and there is one who withholds more than is right, but it leads to poverty.” Question! Are there ‘professing disciples’ who claim allegiance to Christ but ‘scatter’ more than they ‘gather in’? Lost souls, that is, that true disciples are committed to “Bringing in the sheaves”! Yet, many pastors, and church folk, by their ‘poverty in the Word and Spirit’, live on a spiritually- starvation- diet, living on a ‘seldom-search of the Word’, not understanding Jesus’ words in Matthew 4:4, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.’”

In John 6:63-64 Jesus told a number of disciples who followed Him for a season and then abandoned Him because of “His Words”, “It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh (old sin nature!) profits nothing, zip, zero. The words that I speak to you are spirit, and they are life. But there are some of you who do not believe.” Later, in John 7:33, Jesus said to them, “I shall be with you a little longer, and then I go to Him who sent Me. You will seek Me and not find Me, and where I am you cannot come.”

Is that because the Pharisaical Jews wanted to be ‘religious’ apart from “Re-Born in the Spirit”? Oh, and then in John 7:37 Jesus stood and cried out, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me, (trusts in, relies upon, adheres to!), as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.”

Did Jesus say, “As the Scripture has said…?” In 2 Timothy Paul wrote about troubling times and troubled men, saying, in Verses 8-9, “Now as Jannes and Jambres resisted Moses, so do these (Judaizers?) also resist the truth: men of corrupt minds, disapproved concerning the faith; but they will progress no further, for their folly will be manifest to all, as theirs also was,” continuing in Verses 13-17,

“But evil men and imposters will grow worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived. But YOU must continue in the things which you have learned AND BEEN ASSURED OF, knowing from whom you have learned them, and that from childhood you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith WHICH IS IN CHRIST JESUS.”

Sadly, many “professing Christians” are made ‘wise’ in denominational tendencies, but void of the eternal reality of “born-again” sons and daughters of, yes, blood redemption salvation through Christ Jesus alone! I introduce this book with words from 1 Peter 1:18-23! It says: “knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things, like silver or gold, from your aimless conduct received by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot. He indeed was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you who through Him believe in God, who raised Him from the dead and gave Him glory, SO THAT YOUR FAITH AND HOPE ARE IN GOD.

Since you have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit, in sincere love of the brethren, love one another fervently with a pure heart, having been born again, not of corruptible seed but incorruptible, through the Word of God which lives and abides forever…!”

In the old “The Broadman Hymnal”, by the Broadman Press, Nashville, Tennessee, (copyrighted in 1940), there is an old hymn by E.O.Sellers that says: “God, Your Word is a lamp to my feet, A light to my path always; To guide and to save me from sin, And show me the heavenly way.

Forever, O Lord, is Your Word Established and fixed on high; Your faithfulness unto all men Abides forever nigh.

At morning, at noon, and at night I ever will give You praise; For You are my portion, O Lord, And shall be through all my days!

Through Him (Christ Jesus!) Your Word has foretold, The Saviour and Morning Star, Salvation and peace have been brought To those who have strayed afar.

Your Word have I hid in my heart, That I might not sin against You, That I might not sin, That I might not sin, Your Word have I hid in my heart.”

But a tragedy of many in the ‘modern-day church’? They don’t understand the Spirit of the Lord as “Servant”, and sadly, they have no desire to be His ‘representative foot-washer’ (John 13:14!)! Oswald Chambers once said: “Towels and dishes and sandals, all the ordinary sordid things of our lives, reveal more quickly than anything what we are made of. (And I,JFF, say, “What we are made of as a true disciple of Christ or not”!). It takes God Almighty Incarnate in us to do the meanest duty as it ought to be done. Jesus said: “I have given you an example that you should do as I have done to you. Watch the kind of people God brings around you, and you will be humiliated to find that this is His way of revealing to you the kind of person you have been to Him. Now He says, exhibit to that one (in need) exactly what I have shown to you.”

Dare I tell you that true disciples of Christ are the men and women, boys and girls, who are the folks who do not count their lives dear unto themselves, but, yes, are superbly committed to serve as the servants, even bond-slaves, of their Master, the Lord Jesus Christ? I believe I’ll tell you in this new book! This book is 52 chapters long, desiring you to read and re-read each chapter, one a week, to, I pray, absorb the Holy Word of God as never before in your pilgrimage as a “saint”! Amen?

BOOK CONTENT

FOREWARD: BY DR. DANNY MCMAHON :

CHAPTER ONE: VOID OF THE WORD OF GOD OR VICTORY THROUGH THE WORD OF GOD?

CHAPTER TWO: THE BEAUTY AND THE BLESSING OF THE WORD OF GOD

CHAPTER THREE: INTELLECTUAL ALLEGIANCE OR INTERNAL TRANSFORMATION?

CHAPTER FOUR: THE CALL OF THE UNQUALIFIED

CHAPTER FIVE: LIFE’S REJECTS RECEIVED

CHAPTER SIX: THE DECLARATION OF EXCLUSIVITY

CHAPTER SEVEN: CONFIDENCE IN THE CRUCIFIED ‘SELF’ OR ASSURANCE IN RESURRECTION LIFE?

CHAPTER EIGHT: FATE, FURY, OR THE FINISHED WORK?

CHAPTER NINE: CONFLICTING LOYALTY OR ALL- CONSUMING LOVE?

CHAPTER TEN: THE UNPREDICTABILITY OF LOVE?

CHAPTER ELEVEN: BAD NEWS OR GOOD NEWS?

CHAPTER TWELVE: IMITATION ALLEGIANCE OR SOVEREIGN BIRTHING?

CHAPTER THIRTEEN: CHILDREN OF THE FLESH OR CHILDREN OF THE PROMISE?

CHAPTER FOURTEEN: EVIDENCES OF NEW TESTAMENT CONVERSION

CHAPTER FIFTEEN: VITAL AWARENESS UNVEILED

CHAPTER SIXTEEN: AWAKENINGS’ NECESSITY!

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: OPITONAL EXPRESSIONS OF LIFE – HUMAN OR DIVINE, FLESHLY OR SPIRITUAL, TEMPORARY OR ETERNAL?

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: BEARING THE NAME – LIVING WITH SHAME

CHAPTER NINETEEN: WANDERING FROM THE FAITH

CHAPTER TWENTY: GUTSY GRIT OR GODLY SORROW?

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE: CRIMINALIZED FOR STANDING FOR THE TRUTH

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO: WHY NATIONS FORGET GOD!

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE: REMEMBER!

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR: IT’S A MATTER OF THE HEART BEFORE GOD!

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE: VICTIMS OR VICTORS?

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX: IRRESPONSIBLE IMPREGNATION OR SOVEREIGN SELECTION?

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN: IN OUR LORD’S PRESENCE

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT: YESTERDAY, TODAY, TOMORROW?

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE: NO SHAME – NO GAIN OF TRUE LIFE

CHAPTER THIRTY: AWAKENINGS NECESSITY – THE KINGLY REIGN OF CHRIST!

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE: INTROSPECTIVE IDOLATRESSES!

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO: INTROSPECTIVE IDOLATERS!

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE: ADAPTABLE CHURCHES OR APOSTOLIC ASSEMBLIES?

CHAPTER-THIRTY-FOUR: ALL OUR HOPE IS IN CHRIST ALONE!

CHAPTER-THIRTY-FIVE: UNFORGIVENESS – UNFORGIVEN

CHAPTER- THIRTY-SIX: WORLD PHILOSPHERS OR WILLFUL PROMOTION BY GOD?

CHAPTER – THIRTY-SEVEN: ENCOUNTERED BY THE HOLY SPIRIT!

CHAPTER – THIRTY-EIGHT: EXPERIENCING THE POWER OF THE HOLY SPIRIT!

CHAPTER – THIRTY-NINE: ENDURING THROUGH FAILURE!

CHAPTER FORTY: HOLY PRAYING!

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE: MAJOR HINDRANCES TO THE MINISTRY OF PRAYER

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO: THE AFFIRMATION TO ASPIRATIONS!

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE: PERVERTED GRACE OR PERFECTING GRACE?

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR: THE CALL TO HOLINESS

CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE: THE GLORIOUS MINISTRY OF “CHRIST IN YOU”!

CHAPTER FORTY-SIX: SELF-MADE ‘STARS’ OR SOVEREIGN-ORDAINED SERVANTS?

CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN: IMITATION ALLEGIANCE OR SOVEREIGN BIRTHING?

CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT: SOVEREIGN BIRTHING – SELFLESS ALLEGIANCE!

CHAPTER FORTY NINE: GRACED, GOVERNED, GIFTED, AND GLOWING WITH GLORY!

CHAPTER FIFTY: HOLDING FAST TO THE NAME AND FAITH IN CHRIST JESUS!

CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE: WHOLE-HEARTED ALLEGIANCE OR PARTIAL PARTICIPATION WITH CHRIST?

CHAPTER FIFTY TWO: PROPER ATTIRE FOR THE SOLDIERS OF CHRIST!

CONCLUSION:

[ Copyright@ by James Farrell Fisher and Susan M. Fisher. All rights reserved, 2017]

FOREWARD

By: Dr. Danny Mcmahon

CHAPTER ONE

VOID OF THE WORD OF GOD OR VICTORY THROUGH THE WORD OF GOD?

In Hebrews 4:12 we read, “For the Word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.”, Oh, and then the very next Verse describes “no creature hidden from His sight, with all things naked (before Him) and open to the eyes of Him TO WHOM WE MUST GIVE ACCOUNT.”

I’ve often wondered how deep, wide, and broad the absence of daily devotion to the Holy Word makes in the people of the world, but even in the people of the church who sadly see no significance daily to feeding on His Word when He said, “Man does not live by (physical) bread alone but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God”!

Has it ever entered your mind that you as a believer are to be guided by God’s Holy Word? Being united WITH Christ in your heart, soul, and mind, is it in the fabric of your redemptive and daily living to “be being saved” by your devotion to His Holy Word? Is it possible that in YOUR “wedding vows” with Christ you omitted to His Word and His will and His faithful teaching?

Is it in you as it was with David as he wrote in Psalm 25:4-5, “Show me Your ways, O Lord; teach me Your paths. Lead me in Your truth and teach me, for You are the God of my salvation; on You I wait all the day,” but YOU know nothing of the daily discipline of His Word to be personally taught day by day by the King of kings and Lord of lords, guided in that Eternal Word by the Holy Spirit?

“Your will be done” but you never daily yield yourselves to discover His will, His ways, His directive word, but you settle in, “I’m saved; that’s all I need to know”? I believe that I read in Psalm 25:12, “Who is the man that fears the Lord? Him shall He teach in the way that He chooses.” And God’s choice? Matthew 4:4, But He [Jesus] answered and said, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.”

I would challenge you as you’re reading this to evaluate your “saving experience” in Christ if you are void of His Word! So-called “religious experiences” that never lead one to His “revelation” with a hunger to know His will and Word absolutely frightens me! If one has been “born again”, I believe one of the evidences is the desire for His “milk and meat of the Holy Word” and a passion to KNOW the things that are freely given to us of God.” (1 Corinthians 2:12).

To his spiritual son, Timothy, Paul wrote in 2 Timothy 2:15, “Be diligent to present yourself approved to God, a worker who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.” I look upon God’s revelation of divine truth, the Holy Bible, in both the Old and New Testaments as magnificent promises for maturing men and women, boys and girls, who have come to Him in true repentance and faith.

It was Peter who told us in 2 Peter 1:2-4, “Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord, as His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us by glory and virtue, by which have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, that THROUGH THESE you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.”

Tell me about your reception daily through God’s Holy Word of His “exceedingly great and precious promises,” and of your daily discovery and acquired knowledge of “the things freely given to us of God,” yes, and YOUR appropriation of His truths that show you the “escaping [of] the corruption that is in the world through lust.”

Do you remember Abraham’s servant, sent by Abraham to find a bride for his son Isaac? In Genesis 24:48 the servant spoke: “And I bowed my head and worshipped the Lord, and blessed the Lord, and blessed the Lord God of my master Abraham, who had led me IN THE WAY OF TRUTH to take the daughter of my master’s brother for his son.” Thank God for His redeemed, willful servants who are “led in the way of truth!”

In Mark 4 Jesus had been explaining His parables to the new disciples. Verses 33-34 tell us, “And with many such parables He spoke the Word to them as they were able to hear it. But without a parable He did not speak to them. And when they were alone, He explained all things to His disciples.” The very desire of Jesus for you right now is that you listen to Jesus and let Him “explain all things in the Word to you” by the Holy Spirit who “guides us into all truth.” In John 16:13-14 our Lord told His disciples, “However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears (from God the Father!) He will speak; and He will tell you things to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you.” The Holy Spirit is Heaven’s personal “Tutor” in the Holy Word of God!

But haven’t you heard it? “I don’t need a personal “Tutor” to teach me the Bible! I don’t accept the Bible as the authoritative Word of God – I’m smart enough in myself to sense there is no divine truth as there is no “heaven” or “hell” – find a brain-dead ‘christian’ and you’ll probably easily fool them!” [And if you haven’t learned it yet in your classrooms or from many university professors who see themselves as smarter than God Himself, they believe, and by human interaction you will learn that the most harmful ‘curse’ in life’s spiritual realm is personal pride and intellectual superiority, yes, even superior to Jesus Himself who said He was and IS “God in Flesh”!].

Have you ever examined thoroughly Jesus’ passionate prayer in John 17 for you and for all mankind as He described “grace” as that which reveals Him, and then He unveiled “eternal life” by His grace? John 17:3 then says, in His prayer to Father-God, “And this is eternal life, that they may know You [God Himself], the only true God AND Jesus Christ whom You sent.” Oh, and then in Verse 17 Jesus prayed, “Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth.” Sanctify? “Set them apart,” “save them, redeem them, declare them ‘holy’ by Your Word! As Josh MacDowell used to say of Jesus: “Liar, lunatic, or the Lord God?” HE IS LORD TO THE GLORY OF GOD THE FATHER!

But “void of the Word of God” men and women, boys and girls, will, at least some, profess a mental knowledge of Him but never experience “victory in Him through His eternal Word and shed blood”! Oswald Chambers, in his famous book, “My Utmost For His Highest,” (p.4), wrote: “natural devotion may be all very well to attract us to Jesus, to make us feel His fascination, but it will never make us disciples. Natural devotion will always deny Jesus somewhere or other.” What did the Lord Jesus Christ tell us in John 3:3-7?

Jesus answered and said to Nicodemus (a ruler of the Jews), “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” Nicodemus said to Him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?”

Jesus answered, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water [that’s the “water” of the Word?], and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’” ALL believers, true believers, born again believers, will face worldly and satanic opposition to their true faith, but Paul tells all believers in Ephesians 6:10-19:

“Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.

Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all to stand. Stand therefore, having girded your waist with truth, having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace;

Above all, taking the shield of faith, with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one. And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is THE WORD OF GOD; praying always with all prayer, and supplication in the Spirit, being watchful to this end with all perseverance and supplication for all the saints – And for me, that utterance may be given to me, that I may open my mouth boldly to make known the mystery of the gospel.”

Natural mankind poses fierce opposition to Jesus because they in their natural minds are “void of the word of God” and have no heavenly understanding. Even the early disciples, like Philip, had a hard time understanding who Jesus was and what He was about. Look at John 14:7-11! “If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; from now on you know Him and have seen Him.”

Philip said to Jesus, “Lord, show us the Father, and it is sufficient for us.” Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you so long, and yet you have not known Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; so how can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me? The words that I speak to you I do not speak on My own authority; but the Father who dwells in Me does the work. Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father in Me, or else believe Me for the sake of the works themselves.”

Natural mankind is void, opposed, and ‘willfully’ resists Biblical Truth that “the blood of Jesus Christ, THE Lamb of God, cleanses us from all sin.” Natural mankind is highly opposed to Biblical Truth that says “obedience to Jesus is required: as evidence of a born- again life”, even when Jesus said in Matthew 7:21, “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he/she who does the will of My Father in heaven.” In fact, in Luke 6:46 Jesus said, “But why do you call Me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do the things which I say?” Obedience is not an option in the age of grace but is the evidence grace is at work in you finishing its work through you!

We do know beyond a shadow of a doubt that not all of Israel was “lost” because of rejection of the coming of the Promised Messiah – there was a ‘remnant’! But Romans 10:21 says, BUT TO ISRAEL HE SAYS, “All day long I have stretched out My hands to a disobedient and contrary people.” And even as “Jews” there are those who chose to live in the “natural”, yes, fully opposed to “saved by grace” – performers of religious activity but void of “the blood of the Lamb washing them white as snow”! Natural mankind, the majority of “Israel” included, are those who are “a disobedient and contrary people” who have no desire to live by the Life of Another, even by “Emmanuel, “God in flesh”!!

Natural mankind does not “know” Father-God or the Son of God or the Holy Spirit, the Three in One by WHOM we ALL came into this world through “fallen Adam”, yes, “hiding from God, without hope in ourselves, or hope in each other” – we needed a miracle of God! In John 17:25-26 Jesus prayed: “O righteous Father! THE WORLD HAS NOT KNOWN YOU, but I have known You; and these have known that You sent Me. And I have declared to them Your name, and will declare it, that the love with which You loved Me may be in them, and I in them.” Yes, Jesus prayed for YOU and ME that God’s love would capture our minds and hearts and wills, drawing us out of the land of darkness of unbelief to the “Promised Land” of heavenly living on earth NOW through His Resurrection Life, Resurrection Power, and Resurrection Hope!

“Void of the Word of God”? I pray you have not set aside the Epistle to the Hebrews! In Hebrews 1:1-3 we read, “God, who at various times and in various ways, spoke in times past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds; who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high.”

But those who are “void of the Word of God,” “void of Christ Himself”, willfully shut the door to His saving grace and mercy and have no seat in the heavenly places! Read carefully Ephesians 2:4-7! “But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.”

“Void of the Word of God?” That’s those blinded by the world, the flesh, and the devil! It’s why in Galatians 6:7-8 Paul tells us: “Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. For he who sows to his flesh [that’s his old sin nature, old man, First Adam] will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to the Spirit [of God] will of the Spirit reap everlasting life.”

“Void of the Word of God”? Are you aware of the “stumblers”? Peter told us in 1 Peter 2:8, “…they stumble, being disobedient to the word, to which they also were appointed.” God Himself read their hearts and appointed them to their just reward, yes, because of a mental, willful, head and heart rejection of the Lord Jesus Christ!

I think it to be vitally important to have you to read and receive for yourself 1 Corinthians 1:18-31!! “For the message [or word] of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are BEING SAVED it is the power of God. For it is written: ‘I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.’ Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputer [debater] of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?

For since, in the wisdom of God, the world through [its] wisdom did not know God, it pleased God through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe. For Jews request a sign, and Greeks seek after wisdom; BUT we preach Christ crucified, to the Jews a stumbling block and to Greeks foolishness, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.

Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. For you see your calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty; and the base things of the world and the things which are despised God has chosen, and the things which are not, to bring to nothing the things that are, that no flesh [First Adam, old sin nature], should glory in His presence.

But of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God – and righteousness and sanctification and redemption – that, as it is written, ‘He who glories, let him glory in the Lord.’”

Foolishness of men ‘void of the Word’ OR Victory through the Word because we “glory” only in the finished work of Christ “At The Cross”, living a celebratory life because of His Resurrection from the dead? How about for you an eternal shift, an everlasting heart-change, a willful surrender of your ‘old man’, receiving the gift of the “new man in Christ”, your “Victory Through His Word”? In 1 John 5:4-5 John tells us: “For whatever is born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world – our faith. [Our trust in Christ, our relying upon Christ, our total dependence upon Christ, through His shed blood, His death, His Resurrection, His ascension, and His soon coming to celebrate with Him eternally!!]. Who is he who overcomes the world, but he who believes, trusts in, relies upon Jesus as the Son of God who willingly came to die on the Cross, resurrected, and now reigning in him and through him?

I’m forever sorry and broken that ‘religious’ people will never see Jesus in heaven but we at the Judgment Seat as He tells them, “Depart from Me, you who work iniquity – I never knew you!” BUT, the “born of God” through repentance and faith? Are you familiar with Galatians 1:15-16? “But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother’s womb and called me through His grace, to reveal His Son in me…” What an awesome revelation!

Do you remember what Jesus said in John 5:38-40? “But you do not have His word abiding in you, because whom He sent, Him you do not believe (trust in, rely upon, or adhere to!). You search the Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life; and these are they which testify of Me. But you are not willing to come to Me that you may have life.”

There are those who will “read” the Word without “restimng” in its Author. There are professors of allegiance to the ‘paper’ of the Book but fail to process its Author and His Resurrection Life, Power, and Hope! There are ‘historical verifiers’ without “blood-bought, redeemed hearts”! And certainly there are devoted legalists without the Person and heavenly love of the Lord.

The Holy Word tells us: 2 Timothy 3:14-17, “But you must continue in the things which you have learned and been assured of, knowing from whom you have learned them, and that from childhood you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.

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 complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.” Have YOU been “made wise for salvation through faith in Christ alone”?

What did Paul tell us in Romans 5:10? “For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be [being] saved by His life.” Have you forgotten “justified by His blood”?

The author of the Hebrews letter put it like this in Hebrews 9:11-14, “But Christ came as High Priest of the good things to come, with the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made with hands, that is, not of this creation. Not with the blood of goats and calves, but with His own blood He entered the Most Holy Place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption. For if the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifies for the purifying of the flesh, HOW MUCH MORE SHALL THE BLOOD OF CHRIST, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?”

If your life is not a testimony of continuous rejoicing in God for His forgiveness and, yes, forgetfulness of your old sin nature and your pattern and participation in fleshly sins, I believe I would seriously examine what I “thought” was my salvation and what God Himself “says” it is!

Hebrews 10:12-14 tells us, “But this Man, after He had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God, from that time waiting till His enemies are made His footstool. For by ONE OFFERING (HIS SINLESS SELF!) He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified.”

You sin, my sin, the world’s sin became His “pain,” your pain became His suffering, His suffering became your freedom from bondage, and your freedom became the theme of your praise to your true Savior and Lord, your Blessed Redeemer! SO, you take the sentence of death daily that the Resurrection Life of your Lord and Savior may be manifested in and through you for an unbelieving work to see and to seek!

Have you forgotten, overlooked, or never seen Paul’s word to us in Galatians 5:24? “And those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires,” so, Verse 25, “If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.” Is it your daily ambition to honor Christ in your earthly walk?

I close this first chapter with Oswald Chambers’ words: “Beware of refusing to go to the funeral of your own independence.” [My Utmost For His Highest, p.256]. AMEN?

CHAPTER TWO

THE BEAUTY AND BLESSING

OF THE WORD OF GOD

Words fail me in attempting to express how I feel about the Word of God, THE Holy Scripture, the divinely-ordained words of the Heavenly Father. Never have I ever doubted the veracity of the Bible as His “inspired Word”!

I don’t believe that’s ignorance or shallowness or short-sightedness but confidence in a “Thus says the Lord…” Recognition that it is “…living, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword;” Yes, agreement with the words of Jesus, “The words that I speak unto you are spirit and they are life!” It amazes me that men trust their limited intellect over the divine Word of God that is “God-breathed,” Spirit-anointed, and totally trustworthy.

I had a ten-year old granddaughter visiting my home years ago who had been interviewing me for a school project. One of the questions she asked was, “What is the greatest advice you ever received?” and without hesitation I shared Proverbs 3:5-6, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not to your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him and He shall direct your paths.”

But rather than “directed paths” there are those who walk in their own personal preferences; rather than yielding their lives to the Creator, they think they are smarter than God, or at least, smart enough to take care of themselves! Can you imagine that God would say to us that He will direct our paths but not give us an anointed roadmap? Is it remotely possible that Almighty God sees us as wise enough to determine “eternal matters” on our own?

I came across a G.K.Chesterton story recently about a British yachtsman who wanted to sail from the shores of England and find his way to an exotic south-sea paradise. He sailed for many days and the sighted land. He was ecstatic! On land he saw a pagan temple. He claimed it for England! He raised up the Union Jack flag, so proud of himself! But then, all of a sudden, it dawned on him – he had scaled the Brighton Pavilion on the southern coast of England! He had determined for himself “a straight line,” but came up with a circle that took him nowhere near where he wanted to be.

I have no hesitation in saying to you that many “Christians” and many church-groups have charted a course for their journey that is oblivious to divine revelation and eternal Truth! In Isaiah 59:14 the prophet says, “…truth is fallen in the street…” But I believe also that Truth is perishing in the pew. In these modern days it is not, for many, submission to the Holy Word of God but mind-boggling imposition of our own opinions and ideas upon that holy book!

David F. Wells has written a powerful book entitled “No Place For Truth”, and in it he speaks about those who see truth, theology, doctrine as an “embarrassing encumbrance”. He says many have actually turned inward upon themselves and substitute their knowledge for the knowledge!

Once I was in a home in a southern city where I saw and heard two men say that they did not accept the Bible as authoritative but only the “words of men,” and you certainly “cannot accept what Paul wrote!” To which I responded, “All Scripture is God-breathed…”. I told them that God took fishermen, farmers, kings, even tax-collectors and through them, as His instruments, breathed the Word of God.

One said, “If in India no more than 20% have come to Christ, what about the 80%? You surely don’t believe God would assign them to Hell?” And I assured them God’s love had made the way through Christ – “I am the way, the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.” And both said, “We don’t accept that! What about the Muslims? They serve the one God.” To which I responded, “Allah is not the God of Calvary’s Cross but ‘self-instigation’ of a fallen creation plus the devil himself.” And they both said, “Our God is a forgiving God. And we feel sorry for you that you don’t know the God of forgiveness.”

I responded, “And I feel sorry for you that you don’t accept God’s Word. The lost are our responsibility. That’s why I’m in India.. That’s why there are martyrs for the faith. And Paul says, “They are without excuse.” Their response? “We don’t accept Paul.”

My last comment to them? “Your belief that there is more than one way to be reconciled to God is an affront to Christ and a slap in the face of the Lamb of God and also a slap in the face of the martyrs of the ages who laid down their lives for the Gospel of Christ.” And I then quoted John 3:16-18 to which they responded, “We just don’t accept that.”

I was heart-sick for days. These were well-educated worldly men “ever learning but never able to come to the knowledge of the Truth.” They substituted their ‘church’ disciplines for the Holy Revelation! No wonder God spoke through the prophet Hosea in Hosea 8:12, “I have written for him the great things of My law (or Word!), but they were considered a strange thing.”

Though there are those who do not accept Scripture as the voice of God, there still stands the forever verse of Hebrews 4:12, “For the word of God is living and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword…” But still there are those who look upon the Holy Word of God as “old-fashioned,” not relevant for their “up-dated, modern, intellectual superior way of thinking,” destitute in Life-giving, redemptive Truth because they believe in ‘universal salvation’, and bankrupt as to Messiah’s mission as the only way of reconciliation to Holy God, WHICH IT TRULY IS!!

J.C.Ryle was the first bishop of Liverpool in the Church of England. He published a book entitled “No Uncertain Sound.” In it (p.199) he wrote: “Stand fast in the old belief that the whole Bible from Genesis to Revelation was given by inspiration of God, and that the historical facts recorded in the Old Testament are all credible and true. Do not be shaken by the vague assertions and big swelling words of those who sneer at everything supernatural, and talk about ‘the laws of nature, the discoveries of science, and the results of modern criticism.’”

Has the time come? 2 Timothy 4:3-4, “For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires (their own thoughts, their own ‘convictions’ that hold them and strangle true faith), because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers; and they will turn their ears from the truth, and be turned aside to fables (myths, wild thoughts opposing even God’s revelation!).”

What did God say to Ephraim through Hosea? “I have written to him the great things of My law (My Word!), but they were counted as a strange thing.” And again, in another time period of human history, in a “new age” of man’s reasoning opposing eternal TRUTHS, in an era of off-repeated attempts at defusing the powerful, eternal, electrical currents of God’s Word, there are still men who believe they are intellectually superior to God Himself and do not need to be guided by the Holy Spirit in revealed truth.

Let me again quote the Episcopalian bishop, J.C.Ryle: (p.208), “The subject of inspiration is “always important.” It is the very keel and foundation of Christianity. If Christians have no Divine book to turn to as the warrant of their doctrine and practice, they have no solid ground for present peace and hope, and no right to claim the attention of mankind. They are building on quicksand, and their faith is vain. If the Bible is not given by inspiration throughout, and contains defects and errors, which would invalidate any legal settlement or will, it cannot be a safe guide to heaven. We ought to be able to say boldly, ‘We are what we are, and we do what we do, and teach what we teach, because we have here a book which we believe to be, altogether and entirely, the Word of God.’” That was preached in the 1800’s – and how far have we fallen from his conviction?

There are tragic, destructive steps that far too many professing believers take that leads them onto a slippery slope of senseless, sensual, self-centered determinism that dethrones to wisdom of God and enthrones the foolishness of fallen humanity. They substitute their personal mind-set for God’s revealed Truth! They continue on the perverted path of human reasoning calling it a blessing and freedom. They major on listening to false teachers and false prophets and feel vindicated that they know more than God Himself! Dr. James Draper wrote: “They make the individual the final arbiter of truth.” What a dangerous place to be! I do not want to be there – ever! You do understand that not only is it the fallacy of human rationalism, but also there are those who rest their faith strictly and narrowly to their particular church’s “disciplines” with very little regard for His revealed Word. And in 99.9% of either human rationalism or a church’s disciplines they take THAT above Holy Scripture. And that position has cemented one dangerously on the spiritual terra firma of their personal knowledge that transcends God’s Word and HIS ULTIMATE AUTHORITY in all matters of faith and spiritual disciplines.

John 20:21 says, “These are written so that you may believe Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God.’ But you have a better explanation than God? Even Jesus Himself said in John 17:17, “Your Word is truth,” but you possess a better interpretation? Psalm 119:105 says, “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path,” but you trust your better way of human reasoning? 1 Peter 1:23 says, “having been born again, not of corrupt seed but incorruptible, through the word of God which lives and abides forever,” but you believe His Word is untrustworthy and you stake your life and eternal future on your good thoughts?

James, the brother of Jesus, overseer of the church around Jerusalem wrote, (James 1:18), “Of His won will He brought us forth by the word of truth,” but you look upon it as a word of errors and are not “brought forth”? To the church at Thessalonica (1 Thessalonians 2:13), Paul said, (Forgive me. But I believe Paul was an available vessel of God’s faithful Word, as You “in Christ” are to be as His faithful witness!),”For this reason we also thank God without ceasing, because when you received the word of God which you heard from us, you welcomed it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which also effectively works in you who believe,” but you rest what ‘faith’ you have in human reasoning and not God’s Holy Word? Romans 10:17 says, “So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God,” but you believe faith rests in your fallen “brilliance”?

And you know what literally breaks my heart? It’s not only blindness but their influence that spreads to children, grandchildren, friends and neighbors, like a poison, and they have not, nor probably ever share, if they thought they had them, words of redemptive hope.

Clement of Rome, from about A.D. 100, said: “Look carefully into the Scriptures which are the true utterances of the Holy Spirit.” Again I don’t have any hesitation in saying that there are those who truly despise the Word of God yet profess a faith that has no redemptive hope. They don’t believe God’s Holy Word is “the true utterances of the Holy Spirit.” They truly believe it’s okay that they replace God as the Author of His Holy Word and replace Him with themselves as author, interpreter, and defender of what they believe to be truth.

Two or three things I want to magnify. First is the Author and authority of the Word of God! That should be enough – the Author of the Word of God! Pick up your Bible and KNOW that it is the awesome writing of God Himself; every letter possesses the penmanship of Holy God; every beautiful words flows from the mouth of Holy God revealed to available trustees, their personalities, their vocabularies, their circles of reference; and each letter – even the dotting of every “i” and the crossing of every “t”- was flooded over with Holy Spirit-authority and brooded upon until it came forth as “the great things of My law.”

Receive Charles Haddon Spurgeon’s words who wrote and preached powerfully in England so long ago: (“Spurgeon’s Sermons”, Memorial Library, Vol.1, p.26), “ Moses was employed to write his histories with his fiery pen, God guided that pen. It may be that David touched his harp, and let sweet Psalms of melody drop from his fingers; but God moved his hands over the living strings of his golden harp. It may be that Solomon sang canticles of love, or gave forth words of consummate wisdom, but God directed his lips, and made the preacher eloquent. If I follow the thundering Nahum, when his horses plough the waters, or Habakkuk, when he sees the tents of Cushan in affliction; if I read Malachi, when the earth is burning like an oven; if I turn to the smooth pages of John, who tells of Love, or the rugged, fiery chapters of Peter, who speaks of fire devouring God’s enemies; if I turn to Jude, who launches forth anathemas upon the foes of God, everywhere I find God speaking; it is God’s voice, not man’s; the words are God’s words, the words of the Eternal, the Invisible, the Almighty, the Jehovah of this earth. This Bible is God’s Bible!” And you would cast doubt on His Holy Word?

Consider its style! Look at its focus and subjects! Examine its glorious doctrines and truths! Pause for even a second at the truth of God’s sovereignty! Reflect upon God’s plan of the Lamb slain before the world ever was! Be astonished and amazed that before time began, or before you were formed in your mother’s womb He knew you, called you, set you apart for His eternal purpose! His thoughts are ON YOU as if YOU were the man, woman ever to live on His earth; His plan is for your reconciliation to Holy God; and He pours you out as a drink offering to all around you so that through you He is revealed to fallen humanity! And YOU question its Author and authority?

Second, Look at the AIM OF THE WORD OF GOD! CONSIDER HOLY GOD’S AIM THROUGH HIS REVEALED WORD! We could start earlier in His Word, but receive to Him as He spoke in Exodus 7:5! “And the Egyptians shall know that I AM the Lord.” And I challenge you to take out a Strong’s Concordance and study verse after verse after verse saying, “…they shall know that I AM the Lord!”

Do you believe Jesus spoke when He was on the earth? Was it recorded? Are His words trustworthy? John 17:3 says, Jesus speaking, “And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, (Not Allah, not Buddha, not elephants, not snakes, not cows, not a self-proclaimed deceived man who sees himself as a ‘god’!), and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.”

I want you to come in your Bible to John 3 and read along with me verses 30-36. John is speaking: “He must increase, but I must decrease. He who comes from above is above all; he who is of the earth is earthy and speaks of the earth. He who comes from heaven is above all. And what He has seen and heard, that He testifies; and no one receives His testimony. He who HAS received His testimony has certified that God is true. For He whom God has sent speaks the words of God, for God does not give the Spirit by measure. The Father loves the Son, and has given all things into His hand. He who believes in the Son has everlasting life; and he who does not believe the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him.” Unless, of course, you don’t believe in the wrath of God! You’re just so above that! To you that’s a twisted theology, but God calls it triumphant truth!

Third, EXAMINE THE AFFIRMATION OF THE WORD OF GOD! We’ve seen the Author and the authority; we’ve seen the aim of the Word; and now what about its REPEATED AFFIRMATION? Check out Romans 8:29. This is the verse that Almighty God used to break the heart of a twelve-year pastor and bring him to “new birth”. “For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren.”

Though Adam and Eve were created ‘in the image of God’ there was a tragic fall. And even before that fall, Holy God had determined how the holy image would be restored to a scarred, marred, broken, separated, darkened humanity. Genesis 5:3 says, “And Adam lived one hundred and thirty years, and begat a son IN HIS OWN LIKENESS, after his image, and named him Seth.”

And the plan of God before and after the Fall? “…predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son…!” Make Galatians 1:15-16 your daily celebration of a hymn of praise, “But when it pleased God who separated me from my mother’s womb and called me through His grace, to reveal His Son in me…” In Christ Jesus our Lord and Savior we become partakers of the divine nature, becoming “complete in Him,” and daily take unto ourselves the sentence of death that the resurrection of Christ might be manifested in our mortal flesh, in the here and now, and not just when we get to Heaven someday! What an affirmation in God’s Holy Word of your true identity “in Christ”!

Fourth, CELEBRATE IN ADORATION OF THE WORD OF GOD! I want to close this chapter amplifying a biblical attitude of adoration of the Word of God. I challenge you to major on all of Psalm 119 over your next few days, but I want to whet your appetite!

PSALM 119:140, “Your word is very pure; therefore Your servant loves it.” Unless YOU call it impure!

Psalm 119:162, “I rejoice at Your word as one who finds great treasure.” Unless you treasure your “opinions” above His revelation!

Psalm 119:165, “Great peace have those who love Your law, and nothing causes them to stumble.” Unless you refuse to allow God’s law in you to expose your need of the Savior!

Psalm 119:72, “The law of Your mouth is better to me than thousands of coins of gold and silver.” Some spend more time examining their bank and retirement accounts than hungering for God’s Word!

Psalm 119:54, “Your statutes have been my songs in the house of my pilgrimage.” Unless there is no “new song” in your soul!

Let me close “The Beauty and Blessing of the Word of God,” with two quotes from JC Ryle in his book, “No Uncertain Sound,” (pps. 208 & 211), “…let me charge you to hold fast the authority, supremacy, and Divine inspiration of the whole Bible,” and “The thrice-repeated saying of our Lord, taken from Deuteronomy, ‘It is written,’ when tempted by the devil, is deeply significant and instructive.” (Matthew 4:5-10). That is, unless Jesus is not your Way, your Truth, or your Life!

William Butler Yates poetically, and I believe prophetically, wrote these words that so describe resisters to Divine Truth:

“Turning and turning in the widening gyre, The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the center cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst, Are full of passionate intensity.”

When did God’s Word become “fool’s gold”? When did it become the blotted “Sun of Righteousness”? When did “Light” become rays of darkness? When did the “Glory of His Word” become a gory expression in a man’s mind?

I’m so very, very sorry for those who do not trust or love God’s Word. I’m deeply troubled for those who look upon Holy Scripture as a simple addendum to their life’s story and do not stand upon faith in its Author and authority, its aim, its affirmation, and certainly possess no adoration for the Holy Bible! I stand, and will always stand, upon “The Beauty and Blessing of God’s Word”!

CHAPTER THREE

INTELLECTUAL ALLEGIANCE OR INTERNAL TRANSFORMATION?

It’s interesting to me to hear what Paul said in 1 Corinthians 15:1-2, “Moreover, brethren, I declare to you the gospel which I preached to you, which you also received and in which you stand, by which also you are saved, if you hold fast that word which I preached to you – unless you believed in vain.”

I would ask: “Is intellectual allegiance a state of ‘vainness’? Is intellectual allegiance the act of ‘moral stupidity’ or ‘intellectual blindness’? Is ‘intellectual allegiance’ simply a ‘pietistic movement’ with no blood redemption? Is ‘intellectual allegiance’ a mind-awareness with no heart-change through true repentance and all-out surrender to Christ’s Lordship? Is, at least, intellectual allegiance a ‘short-changed acknowledgement’, maimed, minimized, though seemingly spiritual, yet still morally and spiritually bankrupt, or, does the maimed spiritual awareness, at least, lead one to his/her place before the reigning King of kings and Lord of lords where he/she, having truly repented, put their, yes, saving faith in Christ’s “finished work at the Cross”, then hearing Father-God saying, “You shall be PERFECT, just as your Father in heaven is perfect”?

In 1 John 4:17 the beloved John wrote, “Love has been perfected among us in this: that we may have boldness in the day of judgment; because as Jesus is, so are we in this world.” But, in ‘the day of judgment’, where does the ‘intellectual elite’ stand, while intellectually acknowledging the reality of Christ as the True Redeemer, Lord, and Savior, “but…I don’t need to be “saved” – I can make it on my own”, without realizing it that they intellectually acknowledged, and gained Hell with the devil and his demons! In Chapter 5:12 John stressed, “He who HAS THE SON HAS LIFE; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life.”

‘Intellectual Allegiance’? That’s awareness of the reality of Christ but ‘void’ of His abundant mercy given to one as he/she rests in “the living hope” in and through Christ alone, repenting not of their sins because they’ve determined for themselves that Jesus died in vain because they’ve lived ‘worthy lives’ deserving His commendation, not His love and grace and mercy!

‘Intellectual allegiance’? In fact, there are many, many people who are seriously hindered in the absence of a “God-ordained, new-born life” because they live in an orb of indifference, a ‘fleshly, dream world’ of contentment in, of, for, because of their mental independence from anything that clouds their pride, and because they bow to self, exalting unbelief in anything or anyone who would dim or darken ‘self’ as their ‘true god’! Oh, and then they say, “Can you believe that the Christian’s Bible tells them, ‘unless you are CONVERTED and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven,’ when we are mature, educated, well-trained members of an adult world – we’ll have nothing to do with becoming a ‘child’!” So, they go to Hell instead of Heaven! Really brilliant isn’t it?

‘Intellectual allegiance’ can and does exempt God, by their choice, when Christ, our Lord and Savior, wants to be our, their deliverer! In Psalm 31:9-16 we find a song of David! He sang: “Have mercy on me, O Lord, for I am in trouble (godlessness is, will be: “the absence of God”, but His presence will transform ‘my trouble’ into His triumph!); my eye wastes away with grief, yes, my soul and my body! For my life is spent with grief, and my years with sighing; my strength fails because of my iniquity, and my bones waste away.

I am a reproach among all my enemies, but especially among my neighbors, and am repulsive to my acquaintances; those who seek me outside flee from me. I am forgotten like a dead man, out of mind; I am like a broken vessel. For I hear the slander of many; fear is on every side; while they take counsel together against me, they scheme to take away my life.

But as for me, I trust in You, O Lord; I say, “You are my God.” My times are in Your hand; deliver me from the hand of my enemies, and from those who persecute me. Make Your face shine upon Your servant; Save me for Your mercies’ sake.”

‘Intellectual allegiance’? In John 14:9-11 there is another sobering, awakening, convicting, and challenging word from King Jesus when He said to Philip, “Have I been with you so long, and yet you have not known Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; so how can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me? The words that I speak to you I do not speak on My own authority, but the Father who dwells in Me does the works. Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father in Me, or else believe Me for the sake of the works themselves.” Acknowledgement but doesn’t truly know, or knows and doesn’t want to surrender to His Lordship?

But, there are those who know, yield, and surrender fully to Christ’s Lordship as Savior, Redeemer, ‘God in flesh’ laying down His life to set men free from their bondage – to be without Christ as Lord and Savior is to be one enslaved to his flesh, to the world spirit of rebellion to God, and, yes, controlled by the devil and the powers of darkness. Consider: First Adam or Second Adam – Christ Jesus!

FIRST ADAM? The Fleshly Nature! SECOND ADAM? The Divine Nature! FIRST ADAM? Bad Fruit! SECOND ADAM? Good Fruit! FIRST ADAM? Old man! SECOND ADAM? New man! First Adam? Earthly bound! New man? Heavenly blessed! Old man! Darkness-covered! New man? Light eternally unveiled! First Adam? Disillusioned! Second Adam? Divine-destined-dreamer “in Christ”, with Eternity his/her residence!

Revelation 5:9-13 declares the “re-born” celebrating “the Lamb of God”! And they sang a new song, saying: “You are worthy to take the scroll, and to open its seals; For You were slain, and have REDEEMED US TO GOD BY YOUR BLOOD out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation, and have made us (the repentant ones) kings and priests to our God; and we shall reign on the earth.”

Then I looked, and I heard the voice of many angels around the throne, the living creatures, and the elders; and the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice: “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain to receive power and riches and wisdom, and strength and honor and glory and blessing!”

And every creature which is in heaven and on the earth and under the earth and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, I heard saying:

“Blessing and honor and glory and power Be To Him who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb, forever and ever!”

Did you see it, receive it, rest in it? “A kingdom of priests! REDEEMED, REMADE, REINSTITUTED WITH A SOVEREIGN COMMISSIONING, RULING AND REIGNING IN THE FULLNESS OF THE BLESSING OF THE GOSPEL OF JESUS CHRIST!” They understand it, convicted and convinced of Him, they RECEIVE HIM AND CROWN HIM AS LORD OF THEIR LIVES!

Doesn’t John 1:12-13 tell us, “But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in (trust in, rely upon, adhere to!) His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.”

“The kingdom, under Christ’s Lordship!” But for most in the world today, and even the ‘church-world’, the Kingdom of God, in the here and now, is unknown, sadly unseen, unreceived, unconcerned, unappreciated, and unclaimed! Many adore their ‘church allegiance’ ignoring the Ruling, Reigning, Resurrected Christ!

“Intellectual Allegiance”? When one considers the Israeli nation, except for the “True Remnant”, you find a people in 2 Corinthians 3:12-16 mindfully aware but gripped by ‘unveiled hearts’! It says: “Therefore, since WE have such hope, we use great boldness of speech – unlike Moses, who put a veil over his face so that the children of Israel could not look steadily of what was passing away (Old Covenant allegiance!). But their minds were blinded. For until this day the same veil remains unlifted in the reading of the Old Testament, because the veil is taken away in Christ. But even to this day, when Moses is read, a veil lies of their heart. Nevertheless WHEN ONE TURNS TO THE LORD, THE VEIL IS TAKEN AWAY.”

“Intellectual allegiance”? An acceptance of spiritual blindness? An acceptance of “the hidden things of shame”? An acceptance in walking through life in craftiness and mental, moral, and spiritual deception? For instance, I just heard on national television a ‘conservative’ (?) commentator casually speak about: “Our faith (as a nation) is faith in the democratic majority!”, which resembles closely the majority of spiritual ‘isolationists’ who sit in churches and never invade, penetrate, proclaim, or share ‘Truth’ with the citizens of darkness!

“Intellectual allegiance”? Have you noticed a change in ‘intellectual allegiance’ to “intellectual allegiances” because there is an intensification in that intellectual allegiance from the out-and-out sinner to even the radical, unbelieving ‘professors’, even some in seminaries? Have you ever been confronted by men with their ‘ineffable charms’ of spiritual deception saying, either, ‘There is no God’, OR, “Faith is not worthy of your time, thoughts, or commitment – just enjoy your ‘fallen sin natures’ – nothing is going to change!” Of course not! Without Christ nothing changes from a fallen man’s perspective – he just keeps on ‘indulging’!

“Intellectual allegiances, pluralized (!)”, because the sin nature grows deeper, higher, stouter, stronger, and one’s godless mind becomes more impertinent to the things of God, as the godless man becomes impertinent to the unveiling of God in Christ and His saving grace! But it’s not just ‘hardened sinners’, poisoned more by the fallen world around them, but even in churches there will be spiritual ‘isolationists’ who ‘sit’ there but never invade, penetrate, or share “the Way, the Truth, and the Life” in Christ with the citizens of darkness! And if one grasps redemptive truth by the Holy Spirit who ‘guides us into all Truth’, if one refuses the ministry of the Holy Spirit, even in conviction and equipping, where does that leave the unbeliever baffled, blinded, bruised, and bewildered, if a ‘believer’ senses no responsibility to be a ‘witness’ because he/she has no Spirit of Christ?

“Intellectual allegiance”? “If I become a Christian, Jesus must understand that there is a limit to what I’m willing to do.” Does that sound like convenient consecration on one’s own terms? But in Romans 12:1-2 the Holy Word of God through Paul declares: “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be (being) transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God.”

I love Oswald Chambers’ statement in his book, “My Utmost For His Highest”, (p.120), “The first thing we realize when we come to Jesus is that He pays no attention whatever to our natural affinities. We have the notion that we can consecrate our gifts to God. You cannot consecrate what is not yours; there is only one thing you can consecrate to God, and that is your right to yourself.” YES! YOU YIELD TO THE LORD’S SOVEREIGN CONTROL! Have YOU yielded, surrendered, abandoned your ‘self-will’ to live under the Master’s will?

“Intellectual allegiances abandoned! Internal transformation accepted!” How clear is our Lord’s Word when He said to Nicodemus in John 3:3, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.” In John 3:5-6 He stressed, “Most assuredly (Is that, ‘eternally True’, based on the Word of Christ Himself, God in Flesh?), I say to you, unless one is born of water (Water of the Word of God?) and the Spirit (born of the Spirit?), he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh (Old, fallen, inherited, Adam sin nature?), and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.”

Christ-less men and ‘church-member-pretenders’ live with a Robert Ingersoll fleshly principle that “happiness is the legal tender of the soul,” (Encyclopedia of Religious Quotations,” p.209), when the truly ‘born again’ are BLESSED BY THE HOLY SPIRIT – and they know it! It was Frank W. Moyle, in the “Watchman Examiner” who years and years ago wrote: “The question of the authority of the Bible need not trouble the humblest reader. It is not ‘a code which fell from the sky, guaranteed by an ecclesiastical imprimatur,’ but a collection of writings (inspired by the Holy God!) which breathes upon us the only authority that is worth regarding – the authority of the power of the Holy Spirit.” Glory!

Yet, in John 5:38-40, Christ Jesus warned the ‘devout, religious, priestly Jews’, saying, “But you do not have God’s word abiding in you, because whom He sent, Him you do not believe (rest in, adhere to, or selflessly comply with!). You search the Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life; and THESE ARE THEY WHICH TESTIFY OF ME (the Promised Messiah!). but YOU are not willing to come to Me that you may have life.”

It was Peter who wrote in 1 Peter 1:18-21 an amazing, eternal, life and heart-changing Word when he said: “knowing that you were not REDEEMED with corruptible things, like silver or gold, from your AIMLESS CONDUCT RECEIVED BY TRADITION FROM YOUR fathers, but with THE PRECIOUS BLOOD OF CHRIST, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot. He indeed was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you who through Him believe (or trust in) God, who raised Him from the dead and gave Him glory, SO THAT your faith and hope are in God (only).” Amen?

But “the blood-redeemed”, “the born again of the Spirit,” “the elect according to the foreknowledge of God, even before the foundation of the world and its inhabitants,” ARE the Living Witnesses of “new life in Christ alone”!

The beloved John really laid it out for us clearly, convincingly, convictionally, and confidently when he wrote in 1 John 1:6-9, “If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. BUT if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ God’s Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” That, my friends, is an amazing “Glory be to Almighty God”!

Question! Do YOU say, “I really do believe in Jesus, but I have a problem: I still choose to walk, at times, in the darkness of, I know, my decaying world”, – and I say to you, if you have not taken the sentence of death to your mortal, sinful self, you have never been “born again”, but just adapted to a compromising church’s fleshly mentality! I’ll come close to closing this chapter with powerful words from Oswald Chambers in his book, “My Utmost For His Highest,” (pps.269-270)!

Matthew 18:3-4, “Assuredly, I say to you, unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore whoever humbles himself as this little child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.” Oswald’s words?

“These words of our Lord are true of our initial conversion, but we have to be continuously converted all the days of our lives, continually to turn to God as children. If we trust to our wits instead of to God, we produce consequences for which God will hold us responsible. Immediately our bodies are brought into new conditions by the providence of God, we have to see that our natural life obeys the dictates of the Spirit of God. The relation of the natural to the spiritual is one of continuous conversion, and it is the one thing we object to. In every setting in which we are put, the Spirit of God remains unchanged and His salvation unaltered, but we have to “put on the new man.” God holds us responsible every time we refuse to convert ourselves, our reason for refusing is willful obstinacy. Out natural life must not rule, God must rule in us.”

And, do you think that what I just read reveals why Paul said what he did, inspired of the Spirit, in 2 Corinthians 1:9-10? “Yes, we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves but in God who raises the dead, who delivered us from so great a death, and does deliver us; in whom we trust that He will still deliver us…”, saying also in 1 Corinthians 15:31 and Verse 34, “I affirm, by the boasting in you which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord, I DIE DAILY…” followed a few verses later, Verse 34, “Awake to righteousness, and do not sin; for some do not have the knowledge of God. I speak this to your shame.”

Let the Holy Word of God in Hebrews 2:8-18 enlighten, inspire, and encourage in you “The Christ-Inspired, Victorious, Eternal Life”! It says: “’You, God, have put all things in subjection under his feet.’ For in that He put all in subjection under him, He left nothing that is not put under him. But now we do not yet see all things put under him. But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, that He, by the grace of God, might taste death for everyone.

For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings. For both He who sanctifies and those who are being sanctified are all of one, for which reason He is not ashamed to call them brethren, saying: “I will declare Your name to My brethren; in the midst of the assembly I will sing praise to you.” And again: “I will put My trust in Him.” And again: “Here am I and the children whom God has given Me.”

Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, He Himself likewise shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is,, the devil, and release those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage. For indeed He does not give aid to angels, but He does give aid to the seed of Abraham. Therefore, in all things He had to be made like His brethren, that He might be a merciful and faithful High Priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For in that He Himself has suffered, being tempted, He is able to aid those who are tempted.”

W.T.Sleeper and George C. Stebbins had published in the old hymnal entitled “The Broadman Hymnal” (By The Broadman Press, Nashville, Tenn., 1940), a hymn entitled “You Must Be Born Again.” It says:

“You children of men, attend to the word, so solemnly uttered by Jesus the Lord; And let not this message to you be in vain, “You Must be born again.”

O you who would enter that glorious rest, And sing with the ransomed the song of the blest; the life everlasting if you would obtain, “You must be born again.”

A dear one in heaven your heart yearns to see, At the beautiful gate may be watching for you; then listen to the note of this solemn refrain, “You must be born again.”

That hasn’t changed through the ages, and will not change now! “YOU MUST BE BORN AGAIN!”

CHAPTER FOUR

THE CALL OF THE UNQUALIFIED

You are no doubt familiar with King Nebuchadnezzar’s dream and Daniel’s interpretation. It lays such a tremendous foundation for this chapter. To help make this chapter more meaningful, I recommend that you read Daniel 4 before continuing. In Daniel 4 the king has been given a dream by “a holy one.” The king sees a tree chopped down and doesn’t know it’s his reign! In verse 26 Daniel tells him, “Your kingdom shall be assured to you, AFTER you know that heaven rules.” At the end of the chapter the king finally sees that God rules!

Robert R. Brown wrote wisely when he said: “It is part of our human nature but there is that within us which always wants to make self the center of its own universe and, in that selfish way, wants to tear God from His throne and deny his brother and advance his own ambition.” What a contradiction with the intent of God and the total inconsistencies of man! Paschal called us “confused chaos.” And it’s so true.

Even though we were “fearfully and wonderfully made,” mankind has walked faithlessly and woefully. Most men become a ‘god’ unto themselves and never know “the wonder of usefulness to God”! The basic problem is that most people major on their ‘abilities’ and fail to realize God is only interested in their availability to His eternal plan and purpose! Most people feel they are of a superior order beyond even angels in their status. Most people assume they are of such refined quality that regeneration and redemption and reconciliation are strange terms!

The “finest of flesh” falls so short of the fullness of God. Fields of service unto God are not flowing with the names of the more notable but the less known. Positions in kingdom service are not replete with the grandeur of high-office qualifications but with the grace of servant-hood greatness. Self-assurance and ‘self’-confidence are two blind eyes that lead the proud into ditches, not the highway of ministerial service and blessing.

I Corinthians 10:12 says, “Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall.” Earlier in 1 Corinthians 3, Paul talked about the church’s carnality or fleshliness. In verses 3-7 he wrote, “for where there are envy, strife, and divisions among you, are you not carnal and behaving like men? For when one says, ‘I am of Paul,’ and another, ‘I am of Apollos,’ are you not carnal? Who then is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers through whom you believed, as the Lord gave to each one? I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase. So then neither he who plants is anything nor he who waters but God gives the increase.” (NKJ)

Look at 2 Corinthians 4:5-7. “For we do not preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord, and ourselves your servants for Jesus’ sake. For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us.” (NKJ)

That’s such a hard lesson for some to learn. It is so hard to receive when one is full of himself and full of the self-estimation of his importance, even to God! In 1 Corinthians 1:25-29, from the Amplified, “For {simply} consider your own calling, brethren; not many {of you were considered to be} wise, according to human estimates and standards; not many influential and powerful; not many of high and noble birth. {No}, for God selected – deliberately chose – what in the world is foolish to put the wise to shame, and what the world calls weak to put the strong to shame. And God selected – deliberately chose – {what} in the world {is} lowborn and insignificant, and branded and treated with contempt, even the things that are nothing, that He might depose and bring to nothing the things that are so that no mortal man should {have pretense for glorying and} boast in the presence of God.” Is that clear? It’s “The Call of The Unqualified”!

William Barclay, in his 1 Corinthians commentary, wrote: “It is the amazing and the true fact of life that it is the people who realize their own weakness, their own lack of wisdom, their own helplessness and powerlessness, who in the end are strong and wise. It is the fact of experience that the man who thinks he can take on life by himself in the end is certain to make shipwreck of life.”

But listen to Jonathan Edwards: “There is no leveler like Christianity, but it levels by lifting all who receive it to the lofty table-land of a true character and of undying hope both for this world and the next.” Now, notice what God does!

FIRST, GOD CALLS THE FAITHLESS AND RAISES THEM UP AS “FATHERS OF THE FAITH”! Never forget Romans 3:10-12, “As it is written, ‘There is none righteous, no, not one. There is none who understands; there is none who seeks after God. They have all gone out of the way; they have together become unprofitable; there is none who does good, no, not one.” (NKJ).

An if that is true, and it is, how do men all of a sudden become instruments in God’s hands for His purpose and His glory? God’s divine sovereignty!

To the church at Rome, Paul put it like this, Romans 9:15-16, “For God says to Moses, ‘I will have mercy on whomever I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whomever I will have compassion. So then it is not of him who wills, nor of him who runs, but of God who shows mercy.” (NKV)

In John 6:44 Jesus tells us clearly: “No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him.” Do you understand? God called “faithless” Abram and raised him up as the “Father of the Faith.”

Come to Acts 7:2-3; Stephen tells the high priest who was filled with doubt and distrust, “Men and brethren and fathers, listen: The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he dwelt in Haran, and said to him, ‘Get out of your country and from your relatives and come to a land that I will show you.” (NKV)

In Joshua 24:2, we read that Joshua spoke to all the people, “Thus says the Lord God of Israel: ‘Your fathers, including Terah, the father of Abraham and the father of Nahor, dwelt on the other side of the River in old times; and they served other gods.” Abram came out of an idolatrous family. Abram was faithless. Abram wasn’t bent toward God – his bent was away from God. Abram Wasn’t a seeker – he was a sinner. Abram wasn’t righteous – he was unrighteous. Abram wasn’t a believer – he was an unbeliever.

Arthur Pink, in “Gleanings in Genesis,” (p.140) wrote: “There was nothing whatever in the object of God’s choice which commended Abram to God. There was nothing whatever in Abram which merited God’s esteem…” He then quotes Isaiah 51:1-2, “Listen to Me, you who follow after righteousness, you who seek the Lord: Look to the rock from which you were hewn, and to the hole of the pit from which you were dug. Look to Abraham your father, and to Sarah who bore you; for I called him alone, and blessed him and increased him.” (NKJ)

What was God saying? Remember the rock of idolatry from which you’ve been taken; remember the dark hole of faithlessness from which you’ve been dug; remember the vast separation between sinful man and Holy God; but also “remember, from there I called you, I blessed you, and I increased you! “ All Glory Belongs To God Alone!

SECOND, GOD CALLS THE SPEECHLESS AND RAISES THEM UP AS “MOUTHS OF GOD”! Come to Exodus 4:10-12. Moses has been “sitting down by a well” for forty years like so many in our world today. They’ve been silent, they’ve been voiceless as to Truth, maybe even a little “ashamed of the Gospel.” But God shows up! “I have a purpose for your life!” And do you comprehend that there are blazing, glowing, radiating, burning bushes all around you? And God is calling. What did Moses say and what often have we said? “Then Moses said to the Lord, ‘O my Lord, I am not eloquent, neither before nor since You have spoken to Your servant; but I am slow of speech and slow of tongue.’ So the Lord said to him, ‘Who has made man’s mouth? Or who makes the mute, the deaf, the seeing, or the blind? Have not I the Lord? Now therefore go and I will be your mouth and teach you what you shall say.” (NKV)

God takes the speechless and raises them up as “mouths of God” by an implosive, irrepressible work of grace: Acts 4:20,21: “For we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard.’ So when they had further threatened them, they let them go, finding no way of punishing them, because of the people, since they all glorified God for what had been done.” (NKV)

God takes the speechless and raises them up as “mouths of God” by His anointing: Acts 2:4, “And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.” (NKJ)

God takes the speechless (related to the Truths of God!) and raises them up as “mouths of God” through the inevitability of a maturing faith: 2 Corinthians 4:13-15, “But since we have the same spirit of faith, according to what is written, ‘I believed, and therefore I spoke,’ we also believe and therefore speak knowing that He who raised up the Lord Jesus will also raise us up with Jesus, and will present us with you. For all things are for your sakes, that grace, having spread through the many, may cause thanksgiving to abound to the glory of God.” (NKJ)

God takes the speechless and raises them up as “mouths of God” through, yes, the explosion of an inward fire: Jeremiah 20:9, “Then I said, I will not make mention of Him, nor speak anymore in His name. But His word was in my heart like a burning fire shut up in my bones; I was weary of holding it back, and I could not.” (NKV)

I am not eloquent – “Good”! God wants to energize you! I cannot speak – “Good”! God will teach you! I don’t feel like an ambassador – “Good”! God will announce through you what He wants to say. I’m so speechless, slow, sensitive to what others may think – “Good”! God will quickly release a “thus says the Lord” through you as He sees fit!

THIRD, GOD CALLS THE LEAST AND RAISES THEM UP AS “LEADERS OF THE PEOPLE OF GOD”! Come to Judges 6:10-16, and notice “Gideon’s call!” And notice especially Gideon’s response in verse 15: “O my Lord, how can I save Israel? Indeed my clan is weakest in Manasseh, and ‘I am least in my father’s house’!” And God celebrates! He’s found His man. In Galatians 6:3 Paul wrote, “For if anyont thinks himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself.” (NKV)

My tribe is the weakest – “Good” – YOU CAN FIND MY STRENGTH! I’m the least in my father’s house – “Good” – I”LL RAISE YOU UP! Do you remember Paul’s explanation of God’s usefulness of his life? 2 Corinthians 12:7-10, “And lest I should be exalted above measure by the abundance of the revelations, a thorn in the flesh was given to me, a messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I should be exalted above measure. Concerning this I pleaded with the Lord three times that it might depart from me. And He said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore, I take pleasure in my infirmities, in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ’s sake; FOR WHEN I AM WEAK, THEN (IN CHRIST!) I AM STRONG!”

Are you getting the “conquering, overcoming, useful credentials”? I AM NOTHING – but God is everything! I AM LEAST – but Jesus is my all in all! I AM WEAK – but God is strong! I AM HELPLESS – but I lift up my eyes to the hills from whence comes my help. My help comes from the Lord who made heaven and earth. I’M A FAILURE – but my Lord finishes what He starts VICTORIOUSLY!

Look with me at 2 Peter 1:3 where the Apostle encourages us about our calling in Christ: “as His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and Godliness, through the knowledge of Him, Who called us by glory and virtue.” His Glory! His Virtue! We’re the least, the weakest, but because God calls us by His grace, we go from the cow pasture to the Crown Room of ABIDING HOLY PRESENCE!

FOURTH, GOD CALLS THE YOUNG AND RAISES THEM UP AS YOKEFELLOWS OF TRUE MINISTRY AND SERVICE! Come to Jeremiah 1:4-8. “Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying, ‘Before I formed you in the womb I knew you; before you were born I sanctified you; I ordained you a prophet to the nations…Then I said, ‘Ah, Lord God! Behold, I cannot speak, for I am a youth.’ But the Lord said to me, ‘Do not say, ‘I am a youth,’ for you shall go to all whom I send you, AND whatever I command you, you shall speak. Do not be afraid of their faces, for I am with you,’ says the Lord.” (NKJ)

Nowhere in God’s Word do you find youthfulness described as a curse – it’s a blessing! Nowhere do you find youthfulness described as a handicap – it’s an encouragement! Nowhere is it described as a hindrance – it’s a HELP!

Elizabeth Barrett Browning, in Aurora Leigh, wrote: “I felt so young, so strong, so sure of God.” And notice, God called a youngster to be a prophet. God called a young shepherd-boy to be a giant-slayer. God called young Mary to birth the Son of God. God called the young man Saul to be an apostle. God called the youthful Joseph to lead a nation in feeding the hungry. God called the young Daniel to be an interpreter of dreams and visions. God called young Timothy to be “an example to the believers in word, in conduct, in love, in spirit, in faith, in purity.”

Arthur Miller and Ralph Mattson, in their book, “The Truth About You,” (Old Tappan, N.J.: Revell, 1972, p.9), wrote: “There are thousands of young people who are accused of not having direction in their live, and most of them want direction but do not know how to find it…Most people are certain about the rightness and usefulness of their lives. They are looking for signposts that will give them purpose and direction.” Do you remember young Samuel in Eli’s home when he hears that voice in the night? Finally he learned to say as all youth should, “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.”

Young person, you don’t have to be a victim of the visible; you can be one with God Himself! Richard Halverson, in “No Greater Power,” (p.148), wrote: “Live for pleasure – become shallow, empty, giddy; Live for fame – become haughty, arrogant, rude; Live for power and influence – become overbearing, oppressive, insensitive; Live for wealth – become greedy, selfish; Live for the will of God – become selfless, loving, caring, whole.” What are YOU living for?

Jeremiah 2:5 says, “They followed worthless idols and became worthless themselves.” YOUTH IN THE CROSSROADS! Worthless or of great value to God as His vessel? Trash or treasure in the hands of God? Junk or a precious crown jewel? A garbage dump or a graced disciple? What did the Lord do for young Jeremiah? Chapter 1, verses 9 & 10, “Then the Lord put forth His hand and touched my mouth, and the Lord said to me, ‘Behold, I have put My words in your mouth. See, I HAVE THIS DAY SET YOU OVER THE NATIONS AND OVER THE KINGDOMS, to root out and to pull down, to destroy and throw down, to build and to plant.”

FIFTH, GOD CALLS THE “MESSED-UP” AND RAISES THEM UP AS MASTERPIECES OF HIS MAGNIFICENCE! In Mark 16:9 we read, “Now when Jesus was risen early the first day of the week, He appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom He had cast seven demons.” (NKV)

Does that sound like a “messed-up” life? And yet, notice, she’s the first to whom the resurrected Christ Jesus appeared! Henry Brandt, in “The Power of the Call,” (p.116) wrote: “The complexities of your background do not cut you off from God’s resources – nobody can do that.” And Brandt is so right. Our Lord comes where we are, in the midst of our complexities, our corruptness, our corrosiveness, even our callousness, and He pours in the “oil and the wine” of healing grace into the wounds of body, soul, and spirit and HE MAKES US WHOLE, COMPLETE IN CHRIST JESUS, LACKING NOTHING!

In Matthew 9:13, tongue-in-cheek, Jesus said, “I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.” (NKV). The “self-righteous” never sense a need of God, but the “messed-up” are on the doorstep of entrance to mercy and grace! Look at Verse 12: “They that be whole need not a physician, but they that are sick.” (KJV) The “whole” never discover the “whiteness” the red Blood of the Lamb produces. The “righteous” never experience redemption and regeneration because they never see that from which they need to be saved!

In 1 Timothy 1:15 Paul put it like this: “This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief.” (NKV) It’s why to the church at Corinth (2 Corinthians 4:3-4) that Paul said, “But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, whose minds the god of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them.” (NKV)

But if you know you’re “messed-up” – you’re about to be ready to be made whole. If you know you’re “sick” – you’re about ready to receive the touch of the Great Physician. If you know you’re “blind” – you’re about ready to receive “new eyes”, spiritual eyesight, that is! If you know you’re “enslaved” – you’re about ready for God’s spiritual emancipation proclamation!

It was Myrna Brooks Welch who wrote the following powerful poem: “Twas battered and scarred, and the auctioneer thought it scarcely worth his while to waste much time on the old violin, but held it up with a smile.

“What am I bid, good folks?” he dried. “Who’ll start the bidding for me? A dollar, a dollar – now two, only two – Two dollars, and who’ll make it three?” “Three dollars once, three dollars twice, going for three”! But no! From the room far back a gray-haired man came forward and picked up the bow; then wiping the dust from the old violin, and tightening up all the strings, he played a melody pure and sweet, as sweet as an angel sings.

The music ceased, and the auctioneer, with a voice that was quit and low, said: “What am I bid for the old violin?” And he held up the bow. “A thousand – and who’ll make it two? Two thousand – and who’ll make it three? Three thousand once and three thousand twice – and going and gone!” said he.

The people cheered, but some of them cried, “We do not quite understand. What changed its worth?” The man replied, “the touch of the master’s hand.” And many a man with life out of tune, And battered and torn with sin, is auctioned cheap to a thoughtless crowd, much like the old violin. A “mess of pottage,” a glass of wine, a game – and he travels on, he’s going once, and going twice, he’s going – and almost gone!

But the master comes, and the foolish crowd never can quite understand The Worth of a Soul and the changes that’s wrought by the touch of the Master’s hand!

SIXTH, GOD CALLS THE “ZEROES” AND RAISES THEM UP AS MEN AND WOMEN COMPLETE IN CHRIST! Come to 1 Corinthians 1:26-29. “For you see your calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty, and the base things of the world and the things which are despised God has chosen, and the things which are not (‘Zeroes’), to bring to nothing the things that are, that no flesh should glory in His presence.” What a powerful testimony of true disciples!

Now come to Colossians 2:6-10! “As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, rooted and built up IN HIM and established in the faith, as you have been taught, abounding in it with thanksgiving. Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the basic principles of the world, and not according to Christ. For IN HIM dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily, AND YOU ARE COMPLETE IN HIM…” That doesn’t say you someday will be; it says you are – you are – COMPLETE IN HIM! That’s how God sees YOU NOW “IN CHRIST”! COMPLETE!

Henry Blackaby, in “The Power of the Call,” (p.229), wrote: “The credentials of a spiritual leader (or disciple) is the presence of God, AT ALL POINTS AUTHENTICATING HIS SERVANT.” Isn’t it amazing? A “zero” becomes a cup of life overflowing in the presence of God! A “zero” becomes a vessel in which Holy God pours in blessing after blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it all. A “zero” overcome by his emptiness becomes a container full of the joy of the Lord which is his strength. A “zero” void of the love of God becomes the vacuum in which the deep fullness of God’s love overflows without measure. A “zero” drunk with the wines in self-importance all of a sudden becomes “filled with the Holy Spirit of God.” A “zero” empty of faith all of a sudden comes to “a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.”

I want to be qualified “in Christ,” I want to be counted or reckoned worthy, knowing in myself alone, I am not. I’d rather exchange the old man for the new man rather than trying to dress up a corpse! John 1:16 says, “And of His fullness we have all received, and grace for grace.”

SEVENTH, GOD CALLS THE “EMPTY” AND RAISES THEM UP AS TESTIMONIES OF HIS ALL-SUFFICIENT GRACE! Read carefully before continuing 1 Kings 17:8-16!! Here’s my challenge to you: You take your bin of “self-rising” flour that always runs out and give me the God-anointed sustenance of sure promises! You take your jar of “drying-up” oil and give me the sustenance of God’s sure and all-sufficient anointing. You can major on your own ‘morsels’, but give me God’s fresh manna! You can major on the well-water of your own explorations, but give me the deep well of God’s unending “rivers of living water”! Do you remember Thomas Erskine’s classic statement? “Most men are so possessed by themselves that they have no vacuum into which God’s deep waters rise.” Halverson, again, in “No Greater Power, “ (p.182), wrote: “Our culture says, blessed are…those who’ve made it, the achievers, those who’ve got it together…those who are unrestrained by moral and ethical taboos, those who live it up, those who, if it feels good, do it;…the strong, the powerful, those in authority..” In contrast, Jesus said, “Blessed are the poor in spirit; blessed are those who mourn; blessed are the meek (or teachable); blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness; blessed are the merciful; blessed are the pure in heart; blessed are the peacemakers; blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness.”

Then Halverson had a prayer I want to share: (pps.150-151), “Our Father in Heaven, we live so much of our lives as though we were animals. We pay so much attention to the physical, so little to the spiritual. We provide the best food for our bodies and feed our souls on rubbish. We clothe our bodies with fine garments and subject our minds to garbage. We stuff the flesh and starve the Spirit, then wonder why there is so little joy, so much depression. We take pills for highs and lows when we could be energized by Your Holy Spirit and relaxed in Your gracious love and care. Help us to realize, dear Lord, that we are God-hungry and nothing else will satisfy." Do you know that? Have you experienced that? Is your greatest hunger for the Living God? Are you empty and ready to be filled? Your only redeemable qualification? “I need God’s love, grace, and mercy”! Your only beneficial qualification? “Without Him I am nothing!” Your only transforming qualification? “In Him I live and move and have my being!” Your only abounding dividend? “Blessed with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ!” Your only saving qualification? “Predestined to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself according to the good pleasure of His will!” Your only reconciling qualification? “NOW in Christ Jesus we who once were far off have been made near by the blood of Christ!” You choose grit – I take grace! You choose earning it – I take God’s unspeakable gift! You walk merit-way – I’ll walk the path of mercy!

CHAPTER FIVE

LIFE’S REJECTS RECEIVED

A “reject” in our modern day? For some, a “reject” is some one that should just be thrown away, because, in a sick society’s opinion that ‘person’ is unqualified, even for life, and should be discarded, useless to the ‘public good’, unsatisfactory when evaluated by the ‘super smart,’ the ‘highly qualified’, or the ‘self-sainted’, and certainly able to discern a “reject’s” usefulness to an elite society ot not!

Some who become ‘judge and jury’ of a society’s ‘qualifications’ for admittance are certainly adept, professional, and determined not to have anything to do with the “low-lifes,” the “outsiders,” the “uneducated,” the visibly weak and insignificant”, the “foreigners” to a society’s usefulness in making a nation great, and certainly determined that “these have no part with us”!

And sadly, my question is: “Does it ever happen in church life that there comes a place in a church’s ministry when “life’s rejects” should be rejected and utmost care given to who it is one gives his/her attention to”?

But be assured of one thing: In the darkest shadows of human existence, Holy God has His eyes on the “least” a modern-day society or “self-serving ‘church’” thinks ‘worthy’ or ‘needy’ of their time, consideration, or witness, because “God so loved the world that He gave His own Son” for their redemption, reconciliation, re-birth, and eternal ‘rest’ in the Holy Family of God!

There’s a quote in Acts 2:21 from Joel when Peter said: “And it shall come to pass that whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved” (delivered, escaped, freed)!” But today, some refuse ‘ministry’ to rejects?

I don’t know if you’ve sensed it or not in your reading of the Bible, but even Christ Jesus, THE ONLY LORD AND SAVIOR of all mankind – there is no other Redeemer- is considered by many, religious or not, as a “reject” worthy only of the Cross! In Acts 2:22-25 Peter preached to “the men of Judea and all who dwell in Jerusalem,” (and ultimately Holy God extended that message to all of Israel and to every corner of the globe!), Peter declaring, “Men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a Man attested by God to you by miracles, wonders, and signs which God did through Him in your midst, as you yourselves also know – Him, being delivered by the determinate purpose and foreknowledge of God, you have taken by lawless hands, have crucified, and put to death; WHOM GOD RAISED UP, having loosed the pains of death, because it was not possible that He should be held by it.”

Question. Do you see it, as Christ Jesus was taken by, yes, ‘lawless hands’ and crucified by them, that those who crucified Him were part of the whole of fallen humanity who needed blood redemption? “God so loved the world”! Even a world of ‘lawless hands’, ‘religious activity professionals’, the ‘mockers’, lives enslaved to the old sin nature that separates them FROM God, the promiscuous, the profane, the perverted? “There’s hope for them?” Absolutely!

But in the midst of the “fallen – away world” from Holy God you find ‘life’ primed by self-importance over Sovereign-intent, ‘flesh’s finest’ and ‘flesh’s worst’ in place of the fullness of redemptive faith, passionate indulgences in the place of Prince of Peace birthing and blessing, the ‘preyed-on’ by the powers of darkness rather than the ‘prayed-over’ by the conquering King of liberty and freedom from sin’s chains and bondage, internally in the heart satisfied with their ‘self-importance’ more than eternally joined by repentance and faith to the King of kings and Lord of lords!

And, I speak of the ‘good folks’, decent but deceived, productive but paralyzed spiritually, warped in the ‘spirit-realm’ but ‘winsome’ in a sinful society, marred but adaptable, playful but perverted in a ‘people’s world’ of pleasures and perversions and ‘pass-times’ that have forgotten Holy God and majored on the promotion of the ‘satisfying of the flesh’!

I’ve often wondered and, yes, examined if what took place in ‘religious’ Israel has any significance of ‘modern-day’ participants as they attempt to adapt their world, their flesh, AND their devil to a ‘desire’ to be a part of God’s family at the same time.

If you were to examine Ezekiel 36 you’d find a true picture of ‘old religious devotees’ and, yes, the true hope of “new covenant blessings”! In Verses 22-27 we find an awesome picture of loving God’s eternal intent! It says, God speaking through Ezekiel to us in the 21^st Century: Therefore say to the house of Israel, “Thus says the Lord God: ‘I do not do this for your sake, O house of Israel, but for My holy name’s sake, which you have profaned among the nations wherever you went. And I will sanctify My great name, which has been profaned among the nations, which you have profaned in their midst; and the nations shall know that I am the Lord,’ says the Lord God, ‘when I am hallowed in you before their eyes. For I will take you from among the nations, gather you out of all countries, and bring you back into your own land. Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean; I will cleanse you from all filthiness and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you. I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them.”

[Would it be important to examine what it means to “profane God’s holy name among the nations”? What is one’s ‘filthiness’ or one’s devotion to idols? And do you grasp and understand “hearts of stone”?]

But IF one receives what Ezekiel 36 declared, will he/she act upon that Holy Word? I repeat Ezekiel 36:26-27! “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them.” Life’s ‘rejects’ received, beginning the journey of ‘royalty’ in the Holy Family of God and found faithful because of the Spirit God puts within us!

LIFE’S REJECTS RECEIVED? Let’s look to John 4 where Holy God unveils the receiving of life’s rejects! It doesn’t take long there to see and sense Holy God’s overseeing and, yes, His determination of one who NEEDS Him! It’s about a Samaritan woman who meets Christ Jesus! What thrills and touches my heart and mind so deeply? John 4:4 states, “But He (Christ Jesus) needed to go through Samaria.”

What was “the need”? What was pressing in on His spirit to ‘go through an area that most Jews considered being defiled by one’s presence there’? Does ministry to the ‘unclean’, the ‘foul’, the ‘dirty’, the ‘polluted,’ the ‘tainted’ automatically corrupt the true saints of God? That thought is so foreign to the nature, the character, the eternal intent of Holy God! “God so loved the world that He gave His Son” to come and rescue the rejects! That has never changed and has stood even before the world was formed and man had been created!

It was Bernard Iddings Bell in his writing “Argosy” who said: “I should like to see Christian leaders disregard their timid followers and, like Francis of Assisi or John Wesley, go out of the church buildings, shake the dust of denominationalism from impatient feet, and appeal to the folks generally. Americans will listen to religion if and when it claims to have relationship to real life. Let the churches recognize that their job is not to nurture the pious nearly so much as it is to rouse, convict of sin, convert, a pagan nation.” AMEN?

In Verse 10 of John 4, Jesus answered and said to her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you a living water.” She’s dumbfounded! She responded in Verse 11, “Sir, You have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where then do You get that living water?” In Verse 13 Jesus said to her, “Whoever drinks of this (well) water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.” [Do you think the “water” just gave her, “living water”, was the “water of God’s Holy Word”?

She said to Jesus in Verse 15, “Sir, give me this water, that I may not thirst, nor come here to drink.” Verse 16? Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here.” Verse 17, The woman answered Him and said, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You have well said, ‘I have no husband,’ Verse 18, for you have had five husbands, and the one whom you now have is not your husband; in that you spoke truly.”

The ‘religious defense’ is intensified as the woman, in Verses 19-20 said to Jesus, “Sir, I perceive that You are a prophet. Our fathers worshipped on this mountain, and you Jews say that in Jerusalem is the place where one ought to worship.” Jesus then said to her in Verses 21-24,

“Woman, believe Me, the hour is coming when you will neither on this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, worship the Father. You worship what you do not know; we know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews. But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him. God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship Him in spirit and truth.” This woman at least professed an awareness of the “Messiah coming (who is called Christ). When He comes, He will tell us all things.” Jesus then said to her, “I who speak to you am He.” She “rested” in Christ and became a “rest-teller”!

Life’s rejects received? It’s so interesting to me, and so heart and mind gripping, when I come to John 5 and see Jesus going up to Jerusalem. He went to a pool that had five porches. John 5:3 says, “In these lay a great multitude of sick people, blind, lame, paralyzed, waiting for the moving of the water.” [Are there ‘porches’ today where ‘sick people’ scurry about hoping for a ‘stirring’ and ‘healing’ of what ails them?].

John 5:5 says, “Now a certain man was there who had an infirmity thirty-eight years. WHEN JESUS SAW HIM LYING THERE, and knew that he had already been in that condition a long time, Jesus said to him, “Do you want to be made well?” What a question! But so legitimate because many settle into what a ‘fleshly life’ offers and have no ambition for “healing grace and mercy”! In Philip Bennett Power’s book, “The ‘I Wills’ of Christ”, [The Banner of Truth Trust, 1984, pps.51-52], Power spoke of “the one great truth that is all powerful everywhere,” then sharing, “There was once a caravan crossing to the north of India, and numbering in its company a godly and devoted missionary. As it passed along, a poor old man was overcome by the heat and labors of the journey, and sinking down was left to perish on the road. The missionary saw him, and kneeling down at his side, when the rest had passed along, whispered into his ear, “Brother, what is your hope?” The dying man raised himself a little to reply, and with a great effort succeeded in answering, “The blood of Jesus Christ cleanses from all sin!” and immediately expired with the effort. The missionary was greatly astonished at the answer, and in the calm and peaceful appearance of the man, he felt assured he had died in Christ. How, or where, he thought, could this man, seemingly a heathen, have got this hope? And as he thought of it, he observed a piece of paper grasped tightly in the hand of the corpse, which he succeeded in getting out. What do you think was his surprise and delight, when he found it was a single leaf of the Bible, containing the first chapter of the first epistle of John, in which these words occur! On that page the man had found the gospel!” “The blood of Jesus Christ cleanses from all sin!” Has He cleansed you?

Do you grasp it, rest in it, rely upon it? In Christ, one is translated, by faith from darkness into Eternal Light, from bondage to liberty, from sin to sanctification, from ‘flesh-realm’ to the “spirit-world”, from chains of Satanic bondage to the freedom of the character and nature of Christ, from a world of the flesh and a hellish existence to the kingdom of the Spirit and heavenly blessings now and forever, from a consciousness of sin-bondage to an abiding confidence in His presence within the repentant heart, and the true recipient of His pleasure and power! I close with Jesus’ words in John 6:51-58 and notice, Jesus said these things in the synagogue as He taught in Capernaum! Then Jesus said to them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you. Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. For My flesh is food indeed, and My blood is drink indeed. He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me and I in him. As the living Father sent Me, and I live because of the Father, so he who feeds on Me will live because of Me. This is the bread which came down from heaven – not as your fathers ate the manna, and are dead. He who eats this bread will live forever.” Reject, renegade, or one re-born?

CHAPTER SIX

THE DECLARATION OF EXCLUSIVITY

You can be religious without being regenerated – that’s why Jesus says, “You MUST be born again.” You can be awakened to conscience without being reborn in the Spirit. You can be conscious of God without being reconciled to God. You can even be a ‘professing Christian in culture’ without being captured by Christ, converted, or “born again.”

You can be knowledgeable of truths without being kept by Him who is truth. You can be a faithful devotee to the tenets of your chosen religion without being a faithful disciple of Christ’s “shed-blood” redemption. You can be ambitious to be cloaked in the activities of a specific religion with no aim to be pleasing to God alone – He says, “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do what I say?”

Good deeds do not necessarily mean God-like! Attendance of a mosque, church, synagogue, or temple doesn’t necessarily mean the true worship of God in Spirit and in Truth! Following a “prophet” doesn’t necessarily mean you’ve found God or been led to God by that ‘prophet’. The conflict of the ages has always been, “Is there more than one way to God, multiple doors, many windows?” OR is Christ Jesus the only hope?

Is it what I do before God, or what God has done in my behalf? Is it “grit” or Grace? Is it the measuring of a man’s doing or the mercy of God that is ‘the finished work’? Is it man’s precepts or the Promised Messiah? Is it man’s demands of acceptability before God or God’s conditions of alliance, “repentance toward God and faith in the finished work of Christ?”

What are man’s opinions when we have historically the revelation of God pertaining to man’s salvation? What are man’s creations of religious activities when the Creator, before the foundation of the world, ordained the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ?

I want to lay the foundation for this chapter out of God’s Holy Word. In John 14:6 Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father but through Me.” What an awesome, definitive statement! The May 6, 2002, issue of the “U.S.News and World Report” has an article entitled, “Faith in America.” After reading Jesus’ statement in John 14:6, I knew you’d find the article interesting, sad, and awakening to your own mind, your own convictions, or perhaps, the lack of them.

The sub-tile of the article says, “It’s as important as ever, no matter what you believe.” Does it matter what one believes? In their poll among Christians in America –get this- only 20% of Christians believed their faith was the only true faith! Absolutely shocking!

Only 50% of the Christians polled said they had experienced God’s presence! Egon Mayer, sociologist at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, said in the article: “It’s not that Americans don’t believe anything; they believe everything.”

If Jesus were to come into our world today He would not find a warm welcome. Because of Hid “declaration of exclusivity” a religious world would stone Him, or try to crucify Him again! And His declaration confronts us in the valley of decision: are there many doors to God or only one? Is God debtor to man’s religious inventions? Or is man debtor to God and His declarations? Can we take different paths and all arrive at God’s doorstep?

Which brings us to examine Jesus and ask, as Josh McDowell did in “Evidence That Demands A Verdict”, “s Jesus liar, lunatic, or the Lord God?” Is it settled in your mind and heart? And do you understand man’s dilemma when his religion is void of the Truth of Christ?

What are man’s buildings or temples in comparison to God telling man he becomes the True Temple through the very habitation of God in the spirit? What is some “light” if it’s not the True Light? What are moral principles without the Evangel of Truth? What is direction if it leads the wrong way, away from the True God revealed in Christ and void of the divine destiny God authors?

What is strictness apart from Sanctification/ What is regimentation without a return to God through Christ? What are traditions if they’re empty of the Triumphant Christ who rose from the dead? What is an earthly glory that fades away without the manifestations of the glory of Christ’s presence that never dies?

What are devotions without the disciplines that reveal a true desire to unveil Christ? What are authors of religious activities without the Author and Finisher of a saving faith? Would you dare compare hollowness with the wholeness God desires? What is busy-ness compared to God’s desire for birthing, blessing, and becoming? What are prayers that penetrate nothing when God desires prayer that lays hold of Him?

Do you remember Adam and Eve in the garden after the Fall when they pieced fig leaves together when they realized their nakedness? That’s “fig-leaf religion” – man’s attempts at his own salvation apart from God! But God, through the Cross of Christ, clothes us in His robes of righteousness, He dresses us in the garments of His salvation, He declares us worthy because of the winsomeness of Calvary’s Cross, which has nothing to do with religion but everything to do with the revelation and unveiling of the Lord Jesus Christ!

If the One, True, Living God, Who is the true source, the fountain out of which all the universe flows, the One Who only is right and good, and He chooses to unveil Himself to us, how does He do it? Do you remember the angels’ message to Mary in Luke 1:34-35? Mary had asked how she could have a baby since she was a virgin and had known no man intimately. “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the baby born to you will be holy, and he will be called the Son of God.” In another place, He is called Immanuel, meaning God in the flesh! That is why, in John 14”6, Jesus exclusively declares, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father but through Me.”

It’s been years now, but a dear friend, Joyce Baird, deceased a number of years ago, sent me an article from the “Temple Telegram” about a new “church” starting in Temple called “The Church of Today”. It’s not truly a ‘church’ and is not of “today” but goes all the way back to the Garden of Eden when Satan asked, “Has God Really Said?” They view the Bible not as a literal document but simply a spiritual guide. The article said, “They also believe that there are many wonderful viable paths to God and that no one path is correct for everyone, not even our own, and therefore they honor all paths to God be they Buddhist, Baptist, Jew, old or new, Muslim or Mormon. If any path to God has love as a basis we honor it.” I wonder if they also “hate what God hates?” The promoters of this new “church”? Leaders such as Oprah, and authors such as Dyer, Chopra and Vansant…” Sorry, but I have no appreciation for Oprah’s supposedly ‘spiritual knowledge’! Why?

First, Let’s look at THE EXCLUSIVE DECLARATION OF THE WAY! You’re aware that most do not honor Christ Jesus Alone, but promote Satan’s lies, even denying Jesus Christ as the “only Way”! He said: “I am THE way.” And that, dear friends, IS the “exclusivity of opportunity”!

Just what is the “way’ that Jesus defined Himself as? He is THE way back to God, back to a holy relationship with a loving, caring God, who we were separated from because of our sin – separated, severed, disconnected from Mighty God, lost and wandering away.

Notice, it’s not simply what He taught – IT’S WHO HE IS! You understand, we’re all part of a deathly dilemma without Him! Romans 5:12 (NIV) says, “Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man (Adam), and death through sin…” And we know it! Sin and shame, death and darkness are in “flesh’ veins! In Ephesians 2:3 Paul said of us that we “…were by nature children of wrath, just as the others…” Back to Romans 5:12, “..and in this way death came to all men, BECAUSE ALL SINNED.”

Death came as a penalty for sin upon all men and the condemnation of Almighty God stands against sin. In Romans 8:3 (NIV) Paul writes, “For what the law was powerless to do…God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering. And so He condemned sin in sinful man…” However, in Jesus Christ, that penalty is paid, the sacrifice of His blood is the offering for sin that is available to every man who repents and puts his faith in the Crucified, Resurrected Christ!

In his recent book, “Beyond Beliefs To Conviction”, Josh McDowell writes, (p.89), “That is what the Incarnation says to you – and to all of us. Despite your sin, Jesus valued you enough to die for you. His love for you is so great, He spread His arms the width of the Cross and said: “I lay down My life for you, Immanuel, God in flesh, and I come to be a sacrifice.”

John the Baptist, preaching in the wilderness, declared in Matthew 3:3, “…Prepare the way of the Lord; make His paths straight…” Notice, “The Way of the Lord,” the way of the Lord God Almighty, the way of the One True and Living God! There is only one way to Him and it is “the way of the Cross.”

There’s a story in the Old Testament, Genesis 24, about Abraham sending his servant to Abraham’s home place to find a bride for his son Isaac. In Genesis 24:27, the servant speaking, said: “…as for me, being on the way, the Lord led me to the house of my master’s brethren.” And he found Rebecca. But for us it’s not being ON the way that’s good, but being IN the way – that’s Jesus, the Lamb of God that takes away our sin; That’s Redeemer – Jesus, who with His own blood shed at the Cross reconciles us to God!

SECOND, THERE IS, ALWAYS HAS BEEN, AND FOREVER WILL BE THE EXCLUSIVE DECLARATION OF THE TRUTH! The exclusivity of observation! What Jesus said certainly was truth, but when He said “I am the truth” it was not what He taught, but Who He Is! In John 15:22 Jesus said, “If I had not come and spoken to them, they would have no sin, but now (because I’ve come) they have no excuse for their sin.” Jesus IS TRUTH and the very presence of truth removes the excuse of ignorance or the fabrication, imitation, or self-determination of what truth really is to us! And the “TRUTH” is, there’s only one Lamb of God whose shed blood washes away sin and guilt – THE Lamb of God, THE Lord Jesus Christ!

The truth? There is one mediator between God and man – the God-Man, Jesus! The truth? There is only one door into the heart of God – Jesus is that door! The truth? There is only one sacrifice that satisfies the offense of Holy God because of our sinfulness – the sacrifice of Himself, the Son of God who became the Son of Man that the sons of men might become the sons of God!

The Truth? There is only one bread that is truly the spiritual staff of life that nourishes hungry souls – Jesus is that bread!

Pontius Pilate, Roman governor of the area of Judea, was confronted by Christ Jesus as Jesus was brought to court. John 18:33-38 (NIV) unveils that encounter: “Pilate then went back inside the palace, summoned Jesus and asked Him, ‘Are You the king of the Jews?’ [34], ‘Is that your own idea’, Jesus asked, ‘or did others talk to you about Me?’ [35] ‘Am I a Jew?’ Pilate asked. ‘It was Your people and Your chief priests who handed You over to me. What is it You have done?’ [36] Jesus said, ‘My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, My servants would fight to prevent My arrest by the Jews. But now My kingdom is from another place.’ [37] ‘You are a king, then!’ said Pilate. Jesus answered, ‘You are right in saying I am a king. In fact, for this reason I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of truth listens to Me.’ [38] ‘What is truth?’ Pilate asked. With this he went out again to the Jews and said, ‘I find no basis for a charge against Him.’”

In Matthew’s account of the interchange between Jesus and Pilate, he wrote: “…he (Pilate) took water and washed his hands before the multitude, saying, ‘I m innocent of the blood of this person. You see to it.’” Matthew 27:24 (NIV). The truth is that NONE OF US ARE INNOCENT OF THE BLOOD OF JESUS – it was because of your sin and mine that Jesus died!

THIRD, COME FOR YOURSELF EXAMINING THE EXCLUSIVE DECLARATION OF THE LIFE! That’s the exclusivity of overflow! In John 10:10 Jesus declared, “I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.” Understand that though we were born physically, we were birthed in a state of spiritual death – physical life but no life in the Spirit! The Apostle Paul stated this truth in Romans 5:12, “Therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned…”

There’s a famous India man by birth, now a devoted follower of Christ and one of the great Christian thinkers of our day, Ravi Zacharias. In his teen years living in India, he began to deal with two realities in us all – sin within himself and death within himself. He knew the answer was not in religion but relationship – “if we all are separated from God because of our sin and we experience death in the inner man, where do we find life?” And all of a sudden he realized it wasn’t his search for God, but God’s search for him. In Romans 5:8 Paul writes, “But God proved His love for us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us…”

Jesus took our death on Himself that we might have His life! Jesus took our unrighteousness on Himself that we might have His righteousness! Jesus took our curse upon Himself that we might have His blessing! Jesus came to a place called Calvary so that we could go to His place called Heaven to live with Him forever through the gift of forgiveness, reconciliation, new birth, and the Holy Spirit to care for us and guide us in everlasting Truth!

My dear friend and former classmate and teammate at Baylor University, Bill Anderson, pastor for about 27 years at Calvary Baptist Church in Clearwater, Florida, shared with Sue and I once a very interesting story. Sue and I had been invited to share in Bill’s retirement service at Calvary and had the privilege of having dinner with Bill and his wife the following night. We began to share “war stories” of our years in ministry. Bill shared a phenomenal story that occurred in the Hebrew synagogue in Clearwater where he’d been invited by the Rabbi to speak to the people. Bill shared from the Word for about forty-five minutes and then answered questions for about as long as his message. As he was leaving the synagogue Bill noticed an elderly lady with a sweet smile on her face motioning him to come where she was standing. He did. And then the lady pulled up her arm sleeve to show him four numbers on her arm. Bill said, “You were in Auschwitz weren’t you?” She answered in the affirmative, and Bill said, “Please, tell me about it.”

The lady said she was twelve years of age when she and all her family and friends were confined there. She saw a lot of them die. She said that all they had to eat each day was one bowl of soupy water with usually a rotten cabbage leaf – each and every day – and she and the others were always on the edge of starvation. But they learned that if they ate blades of green grass at least their stomachs felt full, until the Germans learned what they’d been doing and began to shoot them on sight. But the lady said that she became so hungry one morning that even if the guards shot her she’d at least die on a full stomach. She went outside to a grassy area early in the morning, knelt down, began to eat the grass, and then heard the cock of the gun, a rifle. She turned around, and at the corner of her barracks, she saw a German guard with his gun aimed right at her. She cried out, “Oh, God, please send someone to help me,” and she said, “He sent Jesus standing directly between me and the German guard. The gurd saw Him, too, and threw down his gun and ran away. I’ve been walking with Jesus ever since that day in Auschwitz.”

Bill said, “What are you doing here in the synagogue?” And she said telling those who need to hear the Gospel of how Jesus saved me, body, soul, and spirit.” Bill said, “Did you talk to your Rabbi?” She said, “I did, and he asked why I hadn’t asked God to send Moses, and I told the Rabbi, I asked God for help and He sent Jesus.” Her name is Anna Kellerman. What a story!

In Ephesians 4:14-15 Paul says, “that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting; but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all things into Him who is the head – that is, Christ.”

Pontius Pilate stood with Jesus before a large crowd and said: “What then shall I do with this Jesus who is called the Christ?” That question is asked of each of us – “what will YOU do with this Jesus who is called the Christ?’ And in your minds and hearts you know there are only two possible options: one, crown Him as the King of YOUR salvation; or, join in with the cries of that crowd before Pilate and declare, “Crucify Him.”

Throughout time and history He has been reaching out to men and women, boys and girls, from every nation, every tribe, every tongue, revealing Himself, even as He did to a young twelve-year old Jewish girl in a death camp. We have the opportunity to respond to Him, to His claim that He and He alone is the way, the truth, and the life. It is a claim of exclusivity – how will you respond? The Apostle Paul warns us in 1 Timothy 4:1 that “in latter times some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons…” Where and with Whom are YOU standing today?

CHAPTER SEVEN

CONFIDENCE IN THE CRUCIFIED “SELF” OR

ASSURANCE IN RESURRECTION LIFE?

It was Polonius in Hamlet who said: “To thine own self be true.” But, is that an attempt at “pumping flesh” by inflating one’s ‘self-esteem’? Is that focusing on “self” rather than centered, cemented, or covered in “the shed blood of the Lamb of God”? Have you ever heard a parent say to a child: “Your place in OUR family is for YOU to become something!” Really? And someone attempting to become something is blinded to the Christ who took our ‘old man’, ‘our old sin-nature’, ‘old SELF’ to the Cross, with the God-inspired, Holy Word telling us in Romans 6:6, “knowing this, that our old man (that’s the ‘old sin-nature’ – YOURS and MINE) WAS CRUCIFIED WITH CHRIST, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should NO LONGER be slaves of sin.”

Dare I say it, and be crucified ‘again’ by a compromising ‘religious establishment’ that says, “You can’t do anything but sin until you get to Heaven”? Believe I will! Being “true to yourself and your old sin nature is to be blinded and void of “Amazing Grace’”! Confidence in the ‘best efforts’ of human flesh IS “fleshly, eternal darkness”, void of the dawning and bright days of “Christ in you the hope of glory”, (Colossians 1:27)!

There’s not a man, a family, a nation that does not need Christ Jesus as “the light of their world”, because the man, the family, the nation, without Christ as Lord and Savior remains in the “darkness” of the world of unbelief and deception, patting themselves of their backs by Satan himself who IS the lord and master of one’s darkness! No wonder the Holy Word declares, affirms, and continually announces Christ Jesus as THE PROPHET, PRIEST, and KING, because, only in and through Him is ‘darkness’ removed, only in and through His ruling heart, mind, and soul of Resurrection Presence is there “Eternal Life and Light”, and only through “Jesus Only” is the reality of bondage and slavery to the world, the flesh, or the devil removed, and ONLY by His Kingly Presence in the human heart, mind, and soul is there acceptance by God the Father who sent His Son to be our Savior!

I was shocked recently when I read a statement by one of the U.S.A’s early founders, Benjamin Franklin, who once said: “God helps those who help themselves.” But, I tell you, ‘Confidence in one’s best effort of “crucifying myself” is a ‘lie’ out of the very pit of Hell itself!’ NO!! “I am (by God’s justice, judgment, and decree!) CRUCIFIED WITH CHRIST; nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ lives in me.” In the old writing, “New Atlantis,” Sir Francis Bacon once said: “The reverence of a man’s SELF is, next to religion, the chiefest bridle of all vices.” [The Encyclopedia of Religious Quotes,” p.396].

You are aware of an ‘allegory’, which the Random House Collegiate Dictionary defines as “a representation of an abstract or spiritual meaning through concrete (Is God’s Word secure, stable, and eternal concrete?) or material forms; figurative treatment of one subject under the guise of another; a symbolic narrative (of the Way, the Truth, and the Life?).” So…HOW ABOUT ONE’S REVERENCE OF HIMSELF/HERSELF? “In Christ” WE are not ‘symbolic narratives’ but “chosen vessels”!

In 2 Corinthians 4:5-11 Paul wrote, inspired by the Holy Spirit of Truth, “For we do not preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord, and ourselves your bondservants for Jesus’ sake. For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness WHO HAS SHONE IN OUR HEARTS TO GIVE THE LIGHT OF THE GLORY OF GOD IN THE FACE OF CHRIST JESUS.

But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us. We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed – always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body. FOR WE WHO LIVE (IN CHRIST) ARE ALWAYS DELIVERED TO DEATH FOR JESUS’ SAKE, THAT THE LIFE OF JESUS ALSO MAY BE MANIFESTED IN OUR MORTAL FLESH.” [AND that doesn’t mean someday, or after physical death, or in “the after-life”, but MANIFESTED IN OUR MORTAL FLESH!].

Yet MANY “lose heart” in their spiritual pilgrimages, because for them it has been a “best-effort-attempt” at trying to be Christ-like! Paul went on to say, in 2 Corinthians 4:16, “Therefore we do not lose heart. Even though our outer man is perishing, yet the inward man is being renewed day by day”, and that’s through the eternal Word, the awesome ministry of the Holy Spirit, and the encouragement, even, at times, the confrontation and motivation of true friends in the faith!

The ‘outward man’ IS ‘fallen flesh”, not Spirit-birthed! The ‘outward man’ flourishes because of ‘deceit’, because of pressured influences from a ‘separated from God society’, because of ‘self-reverence for dead flesh’! Surrender to the Sovereignty of God severs, puts to death, annihilates selfish ambition and self-allegiance, thus at the “holy altar of death to self”, presenting one’s life to Holy God, His Sovereign Power, and His Amazing Love, Grace, and Mercy in need of being “washed in the Blood of the Lamb”, you ARE an altar or ‘redeemed being and presence’ in which the Resurrected Christ lives, reigns, ministers through you!

Sadly, in this 21^st Century within the American ‘Church’, one finds ‘apathy, indifference, complacency’ in the place of the holy anointing of the Spirit and the very “Fire of God” flowing through their veins – only a ‘cold indifference’ to the commissioning of God, “You shall be My witnesses”! Are there churches that ignore the call to evangelize? Do they ignore the training, equipping, commissioning, and sending out their ‘students’ as “salt and light” in their dark world? Does ‘infidelity’ to His commission describe the ‘modern’ church within America?

It was Isaac Barrow who once wrote: “Infidelity, indeed, is the root of all sin; for did man heartily believe the promises to obedience, and the threats to disobedience, they could hardly be unreasonable as to forfeit the one and incur the other.” [The Encyclopedia of Religious Quotations, Fleming H. Revell Company, Westwood, New Jersey, 1965, Frank S. Mead].

Alexander MacLaren once said (Same Encyclopedia! P.397), “All along the Christian course, there must be set up altars to God on which you sacrifice yourself, or you will never advance a step,” in the fullness of the blessing of the Gospel of Christ! That’s altars in the mind, heart, and spirit where I, we, with Paul, “die daily”? (1 Corinthians 15:31b).

In 2 Corinthians 1:8-12 Paul testified: “For we do not want you to be ignorant, brethren, of our trouble which came to us in Asia: that we were burdened beyond measure, above strength, so that we despaired even of life. [ I personally knew pastors in India that I taught and disciple who were ‘martyred’ for the faith!]. Yes, we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves but in God who raises the dead, who delivered us from so great a death, and does deliver us; in whom we trust that He will still deliver us, you also helping together in prayer for us, that thanks may be given by many persons on our behalf for the gift granted to us through many.”

If every day you begin it by purposefully, mentally, willfully constructing your altar, and every day you yield to the Sovereignty of God, and every day you prepare for your ‘witness’, your ‘ministry’, your ‘testimony’, are you then ready, if the opposition comes, to, yes, kill you for the faith? I’ve altered Charles Caleb Colton’s words minimally to build conviction and biblical wisdom in every disciple’s life and ministry. Colton said, “Heroism, magnanimity, and ‘self-denial’, in all instances in which they do not spring from biblical principles (for the glory of God only), are but splendid altars on which we sacrifice one kind of self-love to another king of self-love (religious but not redemptive, one’s best but not blessed by the Indwelling Christ), ‘reverencing one’s flesh’ but void of the omnipotent power of Holy God through the Resurrected Christ and fullness of the Holy Spirit!”

ONLY the man crucified with Christ, and knows it, who repents of his sin and sin nature convicted by the Holy Spirit, and willfully confesses his/her need of the Savior – only is that man “born again” becoming the recipient of “new life in Christ,” clad with “new garments,” given a “new song” in his heart and mind to sing to God and to others, entering a “new and blessed blood covenant on His terms”, “blessed with a new heart and a new spirit,” “fed new fruits, bread, and meat of the Word of God,” granted by His grace a “new and living testimony,” moved into the “new and everlasting Kingdom of God NOW, not when ‘out there’ you finally get to Heaven’s gates and grounds someday,” and all in ALL A “NEW CREATION IN AND OF Christ’s Holy Presence, Christ IN YOU the hope of glory”!

Here’s how Paul was inspired to write about the above truths in Romans 6:1-14! He said: “What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Certainly not! How shall we WHO DIED TO SIN live any longer in it? Or do you not know that as many as were baptized into Christ Jesus WERE baptized into His death? [That’s “crucified with Christ”!]. Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, [not our water baptism but our identity with Him and His chosen, willful, purposeful, loving sacrifice in our place!], that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so WE ALSO should walk in newness of life.

For if we have been UNITED TOGETHER in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection, KNOWING THIS, that our old man was crucified with Him, THAT THE BODY OF SIN MIGHT BE DONE AWAY WITH, that we should no longer be slaves of sin. FOR he who has died (with Christ?) has been freed from sin. NOW, IF WE DIED WITH CHRIST, we believe that we shall also live with Him, KNOWING THAT CHRIST, HAVING BEEN RAISED FROM THE DEAD, dies no more.

Death no longer has dominion over Him. For the DEATH THAT HE DIES, He died to sin once for all; but the LIFE THAT HE LIVES, HE LIVES TO GOD. Likewise YOU also, RECKONING YOURSELVES TO BE DEAD INDEED TO SIN, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body, that you should obey it in its lusts. [Are you really aware of how strong the old man, the old sin nature, and the demons of darkness are, yes, trying, tempting, testing you, if you’re a ‘flesh-believer’ or a “Born-again son and daughter of Father God”?].

And do not present your members as instruments of unrighteousness to sin, but present yourselves to God as being alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God. FOR SIN shall not have dominion over you, FOR YOU ARE NOT UNDER LAW BUT UNDER GRACE.” [BUT, if you “profess faith” but constantly live in sin’s bondage to the flesh or old man, it just possibly may be that you need to be “born again”!].

A few words of fresh poetry! Written as this message mushroomed in my mind and heart: “Under marvelous grace God leads us along, from ‘sin-sadness ‘ He gives us a “new song”;

A song for the soul, a hymn of the heart, a chorus for the mind, as in “new life” we start; praises to God for His amazing grace, darkness to light through His eternal might, His grace but His glory as the “new son” is born, sovereignly birthed to live in His reign, no longer sin-bound to live in disdain, but more than a conqueror through His precious name!

Grace for the battles, grace for the fears, grace for those trials that soon will come near! Grace is God’s governance, His strength and His might, because every son and daughter will know, at times, darkness in their night.

Though ‘darkness’ may be, at times, you facing the deep, He comes faithfully for you NOT to weep! He’s strong and He’s able and He assures us He’s available, so lean not on your own but settle where the Word has been sown – live in the Light, not in the darkness, live in His light, not in your despair, know He is able to separate the wheat from the tares!

An unbelieving soul, with Paradise all around, will blind himself to Heaven, but bear the bad fruit of a devilish hell. A compromising ‘believer’ will celebrate his ‘grit’, even “damned by God’s grace – I like the ‘taste’ of my fleshly vision, I like my mind’s reasoning; who needs God’s grace? I’ve got my pleasure in His place!”

There is a world that has sunk into shame, delirious at even the mention of the Lord’s Name! Their hearts are dead, their minds engulfed, their wills enslaved and bound in the chains of ‘self-approval’ – nothing else matters, “certainly not God’s pleasure or His chatter!”

There is a world that knows about ‘soul’ but has no desire for life in the Spirit. Their fleshly ambition trumps God’s purpose, and for the call to faith, most of the world declares ‘its worthless’! Its worldly stage is constantly degrading, bound to the nature of ‘God-despising’; but the world of God’s Faith and His world of awesome love takes the hungry soul of man into the ‘Promised Land’ of God’s eternal song!

Yes, sing to the Lord for the Victory is His, sing to the Lord for glorious is His triumph, sing praises to His name, no longer sin’s shame, but Holy God has exalted His Son’s fame! He’s Lord to God the Father, Lord to His redeemed sons and daughters, Lord forevermore!

It’s the song of the “Well-Beloved” whose vineyards are repentant sons of faith, and repentant sons of faith are available lands of His merciful grace. The seed of His Word is planted, His vineyards are watered, the Sun of grace shines brightly upon them, and the fruit of His Spirit is the fruit of the righteous, fruitful in every divine work in heavenly blessing!

Though man makes a mire, God hasn’t retired, but mercifully and faithfully He loves to inspire! Look at the Cross, and know it’s His love, look to the tomb and know it’s His power, Look to Jesus, and know it’s YOUR God-ordained hour!

Under marvelous grace God leads us along, from “sin-sadness” He gives a new song! Sing, My beloved, for mercy and grace is yours. Tell me the hour, the day, the year, the place, of YOUR announcement of His Amazing Grace!” [By JFF! 4-13-2017].

Examine YOUR confidence, YOUR assurance, YOUR outlook of YOUR “self-made man” or tell me of YOUR “blessed assurance”, your “new creation,” your “eternal song of faith of transformation in your heart” by the hand and heart of God exalting Christ as your Mediator between Holy God and a needy man!

CHAPTER EIGHT

FATE, FURY, OR THE FINISHED WORK?

The Random House College Dictionary, Revised Edition, 1975, (Copyrighted by Random House Inc., New York), defines ‘fate’ in several ways: “Something that unavoidably befalls a person; fortune; lot. (Or), ultimate agency by which the order of things is prescribed. (Or) that which is inevitably predetermined; destiny. (Or) a prophetic declaration of what must be: death, destruction, or ruin, Or (JFF), life in Christ, complete in Christ, eternal blessing in Christ!” What’s YOUR choice?

Choice? “I choose to do my ‘best’, hoping that is acceptable to the Living God!” It’s not and never has been! It’s so amazing to me that even in the old covenant days of Judaism Holy God gave “precious promises”! In Ezekiel 36:22-27, God spoke to Israel and us!

“Therefore say to the house of Israel, ‘Thus says the Lord God: I do not do this for your Sake, O house of Israel, but for My holy name’s sake, which you have profaned among the nations wherever you went. And I (Holy God!) will sanctify My great name, which you have profaned among the nations, which you have profaned in their midst; and the nations shall know that I am the Lord, says the Lord God, when I am hallowed in you before their eyes. For I will take you from among the nations, gather you out of all countries, and bring you into your own land. Then I will sprinkle clean water on you (the “water of the Word of God”?), and you shall be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh (tender toward God, purified within, yielded to His Sovereign will!). I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them. Then you shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers; you shall be My people, and I will be your God.”

Sadly, much of Israel in those days did not take God at His Word, but there was a “true remnant” that submitted themselves to the sovereignty of God, to His Spirit, and “LIVED” in and through His Holy Promises!

But, do you remember, in Matthew 23:12-13, Jesus went into the temple of God (in Jerusalem) and drove out all those who bought and sold in the temple, and overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold doves. And Jesus said to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of thieves.’”

Is it possible that God, desiring your body to be the “temple of His Holy presence” has sadly seen it become a fleshly temple of self-indulgence? God’s desire, will, and purpose of redeemed flesh is becoming His “Holy Temple”, but “the world, the flesh, and the devil” see it as opportunity for “a den of robbers” stifling God’s intent and ‘lusting’ in the flesh, choosing ‘desolate houses’ instead of the desire, will, and pleasure of being the vessel of His Holy Presence, satisfied with the identity of ‘the den of robbers’, which they sanitized by fleshly, acceptable deception!

In Joshua 24:14-25 there is an amazing story that has resemblance to “professors” today without “possession” of faithfulness to God’s promises! It says: “Now therefore, fear the Lord, serve Him in sincerity and in truth, and put away the gods which your fathers served on the other side of the River and in Egypt. Serve the Lord! (Lay out FOR YOURSELF what Joshua just said to the, at least, inquisitive Israelis!).

And if it seems evil to you to serve the Lord, CHOOSE FOR YOURSELVES THIS DAY whom YOU will serve, whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”

The beloved John, standing with two of his disciples, in John 1:35, ‘looking at Jesus as He walked’, said: “Behold, the Lamb of God”! But earlier, in John 1:29, it says, John saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” Doesn’t that astonish you? IF the sin of the world has been washed away through the shed blood of the Lamb of God, if forgiven, what keeps one from being united with the Savior? It’s their desire, will, and pleasure to do as their flesh dictates, not what Jesus demands! In fact, in Matthew 7:21-23, Jesus unveiled why even some ‘believers’ don’t enter the eternal Kingdom! He said: “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name? And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’”

Fate? Is that determined by ‘what way you choose’ to live your life’s journey – by YOUR GRIT OR BY HIS GRACE? In Matthew 7:13-14 the Lord Jesus declared, “Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it. Because narrow is the gate and DIFFICULT IS THE WAY which leads to life, and there are few who find it.”

Do you understand, comprehend, and are able to discern the difference between spiritual ‘natural affinities’ and ‘the sufferings of this present time’ as Paul wrote about in Romans 8:18-29? Receive it! My New King James highlights these key verses as “From Suffering To Glory”! It says:

“For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us. For the earnest expectation of the creation eagerly waits FOR THE REVEALING OF THE (TRUE) SONS OF GOD. For the creation was subjected to futility ( the deep, deep vacuum of ungodliness!), not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it in hope; (there’s no other way for spiritual blessing other than the habitation of Christ in the repentant heart!)… because the creation itself also WILL BE delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of the children of God. [I don’t know what the “end of the world folks” do with ‘the creation itself delivered from a bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children itself’!]. Verse 22 & following: For we know that the whole creation groans and labors with birth pangs together until now (even now? Even into the 21st Century?). Not only that, but we also who have the first-fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, eagerly waiting for the adoption, the redemption of our body. For we were SAVED IN THIS HOPE, but hope that is seen is not hope; for why does one still hope for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we eagerly wait for it with perseverance.

Likewise the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession FOR US with groanings which cannot be uttered. Now He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God.

And we know that all things work together FOR GOOD to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose. For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren.” Are you ‘brethren’ or simply a “good church member”? AND THERE IS A DIFFERENCE, yes, an eternal difference!

The “FATE” of the ungodly, the unbeliever, the pretender? And with “Fate” foremost in many lives, what about the “promised Fury of the Lord”? In Mark 9: 19 Jesus shared a convicting, scary warning when He said, “O faithless generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I bear with you?” Oh, and then in Verse 42 Jesus said, “But whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to stumble, it would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck, and he were thrown into the sea.”

Is it the ungodly, the unbeliever, or the ‘pretender’ who “deceives little ones”, causing them to stumble, and ‘the offender in religious deceit’ who finds himself with ‘a millstone hung around his neck, and thrown into the sea’ of eternal separation from God and eternal punishment at the hands of the devil and his demons?

In Isaiah 2:10-12, and Verses 17-19, as Isaiah hears, sees, and understands the judgment, the fate of the ungodly, the unbeliever, and the pretenders, his heart and mind and spirit becomes aware of “the terror of the Lord AND the glory of His majesty.” Do YOU understand it and find yourself humbled before Holy God? Hear the Word! Isaiah 2:10-12 says, “Enter into the rock, and hide in the dust, from the terror of the Lord and the glory of His majesty. The lofty looks of man shall be bowed down, and the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day. For the day of “the Lord of hosts” shall come upon everything proud and lofty, upon everything lifted up – and it shall be brought low –“

Then Isaiah 2:17-19 says, “The loftiness of man shall be bowed down, and the haughtiness of men shall be brought low; the Lord alone will be exalted in that day. But the idols He shall utterly abolish. They shall go into the holes of the rocks, and into the caves of the earth, FROM THE TERROR OF THE LORD and the glory of His majesty, when He arises to shake the earth mightily.”

There is an illuminating word from Paul in 2 Corinthians 4:2 when he wrote, and no doubt taught publicly, on the streets, and, yes, even in the temples! He said: “But we (Paul and his associates in Christ!) have renounced ‘the hidden things of shame’, not walking in craftiness nor handling the word of God deceitfully, but by manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God.” The “hidden things of shame”? Violaters of the Spirit of Christ and the Holy Word of God need to be aware of 2 Corinthians 4:5 speaks about “the Lord coming, who will both bring to light the hidden things of darkness and reveal the counsels of the heart.” For some, it may be glorious what the Spirit of Christ witnesses, but for others there is THE EXPOSURE of the hidden things of darkness in his heart and mind!

Will you be hiding from the Lord when He comes “to shake your earth, your world” mightily? There are ‘compromising religious people’ who thrive in walking both sides of the streets, one flesh-side, the other the Spirit and holy side! Loving God but pumping the flesh, feeding the ‘spirit-heart and mind’ but indulging the “hidden lusts of a divided life”, Holy Spirit interest but pummeled by self-interests – yes, divided-mind devotees to Christ with little interest in the Holy Word of God, when the Word declares that “Man does not live by physical bread alone but by every Word that proceeds out of the mouth of God”!

There will be a day of judgment coming – not only for unbelievers, but the game-players in the Christian community, as well as every sold-out, yielded, born-again, Spirit-filled child of the King!

In Colossians 1:24-29 we get a view, the introduction of, the unveiling of, yes, a “sold-out disciple” of Christ Jesus! Is this our introduction, picture, viewing of the reality of “The Finished Work”? To the church at Colossae Paul wrote: “Now I rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up in my flesh what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ, for the sake of His body, which is the church, of which I became a minister according to the stewardship from God which was given to me for you, TO FULFILL THE WORD OF GOD, the mystery which has been hidden from ages and from generations, BUT NOW HAS BEEN REVEALED TO HIS SAINTS. TO THEM God willed to make known what are the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles: WHICH IS ‘CHRIST IN YOU’, the hope of glory. Him we preach, warning every man and teaching every man in all wisdom, THAT WE MAY PRESENT EVERY MAN PERFECT IN CHRIST JESUS.”

Is “EVERY MAN PERFECT IN CHRIST JESUS”? Is the Gospel a “FINISHED WORK”? Of course, IT IS! But it doesn’t mean “every man” is automatically now “a child of the King”! In Luke 24:46-49 Jesus said: “Thus it is written, and thus it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day, and that REPENTANCE AND REMISSION OF SINS SHOULD BE PREACHED IN HIS NAME TO ALL NATIONS, beginning at Jerusalem. And you, repentant disciples, are witnesses of these things. Behold, I send the Promise of My Father upon you, but tarry in the city of Jerusalem until you are endued with power from on high.”

Consider ‘modern-day’ churches around you! Would you say that “repentance” IS the major message of churches to the ‘lost’ and ‘unreconciled to God’? Or, is it, “Make sure you’re a member of a local church’, which could be an invitation to “miss Christ”! Did Paul talk about “fulfilling the Word of God”; yet how often have you heard the “compromisers” talk about: “That’s salvation by works!” Absolutely not! It’s the evidence true salvation has occurred! Do you know the “bible teacher” is on target or void of the mission of Christ? Is he “pressing in” to Christ and “preaching”, “bearing witness to the lost”, of their need of His saving grace, mercy, and love?

I’ve often wondered if in Romans 12:2, as Paul wrote about, “Don’t be conformed any longer to the pattern of this world”, if that would include the patterns of the church world that too often are totally silent and unproductive about “missions” and “evangelism”! In James Montgomery Boice’s book, “Whatever Happened To The Gospel of Grace?” (Crossway Books, Good News Publishers, Copyright, 2001, p.42), he wrote about the church “breaking away from and repudiating the world’s ‘worldview’,” but there came a huge question to me, after 30 years of ‘overseas missions’, proclaiming Christ, even on major streets of needy ‘world’ cities, “Has the church-at-large been ‘transformed by the renewing of its mind, and does evangelism and missions take its place as a major endeavor of the church’?”

In Boice’s book he included a statement from Harry Blamires that came from Blamires’ book, “The Christian Mind: How Should A Christian Think?” (p.44). “To think secularly is to think within a frame of reference bounded by the limits of our life on earth; it is to keep one’s calculations rooted in this – worldly criteria. To think Christianity is to accept all things with the mind as related, directly or indirectly, to man’s eternal destiny as the redeemed and chosen child of God.” CHOSEN? CHOSEN WITH A PURPOSE AND PLAN? In YOU, is there an awareness and commitment to, “YOU shall be My WITNESSES?”, but no understanding in you that YOU ARE TO TELL THE WORLD AROUND YOU OF GOD’S SAVING GRACE, MERCY, AND LOVE IN AND THROUGH CHRIST’S CALVARY’S CROSS?

I close this teaching with an old hymn entitled “Rise Up, O Men of God”, written by William Pierson Merrill and Aaron Williams, in the old “Broadman Hymnal”, (published by The Broadman Press, Nashville, Tenn., 1940!). It says: “Rise up, O men of God, Have done with lesser things; Give heart and mind and soul and strength TO SERVE THE KING OF KINGS!

Rise, up, O men of God! His kingdom tarries long; Bring in this day of brotherhood And end the night of wrong.

Rise up, O men of God! The Church for you does wait, Her strength unequal to her task; Rise up, and make her great!

Lift high the cross of Christ! Tread where His feet have trod; As brothers of the Son of man, Rise up, O men of God!”

I don’t know how YOU respond to God’s Holy Word, but John 6:53-56 is clear, convicting, and challenging! The Lord Jesus said: “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you. For My flesh is food indeed, and My blood is drink indeed. He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me and I in him.”

In Verse 60 many of His disciples voiced a major concern: “This is a hard saying; who can understand it?” Oh, but then we read in Verse 66, “From that time many of His disciples WENT BACK and WALKED WITH HIM NO MORE,” yet some still “sat” in ‘church pews’ within a ‘grain’ of commitment to “be My witnesses”! God, help us!

CHAPTER NINE

“BAD NEWS OR GOOD NEWS?”

In Proverbs 25:25 we read, “As cold water to a weary soul, so is good news from a far country.” I clearly understand that, because for 25-30 years I traveled 3-6 months a year, 3 weeks to 3 months at a time, equipping, encouraging, and, I pray, inspiring pastors in their ministries, plus proclaiming the Gospel in crusades and youth ministries, and at times I needed the cold water for a weary soul.

There are times when disciples of Christ become “weary souls”, but, thank God, for the encouragers rather than the “bad news bears”! In Genesis 27:46, Rebecca said to Isaac, “I am weary of my life because of the daughters of Heth; if Jacob takes a wife of the daughters of Heth, like these who are the daughters of the land, what good will my life be to me?”

At the same time some become wearied, yes, even from “bad, sad, maddening news”, but they are those who understand that the “good news” CAN overcome bad circumstances and events and, for others, it’s “news” that totally disheartens them, good news or bad news. But in fact, in Galatians 6:9, Paul wrote: “And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart.” In life’s journeys, some lose heart because they major on “bad news” rather than the “good News” of God’s grace, mercy, and love!

In Genesis 24:27 “the man” said: “Blessed be the Lord God of my master Abraham, who has not forsaken His mercy and His truth toward my master. As for me, being in the way, the Lord led me to the house of my master’s brethren.” How interesting do you personally find that! “As for me, being in the way, the Lord led me…”? Dare I say to you in beginning, “To not be in the Way, the Truth, and the Life of Christ, is to be traveling on the highway of “bad news”, yet, at the same time, some have committed to the True Way of “good news” yet willfully wander or are deceived by “the powers of darkness” and choose “rough roads” rather than the “Welcome Highway” of goodness, graciousness, and gentleness of Spirit, even satisfied, at times, to ‘taste’ the “bad news” from their “fleshly choices”!

Be assured! Holy God does not Author the “bad News” of one’s life unless that person lives with “my way” to the point he/she doesn’t care for God’s “Amazing Grace” because he/she is wedded to “what I want, not what God declares AND demands”! How many do you know who favor their own ‘religious conceit’ to the divine will of God?

“Bad News” is consistency and devotion to one’s fallen sin nature, to the “stubborn will” of what one desires and not what God commands, to the ‘false peace’ of the godless, world-citizens, who write and observe their own constitutions, void of the will of God!

There are fleshly, devilish, worldly wedges called ‘self-pride, self-will, or self-justification and approval’ of “Who I am and what I desire apart from anything your God demands,” so they willfully choose the “bad news” of “My way – I do it my way – not what your God expects!” “Bad News”? “I’m deeply in love with my natural virtues and passionate about the ways of my godless world!” “There’s nothing evil about my ‘evil thoughts’, just a little bit of the beastly and lots of the demonic that makes my godless life fun, pleasurable, and enjoyable – you Christians ought to try it sometime!” I don’t know how some see it and say it without shame, but they do: “Most of humanity spends its best hours choosing between evils that are rampant all around them – jump in, have fun,” not knowing that’s a leap into the pit of Hell with the devil’s crowd!

“Bad News”? When you turn to the Book of Revelation, in Revelation 2, the heading of my New King James Version of the Bible, entitles Revelation 2:18 and following as “The Corrupt Church”. Certainly it fitted Thyatira, but it also can be an inspired Word of conviction for any compromising church, group of Christians, or even one professing disciple of Christ! Hear it!

Revelation 2:18-29 are words from the angelic messenger over Thyatira, And to the angel of the church in Thyatira write: “These things says the Son of God, who has eyes like a flame of fire, and His feet like fine brass. ‘I know your works, love, service, faith, and your patience; and as for your works, the last are more than the first. NEVERTHELESS I have a few things against you, because you allow that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess, to teach and seduce My servants to commit sexual immorality and eat things sacrificed to idols. And I gave her time to repent of her sexual immorality, and she did not repent.

Indeed I will cast her into a sickbed, and those who ‘commit adultery’ with her into great tribulation, unless they repent of their deeds. I will kill her children with death, and all the churches shall know that I am He who searches the minds and hearts. And I will give to each one of you according to your works.

Now to you I say, and to the rest in (Thyatira), as many as do not have this doctrine, who have not known the depths of Satan, as they say, I will put on you no other burden. But hold fast what you have till I come. And he who overcomes, and keeps My works until the end, to him I will give power over the nations – ‘He shall rule them with a rod of iron; they shall be dashed to pieces like the potter’s vessels’ – as I have also received from My Father, and I will give him the morning star. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says TO THE CHURCHES.”

“Bad News”? My dear friend, fellow classmate and football teammate at Baylor University, from 1956-1958, seminary classmate at Southwestern Seminary also, sent me a message about 8 years ago that was Vance Havner’s sentence about the ‘average Baptist church’ that I feel now is the right time to share it with you! Havner said: “If an airplane had as many useless parts as the average Baptist church, it’d fly about as fast as a canary with a sack of wheat tied to its tail!” But dare I say it? ‘Useless parts of any church today across the USA defined with a tied tail trying to fly that bag of wheat’?

“Bad News”? THERE IS LITTLE PROCLAMATION OF “EXCEPT YOU REPENT, YOU WILL ALL LIKEWISE PERISH!” In fact, most in our modern day simply say, “Join our church – and everything will be OK!” What you see across, around, within most churches today is what Walter Chantry, in his book, “Today’s Gospel – Authentic Or Synthetic?”, wrote about: “in love for souls, true evangelicals invariably present some profound truths in their witnessing. Yet by THE UNCONSCIOUS OMMISSION OF ESSENTIAL INGREDIENTS OF THE GOSPEL, many fail to communicate even that portion of God’s Word which they meant to convey. When a half truth is presented as the whole truth, it becomes an untruth.”

“REPENT!” Really? Is that in a church’s ‘salvation’ presentation? “FORSAKE!” Really? Isaiah 55:7-9 clearly says, God Himself speaking, proclaiming, informing: “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; LET HIM RETURN TO THE LORD, and He (the Lord Himself) will have mercy on him; and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon. For My thoughts are not your thoughts, now are your ways My ways,” says the Lord. “For as the heaven are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts.” AND THE FLESHLY PROUD UNBELIEVER SHAKES HIS FIST AGAINST HOLY GOD, AND TURNS TO HIS SINFUL WORLD TO SATISFY HIS ‘FLESH’ OR OLD, ADAMIC SIN-NATURE! And the fleshly sinner turns away from Holy God’s merciful invitation, trying to be ‘happy’ in himself rather than knowing “the Joy of the Lord”!

It was H.W.Webb-Peploe, in Kurt Bruner’s “Inklings of God”, (p.21) who said, “Joy is not gush; joy is not jolliness. Joy is perfect acquiescence in God’s will because the soul delights itself in God Himself.” Bruner closed out his book, saying, (p.193), “Every religion reminds me that I am made for more. Every religion reaches for God. Every religion offers to make the wrong right again. But only one religion, Christianity, is honest enough to tell me that I can’t solve my own problem. I can’t obey enough rules, offer enough sacrifices, or become enlightened enough to rise above the wretchedness around and within me. All I can do is humbly accept the redemption offered by the One who made me for more and who heroically sacrificed Himself on my behalf. It’s like the preacher told me when I was seven. I am a sinner who needs to be saved.”

Life without the Redeemer, the Atoner, the Savior and Lord, is a life like a bronze statue but void of God’s eternal Presence in and through Christ Jesus. Because to come to Him is to confess: “Without His Resurrection Life and Presence within me, I have no hope, no peace, no eternal purpose – I just ‘counterfeit’ what I have determined is my purpose and my chosen intent!” And Bruner, later in his book, used powerful, convicting words: (p94), “…air out of the illusion of adult omniscience.” And the problem with most of the unregenerate world? Daniel 5 tells us about “Belshazzar’s feast”, and Verses 3-4, unveils, not only an idolatrous worship then but unfolds what, I believe, the Spirit of God sees today in a lot of churches! “Then they brought the gold vessels that had been taken from the temple of the house of God which had been in Jerusalem; and the king and his lords, his wives, and his concubines drank from them. They drank wine, and praised the gods of gold and silver, bronze and iron, wood and stone.”

Dare I tell you that that ‘religious observance’, like much across the religious world today, is like ‘another angel coming down from heaven, having great authority’ – Revelation 18:1, and the earth (the present religious systems!) is now or will be soon “illuminated with his glory.” And he cried mightily: Verses 3-8, “For all the nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth have become rich through the abundance of her luxury. And I heard another voice from heaven saying, “Come out of her, My people, lest you share in her sins, and lest you receive of her plagues. For her sins have reached to heaven, and GOD HAS REMEMBERED HER INIQUITIES! [But today? Most in ‘churchianity’ profess “Glad our sins have been forgiven and that the loving God understands we can’t do anything but sin until we get to Heaven!”] HOW PHONY IS THAT, even to the words of Jesus: “Go, and sin no more!” (John 8:10-12!).

Three things out of John 8:10-12! 1. “Sin no more” because Christ Jesus says so! 2. “Sin no more” because of what sin does! 3. “Sin no more” because “sin” promotes “fleshliness” of the old sin nature that Christ took to the Cross – Christ Jesus gives, after repentance toward God and faith in His finished work at the Cross the “new life” of liberty and freedom from sin and the sin-nature bondage with His Presence within to be released as with Paul we “take the sentence of death to ourselves that His Resurrected Life will be manifested in our mortal flesh”!

False ‘religious hopes’ and ‘carnal mind-twisting of the Scriptures’, vague resemblances, cheap imitation, fleshly, fallible persuasions, a “give your best” mandate substituting what Christ did at the Cross for what one sees him/her capable of doing in one’s outer countenance and personal determination, puts many on ‘dirt roads’ rather than the Christ-constructed “Highway of Holiness”! And this ‘spirit’, this attitude, this fleshly-minded determination , may be why God inspired through Paul, in 2 Corinthians 13:5-6, to write: “Examine yourselves as to whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Do you not know yourselves – that Jesus Christ is in you? – unless indeed you are disqualified. But I trust that you will know that we are not disqualified, [Paul and the co-laborers traveling with him!].

Hear me! There are blessed assurances in the Word to the true believer who “leans not (even) to his own understanding, but in all his/her ways they acknowledge their “only hope” is Christ’s death, burial, resurrection, ascension, and moment by moment abiding with the true “born-again believer”, saying, “I’ll never leave you nor forsake you.” Glory!

Paul said in Galatians 1:15-16, “But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother’s womb and CALLED ME THROUGH HIS GRACE, to reveal His Son in me…,” with John saying in 1 John 3:24, “Now he who keeps His (Christ’s) commandments abides in Him, and He in him. And by this we know that He abides in us, by the Spirit whom He has given us.”

We know! Do you? Serious assurance and confidence flows out of the child of the King because they repent, they rest in His Resurrection presence with them, in them, through them, no longer ‘self-deceived hypocrites’, but living daily, yes, even moment by moment, “Lord, what do You desire to do in me and through me – I’m Yours?” And YOU KNOW you’ve been drawn to Him because YOU KNOW that you were born again, not of the will of men, but of God!” (John 1:13). Do you understand Ezekial 36:25-27, AND receive it? The Lord God speaks! “Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean (real water or the water of the Word?); I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them.”

Glory! A walk of grace, of divine favor, of the supernatural power of the Spirit of God!

I close with a writing I assume, by Max Lucado in his book, “In The Grace of God”, (Copyright, 1996 by Max Lucado, W Publishing Group, A division of Thomas Nelson, Inc. www. Thomas Nelson. Com). It’s entitled “What a God!” (p.55):

“Ponder the achievement of God.

He doesn’t condone our sin, nor does He compromise His standard.

He doesn’t ignore our rebellion, nor does He relax His demands.

Rather than dismiss our sin, He assumes our sin and, incredibly, sentences Himself.

God’s holiness is honored. Our sin is punished… and we are redeemed.

God does what we cannot do so we can be what we dare not dream: perfect before God.”

DO YOU UNDERSTAND? GOD’S GRACE IS GREATER THAN ALL OUR SIN!

William Hunter and J.H. Stockton wrote the old hymn, “The Great Physician”. It’s found in the Broadman Hymnal of Broadman Press, Inc., Nashville, Tennessee. It says: “The great Physician now is near, The sympathizing Jesus; He speaks the drooping heart to cheer, Oh, hear the voice of Jesus.

Your many sins are all forgiven, Oh, hear the voice of Jesus; Go on your way in peace to heaven, And wear a crown with Jesus.

All glory to the dying Lamb! I now believe in Jesus; I love the blessed Savior’s name, I love the name of Jesus.

Sweetest note in seraph song, Sweetest name on mortal tongue; Sweetest carol ever sung, Jesus, blessed Jesus.” AMEN?

CHAPTER NINE

CONFLICTING LOYALTY OR ALL-CONSUMING LOVE?

Conflicting Loyalty? Is that saying one thing but doing another? Is that the demonstration of divided allegiance? Is that the picture vividly being painted on one’s ‘life-canvas’ of one foot in heaven and the other foot touching the outer limits of hell itself?

Conflicting Loyalty? Is that, “Yes, Sir,” to the General or “Do as I please” to the corp? Is that public dedication to be honorable and godly to the vows you make to your wife to be but then you feel at liberty to play the field of available women?

Conflicting Loyalty? Is that a vow of dedication to be honest in your school or university exams but you determine the best way to ‘cheat’ on your exams? Be assured, every day there will be a ‘test’!

Conflicting Loyalty? Is that a president’s public oath to defend, uphold his nation’s constitution but daily, verbally, and in his deeds, he shreds every page he can? Conflicting Loyalty? You’ve hear it! “Yes, I believe the Bible is divinely inspired, God-breathed, Holy Word, but I also believe my devotion to it is an option I hold for myself!” Conflicting Loyalty? Have you ever witnessed an elected national representative or senator talk about his firm belief in liberty and freedom but continually votes for policies that enslaves, endanger s his constituents?

Conflicting Loyalty? “Oh, yes! One man – one woman for life,” but then voices support of men with men and women with women in gross violation of God’s Holy Word – and the sad thing is public support of immorality continues in the U.S.A.!

Conflicting Loyalty? “I’m a devoted kind of guy – He can count on me,” but stumbles, falls, rebels on the first lap with no intention of getting up! Conflicting Loyalty? You’ve seen him/her so consumed by worldly ambition that ‘The Kingdom of God’ is squeezed out by an undaunted intent of “making a name for myself”, and glorifying the Lord takes a back seat!

Conflicting Loyalty? “The high cost of following Jesus? I thought this was a ‘free ride’, but I’ll do what I feel at ease to do, whatever pleases me, even if my choices close the door to Him!”

Conflicting Loyalty? Many professing disciples become totally disappointed, disillusioned, even despairing because they believed they were called to ‘give my best’ – they do, then get a failing grade because true discipleship has nothing to do with ‘our best’ but Christ’s best! Denying ‘self’ for some is asking way too much!

Conflicting Loyalty? “I WILL uphold my devotion to Christ and be a staunch warrior defending the faith,” but after several skirmishes, peer pressure, or procrastination, it takes a damaging toll!

Remember the son born blind and then healed by Jesus? The Pharisees had come to his parents asking about his blindness: “We don’t know how – ask him – he’s of age to answer for himself!” And John 9:22 says: “His parents said these things because they feared the Jews…”. They didn’t want to be put out of the synagogue!

Conflicting Loyalty? You’ll remember that Jesus said: “Whoever does not bear his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple.” There are those “who want to” but the price appears extremely steep! Spurgeon said: “A life in which we have shunned the cross of Christ will lead to a state in which we shall miss the crown of glory.”

Conflicting Loyalty? In relationships between man to man, sometimes compromise has benefits, but to seek to “compromise” God’s revealed Truth breeds disaster! To compromise our Lord’s commands is to acknowledge disobedience and to stand under God’s judgment. To compromise is to decay obedience and to bring on a deterioration of morals, if one had any! To compromise is to vacate privilege. To compromise is to willingly slice off those parts of “unpleasant truths” that you sense “don’t fit my personality and make-up of who I know I am!”

Conflicting Loyalty? Spurgeon, in his “Spurgeon’s Sermons,” [Memorial Library, Vol.19, p.359], has a message entitled “No Compromise.” Spurgeon said: “The new plan is to assimilate the church to the world, and so include a larger area within its bounds. By semi-dramatic performances they make houses of prayer to approximate the theatre; they turn their services into musical displays, and their sermons into political harangues or philosophical essays – in fact, they exchange the temple for the theatre, and turn the ministers of God into actors, whose business it is to amuse men. Is it not so, that the Lord’s Day is becoming more and more a day of recreation or of idleness, and the Lord’s house either a joss-house full of idols, or a political club, where there is more enthusiasm for a party than zeal for God.” “Lord, help us!”

Conflicting Loyalty? How many people have crossed your paths “in church” who are more at ease with church as a combat zone than a celebration of Jesus? Divisiveness is their strong “suit”, opposition their true bonnet they wear regularly, commitment to their way fighting the pastor and God’s true people to the death in one bitter struggle after another! Proverbs 21:2 says, “All a man’s ways seem right to him, but the Lord weighs the heart.”

Conflicting Loyalty? Oh, they play the religious game as “one cool dude,” calloused to the core, with willingly closed eyes to anything but their way or the highway! [Proverbs 23:7 says, “For as a man thinks in his heart, so is he. ‘Eat and drink,’ he says to you, but his heart is not with you.”

Conflicting Loyalty? You’ve witnessed it, no doubt: Intellectual attainments in one’s mind of their understanding of the Bible, God’s Holy Word, often becoming nothing more to them but crippling beliefs! “Thus says the Lord” is translated: “As I see it…!”

Conflicting Loyalty? Effort apart from transformation by repentance toward God and faith in the finished work of Christ at the Cross creates despair for them, not deliverance, healing, or salvation!

Conflicting Loyalty? A change in outward behavior is not the spiritual circumcision of the heart! Romans 2:28-29 tells us: “For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is circumcision that which is outward in the flesh; but he is a Jew (true Jew!) who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the Spirit, not in the letter; whose praise is not from men but from God.”

Conflicting Loyalty? Reaching up, reaching high, is not the same as being raised from the dead (spiritual death!) by God’s power! Look at 1 Corinthians 15:14-19! Verse 14 & fl.: “And if Christ is not risen, then our preaching is empty and your faith is also empty. Yes, and we are found false witnesses of God, because we have testified of God that He raised up Christ, whom He did not raise up – if in fact the dead do not rise. For if the dead do not rise, then Christ is not risen. And if Christ is not risen, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins! Then also those who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men the most pitiable.”

Conflicting Loyalty? Sinful natures are not cloaked with religious garments, religious conversations, or religious activities, but “Crucified with Christ” is the ‘death-nail’ to sinful natures! Galatians 2:20-21a is so clear! “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me. I do not set aside the grace of God…”

Conflicting Loyalty? You’ve heard it or witnessed it! “I’m a man so devoted to the costly bricks and mortar, the lights and stained glass, of our beautiful church,” failing to understand his body is God’s holy temple because of His grace, mercy, and love! 1 Corinthians 6:19 boldly declares: “Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own?” I hate to tell you, but Paul already scared the Hell out of a lot of Corinthian pretenders! He had said in 1 Corinthians 3:16, “Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?” IF YOU’VE BEEN BORN AGAIN!

Conflicting Loyalty? “Discipline and self-determination are the marks of an award-winning follower of Christ.” No! The mark of a true disciple is one “set apart by God Himself for Himself”, sanctified, meet for the Master’s use!

Conflicting Loyalty? “Fig leaves” fashionable sophistication, proper outward attire, educated common sense, band-aids rather than ‘heart transplants’, a manly ticker-ing with myself on my terms, Ali’s style: “Superman don’t need no seat-belt!” Look at Matthew 13:15! “For the hearts of the people have grown dull, their ears are hard of hearing, and their eyes they have closed (Is that ‘religious Jews’ who crucified Christ?), Lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, lest they should understand with their hearts and turn, SO THAT I (HOLY GOD!) should heal them.”

Conflicting Loyalty? I love what John Eldridge said in his book, “Waking The dead” – so on target! [p.161], “Religion and its defenders have always been the most insidious enemy of the true faith precisely because they are not glaring opponents; they are IMPOSTERS.” Insidious? Noah Webster’s 1828 Dictionary defines “insidious” as: “lying in wait; watching for an opportunity to ensnare and entrap; deceitful, treacherous…”

Conflicting Loyalty? It’s not ‘fate’ but faith, fellowship, freedom, fullness, and a fight! Personal fate is out to steal God’s glory! Anarchy becomes a substitution for the Blood Atonement! T.S. Eliot sorrowfully lamented: “Endless invention, endless experiment, brings knowledge of motion, but not of stillness; knowledge of speech, but not of silence; knowledge of words, and ignorance of the Word. Where is the Life we have lost in living? Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?” [Out of “Choruses from the Rock.”].

Conflicting Loyalty? Have you chosen the sanctified life or the starving life because to be without Christ as Lord and Savior, to be without the Bread of Life is shrinking, starving, and shriveling up! Jesus said: “I have come that you might have Life and have it more abundantly!”

Conflicting Loyalty? “Temptation is not a trap – it’s an opportunity of discerning what I really want or not.” Oh, really? James 1:13-15 says: “Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone. But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed. Then, when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, brings forth death.”

Conflicting Loyalty? “Pressure, pressure, pressure! This job is so demanding – I’ going to have to ‘cut corners’ somewhere, somehow, even if it’s wrong!” Hudson Taylor had difficult trials he had to face up to – he wrote out of that hard moment: “It doesn’t matter how great the pressure is. What really matters is WHERE THE PRESSURE LIES – whether it comes between you and God or whether it presses you nearer His heart.” NEVER LET PRESSURE TO CAUSE YOU TO PASS BY, OVERLOOK, OR SHUT OUT JESUS HIMSELF FROM YOUR STRESSFUL MOMENT!

Conflicting Loyalty? That’s when courage is called for but one allows cowardice to call the shots! No doubt this is why the famous Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn wrote in “East and West”, [New York, Harper & Row, 1980, p45], “Must one point out that from ancient times a decline in courage has been considered the beginning of the end.”

Conflicting Loyalty? It was Martin Luther who once said: “The ultimate proof of the sinner is that he does not know his own sin.” Please read carefully from Jerry Falwell’s “25 of the Greatest Sermons Ever Preached,” [Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1983, p.18], a quote of George Whitfield from his famous message, “The Method of Grace”, based on Jeremiah 6:14! Whitfield said: “As God can send a nation or people no greater blessing than to give them faithful, sincere, and upright ministers, so the greatest curse that God can possibly send upon a people in this world is to give them over to blind, unregenerate, carnal, lukewarm, and unskilled guides. And yet, in all ages, we find that there have been many wolves in sheep’s clothing…that prophesied smoother things than God did allow.”

Conflicting Loyalty? I was reading recently Dr. James Kennedy’s and Jerry Newcombe’s book, “Cross Purposes.” [Multonomal Publ., 2007, pps.25-26]. “When I was in seminary, I went to a jail to preach the gospel to those who were locked inside. I had never been to a place like that to preach, and I must say I was a little unnerved by it. I was sent into a big room where I was separated by bars from probably a dozen prisoners. As they were milling around, I started to talk to them. I probably hadn’t gotten two minutes into my talk when one of the largest inmates suddenly came to the bars (which I was happy were there at that point) and said to me, “Mister, you just go tell that God of yours all I want from Him is what I deserve!”….”Sir,” I replied. “if you got what you deserved from God, the floor would open up right where you stand and drop you straight into hell, for that is precisely what you deserve. I don’t say that because you’re behind these bars while I’m outside them, because that is what we all deserve. If we got our just deserts, we would each and every one be condemned – because, you see, we’re actually already condemned. Christ said of the whole human race, “You are condemned already.” (John 3:18!). Dare I tell You that the “condemned” are already pardoned, but most accept their “bars” rather than His mercy and grace!

Let me “shift gears”! I pray “conflicting loyalty” never becomes the pattern in your life but that “by faith and obedience to it” you appropriate our Lord’s “All-Consuming Love”!

The Scripture I feel so led by our Lord to share with you in this moment is Romans 8:35-39 where Paul wrote: “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written: ‘For Your sake we are killed all day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.’ Yet IN ALL THESE THINGS WE ARE MORE THAN CONQUERORS THROUGH HIM WHO LOVED US. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

I don’t know how you read the above passage, but the one thing I’m sure of is the fact there are those who would like to “separate” you from Christ Jesus! “The love of Christ” is an offense to Satan and the powers of darkness; “the love of Christ” is a stumbling block to those who would be reconciled to God on their terms; “the love of Christ” becomes contemptible to some because they don’t receive God in Christ Who FIRST loved us; “the love of Christ” separates some because relationship to Holy God, they think, is merited, earned, rewarded by what THEY DO – not what CHRIST HAS DONE ONCE FOR ALL AT THE CROSS!; “the love of Christ” infuriates some because “my behavior should be recognized by God, rewarding me because of my undaunted radiance in ‘self-performance’ – I shine brighter than even Jesus who was called “the Light of the world.”

Love for God is not manufactured in a fallen man’s heart or mind! It’s why John wrote in 1 John 4:19, “We love Him because He first loved us.”

There has never been man, woman, boy, or girl, inclined to love God and be His follower and devoted servant. The darkness of one’s being, unredeemed, has never produced ‘new life’ but only His amazing love transforms our darkness into His Life and Liberty and Light and Love! It is very, very clear throughout all the Word of God that any man who does not passionately love God, because God FIRST loved him, has never truly known Him or been ‘birthed’ into a family of faith relationship!

And ‘if’ we have been ‘birthed’ into a family of faith relationship, does that mean our ‘LIFE-STYLE’ is unconditional love of others? In 1 John 4:10-11 we read: “In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.”

Spurgeon was a very bold, brilliant preacher and student of God’s Word. In his ninth volume of Spurgeon’s Sermons, [pps.307-308], he wrote: “Now no man is a Christian who does not love Christians. He, who, being in the church, is yet not of it heart and soul, is but an intruder in the family. But since love to our brethren springs out of love to our one common Father, it is plain that we must have love to that Father, or else we shall fail in one of the indispensable marks of the children of God: “We know that we have passed from death unto life because we love the brethren;” but we cannot truly love the brethren unless we love the Father; therefore, lacking love to God, we lack love to the church, which is an essential mark of grace.”

There are two verses in John 1 that we need to put together! John 1:14 says, “And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen His glory, the glory of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.” Then look at Verse 18! “No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father’s heart, who has made Him known.”

Do you see it? THE WORD [EMMANUEL, ‘GOD IN FLESH’] BECAME FLESH! AND THE GOD WE’D NEVER KNOWN BECAME CLESARLY VISIBLE!! All of a sudden, flashing before us like 10,000 rays of the Sun is Jesus! GOD IS LIGHT! GOD IS LOVE! GOD IS LIBERTY! GOD LIFTS US OUT OF DESPAIR TO A THRONE OF GRACE, MERCY, AND LOVE! Didn’t Paul tell us through his Colossians letter: “He [Jesus] is the image of the invisible God.” [Colossians 1:15], and then Colossians 1:22 says: “For in Him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell.”

“Wondrous love so full of Life, Wondrous Love subsiding strife, Wondrous Love to us is given, Wondrous Love translates to Heaven. Wondrous Love, there rings the Bell, Wondrous Love delivered us from Hell. Wondrous Love, Jesus came to show God, Jesus, and the Spirit One in the Same. Wondrous Love to set us free, No longer a captive of Satan to be. Wondrous Love, God’s Son was groaning, because of His Love from sin Atoning!” Paul said in Romans 5:8, “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners CHRIST DIED FOR US,” What an AWESOME REVELATION! The word ‘demonstrates’ is from a Greek word meaning “to commend, establish, stood near, consists” or “holds together”! In Ephesians 4 Paul had been talking about “the equipping of the saints for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the Body of Christ,” Verse 12, and then said in Verse 15, “but speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head – Christ – Verse 16, from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love.” NOW…

How do we rationally, faithfully, responsibly, practically, put all this together to honor God’s faithfulness to us?

• GOD HIMSELF PROVED, COMMENDED, DEMONSTRATED HIS LOVE TOWARD ALL MEN! What does John 3:16 say? “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes (trusts in, relies upon, adheres to) in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
• GOD KNEW, UNDERSTOOD, GRASPED THE SORROWFUL TRUTH THAT MEN’S SIN BROUGHT SEPARATION FROM HIM! I don’t know who wrote it, but they sure understood sin’s consequence ! “Sin is man’s declaration of independence of God.” It was John Bunyan in “The Pilgrim’s Progress” who wrote: “”One leak will sink a ship; and one sin will destroy the sinner,” and God’s intent is to resurrect dead, destroyed sinners who have been separated from His eternal love!
• GOD SOVEREIGNLY DETERMINED ONLY A SINLESS SACRIFICE WAS SUFFICIENT, SUPREMELY EFFECTIVE, TO SAVE SINFUL MAN FROM HIMSELF, HIS SIN, AND RECONCILE HIM TO HOLY GOD! Romans 6:23 tells us, “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Paul had told the church at Rome, and us, in Romans 5:21, “so that as sin reigned in death, even so grace might reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” Oh, then Paul really dispelled the phoniness of some modern-day teachings, that Christians can’t do anything but sin until they get to heaven! Romans 6:1-3, 10 says: “What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Certainly not! How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it? Or do you not know that as many of us were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? Verse 10, For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God.”

Oh, and, yes, please read carefully, contemplate, receive, and stand on Oswald Chambers’ words about Romans 5:10 which says: “For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be (being) saved by His life,” Chambers saying, “The salvation of God does not stand on human logic, it stands on the sacrificial death of Christ Jesus. We can be born again because of the Atonement of our Lord. Sinful men and sinful women can be changed into new creatures, not by their repentance or their belief, but by the marvelous work of God in Christ Jesus which is prior to all experience. The impregnable safety of justification and sanctification is God Himself. We have not to work out these things for ourselves; they have been worked out by the Atonement. The supernatural becomes natural by the miracle of God; there is the realization of what Jesus Christ has already done – “It is finished”!

God’s Heavenly Love made practical for us? 2 Corinthians 5:21, “For He [God] made Him [Jesus] who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.”

• AMAZING LOVE? GOD IN CHRIST “DIED ON THE CROSS” FOR YOU! Amazing love? If you were the only person who had ever lived – past, present, future – on the Cross Jesus would have died there JUST FOR YOU! “God commended His love for us, in that while we were yet sinners, CHRIST DIED FOR US!” Can YOU say, “Christ died for me”?

I don’t know how you respond to that, but in Job 42:5-6 we read: “I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees You. Therefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes.” To see Jesus on the Cross dying just for you, is to see yourself as God sees you, yet He loves you anyway – and PROVES HIS LOVE!

Dr. James Kennedy, in his book, “The Presence of a Hidden God,” [p.191], wrote: “Just imagine for a moment that God were NOT love. Suppose, instead, that God were a cosmic ogre, playing with people like grasshoppers in a bottle – suppose God were a demon, filled with malevolent hatred, or suppose God were an impersonal force, like fate or some machine that had no feeling, no sympathy whatsoever toward mankind.”

But THAT’S NOT OUR GOD OF CALVARY’S CROSS! Oh, there are those who truly wish God were dead, but even to them the Cross and empty tomb still stand as expressions of eternal love for eternal fools! “The fool has said in his heart, ‘there is no God’!” But, history stands: Our God is the God who will not die – we serve a Risen Savior!

You need to know it if you haven’t heard it: “We love Him because He first loved us!”

An old hymn says it like this: “See, from His head, His hands, His feet, Sorrow and love flow mingling down; Did e’er such love and sorrow meet, Or thorns compose so rich a crown?”

Do you understand? It’s only in seeing Jesus suffer, bleed and die for our sins that one truly discovers, discerns, and depends on the love of God! Here’s how Spurgeon put it long ago: [Spurgeon’s Sermons, Vol.9, p.311],

“Again, our love to God does not spring from the self-determining power of the will. I greatly question whether anything does in the world, good or bad. There are some who set up the will as a kind of deity – it does as it wills with earth and heaven; but in truth the will is not a master but a servant. To the sinner his will is a slave; and in the saint, although the will is set free, it is still blessedly under bonds to God. Men do not will a thing because they will it, but because their affections, their passions, or their judgments influence their wills in that direction. No man can stand up and say, “I, unbiased and unaided, will to love God and I will not love Satan.” Such proud self-assuming language would prove him a liar; the man would be clearly a worshipper of himself. A man can only love God when he has perceived some reasons for doing so; and the first argument for loving God, which influences the intellect so as to turn the affections, is the reason mentioned in the text: ‘We love Him because He first loved us.”

God Himself established forever His love for you as Jesus suffered, bled, and died on the Cross! God demonstrated! God proved His love for YOU at Calvary! Now, how is that awesome understanding maintained productively and efficiently day by day? Look at Romans 5:5! “Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been POURED OUT IN OUR HEARTS BY THE HOLY SPIRIT WHO WAS GIVEN TO US.”

History! Historic presence and power! Romans 5:6 then says, “For when we were still without strength (“helpless”), in due time Christ died for the ungodly.” We were without strength, helpless, hopeless in ourselves – “but Christ died for the ungodly.” We were “enemies” but reconciled to God through the death of His Son, Romans 5:10, and having been reconciled, “we shall be [being] saved by His life.”

History? John Piper, in his book “The Pleasures of God,” [p.165], wrote: “Jesus wants us to see that His willingness to lose His life is because of His love for the glory of the Father.” He then quoted John 17:4, Jesus speaking to the Father, “I have glorified You on the earth. I have finished the work which You have given Me to do.”

Then Piper said: “All of Jesus’ work was designed to honor the worth of His Father’s glory. Everything Jesus suffered, He suffered for the sake of God’s glory. Therefore, all His pain and shame and humiliation and dishonor served to magnify the Father’s glory, because they showed how infinitely valuable God’s glory is, that such a loss should be suffered to demonstrate its worth.”

And what about your life, your walk, your calling, your purpose? Is it to honor the worth of the Father’s glory? How did Paul put it? 1 Corinthians 10:31, “Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.”

Let me close this chapter with words again from Oswald Chambers out of “My Utmost For His Highest.” (p.238). “The tendency is to look for the marvelous in our experience; we mistake the sense of the heroic for being heroes. It is one thing to go through a crisis grandly, but another thing to go through every day glorifying God when there is no witness, no limelight, no one paying the remotest attention to us. If we do not want mediaval haloes, we want something that will make people say – ‘What a wonderful man of prayer he is! What a pious devoted woman she is!’ If you are rightly devoted to the Lord Jesus, you have rightly reached the sublime height where no one ever thinks of noticing you, all that is noticed is that the power of God comes through you all the time.” Revelation 1:4-5 is John’s hymn of praise! “Grace to you and peace from Him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven Spirits who are before His throne, and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler over the kings of the earth. To Him who loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood…” AMEN?

CHAPTER TEN

THE UNPREDICTABILITY OF LOVE?

Sacred, holy marriage is not unpredictable but assured because the Christian commitment is in the ‘spirit of Christ’ who laid His life down for all, not the few! “God so loved THE WORLD that He gave His only begotten Son!” Giving in marriage Sacred, holy marriage is not unpredictable but assured because the Christian, yielding to, clinging to, devoted to, is not a ‘sacred vow’ one makes “if everything goes well or goes ‘my way’”!

There are interesting Verses in Matthew 18:3-4 when Jesus said to His new disciples, “Assuredly, I say to you, unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore whoever humbles himself as this little child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.”

But is there “the kingdom of marriage” planned, instituted, and blessed by Almighty God with the clear understanding of marriages’ predictability of unending love as man and wife, before Holy God, who consecrate themselves and their marriage to Him and to each other?

Oh, but then in Matthew 18:4 God identifies why for some THERE IS “the unpredictability of love”! “Therefore whoever humbles himself (herself) as this little child IS the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.” Are there those who do NOT humble themselves before God, “in marriages”, because ‘self-rule, fleshly desires, and warped biblical understandings let the flesh do as it pleases’?

I’ve often wondered, over my 80 years of life, having lost my family at the age of three, taken by my mother to live with her parents, my grandparents, from age three to twelve. But then my mother married again and took me to live with her and my step-dad. And I lived day by day filled with doubt if I’d truly be loved in the spirit of Christ’s ‘predictable love’ –“I’ll never leave you nor forsake you”! And His predictable love never faltered or failed, faithfully released through my grandparents, their two daughters, one six years older than me, the younger only two years older than me – and they were stout witnesses on His unending love and grace and mercy!

And, of course, in a world of ‘free will’, men and women sometimes live with, yes, the ‘unpredictability of love’ because they choose to be ‘lord’ over their own destinies! What did Jesus say in Matthew 18:3? “…unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven.” Of course, the question of the here and now is, is there “the kingdom of heaven in marriage, and do I or we enter it with or without that assurance that Holy God will bless, oversee, and fulfill His promises to us and through us, as we stand true to our ‘sacred vows’”?

I really find it interesting and informative to read Paul saying in Galatians 4:19, “My little children, for whom I labor in birth (pains?) again until Christ is formed in you.” Just as in the spiritual realm of babyhood in Christ, children in Christ, youth in Christ, and adulthood in Christ, is it true in marriage, that there is a path and pilgrimage in the journey that, yes, REQUIRES patience, steadfastness, and heavenly glee over every new step of maturing as we “grow in grace” in ‘marital blessing’ and ‘marital fulfillment’, and ‘marital pleasure’?

But some step into the holy ground of marriage with only ‘my will, my pleasure as I define it, my desire for what I want in my marriage’, not the good, acceptable, or perfect will of God!

Reading through Jeremiah recently, I saw in Jeremiah 4:1 a very powerful word from God that I believe relates not only to national blessing in submitting wholly to God’s will, but, yes, even in marriage! God spoke through the prophet saying, “If you will return, O Israel,” says the Lord, “Return to Me; and if you will put away your abominations out of My sight, THEN YOU SHALL NOT BE MOVED.”

Is it possible that in marriage some “CHOOSE” to fall away from the very Spirit of Sovereign God and choose to live by the ‘best’ and the ‘worst’ of fallen flesh rather than the Word, the will, and the Spirit of God Himself, experiencing not, ‘shall not be moved’, but seeing the foundation of biblical faith in marriage ignored, denied, or overlooked and ‘moved away’ from true devotion to one another? And Jeremiah 4:2 then says, “And you shall swear, ‘The Lord lives,’ in truth, in judgment, and in righteousness,” with God then saying, “The nations (including the sovereign nation of marriage’?) SHALL BLESS THEMSELVES IN HIM, AND IN HIM THEY SHALL ‘GLORY’.”

I love Oswald Chambers’ word in his book, “My Utmost For His Highest”, (p.269), when he said, “The battle is lost or won in the secret places of the will before God, never first in the external world ( world of the flesh- control rather than Spirit or Word controlled! JFF). The Spirit of God apprehends me and I am obliged to get alone with God and fight the battle out before Him. Until this is done, I lose every time (barring divine will and Spirit and glorifying ‘flesh’ and ‘selfishness’ even in the sacredness of marriage! JFF). The battle may take one minute or a year, that will depend on me, not on God; but it must be wrestled out alone before God, and I must RESOLUTELY go through the hell of a renunciation (of ‘selfishness’ in one’s marriage JFF) before God. Nothing has any power over the man (and I say his marriage! JFF) who has fought out the battle before God and won there.” ( But don’t you find Chambers’ words very strange across the marriage world of the U.S.A. today?)

In the Chicago Tribune, Heidi Stevens, Contact Reporter of Tribune Newspapers said: “With more Americans than ever saying ‘I Don’t’ to marriage, it’s time to reinvent the institution.” In her October 7, 2014 article she said: “Fewer Americans are married than ever before, and a growing percentage are happy to stay unhitched.” She went on:

“A Pew Research Center analysis of 2012 census data found that one in five adults age 25 and older – roughly 42 million people – have never been married, meaning the United States is made up of a historically high number of single people. (In 1960 by comparison just one in 10 adults 25 and older had never been hitched).”

In her article she quoted Susan Pease Gadoua, licensed therapist and co-author of “The New ‘I Do’: Reshaping Marriage For Sceptics, Realists, and Rebels.” (Seal Press). She said: “Analysts cite such factors as the rising median age for first marriages, an increased acceptance of cohabitation, and difficult economic times for the increase in singles. But our views of marriage – an institution celebrated and sanctified in every real from the spiritual to the retail – are changing too. When analyzing the census figures, Pew researchers asked people how valuable marriage is for society at large. A full 50 per cent of respondents said society is ‘just as well off if people have other priorities’.” That, my friend, is a shocking observation!

But, do YOU believe “marriage” is a sacred institution, a strong center of witness to the glory of God, in a marriage where both husband and wife live together to honor and glorify Him in and through their holy marriage? The day a husband and wife say, “I Do”, that’s the day, in that present moment and every day to follow, when mutually they agree, “We’re united together to glorify Him in our marriage!” There is an interesting, convicting, awakening Word in Hebrews 13:4, when the author, inspired by the Holy Spirit, wrote: “Marriage is honorable among all, and the bed, undefiled; but fornicators and adulterers God will judge.”

And don’t you find it so enlightening to continue in Hebrews 13:5-6 when the author wrote: “Let your conduct (in marriage?) be without covetousness; be content with such things as you have. For He Himself has said, ‘I will never leave you nor forsake you.’ So we may boldly say:

‘THE LORD IS MY (OUR?) HELPER; I will not fear. What can man do to me?’” Or, maybe, ‘What can my mate do to me to obliterate ABIDING LOVE, SOVEREIGN OVERSIGHT, AND FAITHFUL PROVISION OF WHAT IT TAKES TO HONOR HIM THROUGH YOUR MARRIAGE IN YOUR, YES, SERVANT SPIRIT”? Didn’t Christ Jesus say, “I didn’t come to be served but to serve and to give My life as a ransom for the many”?

It was just today that I heard Roberta Flack’s singing of the song “EVER I SAW YOUR FACE” (by Evan Mccoll by way of THE ROYAL NETWORK INC.). I have chosen to change the words from her chosen male love to the LOVE of the Glory and Honor of God through His redemptive work by Christ on Calvary’s Cross. My edited words?

“The first time I saw Your face, I thought the Son rose in (or through Your eyes). And the moon and stars were the gifts You gave, To the dark and endless, eternal skies.

The first time I ever kissed Your (hand) I felt the earth move in my heart! Like the trembling heart of a captive bird That was there at the time you COMMENDED AND COMMANDED Your love to me.

And the first time I ever “rested” in You I felt Your heart so one in mine, And I knew Your joy would fill the earth and last forever, my greatest love…

The first time ever I saw Your face, Your face, Your face…I knew I was covered by Your grace!” Amen?

I feel led to share a letter my wife Sue wrote to her mother, probably 10-15 years before her mother died. The mother, having read the letter, gave it to Sue’s sister, Amy Rodgers, probably to alert the younger daughter of her sister’s ‘radical’ views of New Testament ‘discipleship’ –( unsure of why Virginia did that). But…Sue wrote:

Dear Mother, I sure hope you are better! Margaret (the one who drove me to the doctor), called me yesterday and Jamie, her oldest daughter has bronchial pneumonia. When Stan (our second son) had pneumonia when he was a child, they took a smear of mucous from his nose to determine the kind of medicine to use. Did they do that with you?

The Millers (the judge from Oklahoma) and their two children came back through and spent Saturday night with us, so they could go to the Bible Study at Thomas Baird’s Sunday morning (Thomas being a lead attorney in his law firm and co-elder with Farrell in our fellowship in Belton). And Susan and Ted Owenby to go with us, too. (They had left at 5a.m.). Farrell had smoked a turkey Saturday and I made dressing and fixed green beans and new potatoes, and triffle for dessert. So we had that Saturday night with the Millers and Sunday noon again with the Millers and Owenbys. The Millers left Sunday afternoon and the Owenbys left Tuesday afternoon.

So I spent yesterday cleaning house to get ready for the Bible study group last night. And Farrell studied, cleaned the carpet in the trailer, and started building a sidewalk up from the steps to the back gate. He built a frame and dug up all the grass and leveled it off. And he’s going to lay flat stones and concrete.

Our garden is doing great. We will have a lot of yellow squash by this weekend and we have lots of tomatoes about the size of grapes and lots more blooms. The beans, cucumbers, peppers, and zucchini squash have lots of blooms, too. And we got some onions yesterday, and should start getting potatoes next week. The okra is coming along, but needs more hot weather. And we have lots and lots of greens!

Farrell and I saw the dermatologist Tuesday and we look like we’ve been in a fight and both lost! He burned off places on Farrell’s face and arms. He then cut off and burned off moles on my neck, chest and mid-drift. And then removed a lot of the whiteheads between my brows. We are a sight!

Stan and LeAnn are coming down for Monday and Tuesday and Zach is going to stay with us until Friday. Farrell is supposed to preach at a church in Dallas Sunday the 21^st, so we’ll take him back with us, and spend the weekend up there. We are supposed to leave for Montana with Vaughn and Joyce Baird.

We are looking forward to the trip, but dread those long days of riding. But we really want to see that part of the country. I just have to figure out how to take a “tee-tee pot” or wear adult diapers!

Mother, I enjoyed having you here so much. And you have a home here where you would be welcome and loved if you ever want it or need it.

I know that what we are all about (in the “faith-realm”) is a real puzzle to you, and I wish I could help you understand. You think that we are against everything and critical of everything and everybody. And I am so sorry it comes across that way. I want to give you a simple illustration. If you were driving down a road and discovered the bridge was out and that if anyone went over it, it would mean certain death. Wouldn’t you flag cars down and do all you could to warn the drivers of the danger ahead? Now you might look a little crazy out in the middle of the road flapping your arms and screaming, and some folks might choose to go right on by you, as they discuss that crazy person out in the road. And they might even roll up their windows and lock their car doors “to protect themselves” from the nut in the road.

Well, the bridge is out – it has been out for a long time, and we are the “nuts” out in the road, warning of the washed-out bridge of true, redemptive faith in and through Christ alone! And we aren’t alone, though sometimes it seems like it! It is happening all over this country and the other countries we have visited. People are meeting in homes, barns, gyms, store fronts etc. sharing their lives, studying God’s Word, weeping over and praying for the church (not only ‘criticizing’ as some say, but exposing extreme errors in their ‘faith’)! Some we stand with are so hungry for “GOD” and “REALITY OF THE TRUE FAITH” that they refuse to play the religious ‘games’ any longer. They refuse to close their eyes and stick their heads in the sand and say something is working that does not work – call it powerful when it is weak and helpless, call it alive when it is dead, and has been dead for years! Paul said that in his day and beyond men would have a “form” of Godliness, but denying its power. A form of Godliness is not Godliness! But it causes great deception and gives a false ease and a false peace. I heard a homosexual on the news the other day, dying of aids, saying it would soon be over and he would be in heaven. Yet the Scripture is real blunt and says NO homosexuals will be in heaven. But the churches say “God is love” and we must love and we must not criticize and judge. Most churches won’t dare tell anyone they are going to Hell, so the homosexuals and lesbians, most of them without true repentance and life- change through Christ’s shed blood, die and go to Hell “thinking” they are going to heaven. That is not love if one denies God’s Truth! Denying Truth is rebellion to God and His Word. So they shake their fists in God’s face and saying His way and Truth isn’t right, “we have a right to be what WE want!” But the “bridge of Truth” is still out for many and they go over the self-determined brink and perish in Hell!

We saw it experientially for years and then began to see it in the Holy Word, Old and New Testament. It didn’t sneak up on God! The prophets of old prophesied about the declining, compromising, ‘flesh-approving’ churches! Proverbs calls her “the strange woman, the whore, the harlot” – claiming to be married to the Lord and in bed with the world, the flesh, and the devil, and with sin and every evil thing.

Look at Colossians 3:5-10. In Verse 5 Paul said that immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire and greed are all idolatry! My, my, I thought for years that idols were only in foreign countries. Then, I think it is in Romans, that Paul said that there are demons behind every idol, and that, when you participate in what God hates, you are actually worshipping demons.

The condition of the homes and children and youth of many ‘church’ parents is evidence enough! But the condition of our whole country screams out that “the church is dying or dead already”! The upsurge of Satan worship is the result of the absence of God in too many churches – no power, no truth, no help – only a ‘form of godliness’!

A law enforcement officer on the news the other night, said that he did not believe it would be an exaggeration that witchcraft and Satan worship is practiced in every town in America, and animal sacrifices and possibly human sacrifices (babies particularly!) are performed in all of their gatherings! And the poor, big, rich, weak, dead churches are “totally helpless” to do anything about it (or just don’t want to!). They don’t even believe in demons – that is not for the ‘sophisticated’, well-educated, cultured people (which Jesus was not!). Many do not even believe there is a devil or a hell.

Well, I didn’t mean to turn this into a sermon. And I know I can’t make you see anything – only God and His Word can – I pray He will. I know we look strange. As time goes on it will be more exaggerated. We aren’t a part of this world system, and we feel our job is to call people out, to Him and His Word! It can’t be cleaned up, straightened up, or rehabilitated. The Bible calls Satan the ‘god’ of this world. So, it has to be forsaken. And in most cases many churches have become a part of the natural world – in fact, if you are honest you can’t tell the difference. So our emphasis is on the only True God who is powerful and mighty to set men free from the power and bondage of sin and to give them clean hands and pure hearts – without which they/we will not see God.

Jesus wept over Jerusalem and said, “Oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem – who stoned the prophets…” And then when Jesus told the Jews they didn’t know God and that they were worshipping Satan, they shut Him up, too, imprisoned Him, then crucified Him! And history repeats itself, always. I think it was Will Rogers who said, “If there is no God, nothing matters. If there is a God, nothing else matters!” Hence the magnificent obsession and possession.

We Love You, Sue and Farrell…..P.S. I’ve included a statement by Martin Luther that we ran across some years ago. His statement? “I WAS BORN TO FIGHT DEVILS AND FACTIONS. IT IS MY BUSINESS TO REMOVE OBSTRUCTIONS, TO CUT DOWN THORNS, TO FILL UP QUAGMIRES, AND TO OPEN AND MAKE STRAIGHT PATHS. BUT IF I MUST HAVE SOME FAILING LET ME RATHER SPEAK THE TRUTH WITH TOO GREAT SEVERITY THAN ONCE TO ACT THE HYPOCRITE AND CONCEAL THE TRUTH.”

What you’ve just read is a powerful love letter from a daughter to her mother that she personally and passionately loved and longed for her to understand what following Christ truly means!

If Hebrews was meant to speak to those around Jesus’ day who had the prophetic letters of the Old Testament, swore by them, but failed to see “Christ in them as the hope of glory” can church folk today, many, not all, “refuse Him who speaks”, even Jesus Himself? In Hebrews 12:25-29 we read:

“See that you do not refuse Him who speaks. For if they did not escape who refused Him who spoke on earth, much more shall we not escape if we turn away Him who speaks from heaven, whose voice then shook the earth; but now He has promised, saying, ‘Yet once more I shake not only the earth, but also heaven.’ Now this, ‘Yet once more’, indicates the removal of those things that are being shaken, (Old Testament Judaism and a man-made temple?), as of things that are made, that the things which cannot be shaken may remain.

Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us have grace, by which we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear. For our God is a consuming fire. (That’s Christ Jesus!).”

In Psalm 25:12-15 we find, not the unpredictability of love, but its grace and assurance! It says: “Who is the man who fears the Lord? Him shall He (God) teach in the way which He chooses. He himself shall dwell in prosperity, and his descendants shall inherit the earth. The secret of the Lord is with those who fear Him (honor and reverences Him first in their lives!), and He will show them His covenant. My eyes are ever toward the Lord, for He shall pluck my feet out of the net.” (Sad to say, there are some who don’t even know they are trapped in the world and its religious system, in their ‘flesh’ allegiance!).

Whether kingdoms of the world or the ‘kingdoms of marriage’, before Holy God IS there an accounting to take place by Him? What did God say to the ‘pretending’ nation of Israel who crucified the Christ, the Promised Messiah? In Matthew 21:43-44 Jesus spoke! “Therefore, I say to you (Israel), the kingdom of God will be taken from you and given to a nation bearing the fruits of it. And whoever falls on this stone (the Rock of Christ?) will be broken; but on whomever it falls, it will grind him to powder.”

How many marriages do you know of, whether one or both partners in the marriage were “ground to powder” because they had no desire, no insight, no agreement with the purpose of God for the relationship, even after ‘holy vows’ and/or holy pledges before Him?

Elsewhere in Matthew 21:33-42 plus Verse 43, examine it related to “the kingdom of marriage”! Jesus said: “Hear another parable: There was a certain landowner who planted a vineyard and set a hedge around it, dug a winepress in it and built a tower. And he leased it to the vinedresser and went into a far country. Now when vintage-time drew near, he sent his servants to the vinedressers, that they might receive its fruit. And the vinedressers took his servants, beat one, killed one, and stoned another.

Again he sent other servants, more than the first, and they did likewise to them. Then last of all he sent his son to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son. But when the vinedressers saw the son, they said among themselves, ‘This is the heir. Come, let us kill him and seize his inheritance’. So they took him and cast him out of the vineyard and killed him. Therefore when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those vinedressers?” They said to Him, “He will destroy those wicked men miserably, and lease his vineyard to other vinedressers who will render to him the fruits in their seasons.”

Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the Scriptures: ‘The stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. This was the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes?’” [How “marvelous” do YOU find the work of God’s Sovereign Grace through Christ?].

Verse 43-44 is so important! “Therefore, I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken from you and given to a nation bearing the fruits of it. And whoever falls on this stone will be broken; but on whomever it falls, it will grind him to powder.” Can you relate these last eleven verses to ‘the kingdom of marriage’? In your ‘kingdom of marriage’, tell me about “the fruit of it” that reveals the honoring, the uplifting, and the glorifying of Christ through your relationship to your mate! Remember, Jesus said, “I didn’t come to be served but to serve and to give My life as a ransom for many.”

Is ‘the stone’ of your marriage relationship evidence of the fruit of the Spirit of Christ, serving, or do flesh-masters insist on their way or the highway? Are you aware that many in the marriage relationship avoid it being ‘mastered by the Master’, satisfied to make it “a den of thieves”?

God, help us in America to witness the revival, renewal, and reclaiming of Your ordained way to honor You! Amen?

CHAPTER ELEVEN

“BAD NEWS OR GOOD NEWS?”

By J. FARRELL FISHER, APRIL 10, 2017

In Proverbs 25:25 we read, “As cold water to a weary soul, so is good news from a far country.” I clearly understand that, because for 25-30 years I traveled 3-6 months a year, 3 weeks to 3 months at a time, equipping, encouraging, and, I pray, inspiring pastors in their ministries, plus proclaiming the Gospel in crusades and youth ministries, and at times I needed the cold water for a weary soul.

There are times when disciples of Christ become “weary souls”, but, thank God, for the encouragers rather than the “bad news bears”! In Genesis 27:46, Rebecca said to Isaac, “I am weary of my life because of the daughters of Heth; if Jacob takes a wife of the daughters of Heth, like these who are the daughters of the land, what good will my life be to me?”

At the same time some become wearied, yes, even from “bad, sad, maddening news”, but they are those who understand that the “good news” CAN overcome bad circumstances and events and, for others, it’s “news” that totally disheartens them, good news or bad news. But in fact, in Galatians 6:9, Paul wrote: “And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart.” In life’s journeys, some lose heart because they major on “bad news” rather than the “good News” of God’s grace, mercy, and love!

In Genesis 24:27 “the man” said: “Blessed be the Lord God of my master Abraham, who has not forsaken His mercy and His truth toward my master. As for me, being in the way, the Lord led me to the house of my master’s brethren.” How interesting do you personally find that! “As for me, being in the way, the Lord led me…”? Dare I say to you in beginning, “To not be in the Way, the Truth, and the Life of Christ, is to be traveling on the highway of “bad news”, yet, at the same time, some have committed to the True Way of “good news” yet willfully wander or are deceived by “the powers of darkness” and choose “rough roads” rather than the “Welcome Highway” of goodness, graciousness, and gentleness of Spirit, even satisfied, at times, to ‘taste’ the “bad news” from their “fleshly choices”!

Be assured! Holy God does not Author the “bad News” of one’s life unless that person lives with “my way” to the point he/she doesn’t care for God’s “Amazing Grace” because he/she is wedded to “what I want, not what God declares AND demands”! How many do you know who favor their own ‘religious conceit’ to the divine will of God?

“Bad News” is consistency and devotion to one’s fallen sin nature, to the “stubborn will” of what one desires and not what God commands, to the ‘false peace’ of the godless, world-citizens, who write and observe their own constitutions, void of the will of God!

There are fleshly, devilish, worldly wedges called ‘self-pride, self-will, or self-justification and approval’ of “Who I am and what I desire apart from anything your God demands,” so they willfully choose the “bad news” of “My way – I do it my way – not what your God expects!” “Bad News”? “I’m deeply in love with my natural virtues and passionate about the ways of my godless world!” “There’s nothing evil about my ‘evil thoughts’, just a little bit of the beastly and lots of the demonic that makes my godless life fun, pleasurable, and enjoyable – you Christians ought to try it sometime!” I don’t know how some see it and say it without shame, but they do: “Most of humanity spends its best hours choosing between evils that are rampant all around them – jump in, have fun,” not knowing that’s a leap into the pit of Hell with the devil’s crowd!

“Bad News”? When you turn to the Book of Revelation, in Revelation 2, the heading of my New King James Version of the Bible, entitles Revelation 2:18 and following as “The Corrupt Church”. Certainly it fitted Thyatira, but it also can be an inspired Word of conviction for any compromising church, group of Christians, or even one professing disciple of Christ! Hear it!

Revelation 2:18-29 are words from the angelic messenger over Thyatira, And to the angel of the church in Thyatira write: “These things says the Son of God, who has eyes like a flame of fire, and His feet like fine brass. ‘I know your works, love, service, faith, and your patience; and as for your works, the last are more than the first. NEVERTHELESS I have a few things against you, because you allow that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess, to teach and seduce My servants to commit sexual immorality and eat things sacrificed to idols. And I gave her time to repent of her sexual immorality, and she did not repent.

Indeed I will cast her into a sickbed, and those who ‘commit adultery’ with her into great tribulation, unless they repent of their deeds. I will kill her children with death, and all the churches shall know that I am He who searches the minds and hearts. And I will give to each one of you according to your works.

Now to you I say, and to the rest in (Thyatira), as many as do not have this doctrine, who have not known the depths of Satan, as they say, I will put on you no other burden. But hold fast what you have till I come. And he who overcomes, and keeps My works until the end, to him I will give power over the nations – ‘He shall rule them with a rod of iron; they shall be dashed to pieces like the potter’s vessels’ – as I have also received from My Father, and I will give him the morning star. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says TO THE CHURCHES.”

“Bad News”? My dear friend, fellow classmate and football teammate at Baylor University, from 1956-1958, seminary classmate at Southwestern Seminary also, sent me a message about 8 years ago that was Vance Havner’s sentence about the ‘average Baptist church’ that I feel now is the right time to share it with you! Havner said: “If an airplane had as many useless parts as the average Baptist church, it’d fly about as fast as a canary with a sack of wheat tied to its tail!” But dare I say it? ‘Useless parts of any church today across the USA defined with a tied tail trying to fly that bag of wheat’?

“Bad News”? THERE IS LITTLE PROCLAMATION OF “EXCEPT YOU REPENT, YOU WILL ALL LIKEWISE PERISH!” In fact, most in our modern day simply say, “Join our church – and everything will be OK!” What you see across, around, within most churches today is what Walter Chantry, in his book, “Today’s Gospel – Authentic Or Synthetic?”, wrote about: “in love for souls, true evangelicals invariably present some profound truths in their witnessing. Yet by THE UNCONSCIOUS OMMISSION OF ESSENTIAL INGREDIENTS OF THE GOSPEL, many fail to communicate even that portion of God’s Word which they meant to convey. When a half truth is presented as the whole truth, it becomes an untruth.”

“REPENT!” Really? Is that in a church’s ‘salvation’ presentation? “FORSAKE!” Really? Isaiah 55:7-9 clearly says, God Himself speaking, proclaiming, informing: “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; LET HIM RETURN TO THE LORD, and He (the Lord Himself) will have mercy on him; and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon. For My thoughts are not your thoughts, now are your ways My ways,” says the Lord. “For as the heaven are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts.” AND THE FLESHLY PROUD UNBELIEVER SHAKES HIS FIST AGAINST HOLY GOD, AND TURNS TO HIS SINFUL WORLD TO SATISFY HIS ‘FLESH’ OR OLD, ADAMIC SIN-NATURE! And the fleshly sinner turns away from Holy God’s merciful invitation, trying to be ‘happy’ in himself rather than knowing “the Joy of the Lord”!

It was H.W.Webb-Peploe, in Kurt Bruner’s “Inklings of God”, (p.21) who said, “Joy is not gush; joy is not jolliness. Joy is perfect acquiescence in God’s will because the soul delights itself in God Himself.” Bruner closed out his book, saying, (p.193), “Every religion reminds me that I am made for more. Every religion reaches for God. Every religion offers to make the wrong right again. But only one religion, Christianity, is honest enough to tell me that I can’t solve my own problem. I can’t obey enough rules, offer enough sacrifices, or become enlightened enough to rise above the wretchedness around and within me. All I can do is humbly accept the redemption offered by the One who made me for more and who heroically sacrificed Himself on my behalf. It’s like the preacher told me when I was seven. I am a sinner who needs to be saved.”

Life without the Redeemer, the Atoner, the Savior and Lord, is a life like a bronze statue but void of God’s eternal Presence in and through Christ Jesus. Because to come to Him is to confess: “Without His Resurrection Life and Presence within me, I have no hope, no peace, no eternal purpose – I just ‘counterfeit’ what I have determined is my purpose and my chosen intent!” And Bruner, later in his book, used powerful, convicting words: (p94), “…air out of the illusion of adult omniscience.” And the problem with most of the unregenerate world? Daniel 5 tells us about “Belshazzar’s feast”, and Verses 3-4, unveils, not only an idolatrous worship then but unfolds what, I believe, the Spirit of God sees today in a lot of churches! “Then they brought the gold vessels that had been taken from the temple of the house of God which had been in Jerusalem; and the king and his lords, his wives, and his concubines drank from them. They drank wine, and praised the gods of gold and silver, bronze and iron, wood and stone.”

Dare I tell you that that ‘religious observance’, like much across the religious world today, is like ‘another angel coming down from heaven, having great authority’ – Revelation 18:1, and the earth (the present religious systems!) is now or will be soon “illuminated with his glory.” And he cried mightily: Verses 3-8, “For all the nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth have become rich through the abundance of her luxury. And I heard another voice from heaven saying, “Come out of her, My people, lest you share in her sins, and lest you receive of her plagues. For her sins have reached to heaven, and GOD HAS REMEMBERED HER INIQUITIES! [But today? Most in ‘churchianity’ profess “Glad our sins have been forgiven and that the loving God understands we can’t do anything but sin until we get to Heaven!”] HOW PHONY IS THAT, even to the words of Jesus: “Go, and sin no more!” (John 8:10-12!).

Three things out of John 8:10-12! 1. “Sin no more” because Christ Jesus says so! 2. “Sin no more” because of what sin does! 3. “Sin no more” because “sin” promotes “fleshliness” of the old sin nature that Christ took to the Cross – Christ Jesus gives, after repentance toward God and faith in His finished work at the Cross the “new life” of liberty and freedom from sin and the sin-nature bondage with His Presence within to be released as with Paul we “take the sentence of death to ourselves that His Resurrected Life will be manifested in our mortal flesh”!

False ‘religious hopes’ and ‘carnal mind-twisting of the Scriptures’, vague resemblances, cheap imitation, fleshly, fallible persuasions, a “give your best” mandate substituting what Christ did at the Cross for what one sees him/her capable of doing in one’s outer countenance and personal determination, puts many on ‘dirt roads’ rather than the Christ-constructed “Highway of Holiness”! And this ‘spirit’, this attitude, this fleshly-minded determination , may be why God inspired through Paul, in 2 Corinthians 13:5-6, to write: “Examine yourselves as to whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Do you not know yourselves – that Jesus Christ is in you? – unless indeed you are disqualified. But I trust that you will know that we are not disqualified, [Paul and the co-laborers traveling with him!].

Hear me! There are blessed assurances in the Word to the true believer who “leans not (even) to his own understanding, but in all his/her ways they acknowledge their “only hope” is Christ’s death, burial, resurrection, ascension, and moment by moment abiding with the true “born-again believer”, saying, “I’ll never leave you nor forsake you.” Glory!

Paul said in Galatians 1:15-16, “But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother’s womb and CALLED ME THROUGH HIS GRACE, to reveal His Son in me…,” with John saying in 1 John 3:24, “Now he who keeps His (Christ’s) commandments abides in Him, and He in him. And by this we know that He abides in us, by the Spirit whom He has given us.”

We know! Do you? Serious assurance and confidence flows out of the child of the King because they repent, they rest in His Resurrection presence with them, in them, through them, no longer ‘self-deceived hypocrites’, but living daily, yes, even moment by moment, “Lord, what do You desire to do in me and through me – I’m Yours?” And YOU KNOW you’ve been drawn to Him because YOU KNOW that you were born again, not of the will of men, but of God!” (John 1:13). Do you understand Ezekial 36:25-27, AND receive it? The Lord God speaks! “Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean (real water or the water of the Word?); I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them.”

Glory! A walk of grace, of divine favor, of the supernatural power of the Spirit of God!

I close with a writing I assume, by Max Lucado in his book, “In The Grace of God”, (Copyright, 1996 by Max Lucado, W Publishing Group, A division of Thomas Nelson, Inc. www. Thomas Nelson. Com). It’s entitled “What a God!” (p.55):

“Ponder the achievement of God.

He doesn’t condone our sin, nor does He compromise His standard.

He doesn’t ignore our rebellion, nor does He relax His demands.

Rather than dismiss our sin, He assumes our sin and, incredibly, sentences Himself.

God’s holiness is honored. Our sin is punished… and we are redeemed.

God does what we cannot do so we can be what we dare not dream: perfect before God.”

DO YOU UNDERSTAND? GOD’S GRACE IS GREATER THAN ALL OUR SIN!

William Hunter and J.H. Stockton wrote the old hymn, “The Great Physician”. It’s found in the Broadman Hymnal of Broadman Press, Inc., Nashville, Tennessee. It says: “The great Physician now is near, The sympathizing Jesus; He speaks the drooping heart to cheer, Oh, hear the voice of Jesus.

Your many sins are all forgiven, Oh, hear the voice of Jesus; Go on your way in peace to heaven, And wear a crown with Jesus.

All glory to the dying Lamb! I now believe in Jesus; I love the blessed Savior’s name, I love the name of Jesus.

Sweetest note in seraph song, Sweetest name on mortal tongue; Sweetest carol ever sung, Jesus, blessed Jesus.” AMEN?

CHAPTER TWELVE

“IMITATION ALLEGIANCE OR SOVEREIGN BIRTHING?”

There is an interesting Verse of the Holy Word in Isaiah 26:3 when the prophet spoke, saying, “You (God) will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on You, because he trusts in you.” But can there be, is there a ‘spirit’ today in many minds AND hearts focused on themselves, “my best”, one’s ‘spiritual determination to live godly’, but ignoring “You MUST be born again”? Dare I tell you that today there IS ‘a spiritual starvation diet’ though ‘devoted’ to “trying” to be acceptable to Holy God, clearly unaware that their old man with its old sin nature was crucified with Christ?

There IS a ‘religious climate’ today where “pretenders” announce their ‘right standing before God’ because “we are fully devoted in our best efforts to honor Him” – “Imitation Allegiance”! – when the Holy Word, through Paul, 2 Corinthians 10:4-6, unveils, not ‘imitation allegiance’ but “Sovereign Birthing”! It says: “For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every high thing (in a man’s fleshly mind!) that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ, and being ready to punish all disobedience when your obedience is fulfilled.”

Is ‘punishing all disobedience’ the exposing of every lawless deed that raises itself up in one’s disobedience in order to unveil the love, mercy, and grace of God for the spiritually needed, the ‘sinner’, the alienated and separated from God? Of course it is, but “imitators” sense no need to be “witnesses” to a godless generation, but at ‘peace’ that they are a part of the family of God, so no concern for the ‘imitators’ or deniers of Emmanuel, “God with us”!

Our ‘modern-day’ in American- evangelical circles is often guided by ‘suspicions’ rather than Revelatory Truths! Many in ‘modern-day’ religious circles are focused on idols of self-invention and not the Holy Word of God! Oh, they want to be ‘religious’, but ignore the path and Person of “blood redemption”! Look at many in Israel who ‘heard’ biblical Truth but still lived devoted to idols, sexual immorality, and the shedding of innocent blood! Of course, in America today, aborting babies is reasonable without any spiritual consequences! Really? In fact, Isaiah says, in Isaiah 28:15, Because you have said, “We have made a covenant with death, and with Sheol we are in agreement. When the overflowing scourge passes through, IT WILL NOT COME TO US, for we have made lies our refuge, and under falsehood we have hidden ourselves.”

Does that sound like a ‘life testimony’ based on falsehood, on deception, on the excusing of the sin-nature apart from the blood of the Lamb of God? Does that sound like ‘self or flesh vindication’ and an unwillingness to accept the crucifixion of the flesh and old sin-nature, but acceptance or adapting or affirming one’s independence from God, exalting ‘individuality’ as all their life is and will be without any consideration of divine, eternal intent?

You are aware of the multitudinous assumptions, not only of fallen men but even ‘religious devotees’, who create their own ‘canned faiths’, but are void of Resurrection Life, Resurrection Power, and Resurrection Hope! And just because one ‘attends’ a church and ‘professes’ faith does not mean that they are exemplary ‘unveil-ers’ of Christ’s indwelling presence!

I was awakened more to this ‘message-Truth’ when I came across Winston Churchill’s amazing word when serving as England’s stout leader! He said: “Man will occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of the time he will pick himself up and continue on,” just being a religious observer apart from ‘You must be born again’!

As I recently opened Isaiah’s prophetic word, in Isaiah 1:2, I was gripped by a convicting passage that I saw relating not only to the nation of Israel but even many ‘church-goers’ across the world! It says: “Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth! FOR THE LORD GOD HAS SPOKEN: ‘I have nourished and brought up children, and they have REBELLED AGAINST Me!”

“Sovereign Birthing” is not for a ‘believer’s desire’ to be religious apart from being ‘atoned for by the blood of the Lamb’, or ‘new-born’ in the sense that the ‘flesh’ has learned how to ‘perform’ religious leanings, or ‘pretending’, ‘imitating’, or at least ‘leaning’ toward Christian ideas! Isaiah continued in Isaiah 1:4 saying, “Alas, sinful nation (which was the majority of Israel, the chosen people of God!), a people laden with iniquity, a brood of evildoers, children who are corrupters! THEY HAVE FORSAKEN THE LORD, they have provoked to anger the Holy One of Israel, they have TURNED AWAY BACKWARD.”

Walter Chantry wrote a little book full of prophetic truth in 1970 entitled “Today’s Gospel – Authentic or Synthetic?” His ‘Introduction’ began, saying, “Evangelicals know that all is not well in their churches and missions. Behind the façade of glowing missionary reports and massive statistics there is a profound awareness that the church has little power in evangelism. While bravely trying to produce an aura of joy and victory among their followers, church leaders are uneasy and deeply dissatisfied with their present experience and the result of their efforts.”

As a disciple, a church, a pastor, a gathering of the “blood-bought”, certainly there IS a calling ‘out of the world’s ways’ but not abandoning them to their ‘lost estate’! True disciples are called to abandon their self-centered, idolatrous ways, and to faithfully yield to the Lord in submission and obedience to His every Word, including “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”Amen?

Is there ‘rebellion’ today in the church of the Lord Jesus Christ or a serious surrender to His calling with the church touching their world with “saving grace”? Charles Haddon Spurgeon, in his Volume 19, “Spurgeon’s Sermons,” (p.60) wrote: “The true church consists of men who are called, and faithful, and chosen. They are redeemed from among men, and called out from among their fellows by effectual grace. God the Holy Spirit continues to call out, and bring to the Lord Jesus, those who are chosen of God according to the good pleasure of His will.”

I often have wondered, over my, now, 80 years of life, how Acts 1:8 has become so buried in a ‘believer’s’ (?) mind, since you know, sadly, it’s not in most ‘church’ hearts, “But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” And, sadly, most Christians ‘prove’ their loyalty by church attendance but ignore His “Great Commission”! Are YOU, as a disciple of Christ, the ‘faithful witness’, the ‘ambassador of Christ’, the ‘openers to others’ of the Way, the Truth, and the Life, or do you emit an appearance of only a religious man without identity before God as a faithful sharer of the Truth to your needy friends, family, or a nation’s followers void and empty of Saving Grace and Mercy and Calvary’s love?

Again, Walter Chantry nailed it strong when in his book, (p.11), he wrote about ‘the church’ in our day, and individual Christians, “lowering their estimate of the value of truth.” He stated: “In a large congress on evangelism we could not insist on a truth of God’s Word that would offend ANY brother evangelical. Thus we must find the lowest common denominator to which all born-again Christians hold. The rest of the Bible will be labeled ‘unessential’ for missions. After all, unity (among Christians) is more essential than doctrinal preciseness,” and especially if it means we should be stressing evangelism and witnessing as one of the primary essentials of a “Live” congregation! God, help us!

If YOU did your ‘discipleship’ thesis, what would be your strong points of emphasis, besides one’s fellowship and communion with your Savior and Lord? Would it include “the just living by faith” AND the awareness of those who know nothing of justification, sanctification, and glorification? Come to Romans 1:16-32 – patience, please, as I share these 16 Verses! It says:

“For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes, for the Jew first and also for the Greek. For IN IT (the gospel of Christ!) the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, ‘The just shall live by faith.’

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse; because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened.

Professing to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man – and birds and four-footed animals and creeping things. Therefore God also gave them up to uncleanness, in the lusts of their hearts, to dishonor their bodies among themselves, who exchanged the truth of God for the lie, and worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.

For this reason God gave them up to vile passions. For even their women exchanged the natural use for what is against nature. Likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust for one another, men with men committing what is shameful, and receiving in themselves the penalty of their error which was due.

And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a debased mind, to do those things which are not fitting; being filled with all unrighteousness, sexual immorality, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, evil-mindedness; they are whisperers, backbiters, haters of God, violent, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, undiscerning, untrustworthy, unloving, unforgiving, unmerciful; who, knowing the righteous judgment of God, that those who practice such things are deserving of death, not only do the same but also approve of those who practice them.”

With that sad word of faithless men’s condition, please hear and receive God’s Word of intent for all men “in Christ”! Colossians 1:12-18 illumines our minds and hearts, granting us mercy and grace! Paul said: “giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light. He (God!) has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, in whom WE HAVE REDEMPTION THROUGH HIS BLOOD, THE FORGIVENESS OF SINS. (Is that so one can continue in it without any consequences? GIVE ME A BREAK! HOW UNGODLY IS THAT?)

He (Christ Jesus) is the image (exact likeness and identity) of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation (new creation!). For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. ALL THINGS WERE CREATED THROUGH HIM AND FOR HIM. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist (or ‘are held together’).

And He is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, THAT IN ALL THINGS HE MAY HAVE THE PREEMINENCE.” Do you see yourself as a “new creation” in Christ, having been redeemed by the blood of the Lamb? Are YOU “a partaker of the inheritance of the saints in the light (of His eternal glory)”? Have YOU been delivered from the powers of darkness and then, yes, conveyed into the Kingdom of the Son of God’s love? If Christ Jesus says, “You must be born again,” is that true of you? If it pleased Father-God that “in Christ” all the fullness should dwell, are YOU living in the fullness of the blessing of the gospel of Jesus Christ? Do you see yourself, new-born, having been conveyed into the kingdom of the Son of God’s love? And that’s here and now, not in the “sweet by and by”!

“IMITATION ALLEGIANCE OR SOVEREIGN BIRTHING”? Isn’t it true that James was inspired to unveil the sin of partial allegiance or obedience? In James 2:14-17 he wrote: “What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can faith save him? If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food, and one of you says to them, ‘Depart in peace, be warmed and filled,’ but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit? Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.”

To me, “imitation allegiance” is a half-hearted, compromising, convenient way of declaring ‘salvation in Jesus’ with no evidence of the “new-born life in Christ”! Several things I encourage you to deal with, examining your own mind and heart which God clearly reads:

• TO COMPROMISE THE LORD’S LIFE AND COMMANDS IS TO ACKNOWLEDGE DISOBEDIENCE AND TO STAND UNDER ALMIGHTY GOD’S JUDGMENT! Didn’t Jesus say, “Why do you call Me ‘Lord, Lord’, but you do not do what I say?”
• TO COMPROMISE IS TO ACKNOWLEDGE OUR UNDERSTANDING OF ITS CONSEQUENCES, INCREASING OUR ACCOUNTABILITY AND RESPONSIBILITY BEFORE THE GOD OF THE THRONE WHO RULES AND REIGNS IN RIGHTEOUSNESS, AWARE ONE’S OWN CHOICES HAS CONSEQUENCES! “Why do you call Me ‘Lord, Lord’ but you do not do what I say?”
• TO COMPROMISE IS TO DECAY OBEDIENCE, BRINGING ON THE OPEN DOOR TO THE DETERIORATION OF BIBLICAL MORALITY AND LORDSHIP HONOR! Do you think the Lord Jesus is pleased if, at least, you do half of what He says?
• TO COMPROMISE IS TO INVITE THE ABSENCE OF BLESSING AND ANOINTING, OPENING THE DOOR AGAIN TO “LIVING UNDER THE CURSE”! David came to the spiritual awareness of what betrayal to Holy God could bring! In Psalm 28 he stared spiritual danger in the face, cried out to Holy God, and was delivered! He said: “To You I will cry, O Lord my Rock: Do not be silent to me, lest, if You are silent to me, I become like those who go down to the pit.

Hear the voice of my supplications when I cry to You, when I lift up my hands (in surrender?) toward Your holy sanctuary. Do not take me away with the wicked and with the workers of iniquity, who speak peace to their neighbors, but evil is in their hearts.

Give them according to their deeds, and according to the wickedness of their endeavors; give them according to the work of their hands; render to them what they deserve.

Because they do not regard the works of the Lord, nor the operation of His hands, He shall destroy them and not build them up. Blessed be the Lord, because He has heard the voice of my supplications! The Lord is my strength and my shield; my heart trusted in Him, and I am helped;

Therefore my heart greatly rejoices, and with my song I will praise Him. The Lord is their strength, and He is the saving refuge of His anointed. Save YOUR PEOPLE, BLESS YOUR INHERITANCE; Shepherd them also, and bear them up forever.”

Reading Spurgeon recently in his “Spurgeon’s Sermons”, (Vol. 19,p.66), Spurgeon wrote and preached, no doubt, about Abram before he became Abraham. He said, God speaking to Abram, “You have left Ur of the Chaldees – the place of open sin; but you have not come to Canaan the holy.” Is that why some “professors of faith” never enter into their Land of Promise because, as Spurgeon said a few sentences later, “They are willing to be saved by the cross of Christ, but they are not willing to take up Christ’s cross, and come right out decidedly upon His side at all times.”

And “compromisers” have not the blessing of perfect peace, abounding joy, intimate fellowship with God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, but live with ‘religious appreciation’ of “imitation allegiance” but not Heaven’s blessing in and through Christ alone, knowing, yes, “Sovereign Birthing” by the Holy Spirit with “the seed of His eternal Word” blooming in their “new-born” Life in Christ! AMEN?

I’m so impressed with Isaac Watts and George F. Root’s hymn entitled, “There Is a Land of Pure Delight,” – and I believe it’s illumining the “Land of Sovereign Birthing”! It says: “There is a land of pure delight, Where saints immortal reign; Eternal day excludes the night, And pleasures banish pain.

There everlasting spring abides, And never withering flowers; Death, like a narrow sea, divides This heavenly land from ours.

Sweet fields beyond the swelling flood Stand dressed in living green; So to the Jews old Canaan stood, While Jordan rolled between.

But timorous mortals start and shrink To cross this narrow sea, And, lingering, shivering, on the brink, And fear to launch away.

Oh, could we make our doubts remove, Those gloomy doubts that rise, And see the Canaan that we love With un-be-clouded eyes!

Could we but climb where Moses stood, And view the landscape o’er, Not Jordan’s stream nor death’s cold flood Should fright us from the shore.” [Dare I tell you? I’m not frightened by ‘death’s cold flood’ because of Christ in me!

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHILDREN OF THE FLESH OR CHILDREN OF THE PROMISE

BY J. FARRELL FISHER, OCTOBER 2, 2014

Please, with all of your mental and spiritual feelings and faith, read Romans 9:1-5 with an alert mind and heart! It will reveal where one truly is in his/her faith walk of compassion for others or a lack of it. In Romans 9:1-5 it’s as if my aged Bible has been drenched again and again with tears of sadness. Paul wrote:

“I tell the truth in Christ, I am not lying, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Spirit, that I have great sorrow and continual grief in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my countrymen according to the flesh,…

Who are Israelites, to whom pertain the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the service of God, and the promises; of whom are the fathers and from whom, according to the flesh, Christ came, who is over all, the eternally blessed God. Amen.”

Christ Jesus, our Lord and Savior, came through the “seed of Abraham,” but not all of Abraham’s descendants became “children of promise”, but only children of flesh, because that was their level of commitment, living only with a desire to be “religious” apart from surrender to obedience to God’s Holy Word!

In Romans 10:1-4 Paul went on to write: “Brethren, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they may be saved. For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge…

For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, have not submitted to the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.”

Paul clearly understood, was spiritually heart-broken over the Israelites who had a “zeal for God,” but not according to the revelation-Truth of the life, death, burial, resurrection, and ascension of the True, Eternal, and Historic Christ that they never saw with spiritual eyes, understood, or comprehended, but willfully rejected Him, ignored Him, and, yes, willingly had Him crucified!

Most Israelites denied Jesus Christ, deplored His presence in their Holy Book, denounced His preaching, and declared His worthiness only of the Cross. They had no sorrow, but in the prophetic passage of Isaiah 53:3 we learn of Christ Jesus, “a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief.”

I recently found a writing by Harriet Beecher Stowe that speaks of sorrow: “Sorrow is divine. Sorrow is reigning on all the thrones of the universe, and the crown of all crowns has been one of thorns. There have been many books that treat of the sympathy of sorrow, but only one that bids us glory in tribulation, and count it all joy when we fall into divers afflictions, that so we may be associated with that great fellowship of suffering of which the incarnate Son of God is the head, and through which He is carrying a redemptive conflict to a glorious victory over evil. If we suffer with Him, we shall also reign with Him.”

Do you see and sense Paul’s sorrow over the Israelites denial of Jesus to be “that great fellowship of suffering” that you as a true believer in Christ Jesus share in? I have no hesitation in saying to you that grief, sadness, or sorrow are but the shadow of God’s Holy Presence over and around your life! It was Edwin Hubbell Chapin who said, “Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seamed with scars; martyrs have put on their coronation robes glittering with fire, and through their tears have the sorrowful first seen the gates of heaven.” Glory!!

And we’re examining “children of the flesh” or “children of the Promise” with Paul as a child of the Promise willing to forego His place “in Christ” if His Israelite “family” could take his place! But it doesn’t happen, can’t happen – before Holy God every man stands alone before Him to answer for himself – “What then did YOU Do with Jesus called the Christ?”

Listen to Romans 9:30-33! “What shall we say then? That Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have attained to righteousness, even the righteousness of faith; but Israel, pursuing the law of righteousness, has not attained to the law of righteousness. Why? Because they did not seek it by faith, but as it were, by the works of the law. For they stumbled at that stumbling stone…

As it is written: “Behold, I lay in Zion a stumbling stone and rock of offense, and whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame.”

The unbelieving Israelites “stumbled at the stumbling stone and stumbled over the rock of offense” [whose name is Jesus, the Promised Messiah] because they substituted self-effort for the Savior and Lord, and, yes, attempted self-improvement by trying to keep the Law given to expose their need of a Savior, and revealed by their disobedience to God’s revelation that they would establish their own righteousness and crucify God’s righteousness – and things haven’t changed thousands of years later!!

Have you forgotten or omitted what Isaiah had to say at least 700 years before the birth of Jesus Christ? It’s reported by Paul in Romans 10:16-17, “But they [Israel] have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, ‘Lord, who has believed our report?’ So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.”

Yes, the majority of Israel, then and now, have rejected God’s compassionate heart and redemptive Way, going about to establish their own worthiness and ability to “do right”, failing to understand from Adam and Eve onward, God determined all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, and are unworthy, taking us all, yes, ALL, and CRUCIFYING US ALL WITH CHRIST!!

What did Paul tell us in Galatians 2:20? “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me. Verse 27, I do not set aside the grace of God; for if righteousness comes through the law, then Christ died in vain.”

Jesus did not die in vain – He died in “VICTORY”!! Yes, He was then raised, by God, from the dead three days later, continuing to live in and through repentant, trusting, surrendered, believing “sinners” who by their repentance are now declared “saints,” servants of Christ, ambassadors of our Lord and Savior, messengers, earthly “point-men” of the Resurrected Christ, witnesses of His winning Way that in “death” there is the new reality of “Life in Christ” alone! In Galatians 3:26 Paul tells us, “For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus.”

And, having been crucified with Christ, birthed into the Kingdom as babes in Christ, indwelt by His Resurrection Life, it doesn’t mean that “babes in Christ” attain to instant adulthood in the faith, but we learn! It is why in Galatians 5:1 Paul wrote to us, “Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage.”

Have you ignored the Word in your daily walk? I remind you that Jesus tells us, “Man does not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.” I’ll guarantee you that most men eat physically three meals a day with snacks in between – but, please, tell me how spiritually the Word of God sits on a table and you only occasionally open it? You “LIVE” by the Word of God, you are to “HUNGER” for the Word of God, you “MATURE IN FAITH” by the Word of God!

Look at Colossians 2:9-10! “For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily; and you are complete in Him…” Oswald Chambers made a statement that aroused concern in me for “believers” who take lightly the importance of “studying to show yourselves approved unto God, a workman that needs not to be ashamed.” He said: “Disobedience in mind to the heavenly vision will make you a slave to points of view that are alien to Jesus Christ.”

Chambers wrote about a half-paragraph later: “We are apt to lie back and bask in the memory of the wonderful experience we have had. If there is one standard in the New Testament revealed by the light of God and you do not come up to it, and do not feel inclined to come up to it, that is the beginning of backsliding, because it means your conscience does not answer to the truth. You can never be the same after the unveiling of a truth. That moment marks you for going on as a more true disciple of Jesus Christ or for going back as a deserter.”

What do we find in John 6:60-68? It’s a startling revelation for some! It says: Therefore many of His disciples, when they heard this, said, ‘This is a hard saying; who can understand it?’ When Jesus knew in Himself that His disciples complained about this, He said to them, “Does this offend you? What then if you should see the Son of Man ascend where He was before? It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak to you are spirit, and they are life…

But there are some of you who do not believe.” For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were who did not believe, and who would betray Him. And He said, “Therefore I have said to you that no one can come to Me unless it has been granted to him by My Father.”…

From that time many of His disciples went back and walked with Him no more. Then Jesus said to the twelve, “Do you also want to go away?” But Simon Peter answered Him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of life.”

Disciples who “went back and walked with Him no more?” Was that “professors” who never fully surrendered to our Lord’s Indwelling Life? Was that “followers” who had never been freed from spiritual bondage? Was that sympathizers with a “cause” who never understood “divine change” from the old man to the new man, from the sinner to the “saint,” from the fleshly to the Spirit-led, from a temporal devotion and not eternal surrender to the Lord of all of life?

Too many ‘church-goers’ are those really who’ve never put their hands to the plow of the Lord in preparing the “fields of their lives” for His seed, fruit, and harvest! Too many so-called “believers” are just like Pharoah on a fleshly pursuit religiously for Moses, but Holy God had removed their ‘chariot wheels’ and Pharoah drowned in the deep waters without a “Life-Preserver” whose name is Jesus! Too many “scribes and Pharisees” impose ‘traditions’ apart from Truth and so burden the people trying to seek that they only are able to talk about their tiredness, their futility, their sadness, their darkness, and not the “Light of the world” whose name is Jesus!

“Children of the flesh” or “Children of the Promise”? What was Paul’s Prayer in Romans 10:1-3? “Brethren, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they may be saved. For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and seeking to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted to the righteousness of God.”

“Children of the flesh”? Without hesitation they are usually led by people who are “ZEALOUSY WRONG – EVEN OPPOSED TO THE REVELATION, UNVEILING, AND ACTUAL PRESENCE OF THE SAVIOR AND REDEEMER, WILLING ONLY THAT HE BE CRUCIFIED!”

That is a world of people who surround you totally indifferent to the Sacrifice of the Lamb of God to cover and wash away their sins by His precious blood! There is a world oblivious to His grace, mercy, and love! Oh, yes, some have a “zeal” FOR GOD, but they don’t even know, understand, or have a true desire to be reconciled to Him!

Have you ever been around those absolutely “zealous” for their church but void of redemptive love and a desire to truly honor the Lord and Savior through a surrendered walk to His Lordship? Have you ever been around those so vocal, so aroused, but off-base in every scriptural truth, and you wonder: ‘how many have bought their lies, misinterpretations, deceptions, and been led astray?’

But what about those who, yes, kill the opposition to their radical, devilish, unsound, ‘screwed-up’ teachings? It was Jesus Himself who said in Matthew 23:34-36, “Therefore, indeed, I send you prophets, wise men, and scribes; some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city, that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar. Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.”

You are aware that there were those, are those, who are so warped in their “religious minds” that they believe and believed that they were anointed servants doing God’s service killing others! How would you describe those unredeemed “scribes and Pharisees”? Would “self-righteous idiots” even get close? How about “spiritual ignoramuses”?

What was it Paul said in Romans 10:2-3? “For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and seeking to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted to the righteousness of God.”

Fleshly righteousness or divine righteousness? The sinners’ righteousness or the Savior’s righteousness? Self-righteousness or God’s righteousness? Self-improvement righteousness or Sovereign-declared righteousness? Ignorant righteousness or Spirit-inspired, implanted righteousness? A righteousness that declares one “guilty” before Holy God of a cheap imitation or Jesus’ righteousness that declares one eternally innocent before Holy God? “Fig-leaf righteousness” or “tree of life righteousness”? Head-strong righteousness or the “new Heart” righteousness? “My own estimation” righteousness or God’s robe of righteousness? God-insulting human attempts or God-inspired finished work? Righteousness by hook or by crook or righteousness in and through Christ alone? Feverish attempts tirelessly or the faithful Atonement truthfully, refreshing us without end? Righteousness in what we do or righteousness because of Who Jesus is and what Jesus did 2000 years ago on the Cross? Salvation by man’s grit or salvation by the Master’s grace? Salvation by one’s “best efforts” religiously or salvation by the willingness to rest in the “blood-bought” release from guilt and eternal separation and “death” by the sacrifice of Christ in “my,” “our,” “your,” behalf! DO YOU SEE, UNDERSTAND, RECEIVE, REST IN BEING “A CHILD OF PROMISE”?

I close this teaching with words from Oswald Chambers from his book, “My Utmost For His Highest,” [p.271], “The sign that God is at work in us is that He corrupts confidence in the natural virtues, because they are not promises of what we are going to be, but remnants of what God created man to be. We will cling to the natural virtues, while all the time God is trying to get us into contact with the life of Jesus Christ which can never be described in terms of the natural virtues.” Can I tell you, “Jesus crucified your worst and your best” so that you, as a child of promise could live by the Life of Another, yes, Emmanuel, “God With Us,” “God in us,” and “God through us”!! That’s “children of the Promises!!

CHAPETER FOURTEEN

“EVIDENCES OF NEW-BIRTH CONVERSION”

In his book entitled “Inklings of God”, Kurt Bruner used a quote by Winston Churchill in his Introduction that says: “Man will occasionally STUMBLE OVER THE TRUTH, BUT MOST OF THE TIME HE WILL PICK HIMSELF UP AND CONTINUE ON,” and I say, totally ignoring ‘divine intervention’!

But do YOU realize how true that statement is? And, especially when confronted by Christ Himself saying to us all, “You MUST be born again, born from above, born of the Spirit,” but many are offended, resentful, and continue on in unbelief.

I was impressed by Kurt Bruner when later in the same book, (p.147), he said, “Frankly, I embrace the Christian faith because it points to a God who expects us to behave ourselves but who also knows we can’t.” But do YOU also know that God KNOWS we can’t ‘redeem’ ourselves? Yet, man-made ‘religions’ worldwide think and act ‘synthetically’, thinking they are ‘authentically’ worshipping, even though like the Pharisees of Jesus’ day, deny Christ, the Promised Messiah, and deny His calling: “You must be born again”, and still today the ‘synthetic’ denies the “authentic”, “eternal reality of the Crucified, Resurrected Lord and Savior”!

And, sadly, many modern-day, so-called ‘Christian churches’, live in the façade of even active denial of “new birth” when they believe ‘church membership’ is the same!

Walter Chantry, in his writing, “Today’s Gospel,” (p.13), wrote: “Products of modern evangelism are often sad examples of Christianity. They make a profession of faith, and then continue to live like the world… ‘Decisions’ for Christ mean very little. Only a small proportion of those who ‘make decisions’ evidence the grace of a transformed life.”

But sadly a large number of American churches AND some preachers major on a “you can do it” mentality rather than “Christ in you the hope of glory”! No wonder Socrates became a well-appreciated philosopher! He once said: “To move the world we must first move ourselves.” Where do you find that in the Word of Almighty God? Didn’t Paul tell us, 2 Corinthians 1:9, [New Chain Reference Bible], “But we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God which raises the dead”?

Most humans all across the world in their nations, or here in the USA, are mostly oblivious to the state of their spiritual death and separation from Holy God! Spiritual success in life is not by the mental philosophy of ‘whatever you sense, you can succeed,’ which may have some ‘truth’ for the ‘flesh’, but has no relevance at all to the spiritual dimension that most know nothing about!

So many today, yes, even worldwide, are locked into the philosophy of ‘self-achievement’ so strongly that rewarding ‘self’ with pats on one’s back blocks, denies, ignores, or starves any Word, leaning, or turning from that ‘self’ to the “Savior”! Life is not a ‘do what you can’ mental philosophy, but an eternal opportunity to be ONE with God Himself through Christ alone!

It’s amazing to me, and exciting, as I read a statement by Benjamin Franklin. He said several hundred years ago,(?), “There is perhaps not one of our natural passions so hard to subdue as pride. Beat it down, stifle it, mortify it as much as one pleases, it is still alive. Even if I could conceive that I had completely overcome it, I should probably be proud of ‘my humility’.” That’s Why we were “crucified with Christ”!

Are you aware though, at times, of the “embarrassing encumbrances” that are brought on a lot of ‘church folk’ who are swamped by ‘self-importance’, who are drowning in ‘self-worth’ that Christ crucified, and stubbornly, stupidly, studiously in pagan teachings, devote themselves to “what we’ve become” apart from the revealed knowledge of God as to the Way, the only Way, to their salvation, healing, deliverance, and completion?

David F. Wells, in his book, “No Place For Truth,” [Wm.B.Eerdmans Publ. Com., Grand Rapids, Mich., & Inter-Varsity Press, Leichester, England, 1993], so unveiled for me a story that encouraged this message! [Introduction, p.10}” Wells wrote: “In saying that I am a staunch disbeliever in the modern world, I do not wish to appear immodest, as if I come finished with the knowledge of a new discovery. In fact, I do not. In this connection, I will remember G.K.Chesterton’s story about the restless yachtsman who set sail from England with the intention of arriving at an exotic South Sea Island. After many days, he sighted land and, as soon as he could, beached his boat and ventured inland. Before him stood a dreadful pagan temple. Undaunted, he decided to claim it for England. He scaled its walls and bravely planted the Union Jack [flag] at its pinnacle. Only then did he realize that what he had scaled was the Brighton Pavilion on England’s south coast! He thought he had sailed a straight line, but because of an unfortunate miscalculation he had ACTUALLY TRAVELED IN A CIRCLE. He imagined that he was first in the land, but it turned out that he was the last.”

Do you realize, sense, or discern, that many, many people begin their “religious journeys” on the basis of men’s speculations about what they think God expects rather than Jesus’ declaration: “You MUST be born again”?

Do you remember Paul saying in Romans 12:2, “And do not be conformed to this world, [and I would say also, “and don’t be conformed to a man-made religious world”!], but be {being} transformed by the renewing of your mind.” And what the Holy Word through Christ Jesus teaches is not simply a ‘mind change’ but a mind changed by the birthing of a new heart through our Lord’s love, grace, and mercy, AS A RESULT OF HOLY-SPIRIT-CONVICTION AND HOLY SPIRIT CONVERSION!

Several verses from John 3 that I want to use in the foundation and overview of this message: John 3:5-7 says: (Amplified Bible), Jesus answered, “I assure you, most solemnly I tell you, except a man be born of water (that’s the “water of the Word”!) and (even) the Spirit, he cannot [ever] enter the kingdom of God.[Ezekial 36:25-27].

What is born of [from] the flesh is flesh – of the physical is physical; and what is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not – do not be surprised, astonished – at My telling you, “You must all be born anew (from above).”

Oh, and then in John 3:16-21 (Amplified Bible) we read: ‘FOR god so greatly loved AND dearly prized the world that He [even] gave up His only-begotten (unique) Son, so that whoever believes in (trusts, clings to, relies upon) Him shall not perish – come to destruction, be lost – but have everlasting life.

For God did not send the Son into the world in order to judge – to reject, to condemn, to pass sentence on – the world; but that the world might find salvation and be made safe and sound through Him.

He who believes on Him – who clings to, trusts in, relies on Him – is not judged (he who trusts in Him never comes up for judgment; for him there is no rejection, no condemnation; he incurs no damnation). But he who does not believe (not cleave to, rely on, trust in Him) is judged already; (he has already been convicted; has already received his sentence) because he has not believed on and trusted in the name of the only begotten Son of God. – He is condemned for refusing to let his trust rest in Christ’s name.

The [basis of the] judgment (indictment, the test by which men are judged, the ground for the sentence) lies in this: that the Light is come into the world, and people have loved the darkness rather than and more than the Light, for their works (deeds) were evil. [Isaiah 5:20].

For every wrongdoer hates (loathes, detests) the light and will not come out into the light, but shrinks from it, lest his works – his deeds, his activities, his conduct – be exposed and reproved. BUT HE WHO PRACTICES TRUTH – who does what is right (according to God’s Word, will, and His ways!) – comes out into the light; so that his works may be plainly shown to be what they are, wrought with God – divinely prompted, done with God’s help, in dependence upon Him.”

“EVIDENCES OF NEW BIRTH CONVERSIONS”? FIRST, NO LONGER IS THERE THE DENIAL OF ONE’S ‘OLD MAN’ SIN NATURE AND SEPARATION FROM GOD BUT A PASSIONATE LONGING OF RECONCILIATION!

Sometimes it takes a Holy Word from God to release His deep conviction in one’s lost, alienated, separated from Him awareness in unbelieving hearts; and I believe 2 Peter 2:4-5 can be that ‘shock awareness’ in some hearts and minds! It says: [Amplified Bible], “For God [even] SPARED NOT ANGELS THAT SINNED, BUT CAST THEM INTO HELL, DELIVERING THEM TO BE KEPT THERE IN PITS OF GLOOM TILL THE JUDGMENT AND THEIR (FINAL) DOOM. And He spared not the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a preacher of righteousness, with seven other persons, when He brought a flood upon the world of ungodly [people].”

Notice! GOD DIDN”T EVEN SPARE ANGELS WHO SINNED BUT CAST THEM INTO HELL! GOD DIDN”T SPARE EVEN THE ANCIENT WORLD, EVEN ‘RELIGIOUS PRETENDERS’ CALLED “JUDAIZERS”, OR ‘PROMINENT’, WELL-KNOWN NATIONAL POLITICAL LEADERS, OR THE “DO MY BEST” CROWD OF the ‘self-anointed’ who worship and are devoted to their old sin natures as personal points of admiration to which they yield themselves!

In fact, Hebrews 10:25-31, my prayer is that “IT WILL SCARE HELL OUT OF YOU, IF NEEDED TO!” It says: “Not forsaking or neglecting to assemble together [as believers], as is the HABIT OF SOME PEOPLE, but admonishing – warning, urging and encouraging – one another, and all the more faithfully as you see the day approaching.

For if we go on deliberately and willfully sinning after once acquiring the knowledge of the Truth, there is no longer any sacrifice to atone for [our] sins – no further offering to which we look forward. [There is nothing left for us then] but a kind of awful and fearful prospect and expectation of divine judgment and the fury of burning wrath and indignation which will consume those who put themselves in opposition [to God]. [Isaiah 26:11].

Any person who has violated and [thus] rejected AND set at naught the Law of Moses is put to death without pity or mercy on the evidence of two or three witnesses. [Deut. 17:2-6]. How much worse (sterner and heavier) punishment do you suppose he will be judged to deserve who has spurned AND [thus] trampled under foot the Son of God, and who has considered the covenant blood by which he was consecrated common and unhallowed, thus profaning it and insulting the (Holy) Spirit (Who imparts) grace – the unmerited favor and blessing of God? {Exo.24:8}.

For we know Him Who said, Vengeance is Mine – retribution and the meting out of full justice rest with Me; I will repay – I will exact the compensation, says the Lord. And again, The Lord will judge and determine and solve and settle the cause and the cases of His people. It is a fearful (formidable and terrible) thing to incur the divine penalties AND be cast into the hands of the living God!”

IF you were “crucified with Christ”, does that not mean He took YOU, your old sin nature, your old godless-living life, and PUT IT TO DEATH on the Cross with Him as He shed His blood that ALL YOUR SIN AND MINE MIGHT BE WASHED AWAY? Why ‘resurrect’ what Jesus crucified?

SECOND, “EVIDENCE OF NEW-BIRTH CONVERSION”? “NO LONGER A DEEP, ABIDING LOVE OF THE WORLDLY INFLUENCES OR PEACE WITH ALL THE DEVILISH AND DEMONIC INFLUENCES AND CONTROL”! Here’s how John relates this, as we read his anointed exposure and heavenly challenge in 1 John 2:2-6!

“And He – that same Jesus Himself – is the propitiation (the atoning sacrifice) for our sins, and not for ours alone but also for [the sins of] the whole world. And this is how we may discern [daily by experience] that we are coming to know Him – to perceive, recognize, understand and become better acquainted with Him: if we keep (bear in mind, observe, practice) His teachings (precepts, commandments).

Whoever says, I know Him – I perceive, recognize, understand and am acquainted with Him – but fails to keep and obey His commandments (teachings) is a liar, and the Truth [of the Gospel] is not in him.

But he who keeps [treasures] His Word – who bears in mind His precepts, who observes His message in its entirety – truly in him has the love of ‘and’ for God has been perfected (completed, reached maturity). By this we may perceive and know and recognize and be sure that we are in Him;

Whoever says he abides in Him ought – as a personal debt – to walk and conduct himself in the same way in which He walked and conducted Himself.”

Christ Jesus was so aware of both the religious influences of false Judaism (not the true “remnant”!) and the darkness of devilish, demonic activities through man-made ‘religious expressions’, when in John 6:57-69, He said, with Peter then grabbing hold and holding on to “Jesus Only”:

“Just as the living Father sent Me, and I live (by, through, because of) the Father, even so whoever continues to feed on Me – who takes Me for his food and is nourished by Me – shall [in his turn] live through and because of Me. This is the Bread which came down from heaven. It is not like the manna which our forefathers ate and yet died. He who takes this Bread for his food shall live forever.

He said these things in a synagogue while He was teaching at Capernaum. When His disciples heard this, many of them said, This is a hard and difficult and strange saying – an offensive and unbearable message. Who can stand to hear it? – Who can be expected to listen to such teaching?

But Jesus, knowing in Himself that His disciples were complaining and protesting and grumbling about it, said to them: Is this a stumbling block and an offense to you? – Does this upset and displease and shock and scandalize you? What then [will be your reaction] if you should see the Son of Man ascending to the place where He was before?

It is the Spirit that gives life – He is the Life-giver; the flesh conveys no benefit whatever – there is no profit in it. The words (truth) that I have been speaking to you are spirit and life. But [still] some of you fail to believe and trust and have faith. For Jesus knew from the first who did not believe and had no faith, and who would betray Him and be false to Him.

And He said, This is why I have told you that no one can come to Me unless it is granted him – unless he is enabled to do so – by the Father. After this many of His disciples drew back – returned to their old associations – and no longer accompanied Him.

Jesus said to the twelve, Will you also go away? And do you too desire to leave Me? Simon Peter answered, Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words (the message) of eternal life. And we have learned to believe and trust; and [more], we have come to know [surely] that You are the Christ, the Anointed One, the Son of the living God.”

There is such a vast difference between ‘religious’ individuals who WILL FALL AWAY and the vital picture and reality of a regenerated soul, indwelt by and led by the Holy Spirit! In John 6:63 Jesus said: “It is the Spirit that gives life – He is the Life-giver; the flesh conveys no benefit whatever – there is no profit in it. The words (truths) that I have been speaking to you are spirit and life.”

I love Watchman Nee’s word in his book, “Ye Search The Scriptures,” [Christian Fellowship Publishers, Inc. New York, Copyright 1974], (p.16), “Canst thou by searching find out God”, challenges the Book of Job (11:7). God is never arrived at through research. He is found by one way only – through the regenerated spirit.”

In 1 Corinthians 2:1-4, “As for myself, brethren, when I came to you I did not come proclaiming to you the testimony and evidence or mystery or secret of God [concerning what He has done through Christ for the salvation of men] in lofty words of eloquence or human philosophy and wisdom;

For I resolved to know nothing – to be acquainted with nothing; to make a display of the knowledge of [nothing] – among you except Jesus Christ, the Messiah, and Him crucified. And I (passed into a state of) weakness and was in fear (dread) and great trembling [after I had ] among you.

And my language and my message were not set forth in persuasive (enticing and plausible) words of wisdom, but they were in demonstration of the [Holy] Spirit and power of God, operating on me and stirring in the minds of my hearers the most holy emotions and thus persuading them.”

An unbelieving world, a self-indulgent flesh, and a demonically, devilish controlled mind will create and establish all kinds of ‘religious mannerisms’ but oppose “You must be born again”! For the most part, fallen humanity and the devil’s crowd and, yes, ‘church pretenders’ will settle for religious entertainment but highly oppose no longer living for yourself but living for Christ alone!

What did Paul write in 2 Corinthians 6:14-7:1? Don’t miss, overlook, or casually kind of knod at his word!! It says: [Again, Amplified Bible!], “Do not be unequally yoked up with unbelievers – do not make mismated alliances with them, or come under a different yoke with then [inconsistent with your faith]. For what partnership have right living and right standing with God with iniquity and lawlessness? Or how can light fellowship with darkness?

What harmony can there be between Christ and Belial [the devil]? Or what has a believer in common with an unbeliever? What agreement [can there be between] a temple of God and idols? For (In Christ!) WE ARE the temple of the living God; even as God said, I will dwell in and with and among them and will walk in and with and among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.

SO, come out from among (unbelievers), and separate (sever) yourselves from them, says the Lord, and touch not [any] unclean thing; then I will receive you kindly and treat you with favor. And I will be a Father to you, and you shall be My sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty.

7:1, Therefore, since these great promises are ours, beloved, LET US CLEANSE ourselves from everything that contaminates and defiles body and spirit,, and bring [our] consecration to completeness in the (reverential) fear of God.”

I have no doubts that even most ‘church folk’ easily accept the blood of the Cross for their forgiveness but will rebel, excuse, accuse faithful men of the Word for lying when they even share Jesus saying, “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord, Lord’, but you do not do what I Say?” Dare I tell YOU that obedience is not an option in the age of grace?

Spiritual focus, even in a religious setting, is more often on fleshly concerns rather than divine revelation or the ultimate Will of God’s eternal intent? I love what Charles Stanley wrote in his booklet, “In Touch”, [April,2016, p.13], “The Lord isn’t looking for people who change a few habits by sheer force of will; He’s calling people to surrender to Him…We don’t evolve into a saved people by deleting old habits and instituting better religious ones; we are transformed by the saving power of Jesus Christ when we believe [trust in, rely upon, adhere to] Him.”

Many ‘church folk’ are highly appreciative of ‘compromisers’ because they ‘believe’ that “fleshly indulgence is justified because, though one is ‘saved’, he/she cannot do anything but sin until Christ comes again – so they blame God rather than trust His Truth! They are euphorically violent to those who uphold Jesus’ Word, like when He said, “Go, and sin no more,” but they believe sin in a believer is ‘normal, and that without ‘guilt’, because “God is love”.

There’s even by some a ‘ministerial’ maligning of the Holy Word because they feel ‘justified’ in ungodly behavior though a professing believer. And in the world around you there is philosophical rationalization because of spiritual ‘brain-tumors’ called resistance to Holy Truth! “Who needs a ‘Savior’? We’re OK , you with or without Christ are OK”! Really?

But I can tell you without hesitation that to continue sinning as a ‘believer’ is to deny Jesus’ Victory at the Cross and to refute Jesus’ words in John 15:22, “If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin, but NOW they have no excuse for their sin.”

Do you remember Paul’s words in 1 Corinthians 15:34? “Awake (from your drunken stupor and return) to sober sense and your right minds, AND SIN NO MORE. For some of you have not the knowledge of God – you are utterly and willfully and disgracefully ignorant, and continue to be so, LACKING THE SENSE OF GOD’S PRESENCE AND ALL TRUE KNOWLEDGE OF HIM. I say this to your shame.”

But, in Isaiah 41:8-15, there is a powerful word of hope to, ‘sometimes’, discouraged disciples who’ve ‘tried’ to live the overcoming life, (with no ‘discipleship’ training), but only a sad pastoral “do your best”. IF YOU DIDN’T KNOW, at the Cross Jesus took YOUR worst and YOUR best, and it was “crucified with Christ”! Look at Isaiah’s ‘Word of Hope’!

• Isaiah 41:9, “I have chosen you and not cast you off.” 2) Verse 10, “Fear not…for I am with you.” 3) Verse 10, “I AM your God…(Elohim), meaning the “high and lifted up, the mighty One,” and He’s ‘able’ to sustain us, strengthen us, and guard us (if we let Him) against the world you face, the “old man” trying to resurrect, AND even victorious over Satan! 4) Verse 10, “I WILL STRENGTHEN AND HARDEN YOU TO [DIFFICULTIES]…”. This is probably why Paul shared, “When I am weak, then I am strong,” because he did not lean on ‘fleshly abilities’ but Holy Presence – ‘Christ in YOU the hope of glory’! 5) Verse 10 again – “I will hold you up and retain you with My victorious right hand of rightness and justice.” God said in Isaiah 42:13, “The Lord will go forth as a mighty man; HE WILL ROUSE HIS ZEALOUS INDIGNATION AND VENGENCE LIKE A WARRIOR; HE WILL CRY, YES, HE WILL SHOUT ALOUD, HE WILL DO MIGHTILY AGAINST HIS ENEMIES.” 6) Verses 11-13 – “Behold, all they who are enraged and inflamed against you shall be put to shame and confounded; they who strive against you shall be as nothing and shall PERISH. You shall seek those who contend with you, and shall not find them; they who war against you shall be as nothing, as nothing at all.” 7) Verse 15 – “Behold, I will make you to be a new, sharp, threshing instrument having teeth…” In 2 Corinthians 13:10 Paul wrote: “So I write these things while I am absent from you, that when I come to you I may not have to DEAL SHARPLY in my use of the authority which the Lord has given me, [to be employed, however] for building [you] up and not tearing you down.” The “SHARP TOOL” of Holy Truth will ‘shape’ you in His image or ‘silence’ your voice if you betray Him!

“Evidence of NEW-BIRTH CONVERSIONS”, sharpened in life by His Word, Will, and Work OR slicing to threads the disobeying, compromising, contented disciple who “plays” on both sides of the street? WHICH LEADS US TO NUMBER THREE AND LAST: “NO LONGER DEVOTION TO WALK OUT ONE’S LIFE OF ‘FAITH’ (?) ON THE “STREETS OF SELF-INDULGENCES AND SELF-FLESH EMPHASES,” BUT STEPPING FAITHFULLY ON THE HIGHWAY OF HOLINESS!

In Colossians 2:5-10 Paul so strongly lays the foundation of a truly birthed and overcoming ‘Life In Christ’! “For though I am away from you in body, yet I am with you in spirit, delighted at the sight of your [standing shoulder to shoulder in such] orderly array and the firmness and the solid front and steadfastness of your faith in Christ, [that leaning of the entire human personality on Him in absolute trust and confidence in His power, wisdom and goodness]. As you therefore received the Christ, [even] Jesus the Lord, [so] walk – regulate your lives and conduct yourselves – in union and conformity to Him.

Have the roots [of your being] firmly and deeply planted [in Him] – fixed and founded in Him – being continually built up in Him, becoming increasingly more confirmed and established in the faith, just as you were taught, and abounding and overflowing in it with thanksgiving.

See to it that no one carries you off as spoil or makes you yourselves captive by his so-called philosophy and intellectualism, and vain deceit (idle fancies and plain nonsense), following human traditions – men’s ideas of the material [rather than the spiritual] world – just crude notions following the rudimentary and elemental teachings of the universe, and disregarding [the teachings of] Christ, the Messiah.

For in Him the whole fullness of Deity (the Godhead), continues to dwell in bodily form – giving complete expression of the divine nature. AND you [in Christ] are in Him, made full and have come to fullness of life – in Christ you too are filled with the Godhead: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and reach full spiritual stature. And He is the Head of all rule and authority – of every angelic principality and power.”

Don’t you think this foundation of the true “Evidence of New-Birth Conversion” is seen in what Paul wrote to us? And it strongly agrees with what Christ Himself said when in John 7:37-38 we read: “If any man is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink! He who believes in Me – who cleaves to and trusts in and relies upon Me – as the Scripture has said, Out from his innermost being springs and rivers of living water shall flow (continuously).”

Even in the walk of redemptive faith there are doors before us – some to condemnation, frustration, and captivity, while others are Christ’s ‘door’ to liberty, freedom from bondage to the old sin nature and ‘birthed’ to the freedom of everlasting life in the here and now, in and through Christ alone! SO…it’s either:

Self-directed in one’s ‘walk of faith’ OR “born-again to new LIFE IN CHRIST”; it’s either a ‘kingdom rule’ that is fleshly rich in sensual satisfactions or the Holy Spirit-enriched life in the very wealth of Holy God and Heaven’s Son, better known as “Emmanuel”, or “God With Us, God in Us, God through Us”, because of Resurrection Life in Christ, Resurrection Power through Christ, and Resurrection Hope instilled within us by His Holy Presence!

It’s ‘philosophically-wise’ in godless ways or personally and intimately blessed with the very “mind of Christ”! It’s either trained by the best of a world’s ‘master’ deceivers, even the devil himself, or Sovereignly guided by the Holy Spirit, truly enriched by the treasures of His Holy Word, and “Master-led” disciple makers who “feed” us on the “bread of life,” the “milk of the Word,” and upon the very “meat” of God’s Holy Truth!

The claim of Christ that He had come that we might have life and that abundant was not a fictitipous claim of a ‘false prophet’ but from the Creator of mankind and the Savior and Lord over mankind!

Jesus said: “I AM THE DOOR” to reconciliation with God, the door of divine forgiveness, the door to abiding presence of God within repentant and faith-filled hearts, and the door of receiving, walking in, and being blessed by the fruit of His Holy Life and His Holy Spirit!

Don’t you find it sad and heart-breaking that you see around you, yes, multitudes who are ‘satisfied’ with the ‘flesh-life’ and all it has to offer, closing the door on the love, grace, and mercy of God. But time will unveil for many the fundamental reality that vocational and financial successes fall short of filling the inner hunger that only Christ Jesus meets and fills!

In Catherine Marshall’s book, “Something More,” [COPYRIGHT, 1961, by Catherine Marshall, Published by Chosen Books, Lincoln, Va. 22078], (p.3), she wrote about “the famous Hollywood actress, Mary Astor, (who) has known the fairy-tale of movie stardom. An Academy Award, glamourous marriages, two children, several Beverly Hills mansions, furs, jewels, publicity – what more could any woman want? Yet Mary Astor admitted in print that ‘for years – even in the midst of fame and glamor – I yearned for contentment, happiness. It took me almost twenty years to go from idle curiosity about religion…to meeting God as a Person and a Father, and knowing that walking in (redemptive) faith meant growing up.”

AND THAT “GROWING UP” IS “FALLING DOWN” before the King of kings and Lord of lords, REPENTING, TRUSTING, RESTING IN HIS FINISHED WORK AT THE CROSS< AND EXPERIENCING THE REALITY OF HIS INDWELLING PRESENCE THROUGH THE “EVIDENCES OF A NEW-BIRTH” RELATIONSHIP!

IS YOUR BODY NOW THE “HOLY TEMPLE”?

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

“THE FLESHLY-UNFULFILLED OR THE SPIRITUALLY FULFILLED?”

In 2 Corinthians 1:12 Paul stated, “For our boasting is this: the testimony of our conscience that we conducted ourselves in the world in simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom but by the grace of God, and more abundantly toward you.” ‘Conduct in the world’? And Paul laid down his challenge: “Not with fleshly wisdom but by the grace of God”! And, you realize, there are multitudes who live by ‘grit’, honoring one’s fleshly determination or fleshly abilities, but not to God’s honor and glory, leaving ‘fleshly lives; UNFULFILLED, though crowned by the world and the devil as outstanding folks and ‘worthy examples’.

As Jesus was instructing His disciples, He said in Mark 9:35, “If anyone desires to be first, he shall be last of all and servant of all.” Yet how many do you know who function through ‘flesh’ at its best and miss God’s eternal intention, with a fleshly, unfulfilled, short of God’s blessing, satisfied with their best life-style and fleshly effort?

Are you aware of the danger of fleshly imagination that has nothing to do with ‘eternal purpose’, but is even that which either doesn’t consider ultimate intention by divine design, or personally chooses to exalt one’s self through personal self-determination above even the knowledge of God Himself?

If the Lord Jesus lived “to do My Father’s will”, don’t you find it so strange that even most Christians have not been disciplined in “bringing every thought captive to the obedience of Christ”? As a result, their view of their salvation ‘experience’ is short-changed concerning relating to worldly influences, old sin-nature limitations, or even the devil’s interferences with the fullness of their development!

But, “the fleshly unfulfilled” I see as worldly, unfulfilled unbelievers who determine to be ‘god’ or ‘goddesses’ themselves, godless lives governed by self-rule, even satisfied with their own “just-rewards”. Didn’t Paul tell young Timothy about those who were “lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of, (some) having a form of godliness but deny its power. And from such people turn away”? [2 Timothy 3:5].

It’s interesting that even in old Israel there came a time, even a time after the time, when, As Deborah said that she arose as a ‘mother’ in Israel only to see Israel “choosing new gods”! [Judges 5:8]. But, of course, in modern-day America, I’m not sure many Americans (?) now have any grasp of the “new gods they choose wo worship”!

Most today bow to a ‘god or goddess’ of appearances with more attention to outside ‘show’ but no inward purified hearts by the blood of the Lamb! Psalm 82:5 speaks of those who, “do not know, nor do they understand; they walk about in darkness; all the foundations of [their] earth is unstable.”

“The fleshly unfulfilled”? Sadly, most are unaware of a ‘way of evil’, walking perverted paths, with no concern for the path of uprightness because they truly love the ways of darkness, rejoice in doing evil things, delight in the perversity of the wicked, looking for crooked paths, desirous pleasures, and devilish men and women – they love unrighteousness and bow willingly before their idols of darkness, deceit, and deathly deception.

“The fleshly unfulfilled”? In 2 Thessalonians 2:9-12, Paul spoke of a ‘lawless one (who) will be revealed, saying, “The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved. AND FOR THIS REASON God will send them a strong delusion, that they should believe the lie, that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth BUT HAD PLEASURE IN UNRIGHTEOUSNESS.”

“The fleshly unfulfilled”? I have no hesitation in saying that unbelievers that avoid “spiritual fulfillment” are individuals undeniably interested only in themselves, with an attitude of mind and heart that is in “what pleases me, the cares of my world, the concerns of what satisfies me and me alone.” Many are so carnal, crude, self-caring, that to expose their need of the Redeemer heightens their anger, resentment, and bitterness! For many, it’s ‘cold minds’, ‘cold hearts,’ and ‘over-all coldness’ to even the awesome love of God for them or even the Name of Christ Jesus as Lord and Savior!

In Luke 19:41 as Jesus “wept over Jerusalem”, I’m convinced the Ascended Lord at the right hand throne of Almighty God still weeps over cities all over the world, saying, “If you had known, even you, especially in this your day, the things that make for your peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes.”

How many times have you heard someone say that Jesus spoke in parables to make it easily understandable to them about what He wanted them to grasp? Yet when you read what He said in Matthew 13, having spoken of “the Parable of the Sower,” in verses 3-9, the disciples of Christ came asking Him, “Why do You speak to them in parables?” Jesus responded in Verses 11-17,

“Because it has been given to you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, BUT TO THEM IT HAS NOT BEEN GIVEN. For whoever has, to him more will be given, and he will have abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him. Therefore I speak to them in parables, BECAUSE SEEING THEY DO NOT SEE, AND HEARING THEY DO NOT HEAR, NOR DO THEY UNDERSTAND. And in them the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled, which says: ‘Hearing you will hear and shall not understand, and seeing you will see and not perceive; for the hearts of this people have grown dull, their ears are hard of hearing, and their eyes THEY have closed, lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, lest they should understand with their hearts and turn, so I should heal them.’

But blessed are your eyes for they see, and your ears for they hear; for assuredly, I say to you, that many prophets and righteous men desired to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it.

You do realize that when most men hear about “water” they are considering a physical water to drink, or a water to nourish their fresh-sown seeds, or a water that cleans a dirty car or what they wash their sweaty bodies with, but they never consider “living water”, or as Proverbs 21:1-2 says, “The king’s heart is in the hand of the Lord, like the rivers of water; He turns it wherever He wishes. Every way of man is right in his own eyes, but the Lord weighs the heart.” [And does YOUR heart over-flow with rivers of your own will or rivers of the divine will?]. Sadly, most ‘fleshly’ lives are not even aware of any fountains of life that ought to be ‘abounding with the water” of Life in Christ, of Holy Presence, or of Holy Purpose!

In Jeremiah 2:13, though speaking historically of ‘the chosen people of Israel’, what the prophet heard God say speaks prophetically of all men who go their own way: “For My people have committed two evils: They have forsaken Me, the fountain of living waters, and hewn themselves cisterns – broken cisterns that can hold no water.”

And Jeremiah is usually associated with “Lamentations” – and he certainly had much to lament about as he saw his own people turning to their own fleshly ways. There is a bold, icing word he gives us when in Lamentations 5:4 he wrote: “We pay for the water we drink!”

Yes, there is a water the world drinks that is not the “water of life”! There’s a water that is not the water that cleanses the heart! There is a water that is not “pure water”! Are you aware that Peter, in 2 Peter 2:17, wrote: “These are wells without water, clouds carried by a tempest, for whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever”?

In the previous verses of 2 Peter 2, he was pointing out the “depravity of false teachers” who were warped in their understanding of the holy life birthed through the blood of Christ! He spoke about those who ‘perish in their own corruption,’ ‘spots and blemishes, carousing in their own deceptions’, ‘eyes full of adultery and that cannot cease from sin,’ ‘enticing unstable souls,’ ‘hearts trained in covetous practices, AND ARE ACCURSED CHILDREN,’ ‘having forsaken the right way and gone astray,’ ‘loving the wages of unrighteousness,’ and, Yes, ‘rebuked for one’s iniquity’; but you realize these are those who say, “Who cares what God thinks? We’re in charge of our own lives!” Then, a day of reckoning awaits them! And it does come!

“The fleshly unfulfilled”? How many do you know who major on things in their lives that will surely guarantee a “successful life” if they set their own goals, and they meet their goals to their satisfaction, but never ask, ‘Is this God’s will, God’s purpose, God’s plan for my life?” Sadly, for many ‘successful people’, relationship to Holy God is the furtherest thing from their minds, if at all!

But, there was “the rich young ruler” who at least acknowledged the reality of eternal life but deemed his riches should be his ‘calling card’ into a blessed life! This ‘rich young ruler’ even took advantage of an opening door to Jesus’ presence, asking Jesus in Luke 18:18, “Good Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus reminded him of ‘the commandments’ with the rich young ruler responding, “All these things I have kept from my youth.”

Then in Verses 22-23 we read about those who major on “self” and refuse “selflessness” as a way of life! It says: So when Jesus heard these things, He said: “You still lack one thing. Sell all that you have and distribute to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me.” But when he heard this, he became very sorrowful, for he was very rich. [How rich are YOU in yourself?].

Being even sorrowful is not full surrender if one wants his wealth more than the will of God! Did he understand it? Yes! For him, he didn’t walk away defiantly – he purposefully listened, but reasoned his fleshly goal was more important to him than God’s eternal desire for men, proven in the sacrifice of His own Son on the Cross of Calvary! His desire for fleshly wealth became more vital to him than a “fire in his bones” for the glory of God’s earnest desire for sons of true faith in their hearts and walks before Him.

“The fleshly unfulfilled”? Most will never admit it, but they are men, if they were to ever consider the will of God for their lives, would at least admit that their “self-allegiance and self-devotion” takes precedent over a man’s devotion to God or His Son, the Lord Jesus! For them, there’s no discouragement about a Godless life, no disenchantment with ‘self-idolatry’, no darkness for them about ‘self-love’ or ‘self-devotion’ – they’ll even say, “That’s my religious faith – I am my own main god!”

And being one’s own conviction about “self”, there are so many who are overwhelmed by the influences of family, or friends, or even societal circumstances, like a war, where many are hardened by the splitting of devotion to protecting lives or ending lives in human wars! There’s nothing that should EVER turn you away from Him, but always turn you to Him in absolute, total surrender and submission to His eternal watch-care, but many are divided, weakened, and become unbelieving that a Holy God could ever care about them!

As one even begins to consider himself related to a fleshly world purpose or eternal divine intent, there’s always, “follow your instincts” or “follow His inspiration” – and, of course, in the world, many are overcome by “the world, the flesh, and the devil”!

There’s a powerful few verses in John 2:23-25 that reveals our Lord’s insight as a discerner of human hearts and their exposure to worldly rather than eternal intent. It says: Now hen Jesus was in Jerusalem at the Passover, during the feast, many believed in His name when they saw the signs which He did. But Jesus did not commit Himself to them, because He knew all men, and had no need that anyone should testify of man, for He knew what was in man.”Illusions, ideas, intents, personal intuitions, for many, become more important than divine revelation or Eternal Will, eternal purpose, eternal provision, or plan – “my ideas take precedent over eternal will,” and they’re eternally settled into that frame of mind and heart, united with the devil himself, though they’d never admit that to you, but look upon you as a ‘spiritual lunatic’ or a child of the devil yourself!

For unbelievers, even on their dying death-beds, they’ll hold out for their way of human existence, even if it’s brought them pain, suffering, a void of eternal purpose – “I’ve had my way, and with that, I’ll live and leave with what I face after my death.” Oh, really? They really don’t know what the devil and the hordes of Hell’s demons have in store for them, do they?

After life? Oh, yes! The body way decay to “ashes and bones”, but the true ‘you’ is eternal with the devil’s insignia of ownership if you were never ‘purchased by the blood of the Lamb’! The one thing about Hell you need to be reminded of is the fact the devil doesn’t leave you for a season, but day after day inflicts the consequences of your yieldedness to him rather than to Jesus! Eternal agonizing is the identifying reward for all unbelievers.

Do you have any conception at all of an unbeliever’s ‘multiplied sorrow’ forever and ever as the reward of his/her unbelief and rebellion and disobedience before Holy God? There IS the sorrow of heart and mind that intensifies and is never soothed or removed! There is a sorrow of heart that gets heavier and heavier for any unbeliever under Satan’s domination – and it intensifies more and more, forever and forever! Proverbs 10:10 says, “He who winks with the eye causes trouble, but a prating fool will fall.” Prating? Idle chatter, foolish talking, absurd reactions to the love and purpose of Holy God! That’s about as good as I can describe ‘a prating fool’ – God says, “He/she falls!”

Are you familiar with “astrologers”? “Astrology” is a ‘professed science’ that supposedly can “read the stars” and, for them, basically, interpret their influences on human affairs! Really? Or is it not more of human attempts at ascending to God’s throne and seeing for themselves how they’d like to see things turning out? It’s like men who are natural desiring to be supernatural, determining for themselves how earthly things ought to be since “we see it in the stars”! Dream-World?

Oh, certainly, there are “fleshly star-gazers” who believe they’ve seen heavenly visions for themselves with a ‘bright light’ or “me, my, mine” so alien to submission to the King of kings and Lord of lords. Walking in their “own light, as I see it,” with a strong sense of self-will, self-direction, because of a fleshly sense of property and a fleshly sense of personal right, even ahead of or more than God’s divine sovereignty! It’s the fallen attitude of fallen men that “my life consists of what I want it to be, what I choose, what I want to possess for myself”, when the Lord Jesus said, and still says, (Luke 12:15), “Take heed and beware of covetousness, for one’s life does not consist in the abundances of the things he possesses”, or packages according to his own flesh desire, worldly influence, or devilish possession and domination!

Dare I tell you that you’ve just read up on “The Fleshly Unfulfilled”? But, what about “The Spiritually Fulfilled”? Why not truly examine the Word of God for yourself about Resurrection Life, Resurrection Power, and Resurrection Hope?

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

“OPTIONAL EXPRESSIONS OF LIFE – HUMAN OR DIVINE, FLESHLY OR SPIRITUAL, TEMPORARY OR ETERNAL?”

A life bleak or blessed, a life scarred with sin and the old sin nature, or a life conceived by the Holy Spirit, a life trying or trusting, a life programmed by the world, the flesh, and the devil, or a life purposed, promised, and spiritually prosperous in God’s Kingdom because of “new births”, or a life experiencing, exposed to, exasperated by, encapsulated by fears, anxieties, worries, doubts or a life enraptured with, enduring, exciting, and exhilarating in the joy of Jesus’ indwelling, overcoming, victorious Resurrection Presence?

What is your life? Is it the life in Christ Jesus with a peace that passes all understanding or is it a life of spiritual death of the guilty, a life of sinful flesh to offer as best one can, or the “Life in Christ” graciously granted in victorious, overcoming, rejoicing- in- Jesus hearts with symphonic Hallelujahs and glorious praise and thanksgiving from a new-born heart?

A ‘worldly life’ sustained by physical bread alone and the best ‘fallen flesh’ has to nibble on without an ounce of true repentance or pure sustenance or purified heart and mind, void of the Holy Spirit, void of the “fruit” of heavenly love, eternal peace, and life-changing joy that never subsides, wanes, or falters, is a life, though mentally religious but never “born again”, that tries to imitate, even pretend, and attempts with all flesh has to offer, but falls short of the reality of truly transformed hearts and lives by the miracle of the “new birth”!

Do you ever consider, think about, evaluate ‘God-less –living’ as empty, self-centered, mindless, purposeless, unfulfilling, unrewarding in its long haul, or a life filled with the manifestations of Holy Presence in Christ?

Do you remember Jesus saying, “Come to Me, learn of Me, rest in Me, and you’ll find “rest” that is eternal and blessing for your soul” that truly is indescribable?

Is your life based on fleshly ‘fairy’ tales or a life blessed on the divine, eternal, revelation of the Christ of Resurrection Life, Resurrection power, and Resurrection Hope?

The enemy of the “God-Life”, the devil, deceives, entraps, blinds men to the “Christ-in-you-Life” of Holy presence, Holy purpose, and Holy power, with ‘imitation’, ‘non-redemptive,’ ‘fleshly intents alone,’ without any consideration of the miracle of “new birth,” the blessing of “Christ-in-you,” or the fulfillment of divinely-ordained, eternal intent, or sovereignly, ordained, and graciously given “Oneness” with the divine nature in and through Christ!

It was Philip James Bailey, in his “Festus, A Country Town,” who once wrote: “We live in deeds, not years; in thought (or Truth) not breath: In feelings, not figures on a dial. We should count time by heart-throbs. He most lives who thinks most, feels the noblest, acts the best. Life’s but a means unto an end; that end Beginning, mean, and end of all things – God.”

What is YOUR life? “Hell’s bells” or “the Joy-Juice of Jesus’ Presence”? A fleshly flame revealing failing, futile living or the pure flame of the Eternal Son and Sun of Life within us, the Crucified, Resurrected King of kings and Lord of lords?

Life is not a ladder finitely stepped – never has been, never will be – Life was extraordinarily given to give men personal choice of ‘flesh-life’ or the “Divine Life” – life without God or life in Him – not fleshly dreams, finite feelings of sensual pleasures, or faltering feelings of human successes, but a life, not of temporary thoughts of pleasure and satisfactions, but one of eternal peace, resurrection presence, and heavenly joys!

Is your life the “bondage” of your ‘old- as- ADAM’ SIN NATURE OR THE “BLESSING” of LIVING IN, BY, and FOR THE LIFE OF ANOTHER, EVEN CHRIST ALONE THE HOPE OF GLORY?

A man who lives only to satisfy his Adam’s original nature, his flesh, his old, ancient sin nature, his selfish ambitions, is a man who never discovers perfect peace in Christ, selfless surrender to the sovereignty of God, or complete liberty and freedom and desire to honor, bless, exalt, and please the Savior, the Blessed Redeemer only!?!

A life that is satisfied with ‘flesh’ (the old sin nature), that knows no ‘self-denial’, that accepts the devil’s ‘slant’ that ‘You Can Sin And Not Die, That Thinks “devotion to God” is unnecessary, that’s been deceived by the powers of darkness, that loving the world and its lust of the flesh is not evil, never submitting to the reality that THAT world of idiotic, fleshly foolishness, is fading, failing, unfulfilling, and that the lust of it is death constantly just warmed over, and is passing away into a dark abode of demon presence, insisting it’s ‘OK’ – and that’s a life ‘OVERCOMING’ ?– just not overcoming by the blood of the Lamb?

You’ve heard it: “Live while you live – satisfy the passions of your old sin nature, realize you are your own, do as you please, never silencing the demons, and you “just go to Hell” – “it’s OK” – “everybody does it”; while that’s true for the most – it’s not true for God’s redeemed, blood-bought remnant – they find the only Way, the only Truth, and the only Life!

How sad that many never come to know the Life that is “in Christ”, never know the true pleasures that never fade that Jesus brings, that never experience the peace that passes all understanding, that never knows “death to self” and “Life in the Savior”, or “death to the fallen nature” and Life in the fullness of the divine nature, or the “death of bad fruit” and not the Life of “the fruit of the Spirit”!

Are you aware of the man-made philosophy that ‘best effort here’ is worthy of life in the “here-after”, that “fleshly best ensures life forever”, that “trusting is good for humanity,” even if God says trusting in Him alone is your only hope?

“Live while you live as your ‘flesh’ dictates” or “Live in Me alone” as Jesus declared? “Live while you live for the pleasures that satisfy your fleshly tendencies” or is it “Live for the purpose of honoring the God who made you, lost you, but bought you with a price, even the blood, innocent blood, of the precious Lamb of God?”

How many do you know who see “life is living it to the fullest for yourself as YOU see it for yourself,” or is it “Life is living as God desires, defines, declares, and delivers me to through a repentant heart, fully trusting and receiving forgiveness, and the fullness of the blessing of the Gospel of Jesus Christ?

Have you ever heard it? “A man’s ingress into his own world is knowing, satisfying, and promoting himself with all due diligence”, without any consideration of the eternal purpose of God of ordination as a vessel or container of divine life and holy presence? It’s not ingress in ‘self’ but INDWELT by Resurrection Life in Christ alone!

Facts of human existence are not as Fosdick once spoke of as ‘loose types with many meanings,” but human existence was intended before time began to be habitations of Holy Presence as “temples” of a loving Lord and Savior, but many have fallen victims desiring the “Las Vegas’ residences of self-indulgence, unbelief, and fleshly rebellion”!

Can you even ‘see’ in fallen humanity the reality of “chaotic disarrangement” and “self-centered”, self-serving, cynical or godless arrangements, fleshly affirmations and loyalties, and descents into hellish, hollow, and ‘holey’ attempts at life in the flesh alone ,but wanting spiritual existence on their own terms? That’s nothing more than fragments of existence offered as one’s best but never aligning or becoming one with God’s intent! But in 2 Corinthians 4:7-15, (Is this the testimony, not simply of your existence but God’s Indwelling?),

“But we have this treasure in earthern vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us. We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed (at times), but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed – always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body. For we who live are always delivered to death for Jesus’ sake, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh. So then death is working in us, but life in you. And since we have the same spirit of faith, according to what is written, ‘I believed and therefore I spoke,’ we also believe and therefore speak, knowing that He who raised up the Lord Jesus will also raise us up with Jesus, and will present us with you. For all things are for your sakes, that grace, having spread through the many, may cause thanksgiving to abound to the glory of God.”

Do you see it? Do you sense it? Have you settled it? Are you aware of it? There is the reality of one’s “best”, the “fleshly unfulfilled”, or God’s “best”, the spiritually re-born, indwelt, regenerated, Spirit-anointed, and “blessed” with the Resurrection Presence of the Living Lord, OR there is the unending evidences of the godless OR the eternal workings of Christ in the “Spirit-Man”.

Yes, there is “the sufferings of the saints” who ARE SUSTAINED BY THE SAVIOR, and who know both toughness in determination to overcome the world, the flesh, and the devil, and at the same time are tender followers who show others the way of Redeeming grace, purpose, and power! And though most saints are “forgotten by the world”, they live “fulfilled, blessed, contented, peaceful lives in and through Christ alone”! They are prayers, prepared, and equipped by the Word and the Spirit!

Do you comprehend “fleshly lives as containers of man’s best” or “spiritual lives birthed by the Spirit as recipients and containers and vessels of God’s best, the Living Christ, crucified, resurrected, ascended, reigning, and available to any repentant heart willing to be the temple of the Eternal Christ”?

In ‘fallen flesh” the “best” of human existence is only ‘variations’ and ‘shadows of the True’, but only ‘IN CHRIST’ is there the ‘victory over sin and death and emptiness and meaninglessness’, when only in the flesh is there the rewards of God’s enemy; but ‘IN CHRIST’ is the reaping and receiving of everlasting Life in Him! Christ-less lives are “oil-less lamps” with no ‘Light” that shines forth God’s glory.

Christ-less lives are ‘fragmented’ left-overs of ‘what could have been’ rather than Christ-Indwelt lives, fully revealing a God-ordained, and God-birthed Resurrection Presence!

Fleshly lives at the human-level “best” is only a cheap imitation of illumined, divine, resurrection presence of eternal life, eternal hope, and eternal fruit.

Free men? That’s not ‘freedom’ to do as one “damn well pleases”, but spiritual freedom in the Spirit to honor Christ alone! Only “in Christ” are men truly liberated to honor Holy God!

Most men, apart from God, arise each morning thinking, “What will really make ‘my day’ and ‘pump my flesh’ to historic levels?”, rather than, “What will honor God and exalt Christ through me to the world around me?”

A mortal man is only committed and satisfied in his self-complacency, his self-promotion, and his self- indulgence , but the “Christ-man” desires, longs for, driven by, and holds onto “honoring Christ alone, the hope of glory through me, as a vessel!”

Everything that promotes ‘flesh’, even ‘flesh at its best’, gives honor to the ‘old sin-nature’, turns a blind eye to the will, the Word, and purposes of Holy God, and is a clear exposure of one’s spiritual nakedness and his ‘egression’ willfully further away from God, and not his willful ‘ingression’ in Him by “repentance toward God and faith in the finished work of Christ alone.”

Misspent lives apart from the presence of Christ are like ‘empty glasses or vessels’ rather than residences of Christ in them as His Holy Temple!

Useless living is ‘born in sin’ with no desire to be reconciled to God, just indifferent to His Word and will, with no desire or longing or fleshly impulse to reconciliation or understanding of His Word or anything different from ‘fleshly satisfaction’ or even a thought about ‘birthed in Christ’ through repentance and faith! Yes, millions live without any desire to be “citizens of the Kingdom of God”, living consumed in promoting ‘self’ , not understanding the rebellious attitude that is the ‘death-nail’ to eternal purpose. Personal imagination and personal intent is not divine life nor divine presence nor divine power, but simply “best of the flesh” honoring “self-made men” of temporary existence, fading fame, tainted rewards, and terrible, eternal residences apart from the God who loved them, wanted them, but lost them by their lusts, their stubbornness, indifference, and mindlessness and heartlessness to His good, acceptable, and perfect will –“best effort” or “fallen flesh” is acceptable to them, and not even the Crucified and Resurrected Christ matters to them!

It’s not even ‘how long you lived’, but “in Whom you lived”, not the “best of self-effort existence in the sands of life” but “the solid foundation” of the True Rock who is Christ alone.

Do YOU fathom, do you understand, do you comprehend lives that are nothing more than ‘helpless pieces’ on “Life’s Game-board” with no submission or open door in them to the True Author of Everlasting Life, Purpose, or Divine Moves on their ‘play-boards’ of one’s earthly existence? Apart from Jesus it’s emptiness, vainness, personal game-playing – not the unveiling and revealing and revelation of Eternal Intent!

Life ‘found’ for one’s self apart from the Savior and Lord is a life guaranteed of eternal loss and one of serious desperation and consequences, but life “FOUND” in Christ for His honor, His glory, His praise, will stand eternally before Holy God, constantly reflecting, radiating, revealing Jesus’ everlasting Presence! It was Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, in his “A Psalm of Life,” who wrote: “Life is real! Life is earnest! And the grave is not its goal,” but I’m not sure if he even grasped, “Life is eternal” – and it’s either ‘in your best’ or Jesus’ “Resurrection Life and Holy, Resurrected Presence”; yes, there is life that continues beyond the grave and Hell with all its demons, devil, and unbelievers, but with the “graced saints” graciously living in God’s gift of eternal life in and through Christ’s “finished work”, there IS Heaven! Yes, Jesus Only!

Any definition of ‘life’ that has no foundation under it of honoring and glorifying Christ Jesus as Lord and Savior is ‘fruitless’, even ‘hollow religions’, ‘unregenerate church members’, or ‘temples steeped with ‘hypocrites’! But Jesus IS “the Light”, and “Jesus Only” is the ONLY UNVEILING OF LIGHT within men!

Christ Jesus, Emmanuel, Promised Messiah, IS the “Life”, the “Bread of Life”, is the “Author of LIFE” and that more abundantly, IS the “gift of God” and the only door to “eternal life”, and Paul says, “To live ‘in Christ’ is to flourish, and to die ‘in Christ’ is to gain eternal Presence and an eternal home in Heaven; life apart from Christ is a ‘vapor’ that only ‘exists’, and that ‘forever’ with flesh’s author and finisher who is the devil, but ‘in Christ’ there is victorious presence that never dies, falters or fades away in insignificance, but constantly joins Heaven’s Angels in the “Hallelujah Chorus”!

Unhappy lives or even ‘happy lives’ are not “God-blessed” or “Spirit-birthed” but just Adam-seeded, sin-natured attempts at “doing one’s best” with even totally unconcerned, misinformed, or blinded allegiance to God’s purpose in their ‘creation’. Have you ever heard someone say, “The purpose of life is just be yourself to your fullest and be happy?” when God’s intent is one being through with himself, accepting God’s judgment of his/her death with Christ as his/her only hope, and rejoicing daily in His Resurrection Presence in their repentant, redeemed, reconciled to God hearts!

It was Shakespeare, in his “Macbeth”, [Act V, sc.5.1,26], who wrote: “Life…is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.” Did the prophet mention the one who says, “Peace, peace, but there is no peace?”

You do understand, you do comprehend, you have evaluated the consequences of “Godless-men, nations, individuals” who ‘try’ to live with “no need of God”! Leo Tolstoy was right on target when in his writing “The Kingdom of God,” (Chapter 12), he said: “The only significance of life consists in helping to establish the kingdom of God; and this can be done only by means of the acknowledgement and profession [and I, JFF, would add ‘confession’ and ‘acceptance’] of the Truth by each one of us.”

I like what Augustine said when he spoke, “Before God can deliver us we must undeceive ourselves”! “The wages of (“my”) sin is death, but the ‘gift of God’ IS eternal life in and through Christ ONLY!” And as a result of receiving the “finished work of Christ AT THE CROSS,” resurrected to the King’s Presence, His Kingdom, and His witness in us and through us, He gives us graciously the “gift of the Holy Spirit,” and Romans 8:16 declares: “The Spirit (the Holy Spirit!) Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs – heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may be also glorified together.”

As a result of the amazing miracle of grace and the habitation of the Risen Christ within repentant hearts, and the recipients of the Holy Spirit “bearing witness in us and through us,” do you doubt, or just never informed and discipled to be led by the Holy Spirit? “The Spirit bears witness!” Is He “bearing witness” in you and through you?

I love Oswald Chambers’ explanation of “The Witness of the Spirit” in his amazing writings entitled, “My Utmost For His Highest.” (p.218). “We are in danger of getting the barter spirit when we come to God, wanting the witness before we have done what God tells us to do. “Why does not God reveal Himself to me?” He cannot, it is not that He will not, but He cannot, because you are in the road as you won’t abandon absolutely to Him. Immediately you do, God witnesses to Himself. He cannot witness to you, but He witnesses instantly to His own nature in you. If you had the witness before the reality, it would end in sentimental emotion. Immediately you transact on the Redemption, and stop the impertinence of debate, God gives the witness. As soon as you abandon reasoning and argument, God witnesses to what He has done, and we are amazed at our impertinence in having kept Him waiting. If you are in debate as to whether God can deliver from sin, either let Him do it, or tell Him He cannot. Do not quote this and that person, try Matthew 11:28, – “Come unto Me.” “COME”, if you are weary and heavy laden; “ask”, if you know you are evil. (Luke 11:13).

Chambers went on to say: (p.219), “The Spirit of God witnesses to the Redemption of our Lord, He does not witness to anything else; He cannot witness to our reason. The simplicity that comes from our common-sense decisions is apt to be mistaken for the witness of the Spirit, but the Spirit witnesses only to His own nature, and to the work of Redemption, never to our reason. If we try to make Him witness to our reason, it is no wonder we are in darkness and perplexity. Fling it all overboard, trust in Him, and He will give the witness.”

That’s so true “IF”! “If any man be in Christ, If any man is finished with his old life, old sin-nature, and his ‘fleshly ambitions’, willing ALL old things “are passed away,” then the “new-creation man”, indwelt by Resurrection Life in Christ, is then ready to “receive the Holy Spirit” to guide, direct, empower, and overflow in you and through you with, yes, “the gifts of the Spirit,” ready to reveal a redeemed, re-born, Spirit-filled, appointed, anointed witness to the glory and honor of Resurrection Life, Resurrection Power, and Resurrection Hope!

In the old American hymnal of Robert Coleman’s, published by The Broadman Press in Nashville, Tennessee, in 1933, I came across the song By Horatuis Bonar entitled “I Heard The Voice of Jesus Say.” It says:

“I heard the voice of Jesus say, “Come unto Me and rest; Lay down, you weary one, lay down your head upon My breast.” I came to Jesus as I was, Weary, and worn, and sad; I found in Him a resting-place, And He has made me glad.

I heard the voice of Jesus say, “Behold I freely give The living water; thirsty one, Stoop down, and drink, and live.” I came to Jesus and I drank of that life-giving stream; my thirst was quenched, my soul revived, and now I live in Him.

I heard the voice of Jesus say, “I am this dark world’s light: Look unto Me, your morn shall rise, And all your days be bright.” I looked to Jesus and found in Him my Star, my Sun; And in that light of life I’ll walk Till all my journey’s done.”

Old man – “new man”; flesh – Spirit; the sinner’s man – His saint; the Undone – in Him a “finished work” complete in Christ lacking nothing; grit, grease, garbage, and gall – “in Christ” is grace, victorious virtue, “fresh springs”, and perfect “God-Likeness”; empty, insignificant, earthly dwelling of ‘human flesh’ – “in Christ” is eternal Life, Holy Presence, and All-Sufficient grace; ‘flesh-poverty? – how about “enriched in Him, heirs, sons and daughters of the Heavenly Father, co-laborers in the Savior’s eternal, redemptive work, recipients of the fullness of the blessing of the gospel of Jesus Christ, blessed with “amazing assurance”, divine anointings, holy callings, the natural crucified but resurrection Life amplified, Kingdom living and resident address, Kingdom presence, Kingdom power, Kingdom privileges, and Kingdom testimonies, visions and dreams, and Holy anointings in fulfilling His good and acceptable and purposeful will, citizens of the eternal Kingdom, members of the divine Family, appointees “in Christ” to the mission of world-wide “redemption” through our testimonies of “the blood of the Lamb and His Resurrection Presence in every “born-again” life! “Rise up, O men of God!”

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

BEARING THE NAME – LIVING WITH SHAME

“BEARING THE NAME – LIVING WITH SHAME!”

“Bearing the Name, then living with the shame, is a life professing faith in Christ Jesus but continuing in a love-relationship with the world, the flesh, and the devil; sadly that’s a life still governed by selfishness rather than the Savior and Lord!

In “The Encyclopedia of Religious Quotations,” (p.398), Robert R. Brown said: “It is part of our human nature but there is that within us which always wants to make self the center of its own universe and, in that selfish way, wants to tear God from His throne and deny his brother and advance his own ambition.”

“Bearing the Name, then living with the shame of self-promotion and self-indulgence”, rather than faithful submission to Christ’s Lordship, is a willing renunciation of that Lordship and compromise with that which is diabolically opposed to the honor and glory of Holy God! And, sadly, sin-indulgent men live with no awareness of its harm and destructive influence and impact on others, even those and that it influences in its ‘cursing’ disregard of ‘blessing and honoring of God’!

Some are confronted with the claims of Christ Jesus for their hearts and lives, but are so contaminated by the sin of self-indulgence that “they” consider ‘suicide’ a better calling for them than surrender to Christ’s Lordship! THAT, my friends, is the depth rebellion can carry one to! But “cold-hearted”, “sin-bound” men will just celebrate their “lost-ness” and “separation” from God with indifference! Oh, and then, “believing Christians” just profess: “We’re under the Blood! So, it’s OK!”

There is a sad, sad commentary of Israel in Jeremiah 11:15-17, (Bearing a resemblance to Titus 1:10-16!!), with God saying in the prophetic passage: “What has My beloved to do in My house, having done lewd deeds with many? And the holy flesh has passed from you. When you do evil, then you rejoice. The Lord called your name, Green Olive Tree, Lovely and of Good Fruit. With the noise of a great tumult He has kindled fire on it, and its branches are broken. For the Lord of hosts, who planted you, has pronounced doom against you for the evil of the house of Israel and of the house of Judah, which they have done against themselves to provoke Me to anger in offering incense to Baal.”

Isn’t it liberating to know what Proverbs 28:13 says? “He who covers his sins will not prosper, but whoever confesses and forsakes them will have mercy.” But “covered” sounds so inviting, but “continuing” in after “forgiveness” (?) is more than costly – it’s deadly, destructive, deceiving, dis-abling, and reveals a lingering heart and mind of a darkened mind and heart, if though a ‘religious one’!

And I believe if one presses into Proverbs 28:13 he/she finds biblical covering through the shed blood of the Lamb of God that there is both forgiveness AND freedom to live in the fullness and blessing of His Resurrection Life – but forgiveness with a warped mind, “I can continue to sin since I’m under the blood of the Lamb” which is disgracing the name and work of Christ at the Cross!

In YOUR church surroundings have you witnessed “fig-leaf” dressing rather than clothed in the “finished” garments of the crucified and Resurrected Christ? The shed blood of Christ “washes” clean, but “fig-leaf” rationale suggests “self-will” rather than divine revelation!

Do you hear ‘unbelievers’ even denying their “sin” or sinful state and ‘trusting’ in their personal ‘pretense’, or ‘excusing’ themselves in blaming others – parents, teachers, ‘stars’ that surround them in ungodly behavior and ‘faith-denial’, and because they are such good people, good citizens, good soldiers, but faithless as to the blood redemption, they leave ‘flesh followers’ with no redemptive hope because they view it as unimportant to their ‘refined’ life?

In fact, many, many people, influenced by godless lives, ‘excuse’ their ‘sin’ as a ‘religionized, homogenized milk’ that is fundamental to every human, without consequence, because: “If there is a God, He made us this way; and it’s normal and natural, without consequence!” Others assert, “God’s to blame because He made us this way!” Blame God?

I love what Spurgeon said about it when he once said: “Shall the prisoner at the bar bring accusations against the Judge who tries him?” And “the prisoner in prison” blames the prison superintendent for his guilt and sentence of death?

“Fleshly denial” is certainly a strong influence for many ‘naturalized’ unbelievers AND ‘professing Christians’ who ‘blame God’. “If God ‘made’ man, ‘birthed’ man, and that with a sin nature, then it’s reasonable to blame Him, and free ourselves from guilt. The fault lies with God who made us, and He ought not be holding us accountable for what He created!”

Some say, ‘ God’s harsh in His judgments’, when fallen men initiate perverseness of lifestyles and vacuums of faith, trust, and obedience to the God who birthed them for the pleasures of self-will, self-pleasure, and self-rule – “We may be ‘fallen men’ in God’s mind, but we’re free to do as we please!” And most sense no need of the Savior, Lord, and Master of life!

Oh, but then there are those fully aware of disobedience to God, diabolical hiding to loving, caring Godly parents, and a coveting, masking, fraudulent hiding from even their fallen world around them, because, at least, they have no desire to be included with “transgressors”! So, they choose “dark clouds”, “deceitful explanations”, or only “deceived circles of sin” that they mostly move in, but at least “profess” and “attend” the church that Jesus loved and gave Himself for. They ‘imitate’, they ‘mimic’, they ‘copy’, they ‘assume’ the religious mask when they feel it’s necessary!

Again, Spurgeon wrote: [ Memorial Library, Spurgeon’s Sermons, Vol.12, p.187-188], “Possibly they themselves held their tongue, and flattered themselves that no observer witnessed their movements or could divulge their action. So it was with Achan. I dare say he took the wedge of gold and the Babylonish garment, ‘mid the confusion of the battle, and hid it when his comrades seemed to much engaged to notice so trivial an affair. While they were rushing over the fallen walls of Jericho, amidst the debris and the dust, he might be unmolested; and then, in the dead of night, while they slept, he turned the sod of his tent, dug into the earth, and buried there his coveted treasure. All looks right, to his heart’s content. He has smoothed it down, and spread his carpet over the grave of his lust. Little did he count on the unerring lot that would come home to the tribe of Judah, to the family of the Zarhites, to the house of Zabdir, and, at last, to the son of Carmi, so that Achan himself would have to stand out confessed as a traitor – a robber of his God. Men little know the ways in which the Almighty can find them out, and bring the evidence that convicts out of the devices that were intended to cover their sin.”

“Bearing the Name – Living with Shame”! One of the things that the “shameful” fail to realize, comprehend, or understand, is that ‘mental dexterity’ does not see, sense, or take note, that, though good at ‘covering their compromising lifestyle’, it does not close the door on Holy God’s spiritual examination and exposure of what’s going on in the secret places of a divided heart!

In Luke 11:17-26 we find a strong, exposing word from Jesus about “kingdom division”! He said: “Every kingdom divided against itself (‘half to Jesus – half to me?’) is brought to desolation, and a house divided against a house falls. If Satan also is divided against himself, how will his kingdom stand? Because you say I cast out demons by Beelezebub. And if I cast out demons by Beelezebub, by whom do your sons cast them out? Therefore they will be your judges. But if I cast out demons with the finger of God, surely the kingdom of God has come upon you.

When a strong man, fully armed, guards his own palace, his goods are in peace. But when a stronger than he comes upon him and overcomes him, he takes from him all his armor in which he trusted, and divides his spoils. HE WHO IS NOT WITH ME IS AGAINST ME, AND HE WHO DOES NOT GATHER WITH ME SCATTERS.

When an unclean spirit goes out of a man, he goes through dry places, seeking rest; and finding none, he says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came. And when he comes, he finds it swept and put in order. Then he goes and takes with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter and dwell there; and the last state of that man is worse than the first.”

“Half to Jesus – half to me”, and the devil rejoices! “Split kingdoms are open doors to devilish shame”! A split kingdom is the devil’s opportunity to thrive in “spoiling” one’s compromised allegiances! Does that result in “empty vines”? Does that mean some measure “fruitfulness” in the spiritual walk as “fruit for myself”? I dare you to search the Scriptures for what it has to say about “divided hearts”!

How strong, how awakening do you find Romans 1:16-25, speaking of a religious but rebellious people who “bear the Name but live with shame”, except for “the few” who are truly the “blood bought” and who DIDN’T exchange “the Truth for the lie”, the lie meaning you can sin and NOT die! It Says:

“For I am not ashamed of the GOSPEL OF CHRIST, for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes [Rests in, relies upon, & adheres to!), for the Jew first and also for the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, ‘The just shall live by faith.’

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who SUPPRESS THE TRUTH in unrighteousness, because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even the eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse,

Because, although THEY KNEW GOD, they DID NOT GLORIFY HIM as God nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man – and birds and four-footed animals and creeping things.

Therefore God also gave them up to uncleanness, in the lusts of their hearts, to dishonor their bodies among themselves, who exchanged the truth of God for the lie, (the lie? You can sin and not die!), and worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.”

“Bearing the name –Living with the shame?” It’s as if one who ‘bears the name’ believes he/she can cover “disobedience” by occasional response to Christ in some ‘form’ of a ‘Christ-like’ activity when in reality he/she loves the crossing of the line and life of holiness in fleshly rebellion “some of the time”. Concealed sin, cunning deliberation about how to hide it, evasions of responsibility and accountability, are ignored – then the Holy Word speaks! In Numbers 32:23 Moses said: “BE SURE YOU SIN WILL FIND YOU OUT!”

“Coverings, masks, excuses, ‘fleshly interpretations’, even outright denials of sin before Holy God” will have “no grounds” of excuse before the Judgment Bar of Holy God! Even long, elegant robes like the Pharisees and priests often wore in Temple activities, cannot conceal what reigns in the heart!

But there is eternal hope – not in our ‘self-efforts’, but in the finished work of Christ at the Cross! In Hebrews 13:20-21 we read: “Now may the God of peace who brought up our Lord Jesus from the dead, that great Shepherd of the sheep, THROUGH THE BLOOD OF THE EVERLASTING COVENANT, make you COMPLETE in every good work TO DO HIS WILL, working in you what is well pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.”

Again, Psalm 85:2 says: “You have forgiven the iniquity of Your people; YOU HAVE COVERED ALL THEIR SIN. You have taken away all Your wrath; You have turned from the fierceness of Your anger,” and in His love, grace, and mercy, He sweeps us up in the arms of His Holy Presence, caresses us in His compassion, anoints us in His Spirit-Power, and the Most High establishes us in the fullness of the blessing of the Gospel of Jesus Christ!

And like Paul, we’ve learned to daily take the sentence of death unto ourselves that the Resurrection Life of Christ may be manifested in mortal flesh! That’s “Christ in you the hope of glory”!

All because of the Love of God! Sinners declared saints, rebellious children birthed into the Holy Family of God, darkened lives becoming enlightened minds and hearts in the Glory of God, sin-imprisoned souls transformed into sons and daughters of Heaven’s Royal Family, condemned souls because of sin and the sin nature translated out of fleshly slavery to consecrated spirits of spiritual freedom and spiritual identity as royal ambassadors of the eternal Kingdom of God, the ‘chained’ to the devil’s dark kingdom-rule freed by the power of Christ over demonic control, ‘darkness’ allegiance, and the deathly walk of deception, loosed by the blood of the Lamb, no longer condemned because of sin but commissioned by the Master as His messengers!

Atoned, anointed, appointed, birthed, blessed, baptized in the Spirit, broken bread, poured out wine, consecrated on the altar of service as delegated representatives of the King of kings and Lord of lords, commissioned as holy representatives of the Savior and Lord, guiltless blood for guilty men, from darkened nights of the soul Christ changes miraculously the repentant heart into the Eternal Daylight by His Being, His Presence, His Purpose, His Power, as constant “Son-risers” and “Servant-saints”, and “Sanctified-Sermons” of His grace, mercy, and love!

Do YOU testify and testify regularly? Far too many ‘believers’ who ARE “temples of Christ’s holy presence”, though ‘steepled’, too often fail to ring their “bells” of worthy testimony that the spiritually unlearned might be drawn to Christ by their ringing – but sadly too many times, those “bells” are never rung!

You, as you hear this, may be those who have been redeemed but you haven’t truly reverenced Him because you’re not sure He can redeem others through you! But John 15:13 tells us about “greater love” – and it says, “Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends”; and then Jesus said in Verse 14, “YOU ARE MY FRIENDS, if you do whatever I command you.” Has there been a New Testament, Christ-Spoken, Spirit-anointed Word to all believers? YES!

In John 15:22 Jesus went on to say to His disciples, and us, “If I had not come and spoken to them, they would have no sin, BUT NOW THEY HAVE NO EXCUSE FOR THEIR SIN.” And, of course, some would say that that related to the Pharisees and Sadducees, but not to all Christians since then. Really? Don’t forget what “All Scripture” is for all believers!

There certainly is the reality of men who pore through the Word but deny its worth for the redemption of their souls! There are those who ‘examine’ Him but without any intent of “repentance toward God and faith in the finished work of Christ at Calvary’s Cross and the Empty Tomb! There are those who admire His compassion but will deny His Crown! There are those who give credit to Him for His strong character and caring outreach to the hungry and needy, but care not that He confessed He was the Promised Messiah! To them, “No man can atone for the sin of all humanity!”

In 1 Peter 2:22-25 Peter wrote, speaking of Christ Jesus, “Who committed no sin, nor was deceit found in His mouth”; who, when He was reviled, did not revile in return; when He suffered, He did not threaten, but committed Himself to Him who judges righteously; who Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live for righteousness – BY WHOSE STRIPES YOU WERE HEALED. For you were like sheep going astray, but have now returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.”

This is why the author of Hebrews sought to awaken sleeping souls when he wrote in Hebrews 9:27-28, “And as it is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment, so Christ was offered once to bear the sins of many. To those who eagerly wait for Him He will appear a second time, apart from sin, for salvation.” A sinful vessel washed, purified, cleansed by the blood of the Lamb, becomes the holy temple of His residence in true believers of redemptive faith! Parodies abound in unbelieving hearts and minds, but “symphonies of praise” are heard worldwide by the “Blood-bought” citizens of Christ’s glorious Kingdom!

Oh, it’s ‘easy’ to deny Christ’s saving grace and mercy when one’s intent is to live with and satisfy one’s sin nature! Self-pride, self-indulgence, self-adulation becomes ‘ruler’ in so many sin-blackened minds and hearts! But one, also, of the great stumbling blocks in unbelievers is their ‘love’ of indifference and unconcern for anything ‘spiritual’! In fact, most unbelievers and rebellers against Holy Truth are “listless”, or, as the Dictionary describes it: “feeling or showing no inclination toward or interest in anything,” except self-rule, self-indulgence and self-pleasure!

Most unbelievers are immersed in the monopoly of what promotes the success I want in what “I” determine as ‘my way of salvation’. But since only true redemptive faith in Christ’s shed blood washes away one’s guilt, ‘fleshly resolutions’ become the fallen’s avenue to success, but always falling short, missing the mark, and coming up empty and drained without saving grace and mercy and love from God Himself!

In Isaiah 45:22-24 the prophet wrote a word from God that call every unbelieving man to repentance and faith. God said: “LOOK TO ME, AND BE SAVED, all you ends of the earth! For I AM GOD, and there is no other. I have sworn by Myself’ the word has gone out of My mouth in righteousness, and shall not return, THAT TO ME EVERY KNEE SHALL BOW, EVERY TONGUE SHALL TAKE AN OATH. He shall say, ‘Surely in the Lord I have righteousness and strength. To Him men shall come, and all shall be ashamed who are incensed against Him.”

No ‘looking to Him,’ no repenting of one’s sin, no surrendering to His Lordship, no resting in His shed blood and His promise of forgiveness and resurrection life, no turning to worship and praise the God of Creation, the God of the Cross, and the God whose Throne is in Heaven, Over the Earth, and according to Hebrews 1:8, But to the Son God says: “Your throne, O God, is forever and ever; a scepter of righteousness is the scepter of Your kingdom. Verse 9, You have loved righteousness and hated lawlessness; Therefore God, Your God, has anointed You with the oil of gladness more than Your companions.”

Yet, how easy for many to “Bear His Name –Yet – Live With Shame”! But then the grace of God is “Rescuing the perishing, and caring for the fallen!” I love Frederick William Robertson’s words in “The Encyclopedia of Religious Quotations,” [p.399], “We are too much haunted by ourselves, projecting the central shadow of self on everything around us. – And then comes the Gospel to rescue us from this selfishness. – Redemption is this, to forget self in God.”

B.B. McKinney and W.T. Dale co-authored an old Hymn entitled: “Crimson Calvary Answers, ‘No!’” Their words? “Shall I be condemned forever, If I to the Lord draw near; If I sue for peace and pardon, Will He deign to hear my prayer? Will He scorn my deep contrition, Will He not His grace bestow? Will He scorn my heart’s petition? Crimson Calvary answers, “No!”

I am mourning over my follies; I am weeping over my sin; For my guilt’s become oppressive, And a burden long has been; Will the Lord be gracious to me, If I tell Him all my woe, Will He leave me in my anguish? Crimson Calvary answers, “No!”

If I go and tell Him truly How I have His love abused, How I’ve sinned against His mercy, And His pardon have refused; Will He grant His loving favor When in penitence I go; Or in wrath will He forsake me? Crimson Calvary answers, “No!”

CHAPTER NINETEEN

“WANDERING FROM THE FAITH”

There are not many men anywhere who live with a total disregard of Holy God; and there are many men all over the world who in their deep and abiding love for Him would never consider ‘walking away’ from Him. But, at the same time, there are those “journeyers” with Jesus who have chosen, not simply to willfully walk away, but at times are “drawn away”, or often “swept away” by powerful tides of false influences thrusting them onto the rocks of “doubt, fears, twisted unbeliefs, or careless, fleshly indulgences”! And, for them, ‘surprisingly’ (?) they “fall into” those temptations and give way to the devil’s strong deceptions, the devil even telling some, “you cannot do anything but sin until you get to heaven; so, at least, have a little ‘fun’ on the way!”

“Faith journeys”? There are missed or messed-up directions that some believers take that become “detours” away from the true and living Way, and become “dead-end streets” that cause a “scattering” and not “gathered unto Jesus”! In fact, in John 16:32, Jesus SPOKE TO HIS DISCIPLES! “Do you now believe? Indeed the hour is coming, yes, has now come, that you will be scattered, EACH TO HIS OWN, and will leave Me alone.”

Don’t you pray that that never happens to you, to yours, to your fellow believers, to your pastoral leadership, even ‘up-until-now’ faithful political leaders who for the most part have sought to honor the Lord Jesus Christ? But are you aware of, yes, some “wandering from the Faith”?

Are you aware of how easy it is to be ‘side-tracked’ to personal interests rather than the cause of Christ in a careless world of, often, a “straying from the faith”? Are there “mental” strayings from pure devotion and surrender to Christ’s Lordship? Are there “willful” choices to disobey and stray away? Are there “inner desolations” or “private sins” that no one sees but God Himself that has captured one’s heart and mind “spoiling” the redemptive blessing of a “new life” in Christ?

course, when you read Luke 19:41-44 about Christ Jesus “weeping over Jerusalem”, you clearly understand how the ‘religious pretenders’ claimed allegiance to Jesus but then participated in His crucifixion, but since “All Scripture is inspired by God, and is profitable for doctrine, reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God (anywhere, anytime, anywho!) may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work,” (2 Timothy 3:16-17), hear the Master, Lord, and Savior in the Luke passage!!

“If YOU had known, even you, especially in this your day, the things that make for your peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. For days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment around you, surround you, and close you in on every side, and level you, and your children within you, to the ground; and they will not leave one stone upon another, BECAUSE you did not know the time of your visitation.” WOW! [Happened to Jerusalem – can happen to you!]

In our “faith journeys” does the Lord Jesus tell us that there are “times of visitation” that become His “times of examination” of ALL disciples? Don’t you find it so interesting and challenging to read King David in Psalm 26:2-8? “Examine me, O Lord, and prove me; try my mind and my heart. For Your lovingkindness is before my eyes, and I have walked in Your truth.

I have not sat with idolatrous mortals, nor will I go in with hypocrites. I have hated the assembly of evildoers, and will not sit with the wicked. I will wash my hands in innocence; So I will go about Your altar, O Lord, that I may proclaim with the voice of thanksgiving, and tell of all Your wondrous works. Lord, I have loved the habitation of Your house, and the place where Your glory dwells.”

In the “faith journey”, with an awareness of examinations and testings by Father-God, some live out the faith carelessly unaware of God’s plan and desire to ‘conform us all into the very image and likeness of Christ’, but darkening opportunities, avoiding divine ability, and limiting the fullness of the blessing of the gospel of Jesus Christ! I really don’t know how it is that many ‘believers’ consider “self-effort-best” in the walk of faith when “Christ in us IS the hope of glory!”

How many do you know or become aware of in your pilgrimage who know nothing about “the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us In Christ Jesus”, not in one’s best effort? But, in the “journey” of “being conformed to the image of Christ”, is it possible that some ‘fall way from the faith’?

In Jeremiah 6:10 the “Lord of hosts” spoke to a “falling-away-people”: “To whom shall I speak and give warning that they may hear? Indeed their ear is uncircumcised, and they cannot give heed. [Why?], Behold, the word of the Lord is a reproach to them; they have no delight in it.”

Oh, but Holy God didn’t stop there! Jeremiah 6:13-15 is a strong, holy, convicting, awakening Word! He said: “Because from the least of them even to the greatest of them, everyone is given to covetousness; and from the prophet even to the priest, everyone deals falsely. They have also healed the hurt of My people slightly, saying, ‘Peace, peace!’ when there is no peace. Were they ashamed when they had committed abomination? No! They were not at all ashamed; nor did they know how to blush. Therefore THEY SHALL FALL among those who fall; At the time I punish them, they shall be cast down,” says the Lord.

Do you remember Joseph preparing his brothers for their ‘journey’ back to Israel and their father? He said, in Genesis 45:24 So he sent his brothers away, and they departed; and he said to them, “See that you do not become troubled along the way.” Did YOU have a spiritual father of the faith who told you that as you began your “pilgrimage of faith and devotion to Christ Jesus”? And yet many failed to warn sons and daughters of the faith that “troubles” leading to a “falling away” can be numerous and horrific!

Didn’t Paul warn the Thessalonians about “the coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish (along the way), because they did not receive (or see as necessary for themselves because they were so “spiritual” in their own understanding!) the love of the truth, that they might be saved.” (2 Thessalonians 2:9-10). Oh, and then God made a sovereign judgment! Verses 11-12 says, “AND FOR THIS REASON GOD will send them strong delusion, that they should believe the lie ( like ‘you can sin and not die’?), that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.” Isn’t it true, haven’t you heard them, read them, witnessed them, teaching and preaching the “white-washing” of “dark truths”, promoting “one can sin, and sin, and sin, and not die, because God overlooks a believer’s sin but condemns sinners”?, when it hasn’t changed: “The wages of sin is death!”

Thank God FOR “the Pauls” who serve Him faithfully and warn of the dangers of “falling away”! In Galatians 5:1 and Verses 4-6, Paul wrote: “Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage….Verses 4-6, You have become estranged from Christ, you who attempt to be justified by law ( you who compromise and want to blend fallen flesh with “new birth spirit”); you have fallen from grace. For we through the Spirit eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness by faith. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but faith working through love.”

And isn’t “the liberty of Christ” the liberty of freedom from, not the liberty to be or do as redeemed ‘flesh’ dictates, but the liberty of Lordship, committed to and dominated by His Holy Will, which IS “Go and sin no more”? (John 8:11!). What ‘yoke’ have you submitted to? The yoke of indulgent flesh or the yoke OF “Christ-Liberation”?

There’s an awesome word from the Lord in Revelation 3:10-12 which says: “Because you have kept My command to PERSEVERE, I also will keep you from the hour of trial which shall come upon the whole world, to test those who dwell on the earth. Behold, I am coming quickly! (Have YOU heard His “door-knocking” at your heart?). Hold fast what you have, that no one may take your crown. He WHO OVERCOMES, I will make him a pillar in the temple of My God, and he shall go out no more. I will write on him the name of My God and the name of the city of My God, the New Jerusalem, which comes down out of heaven from My God. And I will write on him My new name.” There doesn’t have to be a “wandering away from the true, redemptive Faith in Christ alone”, but, sadly, there are those who do!

WANDERING FROM THE FAITH? IS IT POSSIBLE THAT THERE ARE THOSE WHO BEGIN THE JOURNEY WITHOUT COUNTING THE COST? I assume that the words of the Lord Jesus apply as we seek to determine why the ‘wandering away’ occurs – Right? In Luke 14:25-33 we see several ‘types of followers’, temporary-eternal, adapters-adopted, reckless-reliant, divided allegiances- undivided devotion, cost ignoramuses-cost evaluators! Receive Christ Jesus’ “demands of true discipleship”!

Now great multitudes went with Him. And He turned and said to them, “If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple. And whoever does not bear his cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple.

For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not sit down first and count the cost, whether he has enough to finish it – lest, after he has laid the foundation, and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, saying, ‘This man began to build and was not able to finish? Or what king, going to make war against another king, does not sit down first and consider whether he is able with ten thousand to meet him who comes against him with twenty thousand? Or else, while the other is still a great way off, he sends a delegate and asks conditions of peace. SO LIKEWISE, whoever of you does not forsake all that he has cannot be My disciple.”

A ‘king’ considering the cost? Jesus evaluated the ‘human condition’ of sin and separation from Holy God, willingly giving Himself in death to bring opportunity for Resurrection Life, Resurrection Power, and Resurrection Hope to every man who lives in repentance toward God and faith in the Savior’s finished work at the Cross, then three days later rising from the dead, then offering every repentant soul forgiveness, a “new Life”, ushering in the eternal kingdom of God, and assigning all “followers” to endure ‘world rejection’ but rejoice daily in God’s eternal affirmation of a true child of faith that rejects what a fallen world offers and ‘rests’ in what Christ Jesus assures!

It was Paul who said in Acts 17:26-28, “And He (God) has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and has determined their preappointed times and the boundaries of their dwellings, so that they should seek the Lord, in the hope that they might grope and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us; for in Him we live and move and have our being…”. And then in Acts 17:30-31 we find out about the eternal governance of God! “Truly, these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now Commands all men everywhere to repent, BECAUSE He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained. He has given assurance of this to all by raising Him from the dead.” Glory!

Were you informed of “the cost” when you “joined” a church? In Luke 24:46-49 Jesus said, “Thus it is written, and thus it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day, AND THAT REPENTANCE AND REMISSION OF SINS SHOULD BE PREACHED IN HIS NAME TO ALL NATIONS, beginning at Jerusalem. And you are witnesses of these things. Behold, I send the Promise of My Father upon you; but tarry in the city of Jerusalem until you are endued with power from on high.”

Repentance? Brokenness over one’s sin and sin nature, brokenness over alienation and separation from Holy God who made you, brokenness that you ignored Christ’s historic death for you too long, brokenness over the alienation and separation from God’s desire to extend His love, express His grace, and exalt His Son through you – but for too long you ignored divine intent, lived with a closed mind to His love, His will, His sacrifice, brokenness realizing that if YOU were the only sinful man who ever lived, and Christ died just for you, how do you relate to that? Will YOU just wander away from redemptive faith or halt the mis-direction of your life and “lean on Christ Jesus only”? “Count the cost”? Death to the old man and full surrender to the “new man” in Christ!

WANDERING FROM THE FAITH? IS IT POSSIBLE A BELIEVER, HAVING REPENTED, SERVED FAITHFULLY HIS MASTER FOR SOME TIME, CAN BELIEVE THE MASTER ‘MAY DELAY HIS COMING’, THEREFORE “I” CHOOSE TO PLAY AROUND FOR AWHILE! Come to Luke 12: 42-46 where Jesus speaks so clearly about this danger that comes over some ‘believers’ lives: “Who then is that faithful and wise steward, whom his master will make ruler over his household, to give them their portion of food in due season? Blessed is that servant whom his master will find so doing when he comes. Truly, I say to you that he will make him ruler over all that he has. But if that servant says in his heart, ‘My master is delaying his coming,’ and begins to beat the male and female servants, and to eat and drink and be drunk, the master of that servant will come on a day when he is not aware, and will cut him in two and appoint his portion with the unbelievers.”

It’s really, really interesting that early in the church’s existence the Apostle Paul had to intervene, at least in Thessalonica, but you’ll find his concern elsewhere in his writings if you so desire, but in 1 Thessalonians 4:3-8 he stirs up a strong warning to the “play-around” folks who engaged in sexual immorality. Paul wrote:

“For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you should abstain from sexual immorality; that each of you should know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor, not in passion of lust, like the Gentiles, who do not know God; that no one should take advantage of and defraud his brother in this matter, because the Lord is the avenger of all such, as we also forewarned you and testified.

For God did not call us to uncleanness, but in holiness. Therefore he who rejects this does not reject man, but God, who has also given us His Holy Spirit.”

I wonder how many “flesh indulgers” of the past, having come to Christ, consult their Master and Lord before plunging into a sea of sexual immorality? Of course, sadly, some were never discipled as to the ‘holy life’ as “ambassadors of Christ”! When Jesus said in John 18:36, “My kingdom is not of this world,” which, I believe, is certainly a call in one’s life of faith that ‘kingdom living’ under His Lordship is opposite of submission to, entertainment of the world’s fleshly ways, especially sexual immorality!

Have you been taught that coming to Christ through repentance toward God and faith in Christ’s finished work at the Cross opens the door of your heart and life to “Kingdom Allegiance”? Jesus told the religious Pharisees in Luke 17:20-21, “The kingdom of God does not come with observation; nor will they say, ‘See here!’ or ‘See there!’ For indeed, the kingdom of God is within you.”

In Romans 14:16-19 we find interesting, convicting, challenging words: “Therefore do not let your good be spoken of as evil; [but at the same time, I add: “but do not let your evil be spoken of as good”, or “Sexual immorality is OK! Don’t let the ‘Bible-thumpers’ scare you! We all do it.” Really?]. for the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. For he who serves Christ in these things is acceptable to God and approved by men. Therefore let us pursue the things which make for peace and the things by which one may edify another.”

In 1 Thessalonians 4:1-3 I repeat what I read earlier: “Finally then, brethren, we urge and exhort in the Lord Jesus that you should abound more and more, just as you received from us HOW YOU OUGHT TO WALK AND PLEASE GOD; for you know what commandments we gave you through the Lord Jesus. For this is THE WILL OF GOD, your sanctification: THAT YOU SHOULD ABSTAIN FROM SEXUAL IMMORALITY…!”

WANDERING FROM THE FAITH? IS IT POSSIBLE THAT SOME BELIEVERS, SO ENAMORED WITH “PEACE AND SAFETY” TEACHINGS, RATHER THEN “PURSUE, PRESS IN, OR PERPETUALLY” HOLD ONTO CHRIST JESUS, THEY BECOME SO IN LOVE WITH PLEASING ‘FLESH’ THEY ALLOW “SPIRIT-HUNGER” TO DIE? It’s really amazing to me and heart-breaking to read in Isaiah 56:9-12 about Israel’s careless, compromising, irresponsible leaders that influenced a ton of Israel’s people, with only the true remnant remaining steadfast! It says: “All you beasts of the field, come to devour, all you beasts in the forest. (And Jerusalem was ultimately destroyed in 70AD!) His watchmen are blind, they are all ignorant; they are all dumb dogs, they cannot bark; sleeping, lying down loving to slumber.

Yes, they are greedy dogs which never have enough. And they are shepherds who cannot understand; THEY ALL LOOK TO THEIR OWN WAY, every one for his own gain, from his own territory. “Come,” one says, “I will bring wine, and we will fill ourselves with intoxicating drink; Tomorrow will be as today, and much more abundant.” But they ended bankrupt!

That’s “flesh-loving, flesh-desiring, flesh domination”, even as one sings “Peace and Safety”! Oh, but then! SUDDEN DESTRUCTION COMES! In 1 Thessalonians 5:1-11 Paul challenges every believer then and now: But concerning the times and the seasons, brethren, you have no need that I should write to you. For you yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so comes as a thief in the night. For when they say, “Peace and safety!” then sudden destruction comes upon them, as labor pains upon a pregnant woman. And they shall not escape.

But you, brethren, are not in darkness, so that this day should overtake you as a thief. You are all sons of light and sons of the day. We are not of the night nor of darkness. Therefore let us NOT SLEEP, as others do, but let us watch and be sober. For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk are drunk at night. But let us who ARE OF THE DAY be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love, and as a helmet the hope of salvation.

For God did not appoint us to wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, that whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with Him. Therefore comfort each other and edify one another, just as you also are doing.”

Of course, the question of the moment is, “Are you walking, now, this very moment, in the ‘darkness’ of fleshly indulgence or in the “Light” of glorious grace and mercy?” Walking in the “peace and safety” frame of reference is often held by ‘believers’ walking both sides of the street – a devotion to flesh observance during the week and a spirit observance on Sundays! In Matthew 6:24 Jesus said: “No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.” Are YOU a ‘compromising disciple’ walking both sides of the street, or His disciple willing to walk in His “way of the Cross” that leads home victoriously?

In Revelation 1:17-18 John was blessed in the divine unveiling of Christ’s Presence! He said: And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead. But He laid His right hand on me, saying to me, ‘Do not be afraid; I am the First and the Last. I AM He who lives, and was dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore. Amen.” Amen means “So be it,” and our Lord intends His “AMEN” to be YOUR “AMEN”, not in “falling away” but resting in the fullness of the blessing of the gospel of Jesus Christ!

If there has been a tendency in YOU to “walk away”, never resist His Holy Presence within you or around you, or even His Presence through caring, compassionate ambassadors of Christ who have no desire seeing you fall away! HE WILL COME! THEY WILL COME! And caring, loving brothers and sisters ‘in Christ’ will seek to turn you back to Him, not rest as they see you turning to satisfy your ‘flesh’ and fall away!

In Deuteronomy 33:26-27 there is a word of ‘hope’ for Israel as a nation, but also a word of ‘hope’ for people committed to Christ Jesus today, for God is the Same ‘yesterday’, ‘today’, and ‘forever’! “There is no one like the God of Jeshuran, who rides the heavens to help you, and in His and in His excellency on the clouds. The eternal God is your refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms; He will thrust out the enemy from before you, and will say, “Destroy!”

You didn’t let Revelation 1:17 just fly over your head without understanding, did you? Again, “And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead. But He laid His right hand on me, saying to me, ‘Do not be afraid; I am the First and the Last..”, saying then and now: “I’m Lord over everything you face – you don’t have to “fall away” – let Me finish your earthly walk of faith as you choose to be dead to yourself but fully alive and overcoming in Me!”

I love Oswald Chambers’ words in his book, “My Utmost For His Highest”. (P.104-105): “He laid His right hand upon me.” In the midst of the awfulness (and JFF says, ‘the awfulness of falling away”!), a touch comes, and you know it is the right hand of Jesus Christ. The right hand not of restraint nor of correction nor of chastisement, but the right hand of the Everlasting Father. Whenever His hand is laid upon you, it is ineffable peace and comfort, the sense that “underneath are the everlasting arms,” full of sustaining and comfort and strength.”

The question is: When the temptation comes to “fall away”, will I yield to the ‘old man’ OR surrender to the “new man” in Christ; will I give Jesus His rightful place, in me, as Savior, Lord, Master, Conqueror over temptation Himself, conqueror over sin itself, and Conqueror over the spiritual death within you, and the Author of everlasting Life through your available vessel? “CHOOSE CHRIST, THE WAY, THE TRUTH, and ,THE EVERLASTING LIFE”, finishing strong, not in flesh-effort that fails!

CHAPTER TWENTY

“GUTSY GRIT OR GODLY SORROW?”

There’s an interesting verse in Jeremiah 45:5 where the Lord Himself speaks: “And do not seek great things for yourself? Do not seek them; for behold, I will bring adversity on all flesh,” says the Lord. “But I will give your life to you as a prize in all places, wherever you go.” And, if God is no respecter of persons, (and He’s not!), then what He said through the prophet to Baruch, does the same hold true to you? Is YOUR “gutsy grit” what Holy God desires from you or a broken, repentant heart, and truly godly sorrow over the sinful state of your God-less life?

One of the saddest words in all of Scripture, so definitive of “fallen men”, is found in Proverbs 21:2 where the Word declares: “Every way of man is right in his own eyes, but the Lord weighs the hearts.” A gutsy, gritty heart or a heart of Godly sorrow? A gilded heart of showy appearances or a graced heart of Godly indwelling?

Do you sense any of “gutsy grit” around you, whether child, youth, young adult, or aging adult? Do you ever view the “culture of fleshly intellect” and shake your head as you visualize “cultural unbelief” and fleshly rejection of Holy God and His love and purpose for all fallen men?

Jonathan Edwards, in his writing, “The Freedom of the Will,” wrote: “The heart (that’s the heart of fallen men!) is like a viper, hissing, and spitting poison at God.” The hearts of “fallen men”, alienated and separated from Holy God, are yielded to the aim of pursuing and satisfying the ‘flesh’ and its indulgences with no consideration of eternal purpose or what pleases and honors Holy God with His desire that they be reconciled to Him through the blood of the Lamb of God!

“Fallen men”, large in prominence or known by few, are no different! Both are citizens of the kingdom of darkness and the devil, intent on satisfying all fleshly desires, accepting of “seeming shows,” indulging in vain delights, programmed by civilized ‘stupidity’, critical of true men of redeeming faith through the Blood, satisfied with mental allegiance apart from ‘heart-transformation,’ and certainly with “No fear of God” but only acknowledgement of His existence, even if that! Faith, to them, is simply an awareness of God, if even that by some, but absent from true repentance and redeeming faith and them becoming the temple of Holy Presence on earth! Faith, to them, is for far too many, even some pastors, the faith of possibilities, not the faith of divine realities, which is why ‘philosophy’, factual or fiction, at least governs some’s ‘mental allegiance’!

“Gutsy grit” is never able to translate or transform the ‘chord discords’ or ‘off-key’ fleshly realities into an ‘orchestrated-life-harmony’ apart from the grace and the mercy of God! It was Thomas Carlyle who once said: [“The Encyclopedia of Religious Quotations,” edited by Frank S. Mead, Fleming H. Revell com., Westwood New Jersey,p.456], “There is but one thing without honor, smitten with eternal barrenness, inability to do or to be, and that is unbelief. He who believes nothing, who believes only the show of things, is not in relation with nature or fact at all.”

Do you remember Moses and Aaron going in to Pharoah of Egypt and telling him, (Exodus 5:1-2), “Thus says the Lord God of Israel, ‘Let My people go, that they may hold a feast to Me in the wilderness.’” And Pharoah said, “Who is the Lord, that I should obey His voice to let Israel go? I do not know the Lord, nor will I let Israel go.” Yet, in Exodus 14 we read of the destruction of the Egyptian armies AND Pharoah with Verse 28 telling us, “Not so much as one of them remained,” and certainly not “gritted Pharoah”! And, dare I tell you, FROM HELL PHAROAH STILL GRIEVES AND GROANS, BUT NOW VOID OF HIS GUTSY GRIT!

“Gutsy grit” by unbelievers and rejecters of Resurrection Life in Christ are men, past, present, and future, who will reveal to you, if you’re ever able to ask them, (I hope not!), “We know now only anthems of despair, the themes of avenging demons, the scary, constant, unyielding voices of devilish phantoms,” or Harriet Beecher Stowe’s words, “No one is so thoroughly superstitious as the godless man. Life and death to him are haunted grounds, filled with goblin forms of vague and shadowy dread.”

There is no evil so great as the evil of the rejection of grace, mercy, forgiveness, and life in and through Christ, just as Paul wrote to Timothy in 2 Timothy 2:12b, “If we deny Him, He [the One True and Living God, the Resurrected Christ], ALSO will deny us.”

I find the anointed spirit of Paul so needed in this 21^st Century in our own journey of faith, and especially as one is cemented and grounded in the Holy Word, and fully aware of the fallacy of “gutsy grit”, and fully aware of the need of “godly sorrow”, “redemptive faith,” “and true repentance”! In 2 Timothy 2:23-26 he wrote: “But avoid foolish and ignorant disputes, knowing that they generate strife. And a servant of the Lord must not quarrel but be gentle to all, able to teach, patient, in humility correcting those who are in opposition, if God perhaps will grant them repentance, so that they may know the truth, and that THEY MAY COME TO THEIR SENSES AND ESCAPE THE SNARE OF THE DEVIL, having been taken captive by him to do his will.”

Do YOU find that a frightening statement that unbelievers are those “snared by the devil”, functioning in their lives according to his wants, desires, and plans? Isn’t it amazing, shocking, awakening, alerting to you to even hear Jesus, in Revelation 3:9, even mention “those of the synagogue of Satan”? SO…let’s just call on “gutsy grit” to see us through in our earthly warfare with the devil and the powers of darkness – right? WRONG!

Examine Revelation 12:7-12! And war broke out in heaven: Michael and his angels fought with the dragon; and the dragon and his angels fought, but they did not prevail, nor was a place found for them in heaven any longer. So the great dragon was cast out, that serpent of old, called the Devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was cast to the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.

Then I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, “Now salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of His Christ have come, for the accuser of our brethren, who accused them before our God day and night, has been cast down. AND THEY OVERCAME HIM BY THE BLOOD OF THE LAMB AND BY THE WORD OF THEIR OWN TESTIMONY, AND THEY DID NOT LOVE THEIR LIVES TO THE DEATH. THEREFORE rejoice, O heavens, and you who dwell in them!

Woe to the inhabitants of the earth and the sea! For the devil has come down to you, having great wrath, because he knows that he has a short time.”

But, hear me! Whether it’s the world, the flesh, or the devil, Psalm 50:15 tells us: “Call upon Me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you shall glorify me.” What a promise! Dare I ask YOU? “Do YOU stand on the promises in “gutsy grit” or “REST” in the finished work of Christ “At Calvary”? What does the Holy Word tell us in Ephesians 6:10-18?

“Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord [ Does that sound like “gutsy grit” to you?] and IN the power of HIS MIGHT. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.

STAND THEREFORE, having girded your waist with truth, having put on the breastplate of righteousness, [that’s imparted, implanted, imputed righteousness by the grace and mercy of God!], and having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace; above all, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one. And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God; praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, being watchful to this end with all perseverance and supplication for all the saints –“

Dare I tell you that the day of your ‘helpless feeling’ can be, should be, must be, the day of full awareness of ALL God Himself wants to be and to do through you? Proverbs 3:1-6 is a powerful expression from God that should be the launching of your life of faith and trust through “Godly Sorrow” from a heart and life that does not lean on “gutsy grit” or “fleshly best” but God’s mercy, grace, and love! It says: “My son, do not forget my law (the wisdom and instruction from “trust” in the Lord!), but let your heart keep my commands; for length of days and long life they will add to you. Let not mercy and truth forsake you; bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart, And SO find favor and high esteem in the sight of God and man.

Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and LEAN NOT ON YOUR OWN UNDERSTANDING; in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths. [Look now at Verses 13, and 21-26]! “Happy is the man who finds wisdom, and the man who gains understanding.” That’s the wisdom of God and the understanding the Holy Spirit gives to you as you faithfully feed on His Word! Verses 21-26 says, “My son, let them not depart from your eyes – keep sound wisdom and discretion; So they will be LIFE TO YOUR SOUL and GRACE TO YOUR NECK.

Then you will walk safely in your way, and your foot will not stumble. When you lie down, you will not be afraid; Yes, you will lie down and your sleep will be sweet. Do not be afraid of sudden terror, nor of trouble from the wicked when it comes; For the Lord will be your confidence, and will keep your foot from being caught.”

So…what does a fleshly, sinful, mortal man do to obtain his personal salvation? Do you remember Paul and Silas imprisoned for the faith in Acts 16 when the jailer came to them after a great earthquake, finding all the prison doors opened, and Paul and Silas still there! He was ready to kill himself, but went in to Paul and Silas asking, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” And it wasn’t ‘saved from an earthquake but “saved from his sins”! And in Acts 16:31 Paul and Silas told him, “Believe [trust in, rely upon, adhere to] on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved, you and your household.”

That’s: BE FINISHED WITH YOURSELF AND ANY ATTEMPT AT BEING “RELIGIOUS”, AND REST IN THE FINISHED WORK OF CHRIST AT THE CROSS! Have you never received, rested in, or relied upon 2 Corinthians 5:17? “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he IS a ‘new creation’; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.”

“In Christ” we sing a “new song”! “In Christ” we walk in “newness of life” and serve Him in “newness of spirit”! The Lord Jesus said in Revelation 21:5, “Behold, I make all things new…!” We’re ‘clothed’ with “new garments”, we “LIVE” by a “new and living way,” He grants us a “new name”, He bestows upon us out of our death the reality of “new-born”, a “new covenant,” a “new heart and a new spirit,” and as “newborn babes in Christ” we desire, hunger for, rest in, and are assured of His able-ness to keep what we’ve committed unto Him and to keep what He has committed unto us!

2 Corinthians 5:21 declares: “For He (God) made Him (Jesus Christ) who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God In Him.” ARE YOU “the righteousness of God IN CHRIST JESUS”? Hear me!

“In Christ” we are no longer ‘mere men’ but sons and daughters of redemptive faith birthed by God to bear, share, unveil His Name!

“In Christ”, by God’s mercy, grace, and love, we’ve been set apart to be “a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own special, blood-bought people”!

“In Christ”, ‘born again by the Spirit into the Holy Family of God, we are declared by Him to be the “righteousness of God in Christ Jesus”! We’re now “sons and daughters” of our Heavenly Father!

Our lives, now “in Christ”, are “hidden with Christ in God”! We’ve been “raised up to be seated with Him in heavenly places at the very right hand of God the Father!

Our lives “in Christ” are now identified as “ministers of reconciliation” and “ambassadors of Christ”! We’ve been counted worthy to walk with Christ, entrusted with His Gospel!

Christ Jesus is the Bridegroom – we’re “the bride of Christ”! We’re now “trustees of the ‘mysteries’! We’re “witnesses” of His Redeeming Grace! God even says of all repentant believers that they are “priests and kings unto Him.”

To God, we are the ‘fragrance of Christ,’ His ‘peace-makers’ in a troubled world, His disciples and disciplers, His “soldiers of the Cross”! We’re “more than conquerors” – we’re “new creations”!

“In Christ” we’re “living sacrifices”, eternal epistles, poems of the grace, mercy, and love of God! Doesn’t the Word declare the truth and reality, and visual presence of “apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, teachers, or ‘disciples’ meaning “Followers of Christ”?

“In Christ” we’re “servants” of the King of kings and Lord of lords – we bear the image of the Heavenly Man, because WE ARE ‘the called, the separated, the anointed, indwelt by all the very fullness of God”!

“In Christ” we are His messengers, His proclaimers, the heralds of His gospel or ‘good news’! “In Him” we ARE the “glorious Body of Christ,” members of the Holy Body in particular!

“In Christ” we’re “vessels” through which God Himself reveals His Son, we’re “salt” and “light”, we’re the “Symphony” God sings about, the music of His heart, and over us He sings the sounds of joy and sweet pleasure!

It’s time to settle it for Eternity! Are you a ‘mere man’ or “the anointed, appointed, affirmed holy man of God, infilled by the Holy Spirit to be His holy messengers?

Are you a ‘mere man’ or the biblically-declared “mighty men of valor”? Are you a ‘worldly, anxious ant’ or an “ambassador of Christ”? Are you a ‘mere man’ or a son or daughter of the family of Father-God?

Are you a ‘mere man’ or a “true minister and servant of reconciliation”? Are you simply a ‘mere man’ or a true witness of Saving Grace, Master-Full Mercy, and overflowing in Calvary’s Song of eternal love and Christ-Alone “Blood Redemption”?

Are YOU a “witness” of “Saving Grace”? Are YOU “the elect,” the “set-apart”, the “chosen of God”? Are YOU “the apple of God’s eye”? Are YOU His “workmanship”? Are YOU a “partner with God”, a “vessel of honor before Him daily”, available for Him to do as He pleases through YOU?

Are You “clay in the hands of the Potter, being sculpted into His Holy Image and Likeness”? Are you a “partaker of the divine nature”, one with Him, the fullness of Him who fills all in all?

You do realize that a ‘roller coaster’, at least once in your life, ought to be fun to ‘play on’, but the “ups and downs”, the “around and around” moves you nowhere in life in relation to Holy God! A ‘ferris wheel’ at the State Fair will get you ‘up’ momentarily to look “over” for a brief glimpse of the beautiful side, but then it’s down again and around again to the same old circumstances!

And anonymous writer penned these words: “Do you know what makes man the most suffering of all creatures? It is that he has one foot in the finite and the other in the infinite, and that he is torn between the two worlds.” Are You “torn” or “settled” on the True Foundation of Eternal Life, Christ Jesus, our Lord, Savior, Redeemer, Reconciler of men to God?

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

“CRIMINALIZED FOR STANDING FOR THE TRUTH”!

At a “National Hispanic Leadership Conference” in Houston, Texas, April 29, 2015, former Florida governor and presidential candidate, at the time, Jeb Bush, said: “There is no more powerful and liberating influence on this earth than the Christian conscience in action and today in America it is important to respect and to protect Christians acting on their faith…not just talking about their faith, but there is a constitutional right and more importantly for a loving society Christians need to have the space to be able to act on their conscience.” My only problem with his statement is, that often, the ‘Christian conscience’ is willful determination of ‘flesh’ opinions rather than Holy Word of God revelation!

It wasn’t long ago, maybe same day as Jeb Bush, that former Arkansas governor, Mike Huckabee, said, maybe same conference, “We are living in perilous times where people who are Christian are on the brink of being criminalized for their convictions.”

And both men, stressing their beliefs, are easily, in this day and time, set aside and considered ‘radical’ by ‘godless’ or even ‘misinformed’ professing believers who don’t stand on the Word of God! It’s difficult to “stand for Truth” when one’s foundation is built on “self-evaluation” rather than “God-revealed-Holy Truth”!

We can go all the way back to Joshua’s day when in Joshua 24:14-15 we read, Joshua speaking, “Now therefore, fear the Lord, serve Him in sincerity and in truth, and put away the gods which your fathers served on the other side of the River and in Egypt. Serve the Lord! And if it seems evil to you to serve the Lord, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”

We live in days as a nation that are not foreign to any nation, any people, or even to one, and can visualize what goes on anywhere, anytime, with any persons, just like the historical history of Christ’s crucifixion on the Cross several thousand years ago! Come with me to Luke 23, beginning with Verse 32! “There were also two others, criminals, led with Him to be put to death. And when they had come to the place called Calvary, there they crucified Him, and the criminals, one on the right hand and the other on the left.

Then Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do.” And they divided His garments and cast lots. And the people stood looking on. But even the rulers with them sneered, saying, “He saved others; let Him save Himself if He is the Christ, the chosen of God.”

The soldiers also mocked Him, coming and offering Him sour wine, and saying, “If You are the King of the Jews, save Yourself.” {“If”? Are you aware of the reality of literally millions and millions, more likely billions, who understand, ‘There IS the King of the Jews, the King of all Americans, the King of every European, African, or Asian’ but who selfishly decide for themselves as to whether or not they will choose to serve the Lord?!?}.

In Luke 23:34 then tells us that Christ Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do,” {Which is so true of literally millions and millions who do not know what they do when they trivialize Christ, join those who divide His garments and “roll the dice” hoping what He says is not true – BUT IT IS!}. Even the rulers of Israel SNEERED, saying, “He saved others; let Him save Himself if He is the Christ, the chosen of God.”

Don’t you find that so interesting? They had an inkling about ‘the Christ, the chosen of God,’ but couldn’t, wouldn’t, didn’t receive the prophetic word from many of their prophets hundreds and hundreds of years before His actual coming! Do you remember Jesus saying in John 8:56, “Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day, and he saw it and was glad”? Verse 57 follows, Then the Jews said to Him, “You are not yet fifty years old, and have You seen Abraham?” In Verse 58 Jesus said to them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I AM.” And their response? THEN they took up stones to throw at Him; but Jesus hid Himself and went out of the temple, going through the midst of them (the “stone-throwers”), and SO PASSED (THEM) by.” {Will Jesus have to “pass you by” when all are brought before His Throne of Judgment, whether you like it or not?}.

In Luke 23:36-38 we read: The soldiers also mocked Him, coming and offering Him sour wine, and saying, “If You are the King of the Jews, save Yourself.” And an inscription also was written over Him in letters of Greek, Latin, and Hebrews: THIS IS THE KING OF THE JEWS.

Didn’t we just read in Luke 23:33, “And when they had come to the place called Calvary, there they crucified Him, and the criminals, one on the right hand and the other on the left.” At least Luke KNEW Jesus was not a criminal, but, as God in the flesh, Who willingly offered Himself as THE sacrifice for the sins of all humanity! Even John, early in his writing of the Gospel of John, John 1:14, wrote: “And the Word (the Living Word of God!!) became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth,” proclaiming in Verse 29, The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!”

Examine John 1:32-35! And John bore witness, saying, “I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and He remained upon Him. I did not know Him, but He who sent me to baptize with water said to me, ‘Upon whom you see the Spirit descending, and remaining on Him, this is He who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.’ AND I HAVE SEEN AND TESTIFIED THAT THIS IS THE SON OF GOD.” Again, the next day, John stood with two of His disciples. And looking at Jesus as He walked, he said, “Behold, the Lamb of God!”

Dare I tell you that Christ Jesus IS “the Way of Life” that leads to the “way of death”? In Matthew 10:16-18,21-22 Jesus challenged the original ‘twelve disciples’, saying to them, “Behold, I send you out as sheep in the midst of wolves. Therefore be wise as serpents and harmless as doves. But beware of men, for they will deliver you up to councils and scourge you in their synagogues. You will be brought before governors and kings for My sake, as a testimony to them and to the Gentiles.

Verses 21-22 then says, “Now brother will deliver up brother TO DEATH, and a father his child; and children will rise up against parents and cause them to be put to death. And you will be hated by all for My name’s sake. But he who endures to the end will be saved.”

It is so evidently true that to “follow Christ Jesus” is to follow Him in every step He had to take, including the way of ‘suffering’, the way of ‘rejection’, the way of ‘obedience’, willing to fulfill the Father’s eternal will: death to Himself that resurrection life and hope could, would, and was manifested! Oh, and then in John 20, after His crucifixion and burial and resurrection, in Verses 19-21, we read:

Then, the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in the midst, and said to them, “Peace be with you.” When He had said this, He showed them His hands and His side. Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord.

So Jesus said to them again, “Peace to you! As the Father has sent Me, I also send you.” John 20:30-31 then says: And truly Jesus did many other signs in the presence of His disciples, which are not written in this book; but these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His name.”

And do you understand that “life in His name” does not come in full fruition apart from the awareness of and willingness to die daily to the ‘flesh’, the old sin-nature, and self-will, plus, a readiness of physical death by persecution if it comes your way, BECAUSE you will not deny Him?

In 2 Corinthians 1:9-10 Apostle Paul wrote: “Yes, we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves but in God who raises the dead, who delivered us from so great a death (“the wages of sin is death”!), and does deliver us; in whom we trust that He will still deliver us…”! Did Holy God, the Father, allow Jesus’ death and then manifest His Holy Power to raise the dead after Jesus’ three days in the grave?

And, how pleased is God the Father for the willingness of 21^st Century disciples to offer their lives daily as a “willing sacrifice” taking that sentence daily to themselves that His Resurrection Life may be manifested in their mortal flesh?

Do you remember Paul and Silas imprisoned, Acts 16:20-24? It says: And they brought them to the magistrates, and said, “These men, being Jews, exceedingly trouble our city; and they teach customs which are not lawful for us, being Romans, to receive or observe.” ( Ever heard it yourself? “We’re free Americans and not interested in anything you ‘Christians’ have to say! Keep on, and we’ll have you imprisoned, or kill you ourselves!”}. [I actually heard that threat in India as I preached openly on the streets!].

Continuing in Acts 16:22-24, Then the multitude rose up together against them; and the magistrates tore off their clothes and commanded them to be beaten with rods. And when they had laid many stripes on them, they threw them into prison, commanding the jailer to keep them securely. Having received such a charge, he put them into the inner prison and fastened their feet in the stocks.”

That was a literal event for faithful believers, and it does still happen today that some believers are physically jailed for faithful testimonies in certain locations. BUT there IS a ‘symbolism’ which extends to many today who are vocal for the faith but ostracized by ‘friends’ and ‘family’, opponents shutting the door on them for their outspoken challenge to receive Christ!

“CRIMINALIZED FOR STANDING FOR THE TRUTH OF GOD’S HOLY WORD”? Are you aware of Christian Institutional and openly, strong, faithful disciples of Christ witnessing a rapidly growing opposition and threats because of many enemies of God who are becoming openly hostile to the Word and Will of God and against those who uphold “All Scripture is divinely inspired…”?

Prayer is rapidly being removed from classrooms with kids being told “School is not a place to pray!” Really? Yes, really! Ten Commandments are being removed from lots of places across the Nation where the banners of Truth used to fly! In Sweden pastors have been jailed for opposing homosexuality – and that threat is not far away in the U.S.A.!

There’s an active homosexual- sick man named Mitchell Gold whose diatribe against the Word of God and churches, pastors, and faithful disciples who stand on that Word of God, who has said, “They must be made to take homosexuality off the sin list,” and a New York Time’s writer, Frank Bruni, affirmed Gold’s obscene opposition to Holy God and His Word, saying, “His commandment (that’s Mitchell Gold’s commandment) is worthy – and warranted.”

And what sickens me is when I hear some say of their pastors, “They’ll not expose or speak the Truth because they don’t want to offend ANYBODY!” God, help us! It’s as if our formerly great nation, “one nation under God”, is fast becoming a nation under opposition to God!

“CRIMINALIZED FOR STANDING FOR THE TRUTH OF GOD’S HOLY WORD”? I want to urge you right now to commit yourself to reading faithfully, over and over, the Book of Daniel for at least a week! In Daniel you’ll find, not trivializing Truth, but many who want Biblical Truth obliterated from the national scene or stage! Follow Daniel 6:1-16!

It pleased Darius to set over the kingdom one hundred and twenty satraps, to be over the whole kingdom; and over these, three governors, of whom Daniel was one, that the satraps might give account to them, so that the king would suffer no loss. Then this Daniel distinguished himself above the governors and satraps, because an excellent spirit was in him; and the king gave thought to setting him over the whole realm.

So the governors and satraps SOUGHT TO FIND SOME CHARGE AGAINST DANIEL concerning the kingdom; BUT THEY COULD FIND NO CHARGE OR FAULT, because he was faithful; nor was there any error or fault found in him. Then these men said, “We shall not find any charge against this Daniel unless we find it against him concerning the law of his God.”

So these governors and satraps thronged before the king, and said thus to him, “King Darius, live forever! All the governors of the kingdom, the administrators and satraps, the counselors and advisers, have consulted together to establish a royal statute and to make a firm decree, that whoever petitions any god or man for thirty days, except you, O king, shall be cast into the den of lions. Now, O king, establish the decree and sign the writing, so that it cannot be changed, according to the law of the Medes and Persians, which does not alter.” Therefore King Darius signed the written decree.

Now when Daniel knew that the writing was signed, he went home. And in his upper room, with his windows opened toward Jerusalem, he knelt down on his knees three times that day, and prayed and gave thanks before his God, as was his custom since early days. Then these men assembled and found Daniel praying and making supplication before his God.

And they went before the king, and spoke concerning the king’s decree: “Have you not signed a decree that every man who petitions any god or man within thirty days, except you, O king, shall be cast into the den of lions?” The king answered and said, “The thing is true, according to the law of the Medes and Persians, which does not alter.”

So they answered and said before the king, “That Daniel, who is one of the captives from Judah, does not show due regard for you, O king, or for the decree you have signed, but makes his petition three times a day.”

And the king, when he heard these words was greatly displeased with himself, and set his heart on Daniel to deliver him; and he labored till the going down of the sun to deliver him. Then these men approached the king, and said to the king, “Know, O king, that it is the law of the Medes and Persians that no decree or statute which the king establishes may be changed.”

SO the king gave the command, and they brought Daniel and cast him into the den of lions. But the king spoke, saying to Daniel, “Your God, whom you serve continually, He will deliver you.”

In Verses 21-22 Then Daniel said to the king, “O king, live forever! My God sent His angel and shut the lions’ mouths, so that they have not hurt me, because I was found innocent before Him; and also, O king, I have done no wrong before you.”

AND the accusers, on the king’s command, were all cast into the den of lions, them, their children, and their wives; and the lions overpowered them, and broke all their bones in pieces before they ever came to the bottom of the den!!!

What was King Darius’ response? He wrote a proclamation! Verses 25-28 says: “To all peoples, nations, and languages that dwell in all the earth: Peace be multiplied to you. I make a decree that in every dominion of my kingdom men must tremble and fear before the God of Daniel For He is the living God, and steadfast forever; His kingdom is the one which shall not be destroyed, and His dominion shall endure to the end.

He delivers and rescues, and He works signs and wonders in heaven and on earth, Who has delivered Daniel from the power of lions.” So this Daniel prospered in the reign of Darius and in the reign of Cyrus the Persian. Glory!

“CRIMINALIZED FOR STANDING FOR THE TRUTH OF GOD’S HOLY WORD”? John 8 is a strong chapter defining Christ’s strong “Personal Witness” against the ‘religious’ Pharisees who determined He deserved to die because He opposed their religious pretense and no true eternal foundation upon which they walked and talked “the game” yet they never faced their guilt, sin, and separation from Holy God, and certainly had no ears to hear both prophetic utterances from hundreds and hundreds of years before or His declaration of Messianic identity!

Jesus told them in John 8:19, “You know neither Me nor My Father. If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also.” Oh, and then in John 8:23-24 Jesus released the eternal arrow of Truth about the scribes and Pharisees and the ‘religious but unredeemed’ Jews: “You know neither Me nor My Father. If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also.”

In John 8:37-47 Jesus then said: “I know that you are Abraham’s descendants, but you seek to kill Me, because My word has no place in you. I speak what I have seen with My Father, and you do what you have seen with your father.” They answered and said to Him, “Abraham is our father.”

Jesus said to them, “If you were Abraham’s children, you would do the works of Abraham. But now you seek to kill Me, a Man who has told you the truth which I

heard from God. Abraham did not do this. You do the deeds of your father.” Then they said to Him, “We were not born of fornication; we have one Father – God.” Jesus said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love Me, for I proceeded forth and came from God; nor have I come of Myself, but He sent Me.

Why do you not understand My speech? Because you are not able to listen to My word. You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him.

When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it. But because I tell the truth, you do not believe Me. Which of you convicts Me of sin? He who is of God hears God’s words; therefore you do not hear, because you are not of God.”

So…Christ Jesus Himself was ‘criminalized’ by the religious, unbelieving, unrepentant crowd and CRUCIFIED ON THE CROSS for all men because of God’s great love for the world!

What went on then still goes on today! The unbelieving world still condemns the holy and congratulates the hollow; the unbelieving world sentences the sincere and celebrates the sinner; the unbelieving world imprisons the faithful and frees the ‘foul’ from any and every offense; the unbelieving world still maligns the merciful and merits the ‘molded’ in mind and heart!

It was Harriet Beecher Stowe who once said: “No one is so thoroughly superstitious as the godless man. Life and death to him are haunted grounds, filled with goblin forms of vague and shadowy dread.” And, in most cases, it’s the godless man criminalizing those who stand for, in, and through the truth, resulting, for them, a Hell forever with the devil, his demons, and all rejecters of Biblical Truth, and all sin-infected ‘profound minds’, and all ‘superficial thinkers’ who know nothing about standing on Eternal Truth!

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

WHY NATIONS FORGET GOD

There is a stark, shocking verse in Psalm 9:17. It says: “The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God.” …In Psalm 50:22 God says: “Now consider this, you that forget God, lest I tear you in pieces, and there be none to deliver.” “Forgetting God?”

Noah Webster’s 1828 Dictionary says of forgetfulness: “The quality of losing the remembrance or recollection of a thing; or rather, the quality of being apt to let anything slip from the mind…loss of remembrance or recollection; a ceasing to remember; oblivion…neglect, negligence; careless omission; inattention; as forgetfulness of duty.”

Do you remember Daniel confronting Belshazzar in Daniel 5:22-23? [NAS], “Yet you Nebuchadnezzar’s son, Belshazzer, have not humbled your heart even though you knew this, but you have exalted yourself against the Lord of heaven; and they have brought the vessels of His house before you, and you and your nobles, your wives and your concubines have been drinking wine from them; and you have praised the gods of silver and gold, of bronze, iron, wood and stone, which do not see, hear, or understand. But the God in whose hand are your life-breath and your ways, you have not glorified.”

Did Daniel say of some, “There are those who have not, do not, will not GLORIFY GOD”? What did he say?: “But the God in whose hand are your life-breath and your ways, you have not glorified.” But a Paul says in 2 Corinthians 2:14, “Now thanks be to God, which always causes us to triumph in Christ.” Is your walk of faith a testimony of ‘triumph in Christ’ or an unveiling of negligence toward Him, ‘careless omission, inattention; as forgetfulness of duty?’

Romans 1:18-32 are earth-shattering, heart-breaking verses about people and nations who forget God! [Please read before continuing!]

In Hosea 13:4-9 there are sad, prophetic words that ought to grip, convict, and convert every human soul: “Yet I am the Lord your God ever since the land of Egypt, and you shall know no God but Me; For there is no Savior besides Me. I knew you in the wilderness, in the land of great drought. When they had pasture, they were filled; they were filled and their heart was exalted; therefore they forgot Me. So I will be to them like a lion; like a leopard by the road I will lurk; I will meet them like a bear deprived of her cubs; I will tear open their rib cage, and there I will devour them like a lion. The wild beast shall tear them. O Israel, you are destroyed, but your help is from me.”

How easy for some to forget Proverbs 14:34!! “Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a disgrace to any people.” Righteousness is ‘salt’ that preserves while ‘sin’ is poison that destroys. Righteousness is God’s divine preservative for nations while sin is self-inflicted destruction. Psalm 2:11-12 tells us: “Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the Son, lest He be angry, and you perish in the way, when His wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are those who put their trust in Him.”

Do you understand “perishing in the way”? Let’s see if we can discern some of the ways “Why Nations Forget God”!

FIRST, NATIONS FORGET GOD BY OMITTING RESPONSIBILITY TO GOD. In Psalms 37:23 we read: “The steps of a righteous man are ordered by the Lord.” God is to be in control of every man’s life, yes, his every step. The New American Standard translates it: “The steps of a man are established by the Lord; and He [God] delights in his way.”

I was reading in Marketplace Ministries magazine a statement by Jay Badry. He wrote: “Many people hold fast to the idea that ‘God can do anything,’ but I shrink from that for there is one thing God is incapable of doing: violating His own perfections and attributes. What this means to me is that in a constantly changing world, sinking ever deeper into the mire of depravity, the perfect God is both timeless and changeless. As a kite must be tethered to a fixed point for stability, so my soul, indeed all that I am must be tethered to Him at all times.” That’s a person, a people, and a nation!

If a nation, a life, a family, a business, a ministry, is not ‘tethered’ to God, there is no line, strong line, holding it up soaring in the air where God wants it to soar, but releasing itself from God’s control, it crashes!!

Do you understand that when a government omits responsibility to God it shuts the door on a nation ‘blessed by God’? If you’ve studied American History at all you know that Thomas Jefferson was one of our founding fathers. He is reported to have said: “The God who gave us life gave us liberty. Can the liberties of a nation be secure when we have removed a conviction that those liberties are the gift of God?”

WHEN GOVERNMENT IGNORES, DENIES, SEEKS TO REFUTE THE DIGNITY OF DIVINE INITIATIVE IN ESTABLISHING, YES, A ‘HOLY NATION,’ IT VIOLATES EVERYTHING God intended for the human society He created. When government assumes the Jehovah-Jireh spirit, it has stolen and betrayed the ministry only God can fulfill.

It was D.A. Carson in his book “For The Love Of God” who wrote: “People do not drift toward holiness. Apart from grace-driven effort, people do not gravitate toward godliness, prayer, obedience to Scripture, faith, and delight in the Lord. We drift toward compromise and call it tolerance; we drift toward disobedience and call it freedom; we drift toward superstition and call it faith. We cherish the indiscipline of self-control and call it relaxation; we slouch toward prayerlessness and delude ourselves into thinking we have escaped legalism; we slide toward godlessness and convince ourselves we have been liberated.”

A nation is not liberated if it omits, yes, legislatively that God has no place in our nation – “We’re Free”!! No, that nation that denies God’s right to rule is bound by the chains of darkness and the devil himself!

Is America today being ‘governed’ by “LIBERALS”? Are far too many churches being ‘governed’ by “LIBERALS”? Are far too many academic institutions today being ‘governed’ by “LIBERALS”?

Liberals foul the mind and fool the conscience. Liberals promote their ‘truth’ and crucify “The Truth.”

Liberals bow at the throne of its own deceptive governments and denounce the government of God. Liberals preach tolerance, interpreted by its own actions as intolerant, especially of God and men and women of saving faith.

Liberals spout freedom while subjecting its students to their bondage, spouting individual determination of one’s own destiny void of the true, lasting, eternal foundation of faith in the God who made them, lost them, and then bought them with the price of the shed blood of the Lamb of God.

Liberals bow before the idol of education leaving its devotees anchored to emptiness, impotence, and shallowness, while it celebrates its poverty and bankruptcy and avoids the true riches of grace.

Liberals and their liberalism, having become one of the largest religious systems in the world, builds its ‘foundations of faith’ on the doctrines of death, seen in the philosophy, ’you can make it without God,’ ‘Christians are kooks, the truly uneducated of our society,’ or, ‘the Bible is the fool’s book.’

Liberals major on mental imaginations of men who see themselves as men of superior intellects, when in reality they are the spiritual midgets and dwarfs void of REALITY. Liberalism masks itself in the assertions of “superior knowledge and intellect,” validated by their degrees, failing to see their unmasking because of their denial that “the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.”

Liberalism promotes a Godless society, not understanding “The fool has said in his heart, ‘There is no God!’” Liberalism is the cloud of “political correctness” that darkens the sky of constitutional and scriptural freedoms, constitutional intent and scriptural ideals, a nation built on the foundation of faith and submission and obedience and worship and devotion to the one True and Living God as revealed in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Liberalism is the noose around the neck of nations and peoples, strangling the very life of divine intent out of institutions, families, and individuals, captured by the deceptions of foolish men intent on enslaving the wills and minds of those under their diabolical influences.

Liberalism is the release of scriptural restraints upon a society unleashing the release of rebellion, ungodliness, “my way,” my thoughts, ‘god’ unto myself, releasing the supposed higher thoughts of men in total opposition to the holy truths of God.

Do you grasp what I’m speaking about? It’s that shallow grasp for a mystical, meaningless nothing; a deception of diabolical, evil, devilish proportions – no God, no truth, no sin, no wrong, no shame, a reckless abandonment of decency and honor for a moment of soul, sensual, sinful, satanic satisfaction that never satisfies.

For many, their better is better than God’s best, satisfied with the philosophy and religion of personal achievement; for many, educational achievement rules and reigns as supremacy over God’s best, intellectually superior to even the knowledge and wisdom of God Himself.

What did I say ‘FIRST’? “NATIONS FORGET GOD BY OMITTING RESPONSIBILTY TO GOD!” That’s not freedom ‘in Christ’ but freedom from responsibility in doing what God says. Didn’t Jesus say, “Why do you call Me ‘Lord, Lord’ – but you do not do what I say.”

Oh, I pray you don’t miss what’s going on across our nation today! They say, “We’re free!!”, and by that there are those who mean “Freedom of release of responsibility in relationships that includes not only God but free from the spiritual care of others! False freedom is the freedom to do your own thing without any consideration of the consequences to the covenant Body of Christ, yes, your local assembly!

False freedom is the freedom to go your own way and do your own thing without one serious thought of leaving voids and vacuums in others! False freedom is the freedom to exercise self-initiative without any submission to Holy Spirit-direction and leadership!

False freedom is the freedom to believe the Gospel without the insight to walk it out where God places you! False freedom is the freedom to see your wisdom as valid that invalidates the wisdom of God for you.

False freedom is the freedom to believe one can preach the Gospel without the nature of Christ leading and to believe one can do that without imparting one’s own life as well. False freedom is to say you’re a friend without the “greater love” of laying down your life for your “friends”.

False freedom is to receive but not to give, the freedom to take and not to share, the freedom to be blessed and ignore the Blessers.

False freedom is to move in an apparent spirituality in order to steal and take from others who accept you blindly because of their loyalty to the Spirit of Christ in them.

False freedom is to abdicate the calling of ministry “helps” with no feeling of guilt or regrets. False freedom is to ignore ‘brotherhood’ because of a greater allegiance to “me-hood”!

False freedom is to reduce others to ‘less-ness’, unimportant to you because of one’s prideful ‘more-ness.’ False freedom is the phony freedom of virtuousness that is a vacuum as one victimizes the greater victors, yes, victimizing the true disciples of Christ with no regrets!

SECOND, NATIONS FORGET GOD AS THEY IGNORE, DENY, SUPPRESS THE MANDATES OF GOD! Deuteronomy 8 is one of God’s most powerful words for any nation anywhere. Please follow me in your own Bible with a marking pen in hand!!

Deuteronomy 8:2-3 says: “And you shall remember that the Lord your God led you all the way these forty years in the wilderness, to humble you and test you, to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not. So He humbled you, allowed you to hunger, and fed you with manna which you did not know nor did your fathers know that man shall not live by bread alone; but man lives by every word that proceeds from the mouth of the Lord.”

I’m convinced without a doubt that God wants to put His own fingerprint, His own palm-print, His own signature on our lives! Look at verses 11-14!! “Beware that you do not forget the Lord your God by not keeping His commandments, His judgments, and His statutes which I command you today, lest – when you have eaten and are full, and have built beautiful houses and dwell in them; and when your herds and your flocks multiply, and your silver and your gold are multiplied, and all that you have is multiplied; when your heart is lifted up and you forget the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage…”

What is a ‘lifted-up heart’? That’s pride, that’s self-sufficiency, that’s pumped up flesh! Look at verses 17-19! Then you say in your heart, ‘My power and the might of my hand have gained me this wealth.’ And you shall remember the Lord your God, for it is He who gives you power to get wealth, that He may establish His covenant which He swore to your fathers, as it is this day. Then it shall be, if you by any means forget the Lord your God, and follow other gods, and serve them and worship them, I testify against you this day that you shall surely perish.”

In Matthew 4:4 we read of Jesus saying the same thing we read in Deuteronomy 8:3, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.”….Do you remember what the Apostle Paul wrote to Timothy? 2 Timothy 3:14-17, “But you must continue in the things which you have learned and been assured of, knowing from whom you have learned them, and that from childhood you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. 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 complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.”

I pray that you have not failed to grasp the authority, the power, the true freedom that comes for nations through the Word of God. Psalm 119 is so powerful, so liberating, so redemptive in its truth!! Are you ready? Come to Psalm 119!!

Psalm 119:9, 11…Verse 9, “How can a young man cleanse his way? By taking heed according to Your word.” Verse 11, Your word I have hidden in my heart, that I might not sin against You.”

Psalm 119: 24-25, “Your testimonies also are my delight, and my counselors. My soul clings to the dust; revive me according to Your word.”

Psalm 119:37, “Turn away my eyes from looking at worthless things, and revive me in Your way.” Verse 18, “Open my eyes, that I may see wondrous things from Your law.”

Psalm 119: 49, “Remember the word to Your servant, upon which You have caused me to hope.” Verse 54, “Your statutes have been my songs in the house of my pilgrimage.”

Psalm 119: 67, “Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now I keep Your word.” Verse 72, “The law of Your mouth is better to me than thousands of coins of gold and silver.”

Psalm 119: 89, “Forever, O Lord, Your word is settled in heaven.” Verse 92, “Unless Your law had been my delight, I would then have perished in my affliction.”

Psalm 119: 101, “I have restrained my feet from every evil way, that I may keep Your word.” Verses 103-104, “How sweet are Your words to my taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth! Through Your precepts I get understanding; therefore I hate every false way.”

Psalm 119:105, “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” Verse 111, “Your testimonies I have taken as a heritage forever, for they are the rejoicing of my heart.”

Psalm 119:130, “The entrance of Your words gives light; it gives understanding to the simple.” Verse 133, “Direct my steps by Your word, and let no iniquity have dominion over me.”

Psalm 119:140, “Your word is very pure; therefore Your servant loves it.” Verse 160, “The entirety of Your word is truth, and every one of Your righteous judgments endures forever.”

Psalm 119:162, “I rejoice at Your word as one who finds great treasure.” Verse 165, “Great peace have those who love Your law, and nothing causes them to stumble.”

Do you remember Jeremiah’s testimony in Jeremiah 15:16? He said, “Your words were found and I ate them, and Your word was to me the joy and rejoicing of my heart; for I am called by Your name, O Lord God of hosts.”

This is why Peter wrote in I Peter 2:2, “as newborn babes, desire the pure milk of the word, that you may grow [up into your salvation.]”

What did Jesus tell us in Matthew 7:24-29? Listen carefully!! “Therefore whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and does them I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock; and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock. But everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand; and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell. And great was its fall.” And so it was, when Jesus had ended these sayings, that the people were astonished at His teaching, for He taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes.”

Have you ignored, denied, suppressed the Living Word of God?

THIRD, NATIONS FORGET GOD BY THE SUPPRESSION OF THE CELEBRATION AND WORSHIP OF GOD. Come to John 4:7-26!

All around you there is FAMILY DISINTEGRATION but no celebration and worship of the one true and living God. All around you there is pulpit and church quietness but no celebration and worship of the one true and living God. All around you there is national moral decay but no celebration and worship of the one true and living God. All around you there is ‘false religion domination’ but no celebration and worship of the one true and living God!

Nations forget God by the suppression of the celebration and worship of God.

FOURTH AND LAST, NATIONS FORGET GOD BY FORGETTING INTENTIONALLY AND SEEKING TO OBLITERATE THE GREATEST SACRICE OF GOD HIMSELF – THE VERY SHED BLOOD OF THE LAMB OF GOD, JESUS, TO COVER A NATION’S SIN!! Obliterate? Listen to Noah Webster’s definition in his 1828 Dictionary: “To efface, to erase or blot out…to wear out, to destroy by time or means…to reduce to a very low or imperceptible state…to obliterate the monuments of antiquity…”

Well, what about obliterating the truth of the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world? That’s Revelation 13:8!! “All who dwell on the earth will worship him, whose names have not been written in the Book of Life of the Lamb SLAIN FROM THE FOUNDATION OF THE WORLD.” Before nations existed God knew what fallen nations would do and He decided before the world came into existence that the Son would be the Savior as the Lamb of God slain on the Cross!

Come to Revelation 19:5-10, “Then a voice came from the throne, saying, ‘Praise our God, all you His servants and those who fear Him, both small and great!” And I heard, as it were, the voice of a great multitude, as the sound of many waters and as the sound of mighty thunderings, saying, “Alleluia! For the Lord God Omnipotent reigns! Let us be glad and rejoice and give Him glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and His wife has made herself ready.” And to her it was granted to be arrayed in fine linen, clean and bright, for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints. Then he said to me, “Write” ‘Blessed are those who are called to the marriage supper of the Lamb!!” And he said to me, “These are the true sayings of God.” And I fell at his feet to worship him. But he said to me, “See that you do not do that! I am your fellow servant, and of your brethren who have the testimony of Jesus. Worship God! For the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.”

In your history studies did you ever come across the French Statesman Alexis Compte de Tocqueville? In early American history Tocqueville said: “I sought for the greatness and genius of America in her rivers, lands, and prairies, and it was not there. Not until I went to the churches of America and heard her pulpits aflame with righteousness did I understand the secret of her genius and power.”

GOD, HELP US! GOD, SAVE OUR NATION! GOD, LIGHT THE FLAME AGAIN OF CELEBRATION AND WORSHIP OF THE ONE TRUE AND LIVING GOD! GOD, HELP US AGAIN BE A NATION OF DIVINE RIGHTEOUSNESS!”

H. Ernest Nichol wrote this old, old hymn that ought to be resurrected: “We’ve a story to tell to the nations, That shall turn their hearts to the right, A story of truth and mercy, A story of peace and light…

For the darkness shall turn to the dawning, and the dawning to noonday bright; And Christ’s great kingdom shall come on earth, The kingdom of love and light.

We’ve a song to be sung to the nations, That shall lift their hearts to the Lord, A song that shall conquer evil and shatter the spear and sword.

We’ve a message to give to the nations, That the Lord who reigns up above, Has sent His Son to save us, And show us that God is live.

We’ve a Savior to show to the nations, Who the path of sorrow has trod, That all of the world’s great peoples, Might come to the truth of God.

For the darkness shall turn to the dawning, And the dawning to noonday bright; And Christ’s great kingdom shall come on earth, The kingdom of love and light.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

“REMEMBER!”

There’s a very interesting verse of Scripture in 1 John 4:16 that, for me, heightens “remembrance”, which I believe should be a part of every man’s reflection upon his/her spiritual pilgrimage, or lack of it, because of the grace and mercy and love of God for ALL mankind –“God so loved the world!” It says: [The New Open Bible Edition, by Thomas Nelson Inc., 1990], “And we have known and believed [or trusted in, relied upon, adhered to, and, yes, reflect upon faithfully!] the love of God for us. God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, AND GOD IN him!”

And I can only ask in beginning this teaching: “In your own life and spiritual pilgrimage, tell me about your journey to the Mountain of Remembrance and your reflection upon your journey as YOU “remember” what Holy God has done in and through others and in your own personal pilgrimage as Holy God unveils Himself in and through Christ as God’s ‘only Door” to reconciliation, restoration, re-birth into His ETERNAL INTENT for you and me before even the foundation of the heavens and the earth?”

AND, I SAY THIS EARLY IN THIS TEACHING, BECAUSE, SINCE THE BEGINNING OF TIME, THERE ARE THOSE WHO PROMOTE, ‘FORGET GOD AND THE SAVIOR’! In 3 John 9-11 we read: “I wrote to the church, but DIOTREPHES, WHO LOVES TO HAVE THE PREEMINENCE AMONG THEM, DOES NOT RECEIVE US. Therefore, if I come, I will call to mind his deeds which he does, prating against us with malicious words. And not content with that, he himself does not receive the brethren (the truly ‘born-again believers’) and forbids those who wish to, putting them out of the church. Beloved, do not imitate what is evil, but what is good. He who does good (spiritually) is of God, but he who does evil has not seen God.”

False messengers harp on one’s mind: “Forget God! Forget the PHONY BOOK CALLED THE BIBLE! FORGET WHAT ‘SPIRITUALLY-POVERTY-STRICKEN-PREACHERS AND BIBLE TEACHERS TELL YOU (!),” while faithful messengers remind and challenge you: “REMEMBER GOD’S WORD AND ETERNAL REVELATION – AND REMIND YOURSELF FAITHFULLY WHAT HE ASKS OF YOU,” because “Man does not live by (physical) bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God!”

It’s evil to forget – it’s good and godly to “remember”! It’s evil to cast doubt on the Word of God – it’s good and holy to partake daily of the Word’s eternal nutrition! It’s evil to promote “my opinion” or assert “This is what I think” – it’s good and godly to “rest in God’s revealed revelation or His Holy Word”! It’s powerless and ‘self-destructive’ to settle into “This is what I think”, rather than, “THIS IS WHAT GOD HAS SAID!”

Don’t you rejoice when you read about Jeremiah saying in Jeremiah 31:3, “The Lord has appeared of old to me, saying, “Yes, I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore with lovingkindness I have drawn you,” and that’s “drawn you to Myself”?! ?

Two psalms I want to share with you as we journey: First, Psalm 20! It’s entitled in the NKJV “The Assurance of God’s Saving Work”, which I entitled “The Song of Confidence and Assurance”! It says: “May the Lord answer you in the day of trouble; ( and I pray, “Lord, forgive those who stand to preach and teach that to follow Christ is to be free from tribulation or trouble or heartaches or pain!”). May the name of the God of Jacob defend you; (And it is a day of trouble when the “Dream-Buster, the Devil” shows up at your door to defuse the explosive and energetic power of a dream, vision, or eternal reality from God of, yes, the Resurrection Life in you as he did with Jesus, thinking His death on the Cross was its ending, when we know Jesus had just begun His redemptive work! Resurrection was to come!). David went on:

May He send you help from the sanctuary, and strengthen you out of Zion; May He remember all your offerings, and accept your burnt sacrifice. May He grant you according to your heart’s desire, and fulfill all your purpose.

We will rejoice in your salvation, and in the name of God we will set up our banners! May the Lord fulfill all your petitions. Now I know that the Lord SAVES HIS ANOINTED; He will answer him from heaven with the saving strength of His right hand.

Some trust in chariots, and some in horses; but we will remember the name of the Lord our God. They have bowed down and fallen; but we have risen and stand upright. Save, Lord! May the King [King Jesus for you and me today!) answer us when we call.”[But you’re unsure, unbelieving, or even doubtful of the Name, King Jesus?].

But before we turn to the second Psalm, I think it’s very important for me to share 1 Peter 1 in its entirety!! It says: “Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, To the pilgrims of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocie, Asia, and Bithynia [that’s “scattered former Jews who’ve received “The Truth in Christ!”], elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Christ: Grace to you and peace be multiplied.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, who are kept by the power of God through faith for salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. [Revelation 1:1-3!]. [AND, is the last time the last days of Judaism and Jerusalem when the city was destroyed in 70AD?].

In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, if need be, you have been grieved by various trials, that the genuineness of your faith, being more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found to praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ, whom having not seen you love. Though now you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory, receiving the end of your faith – the salvation of your souls.

Of this salvation the prophets have inquired and searched carefully, who prophesied of the grace that would come to you, (the righteous remnant), searching what, or what manner of time, the Spirit of Christ who was in them was indicating when He testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ and the glories that would follow.

To them it was revealed that, not to themselves, but to us they were ministering the things which have NOW been reported to you through those who have preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven – things which angels desire to look into.

Therefore, gird up the loins of your mind, be sober [or ‘serious-minded’], and rest your hope fully upon the grace that is to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ; as obedient children, not conforming yourselves to the former lusts, as in your ignorance; but as He who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, because it is written, “Be holy for I am holy.”

And if you call on the Father, who without partiality judges according to each one’s work, conduct yourselves throughout the time of your stay here in fear; knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things, like silver or gold, from your aimless conduct received by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot.

He indeed was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you who through Him believe in God, who raised Him from the dead and gave Him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God. Since you have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit in sincere love of the brethren, love one another fervently with a pure heart,

Having been born again, not of corruptible seed but incorruptible, through the word of God which lives and abides forever, because ‘All flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of the grass. The grass withers, and its flower falls away, BUT THE WORD OF THE LORD ENDURES FOREVER.’”

And, I would say, if we have a redemptive remembrance of salvation in and through Christ alone, we have joined with Heaven’s Family in continual “remembrance of what God has done in us and for us through the finished work of Christ alone”!

Second Psalm? Psalm 21! It’s titled “Joy in the Salvation of the Lord”! It says: “The king shall have joy in Your strength, O Lord; and in Your salvation how greatly shall he rejoice! [Just an insert here: Revelation 1:5-6! “To Him who loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and has made us kings and priests to His God and Father, to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever. [Amen, or “so be it!”].

You (God) have given him his heart’s desire, and have not withheld the request of his lips. For You meet him with the blessings of goodness; You set a crown of pure gold upon his head. He asked life from You and You gave it to him – {AMEN?!?} – length of days forever and ever.

His glory is great in Your salvation; honor and majesty You have placed upon him.{“As Jesus is so are we in this world!”}. For You have made him most blessed forever; You have made him exceedingly glad with Your presence (“Christ in YOU the hope of glory!”).

For the king trusts in the Lord, and through the mercy of the Most High he shall not be moved. Your hand will find all Your enemies; Your right hand will find those who hate You. [And as a result of that denial of and hatred for the sovereignty of God and His great mercy toward them?].

You shall make them as a fiery oven in the time of Your anger; the Lord shall swallow them up in His wrath, and the fire shall devour them. Their offspring You shall destroy from the earth, and their descendants from among the sons of men.

For they intended evil against You; they devised a plot which they are not able to perform. Therefore You will make them turn their back; You will make ready Your arrows on Your string toward their faces. Be exalted, O Lord, in Your own strength! We will sing and praise Your power!”

How awesome do YOU find these two psalms of David, songs of “remembrance”? But their intent, from me in this teaching, is to touch the deepest cords of your heart and mind in true reflection and evaluation if YOU are as deeply moved, convicted, and TURNED truly to full surrender and awesome “remembrances yourself of what Holy God and the Holy Spirit have brought to full fruition in you concerning Christ Jesus as Savior, Lord, Master of your life, living within you, extending His love, expressing the fullness of His Life within you, and proving His power still reigns today – THROUGH YOU?” Follow, as we examine Jesus’ relationship with His early disciples and His intent through them AND US!

FIRST, “REMEMBER” THE CALL AND COMMAND TO REPENT! In Mark 6:7 Christ Jesus called the twelve “to Himself, and began to send them out two by two, and gave them power over unclean spirits,” and then in Verses 10-12, Jesus told them and us, “In whatever place you enter a house, stay there till you depart from that place. And whoever will not receive you nor hear you, when you depart from there, shake off the dust under your feet as a testimony against them. Assuredly, I say to you, it will be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment than for that city!” So they went out and preached that people should repent.”

You’ll remember in Acts 2 that Peter obeyed and went out preaching, saying in Verse 36, “Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ,” and the Word says that those who heard were cut to the heart, saying to Peter and the rest of the apostles, Verse 37, “Men and brethren, what shall we do?”

In Verses 38-39 of Acts 2 Peter said to them, “Repent, ( which means ‘confess’ and turn away from the old sin nature!) and let every one of you ( as a testimony) be baptized in the name (and honor of Christ alone) for (or because of His remission, forgiveness, cleansing of your sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. FOR THE PROMISE is to you and to your children, and to all who are afar off, as many as the Lord our God will call.”

As Paul the Apostle was writing to one of the churches He saw God raise up through Christ, he wrote in Ephesians 5:8-10, “For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light (for the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness, righteousness, and truth), finding out what is acceptable to the Lord.”

“The Changed Life” book by Henry Drummond, published sometime between 1889 to 1893, is a powerful little quick-read! He began it with a statement by Aldous(?) Huxley that says: “I protest that if some great Power would agree to make me always think what is true and do what is right, on condition of being turned into a sort of clock and wound up every morning, I think I should instantly close the offer.”

Oh, but then Drummond made mention of the only Holy Redemptive Truth when he quoted Paul’s words in Romans 8:29, “For whom He (God) foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He (Jesus) might be the firstborn among many brethren,” with my adding Verse 30! “Moreover whom He (God) predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.” Glory!

And repentant sinners become justified, sanctified, glorified “saints”, set apart to His honor and glory alone! But later, Drummond, (p.50), declared with biblically authority, “Today men are properly told to confess their sins and to ask forgiveness. But evangelists and pastors are forgetting to tell sinners to repent. Consequently this misinformed age imagines that it can continue in its old ways of life while adding Jesus as a personal Hell insurance for the world to come. Treasures on earth “and” treasures in Heaven. Who could turn down that bargain! Pleasures of sin “and” joys of eternity. That is a good deal! Sinners are not being saddened, as was the young ruler, to learn that they must turn from sin to have eternal life. Yet it is the “sine qua non” of the Gospel promises. Scripture always joins repentance AND remission of sins,” then affirming Truth from Proverbs 28:13, “He that covereth his sins shall not prosper; but whoso confesses and forsakes his sins (AND SIN-NATURE!) shall have mercy.”

FIRST, THERE MUST BE AN AWARENESS OF, SORROW FOR THE REALITY THAT CHRIST DIED FOR OUR SINS AND SIN-NATURES, AND WAS RESURRECTED THAT WE WHO REPENT MAY THEN “LIVE FOR, IN, AND THROUGH HIS RESURRECTION LIFE AND THAT ALONE”! Not religion, but a relationship; not a ‘trying, but a trusting’; not improved attempts at godliness by self-effort, but repentance toward God and faith in the finished work of Christ through the Cross and Empty Tomb!

Isn’t this why Paul said in 2 Corinthians 1:9-11, “Yes, we had the sentence of death IN OURSELVES, that we should not trust in ourselves but in God who raises from the dead, who delivered us from so great a death, and does deliver us; in whom we trust that He will still deliver us, you also helping together in prayer for us, that thanks may be given by many persons on our behalf for the gift granted to us through many.” [Dare I say that I believe it was more than their financial support of Paul’s ministry, but the “gift” of willingness to share the Gospel with the lost and needy everywhere they went or where they knew Paul went to minister?].

But the still rampant, resistant, rebellious response to God’s call? Doesn’t Proverbs’ “wise man of wisdom” tell us, even in our modern-day world of much ‘intellectual and fleshly denial’, Proverbs 1: 24-33, the following? “Because I called and you refused, I have stretched out my hand and no one regarded, Because you disdained all my counsel, and would have none of my rebuke, I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when your terror comes, When your terror comes like a storm, and your destruction comes like a whirlwind, when distress and anguish come upon you.

Then they will call on me, but I will not answer; they will seek me diligently, but they will not find me. Because they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the Lord, they would have none of my counsel and despised my every rebuke. Therefore they shall eat the fruit of their own way, and be filled to the full with their own fancies.

For the turning away of the simple will slay them, and the complacency of fools will destroy them; BUT whoever listens to me will dwell safely, and will be secure, without fear of evil.”

Are we hearing and “remembering” God’s call to repent or does ‘the spirit of wandering away from His Word, His will, and His way’ have a ‘strangle-hold on our minds, wills, and emotions’ to the point God has to say to the spiritually deaf, blind, and ‘heartless’ toward God Himself, as Jeremiah described them in Jeremiah 14:10, hearing God Himself say: Thus says the Lord to this people: “Thus they have loved to wander; they have not restrained their feet. THEREFORE the Lord does not accept them; He will remember their iniquity now, and punish their sins.” “Holy God, come today to modern-day America and ‘call out’ sinners to repent!”

In Proverbs 28:13 we read: “He who covers his sins will not prosper, but whoever confesses AND forsakes them will have mercy.”

SECOND, “REMEMBER” THE CALL TO MEDITATE, PONDER, AND TO FEED ON THE WORD OF GOD! In Psalm 63:1-5, as David was wandering in the wilderness, assaulted, and having to run from ungodly men, he SANG: “O God, You are my God; early will I seek You; my soul thirsts for You; my flesh longs for You in a dry and thirsty land where there is no water.

So I have looked for You in the sanctuary, to see Your power and Your glory. Because Your lovingkindness is better than life, my lips shall praise You. Thus I will bless You while I live; I will lift up my hands in Your name. My soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness, and my mouth shall praise You with joyful lips.” I would urge you to personally and seriously examine Psalm 119! But let me whet your appetite related to true discipleship and the Word of God as your ‘daily food’! It says:

Psalm 119:9, “How can a young man cleanse his way? By taking heed to Your word.” Psalm 119:11, “Your word have I hidden in my heart, that I might not sin against You.” Psalm 119:24, “Your testimonies are my delight and my counselors.” Psalm 119: 28b, “Strengthen me according to Your word.”

Psalm 119:49, “Remember the word to Your servant, upon which You have caused me to hope.” And it continues to amaze, equip, and encourage one’s “feeding on the Word of God” when in Psalm 119:89 David said, “Forever, O Lord, Your word is settled in heaven,” saying also in Verse 92, “Unless Your law had been my delight, I would then have perished in my affliction,” adding in Verse 97, “Oh, how I love Your law! It is my meditation all the day.”

In Psalm 119:101-104 the author said (Spirit-enlightened!): “I have restrained my feet from every evil way, THAT I MAY KEEP YOUR WORD. I have not departed from Your judgments, for You Yourself have taught me. How sweet are Your words to my taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth! Through Your precepts I get understanding; therefore I hate every false way.”

Two other Psalm 119 words, and then we’ll move on: Psalm 119:105 says: “Your word, God, is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” Then, Psalm 119: 111, “Your testimonies I have taken as a heritage forever, for they are the rejoicing of my heart.” [Tell me: How many ‘church-folk’ do you know who are truly ‘faithful feeders’ on the Holy Word of God? Many says, “I’m saved, I know it – nothing else about the Bible concerns me!” Really?].

In Matthew 4:1-4 we read, Then was Jesus led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterward He was hungry. Now when the tempter came to Him, he said, ‘If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become flesh.’ But He answered and said, “It is written, Man shall not live by (physical) bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.”

In John 6:53-58 the Lord Jesus declared to the ‘religious and self-serving Jews” the following: “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you. Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. For My flesh is food indeed, and My blood is drink indeed. He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him. As the living Father sent Me, and I live because of the Father, so he who feeds on Me will live because of Me. This is the bread which came down from heaven – not as your fathers ate the manna, and are dead. He who eats this bread will live forever.”

THIRD, “REMEMBER” THE TESTIMONY OF TRUE DISCIPLESHIP IS HOLDING ONTO IN FAITHFUL DEVOTION TO THE CHRIST WITHIN YOU! In Galatians 2:20-21a Paul wrote: “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live(in old sinful flesh still living), BUT CHRIST LIVES IN ME; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me. I do not set aside the grace of God…!” And dare I tell you that the grace of God is strong, enduring, and able to do in us even above all we ask or think!

In 1 Corinthians 15:10 Paul said, “But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me was not in vain; but I labored more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me.”

And I assure you that to live in and through God’s grace reveals to all ‘seekers’ and ‘settlers’ in the Kingdom of God in and through Christ knows the power, the blessing of bestowed grace and continual, faithful victory, because in Him we “are more than conquerors”!

Robert Robinson and John Wyeth wrote the old hymn entitled “Come, God’s Fount”, a hymn I grew up on through my childhood and teen years and into my adult life. It’s found in The American Hymnal, copy-righted by Robert H. Coleman in 1933, published by The Broadman Press, Nashville, Tennessee,. It says:

“Come ‘Christ-Fount’ of every blessing, Tune my heart to sing Your grace; Streams of mercy, never ceasing, Call for songs of loudest praise. Teach me some melodious sonnet, Sung by flaming tongues above; Praise the mount – I’m fixed upon it – Mount of Your redeeming love.

Here I raise my Ebenezer; Hither by Your help I’m come; And I hope by Your good pleasure, Safely to arrive at home. Jesus sought me when a stranger, Wandering from the fold of God; He, to rescue me from danger, Interposed His precious blood.

O to grace how great a debtor Daily I’m constrained to be! Let Your goodness, like a fetter, Bind my wandering heart to You; Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it, Prone to leave the God I love; Here’s my heart, O take and seal it; Seal it for Your courts above.”

Dare I say: “And seal us in Your courts of heavenly power, grace, and love in the here and now”?

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

“IT’S A MATTER OF THE HEART BEFORE GOD!”

There’s a powerful, eye-opening, convicting statement when Isaiah said in Isaiah 64:6-7, “But we are all like an unclean thing, and all our righteousness are like filthy rags; we all fade as a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away. And there is no one who calls on Your name, who stirs himself up to take hold of You; for You have hidden Your face from us, and have consumed us because of our iniquities. [You are aware, I would think, that the ‘unclean thing’ or ‘filthy rags’ are rags stained, like a woman’s disposable rags, from her menstrual cycle!). And, how many do you know outside the ‘redeemed community’ who ‘appreciate’ Holy God’s description of their sinful lives and condemned position as ‘a menstrual rag’ prior to its ‘waste basket’ tossing?

In another prophetic book, Ezekiel 37, the prophet, in Verse One, describes, in a vision, “The hand of the Lord came upon me and brought me out in the Spirit of the Lord, and set me down in the midst of the valley; and it was full of bones.” In Verse Three God asked Ezekiel, “Son of man, can these bones live?” And Ezekiel said to Him, “O Lord God, You know.” Oh, and then there is the eternal calling of Holy God upon His ‘chosen people’ saying to an Ezekiel and every true, blood-bought servant of the Most High God, “Prophesy to these bones, and say to them, ‘O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord! Thus says the Lord God to these bones: ‘Surely I will cause breath to enter into you (physical breath or the spiritual breath of Holy God?), and you shall live. I will put sinews on you and bring (new) flesh upon you, cover you with skin and put breath in you; and you shall live. Then you shall know that I am the Lord.’”

You are, more than likely, fully aware that many within the professing ‘church family’ are void of understanding or comprehension of “sinners made saints,” the “lost being found,” the “ungodly declared godly through God’s grace,” or the “worldly becoming true citizens of the Kingdom of our Lord and Savior”! The unredeemed have only a “grave address”, living without any hope in themselves to influence their world redemptively, but can do an admirable job in “fleshly best” living apart from God, leaving their “friends” as unredeemed as themselves! Only God’s amazing grace unveils what human nature looks like apart from “Christ in you the hope of glory”!

I’M SURE YOU’RE AWARE OF WHAT Genesis 6:5 DECLARES early in ‘human history’! It says: “Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.” Romans 3:23 clearly says: “…for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” And, sadly, many are aware of the glory of God but more devoted to their sin and sin nature! But they do not understand that “the wages of sin is death” when they are so alive in themselves to what their fallen flesh dictates! And impregnation with devotion to the old sin nature continues until convicted by the Holy Spirit and converted to “new life” in Christ! It was Spurgeon who once said: “Sin is a sovereign till sovereign grace dethrones it.” So true!

The counterfeit of obedience to God, if there is any inclination to that ‘thought’, is one’s “best effort” of determination to prove what many perceive “ought to please Him as He sees my strong self-will”! And nowhere in the Word of God do you find any indication of God desiring you to do your ‘best’ but acknowledging and resting in YOUR “crucifixion with Christ at the Cross” and receiving the fullness of the blessing of His Resurrection Life as you repent! Isn’t this what Paul was telling us in 2 Corinthians 7:10? “For godly sorrow produces repentance leading to salvation; but the sorrow of the world produces death.”

You haven’t forgotten already Isaiah’s declaration of fallen men’s hearts before Holy God in Isaiah 64:6-7a? “But we are all like an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are like filthy rags; [and in the ‘flesh’, the old sin-nature] we all fade as a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away. And THERE IS NO ONE WHO CALLS ON GOD’S NAME, who stirs himself up to take hold of you,” BUT Jesus tells us in Revelation 3:20, “BEHOLD, I stand at the door (of your heart!) and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me.”

And this is why I know Paul wrote in Romans 15:13, “NOW may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing (trusting in, relying upon, adhering to!), that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.”

Several things I want you to “rest in” as you see: “It’s A Matter Of The Heart!” FIRST, IT’S A MATTER OF HEART CONVICTION INITIATED BY THE MINISTRY OF THE HOLY SPIRIT! Receive Spurgeon’s words in “My Utmost For His Highest,” (p.255), when he wrote: “The entrance into the Kingdom is through the panging pains of repentance crashing into a man’s respectable goodness; then the Holy Ghost, Who produces these agonies, begins the formation of the Son of God in the life.”

In 1 John 4:9-13 the beloved John wrote: “In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has seen God at any time. If we love one another, God abides in us, and His love has been perfected in us. By THIS WE KNOW THAT WE ABIDE IN HIM, AND HE IN US, BECAUSE HE HAS GIVEN US OF HIS SPIRIT.” Have YOU received, rested in, and relying upon the Holy Spirit daily?

Even in the short ‘epistle’ of Jude he wrote: Verses 20-21, “But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.”

SECOND, IT’S A MATTER OF THE HEART CONCERNING HEART PREPARATION DAILY FOR NOT ONLY ACKNOWLEDING HIS PRESENCE WITHIN US BUT YIELDING TO HIS LEADERSHIP THROUGH US IN GLORIFYING AND HONORING THE LORD JESUS! In the Galatian letter Paul wrote: Galatians 6:8, “For he who sows to his flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to the Spirit will of the Spirit reap everlasting life.” How vital is it to you in your journey of faith to be daily yielded to the ministry of the Holy Spirit in you and through you?

There Is, for some, a counterfeit of allegiance apart from full desire to be one WITH God and honoring the Christ within by being yielded to the Holy Spirit! It’s as if for them the Holy Spirit is an unnecessary part of the Godhead! But for true believers who honor Christ in their daily walks of faith, there is a deliberate, daily determination to be “led by the Holy Spirit”!

The Lord Jesus said in John 16:13-14 of the work or ministry of the Holy Spirit in every true believer: “…when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears (from God the Father) He will speak; and He will tell you things to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine, and declare it to you.”

You do realize, out of spiritual immaturity or out-right rebellion, that some believers live with a pious attitude worked up in their flesh and minds with ‘good intentions’ but fall far short of glorifying or honoring Christ Jesus when we’ve just read King Jesus saying, “He, the Holy Spirit, will glorify Me!” Grace includes God’s gift of the Holy Spirit to the true child of the King! In John 7:37-38 we read: On the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out saying, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink. He who believed in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.” But this He spoke concerning the Spirit, whom those believing in Him would receive; for the Holy Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.”

Do you remember Jesus’ conversation with “the woman at the well” in John 4:23-24? He said: “…the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him. God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and in truth.”

THIRD, IT’S A MATTER OF HEART-AND- MIND TRANSFORMATION BY THE HOLY SPIRIT! Paul told us in Romans 12:2, “And do not be conformed to this world, but be (being) transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”

Even in the Old Testament, Ezekial 11:19, as God informed Israel and the world-at-large of a coming “new covenant”, He declared, “Then I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within them, and take the stony heart out of the flesh and give them a heart of (tender) flesh”, willing to follow His Word and His Spirit!

In 2 Corinthians 11:13-15 Paul also exposes ‘fleshly’ disciples and pretenders, even demonic presence, desiring to keep people from the “eternal Truth”! He said: “For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into apostles of Christ. And no wonder! For Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light. Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers also transform themselves into ministers of righteousness, whose end will be according to THEIR works,” not God’s work through Spirit-anointing, presence, and power within His true disciples!

Do you ever find yourself in a “so-called spiritual gathering” where some are so easily led astray, even falling away, because they bought in to ‘fleshly lies’ substituted for spiritual, eternal Truth? In 1 Timothy 6:20-21 Paul wrote to his spiritual son and us saying, “O Timothy! Guard what was committed to your trust, avoiding the profane and idle babblings and contradictions of what is falsely called knowledge – by professing it some have strayed concerning the faith.”

The Spirit-inspired Word of 1 Peter 4:1-2 says, “Therefore, since Christ suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves with the same mind, for he who has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin, that he no longer should live the rest of his time in the flesh for the lusts of men, but for the will of God.”

Disciples of Christ today are often challenged, criticized, condemned, or ostracized by the ‘kingdoms’ or ‘worldly men’ of devotion to the “best of human ability”, whether by godless governments, spiritually-mindless educators, unbelieving entrepreneurs, or unredeemed neighbors who see your love of Christ, His Word, and His church as ‘misplaced, brainless devotion’ to an empty cause! But in 1 Peter 4:13-14 Peter went on to say: “…rejoice to the extent that you partake of Christ’s sufferings, that when His glory is revealed, you may also be glad with exceeding joy. If you are reproached for the name of Christ, blessed are you, FOR the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you.”

FOURTH, IT’S A MATTER OF HEART-ILLUMINATION AS TO THE REALITY AND EVIDENCE OF SPIRIT-ANOINTED SERVANTS OF CHRIST! In Matthew 7:15-20 our Lord and Savior warns us, saying, “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes from thorn-bushes or figs from thistles? Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Therefore by their fruits you will know them.”

Paul had given a substantive challenge when in Galatians 5:16 he said: I say then: “Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh.” In Verses 22-25 he then instructed us: “But the FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law. And those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.” There are no ‘short-cuts’ to victorious living as a disciple of Christ or “cheap-shots of my best effort” – Death to self only and life in His Resurrection fullness, no fleshly, personal ambition but only His revelation and unveiling of the Spirit, no individual determination to reveal or unveil Christ ‘through me”, but only, as Jesus said, “You’ll know them by their fruit!”

Isaac Watts and George F. Handel really nailed it when they wrote the old Christmas classic together entitled “Joy To The World.” It says: “Joy to the world! The Lord is come; Let earth receive her King; Let every heart prepare Him room, and Heaven and nature sing!

Joy to the earth! The Savior reigns; Let men their songs employ; While fields and floods, rocks, hills and plains Repeat the sounding joy!

No more let sins and sorrows grow, Nor thorns infest the ground; He comes to make His blessings flow Far as the curse is found! He rules the world with truth and grace, And makes the nations prove The glories of His righteousness, and wonders of His love!” What song of faith do you sing right now in your life?

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

“VICTIMS OR VICTORS? ADAPTABLE CHURCHES OR APOSTOLIC ASSEMBLIES?”

Did Jesus come to heighten your darkness or to bring you “Light”? Did Jesus come to improve your darkened conscience or to transform you into the fullness of the blessing of His gospel or His “good news”? Did Jesus come to adapt ‘religious people to a little better plateaus of ‘self-acceptance’ or to BIRTH the “royal race of redeemed disciples”?

Did Jesus come to let you know, though clouds may surround you, in Him is the Bright Son-Light of Ever-Abiding-Presence? Did Jesus come to assure us, that even if sorrow or sadness befall us, in Him it will not stall us in complacency, doubt, or fear, but will be our reminder: ‘I’ll never leave you nor forsake you”?

In 2 Samuel 23:1-5 we read about David’s ‘last words’! It says: Now these are the last words of David. “Thus says David the son of Jesse; thus says the man raised up on high, the anointed of the God of Jacob, and the sweet psalmist of Israel: ‘The Spirit of the Lord spoke by me, and His word was on my tongue. The God of Israel said, the Rock of Israel spoke to me: He who rules over men must be just, ruling in the fear of God.

And he shall be like the light of the morning when the sun arises, a morning without clouds, like the tender grass springing out of the earth, by clear shining after rain.’ Although my house is not so with God, yet He has made me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and secure. For this is all my salvation and all my desire; will He not make it increase?’”

Now let’s look at Acts 13:49-52! And the word of the Lord was being spread throughout all the region. But the Jews stirred up the devout and prominent women and the chief men of the city, raised up persecution against Paul and Barnabas, and expelled them from their region. But they shook off the dust from their feet against them, and came to Iconium. And the disciples were filled with joy and with the Holy Spirit.

Question! “Is there coming a day when even in America there will be intense persecution, opposition, even excommunicating devout disciples of Jesus from America’s ‘liberated society’, ‘schools and universities’, and local governments’?”

“Victims or Victors? Adaptable Churches Or Apostolic Assemblies?” Noah Webster’s 1828 Dictionary defines “victim” as follows: “Something destroyed; something sacrificed in the pursuit of an object. How many persons have fallen “victims” to jealousy, to lust, to ambition!?!” Oh, and then, Webster defined “victor” as “one who conquers in a war; a vanquisher; one who defeats an enemy in battle…one who wins, or gains the advantage…” as GRACE will carry us ‘victoriously’ through all difficulties.”

I want us to look at this truth before we unveil the reality of one, by repentance and faith, becoming “Victor” or adaptable churches becoming truly “Apostolic Assemblies”!

It was the great Englishment, G.K. Chesterton, who once said: “Anyone who doesn’t believe in God will believe in anything.” And there’s no doubt that some have slid into the muck and mire of “no God” and opened themselves up for an on-slaught of victimization!

Stephen Olford, in his Commentary on Philippians, made a comment about Dr. Arthur F. Glasser, dean of the school of world missions at Fuller Theological Seminary evaluating Chesterton’s statement: “If you…fall into the relativistic vacuum of thinking any religion is good as another, you can end up falling patsy to any kind of ideology, such as a Manson family, a Hitler, a Jim Jones…The religious relativism and secularized nihilism of the times [leave] many unable to distinguish between religious realities and fraud, between the divine and the demonic.” And, Oh, how true that statement is!!

There came a moment in time in early human history, after the Fall, that God said: [Genesis 6:5-7], “Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. The Lord was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart. The Lord said, ‘I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, from man to animals to creeping things and to birds of the sky; for I am sorry that I have made them.”

John Piper, in his book “A Godward Life”, commented on the previous verses, (p.221), “To answer this, consider another instance of God’s action that (like creation) resulted in great sin and pain. Acts 2:23 says that Jesus was delivered up to crucifixion “by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God.” In other words, God knew ahead of time that He was sending Jesus to be killed. Yet the killing of the Son of God was more evil than all the evil in Noah’s day that made God feel regret that He had made man. Thus if God regretted the creation of mankind when He saw the great misery and evil that it unleashed, may we not assume that He also felt a similar regret over the incarnation of the Son when He saw the undeserved, wicked, infinitely evil murder and suffering of His “only begotten” and “beloved Son”?…Yet we are told explicitly that God not only knew this would happen, but planned it (Acts 2:23, Isaiah 53:10). So of His Son’s murderers and at the suffering of the Son Himself, then it must be that He was capable of approving the sending of the Son Himself and at the same time experiencing in advance the sorrow and regret over the sin and suffering involved in the Son’s death. If this is conceivable in the incarnation of the Son, it is conceivable in the creation of man.”

What was Piper telling us? No doubt, God knew of the Fall of man – not happiness over it, no joy so He could then show His redemptive love and mercy, but showing us two sides of a ‘coin’ – sorrow over the Fall, sureness of His eternal purpose to make ‘victors’ out of ‘victims’, and even converting ‘adaptable churches’ into “Apostolic Assemblies”!

“Victims”? If “the thief comes to steal, KILL, AND DESTROY”, ARE THERE THOSE PEOPLE WHO ARE CAPTURED BY THE ‘THIEF’ AND HIS ADVANCING ARMIES? Peter wrote in 1 Peter 5:8-11, “Be sober (serious-minded), 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 a while, perfect, establish, strengthen, and settle you. To Him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen (or “SO BE IT!”).”

Sorry if you don’t believe ‘demons’ and ‘powers of darkness’ are real – it just reveals how ‘victimized’ you’ve become! In Ephesians 6:11-12 the Apostle Paul wrote: “Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.”

When the Word speaks of “pulling down strongholds” it certainly refers not only to man-made strongholds, but those demonic strongholds where the powers of darkness have settled in to captured territory in one’s life, with the demons at ease because they so easily deceive unbelievers, compromisers, and those ‘professing believers’ who know nothing about fighting the good fight of faith! Deliverance is needed!

Victims? Do a Word-study sometimes on ‘false gods’ and their origin – they all come out of rebellion to the One, True, Living God, with an unwillingness to bow before Him – so, they invent, fabricate, indulge in fleshly religious feelings and pleasures that deceptively make them feel good about themselves.

You are aware that our world easily produces and accepts ‘religious frauds’ and their inventors – the ‘religious charlatans’! In 2 Peter 2:1-3 we read: But there were also false prophets among the people, even as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Lord who bought them, and bring on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their destructive ways, because of whom the way of truth will be blasphemed. By covetousness they will exploit you with deceptive words; for a long time their judgment has not been idle, and their destruction does not slumber.”

Paul warned the Philippians of the same deception! In Philippians 3:2 we read: “Beware of dogs, beware of evil workers, beware of the mutilation!” And should I dare even propose that ‘mutilation’ was circumcision as a religious ritual, but mutilation, I believe, goes far beyond that, even the ‘killing’ of some faithful disciples with some crucified!

F.B. Meyer called these “pests of every Christian community.” He said: These are “the fanatical and unbalanced [some people IN the church!], the ‘cranks’;…They exaggerate the importance of trifles; they catch up every new theory and vagary, and follow it to the detriment of truth and love…It is impossible to overestimate the harm that these people do, or the desirability of keeping clear of them…”

“Victims”? Because of Fallen sin natures, there are those who remain “chained” by their own intensity of “pumping flesh”, proud of their fallen sin natures, perverted in its demonstration, powerless in themselves to break the ‘hold’ on their lives! Look at Romans 8:12-13a! “Therefore, brethren, we are debtors – not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh (that’s the old sin nature!). For if you live according to the flesh YOU WILL DIE…!” “Pumping flesh”? Someone wrote: “The man who sings his own praises always gets the wrong pitch.”

“Victims”? There’s an interesting verse in 1 John 4:18 where John wrote: “But he who fears has not been made perfect in love.” Fear is a crippler! In “The Bible Friend”, from the “Encyclopedia of 7700 Illustrations”, there’s comments by Ann Landers, famous newspaper counselor: “She was asked if there was any one problem, which predominates throughout the letters she receives, and her reply was the one problem above all others, ‘seems to be fear.’ “People are afraid of losing their health, their wealth, their beloved ones. People are afraid of life itself.” I wondered if Ann Landers herself knew about “the spirit of fear”!

“Victims”? Have YOU ever wrestled with the difference between ‘speculation’ and ‘certainty’? Speculations are not bad when they include CONTEMPLATION! But when ‘speculation’ becomes simply one’s ‘opinions’, it becomes that which has nothing to do with ‘fact’ but one’s theories. Truth isn’t speculative – it’s reality, divine certainty without a ‘blink’! Certainty is fact, certainty is verified, certainty produces eternal results – “I Know that My Redeemer Lives!” “Behold, as the eyes of servants look upon the hand of their masters…so our eyes wait upon the Lord our God.” [Psalm 123:2]. No speculation – just eternal certainty!

“Victims”? Are you aware of any around you who became a ‘victim’ of those dark, subtle, seductive ‘fishing lures of sin’ that hooked them strongly, and then led them to a gage for future skinning and death? Even some around you in the broad-expanse of the ‘Christian community’? You do know we have ‘an adversary’ who is out to ‘devour’ you!

“Victims”? What deception when one chooses the prison of ‘self-analysis’ for an evaluation of himself! In 2 Corinthians 10:12 Paul wrote: “For we dare not class ourselves or compare ourselves with those WHO COMMEND THEMSELVES. But they, measuring themselves by themselves, and comparing themselves among themselves, are not wise.” And YOU ‘choose’ your ‘self-consciousness’ over “Christ Consciousness”? Are you aware that you are either cemented in yourself or you’re ‘anchored’ in Christ? Hebrews 6:17-20 says: “Thus God, determining to show more abundantly to the heirs of promise the immutability of His counsel, confirmed it by an oath, that by two immutable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we might have strong consolation, who have FLED FOR REFUGE TO LAY HOLD OF THE HOPE SET BEFORE US.

This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which enters the Presence behind the veil, where the forerunner has entered for us, even Jesus, having become High Priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.”

“Victims”? Yes, even ‘Christians’ who are at least faithful every Sunday to a local church but faithless to a lost, alienated, separated world around them! But I know, like in India, there were pastors or beloved witnesses for Christ who attended my conferences and later were martyred for the faith. It was Dr. A.T. Pierson who once said: “A light that does not shine, a germ that does not grow, a spring that does not flow, is no more of an anamoly of a Christian who does not witness.”

“Victims”? In 2 Timothy 2:22 Paul wrote: “Flee…youthful lusts,” but across the American scene immorality is fast capturing a large segment of the youth population with shame becoming a lost term! Wild orgies, reckless alcoholic binge drinking, drugs, promiscuous sex – a youthful population is being “pumped” to plunge into and wade and wallow in “dirt”!

“Victims”? It’s not true of all children who live under the influence of godless parents but it is true of a great number. Bossuet said: “Great men are formed on the knees of their mothers.” But also it is just as true that evil men are adversely impacted by godless dads and moms! There was a man I read about sentenced to 15 years hard labor for a violent crime. At his sentencing he was given permission by the judge to speak: “I pardon the judges; their sentence is just; I pardon the police; they did well to arrest me. But there are two people in this court I will never forgive. They are my parents, who brought me up without God and without hope.” How sad is that?!?

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

“IRRESPONSIBLE IMPREGNATION OR SOVEREIGN SELECTION?”

“Irresponsible impregnation”? And I’m not writing about careless, unwanted, unexpected ‘child-births’ by immoral behavior and choices, but rather ‘sinful choices’ infusing, fertilizing, permeating a life with fallen nature’s fleshly desires, the world’s lust, and the devil’s delight!

Irresponsible impregnation is individuality and its choices as the ‘husk’ of an unredeemed life! It was Oswald Chambers who wrote: [“My Utmost For His Highest,” p.257], “Individuality counterfeits personality as lust counterfeits love,” and that is so on target! He had said earlier, [p.256], “It is the things that are right and noble and good from the natural standpoint that keep us back from God’s best.”

And I’m sure that the ‘irresponsible impregnators’ are unaware that “ they that are Christ’s have crucified the flesh” or as Paul said in Galatians 5:24, “those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh WITH ITS PASSIONS AND DESIRES.” In the flesh men are dominated by, controlled by, even deceived by their, yes, devotion to their old sin nature, devotion to “if I want to do this, I’ll do it,” without any consideration of the natural consequences of opposing God’s Purpose, His will, or His holy desire for their lives!

“Irresponsible impregnation” is bowing before the idol of ‘self-indulgence’ intent on satisfying their ‘natural independence’ from God Himself, from His Son, and resist strongly the convicting power of the Holy Spirit BECAUSE “I crown the passions of my heart, my desires, my wants – and if that’s opposite of the Way, the Word, or the Will of God, who cares?” GOD DOES AND HE DEMONSTRATED HIS LOVE AND CONCERN THROUGH HIS SON AND THE SACRIFICE OF CHRIST’S LIFE ON CALVARY’S CROSS WITH YOUR NAME ON HIS LIPS, MIND, AND HEART!

But are you aware of how strong ‘spiritual selfishness’ is as unbelievers ignore, close their ears, and seek to avoid even any contact with ‘true seekers’ and ‘faithful disciples’? It’s as if they feel or sense God, the Savior, or His people are “out to make something of me I don’t want to be!” So they erect ‘high walls’ of resistance to Biblical Truth, or to ‘emancipation proclamations’, or even testimonies about “blood redemption through Christ and His transforming power” because they’re satisfied with their “irresponsible impregnation” of self-will, self-rule, and selfish pleasures! It’s absolutely heart-breaking to encounter ‘smug indifference’ to the love of God! It’s so disturbing when you encounter ‘fleshly pride’ in the fallen sin nature in people you encounter regularly who have no desire to hear or learn about ‘godless existence with a hellish ending’ because they truly are enslaved to a self-love, self-enchantment, and a slavish determination to satisfy every sinful, self-centered desire, warped or not!

Do you remember Jesus’ encounter with the ‘rich young ruler’ in Luke 18? Verses 18-27 tell us: Now a certain ruler asked Him, saying, “Good Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” So Jesus said to him, “Why do you call Me good? No one is good, but One, that is, God. You know the commandments: ‘Do not commit adultery,’ ‘Do not murder,’ Do not steal,’ ‘Do not bear false witness,’ ‘Honor your father and your mother.’”

And the rich young ruler responded, “All these things I have kept from my youth.” So when Jesus heard these things, He said to him, “You still lack one thing. Sell all that you have and distribute to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me.” But when he heard this, he became very sorrowful, for he was very rich.

And when Jesus saw that he became very sorrowful, He said, “How hard it is for those who have riches to enter the kingdom of God! For it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” And those who heard it said, “Who then can be saved?”

But Jesus said, “The things which are impossible with men are possible with God.” Then Peter said, “See, we have left all and followed You.” So He said to them, “Assuredly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or parents or brothers or wife or children, for the sake of the kingdom of God, who shall not receive many times more in this present time, and in the age to come eternal life.”

A “blessed life” is not because one chooses for himself/herself ,or both, what satisfies them, what they work for in their fleshly goal, fulfilling it and feeling ‘rewarded’ – personal ambition takes precedent over the eternal purpose of God and they miss out on eternal blessings through Christ only; self-determined, fleshly plans, goals, ambitions super-cede the eternal will of God “in Christ”; and spiritual self-centeredness -making one’s self the “idol” before which they bow, worship, and consent , without any awareness of serious consequences-, is the establishment of a fleshly altar before which they “bow” to worship their ‘self-realization’!

It was Elizabeth Barrett Browning, in her “The Poetical Works Of Elizabeth Barrett Browning”, (From 1826-1844, J.E.Beale Book Department, The Fancy Fair, Bournemouth, Eng.,p76), who began “The Soul’s Travelling” saying: “I dwell amid the city, the great humanity which beats its life along the stony streets, Like an unsunned river In a self-made course, is ever Rolling on, Rolling on!,” saying a little later: “I dwell amid the city, and hear the flow of souls! I do not hear the several contraries – I do not hear the separate tone that rolls in act or speech, For pomp or trade, for merrymake or folly – I hear the confluence and sum of each, And that is melancholy! – The voice is a complaint, O crowned city, The blue sky covering you, like God’s great pity!’”

The prophet Isaiah was given by God a glance of Holy God’s judgment on the nation of Israel and the holy city’s destruction in 70AD, and I believe a warning to every human being between then and now,(Isaiah 5:30),“In that day they will roar against them like the roaring of a sea. And if one looks to the land, BEHOLD, darkness and sorrow, and the light is darkened by clouds.” And if you are unsure about God’s fulfillment of judgment upon lives, cities, states, or nations, examine what Jesus had to say in Luke 21: 20-28!

But Holy God does not leave His children of faith hopeless in the midst of a faithless, rebellious people, whether family or friends, states or nations! In 1 Thessalonians 5:1-11 Paul wrote: “But concerning the times and the seasons, brethren, you have no need that I should write to you. For you yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so comes as a thief in the night.

For when they say, “Peace and safety!”,(while doing their own thing!), then sudden destruction comes upon them, as labor pains upon a pregnant woman. AND THEY (who do their own thing without the Savior!) SHALL NOT ESCAPE ( OR AVOID GOD”S JUDGMENT)! But you, brethren, are not in darkness, so that this Day should overtake you as a thief. You are all sons of light and sons of the day. We are not of the night nor of darkness.

Therefore let us not sleep, as others do, but let us watch and be sober. For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk are drunk at night. But let us who are of the day (Day of the Lord & His presence and governing and watchcare over us?) be sober (serious-minded), putting on the breastplate of faith and love, and as a helmet the hope of salvation.

For God did not (does not now!) appoint us to wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, that whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with Him. Therefore comfort each other and edify one another, just as you also are doing.”

But for many who live without redemptive, saving faith in the victorious work of Christ at the Cross and beyond His empty tomb, there is the sad reality of many who “choose” to ignore “saving grace and mercy” and are ‘self-determined’ to ‘rescue’ and ‘save themselves’!

But then there are those who have, not an ounce, of fleshly hope in themselves at all, and cannot even see in the fleshly successful of our modern-day world any example of ‘better, fleshly living’, but at the same time remain deaf to our Lord’s entreaty, “Come to Me, and I’ll give you rest!”

In contemplating this teaching of “Irresponsible Impregnation Or Sovereign Selection?”, a few words of distraught souls who ignore His holy plea and invitation to be birthed “In the Spirit”. I wrote: “The rich man has a tower, the politician has power, the beauty has an orchid-flower, but I only cower.

No life, no hope, no talent, no gift, no rope – just a helpless, hopeless feeling of no purpose on earth. Stars shine even in the darkest night, for some, while others feel there is no hope, and respond: “Just not right!”

Eyes on their circumstances, selfish will clamoring to change their surroundings, but no looking up to the God who made them, and no desire for Him to ‘save’ them.

In Mary and Joseph’s day, “No room at the inn,” before Jesus was born. But in this modern-day, no room for Jesus in “my world of scorn!”

“Deny yourself”, was that Jesus’ call? So why should I do what He says at all? Master of my own destiny, owner of my own home – it’s ‘my will, my way,’ not Jesus at all!

Unteachable minds, darkened hearts, self-centered wills, for just a start, in explaining the blindness and pain of men’s hearts who have no desire to be reconciled but willing to live apart.

No desire for reconciliation, no sorrow over separation, no sadness of incoherence of His divine intent – “just leave me to myself and all my flesh invents!”

In the ‘lust of self-vindication’ men willingly attack or just ignore the “love of His vibrant manifestation” – but devotion to their ‘sad sweet selves’ takes precedence over His INTERCESSION!

So easily ignoring divine revelation and spoofing the Truth of Jesus’ crucifixion, men will try to debunk His ‘holy-blood sacrifice’, willingly choosing to assert their “all-rightness”.

But the day will soon come when sinful sorrows will be multiplied as they traded away God for ‘flesh’ and a ‘sin-nature’ as the companions of their side – “No Savior for me as I ‘save’ myself, enjoying my walk in a fool’s paradise’!”

You are aware that though many rebel and talk about their “peace and safety”, the day is coming when before Holy God they’ll have to stand with an explanation of their spiritual stupidity! But, let me shift gears from God saying “I called, but you refused” to Jesus saying, in Matthew 11:28-30, “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”

“Come to Me!” Don’t YOU find it so interesting that unredeemed men and women, even boys and girls, have their sights, souls, intents, desires, and passionate longings on everything and anything except God’s eternal intent for willful sons and daughters, birthed in His ultimate intent spiritually to be vessels of His Holy Presence, temples of His resident-ministry, and extensions of His passionate longing to “draw” all mankind unto Himself through them?

It’s so eternally life-changing when one hears, receives, and walks in what Jesus said in John 14:6! “I AM THE WAY, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.” True salvation, true redemption, true reconciliation to Holy God, true service, at His bidding, is only by “Christ in you the hope of glory.”

In 2 Corinthians 1:9 Paul wrote, revealing God’s eternal intent for true disciples “in Christ”: “Yes, we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that WE SHOULD NOT TRUST IN OURSELVES but in God who raises the dead…”! And, no doubt, this is why Paul said in 1 Corinthians 15:31, “I affirm, by the boasting in you which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord, I DIE DAILY.” If Christ Jesus intended to be Himself in us, then why do men attempt to imitate Him rather than be dead to one’s self, allowing His Resurrection to be manifested in them and through them?

Do you believe this is why we read in 2 Corinthians 4:10-12 the following true plan of loving God for our lives as His ‘temples’ in which He dwells? Paul said: “always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body. For we who live are always delivered to death for Jesus’ sake, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh. So then death is working in us, but life (fleshly life) in you.” Paul was intent on maturing ‘messy diaper babies’ into sons and daughters of true faith who die to themselves daily that His Resurrection Life may be manifested in and through their mortal flesh!

This just may be why we read early in the Old Testament writings, Genesis 24:26-27, of the man who said: “Blessed be the Lord God of my master Abraham, who has not forsaken His mercy and His truth toward my master. As for me, being on (or in) the way, the Lord led me to the house of my master’s brethren.” And, IF JESUS IS THE WAY, THE TRUTH, AND THE LIFE, then why do we assume He lauds our ‘best efforts’ when in reality, He weeps?!?

Did Jesus come to heighten your darkness or to bring you “Light”? Did Jesus come to improve or transform? Did Jesus come to ‘alarm’ or to say, ‘Be not afraid’? Did Jesus come to adapt ‘religious people and unbelievers’ to a plateau of ‘self-acceptance’ or to crucify you and your old sin nature with Him on the Cross? Did He come to affirm your best intentions or to atone for blackened hearts, selfish wills, and godless minds?

Did Jesus come to let you know, though clouds may surround you, in Him the Bright Son-Light of God’s love for you can be affirmed in your heart and mind by His ever-abiding, Spirit-raised, resurrection Presence in a redeemed heart and mind? Did Jesus come to assure us that even if sorrow or sadness befall us, in Him it will not stall us in complacency, doubt, or fear, but will be our reminder, “I’ll never you nor forsake you!”?!?

I find it so encouraging, so enlightening, so uplifting to read and absorb that early prayer of Christ Jesus as He sought to equip His early disciples and those to come when in Matthew 6:9-10 and Verse 13 He taught them “In this manner, therefore pray: “Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven,” with the strong plea of Verse 13, “And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen (Or “so be it!”), and you have to ask: “Are ‘Christians’ today discipled to live under the King’s rule, His leadership, His heavenly desire for their earthly ministries?”

Do we say daily, just as the Genesis 24 man stated, “I being in the way, the Lord led me..”? Do we say with Paul as he stated in Galatians 2:20, “I have been crucified WITH CHRIST; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me. Verse 21, I do not set aside the grace of God”, relying on my “grit” and “self-will, self-determination, or self-pleasure”? NO! We take the sentence of death unto ourselves daily that the resurrection Presence of Christ may be manifested, released, and extended through our mortal flesh!

This is why Paul declared in 2 Corinthians 5:17-21, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation, that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation…

Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us: we implore you on Christ’s behalf, be reconciled to God. For He (God) made Him (Christ Jesus) who knew no sin to be sin for us, that WE MIGHT BECOME THE RIGHTEOUSNESS OF GOD IN HIM.”

Discipleship in Christ is not the best of human effort or the best of fleshly adornment and improvement, but the reality of “new creations” through Christ Jesus’ BLOOD ATONEMENT!

There’s an old hymn in “The American Hymnal,” published by The Broadman Press, Nashville, Tennessee, copyrighted in 1933! The hymn is entitled “Crimson Calvary Answers, “No!”, written by W.T.Dale and B.B. McKinney. It says:

“Shall I be condemned forever, I I to the Lord draw near; If I sue for peace and pardon, Will He deign to hear my prayer? Will He scorn my deep contrition, Will He not His grace bestow? Will He scorn my heart’s petition? Crimson Calvary answers “No!”

I am mourning o’er my follies; I am weeping o’er my sin; For my guilt’s become oppressive, and a burden long has been; Will the Lord be gracious to me, If I tell Him all my woe, Will He leave me in my anguish? Crimson Calvary answers, “No!”

If I go and tell Him truly, How I have His love abused, How I’ve sinned against His mercy, And His pardon have refused; Will He grant His loving favor When in penitence I go; Or in wrath will He forsake me? Crimson Calvary answers, “No!”

While upon the cross He suffered, Jesus prayed with dying breath, “Father, oh, forgive them,” cried He, “Save them from eternal death;” Am I worse than those who mocked Him, And who pierced Him long ago, Have I passed beyond His mercy? Crimson Calvary answers, “No!”

The chorus then says: On the cross the blessed Savior Paid the sin price long ago; All who will on Him believe, Full redemption shall receive, For the blood of Jesus cleanses Whiter than driven snow.”

Ephesians 1: 7-8 declares: “In Him (in Christ Jesus) we have REDEMPTION through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace which He made to abound toward us in all wisdom and prudence..”! Redemption! Forgiveness of sin and the sin nature crucified with Him!

Reconciliation! That’s reconciled to God and “adopted” as sons and daughters of God by Jesus Christ! But hear me! One of the most thrilling truths of having been reconciled to God is: If YOU are a “born-again” child of God, it is because Holy God choice you and called you to Himself! In John 15:16 the Lord Jesus said: “You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask the Father in My name He may give you,” saying in Verse 19, “If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not (any longer) of the world, but I CHOSE YOU out of the world, therefore the world hates you.”

Self-chosen, self-appointed, self-determined ‘service’ (?) in the name of Jesus is so opposite of Genesis 22:3 where the Word tells us: “So Abraham rose early in the morning and saddled his donkey…and arose and went to the place of which God had told him,” obedience to the call, faithful in the divine ministry, intimacy based on faithful, personal response in His eternal purposes!

In 2 Timothy 1:8b-11 Paul testifies, edifies, and instructs true “disciples of Jesus”: “…share with me in the sufferings for the gospel according to the power of God, who has saved us and CALLED US WITH A HOLY CALLING, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was given to us in Christ Jesus before time began, but has now been revealed by the appearing of our Savior Jesus Christ, who has abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel, to which I was appointed a preacher, an apostle, and a teacher of the Gentiles.” And if Jesus redeemed You, reconciled YOU to Holy God, and set YOU apart as a chosen son or daughter of the true faith, please understand, it’s not what YOU choose and select for your ‘witness’ but what He gifts you to be and to do for His honor and glory! One thing you need to reflect upon! Jesus said: “I didn’t come to be served, but to serve and to give My life a ransom for many!”

And the called, the chosen, the gifted, the assigned, are those “born again” and set aside by the Lord Jesus as His ambassadors in our troubled world! We aren’t redeemed to do what we selfishly want to do in His kingdom, but to respond obediently to His gifting, His leading, yes, His directive for your life of ministry and service to the King of kings and the Lord of lords!

Since it’s mid-December, 2016, just prior to the “Christ-mas Celebration” and reminder, receive Adolf Adam’s, “O Holy Night,” from the old American Hymnal”! It says: “O holy night; the stars are brightly shining; It is the night of the dear Savior’s birth; Long lay the world in sin and error pining, Till He appeared, and the soul felt His worth;

A thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices, For yonder breaks a new and cloudless morn! Fall on your knees, O hear the angel voices, O night divine! O night when Christ was born! O night divine! O night, O night divine!

Led by the light Of faith serenely beaming; With glowing hearts by His cradle to stand; Led by the light of the star, so brightly gleaming, Here came the wise men from Orient land;

A thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices, For yonder breaks a new and cloudless morn! Fall on your knees, O hear the angel voices, O night divine! O night when Christ was born! O night divine! O night, O night divine!” Jesus has come!

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

“IN OUR LORD’S HOLY PRESENCE”

It’s so highly interesting to me that in the early history of mankind, through God’s creation of human presence on His earth, in Genesis 3:8, Adam and Eve heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, “and Adam and Eve hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden.”

But the one thing I pray you learn from this time together around God’s Holy Word is that God isn’t interested in you hiding from His Holy Presence but letting Him unveil Himself to you! In Luke 24:31-32 we read of the early disciples, seated at a table with the Lord, but unsure of WHO He really was! It says: “Then their eyes were opened and THEY KNEW HIM; and (then) He vanished from their sight. And they said to one another, “Did not our heart burn within us while He talked with us on the road, and while HE OPENED THE SCRIPTURES TO US?”

I tell you, there is nothing dull or dreary when Christ Jesus knocks on YOUR heart’s door – there IS “a burning heart sensation that pulsates within you”! In Revelation 3:20-22 we hear our Lord speaking to us! “Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, AND HE WITH Me. To him who overcomes I will grant to sit with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.”

What does the word of wisdom say to us in Proverbs 1:24-32? “Because I have called and you refused, I have stretched out my hand and no one regarded, Because you disdained all my counsel, and would have none of my rebuke, I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when your terror comes, When your terror comes like a storm, and your destruction comes like a whirlwind, when distress and anguish come upon you.

Then they will call upon me, but I will not answer; they will seek me diligently, but they will not find me. Because they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the Lord, They would have none of my counsel and despised my every rebuke.

Therefore they shall eat the fruit of their own way, and be filled to the full with their own fancies. For the turning away of the simple will slay them, and the complacency of fools will destroy them; But whoever listens to me will dwell safely, and will be secure, without fear of evil.”

You are aware that many have no desire to hear anything God has to say to them! In Psalm 10:3-7 we read: “For the wicked boasts of his heart’s desire; he blesses the greedy and renounces the Lord. The wicked in ‘his proud countenance’ does not seek God; God is in none of his thoughts.

His ways are always prospering; God’s judgments are far above, out of his sight; as for all his enemies, he sneers at them. He has said in his heart, ‘ I shall not be moved; I shall never be in adversity.’ His mouth is full of cursing and deceit and oppression; under his tongue is trouble and iniquity.” Oh, and then in Verses 8-11, the psalmist, inspired of the Spirit, describes the “godless, the faithless, the unredeemed” with the images of “wild animals”!

Did Luke 24:32 say, “Did not our heart burn within us while He talked with us on the road…”? Is there a “road” called “wherever you go”? Doesn’t Joshua 1:9b tell us: “..do not be afraid, nor be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go”?

Do you remember Moses saying to both Israel and Joshua, as he faced his earthly departure, these words? Deuteronomy 31:6, “Be strong and of good courage, do not fear nor be afraid of them (the world, your enemies, the devil and his demon-tribes?); for the Lord your God, He is the One who goes with you. He will not leave you nor forsake you.”

“In Christ” every disciple has begun a ‘faith pilgrimage’, like Moses and Israel in the journey of the “Promised Land”- walking with our Lord and Savior AND His people, His servants, His ‘soldiers of the Cross’! And as I was reading in Luke 10 as the “seventy were sent out” commissioned by the Lord Jesus, I was uplifted to the seventh heaven again when I read Luke 10:17! Then the seventy returned with joy, saying, “Lord, even the demons are subject to us in Your name.” Do you think those early disciples learned about walking, serving, and ministering in and with His Holy Presence?

How strange it is that somehow, someway, by some insane reasoning, many ‘professing Christians’ have never entered the “blessed, holy land of oneness with and in Christ”! But then the Holy Word enlightens us! In Colossians 3:1-11, Paul instructs us and challenges us:

“If then you were raised with Christ [brought out of sin’s death in you to resurrection life in Him!], seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. [Is seeking those things which are above the reality of ‘pressing in to the eternal’ rather than captured by the temporal?].

Set your mind on things above, not on things of the earth [the ‘fleshly,’ the ‘devilish’, the worldly’?]. FOR YOU DIED [ with Christ!], and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is our life appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory [When you get to Heaven someday or the manifestation of heavenly glory in His resurrection presence in you through His Spirit here and now?].

Therefore put to death your members which are on the earth: fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. Because of these things the wrath of God is coming upon sons of disobedience, in which you yourselves once walked WHEN YOU LIVED IN THEM. [But “in Christ” you don’t live or walk their anymore!].

But now you yourselves are to put off all these: anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy language out of your mouth. Do not lie to one another, since you have PUT OFF THE OLD MAN with his deeds, and HAVE PUT ON THE “NEW MAN” who is renewed in knowledge according to the image of Him who created him, where there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcised nor uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave nor fee, but CHRIST IS ALL IN ALL.”

The passage you’ve just read is one of those ‘identifying passages’ of true believers! Have YOU been “raised with Christ”? Are YOU a “seeker” of eternal things? Is your MIND easily adaptable to world thinking OR is it “fixed” on eternal Truth revealed in Christ? Are you ‘comfortable’ with ‘world thinking’ or captured by Christ on His Heavenly Throne equipping your mind in Eternal Truth? Were YOU “crucified with Christ” or does your ‘religious (?) sin-nature’ still reign?

Did Paul tell us that “in Christ” our life “is hidden with Christ in God”? No wonder Paul said in Galatians 6:14-15, “But God forbid that I should boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. For in Christ neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but a new creation.”

FIRST TRUTH I WANT TO NAIL DOWN ABOUT LIVING IN OUR LORD’S PRESENCE: Does ‘deliverance from the bondage of sin and death, from devilish captivity, or world allegiance’ speak to you at all? What do we see related to how we should respond to or react to Old Testament events? But I see a physical picture that has eternal meaning and relevance in our journey through life with enemies like the world, the flesh, and the devil, out to take us down! In 2 Samuel 22:1 we read: Then David spoke to the Lord the words of this song, on the day when the Lord had delivered him from the hand of all his enemies, and from the hand of Saul. And he said:

“The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer; the God of my strength, in whom I WILL TRUST; my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold, and my refuge; my Savior, You save me from violence. I will call upon the Lord who is worthy to be praised; so shall I be saved from my enemies.” David then spoke about “waves of death that surrounded him,” about “floods of ungodliness made me afraid,” and then in Verses 17-20, David sang: “He sent from above, He took me, He drew me out of many waters. He delivered me from my strong enemy, from those who hated me; for they were too strong for me. They confronted me in the day of my calamity, but the Lord was my support. He also brought me out into a broad place; He delivered me because He delighted in me.”

It was in Psalm 17:8-9 that David also prayed: “Keep me AS THE APPLE OF YOUR EYE; hide me under the shadow of Your wings, From the wicked who oppress me, from my deadly enemies who surround me.”

Don’t you find it extremely sad when in Deuteronomy 32, in the song of Moses, there was a sad refrain when he said in Verse 18: “Of the Rock who begot you, you are unmindful, and have forgotten the God who fathered you”? Oh, but then in Verse 43d, Moses sang, “He (God) WILL PROVIDE ATONEMENT FOR HIS LAND AND HIS PEOPLE!” In Israel there was a faithful remnant WHO “RESTED” IN HIS HOLY PRESENCE AND PROMISES! What a tower of blessed assurance!

SECOND, THERE IS A TOWER OF SACRED TRUST! In 1 Timothy 4:10 we read Paul strengthening our foundation of assurance, protection, and the overcoming Life in Christ when he said: “For to this end we both labor and suffer reproach, because we TRUST IN THE LIVING God, who is the Savior of all men, especially of all men, especially of those who believe (trust in, rely upon, adhere to).”

In Proverbs 28:25-26 we read God’s discernment about the ‘foolish’ and the “faithful”; “He who is of a proud heart stirs up strife, but he who trusts in the Lord will be prospered. He who trusts in his own heart (I say, or mind!) is a fool, but whoever walks wisely will be delivered.”

Have you, as a disciple of Christ, ever found yourself centered in the midst of trouble, testings, turmoil of the world opposed to the reign of the King of kings and Lord of lords, even questioning your survival because you’ve been ‘burdened beyond measure’? In 2 Corinthians 1:8-10 Paul wrote to the Corinthian church then, and us now, “For we do not want you to be ignorant, brethren, of our trouble which came to us in Asia; that we were burdened beyond measure, above strength, so that we despaired even of life. Yes, we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead, who delivered us from so great a death (that’s dead in our trespasses and sins!), and does deliver us; in whom we trust that He will still deliver us…”

In Proverbs 3:5-6 ‘wisdom’ speaks! “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him (give Him His rightful place as Lord of your life!), and He shall direct your paths.”

THIRD, THERE IS THE TOWER OF SPIRITUAL TRIUMPH! Aren’t you thankful, every day, as a true follower of Christ, that Holy God has given us a “hymn of praise” of “Victory in Jesus”? Spiritual triumph? And, even if we go “through the valley of the shadow of dark trials and deathly circumstances”, in Christ we reside in the ‘tower’ of spiritual triumph!

In Romans 8:18-25,28-30, and Verses 35-39, we read: “For I (Paul) consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us. For the EARNEST EXPECTATION of the creation eagerly waits for the revealing of the sons of God.

For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it in hope; because the creation itself also will be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groans and labors with birth pangs together until now.

Not only that, but we also who have the first-fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, eagerly waiting for the adoption, the redemption of our body. FOR WE WERE SAVED IN THIS HOPE, but hope that is seen is not hope; for why does one still hope for what he sees? BUT if we hope for what we do not see, we eagerly wait for it with perseverance.

Come to Verses 28-30! And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those WHO ARE THE CALLED ACCORDING TO HIS PURPOSE. For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover whom He predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.

OH, AND THEN IN VERSES 35-39, WE COME TO THE “HALLELUJAH DECLARATION”! “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written: ‘For Your sake we are killed all day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.’

YET, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created things, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

And you doubt yourself in Christ as a servant who lives in “the tower of spiritual triumph”? This isn’t “the power of positive thinking” – it’s the gift of living in His tower of spiritual triumph, and “resting” in His finished work! In Colossians 1:19-23 we receive the Apostolic message of true reconciliation!

“For it pleased the Father that in Him (Christ Jesus!) all the fullness should dwell, and by Him to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross. And YOU, who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy, and blameless, and above reproach in His sight – if indeed you continue in the faith, grounded and steadfast, and are not moved away from the hope of the gospel which you heard, which was preached to every creature under heaven, of which I, Paul, became a minister.”

Here’s the question: If God declares us “in Christ” to be more than conquerors, then WHY did Paul state in the Colossians passage, Colossians 1:22-23, “present you holy, and blameless, and above reproach in His sight – IF INDEED you continue in the faith, grounded and steadfast, and are NOT MOVED AWAY from the hope of the gospel…!??” But tragically there are some who become so totally deceived, they ‘move away from the hope of the gospel’ to live in “their main attraction” of proving their self-worth, without Christ!

Never forget Colossians 2:9! “For in Him (in Christ) dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily; and you are complete in Him, who is the head of all principality and power.”

FOURTH, THERE IS ALSO THE TOWER OF SET TIMES BY THE LORD! In Psalm 118: 24 God’s people gathered together and they sang: “This is the day the Lord has made; we will rejoice and be glad in it.”

I began pastoring in the early 1960’s as I finished my final year at Baylor University, attended Southwestern Seminary for three years, and from the early days of pastoral ministry, mission enterprises in Brazil, India, and other nations, and I can tell you without a fear or a doubt, I’ve seen and heard many men, women, children and youth, on their ‘death-beds’ proclaim the goodness of the Lord, yes, even in the day when they knew they had come to their final breath in their physical bodies, and because of true, redemptive faith, they understood, “absent from the body, present with the Lord.”

True born-again believers live in God’s time-clock – not their own! “My times on earth are in His hands – and He assures me, in Christ, “I” never die!” And they are at peace, whether on earth or in heaven around the throne of the King of kings and the Lord of lords!

Oh, certainly, there are vessels of wrath fitted for Hell, but vessels of grace are adorned in Resurrection Life, Resurrection Power, and Resurrection Hope! They are clothed in the glory of the Glorious One even Christ! They are heirs of all Jesus is and has! They are ‘marriage partners’ in Christ with all His great covenant promises! “As He is so am I in this world!” “As Jesus sits on the throne of Heaven as King, as He is so am I!” It’s not a matter of ‘common sense’ but “sacred trust”!

It was Spurgeon, in his “Spurgeon’s Sermons,” (Vol.19, Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids, Mich.,p.356) , who said: “The things we have to preach of, such as everlasting life, union with Christ, resurrection from the dead, reigning with Him forever and ever, seem to the dull hearts of men to be as idle tales. Tell them of a high interest for their money, of large estates to be had for a venture, or of honors to be readily gained, and inventions to be found out, they open all their eyes and their ears, for here is something worth knowing; but the things of God, eternal, immortal, boundless – these are of no importance to them. They could not be induced to go from Ur to Canaan for such trifles as eternal life, and heaven, and God Himself!”

“This is the day the Lord has made; we will rejoice and be glad in it,” because we “lean not to our own understanding, but in all our ways, we acknowledge Him, we give Him His rightful place as Lord and Master of our lives and all He desires to do through us, and we become “living sacrifices”, taking the sentence of death unto ourselves, that His resurrected Presence may be manifested in mortal flesh!”

H.G.Spafford and P.P.Bliss wrote the old hymn, “It Is Well With My Soul.” [American Hymnal, The Broadman Press, Nashville, Tennessee, 1933]. It says:

“When peace, like a river, attendeth my way, When sorrows like sea-billows roll; Whatever my lot, You have taught me to say, ‘It is well, it is well with my soul.’

Though Satan should buffet, though trials should come, Let this blest assurance control, That Christ has regarded my helpless estate, And has shed His own blood for my soul.

My sin – oh, the bliss of this glorious thought – my sin – not in part, but the whole, Is nailed to the Cross and I bear it no more, Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, O my soul!

And, Lord, haste the day when the faith shall be sight, The clouds be rolled back as a scroll, The trump shall resound and the Lord shall descend, “Even so” – it is well with my soul.

It is well, with my soul, It is well, it is well with my soul.” Is it well with YOUR soul?

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

“YESTERDAY, TODAY, TOMORROW?”

I really am not sure how to begin this, I pray, a biblical study on man’s or one’s search for meaning to their ‘existence’, if that, to them, is all they sense about their earthly presence or ‘fleshly’ pilgrimage. One thing I’m sure of: most men without God are out to find the ‘filling’ for their empty, tortuous, godless living, and are not even sure they want to learn about His “eternal intent” for them as ‘vessels’ or ‘containers’ of His Heavenly Presence in their hearts and lives! If they are not in control, they’ll substitute anything, anyway, any-how, any-‘who’, if they can find even a moment’s relief from their ‘pointless lives’!

Societies, lives, families, nations, even churches, have choices: Christ or the chaotic, fleshly or the spiritual, sin-nature determinations or ‘vessels of Christ’s Holy Presence that he calls “temples”’, or compromise with convenience or conviction of His Holy Truth, or a participant in societal disintegration or a soldier of Biblical discipline trained in the Lord’s army, or a ‘self-determined idolater’ worshipping what his sin nature dictates or a life convicted, converted, captured, and controlled by His Indwelling Holy Spirit?

I know that the Prophet Hosea was a tool to speak to the rebellious nation of unrepentant, unredeemed Israel, but I also know “All Scripture” does speak to any man, any where, any time! The national judgment of Israel did not apply to the repentant, redeemed, blood-bought sons and daughters of true faith within Israel! But in Hosea 4: 6 God spoke and still speaks: “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. Because YOU have rejected knowledge, I also will reject you from being priest for Me; because YOU have forgotten the law of God, I also will forget your children.”

Oh, and in Verse 8, God said: “They (demons and ‘the religious of the mind and not the heart’, and unfaithful, unbelieving powers of darkness) eat up or feed (on) the sin of My people; they set their heart on their iniquity,” even approving of all that is opposite to the Truth and Holiness of God!

There IS a ‘world’ of “Yesterday-minded men and women, even boys and girls” who fall into the devilish trap of “Has God really said? You surely will not die – if you sin and fall away – God’s too loving”! Really?

“YESTERDAY”? I pray that YOU see that there was a time when your life was WITHOUT HIM, life without purpose, meaning, a goal or God! “Yesterday”? Pain, emptiness, no spiritual goal or intent at all, no God but simply the ‘god’ you willingly bowed down to daily, your ‘self’!

“YESTERDAY”? Striving but failing, trying but drooping, attempting but falling ‘short’, seeking to prove yourself worthy but wilting short of God’s intent and purpose and plan!

“YESTERDAY”? It’s either a forgotten or painful memory OR that stone on which you choose to stand without Him to determine your next step without God with accumulated failures of emptiness, and the ‘hole’ seems to get deeper and wider – and you’re surprised, even shocked by your own spiritual ineptness!

YESTERDAY”? For most, it’s just sad memories because that ‘emptiness’ and ‘unfulfilled desire’ wasn’t seen as God’s provision of an exposure of life without Him, but just a human failure, a cultural blunder, and a sad reward. When ‘self-awareness’ is all one sees in his fleshly journey, it’s difficult for some to see, “This is the day the Lord has made – I will rejoice and be glad in it.”

“YESTERDAY”? That’s a backward look at an empty space without any consideration, contemplation, or confidence at all of divine intent and eternal purpose! At the same time, how many do you know who are pleased in the arrogance of their ‘fleshly successes’ without one ounce of understanding or consideration of the eternal plan and planting

of God for their lives?

“YESTERDAY”? That’s a backward look at one’s ‘age of anxiety’ without any consideration at all of the Historic Day of Atonement! That’s even a backward look at those who enter churches or temples or religious sanctuaries with no understanding that God doesn’t make His abiding in places made by human means but in the “new-born” temples of men’s repentant, regenerated hearts! In John 17:3 Jesus declared: “And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent,” with 1 Peter 2:4-5, telling us, “Coming to Him as to a living stone, rejected indeed by men, but chosen by God and precious, you also, as living stones, are being built up “a spiritual house”, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.”

“YESTERDAY”? That’s man’s fleshly will in full control even if he/she ‘professes’ faith in Christ! There’s a huge gap between ‘believing’ and ‘belonging’ to Jesus Only! It was H.W.Webb-Peploe who once said: “Joy is perfect acquiescence in God’s will because [at last! JFF!] the soul delights itself in God Himself.” That’s God the Father, God the Son, and God the Spirit, and a redeemed heart and mind trusting in Him alone!

“YESTERDAY”? It was Leo Tolstoy who once said, “I lived only during those times when I believed in God,” and I couldn’t help but wonder: “How fleshly is that? Life on, life off, life on, life off – blessed when I believed but cursed when I departed from Him?” Temporary belief or temporary loyalty is not “Oneness with Christ”! That’s, no doubt, why C.S Lewis could describe some spiritual journeys as “an ever increasing desire for an ever diminishing satisfaction.”

The holiest interpretation of Christ is not any man, any woman, at his/her ‘best’, but the “with Christ crucified” that His Resurrected Life may be God’s interpretation of Holy Presence in a present-day earthly setting – your redeemed body as the ‘temple’ of His Holy Presence! Perfect good is not man at his earthly best, even attempting to interpret His Holy Presence, but the “born-again life” in which Resurrection Presence is allowed to be Himself in us, our only hope of glory!

I was reading Kurt Bruner’s book entitled “Inklings of God,” [Zondervan, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49530, Copyright by the author! P.79], when he wrote about Mother Teresa in India before she died. She was one stout lady of true faith who ministered the Truth in India. Bruner wrote, speaking of the Hindu religion, “Its law of karma teaches that those who suffer are paying off debt from a former life, purifying themselves in this life so that they can reincarnate into something better, like a cow, in the next. The entire caste system depends upon the premise that we are destined to pay in one life for messing up in another. To help those suffering is to extend their payment plan. That is why the sick, poor, and disabled suffer so in and beyond India. Their suffering is meant to be. So, in the name of compassion, their religion tells them to avert their eyes [or ‘turn aside’ from how God sees them!].”

Dare I tell you that Hindus in India, unbelieving ‘self-sufficient’ in the U.S., “yesterday” men and women unrepentant, unbelieving anywhere, live breathing the air of ‘personal, self-omniscience’, smarter than God, yet living with illusions encouraged by the devil himself! And they live in the ‘death’ of their hopelessness, not interested in God’s eternal Word of hope, Christ alone! Should I dare tell you that what you believe in the spiritual realm of fallen humanity determines how you live it out, to the glory of fallen flesh or to the glory of Holy God!

“YESTERDAY”? That’s men on their own, even in a religious sense or scene, determining what should be ‘acceptable to God’ on the basis of their “best efforts”! It’s really, really interesting to me to hear Jesus say in John 6:44, “No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him,” saying later, in John 12:32, “And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all peoples to Myself.” Verse 33 then says, This He said, signifying by what death He would die.” And if the Cross hasn’t drawn you to God, nothing else will!

Yesterday’s men and women are drawn by religious activity that leads nowhere – but the “blood-redeemed” understand the willingness of full surrender to the Lordship of Christ! A born-again believer is “drawn” to Christ by the Spirit, while the ‘pretenders’ attempt by best effort to disassociate themselves from godless living but always fall far short of “Redemptive Truth” in and through Christ alone!

Isn’t this why Paul said in Galatians 6:14, “But God forbid that I should boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world”?

“YESTERDAY”? Have you heard the ‘religious world’, world-wide, proudly asserting that “There are many ‘doors’ to God – any ‘door will do’ as long as you promote the religious door you entered and uphold its religious dogma,” which I believe means “eat any old ‘dog-ma meat’ you desire – you’ll be okay,” but I trust only the divine Word like 1 John 1:7 which says, “But if we walk in the light as He (Jesus) is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His (God’s) Son cleanses us from all sin.” Hear me! The Holy Word just declared the eternal way only by which fallen man’s sin-nature is transformed into “new life” is through the shed blood of the Lamb of God, and His shed blood on the Cross unveils the seriousness of my need of deliverance from the penalty of sin and its presence, imparting to me the eternal Truth that I have been made complete in Christ, lacking nothing, but daily ‘resting’ in Him and His manifestation through me of His fullness, His blessing, His purpose, His power, and His desire to express His love, prove His power, and manifest His eternal will through an available ‘vessel’!

In Romans 13:11-14 Paul challenged both the redeemed remnant of Israel and the newly-birthed redeemed of Rome and us in the 21^st Century: “And do this, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep; for now our salvation is nearer than when we first believed. The night is far spent, the day is at hand. Therefore let us cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armor of light. Let us was properly, as in the day, not in revelry and drunkenness, not in lewdness and lust, not in envy and strife. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to fulfill its lusts.”

“YESTERDAY”? Loyalty to lust or loyalty to the Lord Jesus? Loyalty to the ‘flesh’ or loyalty to the Spirit? Loyalty to one’s natural affinities or loyalty to His eternal birth-marks, God-honoring giftings, and the servant-understanding that, yes, “all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose,” (Romans 8:28!)? Loyalty to ‘my interpretation’ or loyalty to His revelation, like John 14:15, “If you love Me, keep My commandments”? Loyalty to the ‘privacy of my own desires’ or loyalty to His “blood-bought possession” of my life, like 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 declaring: “Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.”

And how many ‘doors’ are then shut TO God, and ‘self-serving’ folks, some religious ‘church-goers’, because, even though they ‘profess’ loyalty to Christ, when it comes to ‘religious activities’ they still “call the shots for our own lives”! Paul went on to say in 1 Corinthians 6:17, “But he who is joined to the Lord is one spirit with Him,” and HE IS LORD OF ALL OR NOT LORD, for them, AT ALL!!

THEN, WHAT ABOUT “TODAY” IN YOUR SPIRITUAL JOURNEY? Do you remember Zacharias’ prophetic utterance in Luke 1: 67-79? He had been filled with the Holy Spirit, and then he prophesied! “Blessed is the Lord God of Israel, [Is God the Lord over every nation in the world? YES, whether they yield to Him or not!], for He has visited and redeemed His people, and has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of His servant David [Or in the house of His servant J.Farrell Fisher or YOU?], as He spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets, who HAVE BEEN (and still are!) SINCE THE WORLD BEGAN,

That we should be saved from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us, To perform the mercy promised to our fathers and to remember His holy covenant, the oath which He swore to our father Abraham: To grant us that we, being delivered from the hand of our enemies, might serve Him without fear, in holiness and righteousness before Him all the days of our life.

And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Highest; (The Beloved John?], for you will go before the face of the Lord to prepare His ways, To give knowledge of salvation to His people by the remission of their sins, Through the tender mercy of our God, with which the Dayspring from on high has visited us; to give light to those who sit in darkness and the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.”

There’s another ‘prophetic word, not only about the birthing of the Promised Savior, of the Coming Savior of the world, the Lamb of God to be sacrificed by merciful God on the Cross for our redemption,’ but to the true faithful sons and daughters who “TODAY” unveil the Resurrected, Reigning Christ to a needy world: Psalm 2:7-12 is about “The Richness of Relationship In God’s Eternal Son AND sons!” It says:

I will declare the decree: The Lord has said to Me, ‘You are My Son, TODAY I have begotten You. Ask of Me, and I will give You the nations for Your inheritance, AND the ends of the earth for Your possession. You shall break them with a rod of iron (Biblical Truth?); You shall dash them to pieces like a potter’s vessel.’

Now therefore, be wise, O kings (“In Christ” are we declared “kings and priests unto God the Father”?); Be instructed, you judges of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the Son, lest He be angry, and you perish in the way, when His wrath is kindled but a little. BLESSED ARE THOSE WHO PUT THEIR TRUST IN HIM.”

In his book, “My Utmost For His Highest,” (p.227), Oswald Chambers quoted 1 Corinthians 6:19, “Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own?”

“Crucified with Christ, raised to “New Life” in Him, and now, “Today”, the new “Temple of Resurrection Presence,” with the biblical awareness: “I AM NOT MY OWN,” agreeing with, aligning with, receiving the instruction of Paul and Chambers: “We are not sanctified for ourselves, we are called into the fellowship of the Gospel, and things happen which have nothing to do with us, God is getting us into fellowship with Himself. Let Him have His way, if you do not, instead of being of the slightest use to God in His Redemptive work in the world, you will be a hindrance and a clog.” OR, shouldn’t you and I daily choose: “I take the sentence of death daily that the Resurrection Life of Christ may be manifested in my mortal flesh” TODAY?

What did Isaiah say in Isaiah 60:1? “Arise, shine; for your light has come! And the glory of the Lord is risen upon you.” Do you daily live with that awareness?

ONE OTHER OBSERVANCE AND REFLECTION: WHAT ABOUT “TOMORROW”? And, have you reflected upon what Paul quoted and wrote about in 1 Corinthians 15: 49, and Verses 54-58? 1 Corinthians 15:49, “And as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly Man.”

1 Corinthians 15:54-58, “So WHEN this corruptible has put on the incorruption, and this mortal has put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written: ‘Death is swallowed up in victory.’ ‘O death, where is your sting? O Hades, where is your victory?’ The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain in the Lord.”

You may, at times, sense the ‘onslaught of Satan’ and his demonic forces, but remember, IN CHRIST, WE ARE MORE THAN CONQUERORS! Are YOU “at Rest” in Christ as you face YOUR “Tomorrow”? C. Wordsworth, in the old “The American Hymnal”, wrote the words to this hymn entitled “O Day of Rest and Gladness.”

“O day of rest and gladness, O day of joy and light, O balm of care and sadness, Most beautiful, most bright; Om You, the high and lowly, Bending before the throne, Sing, Holy, Holy, Holy, To the great Three in One.

On You, at the creation, the light first had its birth; On You, for our salvation, Christ rose from depths of earth. On You our Lord victorious, The Spirit sent from Heaven; And thus on You most glorious, A triple light was given.

Today on weary nations The heavenly manna falls; To holy convocations The silver trumpet calls, Where gospel light is glowing With pure and radiant beams, And living water flowing With soul-refreshing streams.

New graces ever gaining From this our day of rest, We reach the rest remaining To spirits of the blest. To Holy Ghost be praises, To Father and to Son; The Church her voice upraises To You, blest Three in One.”

Will YOUR “Tomorrow” be the ‘curse’ or the Everlasting Blessing in Christ alone?

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

“NO SHAME – NO GAIN OF TRUE LIFE!”

‘Educated’ or ‘uneducated’ unbelievers from anywhere across our God-given world are, yes, enslaved to their ‘godless’ enmity of God’s holiness and enormously arrogant concerning their ‘godless identity’, even bragadocios in their historical assertions – and, there are many, while at the same time there are numerous individuals who acknowledge the reality of the “one True God” or assert, “Yes, there are many gods,” while confidently asserting that they are able to be ‘god’ in and through themselves!

I don’t know who said it, but it is a solid understanding! “God may well be taken as a substitute for ‘everything’; but “nothing” can be taken as a substitute for God.” But, do you understand and sense that much of our modern world today has measured God’s reality of Holy Presence in their heads and not their hearts? Even in their ‘heart of hearts’, ranking high as the greatest of unbelievers, Holy God can still be at work being Himself extending His life, expressing His love, and even proving His power, even though the unbelieving individual doesn’t acknowledge His eternal work and will through His “giftings” and “ministries” with Him seemingly absent from their minds and hearts!

Can there be ‘religious individuals’, even ‘religious intellectuals’, or ‘religious devotees’, like Mohammed’s devotees who have rationalized “God” with ninety-nine names, but know nothing about “Father-God” whose great love sent His Son to be Savior and Lord , yes, of their ‘religious world’?

It was Sarah Flower Adams who many years ago wrote the words of the hymn, “Nearer, my God, to Thee!” Examine her words AND your mind and heart if YOU “lean not to your own understanding, but in all your ways acknowledge Him”!

“Nearer, my God, to Thee, Nearer to Thee! Even though it be a cross That raises me; Still all my song shall be, Nearer, my God, to Thee, Nearer, my God, to Thee, Nearer to Thee!

Though like a wanderer, The sun gone down, Darkness be over me, My rest a stone; Yet in my dreams I’d be Nearer, my God to Thee!

There let the way appear, Steps unto heaven; All that You send to me, In mercy given; Angels to beckon me, Nearer, my God to Thee!

Then, with my waking thoughts Bright with Your praise, Out on my stony griefs Bethel I’ll raise; So by my woes to be Nearer, my God, to Thee!

Or if on joyful wing, Cleaving the sky, Sun, moon, and stars forgot, Upwards I’ll fly, Still all my song shall be, Nearer, my God, to Thee, Nearer, my God, to Thee, Nearer to Thee!”

And, if ‘God is near’ to YOU, and He is, has there been in YOU a total indifference to His ‘knock’ on your heart’s door, or did you receive Augustine’s “Confessions”? “You, Holy God, made me for Yourself, and the heart of man is restless until it finds its rest in You!”

What did Jesus say in Matthew 11:28-30? “Come unto Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will GIVE YOU REST. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and YOU will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

You should be amazed that even in the early days of man’s creation Noah, in Genesis 8:20, “built an altar to the Lord, and took of every clean animal and of every clean bird, and offered burnt offerings on the altar.” OH, and then the Holy Word tells us in Verses 21-22, And the Lord smelled a soothing aroma. Then the Lord said in His heart, “I will never again curse the ground for man’s sake, although the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth, nor will I again destroy every living thing as I have done. ‘While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, winter and summer, and day and night shall not cease.” Holy God found a repentant heart, and through that heart extended His life and expressed His love for ALL of fallen humanity! SO… “God so loved the (fallen) world THAT He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him ( trusts Him, relies upon Him, adheres to Him!) should not perish but have everlasting life.” Soothing aroma? The Eternal Christ Jesus!

BUT! “NO SHAME – NO GAIN OF TRUE LIFE!” John 3:18-21 we read, “He who believes (trusts in, relies upon, adheres to) in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. BUT he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God.” Could this be why Paul said: “I die daily”?

Did Jesus say that after ‘coming TO Him’ that the repentant, trusting, obedient heart and life is to “Take My yoke upon you…and you will find rest for your souls (because) My yoke is easy and My burden is light”? And yet are you aware of Paul’s, yes, warning and word of wisdom in Galatians 5:1? “Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled AGAIN in a YOKE OF BONDAGE”?

Simon Peter, a beloved disciple of Jesus, said in 1 Peter 4:17-19, “For the time has come for judgment to begin at the house of God (unrepentant Judaism in Jesus’ day that crucified Him?); and if it begins with us first, what will be the end of those (in the 21^st Century in modern-day American ‘religiosity’?) who do not obey (but just ‘believe’?) the gospel of God? Now, ‘If the righteous one is scarcely saved, where will the ungodly and the sinner appear?’ Therefore let those who suffer according to the will of God commit their souls to Him in doing good, as to a faithful Creator.” Dare I ask? WHAT IS THE FAITHFUL CREATOR CREATING IN AND THROUGH YOU?

Several truths I believe that are vitally important in “gaining the True Life in Christ”! FIRST IS THE LIFE UNDER THE DIVINE CONVICTION OF THE HOLY SPIRIT! Right before the Lord Jesus’ journey of rejection, suffering, pain and death, followed by His Resurrection and Ascension, He said to His disciples in John 16:5-14, “But now I go away to Him who sent Me, and none of you asks Me, ‘Where are You going?’ But because I have said these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart. Nevertheless I tell you the truth. It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I depart, I will send Him to you. And when He has come, HE WILL CONVICT THE WORLD OF SIN, AND OF RIGHTEOUSNESS, AND OF JUDGMENT; of sin, because they do not believe in Me; of righteousness, because I go to My Father and you see Me no more; of judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged. (That’s the devil who deceives!).

I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come. He will glorify Me, for He will of what is Mine, and declare it to you”

If we were created by God with eternal intent, but we understand God was not interested in ‘human robots’ but children of faith willfully choosing to know Him, serve Him, and love Him, then we begin to understand why “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,” fully committed to ‘fallen flesh’ or the ‘old sin nature’ until the Blessed Holy Spirit comes or came to convict of sin and of righteousness and judgment to come! Fallen mankind, universally alienated and separated from God by, yes, their love of sin and their sin nature, Holy God didn’t, doesn’t just wipe fallen men away, but sends His Spirit with the intent of not only exposing one’s sin nature but highlighting God’s holy desire to bring us into union with Father-God through His Son and our Savior, Christ Jesus!

And the Spirit has one never-changing message! It’s “The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” Sin’s penalty was washed away through the blood of the Lamb! Sin’s separation from God has been removed – Now, the question is: “Do I want to be a ‘vessel’ in which Christ tabernacles in me, expressing Himself through me as a ‘chosen vessel’?”

SECOND, CHOSEN VESSELS, CONVICTED BY THE HOLY SPIRIT, NOW MUST STEP UP TO THE AWARENESS OF AND NEED OF AND DESIRE TO BE A TABERNACLE OF HOLY PRESENCE! In John 3, Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews, came to Jesus by night, and in John 3:3 Jesus said to Nicodemus, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” Nicodemus said to Jesus, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?”

Jesus answered, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water (that’s ‘the water of the Word’!) AND the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit.”

Of course, you realize there is a dramatic difference between satisfied with the world ‘spirit’ and the worldly ways, fitting in to a world spirit of defiance and rejection of Holy Truth, because in the ‘fleshly hearts of boys and girls, men and women’, there is that passionate desire to be filled with the ‘darkness’ rather than be illuminated by the Light, the True Light, which lightens and enlightens repentant hearts and minds to the glory of God! When Jesus said: “You must be born again,” it isn’t a religious option that one can hold to or reject – it is the eternal necessity of being reconciled to God for “the gift of eternal, resurrection, Spirit-controlled living” or choosing to be a fellow citizen devoted to the world, the flesh, and the devil’s realm of the kingdom of darkness! When a teenager chooses to participate in ‘ungodly ways’, it’s the natural result, decision, participation in the lower nature, not the “new-born” nature of a true child of God!

“Flesh IS flesh”, and its fruit is affirmed in its liking and tendency and desire to satisfy one’s lower sin nature rather than honoring and glorifying the King of kings and Lord of lords! Without the ‘Spirit-nature’ of the “new-born in Christ”, there is no fleshly desire, no passionate longing to be one with the Savior and Lord, but the pull, persuasion, and participation in satisfying the lusts of the flesh, the lusts of the world, and the lusts of the devil himself! And there are truly many devotees who willingly “let go” to satisfy their sin natures!

But, “new-born disciples”? I find Matthew 11:25-27 an astounding revelation – it says: Jesus speaking, “I thank You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden these things from the wise and prudent, and have revealed them to babes. Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in Your sight. All things have been delivered to Me by My Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father. Nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and the one to whom the Son wills to reveal Him ( reveal God the Father!).”

Unborn lives, yes, husband or wife or both, children and youth, young adult, or the uninformed- aged, devotees of the minds of unbelief, educated or uneducated, worldly wise or university-trained, none ever have their minds opened to “saving grace” except by the sovereign foreknowledge and sacred choice and the Savior’s election, “This is My son, she’s My daughter,” and they know it by the Holy Spirit!

Dare I say it? Yes, I will! It’s the Holy Spirit of God that spoils the “sin-trail” of ‘the fallen away from God’ crowd! Again, John 3:5-6, Jesus speaks: “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of the water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” Natural being or spiritual being? Fallen sin-nature devotee or spiritually-birthed sons and daughters of the ‘blood redemption’? Strangers to saving grace or recipients of the mercy of God? Gripped in the mind of unbelief, rebellion, and deceit, or Graced, (Justified freely by His grace – accepted, just as if I’d never sinned!)?

There is an extremely interesting word in Revelation 15:5 that I willfully choose to ‘spiritualize’ for this present moment – it says: “After these things I looked, and behold, the temple of the tabernacle of the testimony in heaven was opened.” When I read that, I was really challenged: Past, present, or future? And, then, as I arrived at Revelation 21:3-8, I was awe-struck by, yes, present Truth! It says: “And I heard a loud voice from heaven saying, ‘Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people. God Himself will be with them and be their God.

And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes; there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away.’ Then He who sat on the throne said, “Behold, I make all things new.” And He said to me, “Write, for these words are true and faithful.” And He said to me, “It is done!” I am Alpha and Omega, the Beginning and the End. I will give of the fountain of the water of life freely to him who thirsts, and I will be his God and he shall be My son.

But the cowardly, unbelieving, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.”

Question! Has the temple of the tabernacle of the testimony in heaven been opened? Get ready! 1 Corinthians 3:16-17 instructs us who ARE “in Christ”! “Do you not know that YOU ARE THE TEMPLE OF GOD AND THAT THE SPIRIT OF GOD DWELLS IN YOU? If anyone defiles the temple of God, God will destroy him. For the temple of God is holy, which temple YOU ARE.”

THIRD, CONVICTED BY THE HOLY SPIRIT, CONVERTED TO NEW LIFE IN CHRIST, TRUE DISCIPLES MUST BE WILLING RECIPIENTS OF THE HOLY SPIRIT IN “GUIDING THEM” INTO GOD’S REVELATION-TRUTHS! In John 14:25-26 Jesus speaks to every new son or daughter of redemptive faith: “But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I have said to you.”

What an awesome Word that should encourage every new “babe in Christ” or maturing disciple – YOU HAVE A RESIDENT TRAINER AND EQUIPPER IN ETERNAL TRUTH, THE HOLY SPIRIT! Later, in John 16:7-15, Jesus declared, yes, to us in the 21^st Century, “Nevertheless I tell you the truth. It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I depart, I will send Him to you. And when He has come, He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment; of sin, because they do not believe in Me; of righteousness, because I go to My Father and you see Me no more (in the flesh!); of judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged.

I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, HE WILL GUIDE YOU INTO ALL TRUTH; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come. HE WILL GLORIFY ME (the Holy Spirit – not your ‘best effort’!), for He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you. All things that the Father has are Mine. Therefore I said (to you) that He will take of Mine and declare it to you.”

What a promise to every new “child of the King”! The Holy Spirit IS your faithful guide into Biblical Truth and Divine Will , an eternal and never-ceasing forceful empowerment, and the True, full-unveiling of Christ’s Resurrection Presence, which is why, in 1 Corinthians 2:4-5, Paul instructs us, “And my speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, that your faith should not be in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.”

FOURTH, AS A “NEWLY-PLANTED TREE OF LIFE”, ARE WE, IN OURSELVES, THE “FRUIT-OF-GOD PRODUCERS”? I don’t believe that that is what God’s Word trains us in! But then I read in John 15:1-6 where the Lord Jesus Himself said, “I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser. Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit He prunes, that it may bear more fruit. You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. Abide in Me and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me. I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit, for without Me you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in Me, he is cast out as a branch and is withered; and they gather them and throw them into the fire, and they are burned.” Jesus then said in Verse 8, “By this is My Father glorified, that YOU bear much fruit; so you will be My disciples.”

Oh, but hear me! It is not the best of ‘flesh-effort’ that produces abundant fruit (the nature and character of Christ!), but Galatians 5:22-25 equips us in Holy, Spirit-Inspired, manifestations of Christ! Paul wrote: “But the FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law. AND those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. (Did Paul talk about taking the sentence of death daily to himself that the Spirit of Christ might honor Jesus in yieldedness to the Holy Spirit’s ministry?). If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.”

No wonder B.B. McKinney was inspired to write the chorus: “Fall Fresh On Me’! It says: “Spirit of the living God, Fall fresh on me, Spirit of the living God, Fall fresh on me. Break me, melt me, mould me, fill me. Spirit of the living God, Fall fresh on me!”

We’re not called to follow Christ by the ‘central citadel’ of “self-will at its best”, but vessels of honor, birthed by the Spirit, taught by the Spirit, guided by the Spirit, led by the Spirit, or even planting Holy Seed is to be “by the Spirit”! In Galatians 6:7-9 Paul wrote: “DO NOT BE DECEIVED, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. For he who sows to his flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to the Spirit will of the Spirit reap everlasting life. And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart.” Doing good? Don’t you think that might mean believers do good as they are led by the Spirit, giving the Spirit His rightful place on the grounds of our earthly bodies, redeemed by the Blood, declared by God Himself to be a Holy Temple of Presence of the Holy Spirit to glorify Christ on earth as He is in heaven?

“In Christ”, washed in the Blood of the Lamb, re-born, called to be His witnesses – but does that mean by our sincere, well-intended best efforts or by choosing to be “vessels” in and through which the Holy Spirit glorifies Christ in us and through us? I believe Romans 8:14 tells us: “For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.”

No wonder the great hymn entitled “Come, Thou Almighty King” is still true for today when its third verse says: “Come, Holy Comforter, Your sacred witness bear In this glad hour: You who almighty art, Now rule in every heart, And never from us depart, Spirit of power.” Amen?

CHAPTER THIRTY

“AWAKENINGS’ NECESSITY? THE KINGLY REIGN OF CHRIST!”

In 1 John 4:17-19 we have an amazing, life-changing, uplifting revelation: “Love (agape love) has been perfected among us in this: that we may have boldness in the day of judgment; because AS HE IS, SO ARE WE IN THIS WORLD. There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves torment. But he who fears has not been made perfect in love. We love Him because He first loved us.”

Do YOU have a “new song” that you sing, like the twenty-four elders who fell down before the Lamb of God in Revelation 5:9-14? And they sang a new song, saying: ‘You are worthy to take the scroll, and to open its seals; For You were slain, and have redeemed us to God BY YOUR BLOOD out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation, AND HAVE MADE US KINGS AND PRIESTS TO OUR GOD; AND WE SHALL REIGN ON THE EARTH.” Then I looked, and I heard the voice of many angels around the throne, the living creatures, and the elders; and the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice:

“Worthy is the Lamb who was slain to receive power and riches and wisdom, and strength and honor and glory and blessing!” And every creature which is in heaven and on the earth and under the earth and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, I heard saying: ‘Blessing and honor and glory and power Be to Him who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb, forever and ever!’ Then the four living creatures said, ‘Amen!’ And the twenty-four elders fell down and worshipped Him who lives forever and ever.’”

I find it so interesting, at times disheartening and discouraging, because too many ‘believers’ in Christ Jesus have no true foundational knowledge of their ‘identity’ “In Christ”! If “in Christ” ‘we are more than conquerors’, then why are some believers stymied in their journey of redemptive faith? In Romans 8:37-39 Paul wrote: “Yet in all these things (tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, or peril) WE ARE MORE THAN CONQUERORS THROUGH HIM WHO LOVED US. For I am persuaded that neither death not life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Paul clearly understood for his people in his day, and, yes, for the people of our day today who’ve put their faith in Christ Jesus. He said, Romans 8:25, “For He (Christ Jesus) MUST REIGN till He has put all enemies under His feet,” that was then, and it is now in your life and walk of faith: WE MUST BE DAILY YIELDED TO HIS LORDSHIP in all of OUR circumstances! “HE MUST REIGN”!!

Psalm 110:1-3a, David said, “The Lord said to my Lord, ‘Sit at My right hand, till I make Your enemies Your footstool.’ The Lord shall send the rod of Your strength out of Zion. Rule in the midst of Your enemies! Your people shall be volunteers in the day of Your power…”

It’s really interesting as you’re going through the Word to come across a passage like Judges 8:22-23! Then the men of Israel said to Gideon, “Rule over us, both you and your son, and your grandson also; for you have delivered us from the hand of Midian.” But Gideon said to them, “I will not rule over you, nor shall my son rule over you; the Lord (Himself) shall rule over you.”

And Micah 4:1-7 really gets interesting when you know 70AD was coming for the end of Israel, which is also true of any ‘fleshly reign or rule’! And you and I have a choice of Who reigns over us, in us, and through us! It says: “Now it shall come to pass in the latter days ( Last days of Worldly existence or last days of Israel?) that the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established on the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and peoples shall flow to it.

Many nations shall come and say, ‘Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; He will teach us His ways, and we shall walk in His paths.’ For out of Zion the law shall go forth, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. He shall judge between many peoples, and rebuke strong nations afar off; they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore.

But everyone shall sit under his vine and under his fig tree, and no one shall make them afraid; for the mouth of the Lord has spoken. For all people walk each in the name of his god, But we will walk in the name of the Lord our God forever and ever.

“In that day,” says the Lord, “I will assemble the lame, I will gather the outcast and those whom I have afflicted; I will make the lame a remnant, and the outcast a strong nation; So the Lord will reign over them in Mount Zion from now on, even forever.”

And who is that? Those who walk in the name of the Lord our God forever and ever! Does John 1:1-4 describe both the “true light” AND those who do not comprehend it? “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. ALL THINGS were made THROUGH HIM, and without Him nothing was made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.”

The next few verses tell us John was not that Light, but was sent to bear witness of the Light, that all men through Him might believe. Verses 8-9 clearly says that John “was not that Light, but was sent to bear witness of the Light. That was the true Light which gives light to every man coming into the world.”

And then in John 1:10-14 John tells us, “He (Christ Jesus) was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him. He came to His own, and His own did not receive Him. BUT as many as received Him, TO THEM He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in [trust in, rely upon, adhere to], in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but [BORN!] of God.”

In 1 Timothy 4:8-10 we read: “For bodily exercise profits a little, but godliness is profitable for all things, having promise of the life that now is and of that which is to come. This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptance. For to this end we both labor and suffer reproach, BECAUSE WE TRUST IN THE LIVING GOD, who is the Savior of all men, especially of those who believe [trust in, rely upon, adhere to!].”

I would think the legitimate question at this point would be: WHO or what rules over you? In Colossians 2:8-10 Paul warns us all! “Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men, according to the basic principles of the world, and not according to Christ. For IN HIM dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily; and you are complete in Him, who is the head of all principality and power.” Several truths we must rest in:

FIRST, THERE IS THE REIGN OVER TEMPTATION WHEN I KNOW THE TRUTH ABOUT THE REALITY OF TEMPTATION! In Luke 4:1 we read, “The Jesus, being filled with the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness, being tempted for forty days by the devil.” Christ Jesus – filled with the Holy Spirit! Christ Jesus – led by the Spirit into the wilderness. Christ Jesus – tempted by the devil for forty days! Several lessons we must learn and rest in:

• The reality of temptation is no evidence of sin! In Hebrews 4:15-16 we read, “For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. LET US THEREFORE come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”

Later, in Hebrews 10:19-23, the author wrote: “Therefore, brethren, (brothers and sisters in the Faith!), having boldness to enter the Holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which He consecrated for us, through the veil, that is, His flesh, and having a High Priest over the house of God ( 2 Corinthians 6:16b declares, “For YOU are the temple of the living God!”), let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful.”

• The reality of temptation is no sign of God’s Lack of Love for us because He allows temptation! Did we read in Luke 4:1 that Jesus “was led by the Spirit (the Holy Spirit!) into the wilderness, BEING TEMPTED FORTY DAYS BY THE DEVIL.” Jesus WAS tempted, loved of the Father! In fact, at Jesus’ baptism, in Matthew 3:17, we read: “And suddenly a voice came from heaven, saying, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” And the very next event in the life of Christ? Matthew 4:1 again says, “Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.”
• The reality of temptation is no implication of doubt about one being “a child of the King”! Again, the Son of God was tempted – the Eternal Son of God was tested – the “First-Fruit” tasted the fire of temptation to evil! It tells us that the Primacy of Sonship in Scripture FACED THE PERILOUS HOUR OF TESTING TRIUMPHANTLY – and so can you! Spurgeon, in “Spurgeon’s Sermons”, (Vol.18, p.339), wrote: “Temptation is a mark of sonship rather than any reflection thereupon.” So true!
• The reality of temptation is not an opened door for participation in the evil invitation or an opened door to penalty because of it! Temptation Never has to lead to sinful involvement! It’s said of Christ Jesus, “The same yesterday, today, and forever,” therefore one pure in Christ before temptation can be, must be pure in Him after temptation! How? 1 John 5:18b says, “…He that is born of God KEEPS HIMSELF and the evil one (the devil) does not touch him.” “Keeps”? That’s “to guard, to watch over, to be alert to, to keep one’s self, by prayer? Matthew 6:13, “And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from evil – For Yours is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory forever. SO BE IT or Amen!”
• The reality of temptation is not a door of opportunity for murmuring and complaining, but the message that we’re not above or below our Master, Lord, and Savior! Luke 6:40 is Jesus telling us, “A disciple is not above his teacher, but everyone who is perfectly trained will be like his teacher.” And Jesus? Even if it’s Peter, not fully trained as yet, that Jesus confronted in Mark 8:33, He rebuked Peter, saying, “Get behind Me, Satan! For you are not (yet) mindful of the things of God, but the things of men.”
• The reality of temptation is not the way of suffering before the release of His reign! Hebrews 2:18 equips us by saying, “For since He Himself was tempted in that which He suffered, He is able to come to the aid of those who are tempted.” Yes, He stands at YOUR door, ready to be available to you in any moment of the devil’s onslaught! The writer of Hebrews said also in Hebrews 12:3, “For consider Him who endured such hostility from sinners (and Satan!) against Himself, lest you become weary and discouraged in your souls.” His invitation in your trial of faith by the devil? “Lean on Me,” Jesus says, over and over and over again and again! And is that “your performance” or His position, “your grit” or His grace and mercy, “your determination” or faithful dependence upon the King of kings and Lord of lords? Romans 5:17 says, “For if by the one man’s offense death reigned through the one, much more those who receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ.”

SECOND, THERE IS THE REIGN OVER TEMPTATION WHEN I KNOW THE TENDERNESS OF MY SYMPATHEITIC SAVIOR! In Hebrews 2:17-18 we read, “Therefore, in all things He had to be made like His brethren, that He might be a merciful and faithful High Priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For in that He Himself has suffered, being tempted, HE IS ABLE TO AID THOSE WHO ARE TEMPTED.”

• I become aware of the Avenue of His suffering in temptation: The Avenue of EMOTION is involved! Did we just read, “in that He Himself has suffered, being tempted…?” In Spurgeon’s Sermons, (Vol.18, p.329), Spurgeon preached, “Many persons are tempted, but do not suffer in being tempted. When ungodly men are tempted, the bait is to their taste, and they swallow it greedily. Temptation is a pleasure to them; indeed they sometimes tempt the devil to tempt them. They are drawn aside of their own lusts and enticed; so that temptation, instead of being suffering to them becomes a horrible source of pleasure. But good men (godly men) suffer when they are tempted, and the better they are the more they suffer.” And if that’s true of good and godly men, then how must have it have been emotionally for the PURE AND PERFECT, SINLESS SON OF GOD? Spurgeon went on, “Our Lord and Master had such a delicate sensitiveness of soul with regard to holiness, that the sight of sin must have torn Him as a naked man would be torn by thorns, and thistles, and briers.”

The Avenue of PLACE is involved: Christ Jesus left His Eternal Home and came to the sin-infested earth! He was “rich, yet for our sakes He became poor.” He left the place where He could never be tempted to come to the place where temptation is a way of life – and He suffered! (Matthew 26:36-46).

The Avenue of Weariness is involved: We read in John 4:5-6, So Jesus came to a city of Samaria which is called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph. Now Jacob’s well was there. Jesus therefore, being wearied from His journey, sat thus by the well. It was about the sixth hour (or noon). Oh, and then we read in Hebrews 5:7-9, “who, in the days of His flesh, when He had offered up prayers and supplications, with vehement cries and tears to Him who was able to save Him from death, and was heard because of His godly fear, though He was a Son, yet He learned obedience by the things which He suffered. And having been perfected, He became the author of eternal salvation to all who obey Him.” Are YOU learning obedience by what YOU SUFFER when temptation comes your way?

The Avenue of Aloneness is involved: Do you remember Jesus crying out as He faced the Cross? “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?’ God hadn’t forsaken Him, but He had withdrawn temporarily, and for Jesus, it was if God had forsaken Him and it felt as if He’d been deserted! That’s like Job! “Oh, that I knew where I might find Him! That I might come even to His throne!” In Psalm 42:1-5 we read about those passionate FOR GOD in the midst of their distresses thinking they are alone!

THE AVENUE OF EMPATHY IS INVOLVED! In 2 Corinthians 1:3-7 we find the “Hallelujah Chorus” of comforted sufferers! It says: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort those who are in any trouble, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation also abounds through Christ. Now if we are afflicted, it is for your consolation and salvation, which is effective for enduring the same sufferings which we also suffer. Or if we are comforted, it is for your consolation and salvation. And our hope for you is steadfast, because we know that as you are partakers of the sufferings, so also you will partake of the consolation.” How true is that to the true disciple’s walk of faith even today?

• I become aware of The Aid of our Sympathetic Savior. Hebrews 2:18 is so clear! “For in that He Himself has suffered, being tempted, He is able to AID THOSE WHO ARE TEMPTED.” I’m sure this is why we read 1 Thessalonians 3:5 when Paul said, “For this reason, when I could endure it no longer, I also sent to find out about your faith, for fear that THE TEMPTER MIGHT HAVE TEMPTED YOU, and our labor should be in vain.” It’s also interesting that we read in Luke 4:13, “And when the devil had finished every temptation (against Jesus), he departed from Him until a more opportune time.”

We are, yes, fully aware of the aid of our sympathetic Savior because HE OVERCAME TEMPTATION! Hebrews 4:15 says, “For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who has been tempted in all points as we are, yet without sin.” In Galatians 2:20-21 Paul wrote: “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and Himself for me. I do not set aside the grace of God…”! We are fully aware of our sympathetic Savior because He made toothless the tempter! In Colossians 2:13-15 we read: “And you, being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He has made alive together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses, having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. Having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it.”

Oh, but Martin Luther nailed it strong for us when he wrote the great old hymn, “A Mighty Fortress”! It says: “A mighty fortress is our God, A bulwark never failing; Out helper He, amid the flood of mortal ills prevailing; For still our ancient foe Seeks to work us woe; His craft and power are great, armed with cruel hate, On earth is not his equal.

Did we in our own strength confide, Our striving would be losing, Were not the right Man on our side, The Man of God’s own choosing. Do you ask who that may be? Christ Jesus, it is He; Lord Sabaoth is His name, from age to age the same, And He must win the battle.

And tho’ this world, with devils filled, Should threaten to undo us, We will not fear, for God has willed His Truth to triumph through us. The prince of darkness grim – We tremble not for him; his rage we can endure, For lo! His doom is sure: One little word shall fell him.

That word above all earthly powers – No thanks to them – abideth; The Spirit and the gifts are ours Through Him who with us sideth. Let goods and kindred go, This mortal life also; The body they may kill; God’s Truth abideth still, His kingdom is forever.” AMEN?

THIRD, THERE IS THE REIGN OVER TEMPTATION WHEN I KNOW THE TESTIMONY OF COMMON BELIEVERS WHO’VE OVERCOME WHAT I FACE! 1 Corinthians 10:13 tells us: ‘No temptation has overtaken you but such as is common to man (to fellow believers, to true disciples!).”

In Philippians 2:10-16 we have, yes, true, powerful testimonies! “That I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, if, by any means, I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.

Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected; but I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ has also laid hold of me. Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

Therefore let us, as many as are mature, have this mind; and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal even this to you. Nevertheless, to the degree that we have already attained, let us walk by the same rule, let us be of the same mind.”

Did Paul say, “I press toward the prize or mark of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus”? If so, then why would the true disciple turn downward rather than pressing in to the fullness of the blessing of the gospel of Jesus Christ? The “present reign” of Christ is interpreted through faithful believers who reign in and through Him actively, purposefully, benevolently, judicially, and victoriously!

Hebrews 12:1-2 we joyfully read, “Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, LOOKING UNTO JESUS, the author and FINISHER of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.”

FOURTH, THERE IS THE REIGN OVER TEMPTATION WHEN I KNOW THE TRIUMPHANT NATURE OF MY FAITHFUL GOD! 1 Corinthians 10:12-13 says, “Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall. No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who WILL NOT ALLOW YOU TO BE TEMPTED BEYOND WHAT YOU ARE ABLE, but with the temptation will also MAKE THE WAY OF ESCAPE, that you may be able to bear it.” What an awesome, encouraging word!

There’s a promise in Psalm 89:36-37 that says, “His seed shall endure forever, and his throne as the sun before Me; It shall be established forever like the moon, even like the faithful witness in the sky.”

Isn’t it amazing? Psalm 119:86 says: “All Your commandments are faithful…”, and He never falls short of upholding, sustaining, even rescuing each of His sons or daughters who yield to Him!

Proverbs 13:17b says, “…a faithful ambassador brings health”, and is not the author of fleshly sicknesses in one’s spiritual journey! Isaiah 55:3 speaks “faithful mercies”1

Look at 1 Corinthians 1:9 where Paul declared, “God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.” And BECAUSE THE LORD IS FAITHFUL, 1 Thessalonians 5:24 says, “Faithful is He who calls you, who also will do it.”

Doesn’t Revelation 19:11 speak about “heaven opened, and behold, a white horse. And He who sat on him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and makes war.”

Do you understand that Almighty God has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you!” It’s not in “the sweet by and by” but in the ‘here and now’ that the triumphant nature of our faithful God finds full release!

G.A. Young, in the 1930’s, wrote a hymn entitled “God Leads Us Along.” [Renewal by Lillenas Publishing Co., Owner}. It says:

“In shady green pastures, so rich and so sweet, God leads His dear children along; Where the water’s cold flow bathes the weary one’s feet, God leads His dear children along.

Sometimes on the mount where the sun shines so bright, God leads His dear children along; Sometimes in the valley in the darkest of night, God leads His dear children along.

Tho’ sorrows befall us, and Satan oppose, God leads His dear children along; Through grace we can conquer, defeat all our foes, God leads His dear children along.

Away from the mire, and away from the clay, God leads His dear children along; A – -way up in glory, eternity’s day, God leads His dear children along.

Some thro’ the waters, some thro’ the flood, Some thro’ the fire, but all thro’ the Blood; Some thro’ great sorrow, but God gives a song, In the night season and all the day long.” Amen?

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

“INTROSPECTIVE IDOLATRESSES?”

I hope the title doesn’t shock you or embarrass you, but we’re seeing a day in modern-day America when ‘motherhood’ for many is an unwanted, disappointing, and frustrating ‘ministry’ they would just as soon do without – or, let someone else care for the children they birthed – “hire me a ‘nanny’ or I’m leaving”!

The society of modern self-centered, self-serving moms, sadly indifferent to the “Servant-Spirit in Christ”, unknowingly to themselves, prefer the title of “Queen of Disappointing Child-Birthing”!

Educated unbelievers or believers, enslaved to their ‘godless’ enmity of ministry and service to others, even their own babies, live frustrated, disappointing, parent-days, because it interferes with “what I want, what I desire, what I seek”, without any consideration of God’s eternal plan of Godly-parenting for His glory and honor and the ‘selfless’ building of His kingdom through their sons and daughters!

I know – it’s not ALL mothers who are ‘introspective idolatresses’ – I know my loving wife of 60 years used to say in the ‘early days’ of our marriage with two sons and a daughter birthed in the first five years, “If you come home one day and can’t find me, ( with 3 children, full of boundless energy-one more to come about six years later!), look under the bed; you’ll probably find me there flipping my lips!” That was during a time period when I commuted about 100 miles one way, 4 hours of seminary classes 4 days a week, returning home at about 2:30pm, going to work from 3:30-10:30pm! (I usually studied as one of my seminary buddies drove, four or five in our car-pool!).

But a mother disenchanted with one or two very little children? A mother who truly resents ‘childcare’? A mother who believes her husband has betrayed her with his ‘professional busy-ness’? A mother who feels betrayed in her pursuit of ‘working’ but now can’t because of babies? A mother encouraged by other ‘self-serving’ moms who pump each other’s ‘fleshly resentment’ of being tied down to kids? When I have come across this sad attitude, I wonder if it all comes from resentment of Holy, Loving, Gracious, Merciful, Planning God? Is there a total ‘black-out’ of mind to the true calling of disciples “in Christ”(including “stressed ‘moms’!) who said He didn’t come to be served, but to serve and to give His life a ransom for many?

I look back over my own life journey, fully aware of parental disenchantment. My father and mother were divorced when I was three years of age, taken by my mother to her parents who, “Thank God”, cared for me from the time I was three until twelve years of age when she re-married and I went to live with my mother and step-father. One thing I became fully aware of was revealed to me in Psalm 27:10, “When my father and my mother forsake me, then the Lord will take care of me.” My grandparents still had at home two of my mother’s sisters who were God-placed ‘angels’ to love me, bless me, care for me, and inspire in me the blessings of walking with Christ Jesus and living with a caring community of true believers, both men and women, in a church that lived out the spirit of Jesus in ‘community care’, yes, for needy kids- I still can picture in my mind the caring men and women who nurtured me!

But presently, mothers who ARE “introspective idolatresses”? I will follow later with “introspective idolaters”, or ‘fathers’ who ignore the parental calling of God to care for those they birthed!

You are aware that ‘some’ mothers make it a point to arise every morning indulging in that ‘discontentment’ of motherhood, diseased with a spirit of ‘self-pity’. As professing Christians, some are unaware of the sovereign oversight and Throne-of-God desire to be in them ALL He desires to be through them!

Even Paul the Apostle of first-century followers of Christ, in Philippians 3:12, wrote: “Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected; but I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me.” And, if Christ has “laid hold of a woman for motherhood”, is He “able to do exceedingly above all that we ask or think”? Yet often a mother’s ‘thought life’ is her own and her prayer life is non-existent – so, she thought: “Just do your best”, rather than being the vessel through the Lord and Savior Who is the same yesterday, today, and forever!

I found it interesting in reading the Psalms recently to hear the psalmist speak about “servants of the Lord,” saying in Psalm 113, Verse 9, “He, God, the Lord, grants the barren woman a home, like a joyful mother of children; Praise the Lord!” So, I had to ask, “What causes a mother to have no joy but only complaints about motherhood?” Or, “Who is it that produces only everlasting joy in a mother who will not be overcome by her motherly responsibilities?”

If you were to examine the ‘fall of Israel’ as “the princes of Israel: each one has used his power to shed blood in you”, Ezekiel 22:6, followed by, Verse 7, “In you they have made light of father and mother,” you will discover a pattern that still exists today, sadly, in some mothers and disgracefully in some fathers! Since we’ll deal with “dads” in a new writing, suffice it to say here, “Yes, there are SOME mothers who’ve made light of motherly, Christ-honoring ministry to sons and daughters, because they never fully considered parenting as a holy ministry in honoring the Lord!”

And, more than that, consider what King David sang about in Psalm 139! Verse one, “O Lord, You have searched me and known me.” (Does Holy God “know” every mother across the face of our world?). David went on to say in Verse 13, “For You formed my inward parts; You covered me in my mother’s womb,” adding in Verse 16, ‘Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed. And in Your book they all were written, the days fashioned for me, when as yet there were none of them.” [Do you believe Holy God, seeing one in its mother’s womb, has designed His holy plan for that child, yes, every child, but do SOME mothers deny God’s purpose for their child and willfully, ignorantly, unbelievingly fashion their own fleshly designs on God’s child, even before it was birthed? That, my friends, is sorrowfully possible!]

Are you aware, understanding God’s vision for every mother AND her children, that as we just saw in Ezekiel 22:7, some “make light” of parental care of the “kids” before Holy God, that there is ‘false fruit’ leading a ‘mom’ or the “true fruit of the very Spirit”, nature, and character of the Indwelling Christ? I sometimes fear for the sad failure of unbelieving moms, doubt-filled moms, fleshly moms, because somehow, somewhere, some-who, failed in the ministry of queenly preparation of mothers to birth and care for their children in “Spirit-terms”, not “fleshly-best-terms”!

Consider 2 Timothy 2:20-26, not for instruction as an approved worker in the Kingdom of God, but instruction for godly mothers in the Parental Kingdom of Family with boys and girls as her fruit! It says, “But in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and silver, but also of wood and clay, some for honor and some for dishonor.

Therefore if anyone cleanses himself (herself) from the latter, he (she) will be a vessel for honor, sanctified and useful for the Master, prepared for every good work. Flee also youthful lusts; but pursue righteousness, faith, love, peace with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart.

But avoid foolish and ignorant disputes, knowing that they generate strife. And a servant of the Lord must not quarrel but be gentle to all, able to teach, patient, in humility correcting those who are in opposition, if God perhaps will grant them repentance, so that they may know the truth, and that they may come to their senses and escape the snare of the devil, having been taken captive by him to do his will.”

Has it ever crossed your mind that much of the tumult in ‘child-rearing’ can and does come from the ‘snaring of the devil’ in demonic bondage, moms unaware their futility IS the snare of the devil of darkness and not the Light of the Kingdom of Christ?

At the same time, as we examine the diabolical tumult in marriages and divorces in our modern-day, plus the broken heart-strings of many, many children without Christ-centered ministries from moms, does the paraphrasing of Hebrews 11:1 ring true? “Now then, in the 21^st Century, parenting as a mom ‘is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen” for many, but, praise God, not all!

As I moved into this message on “Introspective Idolatresses”, I was reminded of a book I purchased years and years ago, read it, then put it on one of my book shelves. When I was convinced I should write of the disease of ‘idolatresses’, I went to my office to find this book entitled, “Side-Saddle On The Golden Calf”, edited by George H. Lewis, College of the Pacific, copyrighted by Goodyear Publishing Company Inc, Pacific Palissades, California in 1972. It relates to sociological issues in mass society from a ‘pop-artist,’ artistic devotion to ‘flesh at its best and worst’, and a ‘greater social consciousness’ certainly void of repentance toward God and faith alone in the finished work of Christ “At The Cross”!

“The Golden Calf”, I see, as living independently from allegiance to Holy God and ‘riding’ on the ‘golden calf’ of one’s determination to live as I please! But modern America has moved from ‘Side-Saddle’ to holding on to the ‘tail’ of one’s chosen ‘calf’, the allegiance to a social consciousness rather than a sovereign allegiance to the Merciful Master of life, Christ Jesus, Lord over sin and death! And sadly, many modern mothers fail to see ‘child-care’ as an eternally rewarding blessing for those who, yes, lay down their lives, without complaint, in the care of their kids, and “RIDE” in His saddle, not ‘side-saddle’ or ‘tail-grabbing’, rather their “Yes” to the Lord in undivided devotion to honor Him in the ‘child-care arena’ of motherly devotion!

Hear me! One’s journey of faith in the land of motherhood is as the true church’s continuation of the Cross and its reliance upon Resurrection Life, Resurrection Power, and Resurrection Hope! A modern-day mother needs to take the hymn as a daily profession of faith and surrender to what she sings: “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. On Christ, (as a mother), I stand on the Rock; all other ground is sinking sand, all other ground is sinking sand.”

I don’t know who wrote it, but I read it in a book by Dennis Linn and Matthew Linn entitled “Healing Life’s Hurts.” [Copyright @1978 by The Missionary Society of St.Paul the Apostle, State of New York]. The writing? “Healing Harvest.” It says:

“O memory of a painful time, are you seed or stone? A dark and deadly tomb, Or seed with life to bloom? Only if I say, ‘I want you,’ will I really know.

O sprouting seed, are you angry at the dark and choking dirt? What grates your tender shoot and blocks your chosen route? Only if I say “I forgive you,” will I really know.

O tender shoot, are you bargaining, Demanding sun before you grow? Or would you rather as the sun Pour warm love on everyone? Only if I say “I forgive you first,” Will I really know.

O roots, do you wander depressed Searching in drought for tears? Or do you need more sun To dry the tears that run? Only if I say “Forgive me,” Will I really know.

O golden wheat, can you accept The gifts of pulsing seed? Are you wheat or golden bread? Are you bread or Christ instead? Only if I say “Thank You,” Will I really know.

Unless a grain of wheat Falls into the earth and dies, It remains alone: But if it dies, It bears much fruit. (John 12:24)”

Question! “Is motherhood the “Healing Harvest” as a mother faithfully lays down her life daily for the honor of Christ through her “motherly care”? Does a mother today see herself as “clay in the hands of the Potter” but without the recognition of “ply-able-ness” from His hands?

In Ecclesiastes 3:10-15 we read about Holy God “putting eternity in ALL hearts” – and if He does, and He has, does a ‘mother’ operate on the temporal or the eternal? The Ecclesiastes author tells us: “I have seen the God-given task with which the sons (and daughters!) of men are to be occupied. He (God) has made everything beautiful in its time. Also He has put eternity in their hearts, except that no one can find out the work that God does from beginning to end.

I know that nothing is better for them (even over-burdened mothers) than to rejoice, and to do good in their lives, and also that every man should eat and drink and enjoy the good of all his (or her) labor – IT IS THE GIFT OF GOD. I know that whatever God does, it shall be forever. Nothing can be added to it, and nothing taken from it. GOD DOES IT, that men ( and mothers) should fear before Him. That which is has already been, and what is to be has already been; and God requires an account of what is past.”

It’s a sad day when ‘pedestrian persuasion’ becomes the ultimate expression of what some mothers choose rather than the unveiling revelation of Christ’s divine care of children through a Spirit-manifested Presence!

Do you remember Holy God coming to Abraham saying, (Genesis 22:2), “Take now your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you.” God into ‘child sacrifices’? No! God into searching what’s in a mother or dad’s heart! Obedience to His heart and spirit or fleshly, mindful choices of an unsure, unknowing heart and mind of ‘fleshly loyalty’?

As most of my hearers and readers know, I read a lot from Oswald Chambers’ “My Utmost For His Highest.” In his book he wrote about the Genesis 22:2 passage. He said, Verse 3, “And Abraham rose up early in the morning…and went unto the place of which God had told him.” The wonderful simplicity of Abraham! When God spoke, he did not confer with flesh and blood. Beware when you want to confer with flesh and blood, i.e., your own sympathies, your own insight, anything that is not based on your personal relationship to God. These are the things that compete with and hinder obedience to God… Always guard against self-chosen service for God; self-sacrifice may be a disease. If God has made your cup sweet, drink it with grace; if He has made it bitter, drink it in communion with Him. If the providential order of God for you is a hard time of difficulty, go through with it, but never choose the scene of your martyrdom. God chose the crucible for Abraham, and Abraham made no demur (or objection); he went steadily through. If you are not living in touch with Him, it is easy to pass a crude verdict on God. YOU must go through the crucible before you have any right to pronounce a verdict, because in the crucible (if one is open to what God thinks! JFF) you learn to know God better. God (Yes, Holy God!) is working (through you, mother!) for His highest ends until His purpose and man’s purpose become one.” Glory be to God for touching, taking over, and triumphantly seeing His children raised by a truly committed mother!

It was Lydia Huntley Sigourney who wrote “The Mother of Washington,”( l.33). She wrote: “And say to mothers what a holy charge is theirs – with what a kingly power their love Might rule the fountains of the new-born minds.” How true!

Maternal love and maternal ministry either reveals the very nature and character of God Himself or the “bitter-sweet” songs of a mother who questions ‘why’ SHE has to be so bothered by child care when all she wants is “to be free to do as I please”, unveiling so clearly a self-centered life, disappointed in God’s will of mothering! I pray YOU are aware that mothering is the gift and glory of God, and her most precious awards from Him are a mother’s sons, daughters, or both!

We need to pray for Holy God, Loving Father, the caring Christ, and through the power of the Holy Spirit to usher in a new “great awakening” of blessed motherhood, and see God crown those willing mothers as truly God-appointed queens of heavenly-blessed families!

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

“INSTROSPECTIVE IDOLATERS”

After writing recently on “Introspective Idolatresses”, I truly felt compelled to research the probability that both “Introspective Idolatresses” and “Introspective Idolaters” feed off of each other, but ‘bottom-line’, that ‘spirit’ of ‘fleshly introspection’ has a benefactor called the “powers of darkness” that feeds and celebrates in the ‘curse’ of self-importance and self-indulgence in its basest display!

In fact, in Ephesians 5:1-7, Paul enlightens us between ‘imitators of God as dear children’ or the extension of the fleshly, devilish, self-promoting of ‘the idolater’! Paul wrote: “Therefore be imitators of God as dear children. And walk in love (is that ‘laying down one’s life willingly without regret, like Jesus at the Cross’?), as Christ also has loved us and given Himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God FOR A SWEET-SMELLING AROMA (not a soured countenance of disappointment in child-care!).

But fornication and all uncleanness or covetousness, let it not even be named among you, as is fitting for saints; neither filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor coarse jesting, which are not fitting, but rather giving of thanks. For this you know, that no fornicator, unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God.

Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience. Therefore do not be partakers with them.”

Much or most of the inter-action between “introspective idolaters” and “introspective idolatresses” is ‘being fed’ or ‘feeding’ one another in the fruit of flesh, not the “fruit of the Spirit”! And there is definitely an eternal difference between the two, but, sadly, some look upon “feeding off ‘flesh’ or the ‘old sin-nature’ as normal and natural until one gets to Heaven one day in the ‘far-off future’”! How biblically wrong is that? Yes, there is a massive spiritual difference between living in “the best of motherly or fatherly faith” and living in “the fullness of the blessing of the gospel of Jesus Christ” as a mother or a father!

Have YOU ever wondered what ‘rock’ some “moms” or “dads” drink from? In 1 Corinthians 10:4b-5 Paul wrote of both the “gathered” and the “scattered” when he said of those ‘gathered’, “For they drank of that Spiritual Rock that followed them, and that Rock was Christ. But with most of them God was not well pleased, for their bodies were scattered in the wilderness,” challenging us in the 21^st Century, Verse 6, “Now these things became our examples to the intent that we should not lust after evil things as they also lusted,” – “my way of parenting or God’s way”? [Paul later said in Verse 14, “Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry”! And one can only pray, “Holy God, instill Christ-like, selfless service in both moms and dads, and tear down their altars to the ‘flesh-way’, even at its ‘best’!”].

Yes, I know Paul, in 2 Corinthians 6:16, was speaking about ‘temple priests’, not only before Christ but after His crucifixion, and about ‘temple’ idolatry when he wrote: “And what agreement has the temple of God with idols?” But… has there been, in some, a blinded devotion to ‘mothering or fathering as I see fit’ apart from, “Lord, what would You have me to do?”, even blinded to the Christian walk as a life that was crucified with Christ at the Cross, and, “my ‘faith-walk’ IS Christ in me and through me to His glory, honor, and praise, my life as mother or father reflecting His presence, purpose, and power”?

I would be amiss if I failed to point out that the author of Hebrews 11:4-5 shared the major difference between, yes, a “mother’s best effort” and the “more excellent way”: “By faith Abel offered to God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, through which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts; and through it he being dead still speaks.”

The righteousness of “motherhood” or “fatherhood” is imparted, implanted, impacted by the mother’s awareness or the father’s awareness, understanding, desire for, need of, the “obtained witness” of the ministry of the Indwelling Holy Spirit who honors and magnifies Christ through the emptied vessel of flesh, whether father or mother! The ‘Cain-ish way’ of fatherhood or the “Abel-way” through faith and obedience TO the fruit of the Spirit? Do you understand, realize, or comprehend through examples from others, examination of “best effort failures”, or suddenly ‘dumb-founded’ because of no devotion at all to the ways of God in Christ for fathers and mothers, or simply: “Who needs God’s help as a father or mother? I can do it on my own.”

Are future fathers and mothers ever trained or equipped to be “representative parents of Holy God” or is it a ‘best-effort’ philosophy? I wrote a teaching in November of 2004 in which I said: “Even though we are immortal in Christ, as human followers, we have tendencies to fallibility, to failure, and to futility – and sadly some of us accept that and settle in to being our petty little selves! And sadly, some of us settle for religious spasms every now and then, but fail to press in to the High Calling.”

Fathers, mothers, grandparents, friends, neighbors, co-workers, professing Christians, I challenge you: reflect upon 2 Timothy 1:9 where Paul wrote: that God “has SAVED US and CALLED US with A HOLY PURPOSE, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was given us in Christ Jesus, BEFORE TIME BEGAN.”

Holy God has had an eternal plan for marriage and parenting even before the world was created? And whether it’s parenting, pastoring, participating in the present world and kingdom living as fathers and mothers, is there an eternal word of hope for moms and dads who trust in Christ alone for parenting skills and parenting ministries? Psalm 138:7-8 says, “Though I walk in the midst of trouble, You will revive me; You will stretch out Your hand against the wrath of my enemies, and Your right hand will save me. THE LORD WILL PERFECT THAT WHICH CONCERNS ME; Your mercy, O Lord, endures forever; Do not forsake the works of Your hands.”

And I have to ask: Do you, parents, see your present parenting ministry as the works of God’s hands? Are YOU confident in Him when it seems the “candle” has been burned at both ends, and the fire of parenting is about to die out, in you? But, we just read: “THE LORD WILL PERFECT THAT WHICH CONCERNS ME.”

In the previous message on “Introspective Idolatresses” I made mention of Ezekiel 22:6-7, and it’s just as relevant here. “Look, the princes of Israel: each one has used his power to shed blood in you. In you they have made light of father and mother…”. Making light of marriage or parental responsibilities is a sad commentary in this 21^st Century! And one wonders: “In marriage, in parenting, do marriage couples and/or fathers and mothers nonchalantly take marriage and parenting without a clear biblical equipping, alerting them to both pleasure and/or problems, or do they allow themselves to be fully aware of both weaknesses and strengths, dangers and glorious times, its insignificance as seen by some or it’s heavenly ministry, day by day, as formulated, instituted, and empowered by God Himself?

Husbands and/or fathers? Vessels of the Indwelling Christ? Purpose-driven marriages and parenting? Solid witnesses or insensitive husbands and fathers? I often am confronted with guys who have not treated their parental responsibility as a “God-representative father” or their ministry as a God-ordained husband but both as totally insignificant to their “life’s pleasures” – and I want to cry, but I do definitely pray for insensitive fathers and husbands!

It was Sir Charles Villiers Stanford who wrote the following – let it sink in ‘dads’ and husbands! “Human excellence apart from God, is like the fabled flower, which, according to the rabbis, Eve plucked when passing out of paradise. Severed from its native root, it is only the touching memorial of a lost Eden – sad while charming and beautiful, but dead.”

There are a number of truths that I feel vital to share in order not to be “Introspective Idolaters” as fathers in, sadly, a world of ‘fathers’ in America who are absent, away, yes, forsaken “the family fires and gatherings” under the Sovereign administration of King Jesus!

FIRST, THERE MUST BE A REVIVAL AND RETURN OF “TRUSTING” IN CHRIST JESUS TO OVERSEE AND ADMINISTER GODLY FATHERING! In Psalm 22:4-5 David, yes, sang these words: “Our fathers trusted in You; they trusted, and You delivered them. They cried to You, and were delivered; they trusted in You, and were not ashamed.” Is Holy God a respecter of persons?

Trust is visibly and spiritually witnessed as one “leans not to his/her understanding, but trusts in the Lord with ALL of one’s heart; (but) in all ‘the father’s way’, as a father, he sees he must acknowledge the Lord, allowing Him to direct the father’s path”- in child-care with spiritual nurturing!

But the heart-breaking reality? Christ Jesus KNOWS whether an earthly father is truly trusting Him to oversee the care of his children in, yes, cooperation with that father! In John 2:23-25 we find a powerful, awakening, convicting few verses. It says: Now when Jesus was in Jerusalem at the Passover, during the feast, many believed in His name when they saw the signs which He did. BUT Jesus did not commit Himself to them, because He knew all men, and had no need that anyone should testify of man, for He knew what was in man. (Rather than just a ‘mind-reader’, Christ Jesus was and is a ‘heart-reader’ – He Knows every man’s “heart” – unredeemed or redeemed, fleshly or spiritual, out to pump ‘self-image’ or a heart and life to glorify Holy God through Christ by the ministry of the indwelling Holy Spirit)!

SECOND, THE ATTITUDE OF “TRUSTING” LEADS TO THE MINISTRY OF THE HOLY SPIRIT IN ‘BIRTHING’ AND ‘BLESSING’ THE NEW-BORN FATHERS IN THEIR PARENTAL MINISTRIES! What did Jesus say in John 3:3? “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” Nicodemus questioned that, (he was a highly religious Pharisee in the Jewish hierarchy!), and in Verses 5-7 Jesus responded to him, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water (the water of the Word of God!) and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’”

How shocking that ‘religious leaders’ needed to be born again – we understand the ‘out and out, fully committed unbeliever to his/her sin nature – but even the religious’? Religion is NOT a redemptive relationship, but one’s fleshly devotion – and that crucified Christ as well as the darkest sinner! “YOU MUST BE BORN AGAIN!”

THIRD, THERE MUST BE IN GODLY FATHERS THE DAILY HUNGER, FEEDING, APPLYING AND EMPOWERING OF GOD’S HOLY WORD! After Jesus’ temptation in the wilderness, tested by the devil himself, Jesus said in Matthew 4:4, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.’”

And our Lord reaffirmed the historical validity of seeking men and fathers when in John 6:63-64 He said, “It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh (even the “best efforts” of human flesh that fail to birth Sovereign life?) profits NOTHING (redemptive or eternal!); The words that I speak to you are spirit, and they are life. But there are some of you who do not believe.”

The wise author of the book of Hebrews, anointed and inspired by the Holy Spirit, wrote in Hebrews 4:12, “for the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.”

The Word of God, inspired by the Spirit, is like the “Master-Surgeon” of the ages, applying divine skills in “saving” men from living in ‘death’, cut away at the Cross, and granted Resurrection Life, Resurrection Power, and Resurrection Hope!

You are aware, I’m sure, that it is in every man’s mind, heart, and will to decide for himself whether or not he’s even interested in the things, ways, truths of God concerning himself – and he will leave open or eternally shut the door as the Lord knocks! I’m even sure that there can be a counterfeit of outward allegiance apart from brokenness, hunger, or desire to be all God has revealed to them even in their ‘pre-birth’ stage of spiritual journeying!

In fact, to the early disciples of Christ, in Luke 6:46, Jesus asked, “But why do you call Me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and not do the things which I say?” And concerning marriages in general, whether we look at husbands and fathers or wives and mothers, is there that daily consideration, “Lord, what would You have me to do?” Is parenting to be, as disciples of Christ, of faithful feeding and digesting of His Holy Word to honor Him or the ‘pumping’ of “best-effort flesh”! Be careful dads about asserting, “I have no time to be in the Word!” That is a self-destructing word of ‘flesh’! Be guided, inspired, directed, empowered by His never-dying Word!

FOURTH, DOES FAITHFUL INTERCESSORY PRAYER DAILY, AS FATHERS, FOR MOMS, KIDS, AND SELF PLAY A VITAL ROLE IN, YES, AN OVERCOMING FAMILY MINISTRY? In 1 Timothy 2:1-8 the Apostle Paul was truly such a powerful equipper of men about the care of themselves and those around them. He said:

“Therefore I exhort first of all that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks be made for all men, for kings and all who are in authority, that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and reverence. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God and one Mediator between God and man, the Man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time, for which I was appointed a preacher and an apostle – I am speaking the truth in Christ and not lying – a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth. I desire therefore that the men pray everywhere, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting…”

Even to the church at Ephesus, and us in our modern day, in Ephesians 6:18, Paul said: “praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, being watchful to this end with all perseverance and supplication for all the saints.” Is there to be an attitude of prayer throughout your day? I believe so with all my heart! Without hesitation I’m convinced it’s how we begin our days, continue our days, and end our days! Prayer is the invisible pillow upon which the true “set-aside-saint-of-God” lives his/her life! I love the statement Henry Ward Beecher once made: “It is not well for man to pray cream, and live like skim milk.” A “skim-milk prayer life” short-changes some too often!

Prayer, faithful prayer, is the evidence of a finely ‘fermented in- the- Spirit life’ of a disciple who knows that he/she is the bottle and Holy God pours in the ‘wine of Holy Presence’ to fulfill through an available vessel His eternal will! I believe this is why Robert Burns, in “The Cotter’s Saturday Night,” (st.6), wrote: “They never sought in vain that sought the Lord aright!” And I’m sure there is no “arightness” to a prayerless disciple, parent, church, or pastor!

I often wonder how many see “prayer” as simply an adornment of a professing Christian rather than the absolute necessity of requesting, receiving, and resting in the revealed will of God as father or mother – as one said from a long time ago, “to preserve the web of life from unraveling.” (Robert Hall).

Is it possible that some fathers do not see the “prayer ministry” as an absolute essential of being a “God-blessed” husband or father, but just “gut it up and do what you think is best or right” rather than, yes, the will of God?

I need to share a statement by G. Ashton Oldham that I came across in “The Encyclopedia of Religious Quotations, “ (p.345), where he said: “Prayer is the chief agency and activity whereby men align themselves with God’s purpose. Prayer does not consist in battering the walls of heaven for personal benefits or the success of our plans. Rather it is the committing of ourselves for the carrying out of His purposes. It is a telephone call to headquarters for orders. It is not bending God’s will to ours, but our will to God’s. In prayer, we tap vast reservoirs of spiritual power whereby God can find fuller entrance into the hearts of men.”

I would be praying faithfully, dads or moms, “Holy God, Lord Jesus, I pray for those I’m most concerned about for only a seeking of the good, acceptable, and perfect will of God in ‘parenting’ and ‘child-responsibility’ in the ‘raising-up’ ministry of dads and moms.” Let’s close with challenging words for personal examination as parents in Romans 1:20-21! It says: “For since the creation of the world the invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse, because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened.”

Let’s pray for ‘darkened’ hearts and minds to biblical child-caring to be enlightened by the “King of Parenting-Care, the Lord Jesus”! Amen?

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

“ADAPTABLE CHURCHES OR

APOSTOLIC ASSEMBLIES?”

In Exodus 19:5-6 we find an illuminating statement from God about His “chosen people.” And you have to ask, “Did the people God intended His word for become the “special treasure to Him above all people”? Sadly, some didn’t, but with thankful hearts some did! What did Holy God say?

“Now therefore, if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, then you shall be a special treasure to Me above all people; for all the earth is Mine. And you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.”

What an awesome calling yet easily ‘adaptable’ by many churches today! Today it’s ‘one priest’ without the equipping of all saints to touch the darkened world with the True Light, the Lord Jesus Christ, with many, many churches maintaining their survivability without directions, examples, or equipping of the church’s calling to be “witnesses” to the needy world – evangelism is a lost ministry in many churches, even discipleship training is absent in many churches, and to think that a pastor has the role of equipping saints to “do” the work of the ministry is an ‘archaic, religious tradition’ – not the ‘way of a super-saint’ calling!

In fact, if one truly devoted himself/herself to the inspired words of Simon Peter, one might come to a different conclusion and a more sound foundation to ‘church building’! In 1 Peter 2:7-9 Peter wrote: “Therefore, to you who believe, He is precious; but to those who are disobedient, ‘The stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone,’ and ‘A stone of stumbling and a rock of offense.’ They stumble, being disobedient to the word, to which they were also appointed. BUT YOU (in Christ) are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light…”

How much preparation is given in far too many churches nation-wide to being “witnesses”, equipping ‘saints’ to touch their needy world with Redemptive Truth? Sadly, it’s near or about ‘zero’!

Come to Acts 13:1-5a where we find an obedient witness to the Promise of the Holy Spirit to every disciple to fulfill our calling as a follower of Christ! It says: Now to the church that was at Antioch there were certain prophets and teachers: Barnabas, Simeon who was called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manean who had been brought up with Herod the tetrarch, and Saul. As they ministered to the Lord and fasted, the Holy Spirit said, “Now separate to Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.” Then, having fasted and prayed, and laid hands on them, they sent them away. SO, being sent out by the Holy Spirit…” How awesome do you find that commissioning upon every disciple of Christ!?

You can be assured that I for one do not distinguish between ‘leadership’ responsibility and the role and ministry of every true born-again believer. Are there different callings and ministries under the same tent of faith? Of course, but not in excluding or excusing some from being “witnesses”!

I pray you’ll follow with me through John 17 as I look at the prayer of Jesus to His Father in heaven. Don’t miss this! John 17:1-3, “Father, the hour has come. Glorify Your Son, that Your Son also may glorify You, as You have given Him authority over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as You have given Him. And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent…”

John 17:6 says, Jesus speaking, “I have manifested Your name to the men whom You have given me out of the world.” Oh, and then look at what the Lord Jesus said in John 17:17-18! “Sanctify (or “set apart”) them by Your truth. Your word is truth. As You (God the Father!) sent me INTO THE WORLD, I ALSO HAVE SENT THEM INTO THE WORLD.”

And then in John 17:25-26 Jesus thanks the Father and reflects upon His eternal ministry and ours! “O righteous Father! The world has not known You, but I have known You; and these have known that You sent Me. And I have declared to them Your name, and will declare it, that the love with which You loved Me may be in them, and I in them.”

And are you familiar with the rest of John’s gospel? Jesus’ betrayal and arrest in Gethsemane, even disciples’ denial, the choosing of Barabbas’ freedom over Christ’s, the soldiers scourging of the Lord Jesus, Pilate’s deliverance of Christ to be crucified, His piercing, His burial, and then, praise God, “the empty tomb”! Oh, and then, before His ascension, He said to His disciples, “Follow Me!” And that following is a willful surrender of self-will to the divine will of Father-God! Oh, and then Acts 1 unfolds the eternal purpose, the sovereign grace, and the all sufficient supply to fulfill divine intent through our re-born lives!

In Acts 1:7-8 Jesus spoke to the “gathered assembly of true believers”, saying: “It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has put in His own authority. But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” And, praise God, Acts 2:32 declares, “This Jesus God has raised up, of which we are all WITNESSES!”

You are aware that there is a worldwide battle for the souls of men by the world, the flesh, and the devil himself with his demonic forces opposed to anyone or anything that relates to the “blood redemption” of our world – why? Because “God so loved the world” that He desired to rescue as many as received His message and the Master of true life, the Lord Jesus Christ – salvation of the “lost” and alienated from God reduces his kingdom numbers who’ve been the devil’s enslaved!

Notice Paul’s emphasis in 2 Corinthians 10:3-5! “For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ.” [Hear me! I know that much of what we just read relates to the warfare between the old man and the new man, between flesh and spirit – but, at the same time I see our weapons in Him fighting against those spirits that have men and women, boys and girls, enslaved in the demonic kingdom of alienation from Holy God and the Eternal Word!

Apart from Christ fallen mankind ‘drinks’ of worldly streams, devilish rivers, and lakes of unredeemed curses and ‘snake-like’ strangle-holds with its released poisons of godlessness! When Jesus said you’ll know people by their ‘fruits’, it’s either the “Fruit of the Spirit” or the “Foul Fruit of Satanic indifference” to the things of Holy God and His Kingdom rule and reign. I believe the Lord Jesus “celebrates” the child-like obedience of children of the faith to allow their bodies to be the kingdom of His holy presence and through which He bears witness Himself!

It’s really, really interesting that in Revelation 1:5-6 the Holy Spirit unveils the beauty and blessing “from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness,” but continuing, “the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler over the kings of the earth. To Him who loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood, AND HAS MADE US KINGS AND PRIESTS to His God and Father, to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.” That’s ‘kings’ and ‘priests’ in His heavenly kingdom, sovereignly appointed to be the vessel to a world of self-rule, self-worship, and self-gratification, and the change comes in that world when disciples of Christ allow Him to be Himself through them!

No wonder Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 2:14, “Now thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph in Christ, and through us diffuses the fragrance of His knowledge in every place.”

But my concern in this modern day is that, sadly, “Apostolic Assemblies” are set aside for “Adaptable Churches” that want to be so accepted by the world that they tone down biblical truth to make it acceptable, ignore specifically “Preach the Word”, fearing to say what God has said would limit their attendance, and, certainly feel justified to do their best at Bible teaching without encouraging pure devotion to His commissioning to be His witnesses in our lost, needy, alienated from God world!

According to Paul in Ephesians, 3:10-12, there is a divine design by God in maturing the ‘saints’ one has and the mobilizing of the body of Christ in reaching out to a needy world even if it costs us our lives! Paul said, “to the intent that now the manifold wisdom of God might be made known by the church to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places, according to the eternal purpose which He accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord, in whom we have boldness and access with confidence through faith in Him.” That’s confidence in boldly approaching the very throne of Holy God AND boldness in touching our needy world; and that has, can even today, cost you your physical existence!

I’m convinced that much of the problem of churches that do not have mission support worldwide, evangelism outreach locally, or even discipleship training and equipping of the saints to do evangelism ministry, is that “heavenly joy” in Jesus has been ignored, denied, or never understood. In John 15:11-17 Jesus said:

“These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full. This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends. You are My friends IF you do whatever I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I heard from My Father I have made known to you. You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask the Father in My name He may give you. These things I command you, that you love one another.” Yes, rather than an “Adaptable Church,” what about making sure your fellowship of believers is an “Apostolic Assembly”!!

I guess one of the huge questions one must deal with initially is: Do I have a teachable spirit anxious to know what Christ Jesus has to say to me? It was David’s heart when he said in Psalm 27:11, “Teach me Your way, O Lord..” Is that the attitude of YOUR heart?

FIRST, PLEASE NOTE THAT GOD PERSONALLY LOVED YOU ENOUGH THAT EVEN IF YOU WERE THE ONLY HUMAN BEING TO EVER LIVE, BECAUSE OF GOD’S LOVE FOR YOU CHRIST WOULD HAVE DIED ON THE CROSS FOR YOU ALONE, BUT HE DIED TO SAVE ALL MEN, BUT SOME DO NOT BELIEVE IN, RELY UPON, TRUST IN, OR ADHERE TO HIM!

In Romans 8:35-39 Paul gives us a powerful word of hope that should strengthen your ‘faith journey’! He said, “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written: ‘For Your sake we are killed all day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.’ Yet in all these things we are MORE THAN CONQUERORS THROUGH HIM WHO LOVED US. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor death, nor any created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

And our Savior, the Lord Jesus, said in John 3:16-17, “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.” Rev. J.M. Driver wrote an old hymn entitled “Wonderful Story of Love. [Broadman Hymnal, Broadman Press, Nashville, Tenn., 1940]. The first verse says:

“Wonderful story of love; Tell it to me again; Wonderful story of love; Wake the immortal strain! Angels with rapture announce it, Shepherds with wonder receive it; Sinner, O won’t you believe it? Wonderful story of love.”

SECOND, AWARE OF HIS GREAT LOVE, THE SINNER WHO IS DESIROUS OF FORGIVENESS AND RECONCILIATION, IS LED TO THE ALTAR OF REPENTANCE. In Romans 2:4 wise Paul, inspired by the Holy Spirit, wrote: “Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads to repentance?”

When you look upon an ungodly world, one is saddened that a man in his sin and sin nature is not aware of his separation from God and from Holy God’s divine design for his life, so “messengers” are sent praying initially for the truth of the burden of sin and death, then the crucifixion of Christ in his stead! This is why in 2 Corinthians 7:10 the Holy Word instructs us, “For godly sorrow produces repentance leading to salvation, not to be regretted; but the sorrow of the world produces death.”

I so admire Oswald Chambers and his book, “My Utmost For His Highest,” (p.254). In it Chambers wrote: “The marvels of conviction of sin, forgiveness, and holiness are so interwoven that it is only the forgiven man who is the holy man, he proves he is forgiven by being the opposite to what he was, by God’s grace. Repentance always brings a man to this point: I HAVE SINNED. The surest sign that God is at work is when a man says it and means it. Anything less than this is remorse for having made blunders, the reflex action of disgust at himself.”

Examine John 16:5-11 Jesus explains: “But now I go away to Him who sent Me, and none of you asks Me, ‘Where are You going?’ But because I have said these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart. Nevertheless I tell you the truth. It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I depart, I will send Him to you. And when He has come He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment; of sin, because they do not believe in Me; of righteousness, because I go to My Father and you see Me no more; of judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged.” And apart from repentance, there is no reconciliation with Holy God!

THIRD, HAVING BEEN CONVERTED THROUGH FAITH AND REPENTANCE, THE WORD TELLS US THAT THE “APOSTOLIC ASSEMBLIES” LIVE VICTORIOUS, OVERCOMING LIVES BY HOLY SPIRIT GUIDANCE INTO BIBLE TRUTH! In John 16:12-15 Christ Jesus’ holy instruction for new disciples says: “I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come. HE will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine, and declare it to you. All things that the Father has are Mine. Therefore I said that He will take of Mine and declare it to you.”

Christ Jesus emphasized the ministry role of Spirit-assistance, the ministry as faithful guide, the “Joy-Giver” of the full unveiling of Christ in you, and grants each disciple a forceful empowerment!

In Romans 8:26-27 Paul unveils this ‘representative ministry’ of the Holy Spirit before the Throne of God in our behalf. Receive the Word with joy and gladness! “Likewise the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. Now He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God.”

And there is no Spirit-anointed victories in “Apostolic Assembles” or ‘professing lives of allegiance to Christ’ if there is no allegiance to, awareness of, and willfully “yielding” daily to the Holy Spirit’s ministry! Paul asked a penetrating, challenging word in Romans 6:16: “Do you not know that to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey, you are that one’s slaves whom you obey, whether of sin leading to death, or of obedience leading to righteousness?” Are YOU yielded to the Spirit, the Holy Spirit, whose God-inspired role is to glorify Christ through your daily walk?

As Jesus was profoundly concerned about “false prophets” early in His ministry, he warned in Matthew 7:15-16a, “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruit.”

I want to close out this teaching with the solid scriptural challenge of Galatians 5:16-25! It says: Paul speaking, I say then: Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do the things that you wish. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under law.

Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like; of which I tell you beforehand, just as I also told you in time past, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

BUT the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law. And those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.”

Has that changed somewhere along the line or path of discipleship? Is it that some in the 21^st Century feel we’re so intellectually superior that “Christians” shouldn’t be concerned whether they need to walk in the Spirit or Not? The “Abnormal Christian Life” is avoidance of Spirit-ministry in an available vessel! The challenge to be filled with all the fullness of God does not become a reality apart from the Spirit’s abiding and anointing! The Holy Spirit glorifies Christ in us and through us, and only as we willfully yield to the Spirit’s control is Christ’s presence in us fully revealed! Walking in the Spirit is not an option believers hold but an eternal necessity!

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

“ALL OUR HOPE IS IN CHRIST ALONE!”

I don’t know how you personally respond to the title of this teaching, but one thing I’m assured of, and that is the vast difference between fallen mankind’s view of hope and the true biblical hope which is in Christ alone.

I really felt it very comical when I first went to a dictionary, and read in the “Random House Collegiate Dictionary” of 1975, copyrighted by Random House Inc.! Their first words to define hope? “The feeling that what is desired is also possible, or that events may turn out for the best…” (A ‘feeling’? Or ‘what is desired is possible’- even if it deepens and broadens the separation between God and man?) The second words in the Dictionary as they tried to define hope? “A particular instance of this feeling: ‘the hope of winning’! (But has ‘winning’ in one’s fleshly journey enhanced his/her nearness to God, or, because of “pride” in winning and achieving, is the gap widened and broadened before a lost man and the seeking God?).

The third words in Random House’s interpretation of hope? “There is little or no hope of his recovery”, yes, hope for many is really hopelessness in human flesh seldom making a difference in one’s desire for something better than they’ve known.

But somehow, by God’s grace and divine intervention, fallen humanity must see the voice of God and the hand of God lifting people out of spiritual hopelessness to the realm of never-ending seasons of hopefulness! And we’ll search this out in the Word in a few moments, but for now, examine “hope” from the human perspective without divine intervention!

“Hope”? A healthy body! Yet how many have you witnessed in healthy bodies who ARE sin-sick souls? “Hope”? Food on the table every day, but all it does is feed the sin-sick body! “Hope”? A decent income for life’s comfort! Well-fed in the body but dead because of spiritual malnutrition! “Hope”? Pleasurable activities to keep one restrained from having to consider and wrestle with the eternal purpose of God! “Hope”? The ramping up of acceptable ambitions that keeps one reasonably at peace with himself and void of consideration of God’s intention! “Hope”? A relatively cheap acceptance of true devotion or even an awareness of a “God-life”! “Hope”? For a truly fleshly, hopeful life, there must be a strong defense and avoidance of whatever would introduce Light and Life, especially since one is comfortable in darkness and death! “Hope”? Have YOU ever heard someone say to you, “Aren’t I allowed to choose to be at peace in myself with my own darkness and spiritual death?”

And God still says: “Choose you this day whom you will serve”, because Holy God is not interested in imitation discipleship on one’s own terms, but men and women who voluntarily choose, “As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord!”

You realize that there are ‘make-shift stars’ in the galaxy of one’s own fleshly creation, but there IS the Holy Presence of “Heaven’s Star of Bethlehem” never fading but more gloriously illuminated when ‘death to self’ is unreservedly yielded to!

Educated unbelievers are enslaved to their godless enmity of God’s holiness, and enormously arrogant concerning their godless identity! You’ve heard it: “Who cares what God desires? I call the shots of my own life-direction!”

Dare I tell you that unbelievers, smart or dumb, are, and one day will be, called before the Holy Throne of God to explain their “life decision”! Consider Revelation 20:11-15! Then I saw a great white throne and Him who sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away. And there was found no place for them. And I saw the dead, small and great, standing before God, and books were opened. And another book was opened, which is the “BOOK” Of Life. And the dead were judged according to their works, by the things which were written in the books. The sea gave up the dead who were in it, and Death and Hades delivered up the dead who were in them. And they were judged, each one according to his works. Then Death and Hades were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. {God’s determination and declaration of eternal punishment?}. And anyone not found written in the Book of Life was cast into the lake of fire. {Is that cast into the lake of fire called Hell after God’s declaration of guilt because of unbelief, but For the Blood Redeemed, the New Creations, the Sons and Daughters of Redemptive Faith, it’s “Kingdom Living” in God’s realm of, yes, His Eternal Heaven?}

I tell you, it’s absolutely heart-breaking to know, sense, and have to declare that rejecters of the true gospel, rejecters of the Resurrected Christ, enemies of the Cross, are, in the flesh, as the embodiment of self-will, self-rule, reserving the right of self-determination, and are mentally deranged, morally bankrupt, fully ‘flesh-inspired’, demonically controlled, and ‘motherly ill and sin-sick’ like a disguised Jezebel!

Oh, but listen!! Romans 5:5-11! “Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us. For when we were still without strength (“helpless” as to be being reconciled to God by ‘fleshly effort’!), in due time CHRIST DIED FOR THE UNGODLY. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be (being) saved from wrath through Him. For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be (being) saved by His Crucified but Resurrected Life!. And not only that, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have NOW received the reconciliation.” [Don’t you find it strange to hear some Bible teachers talk about everything related to redemptive faith to be finalized IF Jesus comes back to “get” them?]. To far too many ‘hope’ is future, yet when I look at HOPE I see “Hope” like this: “H” or holy, “O” like this: omnipotent, “P” like this: power, “E” or endowed (or blessed with a personal, eternal gift!)! “HOPE”!!

Is it possible that this is why David wrote in Psalm 87:7, “All my ‘fresh’ springs shall BE IN You,” when for all of fallen humanity, apart from a redeemed heart, we drank from streams of dirty water? I know the Book of Jeremiah was written specifically in his day for enslaved Jews, but since the Word declares “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable…,” does all of fallen humanity drink from ‘dirty waters” needing the “new spring of life and living water in Christ”? I think so! Hear me! “The living ‘hope’ doesn’t make one ashamed, but inflamed in the blaze of God’s love, grace, and mercy – out of the “death of the ungodly”, through repentance and faith, we leap with sure and complete confidence in our Lord’s saving grace, and we’ll never be ashamed to honor Him!

Several truths you and I need to rest in: FIRST, THE ASSURANCE OF UNASHAMED HOPE THAT NEVER DIES! But, for an enemy of Christ, they live, at least some, with a false hope of ‘self-betterment’ by their fleshly ‘best’, assuming God should recognize their personal effort at self-improvement, whole others are gripped by their spiritual poverty, satisfied ‘with the husks the swine eat’!

And whether they recognize it or not, ‘unashamed hope in one’s self’ IS the vast void that is a personal stronghold, the unawakened aching abyss of the unbelieving heart, and the diseased heart and mind that resists strongly any conviction of sin, or their part because of sin being the reason Christ Jesus chose Calvary’s Cross in their place! Yes, Jesus died for both ‘saints’ and sinners!

But true believers redeemed by the blood of the Lamb? Having repented, they received forgiveness, reconciliation, “new life in Christ”, and a hope that is eternal! In Hebrews 10:12-14 we see, sense, are sure of, the validity of Christ’s eternal work in our place for our forever benefit! It says:

“But this Man (Christ Jesus), after He had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God, from that time waiting till His enemies are made His footstool. For by one offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified.”

The assurance of unashamed hope that never dies? I can tell you without hesitation or reservation, Holy, Loving, Merciful God intends every true believer resting in and rejoicing in Christ alone and, yes, His gift of assurance in His unashamed hope that never dies! In Philippians 2:5 Paul said, “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus…”, who made Himself of no reputation…, Verses 8-11, “And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross. THEREFORE God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, that AT THE NAME OF JESUS every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”

And Paul’s primary concern for the believers he was apart from at the time he wrote the letter? Verse 15: “that you (as a disciple of Christ!) may become blameless and harmless, children of God without fault in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, AMONG WHOM YOU SHINE AS LIGHTS IN THIS WORLD, Verse 16, holding fast the word of life…”. Tell me about your testimony of “unashamed assurance and hope that never dies”!

SECOND, KNOWING HOPE NEVER DIES OR THAT THE JOURNEY DOESN’T HAVE TO BE DELAYED, FORSAKEN, OR PARTIALLY ACHIEVED, DO WE STAND ON GOD’S PROMISES? Hear the Biblical Assurance of Victory in Jesus! In Romans 5 I remind you of what Paul wrote, inspired by the Holy Spirit: Verses 5-10, “Now hope does not disappoint, BECAUSE the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us.

For when we were still without strength (“helpless”), in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. BUT God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

MUCH MORE THEN, having NOW been justified by His blood, we shall be (being) saved from wrath through Him. For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, WE SHALL BE (BEING) SAVED BY HIS LIFE.” GLORY!

It was J.P.Scholfield who wrote the old hymn entitled: “Saved, Saved!” It says: “I’ve found a friend who is all to me, His love is ever true; I love to tell how He lifted me And what His grace can do for you.

He saves me from every sin and harm, Secures my soul each day; I’m leaning strong on His mighty arm; I know He’ll guide me all the way.

When poor and needy and all alone, In love He said to me, “Come unto Me and I’ll lead you home, To live with Me eternally.”

Saved by His power divine, Saved to ne life sublime! Life now is sweet and my joy is complete, For I’m saved, saved, saved!” Is that YOUR testimony?

THIRD, HAVE YOU BEEN DISCIPLED, AFTER RECONCILIATION AND CONVERSION, IN THE LIFE ENCOUNTER, ENLIGHTMENT, AND ENERGIZING OF THE HOLY SPIRIT? I’m sure you’re aware of what Jesus said before His crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension. In John 16:13-15 our Lord said: “…when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you. All things that the Father has are Mine. Therefore I said that He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you.

Didn’t Romans 5:5 tell us, “Nor hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us,” followed by the awesome truth of the ministry of ‘helps’ by the Spirit under His sovereign guidance in Romans 8:8-14,

“So then, those who are in the flesh (old sin-nature!) cannot please God. But you are not in the flesh (any longer if Christ lives within you!) but IN THE Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His. And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life because of righteousness.

But IF the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.

Therefore, brethren, we are debtors – not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. For if you live according to the flesh you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.”

Are you aware of the “Super-Intended Life” over-seen, watched over, trained in the skills of spiritual warfare against the world, the flesh, the devil? Did Romans 8:14 tell us, “For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God?” Did Romans 5:5 tell us, “Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us”?

And as the result of the Holy Spirit’s presence in true disciples and His eternal watch-care over us, guiding us into all truth, the Spirit interprets tribulation for us as the opportunity of receiving His perseverance, showing us perseverance produces character, and character, endless hope, because we see, receive, rely upon, and welcome every testing and our victories in and through the Spirit!

In fact, what did Paul tell us in Romans 8:26-27? “Likewise the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. Now He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He (the Spirit) makes intercession FOR THE SAINTS according to the will of God.”

How shocked are you that the God who searches men’s hearts is interested in the prayers of the Holy Spirit when He clearly understands an immature disciple’s life of prayer, if there is one, is ‘selfish praying’ of ‘fleshly convenience’? Do you just, maybe, think that Jesus Himself witnessed and understood the prayers of many when He said, “My house shall be called the house of prayer; but you have made it a den of thieves.” (Matthew 21:13).

We need a yieldedness to the Holy Spirit as we pray! And learning to pray, we learn from men like Paul who said to us in Philippians 4:6-7, “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.” I’m convinced it’s going to be a shocking day when professing disciples, pastors, missionaries, teachers, dads and moms, governmental leaders locally and nation-wide, have their daily prayer calendars, if there is one, of their intercessory prayers for all!

I find it alarmingly mind-boggling to read a statement, I don’t know who, who nailed my concerns about “prayerless Christians, men and women, husbands and wives, even, yes, children, who never pray”! The statement? “If Christians spent as much time praying as they do grumbling, they would soon have nothing to pray about.” Do you understand? Prayer is the precious privilege of laying hold of God’s desire to willingly release His longing, His passion, His desire, His, yes, willingness, to bless you – your prayerless life is a broad wall in you that God sees as your lack of desire in having Him truly involved in your life!

From the editor of the very old Des Moines “Register”, a letter written in to him said: “To get nations back on their feet, we must get down on our knees.” And that’s a true God-blessing position for any man! If the Holy Spirit represents us before the Throne of God, does He do so out of the hearts of men and women who desire nothing but answered prayer to the glory of God? I have no doubts! W.W.Walford and William B. Bradbury wrote together an old hymn together entitled “Sweet Hour of Prayer.” I close with these words:

“Sweet hour of prayer! Sweet hour of prayer! That calls me from a world of care, And bids me at my Father’s throne Make all my wants and wishes known; In seasons of distress and grief, My soul has often found relief, and oft escaped the tempter’s snare By your return, sweet hour of prayer.

Sweet hour of prayer! Sweet hour of prayer! Your wings shall my petition bear To Him whose truth and faithfulness Engage the waiting soul to bless; And since He bids me seek His face, believe His Word and trust His grace, I’ll cast on Him my every care, And wait for You, sweet hour of prayer.

Sweet hour of prayer! Sweet hour of prayer! May I your consolation share, Till, from Mount Pisgah’s lofty height, I view my home, and take my flight; This robe of flesh I’ll drop, To seize the everlasting prize; And shout, while passing through the air, Farewell, farewell, sweet hour of prayer.”

Don’t you believe it’s time to resurrect prayer lives, prayer families, prayer churches, prayer disciples who faithfully grab the Throne of God and don’t let go? “All Our Hope Is In Christ Alone!” Do you believe it, receive it, walk in it?

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

UNFORGIVENESS– UNFORGIVEN

It sounds like an extremely harsh title of a sermon or teaching, but His Word is truth and that is what His people are to stand upon. And I’m convinced, whether husband and wife, pastor and people, employer and employee, friend to friend, God’s Word is clear.

Come first to Matthew 6:12, 14–15! Get Ready! Verse 12, “And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.Verses 14–15, “For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.”

But please look at the nature and character of Christ as we read Luke 23:33–34, “And when they were come to the place which is called Calvary, there they crucified him, and the malefactors, one on the right hand, and the other on the left. Then Jesus said, ‘Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.’”

Sinless Jesus nailed to a Cross as a common criminal, but He says, ‘Father forgive them.’”

Holy Jesus crucified as an unholy man, but He says, “Father forgive them.”

Pure Jesus brutalized as an impure sinner, but He says, “Father forgive them.”

There are some things you must wrestle with and come to a clear understanding about:

Forgiveness is far better for any man than bank accounts filled with earthly riches – especially the forgiveness of God – but unforgiveness is self–imposed personal bankruptcy!

Forgiveness is of the spirit and nature of God Himself, while unforgiveness reveals the frailty and failures of fallen flesh.

Forgiveness is the revelation of the indwelling nature and character of Christ, while unforgiveness is the unveiling of the malignant sick nature of “the old man,the “First adam,“The fallen sinnerat odds with God Himself.

Forgiveness is freedom in and through the Indwelling Holy Spirit, while unforgiveness is the living picture of a despairing soul, locked in a self–imposed cage of vanity and vindictiveness.

Forgiveness is peace and the portrait of the indwelling Christ, while unforgiveness is an enslaved, dying sinner, maybe even with sorrow and remorse but dreading to face the prospect of their future because they have an inkling their attitude is horribly wrong and even inexcusable, and even sense a bleak, dark future if things aren’t made right!

I read Spurgeon recently who said, because of unforgiveness: “You will bewail in everlasting misery the mercy that through your willfulness was unavailing.”

Religion without reality is, yes, a professing believer walking without eternal purpose to be conformed to the image of Christ but captured by his old sin nature and willfully walking in unforgiveness, bitterness, anger, resentment, holding grudges and determined to have his selfish way and refuse to bear witness to the spirit of Christ and His saving grace!

Relationships – and it doesn’t matter what the relationship is: marriage, business, church, friend to friend, family member to family member, parent to child or child to parent – relationship is not a matter of winning or losing, BUT…is God glorified in any of this or ‘flesh’ magnified? – what matters is whether or not we decide to walk in the nature and character of Christ and glorify Him in the good and the bad, in the down and the dirty, even ‘flesh’ activity or ‘Spirit’ activity.

Sometimes I wonder if God allows, permits, yes, difficult events or circumstances, to expose us as to how and where and why and with whom we choose to walk:

With the forgivers or the unforgivers, flesh folk or Christ’s fullness, sweet Jesus or sour grapes?

And Lamentations 3:32 gives me a challenging word: “Though he brings grief, he will show compassion, so great is his unfailing love.”

Oswald Chambers really hit a ‘grand–slam homerun when he wrote in “My Utmost For His Highest,[p.241]: “Beware of the pleasant view of the Fatherhood of God – God is so loving and kind that of course He will forgive us. That sentiment has no place whatever in the New Testament. The only ground on which God can forgive us is the tremendous tragedy of the Cross of Christ; to put forgiveness on any other ground is unconscious blasphemy. The only ground on which God can forgive sin and reinstate us in His favour is through the Cross of Christ, and in no other way. Forgiveness, which is so easy for us to accept, cost the agony of Calvary. It is possible to take the forgiveness of sin, the gift of the Holy Ghost, and our sanctification with the simplicity of faith, and to forget at what enormous cost to God it was all made for us.”

Hear me! Forgiveness is the testimony of the Cross, the unveiling of the indwelling Christ, and the power that transforms circumstances and sets the captives free!

Unforgiveness denies God, closes the door on eternal relationships, honors the devil, and blemishes the name of Jesus!

I know you’re familiar with Stephen and his prophetic stand and preaching to Israel. Acts 7:51 says, Stephen speaking, “You stiff–necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears! You always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, so do you.”

And, remember, they took him out of the city and stoned him, as he was calling on God and saying, ‘Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.’ Then in Acts 7:60, it says that he knelt down and cried out with a loud voice, “Lord, do not charge them with this sin.And when he had said this, he fell asleep.”

True believers walk in forgiveness. True believers choose the attitude and actions of their Savior and Lord because to do otherwise shames the holy name of Jesus. They’d rather take stones snuffing out the breath of life than deny the Lord’s spirit and grace and mercy.

And the one thing I want you to see out of Stephen’s testimony is its impact on one called Saul of Tarsus. After the stiff–necked Israelites stoned Stephen to death, Acts 7:58 says, “And the witnesses laid down their clothes at the feet of a young man named Saul.Acts 8:1 says, “Now Saul was consenting to his death.”

But then Saul met our Lord on the Damascus Road – he’s redeemed, saved, transformed, set aside as a mighty witness of the Faith. In 2 Corinthians 2, the converted Saul – now Paul – has to deal with the church at Corinth who had to exercise church discipline but then failed to walk in loving forgiveness toward the brother. Look at 2 Corinthians 2:1–11,

“But I determined this within myself, that I would not come to you again in sorrow. For if I make you sorrowful, then who is he who makes me glad but the one who is made sorrowful by me? And I wrote this very thing to you, lest, when I came, I should have sorrow over those from whom I ought to have joy, having confidence in you all that my joy is the joy of you all. For out of much affliction and anguish of heart I wrote to you, with many tears, not that you should be grieved, but that you might know the love which I have so abundantly for you. But if anyone has caused grief, he has not grieved me, but all of you to some extent – not to be too severe. This punishment which was inflicted by the majority is sufficient for such a man, so that on the contrary, you ought rather to forgive and comfort him, lest perhaps such a one be swallowed up with too much sorrow. Therefore I urge you to reaffirm your love to him. For to this end I also wrote, that I might put you to the test, whether you are obedient in all things. Now whom you forgive anything, I also forgive. For if indeed I have forgiven anything, I have forgiven that one for your sakes in the presence of Christ, lest Satan should take advantage of us; for we are not ignorant of his devices.Does Paul talk about forgiveness exercised in church discipline? You need to realize ‘restoration’ is always God’s intent in the necessity of church discipline.

My wife Sue and I celebrated our 50^th anniversary June 10, 2006. Friends from Temple, Texas, came to our celebration and gave us a print that said: “A successful marriage is the union of two great forgivers.”

I’m sure if Sue were with us she’d say: “We never thought about divorce – the word ‘divorce’ was never allowed to be mentioned by any of our four children, but murder? That is on the table!”

[Just a little family joke! Loosen up!]

Daniel : says, “To the Lord our God belong mercy and forgiveness, though we have rebelled against Him.And that’s true – but don’t stop reading there! Look at Daniel :10–13!

“We have not obeyed the voice of the Lord our God, to walk in His laws [His Word!], which He set before us by His servants the prophets. Yes, all Israel has transgressed Your law, and has departed so as not to obey Your voice; therefore the curse and the oath written in the Law of Moses the servant of God have been poured out on us, because we have sinned against Him. And He has confirmed His words, which He spoke against us and against our judges who judged us, by bringing upon us a great disaster; for under the whole heaven such has never been done as what has been done to Jerusalem. As it is written in the Law of Moses, all this disaster has come upon us; yet we have not made our prayer before the Lord our God, that we might turn from our iniquities and understand Your truth.[Is that a relevant passage for today?]

A number of years ago my son, Scott, and I were in the Phillipines doing pastors’ conferences and on a weekend an open–air crusade right outside Manila in a city park. Before the service our Filipino organizer asked me, “I know you’ll give an evangelistic invitation after your message, but will you also pray for the sick?And, of course, I said ‘Yes.’

There were four Americans and four Filipino pastors that formed eight lines to pray for healing grace on the sick. A young mother stood before me after I’d prayed for several others. When she came I said, “Young lady, how can I help you?”

She said, “I’ve been sick for several weeks but I don’t know what it is.Immediately I heard the Lord say, “Ask her about her husband.And when I did, I saw the demons manifest all over her – her face began to contort, her teeth began to grind back and forth, anger began to boil over – and she said: “My husband left me and our three children three weeks ago for another woman – and I hate him.”

I said, “Young lady, I’d like to pray for you, but I can’t. God will not heal your sickness by accepting your hatred, bitterness, anger, and unforgiveness.It rang a bell within her! She said, “What must I do?”

And I said, “If you promise me, after I pray, that you go find your husband and ask his forgiveness for your hatred and anger and unforgiveness toward him, I’ll pray for you – and God will heal you.She said, “Yes”!

I prayed – brokenness came, tears began to flow, Christ Jesus began to radiate all over her and in her. Though I never saw her again, I believe her new–found spirit and attitude even brought a wayward husband home to a new wife and his three children!

Come to Matthew 18:21–35! “Unforgiveness – Unforgiven!Read it carefully at least five times!

Forgiveness is the heart–cry of Jesus for and all disciples! It’s not an option! I see several vital, important, life–altering truths from the lips of Jesus:

1} Forgiveness is without limit! Matthew 18:22

2} God Himself settles accounts – there is a reckoning! Matthew 18:23

3} God calls a ‘spade’ a ‘spade’ and nothing less! Matthew 18:32 “wicked servant”!

4} There’s things God is ‘angry’ about and unforgiveness is one of them! Matthew 18:34

5} An unforgiving servant of God causes God to deliver that one to ‘the torturers’ – that’s delivered over to the demons, the powers of darkness, for hopefully correction, forgiveness, and a God–honoring life. Matthew 18:34

6} Because of unforgiveness God reinstates the debt! Matthew 18:34

7} God gives an unfailing promise – if one does not forgive from his heart his brother, God will not forgive him. Matthew 18:35!

It’s important that you see how God uses the Deceiver, yes, the devil, the demons, the powers of darkness to discipline and hopefully bring correction to His own children. Come first to Isaiah 5:24–30:

“Therefore, as the fire devours the stubble, and the flame consumes the chaff, so their root will be as rottenness, and their blossom will ascend as dust; Because they have rejected the law of the Lord of hosts, and despised the word of the Holy One of Israel. Therefore the anger of the Lord is aroused against His people; He has stretched out His hand against them, and the hills trembled. Their carcasses were as refuse in the midst of the streets. For all this His anger is not turned away, but His hand is stretched out still. He will lift up a banner to the nations from afar, [“THAT’S THEM – the demons!], and will whistle to them from the end of the earth; surely they shall come with speed, swiftly. No one will be weary or stumble among them, no one will slumber or sleep; nor will the belt on their loins be loosed, nor the strap of their sandals be broken; whose arrows are sharp, and all their bows bent; their horses’ hooves will seem like flint, and their wheels like a whirlwind. Their roaring will be like a lion, they will roar like young lions; Yes, they will roar and lay hold of their prey; they will carry it away safely, and no one will deliver. In that day they will roar against them like the roaring of the sea. And if one looks to the land, Behold, darkness and sorrow; and the light is darkened by the clouds.What an awesome passage!

But look also at Isaiah 7:18–1! “And it shall come to pass in that day that the Lord will “WHISTLEfor the fly that is in the farthest part of the rivers of Egypt, and for the bee that is in the land of Syria. They will come, and all of them will rest in the desolate valleys and in the clefts of the rocks, and on all thorns and in all pastures.”

How illuminating is God’s Holy Word!! See if you’ve seen before or witnessed in churches what Job saw in Job 12:16–25! :

“With Him are strength and prudence. THE DECEIVED AND THE DECEIVER ARE HIS. He leads counselors away plundered, and makes fools of the judges. He loosens the bonds of kings, and binds their waist with a belt. He leads princes [priests] away plundered, and overthrows the mighty. He deprives the trusted ones of speech, and takes away the discernment of the elders. He pours contempt on princes, and disarms the mighty. He uncovers deep things out of darkness, and brings the shadow of death to light. He makes nations great, and destroys them; He enlarges nations and guides them. He takes away the understanding of the chiefs of the people of the earth, and makes them wander in a pathless wilderness. They grope in the dark without light, and He makes them stagger like a drunken man.Oh, God, help us!”

One last Scripture: Come to Joel 2:4–13, and verses 25–2! God tells the prophet about a people coming, great and strong, then He tells the prophet what’s coming down the pikes of life!

“Their appearance is like the appearance of horses; and like swift steeds, so they run. With a noise like chariots over mountaintops they leap, like the noise of a flaming fire that devours the stubble, like a strong people set in battle array. Before them the people writhe in pain; all faces are drained of color. They run like mighty men, they climb the wall like men of war; every one marches in formation, and they do not break ranks. They do not push one another; every one marches in his own column. Though they lunge between the weapons, they are not cut down. They run to and fro in the city, they run on the wall; they climb into the houses, they enter at the windows like a thief. The earth quakes before them; the heavens tremble; the sun and moon grow dark, and the stars diminish their brightness. The Lord gives voice before His army, for His camp is very great; for strong is the One who executes His word. For the day of the Lord is great and very terrible; who can endure it? Now, therefore, says the Lord, ‘Turn to Me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning.’ So rend your heart, and not your garments; return to the Lord your God, for He is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness; and He relents from doing harm.”

Verses 25–2, “So I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten, the crawling locust, the consuming locust. And the chewing locust, My great army which I sent among you. You shall eat in plenty and be satisfied, and praise the name of the Lord your God, Who has dealt wondrously with you; and My people shall never be put to shame. Then you shall know that I am in the midst of Israel; I am the Lord your God and there is no other. My people shall never be put to shame. And it shall come to pass afterward that I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions. And also on My menservants and on My maidservants I will pour out My Spirit in those days.”

And why is this? What’s the difference between the Isaiah passages we read and the last few verses of Joel we just finished reading?

Because we choose to walk in FORGIVENESS, not unforgiveness; we choose to walk in the Spirit, not futile flesh; we choose to die to sin, not celebrate it as under the blood, so we can live and act and do as we please!

Let me close with a true story. I was in Madras, India, now Chennai, India, having finished a pastors’ conference during the week, then preaching on a Sunday morning for the host pastor, Pratap Singh, a graduate of Lee University in my hometown of Cleveland, Tennessee. Pratap is a visionary and our Lord has blessed his ministry phenomenally and powerfully!

I preached that morning on “How Shall We Escape If We Neglect So Great A Salvation?When I gave the invitation, a man in his mid–forties came forward, absolutely broken, weeping uncontrollably.

As Pratap was taking me to my hotel after the service, I said: “Pratap, tell me about the man who was so broken at the invitation.”

He said, “He’s married to one of the ladies in our church with two grown children – 13 years ago he left his wife and children to go to California with a new engineering job. In 13 years he never talked to his wife or children, never sent one dime of support. In that 13–year period he lived in an adulterous relationship.

His wife never ceased to love him or pray for him. She went back to school, finished her degree, became a teacher, taught the children daily to pray for their father, honor him, love him, because one day he was coming home. She taught only love, respect, and confidence in God to hear and answer their prayers…

He said – last week the husband and father called the wife from the States to see if it was alright for him to come home to see the children. She said, “Oh, yes! They are going to be so happy and pleased that you are coming home. You are most welcome!”

He came – and they received him as if he’d never been away! When he came during the invitation, he told Pastor Pratap, “Please tell me of this Jesus who built such a loving, forgiving heart in my wife and children!SAVED BY THE GRACE OF GOD – because of a wife who walked in forgiveness!

Just about 7 years ago I was interim pastor at Calvary Baptist Church, Winter Haven, Florida. I told Pratap’s story. Next morning my fishing buddy and I had launched our boat in a prime lake for big bass. I was ready to catch my lunker. About 30 minutes into our fishing extravaganza, I

Heard crying in the back of the boat –

“Bob, what’s the problem?Bob Davidson said, “Pastor, I heard that story yesterday – I haven’t spoken to my 80–year–old father in over a year. Sorry, but we’ve got to go in – I need to be forgiven and reconciled to my father!We did – and he did – and God was honored

Have you seen the picture? Forgiveness – forgiven! Unforgiveness – unforgiven! What will you do?!

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

“WORLD PHILOSOPHERS OR WILLFUL PROMOTION BY GOD”

There’s an interesting couple of verses for you to examine carefully as you look at Psalm 75:6-7 where the psalmist says: “For promotion comes neither from the east, nor from the west, nor from the south. But God is the judge; He puts down one, and sets up another.”

In Psalm 147:6 it speaks of God’s Word AND His providence: “The Lord lifts up the humble; He casts the wicked down to the ground.” All world philosophers are not “wicked,” but the majority are “too smart in themselves” to ever see God as necessary in their lives!

Didn’t Paul tell us 2000 years ago, in Colossians 2:8, “Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the basic principles of the world, and not according to Christ.”?

Acts 17:16-21 is about philosophical “new things” in opposition to the Eternal Truths of God. Follow it: Now while Paul waited for them at Athens, his spirit provoked him when he saw that the city was given over to idols…

Therefore he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and with the Gentile worshippers, and in the marketplace daily with those who happened to be there…

Then certain Epicurean and Stoic philosophers encountered him. And some said, “What does this babbler say?” Others said, “He seems to be a proclaimer of foreign gods,” because he preached to them Jesus and the resurrection…

And they took him and brought him to the Areopagus, saying, “May we know what this new doctrine is of which you speak? For you are bringing some strange things to our ears. Therefore we want to know what these things mean.”

For all the Athenians and the foreigners who were there spent their time in nothing else but either to tell or to hear some new thing.

And if you follow it carefully, you’ll discern that ‘world philosophies’ are devotion to “wise things” that really have nothing to do with the heart – it’s all mental and divorced from the spiritual nature of fallen men!

Participants in world culture of which we all are a part does not mean we deny Him but affirm, surrender, and yield to our Lord and Savior who IS the King of kings and Lord of lords! It doesn’t mean we’re “not at home” unless we sell our souls as the majority of the world, but we recognize our “worldly home” is in need of God’s grace, mercy, and love.

World philosophers or willful promotion by God Himself! Read carefully Oswald Chambers in his writing, “My Utmost For His Highest,” [pps.175-176], “Beware of not acting upon what you see in your moments on the mount of God. If you don’t obey the light, it will turn into darkness. ‘If therefore the light that is in you be darkness, how great is the darkness!’ The second you waive the question of sanctification [ it means: ‘set apart to the glory of God only’!] or any other thing upon which God gives you light, you begin to get dry rot in your spiritual life. Continually bring the truth out into actuality; work it out in every domain, or the very light you have will prove a curse…The most difficult person to deal with is the one who has the smug satisfaction of an experience to which he can refer back, but who is not working it out in practical life. If you “say” you are sanctified, “show it.”… Beware of any belief that makes you self-indulgent”! What’s that? What pleases me and doesn’t line up with the Spirit of God who sacrificed His all!

World ‘philosophers’ are so adept at convincing people that belief, trust, repentance and faith in Holy God is so unnecessary for the ‘smart folks’ – yet the educated crowd can center their lives in the darkest darkness and call it ‘light’!

It doesn’t take long to discover the worldly, self-righteous individual, or the ‘professor’ of self-satisfaction – and if you stay around them very long you sense a spirit of discontent with all they know and an uncertainty of mind as unbelief always brings on fractures in what they really think.

So often when the Holy Word and the convicting Holy Spirit is shared with a world philosopher, you’ll see and sense degrees of dismay in many because they’re on the threshold of discovering their lost condition and separation from God!

In life as a believer, transformed by the mercy and grace and love of God, aren’t you shocked at times when you see the worldly crowd comfortably seated at a worldly table, easily laughing at any worldly, dirty joke, when in the innermost heart is a person at war with Holy God, embittered by their own set of circumstances, AND WILL NOT LOOK UP TO THE CARING THRONE OF GOD AT THE GOD OF CALVARY’S CROSS?!?

Psalm 4:2 says, “How long, O you sons of men, will you turn My glory to shame? How long will you love worthlessness and seek falsehood?” You realize there are “sons of men” and there are “sons of God”! You understand that there are those whose hearts are cemented in ‘earthly, fleshly values’ that are worthless in comparison to the heavenly treasures that increase in worth and blessing and true enrichment more and more!

In 2 Corinthians 4:1-4 Paul lifts the worldly veil that blinds or hinders true spiritual understanding of the gospel of Christ. He wrote: “Therefore, since we have this ministry, as we have received mercy, we do not lose heart…

But we have renounced the hidden things of shame, not walking in craftiness nor handling the word of God deceitfully, but by manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God…

But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, whose minds the god of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them.”

And that will break your heart if it hasn’t already because there are those whom you know whose hearts are ‘veiled’ to truth and whose minds are ‘blinded’ by the god of this age – they at least feel comfortable in their spiritual state of lostness because they are not alone; tragically, they’re blinded to the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, not knowing they reflect the darkness of the devil himself!

“World philosophers”? It was Paul in Colossians 3:2 who said, “Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth.” And because you received the death of Christ and your crucifixion with Him, and you died with the result that your life is now hidden with Christ IN GOD, verse 5, “therefore put to death your members which are on the earth: fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.”

An ‘idol worshipper’? That’s the worldly ‘dude’ who has saved his life for himself because he loves the world and all that it offers, not God! I know that you are not totally ‘brain-dead’ because you look at our world today and you witness ‘civilization catastrophes’ that grow more corrupt and, yes, ‘sinful’ world-wide!

“World philosophers” certainly major on ‘riches’ any way you can get it! But they are void of understanding about what ‘great gain’ is all about. In I Timothy 6:6-10 Paul advised his spiritual son, saying: “Now godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out…

And having food and clothing, with these we shall be content. But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and harmful lusts which drown men in destruction and perdition…

For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, for which some have strayed from the faith in their greediness, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.” When did that change?

I believe when the author of Proverbs 14:24 spoke of “the crown of the wise”, he certainly was not speaking of “the crown of life” or “the crown of glory” because wisdom apart from God’s wisdom and revelations is a false righteousness that does not lead to repentance and true faith. It says: “The crown of the wise is their riches, but the foolishness of fools is folly.”

In Proverbs 1:28-33 the ‘wise-man’, inspired by God Himself, gives us ALL a word of warning: “Then shall they call upon me, but I will not answer; they shall seek me early, but they shall not find me: For that they hated knowledge, and did not choose the fear of the Lord…

They would [have] none of my counsel: they despised all my reproof… Therefore shall they eat of the fruit of their own way, and be filled with their own devices… For the turning away of the simple shall slay them, and the prosperity of fools shall destroy them…

But whoso hearkens unto me shall dwell safely, and shall be quiet from fear of evil.”

“World Philosophers or Willful Promotion By God?” Oh, I tell you, God’s Word is so rich and man’s worldly philosophies are so bankrupt! Proverbs 3:5-6 tells us, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart; and lean not unto your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths.” Led by the world or led by God Himself?

What did Paul say in II Corinthians 4:3-5? “But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, whose minds the god of this age [the devil] has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them. For we do not preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord, and ourselves your bondservants for Jesus’ sake.”

Willful promotion by God? Bound in the flesh to the world philosophies, ideals, earthly gains, human pride in self-effort, but freed in Christ to divine life, eternal principles, heavenly blessings, holy privilege in sharing God’s faithful provisions, joy in the Lord forever not fleshly happiness, and a crown of glory and rejoicing that does not fade away, with an eternal family under the Fatherhood of God and His Sovereignty!

Willful promotion by God? We’re no longer “slaves of Satan” bound in satanic chains – in Christ we’re “sons and daughters of God” in the Heavenly Family! We’re no longer ‘flavorless’ but we’re the salt of the earth! We’re no longer ‘darkness’ – we’re light in the Lord! We’re no longer empty in the inner man, but filled with the Holy Presence of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit!

We’re no longer of the unrighteous descendants but men and women who through repentance and faith in Christ have been declared righteous in the very righteousness of God imparted and implanted in our washed vessel of trust in Him! We’re not the “happy hour” crowd – we’re the eternally blessed members of the Royal Family of God! Our identity is no longer slaves of Satan, but now the very children of Holy God! We’re not ‘impersonaters’ of our Lord and Savior, but possessors of His Resurrection Life, “vessels of the Victor”!

We’re not distant stars blinking in the darkened nights of men’s souls but “lights” on a hill that cannot be hidden.

Robert Browning, in “Paracelsus”, wrote: “If I stoop, Into a dark tremendous sea of cloud, It is but for a time; I press God’s lamp close to my breast; its splendor soon or late Will pierce the gloom; I shall emerge one day.” And even when destiny brings us temporarily to a “dark tremendous sea of cloud,” WE WILL EMERGE BRIGHTER THAN EVER BEFORE!

We’re sons and daughters of God’s eternal faith, and though doubt, at times, will try to rob us of light’s glow and meaning, and even when I find myself in my darkest moment as a follower, I choose to rest in Him!

I found it so interesting that the agnostic or atheist, Robert Ingersoll, at his brother’s funeral, spoke and said: “From the voiceless lips of the unreplying dead there comes no word. But in the night of Death, Hope sees a star, [but for him it was not the Bright and Morning Star whose name is Jesus!] and listening Love can hear the rustle of a wing.” Oh, that somehow he learned of the Love of God but I doubt he ever did!

If God gave you “existence”, did He do so apart from eternal purpose? Of course not! His one beckoning call is, “Be reconciled to God,” and in that ministry of reconciliation, the blood of Jesus takes center-stage, first place, the only door through which we can walk into the presence of God! It’s why in Matthew 5:8 Jesus said: “Blessed are the pure in heart; for they shall see God.”

It was Thomas a’ Kempis who said: “Simplicity reaches out after God; purity discovers and enjoys Him.”

I so appreciate Noah Webster’s description of ‘providence’ in his 1828 Dictionary. He said: “Providence – in theology the care and superintendence which God exercises over His creatures. He that acknowledges a creation and denies a ‘providence,’ involves himself in a palpable contradiction; for the same power which caused a thing to exist is necessary to continue its existence…By divine providence is often understood God Himself.”

The God who made you, is He unable to save, sustain, and complete you to His good pleasure? In Romans 3:24-26 God’s Holy Word tells us: “being JUSTIFIED FREELY by His grace through the resurrection that is in Christ Jesus…

Whom God set forth as a propitiation by His blood, through faith, to demonstrate His righteousness, because in His forbearance God had passed over the sins that were previously committed, to demonstrate at the present time His righteousness, that He might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.”

Thank God for Chambers’ insight! Listen to what he wrote in “My Utmost For His Highest”: [p.247], “The Gospel of the grace of God awakens an intense longing in human souls and an equally intense resentment, because the revelation which it brings is not palatable. There is a certain pride in man that will give and give, but to come and accept is another thing. I will give my life to martyrdom, I will give myself in consecration, I will do anything, but do not humiliate me to the level of the most hell-deserving sinner and tell me that all I have to do is to accept the gift of salvation through Jesus Christ.” BUT THAT’S IT! IT’S ALL OF HIM and not us in the matter of our redemption, our re-birth, and our reconciliation!

He said a few sentences later, “He can do nothing for us if we think we are sufficient of ourselves, we have to enter His Kingdom through the door of destitution.” WOW!

Oh, I’m telling you: Jesus is to every repentant believer the complete and whole treasury of God!

Remember – we’re looking at “World Philosophy OR Willful Promotion By God”!! And when “world philosop[hy” begins to surface strongly and willful promotion by God takes a backseat, you begin to sense a sad decaying of true faith, an allegiance to the flesh [your old sin nature – so anything goes!], even church attendance by many who have no intention of denying self and taking up His Cross [and our own], and suddenly the Word of God is set aside, truth is left outdoors, and doubt about the veracity of God’s Holy Word takes over the pulpit and the classroom!

Philosophy may give a few insights, but Christ Jesus births “:new men”! It was the German theologian, Soren Kierkegaard, who said: “Not until man has become so utterly unhappy, or has grasped the woefulness of life so deeply that he is moved to say, and mean it: LIFE HAS NO VALUE FOR ME – NOT TILL THEN IS HE ABLE TO MAKE A BID FOR CHRISTIANITY.”

AND ALMIGHTY, HOLY, WISE, LOVING, CARING GOD STEPS UP TO REVEAL HIS UNCHANGING LOVE AND MATCHLESS MERCY TO WOUNDED HUMANITY BY OUR SELF-INFLICTED SIN NATURES!

John 3:14-18 illumines Heaven on earth! “And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up,

That whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.

For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.

He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.”

Paul built out of the Cross of Christ and His Resurrection eternal truth!! Look at Romans 5:6-11!! “For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die…

But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us…

Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him. For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be [being] saved by His life…

And not only that, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation.”

There’s an old hymn entitled “Grace Greater Than Our Sin.” It says: “Marvelous grace of our loving Lord, Grace that exceeds our sin and our guilt…Yonder on Calvary’s mount outpoured, There where the blood of the Lamb was spilled…

Sin and despair, like the sea waves cold, Threaten the soul with infinite loss; Grace that is greater, yes, grace untold, Points to the refuge, the mighty cross.

Dark is the stain that we cannot hide. What can we do to wash it away? Look! There is flowing a crimson tide, Brighter than snow you may be today…

Marvelous, infinite, matchless grace, Freely bestowed on all who believe! You that are longing to see His face, Will you this moment His grace receive?

Grace, grace, God’s grace, Grace that will pardon and cleanse within, Grace, grace, God’s grace, Grace that is greater than all our sin.”

World philosophers or Willful Promotion By God? It’s your choice!

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

“ENCOUNTERED BY THE HOLY SPIRIT!”

There is, according to Biblical Truth, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, the “Three in One”! In this writing, we’re going to be examining one’s “encounter with the Holy Spirit”! Let it be clearly known: no man has ever come to redemption in Christ apart from the conviction ministry of the Holy Spirit!

It’s so interesting and enlightening what the Word of God declares about the “natural man” in 1 Corinthians 2:14 where Paul wrote: “But the ‘natural man’ does not receive the things of the Spirit of God for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” In 2 Corinthians 4:3-6 Paul continued his enlightenment of the “new-born in Christ” about the ministry of the Holy Spirit. He said:

“But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, whose minds the god of this age (Satan!) has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image (or unveiling) of God, should shine on them. For we do not preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord, and ourselves your bondservants for Jesus’ sake. For it is the God who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the glory of God in the face of Christ Jesus.”

And the God who commanded ‘light to shine out of darkness’, shining in our hearts ‘the light of the knowledge of the glory of God’, in, through, and by the face of Jesus Christ? God the Father, God the Son, God the Spirit, the amazing God of “Three in One”, opens our eyes, minds, and hearts by His Spirit, manifesting to us “the light of the knowledge of the glory of God IN THE FACE OF CHRIST JESUS”?

It would be so interesting, so illuminating, for one to search out his/her nature in comparison to the nature, character, presence, and living example of Christ Jesus! In 2 Corinthians 4:10-11 Paul added, “always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal body.” Is your ‘walk of faith’ in the naturalness of “fallen men” or in the supernatural presence of the Resurrected Christ? Is your life testimony one of full surrender and allegiance to your ‘old flesh’ under one’s own ‘self-allegiance’ or a life testimony of the very evidence of Spirit-supernatural birthing and blessing? Let’s look at the Word since man does not live by bread alone but by every Word that proceeds out of the mouth of God!

FIRST, WE KNOW WE’VE ENCOUNTERED THE HOLY SPIRIT AND BEEN LED TO CHRIST BECAUSE OF OUR ENCOUNTER WITH THE HOLY SPIRIT IN THE DIVINE CONVICTION OF OUR SIN! In Isaiah 6: 4-5 the prophet had a holy encounter with the Spirit of the Living God! He said: And the posts of the door were shaken by the voice of him who cried out, and the house was filled with smoke. So I said: “Woe is me, for I am undone! Because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts.”

And Isaiah was “touched”, and Verse 7 tells us he became aware of sovereign grace, mercy, and love, and he heard the Voice: Verse 7, “Behold, this has touched your lips; your iniquity is taken away, and your sin purged.” He learned of the cleansing power of the blood of the Lamb of God and put his faith in Him, not his own best efforts!

What does John 1:29 tells us as John and two of his new disciples saw Jesus walking before him? He said, “Behold the Lamb of God!” And later, in John 16:7-8, Jesus said: “Nevertheless I tell you the truth. It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I depart, I will send Him to you. And when He has come, He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment…”! The Spirit turns one from self-absorption in sin to the eternal desire of ‘finished with the old man of sin and its bondage’ to the fulfillment of sin forgiven and Resurrection Life manifested through me in the “new man” by His mercy, grace and love!

George Matheson and A.L. Peace wrote the old hymn entitled “O Love That Will Not Let Me go”, published in the “American Hymnal”, by Broadman Press in 1933! It says: “O Love that will not let me go, I rest my weary soul in You; I give You back the life I owe, That in Your ocean depths its flow May richer, fuller be.

O Light that follows all my way, I yield my flickering torch to You; My heart restores its borrowed ray, That in Your sunshine’s glow its day May brighter, fairer be.

O Joy that seeks me through pain, I cannot close my heart to You; I trace the rainbow through the rain, And feel the promise is not vain That morn shall tearless be.

O Cross that lifts up my head, I dare not ask to hide from You; I lay in dust life’s glory dead, And from the ground there blossoms read Life that shall endless be.”

And it is because of God’s great love for us that He sends the Holy Spirit to convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment!

SECOND, WE KNOW WE’VE ENCOUNTERED THE HOLY SPIRIT, WHEN CONVICTED, WE WILLINGLY TURN TO THE ACCEPTANCE OF BIBLICAL TRUTH ENLIGHTENED BY THE HOLY SPIRIT! You are aware that there is across the world, then and now, a coldness, an insensitive spirit to the reality of Biblical Truth!

Unredeemed hearts and minds are clear, perfect examples of fallen mankind’s obstinacy toward Holy God’s desire to lift one out of the domain of darkness into the eternal kingdom of light! The spirit of ‘fleshly independence from God’ is bound in the strong wall of godless ‘independence and self-will’, actually, for many, deifying one’s self as more important, more satisfying, more fulfilling than being yielded to the God who made them, lost them, and bought them with the price of the Lamb’s blood shed at Calvary in their place!

In 1 John 2:3-6 are several verses of vital ‘self-examination’ of how devoted and faithful we are, or are not, in obedience to our Living Lord and Savior! “Now by this we know Him, if we keep His commandments. He who says, “I know Him,” and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him. But whoever keeps His word, truly the love of God is perfected in him. By this we know that we are in Him. He who says he abides in Him ought himself to walk just as He walked.”

Do you remember Paul’s illuminating word in Ephesians 4:30? “And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.” Has there been a ‘grieving’ of the Holy Spirit concerning your walk as Christ’s disciple and earthly ambassador? In 1 Corinthians 6:17 Paul stated, “But he who is joined to the Lord is one spirit with Him,” adding in Verses 19-20, “Or DO YOU NOT KNOW THAT YOUR BODY IS THE TEMPLE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT WHO IS IN YOU, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.”

You’ll remember that early in Jesus’ ministry there were some disciples ‘troubled’ and ‘offended’ by some of the things Jesus had to say. In John 6:60-64 we read, Therefore many of His disciples, when they heard this, said, “This is a hard saying; who can understand it?”

When Jesus knew in Himself that His disciples complained about this, He said to them, “Does this offend you? What then if you should see the Son of Man ascend where He was before? It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak to you are spirit, and they are life. But there are some of you who do not believe.” Would you please circle, “It is the Spirit who gives life”?

Come to John 14:15-18 and Verses 23, 25-26 where Jesus added to His disciples understanding of the need of the Holy Spirit! He said, Verses 15-18, “If you love Me, keep My commandments. And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever – the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you. I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you.” Then..

Verses 23, 25-26! “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our home with him.” Verses 25-26 says: “These things I have spoken to you while being present with you. But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you.”

THIRD, BECAUSE OF OUR AWARENESS OF THE HOLY SPIRIT’S PRESENCE WITHIN US, AND OUR AWARENESS OF HIS GUIDANCE THROUGH THE WORD, WE ALSO MUST BECOME FULLY AWARE OF THE SPIRIT’S DESIRE TO HONOR CHRIST THROUGH US! In John 16:14 the Lord Jesus clearly told the disciples then and now, “He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you.”

Oswald Chambers made a powerful statement in his book, “My Utmost For His Highest,” (p.248), when he said: “When I commit myself to the revelation made in the New Testament, I receive from God the gift of the Holy Spirit Who begins to interpret to me what Jesus did; and does in me subjectively all that Jesus Christ did for me objectively.”

And ‘subjectively’ the Spirit is up to unveiling mankind’s eternal help in and through Christ alone! In Romans 5:5 Paul said: “Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us.”

If God poured out His love in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, was it strictly for a believer’s ‘well’ or reservoir of personal benefit or for the believer to be led by the Spirit in extending Christ’s kingdom-rule, releasing His love to the unloved, and unveiling the supernatural power of God in the Spirit to make eternal differences in one’s life, marriage, occupation, or ministry?

FOURTH, BECAUSE OF OUR AWARENESS OF THE HOLY SPIRIT’S INDWELLING IN OUR REDEEMED HEARTS, IS IT ALSO BECAUSE HOLY GOD UNDERSTOOD AND STILL UNDERSTANDS THE MAJOR WARFARE BETWEEN FLESH AND THE SPIRIT? In Galatians 5: 16-18 the Apostle Paul wrote: “I say then: Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against flesh; and these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do the things that you wish. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law (of ‘try your best’!).”

Oh, and then in Galatians 5:19-25, Paul unveils for us the differences between a ‘flesh walk’ and the “Spirit-filled walk”! It says: Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like; of which I tell you beforehand, just as I also told you in time past, THAT THOSE WHO PRACTICE SUCH THINGS WILL NOT INHERIT THE KINGDOM OF GOD.”

The “Spirit-filled walk”? Ephesians 5:22-25 says, “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law. And those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.”

The identifying ‘stamp’ of the ‘flesh walk’ is one’s approval of, participation with, and defense of ‘alive unto’ the world, the flesh, and the devil, but the identifying mark of a Spirit-filled disciple of Christ is not one’s imitation of Him, but one’s death to self daily that the Resurrection Presence of Christ may be manifested, unveiled, and loosed through a yielded vessel to the Lord’s intent in and through that surrendered life to His and the Spirit’s Lordship!

FIFTH, IN THE SPIRIT’S INDWELLING OF EVERY BORN-AGAIN BELIEVER, HE IS THERE, NOT AS A FREQUENT VISITOR, BUT THE RESIDENT INTERCESSOR FOR EVERY TRUE BELIEVER WHO YIELDS TO HIM. In Romans 8:26-27 we read, “Likewise the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself MAKES INTERCESSION FOR US with groanings which cannot be uttered. Now He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He MAKES INTERCESSION for the saints according to the will of God.”

What an awesome revelation! YOUR BODY IS THE RESIDENT TEMPLE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT – and He’s there to intercede in your behalf before Sovereign God! Does this mean I personally need never to pray? I don’t believe that’s what Jesus taught us – check out in your Concordance every time when Jesus said, “When you pray…”! And, yes, at the same time we give the Holy Spirit the blessing of His intercessory praying in our behalf. Just as Jesus said, “I and My Father are one,” in the same vein of eternal relationships between God and the redeemed heart, ‘In Christ’ our bodies become the temples of Holy Spirit presence, and we become “One in the Spirit” and He intercedes in our behalf when we are even so limited in what WE should ask of God the Father – so the Holy Spirit intercedes! It was J.B.Dykes, in the old “American Hymnal” of 1933, published by The Broadman Press, Nashville, Tenn., who wrote the prayer hymn “Come, Holy Spirit, Heavenly Dove,” (p.178). It says: “Come, Holy Spirit, heavenly dove, With all Your quickening powers; Kindle a flame of sacred love In these cold hearts of ours.

In vain we tune our formal songs, In vain we strive to rise; Hosannas languish on our tongues, And our devotion dies.

Dear Lord, and shall we ever live At this poor dying rate? Our love so fain, so cold to You, And Yours to us so great!

Come, Holy Spirit, heavenly Dove, With all Your quickening powers; Come, shed abroad a Savior’s love, And that shall kindle ours.”

Is there the ‘kindling fire’ of the Holy Spirit in you? Have you been “birthed by the Spirit,” “blessed by the Spirit,” “guided by the Spirit,” “empowered by the Spirit with Heaven’s radiant, glowing, strengthening power”? Another prayer hymn in the same hymnal was written by B.B.McKinney and Edwin Hatch entitled “Breathe On Me.” It says: “Holy Spirit, breathe on me, until my heart is clean; Let sunshine fill its inmost part, With not a cloud between.

Holy Spirit, breathe on me, My stubborn will subdue; Teach me in words of living flame What Christ would have me do.

Holy Spirit, breathe on me, Fill me with power divine; Kindle a flame of love and zeal Within this heart of mine.

Holy Spirit, breathe on me, Till I am all Your own, Until my will is lost in Yours, To live for You alone.

Breathe on me, breathe on me, Holy Spirit, breathe on me, On My heart, cleanse every part, Holy Spirit, breathe on me.” Is that your prayer need of the day?

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

EXPERIENCING THE POWER OF THE

PROMISED, PRECIOUS HOLY SPIRIT

It’s amazing to me that many write or speak or preach or teach about “evangelical spirituality” and totally ignore or try to refute the words of Jesus Himself about “wait for the Promise of the Father,” which relates to the “anointing, enduement, filling, or baptism in the Holy Spirit”

In no way do I ignore, make light of, or substitute “…the Gospel of Christ which is the Power of God Unto Salvation,” for a “power” that pumps my ‘flesh.’ But I do recognize in my ‘flesh’ an inability to fulfill the “good, acceptable, and perfect will of God” through my walk as a disciple without His Promise.

If my Savior “fills All in All,” I hunger for the All filling me so that His All is fulfilled through me! If “wait” was among Jesus’ last words for His disciples then, I’m asking, is that “wait” relevant for NOW?

I know there is redemptive power in the Gospel of Christ, but I also know about a released power in the Holy Spirit given His rightful, reigning place in your life.

The question of Paul to the Ephesian followers in Acts 19 is urgent for today: “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” (Acts 19:2), And they responded in verse 3, “We have not so much as heard whether there is a Holy Spirit.”

I have no hesitation in saying to you that “the counterfeit of consecration” is a believer’s life lived independently of the awesome anointing of the Holy Spirit evidenced by no Godly freedom or fullness or “fire in my bones.”

Disciples with uninformed lives about the necessity of the Holy Spirit anointing never experience the unrivaled, unlimited power of God released through their lives.

In Galatians 3:3 Paul asks a vitally important question: “…Having begun in the Spirit (that’s “born of the Spirit” in the second birth), are you now being made perfect by the flesh?” Much of the ‘churchianity’ of today is ‘cosmetic covering’ without the reality of Spirit-anointing! A cheap imitation?

Paul was so on target when in 2 Timothy 3:5 he spoke of “having a form of godliness but denying its power…” That’s why Samuel Chadwick wrote: “A religion of mere emotion and sensationalism is the most terrible of all curses that can come upon any people. The absence of reality is sad enough, but the aggravation of pretence is a deadly sin.”

Are we willing to settle for our impotence when there is the reality of His omnipotence? Are disciples of today content to stand at our Lord’s tomb or to walk through the doors of the power of Pentecost? Are we asleep on pillows of indifference or standing at the pillars of divine enabling? Are we “mesmerized spectators” or mounted on the wings of Holy Ghost anointing?

It was Isaiah who sadly said, (Isaiah 64:7), “And there is no one who calls on Your name, who stirs himself up to take hold of You…” God help us that we not be men and women who do not stir themselves up to take hold of His promised anointing, but that we be truly men and women God-graced, God-gripped, God-galvanized in the fullness of His Holy Spirit! How do we experience that power of His promised, precious Holy Spirit?

First, of all, God’s Word is so very clear – HE IS NO RESPECTOR OF PERSONS! AND IF HE FILLS ONE, IT’S HIS DESIRE TO FILL ALL! Come to Acts 10:38!! “…how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power, who went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him.”

Don’t you find it amazing that the Son of God who became the Son of Man, Emmanuel – “God in flesh” – received and experienced God’s anointing “with the Holy Spirit and with power?” And there’s a reason or explanation:

Come to Philippians 2:7 where Paul says Jesus “made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bond-servant, and coming in the likeness of men…” The NASB says “emptied Himself.”

John 17 explains the “emptying” so there could be in His life God’s FILLING! Verse 2, “no authority” – but God gave it to Him. Verse 5, “no glory” – but God glorified the Son. Verse 6, “no disciples” – but the Father gave Him His disciples. Verse 8, “no words,” – but God gave Him the very words to speak.

In John 17:18, Jesus said, “As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world.” Jesus chose to be totally dependant upon all the Father is so He could appropriate all the Father has! And by His example, we are to be dependant disciples anointed by the Father with the Holy Spirit and power just as Jesus was!

John 5:19 says, “Most assuredly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He sees the Father do…” Verse 30 says the same thing, “I can of Myself do nothing!” But we believe we can? No, as the Father anointed Jesus, so He is to anoint us. RECEIVE THE ANOINTING!

[Second,] you begin to experience that power when you clearly understand, “It is the will of God!” Come to Ephesians 5:17-18. Listen! “Therefore do not be unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is…and do not be drunk with wine, in which is dissipation; BUT BE FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT.”

The Holy Spirit is the generating Spirit of Divine Life! In Romans 8:11, Paul writes, “But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.”

Flesh effort is a futile possibility of honoring our Lord through our walks, but Spirit-anointing, which is God’s will for each of us, fills us full of faith, fire, and power. It’s the will of God!

In the book, “Rent Heaven,” R.B. Jones writes, “A few years ago a warm current called El Nina, which usually comes before Christmas, swept southward along the west coast of South America in greater volume than ever before. It brought with it torrential showers, which visited parts of which had not known rain since the year 1551. El Nina turned thousands of miles of desert into paradise in an incredibly short time, as it caused millions of hardy seeds which had lain dormant in the ground through decades of drought to sprout and grow with incredible vigor.”

And God’s will? It’s for a spiritual El Nina in your barren life germinating divine seeds of Life through you “with incredible vigor. “It’s the will of God!

Experiencing God’s power comes also as an answer to intercessory or personal prayers! Come to Ephesians 3:16 where Paul prays, “that He would grant you, according to the riches of His grace, to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man.”

Do you remember Jesus saying, “You have not because you ask not.” And sadly many walk in spiritual futility about dynamic service to our Lord because they are prayerless or have no one praying in their behalf.

If it is the will of God that we be filled with the Holy Spirit, do we really believe if we pray to that end He’ll not answer? I don’t think so.

It was not only God’s will for Paul but for all disciples to know and experience the anointing. And Romans 15:29 says, Paul speaking, “But I know that when I come to you, I shall come in the fullness of the blessing of the gospel of Christ.”

The Ephesian Christians hadn’t heard of the Holy Spirit, but Acts 19:6 says, “And when Paul laid hands on them (without praying? I don’t think so!), the Holy Spirit came upon them, and they spoke with tongues and prophesied.”

There is a [third ]consideration of vital importance about our anointing in the Holy Spirit – It is showing up for “the fight!” Come to Galatians 5:16-17, 24-25.

Verses 16-17, “I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh…For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do the things that you wish.”

Verses 24_25, “And those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires…If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.”

My traveling companion, Drew Bennett, taught several years ago and used the Spirit and flesh as “two dogs” in a fight. Which one is stronger? And he said, “Feed one and starve the other.”

It is an imperative that if we walk in the fullness of God’s Spirit it is because we’ve starved that doggish ‘flesh’ spirit that wants to dominate. And to be gut-level honest, I don’t believe there is a true “Spirit-filled life,” even if one speaks in tongues, while at the same time that one walks with an unbridled flesh life!

Come to Romans 8:12-14, “Therefore, brethren, we are debtors – not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh…For if you live according to the flesh you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live…For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are sons of God.”

Let’s reverse those last three verses. Who Are The Sons Of God?

• They are those led by the Spirit of God!
• They are putting to death, by the Spirit, the deeds of the body or flesh.
• And, they understand no debt to their old sin natures and long for the Holy Life and its fullness in them!

[Fourth], we experience the power of the Holy Spirit as, in tune with Christ, we resist temptation and refuse to entertain Satan! Luke 4:1-14 is so vital to our understanding of this Victorious, Spirit-anointed walk.

If you look at verse 22 of Luke 3, after Jesus’ baptism, “the Holy Spirit descended in bodily form like a dove upon Jesus…!!” Chapter 4, verse 1 says, “Then Jesus filled with the Holy Spirit, returned from the , and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness…verse 2, being tempted by the devil for 40 days.”

Was that a test God allowed in the life of His Son? We are all tested – and we are all tempted! But Jesus resisted! Hebrews 4:15 says of Jesus, “…in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin…” Then Hebrews 4:16 follows, “Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need.”

Grace to help? That’s the Holy Spirit! Now…come back to Luke 4:13-14, “Now when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from Him until a more opportune time… THEN (when?) Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit to …”

I have no reservation in saying to you His resistance brought a mighty release of power in Jesus’ walk and ministry! Though filled with the eternal reservoir of Holy Ghost power, the release came because He refused to entertain Satan’s temptation choosing to honor His Father.

Do you know my concern for believers and their relationship to the Holy Spirit? They want to be “zappedin an instant when God wants them to zero in on resistance to temptation! They want a “quick-fixwithout an eternal qualified fight. They want an easy path when it’s an experience and expression of precious privilege through the “bloody battlesagainst our Enemy who wants to lead us back into black darkness and bondage. “Resist the devil and he will flee from you,and as you resist a river, a wind, a fire breaks out from within your inner man!! Which leads us to the [fifth] truth about experiencing the explosive power of the promised, precious Holy Spirit”

It comes because of our unwavering understanding that we cannot win the war against the power of darkness apart from Spirit-anointing! Matthew 12:28, listen to Jesus, “But if I cast out demons by the Spirit of God, surely the has come upon you.”

Do you have a problem with that verse? If so it is because you have omitted in your training as a disciple understanding about the and the kingdom of darkness.

If it’s a problem it’s because someone blinded you to the gracious, merciful activity of God’s Kingdom. In Luke 9:1-2, Jesus “called His twelve disciples together and gave them power and authority over all demons and to cure diseases…He sent them to preach the and to heal the sick.”

And if you’ve been taught that ended with the early apostles, then you bought into a great deception that has hindered the effective, eternal ministry of Christ Jesus.

We know that Satan was cast down from heaven and that he deceives the whole world, but our Lord and Savior has no desire for His people to be caught up in that deception but to deliver people from it. Fighting the good fight of faith surely includes setting people free from demonic control and even setting them free from blindness of spiritual warfare.

[Sixth] Holy Spirit anointing? Jesus tells us it is an unceasing, undying, passionate hunger for the third person of the Holy Trinity having His way in us! Come to John 7:37-39, “On the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out saying, If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink…He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water…But this He spoke concerning the Spirit, whom those believing in Him would receive: for the Holy Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.”

And check out the verbs! “Present tense verbs” which mean in the original Greek, present tense,continuousaction. I thirst and keep on thirsting; I come and keep on coming; I drink and keep on drinking; I believe and keep on believing! And the result? “Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water – but He was speaking of the overflow of the Holy Spirit!!”

Are you hearing “process” in that? Are you hearing “passion” in that for more than you’ve experienced? Are you hearing “hunger” for the “much more” of a vibrant, victorious faith?

Romans 15:13 says, “Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.”

But what a sad word when Paul had to say to the church at Corinth, (2 Corinthians 6:12), “you are restrained by your own affections.” Restrained or released to the fullness? Hindered or helped by divine power? Restricted or fully active in the rivers of living water?

One last truth – experiencing the power by the faithfulness of “tarrying” and “waiting” until the fire of anointing falls! Luke 24:49, “Behold, I send the Promise of My Father upon you; but tarry in the city of Jerusalem until you are endued with power from on high.”

What was Jesus saying? There is nothing more important in a disciple’s life than experiencing God’s power! Nothing should distract us! Nothing should become a substitute for the Savior’s Spirit-anointing! Nothing should divert our attention away from “the rushing wind” of Holy Ghost enduement!

I so love how John the Baptist put it in Matthew 3:11, “I indeed…but He!” Look at it in your Bible. Sit until it sinks in!

“I indeed” can give you a taste! “But He…” will give you the tool! “I indeed” can accomplish a few things.” “But He…” fulfills everything!

“I indeed” cannot really see! “But He…” opens my eyes to the eternal spiritual dimension! “I indeed” have a feel of temporal water! “But He…” shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and fire.”

Do I know I’ve been baptized because I now have a gift? No, I know I’ve had Spirit-baptism because His fruit is being produced in me! Donkeys are gifted – disciples under the anointing are graced with Christ-likeness.

Francis Macnutt, in “The Nearly Perfect Crime,” (P63), wrote: “There is no one list of things that always happens to every person. It is as if God tailors the outpouring of the Spirit to each person individually.”

That’s I Corinthians 12:11 where God’s Word says, “But one and the same Spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually as He wills.” Then in verses 29-30 Paul asks, “Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Are all workers of miracles?…Do all have gifts of healing? Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret?”

And what is the obvious answer? “No” to every question Paul asked! We don’t box up the Holy Spirit as to who is truly anointed. Be a fruit-inspector not a gift evaluator! God doesn’t major on giving special status and standing differentiating one gift from another! But more than anything else, YIELD YOUR TOTAL BEING AS A DISCIPLE TO THE SOVEREIGN ADMINISTRATION OF THE HOLY SPIRIT! Get caught up in “the wind.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

ENDURING THROUGH FAILURE!

Some will find it a bit uneasy for many, for me to share two chapters on the Holy Spirit’s ministry in us and through us and then come along in this chapter to share about “enduring through failures”, but the sad reality is that there are times when the Holy Spirit is not in control or has been ignored, set aside, even denying His conviction when we’ve chosen a wrong path or turn or choice for the ‘flesh’ and not fully yielded to the Spirit. But the one thing you can be assured of as a believer is that even if there’s a ‘mis-step’, the Holy Spirit doesn’t run from you but to you to, yes, turn you back to the fullness of Spirit-anointed living, honoring and glorifying the Christ within, not resurrecting the old man in you Jesus crucified on the Cross with Him!

In Matthew 24 the disciples have asked Jesus about “the sign of His coming and the end of the age.” Jesus responds in this way – “The end of the age?” Verse 4, a time of great deception; Verse 7, a time of great conflict; Verses 8-9, a time of great suffering; Verse 12, a time of great open sin; and Verse 14, a time of great opportunity. And in the midst of this description of the end of the age, Jesus said in Verse 13, “BU HE WHO ENDURES TO THE END SHALL BE SAVED!”

“ENDURING through our failures, fires, and fights!” How many do you know who have started a walk with Jesus and end up disappointed, disillusioned, detoured, and are “falling away” because they didn’t understand or know about “failing” and getting up, stumbling short of the goal but getting up, persevering, and pressing in?

Far too many don’t know or understand about counting the cost, failing to see a cross in the path before experiencing the manifestation of resurrection power! High pinnacles – fast falls, slippery slopes, muddy ditches with seemingly high walls they can’t crawl out of, stained banners of allegiance – rotting devotion and passion! Sadly, true biblical faith about the true journey of discipleship has been blurred, even counterfeited by modern ‘church life’ that is co contrary to Jesus’ words, “Follow Me and I will make you to become fishers of men!”

Even though we are immortal in Christ, as human followers, and more than that students in a false ‘school of discipleship’ sadly promoted by ‘fleshly churches and flesh-dominated teachers’! But even ‘in Christ’ if we fail to take the sentence of death daily to ourselves yielding faithfully to His Holy Presence within us, we will see ‘flesh’ not Spirit manifesting in fallibility, failure, and futility – and sadly some accept a compromised allegiance to Christ and yield to the world, the flesh, and the devil, content for a time with one’s petty ‘little’ self! Some, more ‘church’ loyal than Christ-yielded will settle for a few religious spasms every now and then, but fail to press in to the High Calling in Christ.

Chuck Swindoll, in his book, “Come Before Winter,” has a chapter entitled “The Fine Art of Blowing it.” Do you know about which he speaks? Have you ever found yourself enveloped with a heavy fog of failure? John Maxwell’s book, “Failing Forward,” is so rich in reality. One of the first dynamic truths Maxwell writes is, “Your attitude, more than your aptitude, will determine your altitude!” And that redemptive attitude from Christ’s indwelling and not one’s “I’ll try” will daily elevate one into the fullness of Christ’s blessings, avoiding, yes, any failures in the Spirit-realm! But if our hearts are truly one “in Christ’, then even a ‘failure’ will not be a stumbling block but a stepping stone in Christ’s fullness.

It was James Long who said, “One reason God created time was so that there would be a place to bury the failures of the past!” “He who ENDURES TO THE END shall be saved!”

One of the saddest verses in all of the Bible is found in Psalm 78:9, “The children of Ephraim, being armed and carrying bows, TURNED BACK IN THE DAY OF BATTLE.” Some of you as you’re reading this chapter feel so hopeless, fearful, doubt-filled. Some of you are determined to walk away from your ministry as a disciple of Christ because you’ve conceived within yourself a sense of failure – and you’re brought to a crossroads:

Escape or cope? Weakened or strengthed? Clueless or constructively enlightened? Human effort failing and falling or divine enabling strengthening? Pushed down or pressing in? Wilting or working out your own salvation in fear and trembling? Taken over by a defeatist attitude or triumphant through God’s promises and helps? A mind duped by its failures or a mind deepened in God’s truths recognizing by grace I have “the mind of Christ”? Debilitated by your mistakes or discipline in God’s mercy? Adapting to your natural tendencies to failure in the ‘flesh’ or appropriating His supernatural provisions for holy success?

There is such a life-principle of “being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ!” (Philippians 1:6)

Ken Hubbard wisely wrote: “There is no failure except no longer trying (or better: trusting!). There is no defeat except from within, no really insurmountable barrier save our own inherent weakness of purpose.” But that’s flesh! In Christ we become spiritual beings inhabited with His resurrection life and purpose! Paul had to remind Timothy, and I remind you, (2 Timothy 1:9), that God “has saved us and called us with a holy purpose, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was given us in Christ Jesus BEFORE TIME BEGAN.”

It was Pericles who wrote: “The brave are surely those who have the clearest vision of what is before them, glory and danger alike, and yet GO OUT TO MEET IT.” I love the old hymn that somehow needs to be resurrected: “Rise up, O men of God, have done with lesser things,” and the lesser thing is your self-effort that you choose to be through with, but opening the door to His presence, His ministry, His vision, and His plan through your available ‘vessel’!

Victor Frankel said it: “everything can be taken from a man except the last of human freedoms – TO CHOOSE ONE’S ATTITUDES IN ANY GIVEN SET OF CIRCUMSTANCES,” (Death to self, available only to Christ!), and yielded to Him, and yielded to Him, whatever comes our way, we persevere and endure!

It was Louis Pasteur who once wrote: “Chance favors the PREPARED MIND”, and I add PREPARED, YIELDED HEART TO CHRIST’S FULL CONTROL, SENSITIVE TO THE VERY HEART OF GOD IN ME! Several truths of vital importance as an “enduring disciple”:

FIRST, PERSEVERANCE PROMPTED BY GOD’S UNCEASING LOVE!

Let’s look at “perseverance to the end because of the precious precept of the unfailing, unchanging, unceasing love of God”! Three statements out of 1 Corinthians 13 that ought to grip your heart today as you consider God’s love for you: Verse 4, “Love suffers long and is kind.” Verse 7, “bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.” Verse 8, “Love never fails!” When you think about the walk of Simon Peter, have you considered that Peter denied Jesus three times after his strong assertions that he never would? AND HERE COMES JESUS! What did He bring to Peter? A big stick? A harsh look? A mean stare? A sign saying, “Displeased, disappointed, doubtful of Peter?” NO! Jesus came, not only with the look of love, but an affirmation of confidence, an acceptance of his person, and an aim for his life – “Feed My sheep!” Romans 5:8 says, “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”

How could we interpret God’s love as conditional, as changing, as ceasing, with the cross of Christ ever before us? What does God say? “I love you only when you always get it right? I love you only when you never deny Me? I love you when and only when you’re totally perfect? I love you only when you rank high as the best of preachers? I love you only when you score all A’s on the life exams? I love you only when you don’t look back? I love you only when you don’t stumble? I love you only when you don’t wear a mask or pretend? I love you only when you’re so pious that you externally ‘dress the part’”?

In John 15 Jesus instructed His followers: “As the Father loved Me, I also have loved you, abide in My love.” When you’ve fallen, Jesus’ love is there to pick you up! When you’ve failed, Jesus’ love is saying, “You’re My success!” When you’re afraid of what tomorrow holds, “My perfect love casts out and overcomes your fear because I hold your tomorrow!”

SECOND, PERSEVERANCE IN THE FACE OF PERSECUTION: I must say it! “Perseverance to the end because of the powerful awareness that persecution IS “the red badges of courage” for every disciple!” In 2 Timothy 3:10-12 we read, “But you have carefully followed my doctrine, manner of life, purpose, faith, longsuffering, love, PERSEVERANCE, persecutions, afflictions, which happened to me at Antioch, at Iconium, at Lystra – what persecutions I endured. And out of them all THE LORD DELIVERED ME. Yes, and all who desire to live godly in Christ WILL SUFFER PERSECUTION.” Has that changed because we’re supposed to be such an advanced culture?

To the church at Thessalonica, Paul made an even bolder statement: 1 Thessalonians 3:2-3, telling why he sent Timothy to them – “our brother and minister of God, and our fellow laborer in the gospel of Christ, to establish (make to stand!) you and encourage you concerning your faith, that no one should be shaken by these afflictions; for you yourselves know that WE ARE APPOINTED TO THIS.” How shocking! God’s Word is telling us, “We have an appointment with persecutions and afflictions!”

Mac Cleland is a former U.S. senator from Georgia who had his legs and an arm blown off by a grenade in the Vietnam war, and he boldly talks about “turning your scars into stars!” And yet, do you realize how many, at the first sign of trouble through persecution and various trials, easily walk away rather than press in to Christ? Or rather than walk away, they just get “down-in-the-mouth”, sad, embittered about what their faith has brought them to.

Charles Allen, the former great Methodist minister wrote: “Valleys are for moving through, not wallowing in.” So true! I’m always amazed when I re-read Paul talking to his Corinthian friends about his “light afflictions.” That’s 2 Corinthians 4:17. Then in 2 Corinthians 11:23-27 he tells them and us: “…in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequently, in deaths often. From the Jews five times I received forty stripes minus one. Three times I was beaten with rods; once I was stoned; three times I was ship-wrecked; a night and a day I have been in the deep, in journeys often in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils of my own countrymen, in perils of the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren, in weariness and toil, in sleeplessness often, in hunger and thirsting, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness…”

It was Aldous Huxley who wrote: “Experience is not what happens to you. Experience is what you do with what happens to you.” “All who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus WILL suffer persecution.” What did Jesus say in John 15:20? “A servant is not greater than his master, If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you.” And do you remember the rise of persecution against the early church in Acts 8:1? “At that time a great persecution arose against the church which was at Jerusalem; and they were all scattered abroad.” What happens following this? “These who have turned the world upside down have come here also!” “Great persecution?” So, let’s deny our calling and go back to fishing, right? Listen to Jesus!

Matthew 5:11-12! “Blessed are you when they revile and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for My sake. ‘Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.” In Luke 6, Jesus said, “Leap for joy!”

THIRD, PERSEVERANCE BECAUSE OF THE UPWARD CALL OF GOD! There must be in you an awareness of ‘the prize’ of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus! Philippians 3:13-14 says, “Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the mark for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.” I don’t even know what all that means!

But, I read in 1 Corinthians 2:9, “Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those who love Him.” In Hebrews 12:2 I get an inkling of it, “looking unto Jesus, the Author and Finisher of our faith Who for the joy that was set before Him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand throne of God.” Do you see it? 1) Finisher of our faith 2) Joy set before Him 3) Seated at the right hand throne of God!

Listen to 2 Peter 3:11-13, “Therefore, since all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness, looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be dissolved, being on fire, and the elements will melt with fervent heat? Nevertheless we, according to His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.” And “the new heavens and a new earth” IS the establishment of Kingdom-rule in the here and now – not when you get to heaven someday! Paul said twice to the Romans, there’s “much more” coming!

FOURTH, PERSEVERANCE BECAUSE OF OUR CONFIDENCE IN GOD AND HIS WORD! Look with me at “perseverance to the end because of the powerful persuasion of our confidence in God”! In 2 Timothy 1:12 we read, “…for I know Whom I have believed and am persuaded that He is able to keep what I have committed to Him until that day.” Confidence in the God who is able! Where is your confidence? Jude 24-25 says clearly: “Now to HIM Who is ABLE TO KEEP YOU FROM STUMBLING, AND TO PRESENT YOU FAULTLESS before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy, to God our Savior, Who Alone is wise, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and forever. Amen.”

The great old hymn will never die! “My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus’ blood and righteousness.”

John Jasper may not be a name you recognize, but his story and faith was so powerful. Years and years ago he was pastor of the great black church in Richmond, Virginia, called Sixth Mt. Zion Baptist Church. He was a tremendous preacher. Political figures from Washington, D.C. would make their way to Richmond to hear him preach. There came a time they needed to put a state highway right through Richmond which meant they’d have to demolish Jasper’s church. But local and national figures caused an uproar and they had to curve the road round Jasper’s church. He came late in life one Sunday morning to the pulpit and stretched his thinning skin on his hand and said: “Very soon I’m going home to be with God,” and his people in their characteristic way began to speak out, “No, Brother John, No. You can’t go home to be with God. You must stay here and be our pastor.” And Jasper responded, “Now hush, my children, Hush. I tell you what is going to happen. One morning soon the death angel will come and call my name, ‘John Jasper, it’s time to go. Follow me. And I will follow, and he’ll lead me up to the pearly white gates where I’ll meet that catechizing angel, and he’ll say, “Who are you?” And I’ll say, “I’m John Jasper.” And he’ll say, ‘John Jasper, you ain’t no good. You don’t have any right coming in here.’ And I’ll say, ‘You’re right, Mr. Angel, I’m no good, and I don’t have any right coming in here, but I’m not depending upon my righteousness, I’m depending upon the righteousness of Jesus who loved me and gave Himself for me.,

Then he’ll say, ‘Come on in, John Jasper, that’s the way we like to hear men talk.’” Powerful persuasion of our confidence in God alone!

You wouldn’t know, but personally the last ten-fifteen years, I’ve fought through some battles that I wish I didn’t have to go through, but I’ve learned ‘life’s tests as a disciple are necessary’! What happens when it seems that some simply lose sight of your ministry – no longer important, no longer necessary, not really important to sacrifice after 25 years of investment in India; it will go on without him! He’s too old!

My dear friend, Dr. Bill Anderson, shared words of encouragement with Sue and me at the time we were going through our questioning moments of “Is our ministry over or not?” He shared Psalm 138:7-8 which I will never forget! It says: “Though I walk in the midst of trouble, You will revive me; You will stretch out Your hand against the wrath of my enemies, and Your right hand will save me. THE LORD WILL PERFECT that which concerns me; Your mercy, O Lord, endures forever; Do not forsake the works of Your hands.” And God will not forsake us!

FIFTH, PERSEVERANCE BECAUSE WE KNOW OUR CALLING BY CHRIST IS CERTAIN!

2 Peter 1:10-11 says, “Therefore, brethren, be even more diligent to make your calling and election sure, for IF YOU DO THESE THINGS ‘you will never stumble’, for so an entrance will be supplied to you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.”

Do you remember God taking those tablets of stone and writing on them and giving them to Moses? “The Ten Commandments?” And one of them says, Exodus 20:7, “You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes His name in vain.” Make YOUR calling and election sure!

Have you been born again? Does Christ live within you? Are you the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus? Are you alive in Christ? Have you been raised up and seated with Christ in heavenly places? Do you have a new song in your heart and the new name to which you respond? Do you know with great assurance, “I am the Chosen of God?” Do you know, “Saved and called with a holy calling?”

SIXTH, PERSEVERANCE BECAUSE “IN HIM” WE ARE PERSISTENT! Proverbs 24:16 speaks about “a righteous man may fall seven times and rise again.” We don’t accept our failures – we’ll not be half-hearted but whole-hearted, even if we stumble. There may be a time we fall on our faces, but watch us get up! Warren Wiersbe nailed it: “A realist is an idealist who has gone through the fire and been purified. A skeptic is an idealist who has gone through the fire and been burned.”

Calvin Coolidge, one of our former United States presidents wrote: “Press on. Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education alone will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.” That’s like the early disciples asking Jesus, “Lord, what would you have us to do?” with Jesus responding: “Follow Me, and I’ll make you fishers of men.”

Jesus demonstrated this trait of relentlessness in Luke 9:51. “Now it came to pass, when the time had come for Jesus to be received up, that He steadfastly set His face to go to Jerusalem.” Have you steadfastly, resolutely, determinedly set your face to follow Jesus, persevering and enduring to the end? In 1 Corinthians 2:2, Paul says, “For I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified.” WHAT HAVE YOU DETERMINED? Have you resolutely set yourself to live by the way of the cross (daily!) so the resurrection life will be manifested through you? Is it settled? Steadfastly I am persevering and enduring?

Epictetus wrote: “Tentative efforts lead to tentative outcomes. Therefore, give yourself fully to your endeavors (fully surrendered to the Lordship and leadership of Christ alone?). Decide to construct your character through excellent actions and determine to pay the price of a worthy goal (Christ in you the hope of glory?). The trials you encounter will introduce you in your strengths (“In Christ!”). Remain steadfast…and one day you will build something that endures: something worthy of your potential (in Christ!).”

It was G.K.Chesterton who said: “I do not believe in a fate that falls on men however they act; but I do believe in a fate that falls on them unless they act.” Well, I am going to act! I am going to settle it daily! It’s resolved! “Christ in me, Christ through me, Christ for me, Christ acting in me for His glory, His Honor – not mine!” And I challenge you! Romans 12:1-2,

“I beseech you therefore brethren by the multitudinous mercies of God that you present your bodies a living sacrifice (daily), holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable spiritual service of worship. And do not be conformed to this world but be being transformed by the renewing of your mind that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God?” Do you operate on fleshly whims or the Divine Will of God?

It’s by an unknown author but speaks so loudly! “When things go wrong as they sometimes will, when the road you’re trudging seems all uphill, when the funds are low and the debts are high, and you want to smile but you have to sigh, (maybe cry), when care is pressing you down a bit, rest if you must, but don’t you quit. success is failure turned inside out, the silver tint of the clouds of doubt, and you can never tell how close you are, it may be near when it seems afar. So stick to the fight when you’re hurt and hit – it’s when things go wrong that you must not quit.” AND I WILL NOT QUIT, NOW AT ALMOST 81 years of age as of June 12, 2017!

One of my dear friends called me saying, “Really, shouldn’t you slow down?” And I said, “You’ll know I’ve slowed down when they’ve closed the casket top!”

Is there a ‘why’ in that? Romans 8:28 says, “And we know that all things work for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.” God’s purpose for you or me ended, over, fulfilled? No!

Through it all, I’m building my altar and presenting myself to God anew! I haven’t quite reached eighty-one yet, but every day is a new day with the altar before me – and I choose to die to self that He might live fully through me!

Sir Charles Villiers Stanford once wrote: “Human excellence apart from God, is like the fabled flower, which, according to the rabbis, Eve plucked when passing out of paradise. Severed from its native root, it is only the touching memorial of a lost Eden – sad while charming and beautiful, but dead.”

“He who perseveres to the end shall be saved!” Our lives, not memorials of a lost Eden, but testimonies of the Redeemed who persevere and endure. God, help us!

CHAPTER FORTY

HOLY PRAYING

The title of this chapter may seem to some a strange title because I am convinced what some call ‘praying’ is not true prayer and what some call ‘holy praying’ is so unholy! Some speak out, praying, to what they call ‘God’ and it’s like speaking to a cold, dark, dead wall, and because they have some concern to pray but not to the One True & Living God, they are ‘baited and switched’ and all of a sudden CUNNINGLY they begin to hear faint, soft whispers out of Hell and believe Heaven has spoken!

Ralph Waldo Emerson, in his “Essays, FIRST SERIES: SELF-RELIANCE,” wrote: “Prayer as a means to a private end is MEANINGLESS AND THEF.” I don’t hesitate: Prayer that is not for the Glory of God alone is UNHOLY PRAYING! Unholy praying is systematically learning to pray well in man’s eyes, but holy praying is passion to have God’s ears and expectantly wanting to hear His voice! Unholy prayer is when one senses it has to be done, like a pastor beginning his church service and briefly, casually, with no passion or eternal purpose, but “It’s expected, say it quickly, get it over with”!

At the same time unholy praying can be systematically learning to pray well in man’s eyes because one wants to be admired by others in his praying techniques, but holy praying is passion to have God’s ears!

Unholy praying is the strong inhaling of the spirit of self, of the fallen, sinful man who prays only for selfish reason, while holy praying is the inhaling of the greater desire unceasingly for the Spirit of God and Will of God and Word of God enlightened through us because we want Him to be gloriously honored!

Unholy praying is simply “business as usual” while things never change, while Holy Praying is as Kierkegaard says, prayer “is that which lifts the world off its hinges.” Unholy praying is saying what I think without meaning what I say – Holy Praying is rightfully resting upon willful trust and truth.

Unholy praying is sadly an occasional impulse that has no grounds of true faith while Holy Praying is one’ life passion. Unholy praying is selfish desires to hear how eloquently we can pray with our educated wordiness, while Holy Praying is surely getting the door open to hear God speak in His enveloping worthiness and willfulness and wise ways.

Unholy praying is proud – Holy Praying is humbled and broken! Unholy praying is that which overflows out of the dumbness of a man’s dead heart, while Holy Praying is that which surges out of the dependence of a man’s living heart upon Holy God – he/she understands: Without Him, I’m nothing!

Unholy praying is prayer that tries to obtain more strength for the strong man one thinks he/she is – Holy Praying is for nothing less than God’s ability, God’s aim, God’s availability “to do with me as He pleases”!

Unholy praying is the nourishing of “the blind life within the brain” (Tennyson), while Holy Praying is like Whittier said, “I am groping for the keys of heavenly harmonies.”

You’ll remember Elijah on Mt. Carmel confronting the false prophets of Baal and of course their false gods – 1 Kings 18:24, “You call on the name of your gods, and I will call on the name of the Lord; and the God who answers by fire, He is God.” Literal fire or metaphorically speaking? Verse 26, “O Baal hear us!” But there was no voice; no one answered.” Truth is, they never did and never do!!

Psalm 115:3-18 must be read in your Bible, right now, before continuing! .” Literal fire or metaphorically speaking? Verse 26, “O Baal hear us!” But there was no voice; no one answered.” Truth is, they never did and never do!!

Psalm 115:3-18 must be read in your Bible, right now, before continuing! You’ll immediately recognize it as a powerful statement of Holy Praying!! From it we learn: 1. Our God is in Heaven; He does whatever He pleases – and we TRUST HIM! 2. He is our Help, our Shield. 3. Our God IS mindful of us! 4. He WILL bless us! 5. He continually increases us – blessed more and more by our Lord who made Heaven and Earth! 6. We are blessers of our Lord forever! Holy Praying! Let’s examine “Holy Praying”!

FIRST, HOLY PRAYING IS PRAYER THAT COMES OUT OF THE OVERFLOW OF ONE”S ENCOUNTER WITH CHRIST! The early disciples witnessed Jesus and learned that He was a ‘praying Son’! In Acts 9:1-11 we learn this vital truth: Look at what happened! Then Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest and asked letters from him to the synagogues of Damascus, so that if he found any who were of the Way, whether men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem.

As he journeyed he came near Damascus, and suddenly a light shone around him from heaven. Then he fell to the ground, and heard a voice saying to him, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me?” And he said, “Who are You, Lord?” Then the Lord said, “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. It is hard for you to kick against the goads.” So he, trembling and astonished, said, “Lord, what do You want me to do?” Then the Lord said to him, “Arise and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do.”

And the men who journeyed with him stood speechless, hearing a voice but seeing no one. Then Saul arose from the ground, and when his eyes were opened he saw no one. But they led him by the hand and brought him into Damascus. And he was three days without sight, and neither ate not drank.

From Acts 10 to Acts 13 it’s about Peter, but then look at Acts 13:1-2, “Now in the church that was at Antioch there were certain prophets and teachers: Barnabas, Simeon who was called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manaen who had been brought up with Herod the tetrarch, and Saul…AS THEY MINISTERED TO THE LORD AND FASTED, the Holy Spirit said, ‘Now separate to Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I HAVE CALLED THEM.”

What an explosion of spiritual maturity an encounter with Christ brings! Paul knew by experience what he wrote about, “Therefore if any man be IN CHRIST, he is a NEW CREATION. Old things have passed away and all things become new.” In Acts 16 it’s a dark hour, it’s midnight, and Saul, now Paul, has been imprisoned. Verse 25 says, “But at midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God.” Hear me! Because of oneness in Christ a seeming defeat becomes opportunity for a Victory. THEY PRAYED – and THERE WAS AN EARTHQUAKE. They prayed, and THERE WAS A SHAKING, they prayed, and as all around then fled, PAUL STOOD TO PREACH, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved and your household.”

Do you remember Acts 20? Paul was with the Ephesian elders, and Verse 36 tells us, “and when he had said these things HE KNELT DOWN AND PRAYED WITH THEM ALL.” In Acts 27, around the island of Malta, Paul met Publius, “leading citizen of the island,” and Publius’s father was sick with fever and dysentery; Verse 8 then tells us, “Paul went in to him and prayed, and he laid hands on him and healed him.”

Hear me! I’m not calling attention to an AWESOME MAN but to an AWESOME GOD! I’m not writing this to BRAG ON PAUL but to BLESS THE LORD! And I’m not writing this just to elevate our Lord but to EXALT HIM! Jesus met Paul, Jesus converted Paul, Jesus called Paul, Jesus gave him a new heart, Jesus crowned him with a precious ministry, Jesus gave him great compassion, Jesus anointed him with the Holy Spirit, AND JESUS INSPIRED PAUL’S PRAYER LIFE! “Behold, HE IS PRAYING!”

SECOND, HOLY PRAYING IS PRAYER THAT COMES FROM THE CHRIST –LIKE EXAMPLE OF CHOICE! JESUS HIMSELF CHOSE TO PRAY! Never forget Philippians 2:5-8a, “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus…who being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God…but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a servant, AND COMING IN THE LIKENESS OF MEN…but being found in appearance as a man, HE HUMBLED HIMSELF AND BECAME OBEDIENT…” to whatever Father-God told Him to do!

NOW…you understand that the Scriptures are TRUE and TO THE POINT! Romans 3:11 says, “There is none who seeks after God…THEY HAVE ALL GONE OUT OF THE WAY…” ALL BUT JESUS! Luke 2:40 says, “And the Child grew and became strong in spirit, filled with wisdom; and the grace of God was upon Him.” YOU DON’T BECOME STRONG IN SPIRIT WHILE BEING WEAK OR VOID OF A PRAYER LIFE! Filled with wisdom means a life that talks to God, listens, and does what He tells you!

Luke 3:21-22 says, “…Jesus also was baptized; and WHILE HE PRAYED, the heaven was opened…And the Holy Spirit descended in bodily form like a dove upon Him, and a voice came from heaven which said, ‘YOU are My beloved Son; in YOU, I am well-pleased.”

Well=pleased because He IS God’s Son, but God was also pleased because His beloved Son prays! Mark 1:35 says, “Now in the morning, having risen a long while before daylight, He (Jesus) went out and departed to a solitary place; AND THERE HE PRAYED.” Luke 5:18 says, “So He Himself often withdrew into the wilderness and prayed.”

Luke 9:29 says, “And as He prayed, the appearance of His face was altered, and His robe became white and glistening.” Luke 22:32 tells us that Jesus said to Peter, “I have prayed for you that your faith will not fail…” Do you remember that agonizing time in Gethsemane? Luke 22:41-42, “And He was withdrawn from the disciples about a stone’s throw, and HE KNELT DOWN AND PRAYED:…Father, if it is Your will, remove this cup from Me; NEVERTHELESS NOT MY WILL, BUT YOURS, BE DONE!”

Even as He died, in Luke 23:46 we read, “And when Jesus had cried out with a loud voice, He said, ‘Father, into Your hands I commend My Spirit.” Twice Jesus said: “I can do nothing of Myself”, a choice to be true to the Father’s Word, the assignment, the calling only of Father-God! In fact, in John 5:19 we read: “Most assuredly, I say to you, THE SON CAN DO NOTHING OF HIMSELF, BUT WHAT HE SEES THE FATHER DO…”

And receive Jesus’ words in John 12:49! “For I have not spoken on My own authority; but the Father who sent Me gave a command, what I should say and what I should speak.”

Do you receive it? Jesus says: “I don’t do anything I don’t see the Father doing. I don’t say anything I don’t hear the Father say.” How did He KNOW? They communed in prayer! The Lord Jesus willingly made a choice – He PRAYED TO THE FATHER AND ASKED HIS WILL, HIS WORD, HIS DIRECTION, HIS MISSION FOR HIS LIFE ON EARTH as God’s Son!

THIRD, HOLY PRAYING IS PRAYER THAT COMES FROM THE DYNAMIC NEED OF DIVINE COUNSEL! Do you remember Acts 9:6? Paul said, “Lord, what do You want me to do?” The disciples had asked the Lord to teach them to pray. And as He ended that teaching, that foundational, that basic prayer, He taught them in Matthew 6:10, “Your kingdom come, Your will be done in earth as it is in Heaven.”

In Psalm 143:10 the psalmist prayed: Teach me to do Your will; for You are my God; Your spirit is good; LEAD ME IN THE LAND OF UPRIGHTNESS…”. YOU UNDERSTAND THAT THE BLESSED MAN IS NOT THE MAN WALKING IN THE COUNSEL OF THE UNGODLY BUT WALKING IN THE COUNSEL OF GOD!! Psalm 33:11 says, “The counsel of the Lord stands forever, the plans of His heart to all generations.” [Isn’t it sad, sorrowful, heart-breaking that the “one nation under God is fast becoming the nation of many ‘gods’?].

Jeremiah’s day, like Elijah’s, was a day of false prophesy. In Jeremiah 23:16-17 the Lord spoke, THUS SAYS THE LORD, “Do not listen to the words of the prophets who prophesy to you. They make you worthless; they speak a vision of their own hearts, not from the mouth of the Lord…They continually say to those who despise Me, The Lord has said, You shall have peace…And to everyone who walks according to the imagination of his own heart, No Evil Shall Come Upon You…For who has stood in the counsel of the Lord, and has perceived and heard His Word? WHO HAS MARKED HIS WORD AND HEARD IT?”

Do you sense within your own life the dynamic, even the desperateness, of hearing the divine counsel of our Lord? To the Ephesians Paul said (Ephesians 1:11) that God had “predestined (us) according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to THE COUNSEL OF HIS WILL.” But do you want to know those who wandered in the wilderness and died? Psalm 107:10-15 tells us! It says: “Those who sat in darkness and in the shadow of death, bound in affliction and irons – Because they rebelled against the words of God, and despised the counsel of the Most High, THEREFORE He brought down their heart with labor; they fell down, and there was none to help. THEN they cried out to the Lord in their trouble, and He saved them out of their distresses. He brought them out of darkness and the shadow of death, and broke their chains in pieces. Oh, that men would give thanks to the Lord for His goodness, and for His wonderful works to the children of men!”

FOURTH, HOLY PRAYING IS PRAYER THAT COMES FROM DIVINE CONVICTION! Isn’t that what Jeremiah 33:3 produces in a seeking heart? A divine conviction birthed within one that God says, ‘Call’ – I ‘call’, AND I K NOW HE’S GOING TO ANSWER ME! In Psalm 81:7 God said, “You called in trouble, and I delivered you; I answered you in the secret place of thunder…” Oh, IT GETS BETTER! Psalm 65:5 says, “By awesome deeds in righteousness You will answer us, O God of our salvation, You who are the confidence of all the ends of the earth, and of the far-off seas.”

YOU HAVE A CONVICTION – GOD IS ABLE AND HE ANSWERS!! Spurgeon said of Paul’s prayer life: “He believed in the influence that God can have upon men’s hearts…” So he prayed and encouraged others to pray! Further, he said: “Do you not also believe that the hearts of all men are in the hands of the Lord? Do you not believe in the supremacy of the will of God over the freewill of man? Do you not rejoice that there is not only Providence that shapes our ends, but a secret influence which moulds men’s hearts?” (Spurgeon’s Sermons, Memorial Library, Vol.17, p.19).

What did Paul say to the church at Ephesus? (3:20), “Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us.” WE PRAY – GOD ANSWERS – BECAUSE HE IS ABLE!

FIFTH, PRAYING IS PRAYER THAT COMES FROM COMPELLING RESTRAINT! 2 Corinthians 5:14 says, “FOR THE LOVE OF CHRIST CONSTRAINS US…!!” The love of Christ constrains us that we should no longer live unto ourselves, but living unto Him who loved us and died for us! The love of Christ constrains us to lay down our lives as He did His. The love of Christ constrains us to ‘seek and to save that which is lost, alienated, separated from Him, the love of Christ constrains us to love one another.

In John 17:20-26 receive Christ Jesus’s prayer for every son and daughter of faith! “I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word; that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me. And the glory which You gave Me I have given them, that they may be one just as We are one; I in them, and You in Me; that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved Me. Father, I desire that they also whom You gave Me may be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory which You have given Me; for You loved Me before the foundation of the world. O righteous Father! The world has not known You, but I have known You; and these have known that You sent Me. And I have declared to them Your name, and will declare it, that the love with which You loved Me may be in them, and I in them.”

And, OH!, what compelling constraint we sense from Jesus’ prayer is, yes, to passionately PRAY TO THE FATHER AS JESUS PRAYED! He said in Verse 13, “But I come now to You, and these things I speak in the world, that they may have My joy fulfilled in themselves,” and dare I say, compels us to be prayer warriors for ourselves AND the lost and alienated from God?

The passionate desire of the Lord Jesus was for loving, praying saints! The heart-cry of our Lord was for loving servants who, Proverbs 3:5-6, “Trust in the Lord with all their hearts, and lean not to THEIR own understanding…In all their ways they acknowledge God (Knowing that) He shall direct their paths.”

SIXTH, HOLY PRAYING IS PRAYER THAT COMES FROM THE RECOGNITION OF THE CALLING OF CONTINUALLY CROWNING GOD WITH THANKSGIVING AND PRAISE! Psalm 18:3 says, “I will call upon the Lord, who is worthy to be praised; so shall I be saved from my enemies.” Psalm 100 says it like this: “Make a joyful shout to the Lord, all you lands! Serve the Lord with gladness; come before His presence with singing. Know that the Lord, He is God; it is He who has made us, and not we ourselves; we are His people and the sheep of His pasture.

Enter into His gates with thanksgiving, and into His courts with praise. Be thankful to Him, and bless His name. For the Lord is good; His mercy is everlasting, and His truth endures to all generations.”

Psalm 34:8-10 really explains why one should continually, day by day, crown the Lord with blessing, honor, and praise! It says: “Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good; BLESSED is the man who trusts in Him! Of, fear the Lord, you His saints! There IS NO WANT TO THOSE WHO FEAR HIM. The young lions lack and suffer hunger; but those who seek the Lord shall not lack any good thing.”

It was Oswald Chambers in his book, “My Utmost For His Highest,” (p.187), who wrote: “The workshop of missionary munitions is the hidden, personal, worshipping life of the saint.” And I’m sure this is why Hebrews 13:15 tells us, “Through Him then, let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise of God, that is, the FRUIT OF LIPS THAT GIVE THANKS TO HIS NAME.”

In Psalm 50:23 we read, “Whoever offers praise GLORIFIES ME; and to him who orders his conduct aright, I will show the salvation of God.” GLORY! And I must ask: As a saint set apart to the glory of God, do YOU have a hidden, personal, worshipping life?

Moses and the children of Israel had just been delivered out of Egypt. But Pharoah is on their heels with his great army. God opened the Red Sea, they went across on dry land, and then God closed the waters of death over Pharoah and his army. Receive Exodus 15:1-2! “I will sing to the Lord. For He has triumphed gloriously! The horse and its rider He has thrown into the sea…The Lord IS my strength and song, and He has become my salvation; He is my God and I will praise Him; my father’s God and I will exalt Him.” Five things to rest in:

• Prayer is praise because in our hearts we know God is our salvation.
• Prayer is praise because we have been and continually will be delivered from our enemies.
• Prayer is praise because our God has triumphed gloriously and we thank Him.
• Prayer is praise because we know He is our Father – “Our Father which is in heaven, hallowed be Your Name…Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever and ever.”
• Prayer is praise because it’s in our hearts and minds TO EXALT HIM! Never forget: God inhabits the praises of His people!!

SEVENTH, HOLY PRAYING IS PRAYER THAT COMES FROM COMMUNITY COMMUNION AND SUPPLICATIONS! Come to Romans 15:30-33 where Paul reached out to the church at Rome with an impassioned plea. Having met Christ on the Damascus Road and becoming a man of prayer, now he faced Rome and his possible death. Follow carefully:

“Now I beg you, brothers, through the Lord Jesus Christ, and love the love of the Spirit, THAT YOU STRIVE TOGETHER WITH ME IN YOUR PRAYERS TO GOD FOR ME, that I may be delivered from those in Judea who do not believe, and that my service for Jerusalem may be acceptable to the saints…that I may come to you with joy by the will of God, and may be refreshed together with you…NOW THE GOD OF PEACE BE WITH YOU ALL. AMEN.”

YOU ARE AWARE THAT ANY CHURCH HAS THE CHOICE OF LOWER LEVEL LIVING IN THE FAITH, PRAYERLESS, OR THE UPPER ROOM MINISTRY OF FAITHFUL, PASSIONATE PRAYING AND INTERCEDING, PRAISING HIM, AND CELEBRATING HIS HOLY, PRECIOUS NAME!

In Acts 1 Jesus had just told His disciples to “wait for the promise of the Father.” Verses 13-14 tell us, “And WHEN they had entered, they went up into THE UPPER ROOM…these ALL CONTINUED WITH ONE ACCORD IN PRAYER AND SUPPLICATION, with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with His brothers.” DO YOU REALIZE THE POWER OF THE CONSTANCY OF CORPORATE PRAYING?

In Acts 4 the rulers, elders, and scribes moved against the disciples. They commanded them not to speak at all nor teach in the name of Jesus. But the disciples boldly declared: “We cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard.” As they faithfully prayed, did those early disciples hear Jesus speaking to them?

Come to Verses 29-31!! THEY PRAY –TOGETHER-CORPORATELY-UNITEDLY- AS A COMMUNITY OF TRUE BELIEVERS! “Now, Lord, look on their threats, and grant to Your servants that with all boldness they may speak Your word…by stretching out Your hand to heal, and that signs and wonders may be done through the name of Your holy Servant Jesus…(Listen!)…And when they had prayed, the place where they were assembled together was shaken; and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and they spoke the Word of God with boldness!”

EIGHTH, HOLY PRAYER IS PRAYER THSAT COMES FROM THE DEEPEST CRIES OF THE HUMAN HEART IN DEPENDENCE AND TRUST IN GOD ALONE! Several Psalms passages I want to share here also: Psalm 119:145-149 first, “I cry out with my whole heart; Hear me, O Lord! I will keep Your statutes. I cry out to You; Save me, and I will keep Your testimonies. I rise before the dawning of the morning, and cry for help; I hope in Your word. My eyes are awake through the night watches, that I may meditate on Your word. My eyes are awake through the night watches, that I may meditate on Your word. Hear my voice according to Your loving kindness; O Lord, revive me according to Your justice.”

In Psalm 119:169-176 we read: “Let my cry come before You, O Lord; Give me understanding according to Your word. Let my supplication come before You; deliver me according to Your word. My lips shall utter praise, for You teach Me Your statutes. My tongue shall speak of Your word, for all Your commandments are righteousness. Let Your hand become my help, for I have chosen Your precepts. I long for Your salvation, O Lord, and Your law is my delight. Let my soul live, and it shall praise You; and let Your judgments help me. I have gone astray like a lost sheep; seek Your servant, for I do not forget Your commandments.”

In Psalm 120:1-2 we read: “In my distress I cried to the Lord, and He heard me. (He always does!). Deliver my soul, O Lord from lying lips and from a deceitful tongue.”

Hannah More wrote: “Prayer is not eloquence but earnestness; not the definition of helplessness, but the feeling of it; not figures of speech, but earnestness of soul.” It was Tennyson who wrote about “battering the gates of heaven with storms of prayer”, while, sadly, most pray sometimes a ‘light wind of words’, apart from the need of being truthful with God! But I believe there IS opening the gates of heaven with prayers of brokenness!

2 Kings 20:5-6 says, “Return and tell Hezekiah the leader of My people, THUS SAYS THE LORD, THE GOD OF DAVID YOUR FATHER, ‘I have heard your PRAYERS, I have seen your tears; surely I will heal you. On the third day you shall go up to the house of the Lord…And I WILL ADD TO YOUR DAYS 15 YEARS.” [Does ‘the third day’ represent “Resurrection Day”?].

Samuel Henry Price wrote: “The world is full of faces, black with anger, green with envy and red with shame, WHICH COULD BE MADE RADIANTLY WHITE WITH HOLINESS AND SPIRITUALITY AGLOW BY THE TRANSFIGURING POWER OF PRAYER!” I CRIED UNTO THE LORD!!

And I don’t hesitate. I urge you to pray for me in HOLY FASHION. Pray, not for a double portion of His power and anointing, but the Mighty One’s unlimited outpouring, praying for me to receive more and more of His heavenly wisdom. Pray for me to enter in to MORE OF HIM and less of me. Pray for release of Heaven’s gold that’s been hoarded to release in and through me more of His heavenly treasures and biblically wisdom. Pray for the fire in my bones. I like what Spurgeon wrote: (Spurgeon’s Sermons, Memorial Library, Vol.17,p.12), “A man cannot be charged with egotism if he begs for personal support when he is engaged in labors for others, and is not seeking himself but the success of The Great Cause.” AND YOU? WHAT IS IT OR WHO IS YOU SEEK AND PRESS INTO?

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

MAJOR HINDRANCES TO THE MINISTRY OF PRAYER

The title of this chapter suggests or implies that there can be major roadblocks in effective, redemptive prayer. Are you aware of that? Let me inform you of the meaning of the word ‘hindrance’ if you don’t already know. From Noah Webster’s 1828 Dictionary the word ‘hindrance’ means: “The act of impeding or restraining motion…impediment; that which stops progress or advance; obstruction.”

And related to major hindrances to the ministry of prayer, ‘obstruction’ by the world, the flesh, or the devil is probably what ‘blocks’ effective intercessory prayer or conversations with the Father. I Peter 3:7 is very clear when it says, “…that your prayers may not be hindered,” or obstructed, or because of indifference, just ‘set aside’ for another day!

In Revelation 5:8 the Word says, “Now when (the Lamb, the Lion of the tribe of Judah) had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders FELL DOWN BEFORE THE LAMB, each having a harp, and golden bowls of incense WHICH ARE THE PRAYERS OF THE SAINTS.”

And the prayers of the saints are precious to God. They please Him. Yet at the very same time Psalm 66:18 says, “If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear.” The word “regard” comes from a Hebrew word meaning “to see”, “to have”, “to respect”, “to approve”, “to gaze on or take heed to.” If that’s in my heart, THE LORD WILL NOT HEAR ME.

But that’s not God’s heart or desire for any of us, BUT THERE ARE SPIRITUAL LAWS ESTABLISHED BY GOD FOR A FRUITFUL WALK IN THE KINGDOM-AREA OF PRAYER, and if those laws are violated, we’ve personally chosen to exempt ourselves from conversations with God or receiving His blessings.

To the Galatians, (6:7), Paul said correctly, “Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap.” Yet in John 11:42 Jesus spoke confidently and said to the Father, “And I know that You always hear Me.” Why? Because Jesus sowed the seeds of faith and obedience, not the wild tares of unbelief and rebellion to the nature and character of God!

THE ONE THING I WANT YOU TO TAKE AWAY FOR YOURSELF IN THIS CHAPTER IS THAT THE NORMAL FOR THE TRUE DISCIPLE OF THE LORD JESUS CHRIST IS TO LIVE IN CONSTANT COMMUNION WITH GOD and to live the abundant, joyful, fruitful life of daily answered prayers.

But you know how a water-line can sometimes build up corrosion and all of a sudden the flow of fresh water is stopped. In the same way, there can come a time when one is not praying because there is a ‘blockage’. In Leviticus 26:19 God said, “I will break the pride of your power; I will make your heavens like iron and your earth like bronze.” It’s not an “open heaven” when the pathway of ‘self-reliance’ is chosen over surrender, yieldedness, and the need of God to help a person!

David said in Psalm 35:13 that he would pray, even fast, but (LISTEN!), “my prayer would return to my own bosom or heart.” Even Jeremiah, the weeping prophet, said in Lamentations 3:8-9, “Even when I cry and shout, He shuts out my prayer…He has blocked my ways with hewn stones; He has made my paths crooked.” In Verse 44 of the same chapter, Jeremiah said, “You have covered Yourself with a cloud, that prayer should not pass through.” To me, that sounds serious! To me, that’s major! And something or someone can and often does close the ‘Free-Way’ to Heaven’s heart!

It gets real serious in Isaiah 1:15 when God said to His people, “When you spread out your hands, I will hide My eyes from you; even though you make many prayers, I will not hear. YOUR HANDS ARE FULL OF BLOOD.” I don’t want our prayers to be a ‘mess’ before God; I want them going up as a MEMORIAL! I don’t want to draw near to God with my mouth only and honor Him with my lips while my heart may be far from Him, like the Pharisees – I want to be one with Him. I don’t want to trifle at the throne with ignoramus tidbits – I want to be joined in TRUTH and TRUST with the Christ of Calvary!

There’s a great old hymn I grew up on, and in the chorus it says: “Nothing between my soul and the Savior, SOTHAT His blessed face may be seen,; Nothing preventing the least of His favor, Keep the way clear! Let nothing between!” Is there something between you and Jesus? Is there a major hindrance to the effective ministry of your prayer life? The other verses of that precious old hymn says this:

“Nothing between my soul and the Savior, Naught of this world’s delusive dream; I have renounced all sinful pleasure, Jesus is mine, there’s nothing between.

Nothing between like worldly pleasure; Habits of life, tho’ harmless they seem, Must not my heart from Him ever sever – He is my all, there’s nothing between.

Nothing between, like pride or station; Self or friends shall not intervene; Tho’ it may cost me much tribulation, I am resolved, there’s nothing between.

Nothing between, even many hard trials, Tho’ the whole world against me convene; Watching with prayer and much self-denial, I’ll triumph at last, with nothing between.” How glorious is that hymn?

BUT IN THIS MOMENT, MAYBE, SOMETHING’S NOT RIGHT – and YOU know it! In this moment, is it a major blockage? In this moment have you allowed hindrances to abound? In this moment, do you sense Heaven may be closed to you? Thomas Benton Brooks wrote: “God hears no more than the heart speaks; and if the heart be dumb, God will certainly be deaf.”

Sometimes God is deaf to our cries because we treat Him like “A COSMIC BELL-BOY.” Silence comes from Heaven’s side because we’ve seen Him like our personal ‘errand-runner’! Sometimes It’s expectation apart from appreciation! Sometimes it’s even earnestness without any expression of True Faith! Sometimes it’s an infrequent or occasional impulse like an unimportant call to a duty that doesn’t have one’s heart! Sometimes it’s presumption or assuming “we know what God must do for us!” Sometimes it’s the high sounds of unceasing words seeking only to get God down to our point of view rather than submission to what we know God would have us doing! Sometimes it’s the finest of phrases, but empty, because it’s ‘heartless’ praying rather than laying hold of and freshly submitting to Who God Is!

1 Peter 3:12 says, “For the eyes of the Lord are over the righteous, and His ears are open unto their prayers: But the face of the Lord is against them that do evil.” Serious truth! [Maybe, just maybe, one should research what offends Holy God!]. Major hindrances to the ministry of prayer? Let’s look at it!!

FIRST, THE MAJOR HINDRANCE OF A DIVIDED RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN HUSBANDS AND WIVES! Examine carefully before continuing reading this chapter 1 Peter 3:1-7, noticing Verse 7, “that your prayers may not be hindered.” It is not a statement only for husbands as the first six verses are laid out to show how a wife can be the blockage to answered prayer! Certainly, sadly, both are to blame, at times, for shutting prayer out of their lives!

If you read those six verses over and over seeking to hear and understand what God is saying to the woman about why her prayers are not answered, I believe you could sum it up in one word – “REBELLION!”

Listen to Dr. John R.Rice, (Prayer, Sword of the Lord Publishers, p.281), “Rebellion is the sin of fallen angels. Rebellion is the sin which damns every Christ-rejecting sinner. Rebellion against authority is the heart of all crime, and every criminal in a penitentiary has been guilty first not of murder, nor of theft, but has been guilty first of rebellion against authority. This was the sin of the prodigal son. Rebellion is the very heart of all sin. Dear Christian wife, God says to you that if you will not be subject to your husband that your prayers are hindered.” (I just wish Dr. Rice had emphasized the same thing to husbands, because the Truth of the Word is “mutual submission”!).

But God declares through Peter that a woman’s husband is not won over by outward beauty alone, but (Listen!), Verse 4, “let it be the hidden person of the heart, with the incorruptible ornament of a gentle and quiet spirit, WHICH IS VERY PRECIOUS IN THE SIGHT OF GOD.” Steam-rolling wives do not express the Spirit of Christ! But in Peter’s unveiling of husband-wife relationships, he doesn’t mean husbands are “off the hook” because they have a rebellious wife – it just may be wives rebelling against everything their husbands are not!

Three things God says to husbands: 1) “Dwell with them with understanding,” in other words LIVE WITH YOUR WIFE ACCORDING TO THE BIBLICA TRUTH OF HEALTHY MARITAL BLISS AND BLESSING> FIND OUT, HUSBANDS, WHAT GOD EXPECTS OF YOU! 2) “Giving honor to the wife as to the weaker vessel…” It doesn’t say she Is the weaker vessel! I’ve seen many wives far beyond the “strength” of husbands in many areas. He said, “…as to the weaker vessel”; she’s like priceless china or crystal that must be carefully cared for! She’s not a flower without fragrance! She’s not a body without a mind and will! She’s not a partner without a distinct contribution to make!

Martin Luther once wrote: “Earth has nothing more tender than a woman’s heart when it is the abode of piety.” So true! Thomas Otway, in “Venice Preserved,” wrote: “O woman! Lovely woman! Nature made you to temper man: we had been brutes without you; Angels are painted fair, to look like you; There’s in you all that we believe of Heaven, Amazing brightness, purity, and truth, Eternal joy, and everlasting love.” It’s why, husbands, you give her honor and appreciation! But to keep you humble, ladies, listen to Spurgeon: “God save us all from wives who are angels in the streets, saints in the Church, and devils at home.”

3)“as being HEIRS TOGETHER of the grace of life…”. A husband takes his place as the wife takes her place. And with Joshua, because we want our prayers answered: “As for me and my house, WE WILL SERVE THE LORD.” Do you remember Ephesians 5:29? “For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, JUST AS THE LORD DOES THE CHURCH.”

Home disturbances hamper our prayer lives! Home discord disrupts effective communication with God! Home distresses call for emergency SOS’S of broken repentance so we can reach God! Home disunity muddies the waters of trying to reach out to God! Home diatribes silence the response of God! It’s SERIOUS!! “That your prayers may not be hindered.”

SECOND, THERE’S THE MAJOR HINDRANCE OF BROKEN RELATIONSHIPS OF BROTHERS IN CHRIST! Receive Matthew 5:23-24!! “Therefore if you bring your gift to the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you…leave your gift there before the altar, and go your way. First, be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift.”

Do you remember why Jesus said of Zacchaeus (Luke 18:9), “Today SALVATION HAS COME TO THIS HOUSE!!” Why did Jesus say it? Because He saw an outward demonstration of a true inward response. In Verse 8 Zacchaeus had said, “Look, Lord, I give half of my goods to the poor; and if I have taken anything from anyone by false accusation, I restore four-fold.”

In Matthew 18:15 Jesus said, “Moreover IF your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he hears you, you have gained your brother.”

Well, what else have you gained? You’ve gained the ear and attention of God! You’ve gained the overflowing heart and blessing of God who wants to do nothing but bless you. You’ve gained the help and the hand of the Almighty God!

In Philippians 2:3 Paul said, “Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, (KJV says it, ‘let nothing be done through STRIFE OR VAINGLORY), but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself.”

Now do you understand why some don’t have their prayers answered? They see themselves better than others, ‘deserve more respect’, “it’s my way come hell or high waters, hot words of a heated event and they deserved every word! ‘Wrongs are medals I wear proudly’! Grudges are golden in my scheme of things!’ Anger and revenge are justifiable attitudes in my cosmic constitution! Hatchets are so helpful in self-justification! The cost of hatred is not a high price to pay when you’ve been wronged! Injuring the offender is excusable! Slighting the one who has hurt me is sane! Indulging unforgiveness is a virtue of true manhood, not a vice! I don’t mind de-clawing the lion-hearted and extracting his teeth if he comes against me and I get my ounce of revenger – doesn’t he know who I am?”

Receive Matthew 6:14-15! “For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you…BUT IF YOU DON”T FORGIVE MEN THEIR TRESPASSES, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.” Is that clear? There can never be an ounce of misunderstanding between you and a brother if you want your prayers answered!

THIRD, LOOK AT THE MAJOR HINDRANCE OF THE STRANGLING ATTITUUDE OF UNFORGIVENESS! Matthew 6:12 says, as Jesus was teaching the disciples to pray, “And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors…” And what a classic teaching in Matthew 18:21-35! It is so life-shaking! If this passage doesn’t wake you up on your path of unforgiveness, NOTHING WILL! Read it carefully, examining whether or not you’ve held on to grudges! It says:

Then Peter came to Him (Jesus) and said, “Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? Up to seven times?” Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you, up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven. Therefore the kingdom of heaven is like a certain king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. And when he had begun to settle accounts, one was brought to him who owed him ten thousand talents. [I read in the footnotes of my KJV bible that “the talent was the largest unit of currency equivalent to approximately 6000 days’ wages.” Think of ten thousand talents with one talent 6000 days wages! It’s mind-boggling for a non-mathematician!].

But as he was not able to pay, his master commanded that he be sold, with his wife and children and all that he had, and that payment be made. The servant therefore fell down before him, saying, ‘Master, have patience with me, and I will pay you all. Then the master of that servant was moved with compassion, released him, and forgave the debt.

BUT that servant went out and found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii; and he laid hands on him and took him by the throat, saying, ‘Pay me what you owe!’ So his fellow servant fell down at his feet and begged him, saying, ‘Have patience with me and I will pay you all. And he would not, but went and threw him into prison till he should pay the debt. So when his fellow servants saw what had been done, they were very grieved, and came and told their master all that had been done. Then his master, after he had called him, said to him, ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you begged me. Should you not also have had compassion on your fellow servant, just as I had pity on you?’ And his master was angry, and delivered him to the torturers until he should pay all that was due him. SO My heavenly Father also will do to you if each of you, from his heart, does not forgive his brother his trespasses.”

No sun should ever set until you’ve forgiven every offense. No week should come to a close until you’ve willfully forgiven every wrong. No month should ever pass until there’s mending of our messes. No year should ever face its last days until yieldedness to God’s ways and will have found full fruition in a True disciple!

Mark Twain put it like this: “Forgiveness is the fragrance the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it.” One little boy repeating what he thought was the Lord’s Prayer, prayed it like this: “And forgives us our debts as we forgive those who are dead against us.” I love what James Hilton in “Time and Time Again” wrote: It’s a classic!! “If you forgive people enough you belong to them, and they to you, whether either person likes it or not – squatter’s rights of the heart.”

And when forgiveness becomes the testimony of your walk, God has exercised His squatter’s rights right in your heart! But to be unforgiving, and try to pray? It’s not that God will stammer – He’ll be silent toward you!

FOURTH, THERE IS THE MAJOR HINDRANCE OF THE ROBBING SPIRIT OF COVETOUSNESS OR GREED! In Malachi 3:6-12 we read, “For I am the Lord, I do not change; therefore you are not consumed, O sons of Jacob. Yet from the days of your fathers you have gone away from My ordinances and have not kept them. Return to Me, and I will return to you,” says the Lord of hosts. “But you said, ‘In what way shall we return?’

“Will a man rob God? Yet you have robbed Me! But you say, ‘In what way have we robbed You? In tithes and offerings. You are cursed with a curse, for you have robbed Me, even this whole nation. Bring all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be food in My house, and try Me now in this,” says the Lord of hosts, “If I will not open for you the windows of heaven and pour out for you such blessing that there will not be room enough to receive it.

And I will rebuke the devourer for your sakes, so that he will not destroy the fruit of your ground, nor shall the vine fail to bear fruit for you in the field,” says the Lord of hosts; “And all nations will call you blessed, for you will be a delightful land,” says the Lord of hosts.

And I would ask, ‘Are YOU and YOUR family, You and Your business, You and Your church ‘a fruitful nation’, or is God’s evaluation on target, so ‘the curse’ is on? And do you understand that closing one’s heart to the spirit of giving TO GOD closes God’s heart to the blessings He wants to bestow? Aren’t you aware that a covetousness man ‘never has money – it HAS him? In fact Colossians 3:5 speaks of “greed…which is IDOLATRY!” In your lifetime haven’t you witnessed the blessed disciple financially who has turned inward on himself , and what he has became a ‘curse’ rather than a blessing?

Robert South wrote that “covetousness is both the beginning and end of the devil’s alphabet – the first vice in corrupt nature that moves, and the last which dies.”

In Luke 12:15 Jesus said, “Take heed, and beware of covetousness: for a man’s life does not consist in the abundance of the things which he possesses.” How could we ever forget Achan? A long time ago I did a message entitled “The Consequences of Buried Sin.” It related to how one man’s sin of greed and covetousness withheld the blessing of God upon all His people! Receive Joshua 7:21! “When I saw among the spoils a beautiful Babylonian garment, two hundred shekels of silver, and a wedge of gold weighing fifty shekels, I COVETED THEM AND TOOK THEM. And there they are, hidden in the earth in the midst of my tent with the silver under it.”

POSSESSING OR BEING POSSESSED BY ALL THE WEALTH OF THE WORLD IS NOT WORTH HAVING TO EXPERIENCE THE SILENCE OF GOD! It’s an amazing statement when one quotes the Word that there are men who have no guilt at all in actually ‘robbing God’! Oh, one may feel secure in his selfishness withholding from God, but that ‘sense of security’ is going to fade in a flash when God arises, “I AM the same – I do not change!” Listen to this now-departed saint who once said: “…those who sing, ‘Oh, How I Love Jesus,’ but do not love Him a dime’s worth out of a dollar will not go far in their praying. If you cannot trust God to supply your need and to repay you for all the tithes and offerings you bring in to Him, you have not much faith.” Are you ‘short-changed’?

FIFTH, A MAJOR HINDRANCE OF THE DESTRUCTIVE TRACK ONE WALKS ON IS IN DISOBEDIENCE, ROTTEN REBELLION, AND A STRONG SELF-WILL! In 1 Samuel 15:22-23 we read, “Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offering and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed than the fat of rams…For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because you have rejected the word of the Lord, He also has rejected you from being king.”

I made a comment in the last teaching on prayer that the only prayer God hears from a sin-darkened heart is the cry of repentance. That hasn’t changed. I have no doubt that Saul wanted to pray to God, even with Samuel, but Samuel knew Saul’s only intent was personal honor before his people, not the honor of God alone! In fact, Verse 30 says, “I have sinned; YET HONOR ME NOW, PLEASE, BEFORE THE ELDERS OF MY PEOPLE AND BEFORE ISRAEL…” [That’s what rebellion is all about: self-interest, self-concern, self-consideration, self-domination, self-thought, self-will, self-desires, self-serving, self-seeking! Can you hear the spirit of that?

And if one prays with that attitude, what’s the end result of it? SILENCE – TOTAL SILENCE. The deafened ears of God that do not hear are overridden or closed by the stubborn heart and rebellious will because of a cemented-self-concern! Thomas Erskine wrote: “Most men are so possessed by themselves that they have no vacuum into which God’s deep water may rise.” Why did Jesus die? 2 Corinthians 5:15 says, “And He died for all, that those who live SHOULD NO LONGER LIVE FOR THEMSELVES, but for Him who died for them and rose again.” We are not living ‘for the Lord’ or ‘by Him’ when we’re so consumed with ourselves even when we pray!

SIXTH, ALSO THERE IS THE MAJOR HINDRANCE OF THE ADVERSE ACTION OF ALWAYS ASKING AMISS! Never forget James 4:1-3!! “Where do wars and fights come from among you? Do they not come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members?…You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask…You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures.”

“Amiss”? It comes from a root word, (LISTEN!), diseased, evil, grievously, miserably, sick, sore!!” But then we read in Psalm 2:8 where God said, “”ASK OF ME, and I will give you the nations for Your inheritance, and the ends of the earth for Your possession.”

Just think of the contrast between the heart of God and His desire to bless AND the heart of a man, even in asking God to help him build his own miserable kingdom of flesh, personal pleasures, and a sick ‘sin-centered ego’. It will help you understand why Jesus said what He did in Matthew 21:13! :My house shall be called a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of thieves.”

Fenelon once wrote: “To pray…is to desire, but it is to desire what God would have us desire. He who desires not from the bottom of his heart, offers a deceitful prayer.” And I would add, “who desires, not from the bottom of God’s heart, offers a deceitful prayer.”

SEVENTH, THERE IS THE MAJOR HINDRANCE OF THE DEADENING DOUBT OF A DIVIDED HEART! James 1:6-8 says, “But let him ask in faith, with No Doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind…let not that man suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord;—He Is a Double-minded Man, unstable in all his ways.”

Let me give you two statements by anonymous writers: 1) “Doubt digs the grave of faith.” It’s why Jesus, in Matthew 14:31, said to Peter, “O you of little faith, WHY did you doubt?” Jesus was saying, ‘Why doubt?’ Even if you are sinking – I’m here!

2)”Doubters invert the metaphor and insist that they need faith as big as a mountain in order to move a mustard seed.” Isn’t that so often true? Do we really believe nothing is impossible with God? Do we really believe that He is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all we ask or think?

Spurgeon preached: “It is never worthwhile to make rents in a garment for the sake of mending them, nor to create doubts in order to show how cleverly we can quiet them.”

Doubt in a divided heart is tyranny against God! Doubt in a divided heart is a cruel taskmaster! Doubt in a divided heart is another expression of cowardice – fearful to stand! Doubt in a divided heart is ‘self-burial’ in a rotting grave! Doubt in a divided heart is the present hell of a human soul intensifying hell’s control as one yields to ‘flesh’ and not the Spirit and the Word of God!

Soren Kierkegaard put it like this: “The method which begins by doubting in order to philosophize is just as suited to its purpose as making a soldier lie down in a heap in order to teach him to stand up straight!”

I don’t want to live in doubt – I want to live in faith! I don’t want to live in fear – I want to live in trust! I don’t want to live in unbelief – I want to live in THE confidence and assurance that I know Whom I have believed, and I AM persuaded that He is able – whatever – He is able!

EIGHTH, ALSO EXAMINE THE MAJOR HINDRANCE OF DEAFENED EARS THAT CAN SO EASILY AND CONVENIENTLY NEGLECT MERCY! Proverbs 21:13 says, “Whosoever shuts his ears to the cry of the poor will also cry himself and not be heard.” Is that plain? Is that clear? Is there understandable?

In Zechariah 7 the Lord had been talking about showing mercy and compassion, not oppressing the widow or the fatherless or the alien or the poor or your own brother. But His people “refused to heed, shrugged their shoulders, and stopped their ears so that they could not hear.” Verse 13, “Therefore it happened, that just as God proclaimed and they would not hear (the cries of the needy), so THEY CALLED OUT AND I WOULD NOT LISTEN, says the Lord of hosts.”

In Matthew 25:41-46 we read: “Then He will also say to those on the left hand, ‘Depart from Me, you cursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels; for I was hungry and you gave Me no food; I was thirsty and you gave Me no drink; I was a stranger and you did not take Me in, naked and you did not clothe Me, sick and in prison and you did not visit Me.” Then they will answer Him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to You?’ Then He will answer them, saying, Assuredly, I say to you, inasmuch as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me. And these will go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

NINTH, THERE CAN BE DEAFENED EARS TO THE WORD OF GOD! Oh, Proverbs 28:9 is a shocker! It says, “One who turns away his ear from hearing (God’s Word) the law, EVEN HIS PRAYER SHALL BE AN ABOMINATION.” But what is the opposite of that? Psalm 1:1-3 says, “Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stands in the path of sinners, nor sits in the seat of the scornful; But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in His law he meditates day and night. He shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that brings forth its fruit in its season, whose leaf shall not wither; and whatever he does shall prosper.

Jesus challenged us in John 15:7 when He said, “Abide in Me, AND My words abide in you, you shall ask what you will, and it shall be done unto you.” And so, I ask, “How are you ever going to please God IF you have no pleasure in the power of His Word? What did Jeremiah say? “Your words were found and they became the joy and rejoicing of my heart”, but for a man who SHUNS God’s Word? SILENCE FROM THE THRONE OF GOD!

TENTH! CONSIDER LASTLY THE MAJOR HINDRANCE OF UNCONFESSED SIN THAT CLOSES HEAVEN’S GATES! You know what it says! Psalm 66:18, “If I regard iniquity in my heart, THE LORD WILL NOT HEAR.” Receive Dr. John R. Rice’s word! “…it is not primarily the fact of sin, but it is a love for sin, a willingness to sin, an excusing of sin that make it so God cannot answer our prayers.” He’s right on target!

God also says in 2 Chronicles 7:14, “If My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and SEEK MY FACE, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.” Some say, ‘Is there a New Testament word for His people’? 1 John 1:9 says, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

Isaac Watts and R.E. Hudson nailed it strongly in their hymn “AT THE CROSS”! It’s in my old “The Broadman Hymnal” of 1940 published by the Broadman Press, Nashville, Tenn.). It says: “Alas and did my Savior bleed? And did my Sovereign die? Would He devote that sacred head For such a worm as I?

Was it for crimes that I have done, He groaned upon the tree? Amazing pity! Grace unknown! And love beyond degree!

But drops of grief can ne’er repay The debt of love I owe: Here, Lord, I give myself away (To You, Lord!), It’s all that I can do! [AND THAT’S SO TRUE! FOR YOU, TOO?]

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

THE AFFIRMATION TO ASPIRATIONS

The biblical text for this chapter is 1 Timothy 3:1! “This is a faithful saying: If a man desires the position of a bishop (and I add: pastor, overseer, faithful servant!), he desires a good work.” And shouldn’t we include parental ministry, home oversight, business eldership, school maintenance, or also, how about team sports?

I’m convinced John Greenleaf Whittier’s words should serve us well as seekers of divine will, heavenly calling, and fruitful ministries! He wrote: “In simple trust like theirs who heard beside the Syrian Sea The gracious calling of the Lord, Let us, like them, without a word, Rise up and follow Him!” That’s an ordained path! But, I think, you’ll find many “followers” who’ll begin to call themselves ‘followers of Christ’, except when they read something about Christ’s obedient testimony as a Son before Holy God! In Luke 2:49-52 we have an awesome testimony of “the affirmation to aspirations! It says:

And Jesus said to them, “Why did you seek Me? Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business?” But they did not understand the statement which He spoke to them. Then He went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was subject to them, but His mother kept all these things in her heart. And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men.

Did the Lord Jesus Christ, Son of Man AND Son of God, ever have a doubt as to His eternal purpose? Didn’t Christ Jesus declare, “I didn’t come to be served, but to serve and to give My life a ransom for many”? (Matthew 20:28!) And, of course, there are those who consider themselves “the spiritual elite”, but have no desire to be a “foot-washer” like Christ Jesus!

The Random House Collegiate Dictionary of 1975 (Revised Edition) defines ‘aspiration’ as: “strong desire, longing, or aim, and even aspiring (or longing for).” Affirmation? The Dictionary I just mentioned defines ‘affirmation’ as ‘the act of affirming, a confirmation or ratification,’ which I see as a declaration of Truth! But some “affirm” with no intention of being ‘fully submitted’ to Christ’s Lordship, but assume ‘acquaintance’ is “the affirmation to aspirations” when Christ Jesus clearly says, “Why do you call Me ‘Lord, Lord’ but you do not do what I say!”

This is why George Eliot once said, “It is vain thought to flee from the work that God appoints us, for the sake of finding a greater blessing, instead of seeking it where alone it is to be found – in loving obedience.” And this thought highlights our FIRST POINT: THE AFFIRMATION TO ASPIRATION OF LEADERSHIP IS A GOOD AND GODLY DESIRE! Christ Jesus led by example as “servant of all!” And that ambition should be true of every man, husband, father, business owner, or employee! He, Christ Jesus, extends Himself through a bought, purchased, blood-washed, yielding vessel!

And I’m sure you understand that there is such a vast difference between fleshly ambition and the aspiration to be or do whatever God desires for your life. AN ASPIRATION OF LEADERSHIP WITHOUT A WILLFUL CRUCIFIXION OF SELF-GLORY BECOMES NOTHING MORE THAN A CORONATION TO VAINNESS AND SELF-IMPORTANCE. The aspiration of leadership or witness that honors God is NOT CARNAL AMBITION BUT SPIRIT-ANOINTED PASSION TO BE THE VESSEL THROUGH WHICH CHRIST EXTENDS HIMSELF, SHARES HIS LOVE, AND PROVES HIS PASSION – and you, ‘dead to self but alive in Christ’, get to see Him fulfill His ‘business’ through you! Glory!

Spiritual aspiration is not the best efforts of fallen flesh but redeemed, “blood-bought” men and women aflame in the fires of Holy Ghost anointing! Spiritual aspiration is not based on how many servants I have in the little kingdom I’m building, but the number I serve because I’ve given myself to them as a poured out drink offering. Spiritual aspiration is not an unsatisfied thirst for power and prominence, but a satisfied thirst for meeting other’s needs expecting nothing in return!

Spiritual aspiration is not a consideration for a place of rank or title but a passion to see that Christ is uplifted and honored as I bow at the feet of others TO DO AS CHRIST DID AND STILL DOES THROUGH YOU!

Oswald Chambers, in “Spiritual Leadership,” (p.16), made a powerful statement about the need of the church: “The overriding need of the church, if it is to discharge its obligation to the rising generation, is for a leadership that is authoritative, spiritual and sacrificial”…(Listen!)… Authoritative, because people love to be led by one who knows where he is going and who inspires confidence. They follow almost without question the man who shows himself wise and strong, who adheres to what he believes…Spiritual, because a leadership that is unspiritual, that can be fully explained in terms of the natural, although ever so attractive and competent, will only result in sterility and moral and spiritual bankruptcy…Sacrificial, because modeled on the life of the One who gave Himself a sacrifice for the whole world, who left us an example that we shall follow His steps.”

Always remember what Jesus said about the essence of true leadership, Matthew 20:25-28: “But Jesus called them to Himself and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them. Yet it shall not be so among you; but whoever desires to become great among you, let him be your servant. And whoever desires to be first among you, let him be your slave – just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.”

SECOND POINT: THE AFFIRMATION TO THE ASPIRATION OF THE PLEASURE OF GOD: Receive 1 Thessalonians 4:1, “Finally, then, brethren, we urge and exhort in the Lord Jesus that you should abound more and more, just as you received from us, how you ought to walk and to please God.” To the Galatians Paul made it even clearer: Galatians 1:10, “For do I now persuade men or God? Or do I seek to please men? For if I still pleased men, I would not be a bondservant of Christ.”

Do you realize how foreign a concept this is to fallen humanity? The whole bent of most folks is the approval of men more than the approval of God! Receive Romans 15:1-3! “We then who are strong ought to bear the scruples of the weak, and not to please ourselves. Let each of us please his neighbor for his good, leading to edification. For even Christ did not please Himself; but as it is written “THE REPROACHES OF THOSE WHO REPROACHED YOU (GOD) FELL ON ME.”

This is why Paul strongly affirms “SPIRIT-ANOINTED- LIVING” in Romans 8, Verse 8, “So that, those who are in the flesh cannot please God.” SPIRIT-ANOINTED LIVING ia taking willfully, daily, that SENTENCE OF DEATH UNTO OURSELVES THAT THE RESURRECTION LIFE OF CHRIST MAY BE MANIFESTED IN OUR MORTAL FLESH!

John 8:29, Jesus speaking, lays out for us His eternal example of ‘the good and faithful servant.’ He said: “And He who sent Me is with Me. The Father has not left Me alone, for I ALWAYS do those things that please Him.” I’m going to tell you that 1 Samuel 12:22 ought to ‘rattle the rafters’ of your redeemed life! It says: “For the Lord will not forsake His people, for His great name’s sake, BECAUSE IT HAS PLEASED THE LORD TO MAKE YOU HIS PEOPLE!”

Are you the possessor of a white-hot affection to please God? And that white-hot affection to please God is always because of God’s Grace and Mercy which far too many professing believers have misinterpreted as “grease” – just sliding into heaven doing the same things the Devil got kicked out for!

True grace is so much more than “Pardon” – it’s power! In 2 Thessalonians 1:11-12 Paul wrote: “Therefore we also pray always for you that our God would count you worthy to this calling, and fulfill all the good pleasure of His goodness and the work of faith with power. That the name of our Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified in you, and you in Him,(Listen!), according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ!”

Grace that is power? Titus 2:11-14 says: “For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men TEACHING US THAT, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present age, looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself His own special people, zealous for good works.”

I absolutely love the truth John Piper wrote when he said: “We are His pleasure when He is our treasure.” (“The Pleasures of God,” Multonomah Publishers, Sisters, Or., 97759, p.250). We’re no “Ivory Tower” inhabitants, but initiated trustees of the inspired truth that, that which truly pleases God is, a life laid down in the sacrificial spirit of His Son and our Savior.

In Isaiah 55:11 God spoke! “So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth. It shall not return to Me void, but it shall accomplish what I please and it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it.” ARE YOU ‘PROSPERING’ IN THE SPIRIT BECAUSE OF YOUR PASSION TO PLEASE GOD?

THIRD POINT: THERE IS THE AFFIRMATION OF ASPIRATION TO THE ASCENT TO HEAVENLY LIVING! And I’m not talking about wanting to die so you can go to heaven, but the passion of your soul to see Heaven in your life! Look with me at Psalm 37:4! “Delight yourself also in the Lord, and He shall give you the desires of your heart.”

Do you remember those ‘heroes of the faith’ in Hebrews 11? Verse 16 says, “But not they desire a better, that is, a Heavenly country…Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for He has prepared a city for them.” And do YOU realize that it’s God’s eternal desire to make your heart His home, establishing His Holy Presence IN YOU?

When you’re pressed by the flesh-nature, you’re asking, “Is there anything of the spiritual real of my life worth living for or dying for? When you know your “life is a vapor that appears briefly and the vanishes away”, one ought to be asking, “Is there anything of eternal significance?” – OR at least YOU OUGHT TO BE ASKING THAT! When you become aware of how infantile, fleeting, and unimportant your fleshly thoughts are, you’re probably asking “What is there of value to renew my mind and set my eternal course and destiny? When you see the downgrading, the degradation, the dark side of a “Brittany Spears”, you begin asking yourself, “Is there a better reflection in life to live out before my world?”

Receive Colossians 3:1-4! “If then you were raised with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. Set your mind on things above, not on things of the earth. For you died (did you? Do you see yourself ‘crucified with Christ?’), and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is our life appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory.”

Many years ago in a church I pastored someone came with a broken heart. “Pastor, you know ‘so and so’ is a leader among our youth but she’s fast gaining the reputation of being promiscuous and I’m really concerned for her, for our youth, but most of all the cause of Christ since she’s so vocal about her ‘faith’.” I told them, “I’m glad you came. I’ll reach out to her.”

I asked her to come by my office for a visit. And when she did I told her of her fast-growing reputation that was not good. I asked her, “When you gave your heart to Christ did you believe that didn’t include your glands…do you not know that you’re fast becoming like a ‘tackling dummy’ on an athletic field that boys like to hit on or…do you not realize God means you to be a jewel, a royal treasure, a holy gift of the husband He’s picked out for you?” And she broke own and wept and sobbed and repented and gave her heart, mind, will, and glands to God! Her reputation changed and she became a glowing witness of the Lord Jesus Christ!

Life is made of choices: The glory of God or the goriness of a mangled, messed-up, self-inflicted sick life? The blessing of God or the curse of the fallen sin-nature? Eternal values or the wreck and recklessness of a misspent life?

I so love what William Cullen Bryant wrote: “So live that when your summons comes to join the innumerable caravan which moves…to that mysterious realm where each shall take his chamber in the silent halls of death…You go not, like the quarry-slave at night, scourged to his dungeon, but sustained and soothed…By an unfaltering TRUST, approach your grave like one that wraps the drapery of his couch about him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.”

Isn’t it sad that so many do not lie down to pleasant dreams but nightmares because there was or is no aspiration of the ascent to Heavenly Living?

FOURTH: THERE IS THE AFFIRMATION OF ASPIRATION TO THE APPROPRIATION AND ASSIMILATION OF YOUR GOD-APPOINTED AND GOD-ANOINTED SPIRITUAL GIFT AND MINISTRY! 1 Corinthians 14:1 says, “Pursue love, and desire spiritual gifts, but especially that you may prophesy.” A prophetic ministry, yes, to a godless society around you? Did Paul say, “…desire spiritual gifts…”? It ought to be an all-consuming passion that through the Word and the Spirit YOU discover the spiritual motivation and direction of your life AS DEFINED BY GOD HIMSELF! Look at 1 Corinthians 12:11! “But one and the same Spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually as He wills.”

How vital, how inspiring, how fulfilling, how challenging AND informative do you find Colossians 1:24-29? “I now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up in my flesh what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ, for the sake of His body, which is the church, of which I became a minister according to the stewardship from God which was given to me for you, to fulfill the word of God, the mystery which has been hidden from ages and from generations, but now has been revealed to His saints. To them God willed to make known what are the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles which is CHRIST IN YOU, the hope of glory. Him we preach, warning every man and teaching every man in all wisdom, that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus. To this end I also labor, striving according to HIS WORKING which works in me mightily.”

It was a thrilling statement Elizabeth Barrett Browning made many years ago! (Sonnets from the Portuguese, Number 26), “God’s gifts put man’s dreams to shame.” Yet many Christians are unaware of God’s giftings and seek to manufacture their own interpretation of what Christ would have them be and do!

Examine 1 Corinthians 12:7-10, 18-31:”But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to each one for the profit of all: for to one is given the word of wisdom through the Spirit, to another the word of knowledge through the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healings by the same Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another discerning of spirits, to another different kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. Verses 18-31, But now God has set the members, each one of them, in the body just as He pleased. And if they were all one member, where would the body be? But now indeed there are many members, yet one body. And the eye cannot say to the hand, ‘I have no need of you’, nor again the head to the feet, ‘I have no need of you.’ No, much rather, those members of the body which seem to be weaker are necessary. And those members of the body which we think to be less honorable, on these we bestow greater honor; and our unpresentable parts have greater modesty, but our presentable parts have no need. But God composed the body, having given greater honor to that part which lacks it, that there should be no schism in the body, but that the members should have the same care for one another. And if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it; or if one member is honored, all the members rejoice with it. NOW you are the body of Christ, and members individually. And God has appointed these in the church: first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, after that miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, administrations, varieties of tongues. Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Are all workers of miracles? Do all have gifts of healings? Do all interpret? But earnestly desire the best gifts. And yet I show you a more excellent way.”

Chuck Swindoll, in his writing, “The Quest For Character,” (p.146) wrote: “Marbles or grapes, which will it be? Every congregation has a choice. You can choose to be a bag of marbles…independent, hard, loud, unmarked, and unaffected by others. Or you can be a bunch of grapes…fragrant, soft, blending, mingling, flowing into one another’s lives. Marbles are made to be counted and kept. Grapes are made to be bruised and used. Marbles scar and clank. Grapes yield and cling!” So true! Grapes make sweet wine – marbles bang around and make noise! What’s your life made of? Loud marbles or sweet wine?

FIFTH, WE’LL EXAMINE AFFIRMATION OF ASPIRATION TO AN ARRIVAL OF BEING WHERE AND WHAT GOD WANTS ME TO BE! Romans 15:22-24, 29, 32 says: “For this reason I also have been much hindered from coming to you. But now no longer having a place in these parts, and having a great desire these many years to come to you, whenever I journey to Spain, I shall come to you. For I hope to see you on my journey, and to be helped on my way there by you, if first I may enjoy your company for a while Verse 29, But I know that when I come to you, I shall come in the fullness of the blessing of the gospel of Christ, Verse 32, that I may come to you with joy by the will of God, and may be refreshed together with you.”

Galatians 4:4 is also so uplifting and encouraging when Paul said, “But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law, Verse 5, to redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.” Does ‘son or daughter of God’ intensify your love for and devotion to God’s intent for your life to be ‘the temple of His Holy Presence through Christ Jesus’?

GOD SENT FORTH HIS SON – right time, right place, right purpose! Listen to Jesus’ response in John 4:34 – “My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me, and to finish His work.” What is the “food” that you’re partaking of? The “food” of self-will or the “food” of the Master’s will? In John 5:30 Jesus said, “I can of Myself do nothing…I do not seek My own will but the will of the Father who sent Me.” Then, in John 6:36, Jesus said, “For I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me.” And He said in John 10:18, “No one takes (My life) from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again.”

Do YOU understand the Gospel? Do you receive “adoption as sons”? Do you see walking on the basis of divine will – not fleshly likes and dislikes? Can you really say, “Your kingdom come, Your will be done on earth, in my life, through Your sovereignly prescribed and gracious provision of Resurrection Life through Jesus, gracing me with His Life, His Purpose, His Plan of touching His world through His amazing love and eternal act of mercy through the Cross, with me taking His cross into my life as if I become anew Golgotha’s hill and His abode of Resurrection Presence? William Shakespeare, in Henry VIII, (Act 3, scene 2, line 456) wrote: “Had I but served God with half the zeal I served my king, He would not in mine age have left me naked to mine enemies.” Oh, how much truth is in that poetry? Many serve themselves about where they’re going to be and what they’re going to do, rather than the will of God – and as a result, go “un-dressed” in one’s own way wherever “I” want to be, not knowing, before God, the faithless one has been stripped naked! Proverbs 16:7 says, “When a man’s ways please the Lord, He makes even his enemies to be at peace with him.” Is your heart-cry, “Lord, I want to be exactly where You place me, want me, where I honor only You?”

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

PERVERTED GRACE OR PERFECTING GRACE?

Barclay gave us an interesting translation of Jude 3-4 when he wrote: “For certain men have wormed their way into the church – long before this they were designated for judgment – impious creatures they are – who twist the grace of God into a justification of blatant immorality, and who deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.”

And when I read that, I saw the two camps of the false and true devotions, some to the dark cloud of perverted grace but others to the light of perfecting grace! Receiving a ‘twisted, perverted grace’ is the doorway to Hell itself, but true grace is, yes, the wide-open door to “new-birth in Christ” and an eternal home forever in His eternal temple or tabernacle!

One is either being deceived by a ‘cheap grace’ or is enlightened by “costly grace”! One is either walking in danger today with a ‘trifling grace’ or one walks in the blessed assurance and confidence with the treasures of “Amazing Grace” because he/she left all to follow Jesus!

Perverted grace allows compromise in ‘so-called’ Christians so one can maintain his/her fleshly, sinful, lustful, do-your-own thing ‘life’ (?) because, under their ‘grace’ which I call ‘grease’, they feel ‘justified’ in maintaining their fleshly desires, ambitions, and worldly acceptance of worldly friends! But perfecting grace is a ‘completing’ grace that, yes, demands we walk in Christ’s way, dying to the flesh and the old sin nature daily with power and victory because through repentance toward God and faith in Christ’s finished work alone one becomes “partakers of the divine nature.”

You do understand, you are aware, you are alert to the fact that there are those who “turn the grace of God into licentiousness”! In the Random House College Dictionary (Revised Edition, 1975 by Random House Inc.0 ‘licentiousness’ is defined as “sexually unrestrained, lewd, unrestrained by law or morality, lawless, immoral, going beyond customary or proper bounds or limits.” And, of course, you are aware of more than licentious, immoral sexual behavior, but even the reality of licentious spiritual behavior. No doubt this is what James wrote about when in James 4:4 he said, “Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God?”

Is there an expectation of judgment from one’s surrender to ‘perverted grace’ and its consequence? In Hebrews 10:29-31 we read, “Of how much worse punishment, do you suppose, will he be thought worthy who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, counted the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified a common thing, and insulted the Spirit of grace? For we know Him who said, “Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,” says the Lord. And again, “The Lord will judge His people.” It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.” But, thank God, one can be enlightened, convicted, turning from his/her wicked ways, repenting and resting in Jesus Only!

Before I take you to about ten truths on “perfecting grace”, I want to lay a strong foundation from Romans 6:15-23! It says: “What then? SHALL WE SIN BECAUSE WE ARE NOT UNDER LAW BUT UNDER GRACE? Certainly not! Do you not know that to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey, you are that one’s slaves whom you obey, whether of sin leading to death, or of obedience leading to righteousness? But God be thanked that THOUGH YOU WERE SLAVES OF SIN, yet you obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine to which YOU WERE DELIVERED. And having been set free from sin, YOU BECAME SLAVES OF RIGHTEOUSNESS. I speak in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh. For just as you presented your members as slaves on uncleanness, and of lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves of righteousness for holiness. For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. What fruit did you have then in the things of which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death. BUT NOW having been set free from sin, and having become slaves of God, you have your fruit to holiness, and the end, everlasting life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

FIRST, PERFECTING GRACE IS THE GRACE THAT UNVEILS THE CRUCIFIED CHRIST AND BRINGS MOURNING, SORROW, HEART-BREAK OVER WHAT YOUR SIN COST JESUS! In Zechariah 12:10-11a we read: “And I will pour on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem (Bedford, Texas, Cleveland, Tennessee, New York City, San Francisco, Ca., Brazil, Europe, Asia) the Spirit of grace and supplication; then they will look on Me whom they pierced. Yes, they will mourn for Him as one grieves for a firstborn. In that day there shall be great mourning….”

Dare I tell you that I’m not sure if the ‘majority’ of the church in America knows ANYTHING about “a great mourning over sin and its consequence of the Crucified Christ!” But in Ephesians 2:7-10 Paul wrote: “…that in the ages to come He (God of mercy) might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the GIFT OF GOD, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which GOD PREPARED BEFOREHAND that we should walk in them.”

Hebrews 2:9 is just as clear! “But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, that He, by the grace of God, might taste death for everyone.”

SECOND, PERFECTING GRACE IS SAVING GRACE THAT BRINGS AND BLESSES ONE WITH THE FORGIVENESS OF SINS! Ephesians 1:7-8 tells us, “In Him (in Christ Jesus) we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace which He made to abound toward us in all wisdom and prudence…”

Do you remember Christ Jesus instituting the “Lord’s Supper” in Matthew 26:26-29? And as they were eating, Jesus took bread and broke it, and gave it to the disciples and said, “Take eat, this is My body.” Then He took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, “Drink from it, all of you. For this is My blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the remission of sins. But I say to you, I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it new with you in My Father’s kingdom.”

I’m sure that you remember John the Baptist’s introduction to God’s “Amazing Grace” through the sacrifice of His Son and our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. In Luke 1:76-79 John the Baptist received Zacharias’ prophecy! “And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Highest; for you will go before the face of the Lord to prepare His ways, to give knowledge of salvation to His people BY THE REMISSION OF THEIR SINS, Through the tender mercy of our God, with which the Dayspring from on high has visited us; To give light to those who sit in darkness and the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.” Glory!

Didn’t the beloved John say in 1 John 2:2, “And He Himself (Jesus Christ the righteous!) is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the whole world.” Jesus’ death has brought forgiveness for every man’s sin? Absolutely! But it doesn’t mean they’ve been reconciled to God because most will accept forgiveness but reject Christ as Lord of their lives! In 1 Timothy 4:10 Paul wrote to Timothy saying, “For to this end we both labor and suffer reproach, because we trust in the living God, who is the Savior of all men, especially of those who believe (or trust in, rely upon, adhere to!).”

THIRD, PERFECTING GRACE IS ‘INSTRUCTING GRACE’ THAT CALLS GOD’S TRUE SONS TO HOLY LIVING! And I can assure you most of the “professors of faith” will accept ‘forgiveness’ apart from declaring Jesus as Lord of their lives – they want to be forgiven but not “forged” into the very image and likeness of Christ!

In Titus 2:11-15a, Paul wrote to a spiritual son in his day and for those of us thousands of years later! “For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present age, looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself HIS OWN SPECIAL PEOPLE, zealous for good works. Speak these things, exhort, and rebuke with all authority.”

Oh, but then Paul extended his message about ‘the grace of God’ applying it to the daily ministry of all true sons and daughters! In Titus 3:1-8 Paul wrote: “Remind them to be subject to rulers and authorities, TO OBEY, to be ready for every good work, to speak evil of no one, to be peaceable, gentle, showing all humility to all men. For we ourselves were also once foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving various lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another. BUT when the kindness and the love of God our Savior toward man appeared, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, THROUGH THE WASHING OF REGENERATION AND RENEWING OF THE HOLY SPIRIT, whom He poured out on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior, THAT HAVING BEEN JUSTIFIED BY HIS GRACE we should become heirs according to the hope of eternal life. This is a faithful saying, and these things I want you to affirm constantly, that those who have believed in God should be careful to maintain good works. These things are good and profitable to men.”

FOURTH, PERFECTING GRACE IS THE LABOR OF LOVE THAT CAUSES MEN TO LAY DOWN THEIR LIVES FOR OTHERS! In 1 Corinthians 15:9-11 Paul wrote: “For I am the least of the apostles, who am not worthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am, AND HIS GRACE TOWARD ME WAS NOT IN VAIN; but I labored more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me. Therefore, whether it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed.”

In Acts 4:33 Luke shares the foundation of true, victorious, successful, overcoming ministry of men like Peter and John. He wrote: “And WITH GREAT POWER the apostles gave witness to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. And great grace was upon them all.”

I’ve always in my ministry days loved, and still do, Oswald Chambers’ words in his book, “My Utmost For His Highest.” In one section he quoted Psalm 87:7 (P.B.V.), “All my fresh springs shall be in You, Lord.” Chambers then wrote: “Our Lord never patches up our natural virtues. “Put on the new man,” see that your natural human life puts on the garb that is in keeping with the new life. The life God plants in us develops its own virtues, not the virtues of Adam, but of Jesus Christ. Watch how God will wither up your confidence in natural virtues after sanctification, and in any power you have, until you learn to draw your life from the reservoir of the resurrection life of Jesus. Thank God if you are going through a drying-up experience.”

In Jeremiah 29:11-13 the Lord spoke! “For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart.” But, hear me! I’m convinced through the Word that IF one is not laying down his life for others, then he/she has settled for perverted grace, not perfecting grace!

FIFTH, PERFECTING GRACE IS COMMITMENT TO THE UNLIMITED OPPORTUNITY OF GRACE FOR EVERYONE, YES, EVEN IMPOWERMENT IN FULFILLING OUR CALLING! In Acts 11 Peter had gone up to Jerusalem to inspire how, yes, Gentiles could be saved as well as Jews. In Verses 15-17 we read, “And as I began to speak, the Holy Spirit fell upon them, as upon us at the beginning. Then I remembered the word of the Lord, how He said, “John indeed baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit.” If therefore God gave them the same gift as He gave us when we believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could withstand God?”

Now… in Verses 20-24, we see this never-changing opportunity of grace for everyone, even empowerment in fulfilling our calling! The Word says: “But some of them were men from Cyprus and Cyrene, who, when they had come up to Antioch, spoke to the Hellenists, preaching the Lord Jesus. And the hand of the Lord was with them, and a great number believed and turned to the Lord. Then mews of these things came to the ears of the church in Jerusalem, and they sent out Barnabas to go as far as Antioch. When he came and HAD SEEN THE GRACE OF GOD, he was glad, and encouraged them all that with purpose of heart they should continue with the Lord. For he was a good man, full of the Holy Spirit and of faith. And a great many people were added to the Lord.”

SIXTH, PERFECTING GRACE IS GRACE THAT GIVES WARNING AND THE CALL TO JUDGMENT! Examine Acts 13:37-43! “…but He (Jesus) whom God raised up saw no corruption. Therefore let it be known to you, brethren, that through this Man is preached to you the forgiveness of sins; and by Him everyone who believes (trusts in, relies upon, adheres to) is justified from all things from which you could not be justified by the law of Moses.

Beware therefore, lest what has been spoken in the prophets come upon you: ‘Behold, you despisers, marvel and perish! For I work a work in your days, a work which you will by no means believe, though one were to declare it to you.’ SO…when the Jews went out of the synagogue, the Gentiles begged that these words might be preached to them the next Sabbath. Now when the congregation had broken up, many of the Jews and devout proselytes followed Paul and Barnabas, who, speaking to them, persuaded them to continue in the grace of God.” Dare I ask? I believe I will! “Do you preach, teach, live by “the grace of God”?

SEVENTH, PERFECTING GRACE IS GRACE THAT LEADS US AND LEAVES US WITH THE REMNANT OF ENCOURAGEMENT! In Ezra 9:8-9 we read: “And now for a little while GRACE has been shown from the Lord our God, to leave us a remnant to escape, and to give us a peg in His holy place, that our God may enlighten our eyes and give us a measure of revival in our bondage. For we were slaves. Yet our God did not forsake us in our bondage, but He extended mercy to us…”

Are you aware that God has ‘graced’ you with His divine nature if you’ve repented of your sins and sin nature and “rested” in the finished work of Christ at the Cross? In 2 Peter 1:2-4 we discover the true foundation of redemptive faith that insures our ‘home foundation of faith’ standing, even in and through ‘the storms of life’! It says: “Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord, AS HIS DIVINE POWER HAS GIVEN TO US ALL THINGS THAT PERTAIN TO LIFE AND GODLINESS, through the knowledge of Him who called us by glory and virtue, BY WHICH HAVE BEEN GIVEN TO US EXCEEDINGLY GREAT AND PRECIOUS PROMISES, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.”

We are not “illuminated versions” of the Resurrected Christ or “cheap imitations” molded by one’s creative imagination, but through repentance and faith in Him alone, we rest in His Resurrection Life, Power, and Hope, as temples, tabernacles, and as Paul said in 1 Corinthians 3:9, “For we are God’s fellow workers; you are God’s field, you are God’s building,” saying in Verse 16, “Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?” A disciple of Jesus Christ, a true disciple, a ‘born-again’ child of the King is fitted by God as the “vessel” in which Christ Jesus resides to be Himself in that vessel touching the world He loves with His grace and mercy!

EIGHTH, PERFECTING GRACE IS GRACE THAT SAYS WHAT JESUS SAYS! Psalm 45:1-2 says it so clearly, so convincingly, so comfortingly when the psalmist “sang”, “My heart is overflowing with a good theme; I recite my composition concerning the King; my tongue is the pen of a ready writer. You (Lord Jesus) are fairer than the sons of men; Grace is poured on Your lips; Therefore God has blessed You forever.”

And certainly there is no doubt about what Paul meant when in Colossians 4:6 he wrote: “But let your speech always be with grace, seasoned with salt, that you may know how you ought to answer each one.”

In Ephesians 4:29-32 Paul instructs us further! He said: “Let no corrupt word proceed out of your mouth, but what is good for necessary edification, that it may impart grace to the hearers. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. Let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, and evil speaking be put away from you, with all malice. And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Christ forgave you.”

NINTH, PERFECTING GRACE IS REIGNING GRACE! Romans 5:20b-6:11 instructs us, “…But where sin abounded, grace abounded much more, so that as sin reigned in death, even so grace might reign through righteousness to eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 6:1-11! What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Certainly not! (May it never be!). How shall we WHO DIED TO SIN LIVE ANY LONGER IN IT? Or do you not know that as many of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.

For if we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection, KNOWING THIS, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that WE SHOULD NO LONGER BE SLAVES OF SIN. For he who has died has been freed from sin.

Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him, knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, dies no more. Death no longer has dominion over Him. FOR THE DEATH THAT HE DIED, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God. LIKEWISE YOU ALSO, RECKON YOURSELVES TO BE DEAD TO SIN, BUT ALIVE TO GOD IN CHRIST JESUS OUR LORD.” Are YOU ‘ruined’ or are YOU “reigning in and through Christ Jesus”?

TENTH AND LAST FOR THIS CHAPTER: PERFECTING GRACE IS GIFTING GRACE! In Ephesians 4:7-8 Paul tells us: “But to each one of us (in Christ) grace was given according to the measure of Christ’s gift. Therefore He says: ‘When He ascended on high, He led captivity captive, and gave gifts to men.” What an awesome declaration of Redemptive Faith and Grace! He equips us all to fulfill His continuing ministry in our world today!

There’s not a day that passes that allows us to lean on ourselves or to choose for ourselves what we think might please God the Father. How sad is that delusion? God is interested IN YOU being His chosen vessel of the “new man in Christ”! It’s clear and it’s best that you understand and comprehend that your “old man, old sin and sin-nature” was CRUCIFIED WITH CHRIST

Oswald Chambers wrote in his famous book, “My Utmost For His Highest” (p.271), “The sign that God is at work in us is that He corrupts confidence in the natural virtues, because they are not promises of what we are going to be, but remnants of what God created man to be. We will cling to the natural virtues, while all the time God is trying to get us into contact with the life of Jesus Christ which can never be described in terms of the natural virtues. It is the saddest thing to see people in the service of God depending on that which the grace of God never gave them, depending on what they have by the accident of heredity…But as we bring every bit of our bodily life into harmony with the new life which God has put in us, He will exhibit in us the virtues that were characteristic of the Lord Jesus…”And every virtue we possess IS HIS ALONE!” AMEN?

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

THE CALL TO HOLINESS

In Hebrews 12:14-17 we find a strong challenge for the peace of God and true holiness! It says: “Pursue peace with all people, and holiness, without which no one will see the Lord: looking carefully, lest anyone should fall short of the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness spring up causes trouble, and by this many become defiled; lest there be any fornicator or profane person like Esau, who for one morsel of food sold his birthright. For you know that afterward, when he wanted to inherit the blessing, he was rejected, for he found no place for repentance, though he sought it diligently with tears.”

Be assured! Holy God, before the foundation of the earth, prepared the Way for sinful men to return to Him! In Isaiah 35:8 the prophet has heard about “preparing the Way of the Lord”! He said, “a highway shall be there, and a road, and it shall be called the Highway of Holiness,” with Verse 9b saying, “But the redeemed shall walk there.” That’s the “blood-bought” purchased by the “blood of the Lamb of God!

Revelation 21 speaks about ‘the holy city, the New Jerusalem’, and most see that as a ‘last days’ location, but true kingdom living IS “the holy city, New Jerusalem, the true tabernacle of God with men, yes, Him dwelling with them, in them, through them, and they learn He’s THERE”, Revelation 21:5, sitting on His throne in the repentant heart, saying, “Behold, I make all things new”, with John saying, And He said to me, “Write, for these words are true and faithful.”

How many times does God have to say something for it to be true, to you? In 1 Peter 1:13-21 Peter is enlightening, encouraging, and hopefully empowering disciples by Biblical Truth and the Holy Spirit to live the overcoming life of holiness and godly witnessing. He said: “Therefore gird up the loins of your mind, be sober (or serious-minded!), and rest your hope fully upon the grace that is to be brought to you at the revelation (or unveiling) of Jesus Christ; as obedient children, not conforming yourselves to the former lusts, as in ignorance; but as He who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, because it is written, “Be holy, for I am holy.” (Leviticus 11:44).

And if you call on the Father, who without partiality judges according to each one’s work, conduct yourselves throughout the time of your stay here in fear; knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things, like silver or gold, from your aimless conduct received by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot. He indeed was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you who through Him believe in God, who raised Him from the dead and gave Him glory, SO THAT YOUR FAITH AND HOPE ARE IN GOD.”

Back to Hebrews 12! Especially examine Verses 14-15! “Pursue peace, follow after peace, AND holiness, without which no one will see the Lord: looking carefully lest anyone fall short of the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness springing up cause trouble, and by this many become defiled.”

“Pursuing or following after” is to be an intense pursuit with great strength and character of life. It’s a WORD PICTURE! Consider the picture of an animal stalking another animal in order to sustain life! Picture a man in the Olympics running a race, striving with every muscle of his body to win! In Luke 13:24-27 Jesus shared “striving to enter” the Kingdom of God! He said, spurred by one’s inquiry, “Lord, are there few who are saved?”

And He said to them, “Strive to enter through the narrow gate, for many, I say to you, will seek to enter and will not be able. When once the Master of the house has risen up and shut the door, and you begin to stand outside and knock at the door, saying, ‘Lord, Lord, open for us,’ and He will answer and say to you, ‘I do not know you, where you are from,’ then you will begin to say, ‘We ate and drank in Your presence, and You taught in our streets.’ But He will say, ‘I tell you I do not know you, where you are from. Depart from Me, all you workers of iniquity.’”

“Pursue peace”! In Christ, we are to be ‘peace’ creators, designers, makers, models of “the peace of God that passes all understanding!” It doesn’t say ‘blessed are those who allow peace’; it doesn’t say ‘blessed are those thank God for the possibility of peace’; BUT blessed are those who initiate peace proceedings in every situation. Are YOU a peacemaker?

“Pursue peace and “HOLINESS” without which no man will see the Lord!” So… the FIRST STRONG POINT I WANT TO MAKE IS ‘WHAT HOLINESS IS NOT!’ It’s so easy to be misled about ‘a holy life or holy walk’! There’s about 36 things I want to expose that are not ‘true holiness’!

• Holiness is not ‘following Jesus’: Judas did that and many others ‘followed’ Jesus, but they were not ‘holy people’! Oh, maybe ‘religious’ but not “re-born”! There’s a difference between ‘following’ and “following After”!
• Holiness is not ‘a profession of faith’: There are some who believe that if one makes a profession of faith that it guarantees holiness. It isn’t true In Matthew 7:21-23 Jesus said, “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord’, shall enter the kingdom of heaven, BUT HE WHO DORES THE WILL OF MY FATHER in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders if Your name?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.”
• It isn’t being ‘religious’: Saul of Tarsus was a religious man and after his conversion preached on Mars Hill in Athens and said to the Athenians: “I perceive among all men that you are most religious,” but they weren’t saved or “born-again”! ‘Religious doesn’t mean saved or holy!
• It doesn’t mean having a good and godly parentage! There was a priest in the Old Testament named Eli. He had two sons, Hophini and Phinehas. In fact those 2 sons caused the people of God under Eli to despise offerings to the Lord. Eli was godly – his sons were not! (Check 1 Samuel 3:11-14!).
• Salvation in Christ doesn’t mean religious zeal working with religious frenzy! Paul in Romans 10 speaking of some Israelites said: 10:2, “For I bear them record that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge.” The Bible declares that prophets of Baal walked about in a religious frenzy but weren’t right with God. It isn’t how high one jumps but how straight he walks when he comes down, inspired by Jesus alone! Religious intensity doesn’t mean holiness unto the Lord!
• It doesn’t mean attempting to live a morally clean life, an upright life. Do you remember the rich young ruler? Check Luke 18:18-23! “All these things I have kept from my youth up,” and Jesus didn’t rebuke him for that statement. He may well have done so, but “closeness to is not membership in the Holy Family of God! Ever you ever heard said, “That man was such a good man”? But is “goodness” the prerequisite of being “born again”?
• It doesn’t mean keeping good company: Demas kept good company. Diotrephes kept good company. Judas kept good company. 1 Corinthians 5 speaks of a member of the Corinthian church, yet he lived in incest.
• It does not mean to possess innate ability or talent: Tradition says Herod the Great had tremendous ability as an administrator, but he wasn’t holy!
• It does not mean to have a high position in religious affairs: Consider Caiaphas! High-positioned leaders at times have been exposed as “low-lives”
• It does not mean one is “holy” because he/she has a knowledge of Scripture: One could have memorized it from cover to cover, but it doesn’t Mean: “Shazam! I’m now holy!” Many of the scribes of Jesus’ day memorized the entire Old Testament, but that didn’t guarantee ‘holiness’!
• It does not mean one is holy because one knows what a great and horrible sinner he is. Many believe that and have not been “saved” or “born again”! In James 1:23-24 the brother of Jesus nailed it! He said, “For if anyone is a hearer of the Word and not a doer, he is like a man observing his natural face in a mirror; for he observes himself, goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was.”
• It does not mean one is holy because he is “sorry for my sins”: Judas was sorry for his sins, but wasn’t holy! (Matthew 27:1-5!)
• It does not mean that one is holy even if he/she admits that Jesus is the Son of God and even sinless – Pilate believed that!
• It does not mean one is holy is he joins a church and its ministries! Again, Judas did that and partook of the Lord’s Supper – but he was not saved or holy!
• It does not mean one is holy if he holds a position of leadership in the church. The world assumes that if you’re some kind of church leader, you must be some kind of virtuous person, but remember Judas was treasurer of the first church!
• It does not mean holy if one gives money to God’s works! How perilous do you find ‘stealing’ from God? In Acts 5 you’ll find Ananias and his wife Sapphira conspiring to hold back a portion of what they knew God wanted in their giving! Ananias and Sapphira both fell down dead after being confronted by Peter.
• It does not mean ‘holy working for God’! You’ve heard it said: “He’s a worker, and that could be seen as commendable, even worthy, but it doesn’t guarantee holiness! In Acts 8:17-21 we find, after the Apostles had prayed for some to receive the Holy Spirit, an interesting confrontation! Then they laid hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit. And when Simon saw that through the laying on of the apostles’ hands the Holy Spirit was given, he offered them money, saying, Give me this power also, that anyone on whom I lay my hands may receive the Holy Spirit.” But Peter said to him, “Your money perish with you, because you thought that the gift of God could be purchased with money! You have neither part nor portion in this matter, for your heart is not right in the sight of God. “
• It does not mean ‘holy’ preaching! Saul, in the Old Testament was considered a ‘prophet’, but he was not “saved”!
• It does not mean one is holy because he/she allows himself/herself to hear good sermons! Agrippa and Felix heard some of the greatest sermons ever preached but it didn’t make them holy!
• It does not mean one is holy if he/she lives in good surroundings: Adam and Eve were in a paradise but lost!
• It does not mean salvation has arrived because someone had ‘a special religious experience. Balaam, in the Old Testament, had a great religious experience. Saul, again, had a religious experience. There are those who think if they experience some mysterious, marvelous, magical experience that “I must be holy.”
• It does not mean great ecclesiastical heritage! But the Pharisees and Sadducees had that!
• It does not mean the ‘influence’ of a positive nature in one’s community: Nicodemus had that: He had been “a ruler of the Jews”!
• It does not necessarily mean spiritual gifts and abilities: We think the man must be ‘holy’ when in Romans 11:29 we read, “For the gifts and callings of God are without repentance.”
• It does not mean men are holy because they ‘pray’ al the time: Many men many ‘religious’ men of various faiths pray, even ALL THE TIME! Jesus told the Pharisees: “You wear me out praying all the time.” It doesn’t mean one is holy!
• It doesn’t mean one is holy even if he/she believes God is answering all their prayers: God answered Cornelius’ prayers before he’d even been saved, that is, that’s what Cornelius thought – but the Bible says that He “rains on the just and the unjust.” The blessings of God come on all kinds of persons. Many even think: “Why, I couldn’t be so blessed or as successful as I am if I were not holy!” Not so!
• It does not mean one is holy because he “fasts”! Would it be an evidence of holiness if I fasted one day a week, or 3 days a week, or 40 days straight? The Pharisees fasted two days every week! No food at all those two days.
• It does not mean one is holy by ‘alms giving’: Cornelius did that.
• It does not mean one is holy is he has a good reputation among religious leaders. Micaiah the prophet had that!
• It does not mean one is holy if he holds to a belief in God: “I believe in God”, along with “the devils believe, and they tremble!” (James 2:19).
• It does not mean one is holy if he/she is a possessor of magical or occult powers! Jannes and Jambrees in the Old Testament had tremendous powers. Do you remember the young ‘damsel’ in Acts 16 who had the spirit of divination who “brought her masters much gain by soothsaying”? The ‘occult’ is not of God, the demonic is not divine! It is not holiness!
• It does not mean one is holy even if they have ‘the bent’ to cast out demons! In Acts 19, Sceva and the seven sons who were exorcists, cast out demons, but they weren’t ‘holy men’! Acts 19:14.
• It doesn’t mean one is holy if he/she participates in ‘holy ascetism’ (which is denying one’s bodily appetites) which the Pharisees did often! The Essenes did that. Even men in India do that regularly! In Micah 6:6-7 we read Micah saying, “With what shall I come to the Lord? Should I give the fruit of my body for the sins of my soul? Shall I sacrifice my child? Will God be pleased with that?” And the answer? “NO!”
• It doesn’t mean holy ritual righteousness! The Pharisees were known by it, continually ‘nose-deep’ in religious ritual, dressing out in fancy regalia, easily identifiable as they walked the streets!
• It doesn’t mean one is an inheritor of great, religious privileges, many saying, “My grandfather was saved, my father was saved, so surely I’m saved.” That’s horrible logic!
• It does not mean “holy religious followings”! “Oh, he’s got thousands following him! He must be a man of God!” In Acts 5 Judas “had it”, Theadas had it, Jim Jones fed ‘poison’ to followers in Guyuna who ‘had it’! There ARE “religious sorts” or “the blind leading the blind” and both wind up in Hell’s ditches! THAT IS NOT WHAT HOLINESS MEANS! A ‘following’ doesn’t mean holiness! THAT OFTEN IS WHAT HOLINESS IS NOT!!

Now, many times, if a man IS holy, signs will follow in his life! But it doesn’t guarantee that if a man has one or two or a dozen that it helps him to “see the Lord”! WHAT DOES IT MEAN? The definition of “HOLY” in the Word? It’s a state of being set apart TO God, that is, an act, by God, first of all, resulting in a state which results in a process! An act of God becomes a state or condition in my life that is then evidenced by the ‘activity of the demons’ that I am one set apart to the glory of God!

But holiness is not and cannot be simply an acts of God! It is not and cannot be simply the state of mind in which I exist! It MUST BE the act, the state, the process, or the activity of ‘holiness’ coming to fruition and maturity in my life, “completing” and “perfecting” and “surrendering daily to His Indwelling Presence! Let’s LOOK at “HOLINESS”!

FIRST, HOLINESS IS AN ACT OF GOD SETTING YOU APART FOR SPECIAL SERVICE TO HIS HONOR, GLORY, AND PRAISE! There’s a simple New Testament picture to show that! Consider “Hagiasmos”, a potter taking moist clay and making several vessels, puts them into the ‘kiln’, their dried, then he sets them out to sell. Let’s say 4 come to the Maker:

A man comes along: “I want one bowl of water to water my garden”; a woman comes along: “I want one bowl to cook dinner in”; another comes along wanting one bowl as a decorative ornament in my home;” the priest comes saying, “I had a pot in the Temple, broken, and I need another!” He buys it, takes it to the temple, consecrates it to the glory of God, the Lord, and it can’t be used for anything else!

NOW… the world is filled with vessels God made! There are many lives lived for different reasons. But God comes along to you! He comes along today to say to you, “I want you for Myself!” He confers upon you His Holiness! “YOU ARE MINE” and you are stamped and sealed by the grace of God! It’s not worked up, but it becomes eternal reality by the grace of God! YOU can’t create an act of holiness – it’s the “gift” of God. You can’t win it – God claimed your victory in and through the Cross! That means at least three things as I see it:

• The act of being made holy is that you must come to God as He has come to you, and be made willing to be set apart for His purpose, His plan. There IS decision involved on your part. “Do I want to exist ONLY for the glory of God alone?” And God is the ONLY One in the universe that can confer holiness upon anything or anyone! In the Bible holiness was never conferred upon anything by any human! If we were able to get millions and millions of people together in one place, and they decided, “Farrell Fisher is an OK-guy – let’s confer holiness upon him!”, how foolish is that? We couldn’t confer holiness any more than in our own power gather at a cemetery to resurrect the dead! “In our power – Rise!” How foolish is that?
• I must come and deal with God personally – when in truth HE COMES TO ME! Some of you may have a grandchild, a great grandchild, a great, great grandchild…But God has no grandchildren – He only has first generation children. You’re either His as He deals directly with you or you’re not His by YOUR choice, surrender, and yieldedness!
• One must come, respond to Him personally according to God’s terms! If one is in an orphanage – a truly, dependent child – and someone comes along and says, “I want to adopt you, love you, care for you, meet your needs,” that child doesn’t lay down terms of the adoption – all the child can say is: “All I have to comment to you is my need as a child to be loved and cared for.” And on the terms of adoptive parents, the child is adopted, setting him/her apart, like the ACT of holiness by which God chooses us, on His terms!

SECOND, HOLINESS IS ‘A STATE OF LIFE’ OF THOSE WHO BY REPENTANCE TOWARD GOD AND FAITH IN THE LORD JESUS CHRIST HAVE ‘ROYSLTY’ CONFERRED UPON THEM AND THEREBY ARE DECLARED BY GOD AS HIS SONS OR DAUGHTERS! That’s what it is!

Shakespeare, in the “Twelfth Night”, had a great statement: “Some men are born to greatness, (born into royalty). Others achieve greatness while others have greatness thrust upon them.” IF YOU are ever great in God’s eyes, it will not be because you were born into it, achieved it, but because God Himself graciously conferred it upon you! He thrust it upon You! An Act of God and a state of His graciousness!

THIRD, HOLINESS IS A PROCESS BY WHICH ONE DEMONSTRATES HE HAS BEEN SET APART BY GOD HIMSELF! One is able to interpret the ‘state’ and ‘act’ of holiness by the life one lives. And someone says, “Prove it!” There is a rule in the Greek language which Jesus used: Every noun in Greek language that ends in ‘SMOS’ always speaks of process. That’s the way it is! This word, HAGIASMOS, IS process!

That is an in-working, graciously of God, but not valid, not real, if it’s not the OUTWORKING OF HOLINESS WHICH IS, ALWAYS HAS BEEN, MUST BE THE RESULT OF A TRUE BELIEVER’S UNION WITH JESUS CHRIST! “In Christ” one shares His nature, consenting to be ruled by it! “Why do you call Me, Lord, Lord, but you do not do what I say?” In 2 Peter 1:2-4 Peter tells us: “Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord, AS HIS divine power has been given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us by glory and virtue, by which HAVE BEEN GIVEN TO US exceedingly great and precious promises, that THROUGH THESE you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.”

In 1 Peter 1:13-16 Peter had already challenged those under his influence saying, “Therefore gird up the loins of your mind, be sober (serious-minded), and rest your hope upon the grace that is to be brought to you at the revelation (or unveiling) of Jesus Christ; as obedient children, not conforming yourselves to the former lusts, as in your ignorance; but as He who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, because it is written, ‘Be holy, for I am holy.’” And that is not for a ‘special breed’ of Christians, preachers, evangelists, or priests’ – the nature of salvation is both sharing Christ’s nature and the willingness to be ruled by that divine nature! And the paradox? It’s already been done if you’re ‘saved’ or ‘born again’!

1 Corinthians 6:11 says: “And such were some of you: but you are washed, but you are sanctified, but you are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.” But also: 11 Corinthians 7:1 declares: “Having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.” “Perfecting”? How? ONLY IS, you are pursuing what is already perfected in your life ! The worldly say, “Handsome is as handsome does,” while God says, “Handsome does as handsome is!” One is not saved ‘by good works’ but ‘good works’ are because one has been saved! We don’t progress into holiness, we progress inside and because of the God-implanted declaration and liberty of ‘graced holiness’! It’s weird for some, but the ‘goal’ stands, not at the end of the Christian track of faith but in its beginning! “Fisher, you’re saved, redeemed, sanctified, holy, a winner, a champion of Christ – go, let Him be Himself through you 0- you’re already the ‘winner’ in the Race of Faith!

Let me wrap this chapter up! “How, as a believer, do I respond to great, unchanging, never-ending Truth? 1) It is in the imperative mood! God says: “You must follow holiness without which you won’t see Me!” Some think it’s an elective in the Christian life or an option. But the Word says, “You be holy…!” 2) It is a present active imperative: Keep on keeping on! When, or if, does a man graduate from the school of holiness? NEVER does a man graduate from the school of holiness! 3) Pursue IN the actual state AND PROCESS! What if one doesn’t pursue or follow after holiness? IT MEANS THEY’VE NEVER BEEN “BORN AGAIN”! If there is no outworking of holiness there was never a previous in-working! 4) The world will never understand you if you start pursuing holiness like the Bible speaks about! In 1 John 2:15-17 we read, “Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world – the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life – is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world is passing away, and the lust of it; but he who DOES THE WILL OF GOD abides forever.”

It was William Gurnall who once said: “Do not claim that you are begotten of God and have His royal blood running in your veins unless you can prove lineage by THIS heroic spirit – “To dare to be holy in spite of men and devils!” Amen?

CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

THE GLORIOUS MINISTRY OF “CHRIST IN YOU”!

There are extremely interesting, convicting, and motivating words from Psalm 25:12 when David wrote and sang: “Who is the man that fears the Lord? Him shall He teach in the way He chooses.” But how many do you know, some even in the church, who say: “Do as God says? No, I’m created, birthed, living, to DO AS I PLEASE!” There are ‘worlds of folk’ who are on a path of seeking only their own fleshly will and fleshly purpose without any consideration of the God who made them, lost them, and even went so far as to make a “blood-purchase for their freedom, identity, and eternal purpose”!

If there is a path of ‘self-purpose’, just remember that those folks are on the path of seeking great things for themselves without any consideration of God’s eternal intent! Self-centered interest in only clouds, only ‘drives’, only personal ambitions and determinations of “What I choose to be about,” creates human, selfish, and devil-driven barriers to the will of God for one’s life! Some are so intent on ‘self-driven’ ambitions and dreams that their ears are closed to the eternal intent of God through Christ!

In Colossians 1:24-29 Paul unveils “the glorious ministry of “Christ in YOU”! He wrote: “I now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up in my flesh what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ, for the sake of His body, which is the church, of which I became a minister according to the stewardship from God which was given to me for you, to fulfill the word of God, the mystery which has been hidden from ages and from generations, but now has been revealed to His saints. TOTHEM God willed to make known what are the riches of this mystery among the Gentiles: which is CHRIST IN YOU, THE HOPE OF GLORY. Him we preach, warning every man and teaching every man in all wisdom, that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus.” SOMEDAY OR IN THE HERE AND NOW?

Have you, as a professing believer or devout ‘church member’ ever considered your holy calling as the chosen representative of the King of kings and Lord of lords, that YOU are Holy God’s earthly but saved and sanctified “stepping stone” between fallen men and the Loving Savior and Lord, that YOU, washed in the blood of the Lamb and indwelt by the Holy Spirit, are being transformed from your earthly body and existence to the very Temple and Tabernacle of Christ Jesus, a Holy House in which the Resurrected Savior and Lord has made His dwelling place, yet the day came with Christ had to confront the ‘pretenders’ of His day, saying, “My house shall be called the house of prayer; but you have made it into a den of thieves!”

I love what Oswald Chambers said in his famous book, “My Utmost For His Highest,” (p.233), “It is not the strength of one man’s personality being superimposed on another, but the real presence of Christ coming through the elements of the worker’s life.” So true!

I was amazed and inspired as I read Max Lucado’s “Introduction” to his book, “In the Grip of Grace”. He said: My only qualification for writing a book on grace is the clothing I wear. Let me explain. For years I owned an elegant suit complete with coat, trousers, even a hat.. I considered myself quite dapper in the outfit and was confident others agreed.

The pants were cut from the cloth of my good works, sturdy fabric of good deeds done and projects completed. Some studies here, some sermons there. Many people complimented my trousers, and I confess, I tended to hitch them up in public so people would notice them.

The coat was equally impressive. It was woven together from my convictions. Each day I dressed myself in deep feelings of religious fervor. My emotions were quite strong. So strong, in fact, that I was often asked to model my cloak of zeal in public gatherings to inspire others. Of course I was happy to comply.

While there I’d also display my hat, a feathered cap of knowledge. Formed with my own hands from the fabric of personal opinion, I wore it proudly. “SURELY GOD IS IMPRESSED WITH MY GARMENTS,” I often thought. Occasionally I strutted into his presence so he could compliment the self-tailored wear. He never spoke. “His silence must mean admiration,” I was convinced.

But then my wardrobe began to suffer. The fabric of my trousers grew thin. My best works started coming unstitched. I began leaving more undone than done, and what little I did was nothing to boast about. “No problem,” I thought. “I’ll work harder.”

But working harder WAS a problem. There was a hole in my coat of convictions. My resolve was threadbare. A cold wind cut into my chest. I reached up to pull my hat down firmly, and the brim ripped off in my hands.

Over a period of a few months, my wardrobe of self-righteousness completely unraveled. I went from tailored gentlemen’s apparel to beggars’ rags. Fearful that God might be angry at my tattered suit, I did my best to stitch it together and cover my mistakes. But the cloth was so worn. And the wind was so icy. I gave up. I went back to God. (Where else could I go?).”

Do YOU know anything about being absorbed in “fleshly thoughts, fleshly ambitions, fleshly dreams, in self-absorbed traps and cycles that continue downward in diminishing appreciation or fulfillment” when you were convinced by the world, the flesh, and the devil that this is where “living” is really at its best, when ‘flesh, the old sin-nature, the worldly mind’ is the smartest, but then there’s the bottom of godlessness, the bottom of fleshly ‘fantasies’, the bottom of fleshly fulfillment which IS fleshly nothingness!

I challenge you to begin reflecting upon ‘world religions’, considering Jews, or the Hindus I ministered to in India, or the masses of Muslims worldwide, or the Buddhists, or the Catholics, the Mormons, or even the Protestants, or the “branched-off sects” of them all! And, then, would you dare say that “in them all, there may be a few who’ve found, rested in, been transformed into the true family of God in Christ alone”? I believe it’s possible! I’ve asked my wife, Sue, to give you the story of Anna Kellerman before I carry you further into “The Glorious Ministry of Christ IN YOU!” Ms. Kellerman told her story to my Baylor classmate and Baylor football teammate in the mid to late 1950’s, Dr. Bill Anderson, former pastor for 26 years at Calvary Baptist, Clearwater, Florida. Receive this amazing unveiling of a changed heart and life by God’s grace and mercy! Tell it, Sue!

There is NO WAY you can look upon the modern religious world and convince yourself, “Any religion will do, or all ‘faiths’ are certainly valid, or like Shirley Maclaine used to say, sadly, “I am God!” No she’s not, and neither are you or me!

I was reading Kurt Bruner’s book recently entitled “Inklings of God”. In Chapter 22 he spoke about “My first encounter occurs in a spiritual community called “astara” located in Upland, California. (He was seeking to evaluate, understand “spiritual communities” seeking, truly, to extend the Lordship of Christ if possible!) Bruner said that “the tranquility of the environment fades as I read the brochure describing the kinds of “spiritual exploration” hosted here,” (p.165), but then one page later he began reading what they hosted and encouraged: (www.astara.org.),

“People from all faiths study esoteric teachings and mystic philosophy through Astara. You may maintain membership in any religion and still become Astarian. This is a way to explore life’s most personal and meaningful treasures. If you want the mystical wisdom of the ages, if you want to express hidden potential of mind and Higher Self, you may be very near the answers to your desires. If you seek enlightenment, healing for body and soul, new inspiration and aspiration, you may find the realization of your personal goals and dreams through Astara, a place of light, a lodestar on the true path of the soul.”

Bruner asked the “host lady” if she could help him understand a few things because he had a major project for a class he was attending. He had a few questions he wanted her to answer – she was willing! 1) How would you describe God? 2) Who is Jesus? 3) What is wrong with our world? 4) How do we find salvation? He wanted her to answer or compare her ‘faith’ to his clear explanation! She said: 1. God is not a personal, loving father. He/She/It is the cosmic oneness we all inhabit.

2 Jesus is not God in the flesh. He is one of many enlightened ones who invite us to discover our higher selves. 3. Ours is not a world of fallen, sinful men and women. Ours is a world of men and women who have forgotten their true goodness – and their true goodness. 4. Salvation is not through faith in Christ. It is through higher consciousness.

I hate to be the one to tell you, but our God, our Holy Bible, our true promise of salvation in Christ alone, “finds few who find the only Way, the only Truth, or the only Life” – your battle with true, redemptive faith, always revolves around what God has said, what God has done in and through Christ, not a ‘religious world’s vast numbers of opinions’! This is why in 1 John 1:5-10 we read what John wrote, which unveils, yes, the one and only way to be reconciled to God:

“This IS the message which we have heard from Him and declare to you, that God is light and in Him no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. BUT if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say we have no sin (when we do) we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned (when we have!), we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us.”

Walter Chantry, Pastor of Grace Baptist Church, Carlisle, Pennsylvania, had a book published by “The Banner of Truth Trust” initially in 1970 with a number of years following of ‘fresh’ printings entitled “Today’s Gospel, Authentic or Synthetic?” He wrote: ‘If only all Bible-believing people join together, the world will sit up and listen,’ thinks the church (in this modern day!). Let’s merge our mission boards to pool our funds and our personnel. Let’s join giant evangelistic projects. If every evangelical joins in a common organization, we can have greater depth of evangelism. Thus organizational unity becomes the aim of Gospel churches…Having accepted the theory that unity is all-important for world evangelism, both the church and the individual must lower their estimate of the value of truth. In a large congress on evangelism we could not insist on a truth of God’s Word that would offend ‘any’ brother evangelical. THUS we must find the lowest common denominator to which all born-again Christians hold. The rest of the Bible will be labelled ‘unessential’ for missions. After all unity (among Christians) is more essential than doctrinal preciseness.” Chantry is a brave pastor! He’s not afraid to expose modern-day ‘church’ stupidity and denial of even Christ’s own words in His day! Repentance toward God and faith in Christ alone has become “doubts” in a large segment of the professing church in America!

Consider what the ‘modern-day church’ accepts today, evidenced by what a lot of ill-informed pastors and leaders who ‘twist’ truth to shallow the eternal Truth! The most unimportant theme of many ‘preachers’ and ‘teachers’ that got Paul killed in his day was, like Galatians 6:14, “But God forbid that I should boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.” And you preach the necessity of personally dying daily that Christ’s Resurrection Life may be manifested in you – and many in the ‘church-world today will label you a ‘lunatic’!

The ‘modern-day church’? There’s no emphasis about ‘death to self,’ ‘death to one’s indulgence in sin,’ or ‘ death to the ‘old man’, or ‘death to a fallen world’s devotion to its failing allegiance of no surrender to the Sovereignty of God’! Even most ‘church folk’ don’t know that their ‘old man’ was crucified with Christ, therefore, sin can’t be rejected, only accepted, and that without consequences! I call that ‘phony bologna’!

But, thank God, in Colossians 3:3, Paul wrote: “For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.” “Hidden with Christ IN GOD?” The psalmist, in Psalm 91, wrote: “He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High SHALL ABIDE UNDER THE SHADOW OF THE ALMIGHTY. I will say of the Lord, “He is my REFUGE AND FORTRESS; My God, in Him I will trust.” Surely He shall deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the perilous pestilence. He shall cover you with His feathers, and under His wings you shall take refuge; HIS TRUTH shall be your shield and buckler. You shall not be afraid of the terror by night, nor of the arrow that flies by day, Nor of the pestilence that walks in darkness, nor of the destruction that lays waste at noonday. A thousand may fall at your side, and ten thousand at your right hand; but it shall not come near you. Only with your eyes shall you look and see the reward of the wicked. BECAUSE you have made the Lord, who is my refuge, even the Most High, YOUR DWELLING PLACE, No evil shall befall you, nor shall any plague come near your dwelling; For He shall give His angels charge over you, to keep you in all your ways!”

Are YOU “hidden with Christ”? Is Holy God your Refuge and Fortress? Martin Luther wrote the old, the golden, the marvelous truth of “A Mighty Fortress”! I reflected upon it from “The Broadman Hymnal” of 1940, Broadman Press, Nashville, Tenn.! It says: “A mighty fortress is our God, A bulwark never failing; Our helper He, amid the flood of mortal ills prevailing. For still our ancient foe Does seek to work us woe; His craft and power are great, And, armed with cruel hate, On earth is not his equal.

Did we in our own strength confide, Our striving would be losing, Were not the right Man on our side, The Man of God’s own choosing. Do you ask who that may be? Christ Jesus, it is He; Lord Sabaoth is His name, From age to age the same, And He must win the battle.”

And though this world, with devils filled, Should threaten to undo us, We will not fear, for God has willed His truth to triumph through us. The prince of darkness grim – We tremble not at him; his rage we can endure, For lo! His doom is sure: One little word shall fell him.

That Word above all earthly powers – No thanks to them – abideth; (But) The Spirit and the gifts are ours Through Him who with us sideth. Let goods and kindred go, This mortal life also; the body they may kill; God’s truth abides us still, His Kingdom is forever.” Can YOU say, “Amen! Glory to God alone – our Victor, our Overcomer, our Mighty Conqueror, our Lord the bulwark never failing?”

What a “Victory in Jesus” to be transformed by the grace and mercy of God from the ‘old man’ to the “new man in Christ”, translated out of darkness into Eternal Light, taken from control of the powers of darkness to the power of His never-ending Life!

God, our Savior, is the Giver of Eternal Life! God, our Redeemer, has washed away all guilt of sin and set the captives free! God, our Master-Teacher, guides us only into All Truth! God, our Protector, IS the Master-Defender of our Life and Faith! God, our Author of Redeemed Life and Over-coming Faith leads us through the shadows of death and darkness into the fullness of the blessing of the Gospel of Jesus Christ! Yes!

In Romans 8:35-39 Paul sings the Anthem of Praise to God’s everlasting love, faithful mercy, and unending watch-care! He said: “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written:

“For Your sake we are killed all day long; We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.”

Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

I close this chapter with Charles Wesley and John Zundel’s old hymn entitled “Love Divine”, (From the old “American Hymnal” published by “Broadman Press”, Nashville, Tenn., copyrighted by Robert Coleman in 1933!). The hymn says:

Love divine, all love excelling, Joy of heaven, to earth come down! Fix in us Your humble dwelling; All Your faithful mercies crown. Jesus, You are all compassion, Pure, unbounded love you are; Visit us with Your salvation; Enter every trembling heart.

Breathe, O breathe Your loving Spirit Into every troubled breast! Let us all in You inherit, Let us find that second rest. Take away our bent to sinning; Alpha and Omega be; End of faith as its beginning, Set our hearts at liberty.

Come, Almighty to deliver, Let us all Your life receive; Suddenly return, and never, Nevermore Your temples leave: You we would be always blessing, Serve You as Your hosts above, Pray, and praise You without ceasing, Glory in Your perfect love.

Finish then Your new creation; Pure and spotless let us be; Let us see Your great salvation, Perfectly restored in Thee; Changed from glory into glory, Till in heaven we take our place, Till we cast our crowns before You, Lost in wonder, love , and praise.” AMEN!

CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

SELF-MADE ‘STARS’ OR SOVEREIGN-ORDAINED SERVANTS?

I don’t know how aware YOU are concerning the discouragement and disenchantment and doubt and even disgust that unbelieving, ‘Self-Made Stars’ live with in the real world, in the privacy of their own hearts, in their efforts at pleasure with no eternal rewards filled and overflowing with ‘sorrow’ in the inner man, refusing to look to the Holy God who made them, lost them, and paid the eternal price of death on Calvary’s Cross in order to bring them to the awareness, “I’m loved by God!”

Self-Made ‘Stars’, though ‘rich’ in self-approval, are bankrupt concerning “rest in the will of God for their lives”. The “riches of self-consciousness” breeds ‘self-doubt’, and ‘self-doubt’ breeds reckless abandonment to the world’s ways, striving desperately to find meaning, purpose, and reward in life, but without faith in God they remain in a hopeless cycle of unbelief and despair, holding contempt for those who’ve forsaken ALL to follow Jesus!

Don’t you find it alarming, yet illuminating, to hear Jesus call the ‘world of unbelievers’ “heathen”? Follow Matthew 6: 7-8, followed by His Masterful prayer in Verses 9-11! Jesus said, “And when you pray, do not use vain repetitions as the heathen do. For they think that they will be heard for their many words. Therefore do not be like them. For your Father knows the things you have need of before you ask Him. In this manner, therefore, pray:

Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come, Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen.”

But “self-made stars” are out to promote themselves and establish their own, little, fleshly kingdom! Theirs is “my kingdom, my will, my fleshly desires, my power, and my glory”, ending in a godless life void of the goodness, mercy, love, and divine intent of Holy God! And in a world of ‘self-absorbed indulgence’, always seeking a “bigger kick than the last,” always yielding to one’s fleshly wishes and whims, benignly imprisoned in love with one’s old sin nature, blindly unwilling to “see spiritual realities and consequences,” blinded to the spiritual realities and bound to fleshly indulgences, a person or persons avoids “saving Grace” or “sovereign mercies”!

It was William Shakespeare who once wrote: “He jests at scars who never felt a wound.” ‘Self-made stars’ are reproductions of Budzisewski’s comment in his writing “Revenge” when he said: “Disbelieving in God was a good way to get back at Him for the various things which predictably went wrong in my life,” not receiving the Lord Jesus’ words in John 16:33 when He said, “These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. IN THE WORLD YOU WILL HAVE TRIBULATION; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.”

It’s interesting to me that Old Testament saints understood trouble or tribulation or tormenting situations were divine opportunities for God to be Himself as He sheltered, watched over, or cared for His own. In Psalm 28:6-9 David’s song was, “Blessed be the Lord, because He has heard the voice of my supplications! The Lord is my strength and my shield; My heart trusted in Him, and I am helped. Therefore my heart greatly rejoices, and with my song I will praise Him. The Lord is their strength, And He is the saving refuge of His anointed. Save Your people, and bless Your inheritance; Shepherd them also, and bear them up forever.”

How familiar are you with Isaiah 53? It ought to be consumed by you every day for a week, several times a day! But Isaiah said in Verse 3-6, unveiling Christ, “He is despised and rejected by men, a Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. And we hid, as it were, our faces from Him; He was despised, and we did not esteem Him. Surely He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; Yet we esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. BUT He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement for our peace WAS UPON HIM, and BY HIS STRIPES WE ARE HEALED. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned, every one, to his own way; and the Lord God has laid on Him the iniquity of us all,” saying also in Verse 11b, “By His knowledge My righteous Servant shall justify many, for He shall bear their iniquities.”

But, you are aware, most of a nation’s people, birthed into life with the nature of sin, are totally unaware of that nature or its absence of a pressing need to be reconciled to God. Most assume a rational education of the “self” is sufficient without an awareness of the fact of sin, or that it’s fruit IS spiritual death, assuming one can rule over his sin nature without a heart-change! Oswald Chambers, in his book “My Utmost For His Highest,” wrote: (p.127), “If sin rules in me, God’s life in me will be killed; if God rules in me, sin in me will be killed. There is no possible ultimate but that. The climax of sin is that it crucified Jesus Christ, and what was true in the history of God on earth will be true in your history and mine. In our mental outlook we have to reconcile ourselves to the fact of sin as the only explanation as to why Jesus Christ came, and as the explanation of the grief and sorrow in life.”

Do you think what you’ve been reading may alert you to follow Paul’s direction in 2 Corinthians 10:4-5? “For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, CASTING DOWN ARGUMENTS AND EVERY HIGH THING THAT EXALTS ITSELF AGAINST THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ!”

‘Self-Made Stars’? ‘Self-assertiveness’ is shouldered by truly believing that if you fight for what’s right, if one stresses his ‘goodness’, or if he/she exalts independence, they’re OK, without awareness ‘OK-NESS’ is not Godliness! “Self-made stars” are in love with themselves, with their lusts, and with their godless affections! But if Christ Jesus has declared, still declares, “Come unto Me, and I will give you rest”, “Come to Me, and I will see you completed”, or “Come to Me, and I will give you the gift of eternal life,” most aren’t even aware of the disintegration of their lives by the worldly, by the sin-nature control, or by the devilish and demonic activity of the powers of darkness! Apart from salvation in and through Christ, fallen mankind, alienated and separated from God, is fully, sinfully, and morally void or conscious of the need of “Blood Redemption”!

‘Self-Made Stars’? That’s lives seduced about ‘the light in me’, which Jesus says is nothing more than ‘spiritual darkness’, independently ‘living unto myself’, unaware God wanted me for His glory, His honor, and His praise! They live to satisfy themselves! They live void of Holy Revelation, like Paul saying in Galatians 1:15-16, “But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother’s womb and called me through His grace, TO REVEAL HIS SON IN ME…!” And can’t you hear it? “Well, that may have been for Paul, but that’s not God’s plan for every life” even when we know the Word declares: “Christ in you the hope of glory” – and that’s for every born-again believer!

‘Self-Made Stars’? Didn’t Peter tells us about “They stumble ( fall, alienated from God), being disobedient to the Word, to which they also were appointed.” God has a plan, God has a purpose, God has a Voice, and God speaks to ALL Humanity as He pleases! But His call is never to congratulate your fallen nature, seeking to use what killed His Son – No! His call is to expose, enlighten your deadly sinful nature within you, and awaken you to His amazing grace! But if one’s plan of ‘stardom’ in his own fleshly ‘show’ without the consciousness of one’s need to be reconciled to God, “new birth, new life, new purpose” will never be born or birthed in them by the grace and mercy of God!

Jesus said in John 6:63-64, “It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh (the old sin-nature) profits nothing. The words that I speak to you are spirit, and they are life. But there are some of you who do not believe.”

‘Self-Made Stars’? Sin is the signature of a ‘self-made star’! ‘Self-made stars’ sin and fall short of the glory of God! ‘Self-made stars’, rather than humbling themselves under the mighty hand of God, live proudly, arrogantly, defilingly, deficiently, even senselessly, spiritually unconscious, and “certainly unaccountable to a supposed God who rules my world”! Proud ‘sinners’ are arrogant defiers of God’s declarations concerning them, certain they can ‘palliate’ (which means ‘an attempt to mitigate or conceal the gravity of offenses by excuses’), or ‘relief without a curing’!

In Walter L. Carson’s writing entitled “Interpretation” he said: “Sin is twisting and distorting out of its proper shape a human personality which God designed to be a thing of beauty and a joy forever.” Theodore Dalrymple, British psychiatrist, authored a book entitled “Life At The Bottom” (Chicago: Ivan R. Dee, 2001, p.5). In it he dealt with the false ideas, “There is no God!” He wanted to expose the error and hypocrisy of “No need of a God!” And certainly he exposed no accountability, no concern, or no foundation for choosing wrong with consequences or choosing right with consequences! He said: “The aim of untold millions is to be free to do exactly as they choose and for someone else to pay when things go wrong…Implicitly they disagree with Bacon’s famous dictum that ‘chiefly the mold of a man’s fortune is in his own hands.’ Instead they experience themselves as putty in the hands of fate.”

And, sadly, ‘self-made stars’ are ‘fleshly oriented’ with no interest in the things of a Biblical or Spirit-nature! For them, there is no interest in Christ’s crucifixion because they have no desire for the enlightenment that He died for their sin! Some truly understand, while the majority just don’t want to know, having nothing to do with or the slightest interest in His crucifixion with them, crucified with Him to put to death their old, Adam-sin nature, because that ‘death’ would be leaving the darkness to live in the Light when they desire to maintain an interest and affiliation with sin, with worldliness, and, for some, even demonic, devilish activity! Joining Jesus would be putting to death their fleshly allegiances – and some are not willing for that to happen to their sin-nature kingdom under their own control! So, they live in sin, die in sin, die, and then without Christ go to Hell!

Oh, but there is another part of humanity in, yes, the real world? And, that is, “The Kingdom of Sovereign-Ordained Servants!” It was Paul W. Harrison who once wrote: “Wherever God rules over the human heart as King, there is the kingdom of God established.” And T.Z.Koo really builds enlightment in true followers of Christ when he wrote: “The kingdom of God does not exist because of your effort or mine. It exists because God reigns. Out part is to enter His kingdom and bring our life under His sovereign will.” [Both statements came out of “The Encyclopedia of Religious Quotations,” Fleming H. Revell Com., Westwood, New Jersey, p.265].

In Matthew 6:33, after teaching His disciples earlier to pray, “Your kingdom come, Oh God,” and “Yours IS THE KINGDOM and the power and the glory forever,” Jesus then said in Verse 33, “Seek FIRST the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.”

But there is a very sad Word in Isaiah 66:3d-4 when the Lord God spoke through the prophet! It says: “…just as they have chosen their own ways, and their soul delights in their abominations, So I will choose their delusions, and bring their fears on them; Because, when I called, no one answered, when I spoke they did not hear; but they did evil before My eyes, and chose that in which I do not delight.” Chose?

In Joshua 24:14-15 the author, inspired by the Holy Spirit, gave mankind an unchanging challenge! “Now therefore, fear the Lord, (That’s: HOLD HIM IN REVERENTIAL AWE!!), serve Him in sincerity and in truth, put away the gods which your fathers served ( the god of immorality, the god of ‘self’ inspiration, the god of ‘flesh’ at both its worst and its best, the god of ‘self’ aggrandizement, the god of fleshly, carnal, sensual, morally corrupt indulgence)…And if it seems evil to you to serve the Lord, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods which your fathers served, or the gods of the land in which you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”

Has it ever come to your mind, heart, and will that, “Yes, praise God, He has a purpose for my life”? In Galatians 1:15-16 I remind you of Paul’s calling which is not unique to him but is true of any and every ‘visitation’ of Christ to those whom He has chosen! Paul wrote: “But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother’s womb and called me through His grace, to reveal His Son in me…!” It’s not what I would like to do in and through my “best efforts”, but the sovereign understanding and administration of “Your kingdom come, Your will be done, in me, as I make myself fully available to Your eternal will”! Isn’t this why we hear the Verse daily? “Christ in you the hope of glory!” “Christ through you in His ever-abiding presence!”

“The call of God!” How do YOU respond to Matthew 28: 18-20? Many say, “Oh, that was a call to the first twelve disciples, to the early church in Jerusalem, but it really is not my involvement or the modern-day church’s calling.” And, I say, “Phony bologna!” “Yes, it is the calling of every true disciple to touch his world with grace, even if it’s only his personal financial support and prayers for those who go out, called of God, to a specific location or nation!” JESUS SAID: “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. GO THEREFORE and MAKE DISCIPLES OF ALL NATIONS, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, TEACHING THEM to observe all things that I have commanded you; and LO, IAM WITH YOU ALWAYS, even to the end of the Age.” AMEN?

“The Kingdom of Sovereign-Ordained Servants”? I have found Romans 5:10-11 to be one of the most enlightening, empowering, enveloping passages in all of Scripture! It says: “For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be (BEING) saved by His life. AND not only that, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation.” Is that reconciled to God with no concern for those who haven’t been reconciled?

Examine carefully Romans 8:28-30! “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to THOSE WHO ARE CALLED ACCORDING TO HIS PURPOSE. For whom He foreknew, He also PREDESTINED to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover, whom He predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.”

It breaks my heart at times when I hear some men preach or teach on television or the radio, and they appear by their teachings that they are either blind to the Holy Word in their hands or deaf to the very voice of God, because God tells us, in Romans 5:21, “For He (God) made Him (Jesus) who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” Your sin and mine was placed by Sovereign God willingly on His Son – our sin and sin nature, our trespasses, our unrighteousness, our ‘self-assertive’, godless life Jesus took upon Himself, and He and your godless nature WAS CRUCIFIED ON THE CROSS! Crucified, dead, buried, but resurrected the third day! And the word of reconciliation to Holy God was announced, is announced, and will be announced and proclaimed by “THE KINGDOM OF SOVEREIGN-ORDAINED SERVANTS!”

In Mark 10:42-45 Jesus called His inner circle to Himself to share the glorious news of what their lives and ministries were to be about. King Jesus said: “You know that those who are considered rulers over the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. Yet it shall not be so among you; but whoever desires to become great among you shall be your servant. And whoever of you desires to be first shall be slave of all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.”

No wonder Paul exclaimed in Galatians 6:14-15, “But God forbid that I should boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but a new creation.”

There’s a “new commandment”! In John 13:34-35 Jesus said: “A new commandment I give to you, that you love (agape) one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.” Psalm 33:3 speaks about “singing to Him a ‘new song’!” All of this because His amazing grace has manifested to an old man enslaved to his old sin nature who has been transformed by the grace, mercy, and love of God, and before the sinful world Jesus Presents the “new man”! And in Ephesians 4:17-19 he unveiled that ‘old man’!

“This I say therefore, and testify in the Lord, that you should no longer walk as the rest of the Gentiles walk, in the futility of their mind, having their understanding darkened, BEING ALIENATED FROM THE LIFE OF GOD, because of the ignorance in them, because of the BLINDNESS OF THEIR HEART; who, being past feeling, have given themselves over to lewdness, to work all uncleanness with greediness.” Hut Paul didn’t stop there! He moved into the “kingdom of God realm”, into the story and truth of God’s amazing grace! In Ephesians 4:20-24 he wrote:

“But you have not so learned Christ, if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught by Him, as the truth IS IN JESUS: that you put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, AND BE RENEWED IN THE SPIRIT OF YOUR MIND, and that YOU PUT ON THE NEW MAN WHICH WAS CREATED ACCORDING TO GOD, in true righteousness and holiness.” And that is not an option- it’s the evidence of a truly born again, redeemed life, ‘hidden with Christ in God’

Kurt Bruner, author of “Inklings of God”, in his “Conclusion: The Right Key”, he wrote: (pps 195-196), “Religion (and I, JFF, say relationship to & with God!) is like a marriage. It is by definition exclusive. That doesn’t mean a religious person hates all other faiths or even views them as entirely wrong. (But I, JFF, see them as religious scams!!). But we can’t view them as equally right. The creed of each excludes the creed of others. Jesus certainly did when He rejected the notion that all paths lead to God. (Amen to that exposure!). “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.” (Matthew 7:13).

What is “the Door” by which YOU have ‘entered’ the Kingdom of God? I close this chapter with Paul’s words in Ephesians 2:1-10! Rejoice with me “blood-bought saint of God in Christ”! It says: “And you He made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins, in which YOU once walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air (the devil himself!), the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience, among whom also we all once conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, just as the others.

But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, MADE US ALIVE TOGETHER WITH CHRIST (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.

For we are HIS WORKMANSHIP, created IN CHRIST JESUS for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.” Do you walk by ‘grit’ or by grace, by self-effort or by God’s Sovereign administration, by ‘trying’ or by TRUSTING, by the perversion of a strong self-will or by the presence of Christ’s Resurrection Life in and through you? I choose “The Kingdom of Sovereign-Ordained Servants”!! Amen?

CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

IMITATION ALLEGIANCE OR SOVEREIGN BIRTHING?

Much of the so-called ‘spiritual inspiration’ of our day is sadly ‘religious idolatry’ without symbolic idols but ‘imitations’ of true submission and obedience, many ‘pretending’ without “Sovereign Birthing”!

It was William Shakespeare, in Henry V, (Act 1V, sc.1,l. 257), who wrote: “What art thou, thou idol ceremony? What kind of god art thou, that suffer’st more of mortal griefs than they do thy worshippers?”

Sadly, much of “Christian activity” today is one who is “affiliated with” but not “Blood-Atoned For”! Fleshly impulses rule many lives, self-awareness foolishness is often the source of religious awareness actually idolizing the natural traits at their best in some fallen men, with self-will and self-determination facing earthly trials ‘successfully’ because “both for us is just as good as your ‘trust’ in your God to see you through”!

But ‘imitation allegiance’ is not the miraculous, heavenly blessing of a “new creation” with ‘old things passing away’. I love Oswald Chambers writing in his book “My Utmost For His Highest.” In it he said (p.219), “As soon as you abandon reasoning and argument, God witnesses to what He has done, (and able to do in and through the repentant, submissive heart! JFF), and we are amazed at our impertinence in having kept Him waiting. If you are in debate as to whether God can deliver from sin, either let Him do it, or tell Him He cannot. Do not quote this and that person, try Matthew 11:28 – “Come unto Me.”

How very, very illuminating is Luke 11:13 when Jesus said, “If You then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him!” But ‘imitation allegiance’ to a faith is without the eternal foundation of the solid rock of Christ’s finished work in and through the Cross! And “old things” don’t pass away by ‘fleshly determination and self-will! And ‘imitation allegiance’ doesn’t need God’s help – they “give my best”, and miss God’s gifts of all spiritual necessities to a God-honoring life and ministry!

“Imitation allegiance” is a fleshly life at its best without understanding or comprehension that God sovereignly crucified the ‘natural man’ at its worst or at its best! This is why in Galatians 5:24-25 Paul wrote, “And those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh (old sin nature) with its passions and desires. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.”

But that biblical proclamation becomes a huge problem for a strong, self-willed, ‘child’s mind-set’: “That toy is mine – and you leave it alone!” I don’t have any problem identifying the strong, self-willed individual, resistant to all Biblical Truth, as one who idolizes ‘self’, counterfeits ‘devotion’ to a ‘higher being’, and wraps himself/herself in the garments of godlessness called ‘my independence’ and ‘my self-worth’, and as Chambers once said: “Beware of refusing to go to the funeral of your own independence.” (“My Utmost –p.256).

I have no hesitation to say, that if you’ve come this far in this book, YOU have no question as to the difference between the natural and the spiritual, the godless and the Godly, or the cheap ‘imitation allegiance’ and the Sovereignly birthed life! But, in the realm of ‘imitation allegiance’ there is the, yes, tragedy of spiritual imitation totally apart from the “new-born Life in Christ”! In John 16:33 Jesus said to His disciples then and now, “These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.” Wouldn’t you think this just might be why Paul spoke strongly saying, “Christ in you the hope of glory”?

In the old hymnal, “The Broadman Hymnal”, (Broadman Press, Nashville, Tenn., 1940 copyright, p.96), they included a hymn by Edward Mote and WilliamB.Bradbury entitled “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.” Glory!

In Max Lucado’s Introduction to his book, “In The Grip of Grace”, he wrote, after mentioning “Dressed in His righteousness alone, faultless to stand before the throne,” “I have a hunch that some of you know what I’m talking about. You’re wearing a handmade wardrobe yourself. You’ve sewn your garments, and you’re sporting your religious deeds…and, already, you’ve noticed a tear in the fabric. Before you start stitching yourself together, I’d like to share some thoughts with you on the greatest discovery of my life: the grace of God.”

There was a book I wrote in 2005 that I had published in India for the thousands of pastors I taught there over 25 years. I entitled it “Behold I Make All Things New.” In Chapter One, p.15, I wrote: “Do you understand the curse of “modern-day Christianity”, and even “church life”? It’s the curse of self-will, self-realization, self-determination, self-satisfaction, self-centeredness – and following that we proclaim, “We are followers of Christ.” No!! He is not an addendum to my self-determined life! “I press toward the mark of the ‘high calling’ of God in Christ Jesus!! God has, ‘Saved us and called us in a “Holy Calling”!’ A new passion in our lives!”

And the “new passion” in one’s life is not “Imitation Allegiance”! In Galatians 3:9 Paul wrote: “So then those who are of faith (redemptive faith) are blessed with believing Abraham”, and it shocks many that Abraham’s faith was not imitation allegiance but surrender to the Sovereignty of God! Interesting Verses related to Jesus and Abraham in John 8:54-59! It says: Jesus answered (the religious Jews), “If I honor Myself, My honor is nothing. It is the Father who honors Me, of whom you say that He is your God.

Yet you HAVE NOT KNOWN HIM, but I know Him. And if I say, ‘I do not know Him,’ I shall be a liar like you; but I do know Him and keep His word. Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day, and he saw it and was glad.” Then the Jews said to Him, “You are not yet fifty years old, and have You seen Abraham?”

Jesus said to them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, before Abraham was, “I AM.” Then they took up stones to throw at Him; but Jesus hid Himself and went out of the temple, going through the midst of them, and so passed by.

And Jesus “passed them by” because in John 8:20, responding to the arrogant scribes and Pharisees, He said: “You know neither Me nor My Father. If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also.” And even though Jesus came birthed into their world of supposedly “God representatives”, the majority of Judaism exercised incarnate unbelief!

In fact, about 700 years before, Isaiah was called upon by God to reveal God’s proclamation against Jerusalem! In Isaiah 22:1-14 is the solemn pronouncement to which “few” Israelites listened and received! It says: The burden against the Valley of Vision. What ails you now, that you have all gone up to the housetops, You who are full of noise, a tumultuous city, a joyous city? Your slain men are not slain with the sword, nor dead in battle. All your rulers have fled together; they are captured by archers. All who are found in you are bound together; they have fled from afar.

Therefore I said, “Look away from me, I will weep bitterly; do not labor to comfort me because of the plundering of the daughter of my people.” For it is a day of trouble and treading down and perplexity by the Lord God of hosts in the Valley of Vision – breaking down walls and of crying to the mountain. Elam bore the quiver with chariots of men and horsemen, and Kir uncovered the shield.

It shall come to pass that your choicest valleys shall be full of chariots, and the horsemen shall set themselves in array at the gate. He removed the protection of Judah. You looked in that day to the armor of the House of the Forest (storehouse); You also saw the damage to the city of David, that it was great; and you gathered together the waters of the lower pool. You numbered the houses of Jerusalem, and the houses you broke down to fortify the wall.

You also made a reservoir between the two walls for the water of the old pool. But you did not look to its Maker, nor did you have respect for Him who fashioned it long ago. And IN THAT DAY the Lord God of hosts called for weeping and for mourning, for baldness and for girding with sackcloth. But instead, joy and gladness, slaying oxen and killing sheep, eating meat and drinking wine: “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die!”

Then it was revealed in my hearing by the Lord of hosts, “Surely for this iniquity there will be no atonement for you, even to your death,” says the Lord of hosts.”

“Imitation Allegiance Or Sovereign Birthing?” Please, please, understand that redemptive faith is so beyond intellectual allegiance which is for most imitation activity apart from repentance toward God and faith in the finished work of Christ alone, not one’s best effort or one’s intellectual awareness of Christ Himself! One can say, “I know Jesus’, but never surrender to His Lordship; one can say, “I believe in Jesus”, but never submit to His every command: Again, “Why do you call Me ‘Lord, Lord’ but you do not do what I say?”

“Blood Atonement?” Romans 5:10-11 tells us, “For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be (being) saved by His life. And not only that, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation.” Belief apart from heart change? Belief apart from surrender to His divine will and eternal orders? Belief apart from “newness of life”? Belief, but barren of “the peace that passes all understanding”? Belief, but no ‘kingdom rule’ in you, willfully bowing daily to the King of kings and Lord of lords?

It was Sir Francis Bacon in his writing “Aphorisms” (no.49) who wrote: “Man prefers to believe what he prefers to be true”, but “Sovereign Birthing is the “Thus says the Lord,” and what He says, you are called to obey! That’s not in order to be saved but because you have been saved!

Samuel Butler, in “Hudibras”, (Pt.111, Canto 11, l,p.481), wrote: “For fools are stubborn in their way, As coins hardened by th’ allay; And obstinacy’s never so stiff as when it’s in a wrong belief.”

“Imitation Allegiance” is often unveiled in exposing obstinacy, disobedience, even disinterest in the Holy things of God, evidenced by a mindful rebellion to His Holy Word! In John 12:44-50 the Word says, The Jesus cried out and said, “He who believes (trusts in, relies upon, adheres to) in Me, believes not in Me but in Him who sent Me (Sovereign Holy God the Father!). And he who sees Me sees Him who sent Me (which is the major reason they crucified Jesus!). I have come as a light into the world, that whoever believes in Me should not abide in darkness. And if anyone hears My words and does not believe, I do not judge him; for I did not come to judge the world but to save the world. He who rejects Me, and does not receive My word, has that which judges him – the word that I have spoken will judge him in the last day. For I have not spoken on My own authority; but the Father who sent Me gave Me a command, what I should say and what I should speak. And I know that HIS COMMAND is everlasting life. Therefore, whatever I speak, just as the Father told Me, so I speak.”

But there is a vast difference between verbal allegiance, saying one thing but not obeying, OR, ‘hearing Him AND doing what He says’! In John 13:12-17 we learn about the “truly blessed”! It says: So when He (Jesus) had washed their feet, taken His garments, and sat down again, He said to them, “Do you know what I have done to you?

You call Me Teacher and Lord, and you say well, for so I am. If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have given you an example, that you should do as I have done to you. Most assuredly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master; nor is he who is sent greater than he who sent him. If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them.”

Dallas Willard, in his book “The Divine Conspiracy,” (pps.38-39), asks vital questions: “Can we seriously believe that God would establish a plan for us that essentially bypasses the awesome needs of present human life and leaves human character untouched? Would He leave us even temporarily marooned with no help in our kind of world, with our kind of problems; psychological, emotional, social, and global? Can we believe that the essence of Christian faith and salvation covers nothing but death and after? Can we believe that being saved really has nothing to do with the kinds of persons we are?…Are we to suppose that God gives us nothing that really influences character and spirituality? Are we to suppose that in fact Jesus has no substantial impact on our ‘real lives’?”

John 3:3! What an amazing revelation! Jesus answered and said to Nicodemus, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God”, amplifying it further in John 3:4-8 with Nicodemus responding in Verse 4, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” Jesus answered him, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water (the water of the Word!) and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone born of the Spirit.”

Have YOU been born again or is ‘church affiliation’ your only concern? But Thomas Carlyle, in “Cromwell’s Letters and Speeches,” (Vol.5, Pt.10), once said: “Blessed are the valiant that have lived in the Lord.” Are YOU “LIVING” in the Lord? Harold A. Bosley, in his writing, “Religion In Life”, wrote: “Dostoevski cause one of his characters to say: ‘I am X in an indeterminate equation. I am sort of phantom in life who has lost all beginning and end, who has forgotten his own name.’ The affirmation that we find in the Gospel causes us to confront every man with the word, ‘I know your real name. You are not an X in an indeterminate equation or a phantom in life, you are a child of God, you are a brother of mine in Christ.”

Dare I tell you? “Knowing you are a brother of in Christ is your greatest identity?”

CHAPTER 48

SOVEREIGN BIRTHING – SELFLESS ALLEGIANCE!

You do clearly understand that outside the hope we find in the Gospel of Christ fallen humanity lives hopelessly about radical change in human nature! “We are what we are ! Accept it.” And they descend or remain in a deep pit of desperation, condemnation, indifference, ‘fantasy living,’ or devotion to the desires of a depraved nature.

Billy Graham said, (“How To Be Born Again,” Guideposts, Carmel, NY, 1977), “Human viciousness breaks out as people steal, cheat, lie, murder, and rape.” Yet from God’s perspective, beyond the thieves, the liars, the murderers, or the rapists, what about those who camouflage the “dead corpse” with education – “ever learning but never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.” – with social activities, calling it ‘reconciliation with God-likeness’ – with philanthropy, giving to everybody but God – with attempts at achieving self-described moral goals but disillusioned that we fall so short – with religions, but falling short because religion cannot change the ‘leopard’s spots’! Camouflaged “dead corpses” with hidden slums, ghettos, and garbage dumps, never disappearing apart from the radical change of the human heart – or “New Birth”!

Camouflaged “sin natures” never sense our Savior’s newness. Camouflaged “old men” like fallen Adam have a hard time even believing “Second Adam” and saving grace.

Camouflaged “horrible-pit-dwellers” find it so difficult to believe there is a Savior and Lord able to lift them out of the miry clay of sin and death and able to set their feet upon the Rock of forgiveness and a new life.

And camouflaged religiosity will never take the place of Christ’s Word: “You must be born again!”

I want to include and extend the words of Scripture from the previous chapter, highlighting for you John 3:1-21! It says: There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to Him, “Rabbi, we know that You are a teacher come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.”

Jesus answered and said to him, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water (the water of the Word!) and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again’. The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit.”

Nicodemus answered and said to Him, “How can these things be?” Jesus answered and said to him, “Are you the teacher of Israel, and do not know these things? Most assuredly, I say to you, We (The Father, the Son, AND the Holy Spirit!) speak what we know and testify what we have seen, and you do not receive Our witness. If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things?

No one has ascended to heaven but He who came down from heaven, that is, the Son of Man who is in heaven. And as Moses lifted up the servant in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.

He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. BUT he who DOES the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly see, that they have been done in God.” So! “We choose daily death to ourselves that Christ’s Resurrection Life may be manifested in our mortal flesh”? It’s all because of God’s love for us! BUT WHAT DOES THIS “BORN AGAIN” REALLY MEAN FOR US IN THIS 21^st CENTURY? “SOVEREIGN BIRTHING – SELFLESS ALLEGIANCE”?

FIRST, NEW BIRTH – NEW BEGINNING IS THE INITIATIVE OF GOD HIMSELF! If you’re not familiar with Romans 3, you must spend necessary time there, but let me begin here with Verses 10-12. “As it’s written: ‘There is none who understands; there is NONE WHO SEEKS AFTER GOD…they have ALL TURNED ASIDE; they have together become unprofitable, there is none who does good, no, NOT ONE.”

But, you say, “What about Nicodemus who ‘came to Jesus by night and spoke to Jesus’?” In John 6:44 Jesus declared, “NO ONE can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me DRAWS HIM…” Nicodemus came because God sought him! God drew him! He came because God led him to the only hope Nicodemus had or the only hope you and I have! We seek Him because He sought us! We love Him because HE FIRST LOVED US! “New Birth – New Beginning,” the initiative of God Himself!

Receive 2 Corinthians 5:18-19! “Now all things are of God, WHO HAS RECONCILED US TO HIMSELF THROUGH JESUS CHRIST, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation…that is, THAT GOD WAS IN CHRIST RECONCILING THE WORLD TO HIMSELF…” It was Martin Luther who couldn’t understand how God could tolerate fallen man untiringly. He said, “If I were God and the world treated me as it treated Him, I would kick the wretched things to pieces.” And Luther probably would have tried…but God?

2 Peter 3:9 says, (The YOUNG READER’S STUDY BIBLE, 1994 by Thomas Nelson, Inc.), “He isn’t really being slow about His promised return, even though it sometimes seems that way. But He is waiting, for the good reason that He is not willing any should perish, and He is giving more time for sinners to repent.” Do you understand?

SECOND, NEW BIRTH –NEW BEGINNING IS THE RESULT OF OPENED EYES AND OVERTAKING GRACE! The Lord Jesus saved, sent, and anointed Paul for what purpose? Look at Acts 26:16-18. Do you see it in your Bible? OPENED EYES, in order to turn them,…that they may receive forgiveness of sins – OVERTAKING GRACE! How do you interpret “salvation”? What is redemption? When has a man experienced “atonement”? He has REPENTED and RECEIVED FROM GOD FORGIVENESS THROUGH OPENED EYES, OVERTAKEN BY AMAZING GRACE! SOVEREIGN BIRTHING – SELFLESS ALLEGIANCE?

Do you understand that there are those who’ve had their eyes or their ears opened yet never experienced overtaking grace? It was Major Ian Thomas who used to teach the difference between “awakened souls and regenerated spirits!!” Oswald Chambers wrote (MY Utmost For His Highest, p.7), “When a man is born again, he knows it is because he has received something as a gift from Almighty God and not because of his own decision.” OPENED EYES – OVERTAKING GRACE!

“That they may receive (WHAT?) – forgiveness of sins!” “That they may receive (WHAT?) – an inheritance among those who are sanctified (or set apart) by faith in Christ!” “That they may receive (WHAT?) – John 1:12 “But as many as received Him to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name, v13…who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but (BORN) of God.” “That they may receive (WHAT?) – John 1:16, “and of His fullness we have all received, and grace for grace.” “That they may receive (What?) – Galatians 6:17, “….for I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus.”

We need to hear what Paul said to the Church at Colossae, (Colossians 3:9-10), “Do not lie to one another, since you have put off the old man with his deeds…and have put on the new man who is renewed in knowledge according to the image of Him who created him.”

OPENED EYES – OVERTAKING GRACE? Titus 3:5 says, “Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit!!”

THIRD, NEW BIRTH – NEW BEGINNING? IT’S THE DEEP AWARENESS OF AND COMMITMENT TO KINGDOM LIVING! Let’s look at John 3:3 and John 3:5! Jesus answered and said, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” Jesus answered, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.”

You’ll remember Jesus, in Matthew 6, teaching us about prayer. And in what is often called “the Lord’s Prayer” He made it clear about when one has left the kingdom of darkness and entered the Kingdom of Light!! When? When one has left his world behind and crossed the threshold into Kingdom living! Matthew 6:9-10 says, “In this manner, therefore, pray: ‘Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be Your name, Your Kingdom come, Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven…!!”

Do YOU understand “KINGDOM LIVING?” It’s that abandonment of Self-Rule and submission to the Sovereignty of God. It’s the absence of ‘Self-Centeredness’ and allegiance to the King of kings and Lord of lords. Jesus said in Matthew 6:33, “But seek FIRST the Kingdom of God and His righteousness…” Are you a seeker? Is His Kingdom-Rule your passion? Are you dominated by the desire to know, please, honor, and obey Him?

Romans 14:17 says, “For the Kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost!!”

Here’s how Dr.J.Wallace Hamilton put it: (“Who Goes There?” Fleming Revell, 1958, p.45), “A little girl, watching her father total up his income tax, noticed the difference between the tax to the government and his gifts to the church, and said: ‘Look, Daddy, Uncle Sam gets more than God.’” And Dr. Hamilton commented, “Liquor gets more than God in America; luxury, movies, tobacco, even cosmetics get more than Christ and Christ’s Church. First? We spend more on the skins of women than on the souls of mankind.” QUESTION! ARE YOU TRULY COMMITTED TO KINGDOM LIVING? IT’S A SIGN OF BEING “BORN AGAIN!!”

FOURTH, NEW BIRTH – NEW BEGINNING? IT’S UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER TO THE LORDSHIP OF CHRIST JESUS! In Matthew 18:1-4 we read, “At that time the disciples came to Jesus saying, “Who then is greatest in the kingdom of heaven?…Then Jesus called a little child to Him, set him in the midst of them,…and said, Assuredly I say to you unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven…therefore whoever humbles himself as this little child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.”

Please notice, “becoming as little children” and “humbling himself as this little child…” – what is Jesus talking about? Three things about children: 1) A CHILD FINDS HIS LIFE FROM ANOTHER, 2) A CHILD IS TOTALLY DEPENDANT, #) A CHILD IS SO TRUSTING. SOVEREIGN BIRTHING – SELFLESS ALLEGIANCE?

Jesus had to ask it and still does, Luke 6:46, “But why do you call Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do the things which I say?” You’ll remember that Jesus humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the Cross…And what has God done because of what Christ did in submission to the will of the Father? Philippians 2:9-10 says, “Therefore God also has highly exalted Him (Christ Jesus) and given Him the name which is above every name…that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and those in earth, and of those under the earth…AND THAT EVERY TONGUE SHOULD CONFESS THAT JESUS IS LORD, to the glory of God the Father.”

Is Jesus truly the Lord of your life? Romans 14:9 says, For to this end Christ died and rose and lived again, that He might BE LORD of both the dead and the living.”

FIFTH, NEW BIRTH – NEW BEGINNING? READ CAREFULLY!! BECAUSE OF “THE REMISSION OF SINS,” THERE IS A DISSATISFACTION AND A DISCONTENT WITH THE OLD LIFE OF SIN!! 1 John 3:9 clearly declares, “Whoever has been born of God does not sin (Present tense, continuous action!), for His seed remains in him; and he cannot sin (and keep on sinning) because he has been born of God.”

Separated from God! And in “that” state who is without sin? No wonder God spoke through Isaiah (45:22) and said, “Look to Me, and be saved, all you ends of the earth! For I am God, and there is no other.”

What did John say? “Whoever is born of God does not commit sin.” Here’s how Oswald Chambers put it (“My Utmost For His Highest,” p.167), “Do I seek to stop sinning or have I stopped sinning? To be born of God “means” THAT I HAVE THE SUPERNATURAL POWER OF GOD TO STOP SINNING. In the Bible it is never – should a Christian sin? The Bible puts it emphatically – ‘a Christian must never sin.’ The effective working of the new birth life in us is that we do not commit sin, not merely that we have the power not to sin, but that we have stopped sinning. 1 John 3:9 does not mean that we CANNOT sin; it means that if we obey the life of God in us, WE NEED NOT SIN.”

Spurgeon is even stronger. In his book “The Soul-Winner” (p.31), he taught, “Idle are the boasts of a man who harbors within himself the love of any transgression. He may feel what he likes and believe what he likes, but he is still in the gall of bitterness and the bonds of iniquity while a single sin rules in his heart and life. True regeneration implants a hatred of all evil. Where one sin is delighted in, the evidence is fatal to a sound hope. A man need not take a dozen poisons to destroy his life; one is quite sufficient.” Sovereign Birthing – Selfless Allegiance?

IS THERE IN YOU A DISSATISFACTION AND A DISCONNECT WITH A LIFE OF SIN?

SIXTH, NEW BIRTH – NEW BEGINNING? IT’S THE GLORIOUS NEW EXPERIENCE THAT THE OLD IS GONE AND THERE IS THE NEW BEGINNING! 2 Corinthians 5:17 says, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.” Do you believe what Jesus said in Revelation 21:5? “BEHOLD, I MAKE ALL THINGS NEW.”

No wonder David sang “unto Him a new song” (Psalm 33:3)!! Has David put that eternally new melody line into your life? Is there a symphony of praise that cannot be contained? Jeremiah was bathed in “new mercies every morning” (Lamentations 3:23), because he knew the faithfulness of God.

We saw in Ezekiel NEW HEARTS, NEW SPIRITS. Paul, in Ephesians, talks about the new man. Because of Jesus’ shed blood we walk “By a new and living way” (Hebrews 10:20). Revelations 2:17 speaks of our “new name.”

For far too many the “NEW” is totally irrelevant because they’re consumed by the OLD MAN; in fact, they’re in bondage to it! For some their hankerings are “sin for a season.” For others it’s love of the old man, love of rotten fruit and spoiled senses and cloudy minds. They’re at home there!!

BUT THEN THERE’S THAT ONE – “I AM IN CHRIST. THE OLD HAS TRULY PASSED AWAY. AND ALL THINGS HAVE BECOME NEW!!”

SEVENTH, NEW BIRTH – NEW BEGINNING? THERE”S A DEEP AWARENESS OF THE AWESOME LEADERSHIP OF OUR LORD! Do you remember Abraham’s servant being sent out to find a bride for Isaac? Genesis 24:27 says, the servant speaking, “…As for me, being on the way, THE LORD LED ME…” Did YOU hear that with your heart?

You know you’re on the way and it dawns on you, “The Lord has led me and the Lord will lead me.” I’m not adrift on the sea of life – I’m guided by the compass of God’s sovereign will! I’m not a “loose cannon” – I’m an arrow in the holy bow of God’s divine providence! My life IS NOT a “roll of the dice” – I’m a blueprint of the awesome and amazing design of God’s Holy Purpose!

Romans 8:14 declares, “For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God.” Isaiah 55:12 says, “For you shall go out with joy and be led out with peace.” Psalm 77:20 says, “You led Your people like a flock…”

I DON’T WANT TO “CALL THE SHOTS” FOR MY LIFE – I WANT TO BE LED! “GUIDE ME, O THOU GREAT JEHOVAH!!”

EIGHTH, NEW BIRTH – NEW BEGINNING? A DEEP CONVICTION OF IRREPRESSIBLE CONFIDENCE IN GOD! Here’s how Paul put it for the church at Colossae (3:3), “For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.”

On my own I wasn’t hidden – I WAS EXPOSED! On my own I wasn’t covered – I WAS SO VULNERABLE! On my own I wasn’t hidden

I’m no longer on my own – I’ve entrusted myself to the hands and heart of God! With Paul (2 Timothy 1:12), I say, “I know WHOM I have believed and am persuaded that HE IS ABLE to keep what I have committed to Him until that day.” – I WAS A CLEAR TARGET FOR THE FIERY DARTS OF EVIL! On my own I wasn’t hidden – I WAS OPEN GAME FOR ANY FOUL FORCE! BUT NOW?…

NINTH, NEW BIRTH – NEW CONFIDENCE? IRREPRESSIBLE CONFIDENCE IN GOD ALONE? Philippians 1:6, “being CONFIDENT of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ!!” The writer of Hebrews affirms (3:5-6) that as Moses was faithful over his house, “Christ as a Son (was faithful) over His own house, WHOSE HOUSE WE ARE IF, IF, IF, IF, WE HOLD THE CONFIDENCE AND THE REJOICING OF HOPE FIRM TO THE END.” Sovereign Birthing – Selfless Allegiance?

From the old aristocracy of Russia a prominent lady came to America in the 1920’s. She came with nothing because of the Bolshevik revolution. She got away with her life. Once here she was confronted with the claims of Christ and was converted. With the opportunity to share her new-found faith she talked about the coming of two revolutions. Because of the Bolshevik revolution she lost her fortune but because of Christ and His shed blood she lost her sins! In contemplation she shared, “What if the second revolution had been first? What if the aristocracy of Russia, the privileged class had truly been born again, those famous ten days of revolution by the Bolsheviks might never have happened.”

Then she said, “Revolution didn’t begin with an atheist or a Karl Marx, but in the visions of the prophets, the good news out of the heart of Israel, out of the very heart of a caring, compassionate God who loved the world, who proved His love for us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us. Who not only raised His Son from the dead but who incredibly takes sinners and makes them saints, who takes the dead and raises them spiritually, victoriously, and literally, WHO CRUCIFIES US WITH CHRIST AND YET WE LIVE, NOT US, BUT THE CHRIST LIVES IN US!” GLORY! “Born again by the grace of God!!”

CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

GRACED, GOVERNED, GIFTED, AND GLOWING WITH GLORY

I was deeply impressed AND convicted when I first read years ago Jonathan Edwards profound and biblically powerful comment: “Grace is but glory begun, and glory is but grace perfected.” How do you respond to the marvelous grace of our loving Lord?

No doubt this is why Thomas Adams shared: “Grace comes into the soul. As the morning sun into the world; first a dawning; then a light; and at last the full sun in his full and excellent brightness.”

And if you’re aware of “law and grace”, you know grace exposes ‘guilt’ in breaking God’s law even if you ‘keep the law, but offend in one point, one becomes guilty of it all!’ Then, we stand in need of both mercy AND grace! I remember at one point in my journey reading E. Stanley Jones in his writing “The Way,” (by Abingdon Press, p.196) when he said: “Grace binds you with far stronger cords than the cords of duty or obligation can bind you. Grace is free, but when once you take it you are bound forever to the Giver, and bound to catch the spirit of the Giver. Like produces like. Grace makes you gracious, the Giver makes you give.”

THAT IS SO VERY, VERY TRUE! Consider the grace of God as it calls you out, births new life within you, and THEN grace pours you out as a drink offering to a thirsty land that you dwell in! The nature of grace? Man at His worst – God at His best – “new man birthed, new man poured out as a drink offering, new man reflected and glowing with the glory of God”! Apart from grace there is no inward glow to the glory of God but only the ‘enlightenment’ of fleshly, sensual, carnally dimmed lighting of a short life but eternal darkness!

August Lang once stated that “whatever man is able to do in order to experience the effects of divine grace is merely owing to the action of the Holy Spirit which draws us toward God.” But what a man does to enjoy, temporarily embrace the effects of grace, or even lean toward God’s full desire and eternal will, does not mean, he has been transformed but ‘tempted’ in his flesh to at least give the Spirit a hearing! How many in your life journey have you seen ‘taste’ of grace but then give way to one’s ‘grit’ and self-determination? No doubt this is why Oswald Chambers once said, “Beware of making a fetish of consistency to YOUR convictions instead of being devoted to God.”

FIRST, CONSIDER WITH ME THE AMAZING GRACE OF GOD IN ITS UNCHANGING GLORY, TRUTH, AND MATCHLESS MINISTRY.

Biblical grace is not a ‘fleshly “gutting it out” until one arrives at his desired goal of spirituality’, but one confronted by Christ, convicted by the Spirit, confessing a need of the “Blood Redemption in Christ Alone”, and being raised up out of spiritual death into the glow of His eternal Life and Presence within the repentant and faith-filled heart AND mind – and he/she never sways from Him and His Truth!

Max Lucado’s book, “In The Grip of Grace, (W. Publishing Group, A division of Thomas Nelson, Inc.), has under the front-cover title: “He will love you forever.” In his introduction he quoted Galatians 3:27 which says, “For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ,” or, in his own words said, “My son, you are now clothed with Christ.” Grace is the garment, not of the ‘self-dressed’, but of the super-natural ‘clothing’ by God of the very life, nature, character, and mission of Christ ‘in You the hope of glory’!

In Psalm 4:3-8 we read of the “glory” graced on true sons and daughters. It says: “But know that the Lord (in His Sovereign Mercy!) has set apart (chosen) for Himself him who is godly; the Lord will hear when I call to Him. Be angry (‘shaking’, trembling!), and do not sin. Meditate within your heart on your bed, and be still. Offer the sacrifices of righteousness, and put your trust in the Lord. There are many who say, ‘Who will show us any good?’ Lord, lift up the light of Your countenance upon us. You have put gladness in my heart, more than in the season that their grain and wine increased. I will both lie down in peace, and sleep; For You alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety.”

But ‘the graceless’? Bondage to the human nature, bound by the chains of the devil, darkness, and domination of one’s old sin nature, life built on a faulty foundation, embracing ‘imaginations’ and every low thing or high thing that exalts ‘self’ over the knowledge of God! ‘The graceless’? Easily moved by circumstances, easily swayed by the world’s ‘wandering’ participants, easily drawn into life’s drudgeries by the world, the flesh or the devil’s temporary, non-redemptive activities, promotions or schemes, easily deceived by the world’s ‘norm’ of lust, lying, or ‘fleshly inspiration’ that is so temporary, so misleading, even falsifying why one is even here on life’s tableland, created by Holy, Awesome, Redeeming, Merciful God!

In “The American Hymnal” of 1933 published by The Broadman Press, Nashville, Tennessee, there is an old Hymn by Robert Robinson and John Wyeth entitled “Come, Thou Fount”. It says: “Come, Thou Fount of every blessing, Tune my heart to sing Your grace’ Streams of mercy, never ceasing, call for songs of loudest praise. Teach me some melodious sonnet, Sung by flaming tongues above; Praise the mount – I’m fixed upon it – Mount of They redeeming love.

Here I raise my Ebenezer; Hither by Your help I’m come; And I hope by Your good pleasure, Safely to arrive at home. Jesus sought me when a stranger, Wandering from the fold of God; He, to rescue me from danger, Interposed His precious blood.

O to grace how great a debtor Daily I’m constrained to be! Let Your goodness, like a fetter, Bind my wandering heart to Thee: Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it, Prone to leave the God I love; Here’s my heart, O take and seal it; Seal it for Your courts above.”

In 2 Corinthians 1:21 Paul wrote: “Now He who establishes us is God, who also HAS SEALED US and GIVEN US THE SPIRIT IN OUR HEARTS AS A GUARANTEE.” How uplifting and inspiring do YOU find that!?! Oh, and then in 2 Corinthians 9:8-9, he wrote: “And God is able to make all grace abound toward you, that you, always having all sufficiency in all things, may have an abundance for every good work. As it is written: ‘He has dispersed abroad, He has given to the poor; His righteousness endures forever,” AND THAT’S THE GRACE OF GOD!! Are YOU graced by God?

SECOND, GRACE IN SALVATION REALITY LEADS TO GRACE THAT GOVERNS THE REDEEMED HEART AND LIFE. In Isaiah 9: 6-7 Isaiah was given a glimpse of the Savior, the Redeemer, who will be King of kings and Lord of lords! “For unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given; and the government will be upon His shoulder. And His name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of peace. Of the increase of His government and peace there will be no end, upon the throne of David and over His kingdom, to order it and establish it with judgment and justice from that time forward, even forever!! The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.”

He has, He does, and He does so forever and ever, through the government of His Son and our Savior! Christ’s “government” is the guidance of our Lord through His Word and through His Spirit and through, yes, the godly witness of the “Born again”! Do you remember from Genesis 24:26-27 “the man” bowing down his head and worshipping the Lord? And he said: “Blessed be the Lord God of my master Abraham, who has not forsaken His mercy and His truth toward my master. As for me, being on the way, the Lord led me…!” Wow! Are YOU led by the Lord daily?

In Exodus 15:13 Moses and the children of Israel sang, yes, sang: “You in Your mercy have led forth the people whom You have redeemed; You, God, have guided them in Your strength to Your holy habitation.”

Another very old hymn unveils this grace in salvation reality leading to more grace that governs the redeemed heart and life. It was written by Sir John Bowring and Ithamar Conkey entitled “In The Cross of Christ.” It says: “In the cross of Christ I glory, Towering over the wrecks of time; All the light of sacred story Gathers round its head sublime.

When the woes of life overtake me, Hopes deceive, and fears annoy, Never shall the Cross forsake me; Lo! It glows with peace and joy.

When the sun of bliss is beaming Light and love upon my way, From the Cross the radiance streaming Adds more luster to the day.

Bane and blessing, pain and pleasure, By the Cross are sanctified; Peace is there that knows no measure, Joys that through all time abide.” Are you graced and governed by the Resurrected and Reigning Christ Jesus?

THIRD, GRACE IN SALVATION TRANSFORMATION IS GRACE THAT “GIFTS” EACH AND EVERY BORN-AGAIN BELIEVER. It was Paul again who laid the strong, enduring wisdom about God’s “gifting” of each and every child of the King! And no gifting is more or less valuable or important than one or the other. In 1 Corinthians 12:1-11 we are trained and equipped in “Body Life Appreciation” for the whole family of faith! Paul said:

“Now concerning spiritual gifts, brethren, I do not want you to be ignorant: YOU KNOW that you were Gentiles, carried away to these dumb idols, however you were led. Therefore I make known to you that no one speaking by the Spirit of God calls Jesus accursed, and no one can say that Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit.

THERE ARE DIVERSITIES OF GIFTS, but the same Spirit. There are differences of ministries, but the same Lord. And there are diversities of activities, but it is the same God who works all in all. But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to each one for the profit of all: For to one is given the word of wisdom through the Spirit, to another the word of knowledge through the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the same Spirit, to another working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another discerning of spirits, to another different kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. But the one and the same Spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually AS HE WILLS.” GLORY! Oh, and then in Romans 11:29 we read: “For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable – what was true through Israel’s history, good or bad, as God’s chosen messengers and His gifted “army”, the equipped “army” today is just as gifted!

The brother of Jesus, James, has another enlightening word about “gifts”. He said in James 1:16-18, “Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren. Every good and perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning. Of His own will He brought us forth by the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of His creatures.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning, in her writing, “Sonnets from the Portuguese,” (no.26), wrote: “God’s gifts put man’s best dreams to shame.” And yet the sad truth is, many who are gifted and never use them to God’s glory, are spiritually blinded to God’s graciousness in ‘gifting’ them! Yes, many enriched by God treat Him as ‘paupers’ – “We have nothing to give to God’s unimportant work?” But I also wonder at times, “Do those who do give do so, yes, to the glory of God alone?”

FOURTH, GRACE IN SALVATION TRANSFORMATION IS EVIDENCED BY THOSE OUTWARDLY OR INWARDLY WHO CONTINUALLY “GLOW IN GLORY”! It’s so very short and simple yet celebratory for every moment of your faith-walk! Psalm 21:1-7 Davis “sang” to the glory of the Lord: “The king shall have joy in Your strength, O Lord; and in Your salvation how greatly shall he rejoice! You have given him his heart’s desire, and have not withheld the request of his lips. For You meet him with goodness; You set a crown of pure gold upon his head. He asked life from You, AND You gave it to him – Length of days forever and ever. His glory is great in Your salvation; honor and majesty You have placed upon him. For You have made him MOST BLESSED FOREVER; You have made him exceedingly glad with Your presence. For the king (and I say all “the kings and priests of the family of faith”, every disciple!) trusts in the Lord, and through the mercy of the Most High he shall not be moved.”

I really don’t know, understand, or comprehend how many “professors of faith” are ‘dumb’ as to the Glory of God! And especially when He tabernacles in the inner man or inner woman who repents toward merciful God and rests in Christ’s Resurrection Life, His Resurrection Power, and His Resurrection Hope! His eternal will for your earthly life of faith in Christ is not a matter of doubt, debate, or delay! Jesus says: “Take up YOUR cross and follow Me!” Do you believe that’s daily death to self and yieldedness to the Savior’s Presence within you?

I tell you, with all of my heart and mind: “To be Heavenly relevant is to be, yes, earthly radical in willing obedience and yieldingness to the Christ within!” AMEN?

CHAPTER FIFTY

HOLDING FAST TO THE NAME AND FAITH IN CHRIST JESUS!

In Revelation 2:12-14 we read about the Lord, the Alpha and Omega, the Savior WHO WAS DEAD after the Cross, BUT IS ALIVE FOREVERMORE! And in these Verses, 12-13 of Chapter Two, we hear Him say, “And to the angel (the messenger) of the church in Pergamos write, (or can we legitimately say, ‘to the church in your immediate area, city, state, and nation?), These things says He who has the sharp two-edged sword (the Word of God?): “I know your works, and where you dwell, where Satan’s throne is ( like Judaism in Jesus’ day, head-quartered in Jerusalem! Or a modern-day Dallas or Ft. Worth?). And you hold fast to My name, and did not deny My faith even in the days in which Antipas was my faithful martyr, who was killed among you, where Satan dwells. But I have a few things against you…” Is it at all possible that “the angel over your area examines you and your church family, and must say, ‘I have a few things against you”?

I would surmise that the most important thing of the moment for you and me is, “Are we holding fast to the name and faith in Christ Jesus?” I think it’s vital at times! In 2 Corinthians 13: 4-6 the Apostle Paul wrote: “For though He (Christ Jesus) was crucified in weakness, yet He lives by the power of God. For we also are weak in Him, but we shall live with Him by the power of God toward you. Examine yourselves as to whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Do you not know yourselves, that Jesus Christ IS IN YOU? – unless indeed you are disqualified. But I trust that you will know that we (Paul and his co-laborers with Him) are not disqualified.”

Here Christ Jesus comes! He carries the “two-edged sword” in His hand! And beyond a shadow of any doubt, there’s not a disciple, a church, a gathering in His Name, when He’s not absent but present, examining the “professors and possessors” of His eternal promises! In Hebrews 2:8-18 we read one of those powerful explanations of WHY you and I should hold fast to His Name and Faith! It says: “You (God the Father) have put all things in subjection under his feet. For in that He put all in subjection under him, He left nothing that is not put under him. But now we do not yet see all things put under him. But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than angels, for the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, that He, by the grace of God, might taste death for everyone.

For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through the sufferings. For both He who sanctifies and those who are being sanctified are all of one, for which reason He is not ashamed to call them brethren, saying: ‘I will declare Your name to My brethren; in the midst of the assembly I will sing praise to You.’ And again, ‘I will put My trust in Him.’ And again, “Here am I and the children whom God has given Me.’

Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, He Himself likewise shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil, and release those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage. For indeed He does not give aid to angels, but He does give aid to the seed of Abraham. Therefore, in all things He had to be made like His brethren, that He might be a merciful and faithful High Priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For in that He Himself has suffered, being tempted, He is able to aid those who are tempted.”

Are YOU aware of ‘the ability of Christ’s aid’ in helping you, when temptation comes, to hold fast to the name and faith of those “In Christ”? Understanding that you have ‘arch-enemies’ to your faith in Christ (the world, the old sinful flesh, and the devil!), do you receive and walk in the eternal truth that YOU “are more than conquerors through Him who loved us”? Paul asked the Roman believers in one of their testy times, Romans 8:35, “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?”

CONSIDER, FIRST, THAT “IN CHRIST” WE ARE BLESSED WITH THE STRONG AND VICTORIOUS WARRIOR OVER SIN AND THE WORLD AND THE DEVIL! “In Christ” we who know His abiding Presence with us and within us, when troubles, trials, and testings come, attempting to lead us astray from Him, but we’re reminded that Christ, the Captain of the Lord’s armies, has said to us: “Come to Me, and I will give you rest!” And Christ Jesus is the “Living Word”, and Hebrews 4:12 tells us, “For the Word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.”

Even beyond His abiding Presence with you and in you, consider what His gifts to you are related to living in a world of trials, troubles, and tribulations; so..He leaves us ill-equipped or unprepared? I don’t think so! In Matthew 3:11 John the Baptist said, “I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance, but He who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.” Is it you as “I indeed” OR in ‘holding His name and your faith in it’, OR, “I choose the baptism of the Holy Ghost and the fire of God” to stand victorious in me and through His Word to me? How about holding to all three options, or better, all three provisions?

There is another challenging Verse that should awaken some readers! It’s Isaiah 33:14 about God’s judgment on “Zion”! It says: “The sinners in Zion are afraid; fearfulness has seized the hypocrites; who among us shall dwell in the devouring fire? Who among us shall dwell with everlasting burnings?”

But… IF the ‘sword of the Lord’ is your strong defense, be assured, as you walk and rest in Him, you are to have no fear because Jesus IS YOUR STRONG DEFENSE! In Zechariah 9:9-17 are YOUR refrigerator verses for the year!! It says: “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem! BEHOLD, your King is coming to you; He is just and having salvation, lowly and riding on a donkey, a colt, the foal of a donkey. I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the horse from Jerusalem; the battle bow shall be cut off. He shall speak peace to the nations; His dominion shall be ‘from sea to sea, and from the River to the ends of the earth’.”

CONSIDER, SECOND, THAT “IN CHRIST” WE’RE BLESSED WITH HIS CONSTANT, CARING OVERSIGHT, BECAUSE HE’S PROMISED NOT TO TAKE US OUT OF OUR WORLD SETTINGS, WHICH CAN MEAN ABUSE, ATTACKS, ABOMINABLE ACCUSATIONS, ADULTEROUS TEMPTATIONS, AFFLICTIONS OF CHAINS, PERSECUTIONS, ISOLATION, AND ON AND ON IN DEVILISH RESENTMENTS, BUT TO OVERSEE OUR JOURNEY OF FAITH! Did we read in Revelation 2:13 about ‘the church in Pergamos’? Did ‘the angel of the church’ there say that He (the Lord Jesus Christ) “has the sharp two-edged sword” and He “knows where you dwell, where Satan’s throne is”, and that He knows “you hold fast to My name, and did not deny My faith even in the days in which Antipas was My faithful martyr, who was killed among you, where Satan dwells?”

When you scan our modern world around us, are you aware of the spirit of godlessness that rules many hearts, where there is no shame for obsceneness, licentiousness, adulteries fleshly and spiritual, hypocritical pretenses, fleshly and spiritual idolatries, blasphemies, Sodom and Gomorrah shamelessness, and ‘out-of-control’ societal sickness of unbelief, rebellion, and Satanic oppositions? In Luke 22:31-34 the Lord Jesus spoke predicting Simon Peter’s denial! He said: “Simon, Simon! Indeed, Satan has asked for you, that he may sift you as wheat. But I have prayed for you that your faith should not fail; and when you have returned to Me, strengthen your brethren.” But Peter said to Him, “Lord, I am ready to go with You, both to prison and to death.” Then He said to Peter, “I tell you, Peter, the rooster shall not crow this day before you will deny three times that you know Me,” and it happened, but with the Lord’s confrontation, and even “following Jesus at a distance,” there came a time of brokenness, sorrow, repentance, AND ‘sold-out allegiance’!

As a missionary who traveled worldwide but primarily in India, I can tell you I’ve had India pastor friends whom I’ve known who, yes, were martyred for the faith, beaten and left for dead but survived, even their wives and sons and daughters horribly mistreated because they proclaimed Christ Jesus as Savior and Lord! At the same time, I’ve heard of men there who “fell away”, “wandered from the faith and calling”, some even becoming arch-enemies of Christ and His gospel!

Some have asked me, “How does that happen that allegiance becomes perverted”? For some it’s been a temporary allegiance apart from the eternal reality of the “Second Birth”. For others it’s been by ‘procrastination’, or an attitude of ‘later, but not now’, or by peer pressure from family, friends, or worldly foes that can be intense, even life-threatening, like John 9:20-23 and what the parents of the ‘man born blind’ had to day after His miraculous healing! The Jews had put intense pressure on them actually confronting them saying, “Is this your son, who you say was born blind? How then does he now see?”

Verses 20-23, the parents answered them and said, “We know that it is our son, and that he was born blind; but by what means he now sees we do not know, or who opened his eyes we do not know. He is of age; ask him. He will speak for himself.”

Others deny the faith by complacency and indifference about whether the Lord ‘confesses them before Father-God or not’ – they just don’t care! Jesus said in Luke 11:23, “He who is not with Me is against Me, and he who does not gather with Me scatters.” And to ‘scatter’ people away from Christ rather than ‘gather’ them to Him is, yes, a criminal offense in the eyes of Christ Jesus!

In Spurgeon’s Sermons, (Memorial Library, Vol.19, p.41), Spurgeon wrote: “A life in which we have shunned the cross of Christ will lead to a state in which we shall miss the crown of glory.” And since He is “the way, the truth, and the life,” how is it some perpetuate unbelief, doubt, indifference, or fleshly philosophies? In Colossians 2:8-9 Paul warns: “Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men, according to the basic principles of the world and not according to Christ. For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily; and you are complete in Him, who is the head of all principality and power.” Hoy’s YOUR faith? Complete or incomplete or you’re just getting started? If it’s a new start, then “press in” daily, resting in His finished work! When you surrender to Christ, you begin your pilgrimage “complete in Him lacking nothing!” Live like it! Jesus says, “I’ll never leave you nor forsake you!”

THIRD, “IN CHRIST” WE HOLD FAST THE NAME AND FAITH OF CHRIST BY, YES, THE DAILY RENEWING OF OUR MINDS THROUGH HIS FAITHFUL WORD! Paul gives every true believer instruction as to living daily as “living sacrifices” to the glory of Christ when in Romans 12:1-2 he wrote: “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable serve. AND do not be conformed to this world, but be (being) transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”

Interesting word in Acts 17:10-12a when the “brethren” had sent Paul and Silas on their journey of touching their world with grace. The Word says, “Then the brethren immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea. When they arrived, they went into the synagogue of the Jews. These were more noble, or fair-minded, than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness, and searched the Scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so.”

Paul also wrote to the Thessalonians an important word! 1 Thessalonians 2:13 he said, “For this reason we also thank God without ceasing, because when you received the word of God which you hear from us, you welcomed it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which also effectively works in you who believe.”

In Matthew 4 the Word tells us that Jesus had been led ‘by the Spirit’ into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. He fasted for forty days and forty nights, and the Word says that afterward He was hungry. And who came to Him? The tempter, the devil, and aid to Him, in Verse 3, “If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.” But Jesus responded in Verse 4, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.” In John 6:63 Jesus said to, yes, many of His own disciples who had a hard time understanding about “eating His flesh and drinking His blood.” They called it ‘a hard saying’ and ‘who can understand it?’ Jesus responded, “Does this offend you? What then if you should see the Son of Man ascend where He was before? It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak to you are spirit, and they are life.”

In 1 Thessalonians 2:13 Paul affirmed the new Thessalonian believers saying to them: “For this reason we also thank God without ceasing, because when you received the word of God which you heard from us, you welcomed it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which also effectively works in you who believe )trust in, obey, adhere to!).” Are YOU feeding on the Word of God daily? One meal like breakfast, second meal like lunch, or third meal like night dinner or supper? Are you “holding fast” the Name and Word of God?

FOURTH, WE HOLD FAST TO THE NAME AND FAITH “IN CHRIST” BECAUSE WE KNOW THE PRICELESS PRECIOUSNESS OF THAT NAME ABOVE ALL NAMES! Paul said in Philippians 2:8-11, “And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross. Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”

Are there ever in your quiet times as you reach out and rest in Him that you hear the unnumbered masses of “born again believers” who’ve passed on or still around you, yes, by the billions, and you hear erupting to your inner man the “Hallelujah Chorus”! They are exalting Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace, united in praising “Christ – My Lord and my God!”

True believers never have a mind-change because their hearts are surrendered to and yielded to “the preeminence of His Name”! Didn’t Jesus say at one time, “I AM Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending”? In Matthew 1:20-21 the angel told Joseph, husband of Mary, before Jesus was born, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take to you Mary your wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. And she will bring forth a Son, and you shall call His name JESUS, for He will save His people from their sins.” GLORY NOW AND GLORY THROUGH ALL OF ETERNITY – WE SERVE A RISEN SAVIOR AND LORD!

Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, before the Sanhedrin or rulers of the people of Jerusalem and the nation Israel, declared in Acts 4:10-12, after a dramatic healing, said, “Let it be known to you, and to all the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead, by Him this man stands here before you whole. This is the ‘stone which was rejected by you builders, which has become the chief cornerstone.’ NOR IS THERE SALVATION IN ANY OTHER, FOR THERE IS NO OTHER NAME UNDER HEAVEN GIVEN AMONG MEN BY WHICH WE MUST BE SAVED.”

FIFTH, WE HOLD FAST TO THE NAME AND FAITH “IN CHRIST” BECAUSE OF THE PRICELESS BENEFITS AND BLESSING OF RESTING IN HIM! In Philippians 4:6 Paul challenges us with Christ’s holy care and comfort! “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; AND the peace of God which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds THROUGH CHRIST JESUS.”

I close this chapter with words of an old, old hymn I grew up on, written by Edward Mote and William B. Bradbury well before the year 1930 when “The American Hymnal” was published – only the first Verse and Chorus:

“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.

On Christ the solid Rock, I stand; All other ground is sinking sand, All other ground is sinking sand.” AMEN?

CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

WHOLE-HEARTED ALLEGIANCE OR PARTIAL PARTICIPATION?

There are several Verses in Hebrews 13:5-6 that I want to highlight as we begin this chapter. It says: “Let your conduct (as a believer in Christ Jesus) be without covetousness; be content with such things as you have. For He Himself has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” So we may boldly say: “The Lord is my helper; I will not fear. What can man do to me?”

And some disciples who have ‘professed’ are often more influenced by the world, the flesh, and the devil, than they are by the inspired Word of God or the Savior who does knock on one’s ‘heart-door’!

In Luke 11:37-52 we find Jesus invited by ‘a certain Pharisee’ to fine with him. The ‘Pharisee’ was a part of the Judaic system which certainly promoted ‘a monotheistic system’ of ‘religious beliefs’ but avoided “the Coming Messiah”, in fact crucifying Him on their ‘whims’ because of their ‘worship’ of their false belief in how God should relate to them!

It’s like, yes, multitudes today who ‘worship and serve’ the ‘anti-Christ’, the center of man-made religious systems! In 1 John 2:18-23 the beloved John wrote: “Little children, it is the last hour; (What last hour? The last hour of the Judaic system before its destruction by the Romans in 70AD!); and as you have heard that the Antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have come, by which we know that it is the last hour. They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us; but they went out that THEY might be made manifest, that none of them were of us. BUT you have an anointing from the Holy Spirit, and you know all things. I have not written to you because you do not know the truth, but because you know it, and that no lie if of the truth. Who is a liar but he who denies that Jesus IS the Christ (or, yes, The Promised Messiah!). He IS antichrist who denies the Father and the Son. Whoever denies the Son does not have the Father; he who acknowledges the Son (gives Him His rightful place in them!) has the Father also.”

Who IS ‘the liar’? He/she who denies Jesus Is WHO He says He is, he/she who takes a stand with a world of unbelievers, he/she who has no grasp of eternal Truth but is ‘blindly’ aligned with self-centered allegiance masquerading as the “pure gospel”!

Who is ‘the liar’? The ‘partial participant’, the ‘half-hearted’ soul with one foot in Hell and, he thinks, one foot in Heaven, or like Shakespeare in “Troilus and Cressida,” (Act 11, sc.2,l, 56), “It’s mad idolatry to make the service greater than the god;” AND BE ASSURED, there are multitudes of ‘performers’ who’ve never been “born again,” “born of the Spirit,” or “birthed into ‘New Life In Christ”, but see themselves as greater than the “servant- Christ Jesus”, even greater than God on His governing Throne!

Who is ‘the liar’? The “drainers of the swamp” through their best efforts, their ‘higher education’ and self-performance, their ‘intellectual brilliance’ that they see as “smarter than God Himself”, their ‘vain’ self-imagination that substitutes fleshly wisdom in place of spiritual truth and revelation, their denial of the everlasting God who never faints or grows weary, but, as ‘self-appointed ruler of their own hearts’, they have no desire to enter the process of the grace of God, becoming broken bread and poured out wine, but prefer the ‘self-made wine of fleshly performance’?

It was Isaiah in his prophetic word in Isaiah 40:25-31 who hears God Himself say to him, “To whom then will you liken Me, or to whom shall I be equal?” says the Holy One. Lift up your eyes on high, and see who created these things, who brings out their hosts by number; He calls them all by name, by the greatness of His might and the strength of His power; not one is missing.

Why do you say, O Jacob, and speak, O Israel: “My way is hidden from the Lord, and my just claim is passed over by my God”? ( Do you sense that there was and are folks who believe “God is asleep”, unconcerned about them, OR they evidence it by their words, actions, choices, or deeds?).

Have you not known? Have you not heard? The everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, neither faints nor is weary. His understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the weak, and to those who have no might He increases strength.

Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall, BUT THOSE WHO WAIT ON THE LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.”

Psalm 106 is a very powerful Word related to ‘partial obedience’, a ‘compromised life-style of faith’, or ‘worshipping’ likenesses, imitations, but not true, undying allegiance to the King of kings and Lord of lords! In Psalm 106: 15 the psalmist wrote: “And He (Holy God) gave them their request, but sent leanness into their soul.” (Have you ever heard someone say, “You may get what you want but you may not want what you get?”).

In Psalm 106:35-40 we read, “But they mingled with the Gentiles and learned their works; they served their idols, which became a snare to them. They even sacrificed their sons and their daughters to demons, and shed innocent blood, the blood of their sons and daughters, whom they sacrificed to the idols of Canaan; and the land was polluted with blood. Thus they were defiled by their own works, and played the harlot by their own deeds. Therefore the wrath of the Lord was kindled against His people, so that He abhorred His own inheritance.”

Did the Holy Word call ‘unbelievers’ “minglers”? The Random House Collegiate Dictionary of 1975 calls “minglers” ‘those who become ‘mixed, blended, or united’, (like one united with the world, the flesh, and the devil!), combined, or put together in a mixture, blended, united, joined, or conjoined.”

In God’s Holy Faith Book, the inspired Word of God, highlights and exposes unbelief as that which is the absence of spiritual life in Christ apart from ‘repentance toward God and faith in the finished work of Christ “At The Cross” and “the empty tomb”! It IS the life of sin and the sin-nature that blinds, darkens, and destroys, that limits eternal intention or purpose, that establishes inwardly a moral desert where there is the absence of eternal intent, or the hearts and minds and purposes are pumped by satisfying ‘the flesh-nature’ or ‘sin at its fleshly best’!

Would you consider as I do that ‘mockers of the true Faith who are the ‘minglers’ are truly lives with no true, eternal foundation, living ‘vain’, purposeless lives’? It was William Blake in his writing “Mock On” who once wrote: “Mock on, mock on, Voltaire, Rousseau; Mock on, mock on; it’s all in vain! You throw the sand against the wind, and the wind blows it back again.” Superficial, fleshly thinkers, though brilliant in their intellectual ‘thinking’ of math or philosophy, or science, post ‘grades’ of D’s and F’s when it comes to eternal and, yes, historical history and Truth of Emmanuel, the One who is Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, and the Prince of Peace!

But apart from the ‘minglers’, there is the Messenger who comes, and still comes, and knocks on the door of men’s hearts with the desire to come in ushering in healing, deliverance, salvation, and assurance that He is able to do exceedingly above all we might ask or think!

In Mark 5:25-34 we find ‘a certain woman’ who had an issue of blood for twelve years’! The Word tells us, that she “had suffered many things from many physicians. She had spent all she had and was no better, but rather grew worse. When she heard about Jesus, she came behind Him in the crowd and touched His garment. For she said, ‘If only I may touch His clothes, I shall be made well.’ Immediately the fountain of her blood was dried up, and she felt in her body that she was healed of the affliction. And Jesus, immediately knowing in Himself that power had gone out of Him, turned around in the crowd and said, ‘Who touched My clothes?’

But His disciples said to Him, “You see the multitude thronging You, and You say, ‘Who touched Me?’ And He looked around to see her who had done this thing. But the woman, fearing and trembling, knowing what had happened to her, came and fell down before Him and told Him the WHOLE truth. And Jesus said to her, “Daughter, your faith has made you well. Go in peace, and be healed of your affliction.”

Without a doubt, I am sure there are those who say, “Well, if a woman lives recklessly in the world as she did, she may have needed, as you Christians say, to be ‘saved’ out of her promiscuous lifestyle, but we in the world today try our best to be decent,” not receiving Romans 3:23 where the Word declares, “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”

How easy it is for the ‘proud and arrogant’ to look down on a woman of lowly character yet fail to look inward to the absence of the “God- Life” in all created human beings given the option of life in themselves or Divine Life in the Savior! What’s interesting about the ‘certain woman’ is that she at least was “looking for a cure” – most adapt, ignore, or seek to refute any serious concern about their condition, physically, mentally, or spiritually!

Are you aware of the huge depth of unconcern about many related to their ‘spiritual state’, even to the drastic depths of insensibility, because in their proud state of self-righteousness, there is nothing they cannot overcome and endure! It was Spurgeon in his “Spurgeon’s Sermons,” (Vol. 19, p.104), who wrote: “Indifference is the rule; indifference about their immortal souls! Many are sick with dire spiritual diseases, but they make no resolve to have it cured; they trifle with sin, and death, and heaven and hell.”

There’s a huge summation of the godless condition in Romans 8:5-8 when Paul wrote: “For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal (fleshly, ‘me, mine’ philosophy) mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be. SO THEN, those who are in the flesh (under the domination of their old sin nature and the devil himself) cannot please God.”

The Lord Jesus raised up a true family of born-again disciples and set aside His choice of godly men as “Apostles” to guide the church in its early conception and, yes, childlike growth. But the ‘religious establishment of Judaism’ pitched a fit! In Acts 5:17-20 we read, “Then the high priest rose up, and all those who were with him (which is the sect of the Sadducees), and they were filled with indignation, and laid their hands on the apostles and put them in the common prison. But at night an angel of the Lord opened the prison doors and brought them out, and said, ‘Go, stand in the temple and speak to the people all the words of this life.”

They did! But when the prison officials and officers discovered the prisoners were gone, they found them faithful to their calling, testifying and preaching! In Acts 5:28 the high priest of Judaism said, “Did we not strictly command you not to teach in this name (the name of Christ Jesus!)? And look, you have filled Jerusalem with your doctrine, and intend to bring this Man’s blood on us!”

And here came the eternal calling then and now! In Acts 5:29-32 the Word tells us, But Peter and the other apostles answered and said: “We ought to obey God rather than men. The God of our fathers raised up Jesus whom you murdered by hanging on a tree. Him God has exalted to His right hand to be Prince and Savior, to give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins. And WE ARE HIS WITNESSES to these things, and so also is the Holy Spirit whom God has given TO THOSE WHO OBEY HIM.”

Yes, some in Israel responded to Truth as some in America today respond to Truth, but the sad reality is there are multitudes in America and across the world who live under a cloud of a destructive deception that ‘salvation’ is for the dumb-minded, not the mentally alert – “We don’t despair for our lack of God’s mercy and grace and love, and we don’t despair as if we lived in a state of hopelessness.” Trifling with Truth, they dig their own deep hole of alienation and separation from Holy God!

You are aware that there is a huge, huge movement of physical strength and physical health in both men and women and boys and girls! “Stay physically healthy and alert – pay the price,” but does a modern-day, self-made society give God any time, any serious consideration, even welcoming His Spirit to guide them into all truth?

There are some, like this woman at the well! It may for her been desperation only, but at least she reached out! Didn’t the Word tell us that this woman “touched the hem of Jesus’ garment” as He passed by Her? He responded: “Who touched Me?”

With all my heart, I pray that you are, will be, always will be, in whatever spiritual, emotional, physical, or mental state you find yourself in , as a woman or a man, willing to grab hold of the hem of Jesus’ garment of salvation, of healing, and of deliverance! She held to the hem of Jesus’ robe – and Jesus responded to her gentle ‘touch’!

Hear me! “Touching Jesus”, laying hold of Him, unwilling to let go, and transformation eternally occurs! I want you to come with me to Psalm 4! And in it we’re going to see, sense, and celebrate the greatness of God’s healing grace and mercy. My new Holman Study Bible, NKJV, translated it saying: “Hear me when I call, O God of my righteousness! You have relieved me in my distress; have mercy on me, and hear my prayer.

How long, O you sons of men will you turn my glory to shame? How long will you love worthlessness and seek falsehood? But know that the Lord has set apart for Himself him who is godly; the Lord will hear when I call to Him. (Set apart? That’s the realization of one being a chosen vessel by God Himself – He sought you, rather than you seeking Him!).

Be angry, and do not sin. Meditate within your heart on your bed, and be still. Offer the sacrifices of righteousness, and put your trust in the Lord. There are many who will say, ‘Who will show us any good?’ Lord, lift up the light of Your countenance upon us.

You have put gladness in my heart, more than in the season that their grain and wine increased. I will both lie down in peace, and sleep; for You alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety.” Is it for YOU, “You alone, O Lord, make ME dwell in safety?”

W.H.Doane and Fanny J. Crosby wrote the old Hymn, “Safe In The Arms of Jesus” found in the “American Hymnal” of 1933 by Broadman Press, Nashville, Tennessee. It says: “Safe in the arms of Jesus, Safe on His gentle breast, There by His love overshadowed, Sweetly my soul shall rest. Hark! It’s the voice of angels, Borne in a song to me, Over the fields of glory, Over the jasper sea.

Jesus, my heart’s dear refuge, Jesus has died for me; Firm on the Rock of Ages, Ever my trust shall be. Here let me wait with patience, Wait till the night is over; Wait till I see the morning Break on the golden shore.

Safe in the arms of Jesus, Safe on His gentle breast, There by His love overshadowed, Sweetly my soul shall rest.” HAVE YOU ENTERED HIS REST?

CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO

PROPER ATTIRE FOR THE SOLDIERS OF CHRIST!

Paul was blessed by our Lord and Savior as a willful, determined, well-prepared “soldier” in the “Army” of King Jesus, just as every born-again believer is to be equipped in “fighting the good fight of Faith”! In 2 Timothy 2:1-5 Paul wrote to his spiritual son, “You therefore, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. And the things that you have heard from me among many witnesses, commit these to faithful men who will be able to teach others also. You therefore must endure hardship as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. No one engaged in warfare entangles himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please him who enlisted him as a soldier. And also if anyone competes in athletics, he is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules.”

In writing to the church at Ephesus Paul put forth his challenge just a ‘tad’ differently but honed in specifically concerning “the whole armor of God”. He said in Ephesians 6:10-18, “Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.

Stand therefore, having girded your waist with truth, having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace; above all, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one. And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God; praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, being watchful to this end with all perseverance and supplication for all the saints –“!

I’d be shocked if I heard a professing Christian say, “I really don’t understand what Paul was talking about – I don’t face any enemies, any battles, any conflicts in my walk.” And I would have to ask, “What highway have you been walking on? In Christ we’re not removed from our world setting, but are in the midst of it with imminent battles and warfronts, yes, constantly erupting – if we live and walk “in Christ”!”

Sadly, some ‘believers’ are totally unaware of the battlefields of their own existence, unconcerned that temptations from the world or even demonic activity in the mind and old flesh, can and do become major ‘battle-fronts’ that sadly can take a believer down! In James 1:12-16 the brother of Jesus wrote: “Blessed is the man who endures temptation; for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love Him. Let no one say when he is tempted, ‘I am tempted by God’; for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone. But each one is tempted when he/she is DRAWN AWAY By his/her desires and enticed. Then, when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, brings forth death. Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren.”

Do you ever sense that time or chance or temptation finds fertile ground in all peoples that they might move in and bring about evil rather than good or the devil rather than the honor of God alone? Ecclesiastes 9:12, supposedly written by King David’s son, Solomon, states: “For a man also does not know his time: like fish taken in a cruel net, like birds caught in a snare, so the sons of men are snared in an evil time, when it falls upon them.”

In Luke 19:41-44 we find Jesus as He drew near to Jerusalem with the Word telling us that He saw the city and wept over it, saying, “If you had known, even you, especially in this your day, the things that make for your peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. For days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment around you, surround you and close in on every side, and level you, and your children within you, to the ground; and they will not leave in you one stone upon another, because you did not know the time of your visitation.” Now, I know this passage related to Jerusalem, but in life’s spiritual realm is there not for, yes, every city those things that exist void of any concern of God’s oversight because “cities can operate without looking to God”? For the Jews in Jerusalem they lived in the fleshly pride of governmental Pharisaism which my dictionary I use defines it as “practicing or advocating strict observance or external forms and ceremonies of religion or conduct without regard to the spirit; self-righteous; sanctimonius.”

Jesus said what? “If you had known, even YOU, especially in this YOUR day, the things that make for your peace.” Interesting Verse in Proverbs 29: 18 that says, “Where there is no revelation (or unveiling of the will of God), the people cast off restraint; But happy is he who keeps the law (the Word of God!).” It was Phillips Brooks whose quote is found in “The Encyclopedia of Religious Quotations,” (p.320). He said: “Obedience must be the struggle and desire of our life. Obedience, not hard and forced, but ready, loving and spontaneous; the doing of duty, not merely that the duty may be done, but that the soul in doing it may become capable of receiving and uttering God.”

Yet, how many do you know who question the ‘obedience factor’ because they assume that’s teaching obedience in order to be saved rather than the truth that one obeys because he/she has been saved!

It’s so easy for many to profess allegiance to Christ, but when they witness in the Word His full surrender to the will of God, even the Cross, they begin to wonder why they looked to Him for getting their lives ‘straightened out’! They so casually read “The Lord’s Prayer” and omit, overlook, or deny that Jesus meant what He said as He teaches them to pray! Matthew 6:9-10 His prayer begins, “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come, Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” Do YOU deny Christ’s crucifixion was THE WILL OF FATHER-GOD?

In Matthew 27:27-31 we read, Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the Praetorium and gathered the whole garrison around Him. And they stripped Him and put a scarlet robe on Him. When they had twisted a crown of thorns, they put it on His head, and a reed in His right hand. And they bowed the knee before Him and mocked Him, saying, “Hail, King of the Jews!” Then they spat on Him, and took the reed and struck Him on the head. And when they had mocked Him, they took the robe off Him, put His own clothes on Him, and led Him away to be crucified.”

Oh, and here was His willful intent for His death on the Cross: Colossians 1:12-14! “…giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light. He has delivered us from the power of darkness, and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of God’s love, in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.”

Paul the Apostle became the strong ambassador of Christ in proclaiming the true Gospel – and it cost him his life, but he was well-prepared for it! In 2 Corinthians 1:9-11 he wrote: “Yes, we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves but in God who raises the dead, who delivered us from so great a death, and does deliver us; in whom we trust He will still deliver us, you also helping together in prayer for us…”

The beloved John wrote an affirming word of the call in taking that sentence of death daily that Christ Resurrection Life would be manifested in our mortal flesh. In 1 John 4:9-10 John unveils true redemptive love by way of the Cross! He wrote: “In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.”

The physical crucifiers of Jesus on the Cross were not only soldiers but the motivaters of the ‘religious establishment’ and, yes, fallen humanity then and even now and beyond, until God says: “Gentlemen, it’s closing time.” Before that moment, all men of fallen flesh voted “Yes” for Christ’s crucifixion!

Now, come back with me to Ephesians 6:10-18, and let’s equip ourselves in the “Proper Attire For the Soldiers of Christ”! First, “BE STRONG IN THE LORD AND IN THE POWER OF HIS MIGHT.” It always amazes me when I hear some ‘believers’ saying, “I tried, I really tried, but I just couldn’t live the ‘Christ-Life’,” and I wonder, where or who taught them to ‘give your best’, when Jesus crucified not only Himself but your worst AND your best!

It doesn’t matter, Old Testament or New Testament, Holy God sought men and women, boys and girls, nations and governments, states and cities, businesses, schools, yes, even religious institutions where He could be Himself in them and through them as they chose not to lean to their own understanding but to yield to Him, acknowledging and giving Him His rightful place as “Lord over all”!

Second, IN EPHESIANS 6:11, HE CHALLENGES US TO PUT ON THE WHOLE ARMOR OF GOD, THAT WE MAY BE ABLE TO STAND AGAINST THE WILES OF THE DEVIL! I find it so strange that many Christians or ‘church members’ are completely unaware of a constant attempt by the devil and the powers of darkness to silence or obliterate their ‘war’ against him or them!

But in Matthew 4:1-4 we read, Then JESUS was ‘led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil’. And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterward He was hungry. Now when the tempter came to Him, he said, “If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.” (That’s the ‘lust of the flesh’!).

But Jesus answered and said, (To the devil!), “It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.” And don’t ignore or pass by Verses 5-11!! Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, set Him on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down. For it is written: “He shall give His angels charge over You,” AND “In their hands they shall bear You up, Lest You dash Your foot against a stone.” (That’s the ‘boastful pride of life’!).

Jesus said to him, “It is written, ‘You shall not tempt the Lord your God.” Again, the devil took Him up on an exceedingly high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to Him, “All these things I will give You if You will fall down and worship me.” (That’s the ‘lust of the eyes’!)

The Jesus said to him, “Away with you, Satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only you shall serve.’” Then the devil left Him, and behold, angels came and ministered to Him.

Third, In Ephesians 6:12-13, HE UNVEILS THE SERIOUSNESS OF WHAT EVERY TRUE BELIEVER FACES BY OPPOSITION OF THE DEMONIC FORCES, EMPHASIZING THE UTMOST PREPARATION FOR THE WAR OF EVIL THAT IS TO COME AGAINST YOU! The Word says, “For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual wickedness in the heavenly places. THEREFORE take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.”

Oh, and then in Verse 18 Paul said: “praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, being watchful to this end with all perseverance and supplication for all the saints.”

It is of very serious concern if we’re not enlisting “soldiers to the true faith” and just as serious if there is no training, equipping, and discipling new believers in how to fight the good fight of faith! Oswald Chambers once said: “Beware of squatting lazily before God instead of putting up a glorious fight so that you may lay hold of His strength.” So true!

Fourth, in Ephesians 6:14-19, PAUL PREPARES THE “NEW RECRUITS” CONCERNING HOW TO STAND, BEING EQUIPPED WITH GOD”S GRACIOUS ARMOR FOR EVERY SOLDIER IN HIS ARMY OF FAITH! He said: “Stand therefore, having girded your waist with TRUTH, having put on the BREASTPLATE OF RIGHTEOUSNESS, and having shod your feet with THE PREPARATION OF THE GOSPEL OF PEACE; and above all, TAKING THE SHIELD OF FAITH with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the enemy.

And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God; praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, being watchful to this end WITH ALL PERSEVERANCE AND SUPPLICATION FOR ALL THE SAINTS – and for me, that utterance may be given to me, that I may open my mouth boldly to make known the mystery of the gospel…”

Do YOU believe there can be another “Great Awakening” in this modern day? Do YOU believe we stand in need of another outpouring of the Mighty Waves of God’s Spirit, convicting, converting, consecrating, yes, whole nations, states, and cities to the Gospel of Christ and His very Indwelling Presence? I SAY, YES! TO THE GLORY OF GOD!

It’s my prayer that this Book, yes, even this chapter, has awakened in you a new spirit of determination to truly walk in submission and obedience to our Lord and Savior who was “Servant to all”! Jesus had just washed the disciples feet, and in John 13:12b-17 we read what took place in those holy moments! Jesus said: “Do you know what I have done to you? You call Me Teacher and Lord, for you say well, for so I am. If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have given you an example, that you should do as I have done to you. Most assuredly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master, nor is he who is sent greater than he who sent him. If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them.”

And for YOU? What do you know about the ministry of Christ? AND, what are YOU up to related to YOUR oneness in Christ? Spurgeon, in his masterful book (& series, 19 books in Spurgeon’s Sermons) wrote, (p.232, Vol.19), “Ah, dear friend! Christ intended that the gospel should repeat His own experience, and then should triumph like Himself. The gospel lives by being killed and conquers by defeat. Cast it where you will, it always falls upon its feet. You need not be afraid of it under any trial. Just now, the wisdom of man is its worst foe, but the Lord will deliver it “now”. The gospel lives and reigns. Tell it out among the heathen, that the Lord reigns from the tree, (the Cross), and from that tree of the curse He issues His supreme commands. The self-same day in which Jesus died, He took with Him into His kingdom and His inmost paradise a thief who had hung at His side. He lives and reigns forever and ever, and calls to Himself whomsoever He has chosen. Let us drown the taunts of the adversary with our shouts: Hallelujah!”

CONCLUSION

This has been an amazing journey for me, and I pray for you also! The Word of God IS living and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword, announcing eternal life in Christ OR eternal death that never dies if one rejects Him. Heaven is a much better place for one’s eternal home, but without Christ men ‘choose’ to dwell with the devil and his demons, with unbelievers, with the ‘cursed’, rather than with the King of kings and Lord of lords and His servants! ‘Death songs of Hell’ have no hope, but ‘Life songs in Christ’ are the eternal Hallelujah Choruses!

“Choose you this day whom you will serve – as for me and my house, WE CHOOSE TO SERVE THE LORD JESUS CHRIST!” JFF!

By:J.Farrell Fisher, June 19-21, 2018

The “Living Word”, IN AND THROUGH Christ Jesus, never fades or grows old or uninteresting or uninviting , but actually every new day of coming to the Throne of the “Living Word”, enlarges its understanding while maturing it’s hungry disciple, expands one’s horizon of spiritual-hunger resolved, and advances one’s calling and mission as they “lean not to their own understanding, but are willing to obey, adopt, and adapt” as they appropriate the ‘meat’, the ‘Bread’, and the ‘fruit’ of the Spirit of the Word in their daily journey of the ‘walk’ of faith and obedience!

In Matthew 7:21-27 King Jesus spoke loud and clear! He said: “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, BUT HE “WHO DOES” THE WILL OF MY FATHER IN HEAVEN. Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’

Therefore whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and DOES them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock; and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock. But everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand; and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell. And great was its fall.”

CONSIDER: “Stars birthed, Stars radiant, Stars temporarily enlightening, Stars falling, Stars dimming fast, Stars gone!” AND, THAT’S “temporary ‘stars’ of a religious or governmental faith that ‘shine’ for a while but “fall away” because they are, yes, ‘in love’ with the “best of their religious devotion and political persuasion” but becoming blinder and falling faster spiritually because of the very height of their “falling away” – from the height of God’s Eternal Glory to the darkness, grime, and dirt of Satan’s eternal Hell with “flesh” in the middle!!” Yes, some ‘leaders’ miss out on allowing God to be God through them!

How interestingly, how clearly, and how in Spirit-conviction Paul wrote to the Thessalonians about the “unbelievers”! He said, in 2 Thessalonians 1:5-10, “which is manifest evidence of the righteous judgment of God, that YOU may be counted worthy of the kingdom of God, for which you also suffer; since it is A RIGHTEOUS JUDGMENT with God to repay with tribulation those who trouble you, and to give you who are troubled (Disciples troubled? Beyond any doubt!! Then, and at times ‘now’ across the world!!) rest with us when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with His mighty angels,

IN FLAMING FIRE taking vengeance on those who do not know God, and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. These shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power, when He comes, in that Day, to be glorified in His saints and to be admired among all those who believe, because our testimony among you was believed (or Trusted, or Relied upon!).”

Did you catch Paul who said “accompanied God” in administering “God’s Righteous Judgment”? Paul said that the “Lord Jesus would be revealed from heaven with His mighty angels.” (I’ll never forget years ago traveling in India with Duane and Leslie Weehunt. On an India street, I saw visibly at least a 10-foot angel, if not taller, and maybe Jesus Himself, standing before us as we prepared to preach on the streets. I turned to Dwayne and Leslie saying, “Did YOU see that visible appearance of the angel?” They both said, “Yes”; and I responded, “Get ready! This is going to be an awesome conference!” AND IT WAS!!).

Later, in 2 Thessalonians 2:7-12, Paul powerfully wrote: “For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work; (Is that mystery of lawlessness still at work across every continent?), only He who now restrains will do so until He is taken out of the way.

And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord will consume with the breath of His mouth and destroy with the brightness of His coming. The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish,

Because they did not receive the love of truth, that they might be saved. And FOR THIS REASON God will send them strong delusion, that they should believe the lie, (the lie? You can sin and not die!), that all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.”

How many do you know who have no love of the truth, but whose lives are addicted to “pleasure in unrighteousness”? It’s amazing to me the number of people nation-wide across America today opposing President Trump without a tiny ‘grain’ of submission to the ‘governing authorities’, especially a Donald Trump! RECEIVE ROMANS 13:1-7!!

“Let every soul be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and the authorities that exist are appointed by God. Therefore whoever resists the authority resists the ordinance of God, and those who resist will bring judgment on themselves. For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to evil. Do you want to be unafraid of the authority? Do what is good, and you will have praise from the same.

For he is God’s minister to you for good. But if you do evil, be afraid; for he does not bear the sword in vain; for he is God’s minister, an avenger to execute wrath on him who practices evil. Therefore you must be subject, not only because of wrath, but also for conscience’ sake. For because of this you also pay taxes, for they are God’s ministers attending continually to this very thing. Render therefore to all their due: taxes to whom taxes are due, customs to whom customs, fear to whom fear, honor to whom honor.” (And one becomes a part of a ‘civilized society’ whether your particular country honors God or not! At least in most nations there are degrees of civility whether the nations are submitted to God or not! If a ‘nation’ is not submitted TO God, judgment day does come around!).

It amazes me when I read in Ezekiel 13:1-10a the following ‘word of the Lord’ to Ezekiel: And the word of the Lord came to me saying, “Son of man, prophesy against the prophets of Israel who prophesy, and say to those who prophesy out of their own heart, ‘Hear the word of the Lord!’” Thus says the Lord God: “Woe to the foolish prophets, who follow their own spirit and have seen nothing! O Israel, your prophets are like foxes in the deserts. You have not gone up into the gaps to build a wall for the house of Israel to stand in battle on the day of the Lord.

They have envisioned futility and false divination, saying, “Thus says the Lord!” But the Lord has not sent them; yet they hope that the word may be confirmed. Have you not seen a futile vision, and have you not spoken the false divination? You say, ‘The Lord says,’ but I have not spoken.” Therefore thus says the Lord God: “Because you have spoken nonsense and envisioned lies, therefore I am indeed against you,” says the Lord God.

“My hand will be against the prophets who envision futility and who divine lies; they shall not be in the assembly of My people, nor be written in the record of the house of Israel, nor shall they enter the land of Israel. Then you shall know that I am the Lord God. Because, indeed, because they have seduced My people, saying, “’Peace!’ when there is no peace”.

“Peace” is not “man-made-best efforts” at pleasing God, but God’s BEST, His eternal blessing of the Indwelling Christ upon the convicted, confessing, trusting life in the Lord’s “finished work” at Calvary and His victory over that sin and death also through His Resurrection and Ascension to the Throne of God where He everlastingly reigns to God’s glory!

In John 14:1-18 we read about Christ’s Way, the Truth, and the Everlasting Life, from the lips, mind, and heart of Christ Jesus! He said: “Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also. And where I go you know, and the way you know.”

Thomas said to Him, “Lord, we do not know where You are going, and how can we know the way?” Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.” [That’s no ‘best effort’! That’s no ‘flesh trying to overcome one’s old sin-nature”! That’s not ‘striving to climb the mountain of ‘faith’ but “resting” in Him Alone!].

“If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; and from now on you know Him and have seen Him.” Philip said to Him, “Lord, show us the Father, and it is sufficient for us.” Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you so long, and yet you have not known Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; so how can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me?

The words that I speak to you I do not speak on My own authority, but the Father who dwells in Me does the works. [But the Christ IN YOU DOESN’T DO the WORKS THROUGH YOU, because you’ve “discerned for yourself”: ‘Try your best’?]. Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father in Me, or else believe Me for the sake of the works themselves.

Most assuredly, I say to you, he who believes in Me [trusts in Me, relies upon Me, adheres to Me!], the works that I do he will do also; and greater works than these he will do, because I go to My Father. And whatever you ask in My name, that I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask anything in My name, I will do it. If you love Me, keep My commandments.

And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever – the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you. I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you.”

It breaks my heart at times to hear some ‘professing people’ at times expounding about their “best efforts” in seeking to supposedly honor Christ when it is nothing more but “pumping their flesh” in admiration of their “supposed Christ-likeness”!! I wonder if they’ve ever read the Book of Ephesians!

In Chapter One Paul, by the Holy Spirit, unveils the identity of true disciples of Christ! Notice Ephesians 1:3! “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places IN CHRIST!” What is Paul telling us?

Ephesians 1:4 “God chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world”! Verse 7, “In Christ we have redemption through His blood…Verse 9, which He purposed in Himself! Verse 10,He gathers together in one all things in Christ! Verse 11, “In Christ” we’ve obtained an inheritance! Verse 12, because we TRUSTED IN CHRIST, we should be to the praise of His glory!

Verse 13, Having trusted, we are “sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise”, the guarantee of our inheritance!

Ephesians 2:1, “And YOU He (Christ Jesus) made alive, who were dead…”, (‘spiritually dead’, alienated from God,) BECAUSE, Verse 2, you “once walked according to the course of the world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now walks in the sons of disobedience,” Verse 3, “…were by nature children of wrath…,” and when one reads that with an open mind and a convicted heart, he/she asks, “Is there any hope for, yes, “sinners” separated from God”?

Examine Ephesians 2:4-10! “But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For WE are HIS WORKMANSHIP, created IN CHRIST JESUS for good works, which GOD PREPARED BEFOREHAND that we should walk in them.”

In the old “Broadman Hymnal”, published in 1940 by Broadman Press, Nashville, Tennessee, there’s an old hymn entitled “Heavenly Sunlight”! It says:

“Walking in sunlight, all of my journey, Over the mountains, through the deep vale; Jesus has said “I’ll never forsake you,” Promise divine that never can fail.

Shadows around me, shadows above me, Never conceal my Savior and Guide; He is the Light, in Him is no darkness; Ever I’m walking close to His side.

In the bright sunlight, ever rejoicing, Pressing my way to mansions above; Singing His praises gladly I’m walking, Walking in sunlight, sunlight of love.

Heavenly sunlight, heavenly sunlight, Flooding my soul with glory divine; Hallelujah, I am rejoicing, Singing His praises, Jesus is mine.” Amen?

Are YOU daily “singing His praises”? I close this chapter with Ephesians 2:11-19!! It says: “Therefore remember that you, once Gentiles in the flesh – who are called Uncircumcision by what is called the Circumcision made in the flesh by hands – that at that time you were without Christ (every naturally birthed child WAS birthed without Christ! Don’t ever forget it, Mom or Dad!), without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the covenants of promise, HAVING NO HOPE AND WITHOUT GOD IN THE WORLD. But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.

For He Himself is our PEACE, who has made both one, and has broken down the middle wall of separation, having abolished in His flesh the enmity, that is, the law of commandments contained in ordinances, so as to create in Himself one new man from the two, thus making peace, and that He might reconcile them both to God in one body through the cross, thereby putting to death the enmity. And He came and preached peace to you who were afar off and to those who were near. For through Him we both have access by one Spirit to the Father (Kingdom of God Presence!!). Now therefore, you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God.” Glory! Glory BE to the Father, to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, the Three in One, who graciously allows us to be one through Christ’s shed blood in the “household of God”!!

“BLAND-SOME, HANDSOME, OR

AWESOMELY TRANSFORMED?”

It was really interesting when I read casually a statement written anonymously but included in a major book called “The Encyclopedia of Religious Quotations.” The encyclopedia was a Fleming H. Revell Company publication. The statement? “Beware of no man more than yourself.” And I’m sure without hesitation that there ought to be at times the necessity of looking to ourselves, examining ourselves, and determining if we’re responsible and accountable to God about our ‘present state’, mentally, emotionally, health-wise, and certainly spiritual evaluation about ourselves, whether under our own control or moving daily through life under God’s agenda and not our fleshly anticipation!

It was Alexander Maclaren who once said, “All along the Christian course, there must be set up altars to God on which you sacrifice yourself, or you will never advance a step.” So true!

When there is no inward analysis about where we presently are in the inner man, it is so easy in making turns more and more away from God but centering and surrendering and classifying ourselves as our own ‘man’ able to determine one’s own spiritual destiny or as an ‘asserting believer sure of one’s ‘salvation’ because they attend ‘church’ regularly yet bear “no fruit” of a redeemed, Spirit-led walk of true discipleship!

Shockingly I read where Benjamin Franklin once said, “God helps those who help themselves.” NO! A THOUSAND TIMES, NO! God helps those who empty themselves of self-control, choosing death daily to our ‘old man’ and being filled with and controlled by the Holy Presence of Christ and His “guiding” Holy Spirit, by the reality of Resurrection Life, Resurrection Power, and Resurrection Hope!

A paraphrased statement of Charles Caleb Colton says: “Heroism, magnanimity, and self-denial, in which they do not spring from the foundational truth of “death to self and pure life only in Christ’s Resurrection Presence within”, may be religious in their tendencies, but are only on the ‘personal altar’ of sacrifice of one kind of self-love to another kind of self-love,’ with no glory to God and no honor to the pretender,” but just promotes attention to ‘self-gratification”!”

Have you ever heard people in religious circles encouraging those in their circles having a hard time adjusting to their ‘profession of faith’, “You must TRY HARDER”! And the true disciple understands that it’s not a matter of ‘trying harder’ but “trusting more and more”, like we read through Paul’s teaching, led by the Holy Spirit, “Take the sentence of death daily that the Resurrection Life of Christ may be manifested in your mortal flesh”!

Daily denial of the “old self” willfully explodes”(!*) in the reality of the heart’s open door to the “Master-ing” of Christ Himself through you! Holy God longs and looks for those who willfully deny themselves and are filled and over-flowing with the Holy Presence of the Resurrected Christ, yes, Him reigning as the Victorious King in one’s humble heart, daily dead to self and the old man but living in “the fullness of the blessing” of His moment by moment “reign in victory” over your life, even over all your trials, temptations, and troubles! Sadly, in much of modern-day Christianity, many know nothing of “the joy of the Lord”!

Modern-day ‘humanity’, the general public, the national or international make-up of men, includes often rulers with no allegiance to “King Jesus”, business owners and some of their employees, State leaders with some having NO allegiance to the will of God, even universities or local school employees or state governments who’ve decided the “Sacred Scriptures” have no place in their communities, even doctors, nurses, and hospitals who have no desire or place for the ministry of the Great Physician! And even more sad is when some churches are ‘ruled’ by some pastors and elders who major more on their personal philosophies than they do “Preaching and Teaching the Word of God”, yes, excellent in its history but void and empty of its message to “go into all the world and preach the Gospel”, or validating His Presence in them by witnessing, evangelizing, loving and caring for the lost community that surrounds the local gathering and ‘smart’ preacher (?)!

Let’s examine “The Bland-some”! In “The Random House Collegiate Dictionary”, Revised Edition of 1975 by Random House Inc., the word “bland” is described as follows: “pleasantly gentle or agreeable, (and I have to ask, “With anything and everything”?), non-irritating,lacking in interest (of what doesn’t fit their mind or heart-set?,lacking liveliness, lacking loveliness in what miraculously blesses it?),unemotional, indifferent, casual, possessing either a softness, or harshness, or irritating.”

The bland-some? That’s individuals being consumed in their self-awareness that they do not like, but indifferent to the “knock” at their hearts’ doors to a caring, merciful, able God, Savior, and Lord, able to do exceedingly above All that one might consider or think, even miraculously producing a “new man”!

The bland-some, un-governed, have no desire to be governed by Another who IS the Master of an individual’s destiny! The bland-some, though within their minds and hearts are often encouraged by even a human touch or a fleshly encouragement, are strongly minded against anything Holy God has to say about them! That’s why Jesus said about the rulers over the religious Pharisees, in John 12:43, fearful of being put out of the synagogue, “for they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God”!

Even from the time of beginning, by God, of man’s earthly residency, many of natural mankind had an aversion to God! And because of, and even being created “in the image or likeness of God”, and really for His glory only(!), some of natural mankind had and has no desire to be birthed again (in the Spirit!) and see their ‘seed’ becoming “servants of God”! And buried in the recesses of their minds and darkened hearts was and is, by some, was and is, resistance to obedience to God’s will or purpose for their lives! That attitude is still paramount across our known world! (That’s why true believers are called by Christ to be “witnesses to their world” of saving grace, love, power, and purpose!).

The bland-some? Have you ever read through early Exodus about Moses’ encounter with the Pharaoh of Egypt? Holy God sent faithful Moses as a witness, but Pharaoh’s heart was “hardened by God” because of his resistance to divine truth, the divine Way, and the divine purpose, exactly the ‘spiritual disease’ of the bland-some!

In 1 Samuel 8 we find the historical record of ‘bland-some’ folk who have no desire to even know what God thinks about the purpose of their existence! Follow carefully the historical record, beginning at Verse 4 through Verse 9! It says: “Then all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah, and said to him, “Look, you are old, and your sons do not walk in your ways. Now make us a king to judge us like all the nations.” [Please consider!! What would happen worldwide if nations declared allegiance to Jesus’ saving grace and Jesus’ eternal purpose for lives, homes, cities, states, and nations?].

But the thing displeased Samuel when they said, “Give us a king to judge us.” So Samuel prayed to the Lord. And the Lord said to Samuel, “Heed the voice of the people in all that they say to you; for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected Me, THAT I SHOULD NOT REIGN OVER THEM. According to all the works which they have done since the day that I brought them up out of Egypt, even to this day – with which they have forsaken Me and served other gods – so they are doing to you also. Now therefore, heed there voice. However, you shall solemnly forewarn them, and show them the behavior of the king who will reign over them.” [Tell me of the present result in your life of the results of the “bland-some king of flesh” ruling in you, through you, for his hellish ‘academy award’ of deceit reigning over you presently!].

OH, BUT THEN, BEYOND THE BLAND-SOME, LET’S EXAMINE THE HANDSOME, THE ‘HOLLYWOOD’ PRODUCTION OF SELF-BEAUTIFIED, SELF-GLORIFIED, SELF- CELEBRATING!!

In, yes, the context of human existence, beyond the ‘bland-some’, there are the ‘handsome’ who truly are ‘successful’ in what most consider to be “successes, academy award winners of the best efforts of ‘flesh’, best efforts of godless men, best efforts of human achievements.” And the world around them celebrate, rejoice, and are giddy about their achievements – but GOD LAUGHS and opens the door to Hell’s celebration of their self-centered, godless existence!

Are you familiar with Pharoah of Egypt’s handsomeness, his impressiveness in ascending to national leadership, and his allegiance to his ‘handsome way’ of leadership(?)? He had ‘the peacock-pride’ of self-will, self-rule, self-preeminence! He was ruler, he was ‘master’ over slaves, he owned Egypt (he thought), and lived a self-centered, wealthy, prosperous life-style while his citizens hungered! Some consider ‘pride’ as the beginning of sin, when in reality it is only the bad fruit of what is already there, thus reigning ‘in sin’ as he ruled over his people! What are You ‘reigning’ in as you live, yes, independently of the Indwelling Christ as He makes a man’s redeemed life the center of His Earthly Throne and His Heavenly Presence?

The ‘handsome back-slappers’ have no awareness of the sin of pride, of hypocrisy, and of, yes, their vain-glory! The ‘fallen’ are spiritually blind and need the miracle of God’s saving grace to “open their eyes” to see eternal opportunity!! I was reading somewhere, not sure where or even by whom, but I wrote down a reference to the words of Charles Churchill in his writing “Independence” about William Warburton, Bishop of Glouchester, in England, many, many years ago. The statement? Speaking about the Bishop:

“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.” Wow! What an illuminating statement! Can YOU believe that even some national church leaders have been ‘pretenders’, imitators, comical ‘showboats’, shaming their profession of Christ without an ounce of possession of “the fullness of the blessing of the Gospel of Jesus Christ”? Was it pride that shamed some angels even before human creation?

Do you even grasp the absurdity of ‘fallen’, ‘professing’, ‘religious’, ‘pretending’, supposedly ‘righteous men’, celebrating their ‘religious faith’ (?), but they hold out, yield to a ‘heaven-inspired’ (?) of their ‘salvation’ when the historical, living testimony, is a Christless life never yielding to the Christ who desires to indwell them, but they profess that on their terms! YOUR “BEST” IS NOT HIS BLESSED PRESENCE!!!

You don’t seek to understand so that you may believe, you TRUST what Jesus says He’s already accomplished through His death, His Resurrection, and His Throne-Reigning in Heaven, graciously granting His Holy Spirit’s residence in you to “guide you into all truth” in “the fullness of the blessing of the gospel of Jesus Christ”!

Valiant, blessed, fulfilled, rejoicing individuals, though having “embraced the darkness of their old sin natures” COME TO THE LIGHT OF CHRIST IN AND THROUGH And BY HIS GRACE AND MERCY THEY ARE ETERNALLY CHANGED INTO SONS AND DAUGHTERS OF A TRUE, LIVING, TRANSFORMING FAITH – It’s “JESUS ONLY”! THIS BRINGS US TO:

THE DIVINE REALITY, THE HEAVENLY MIRACLE OF GRACE OF AWESOME TRANSFORMED LIVES THROUGH THE SHED BLOOD OF CHRIST!! In John 1:14, 16 we read: “And the Word (that’s Jesus!) became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth”, with Verse 16 telling us, “And of His fullness we have all received, and grace for grace.” Are you trying to live the Christian walk by ‘grit’ or by God’s grace?

Patiently read and follow with me Ephesians 1:15-2:10!! It says: “Therefore I also, after I heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, do not cease to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers; that the God (and Father!) of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, they eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, ACCORDING TO THE WORKING OF HIS MIGHTY POWER WHICH HE WORKED IN CHRIST WHEN HE RAISED HIM FROM THE DEAD AND SEATED HIM AT HIS RIGHT HAND IN THE HEAVENLY PLACES, far above all principality and power and might and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in that which is to come. And God put all things under Christ Jesus’ feet, and gave Him to be head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all.

Ephesians 2:1-10, “And you He made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins, in which you once walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience, among whom also we all once conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, just as the others.

But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.” Can you say, “Glory, Hallelujah”?

Do you know and understand what Paul was saying in Ephesians 3:19? He was praying for Ephesian believers and us in the 21^st Century in America and the world over that we should “know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.” Oh, and then in Ephesians 5:17-21 we read:

“Therefore do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is. And do not be drunk with wine, in which is dissipation; but be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord, giving thanks always for all things to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, submitting to one another in the fear of God.” Is there a continuous song of praise in your heart, spirit, and mind, even when it may be the darkest moment of your life, walk, and journey of faith and trust?

I AM TRULY ALWAYS AWED WHEN I READ PAUL’S ANOINTED ASSETMENT OF THE “PREEMINENCE OF CHRIST JESUS” IN COLOSSIANS 1:9-18! It says: For this reason we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will, in all wisdom and spiritual understanding, that you may walk worthy of the Lord, FULLY PLEASING HIM, being fruitful in every good work and INCREASING IN THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD; strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power, for all patience and longsuffering with joy; giving thanks to the Father who HAS QUALIFIED US TO BE PARTAKERS OF THE INHERITANCE OF THE SAINTS IN THE LIGHT.

He has “delivered us from the power of darkness” and “conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love”, in whom “we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins”. He (Christ Jesus) is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist. And He is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things He may have preeminence.”

Question! “If Christ Jesus is meant to have preeminence IN ALL THINGS, in your life and walk, does He have preeminence in who you are and what you do? Does He have ‘preeminence’ in determining the streets upon which you walk? Your education, your training, who you date, who you marry, your evaluation and commitment of your ‘best effort’ to what you consider your spiritual, eternal calling?” What did the Word just say? “that in all things He may have the preeminence”! DOES JESUS HOLD PREEMINENCE IN YOUR LIFE’S JOURNEY? Fanny Crosby and Robert Lowry wrote the following hymn words: “All the way my Savior leads me; What have I to ask beside? Can I doubt His tender mercy, Who thro’ life has been my Guide? Heavenly peace, divinest comfort, here by faith in Him to dwell! For I know, whate’er befall me, Jesus does all things well.

All the way my Savior leads me, Cheers each winding path I tread, Gives me grace for every trial, Feeds me with the living bread. Though my weary steps may falter, and my soul athirst may be, Gushing from the Rock before me, Lo! A spring of joy I see.

All the way my Savior leads me; Oh, the fullness of His love! Perfect Rest to me is promised in my Father’s house of love. (Now, not someday, ABOVE in the after-life!).When my spirit, clothed immortal, Wings its flight to realms of day (Actual Heaven’s abode!), This my song thro’ endless ages: JESUS LED (IN ME) ALL THE WAY; (EVERY DAY IN THE STILL ETERNAL DAY, IN THE ENDLESS AGES OF NO DEATH, NO SORROW, NO PAIN, NO SEPARATION)!” And His “Eternal Light” in us never dims, never fades, never darkens! AMEN?

ARE YOU ENJOYING AND CELEBRATING AND CONTINUALLY REJOICING AND PRAISING HIM THAT BY HIS GRACE, MERCY, AND LOVE, THROUGH REPENTANCE AND FAITH, YIELDEDNESS AND SURRENDER, YOUR “NEW-BORN” LIFE IN CHRIST BECOMES HIS HOLY TEMPLE OF ABIDING PRESENCE, YES, HEAVEN ON EARTH!??!

IN THE HEART!”

BY:J.FARRELL FISHER, MAY 26,2019

A VERY SIGNIFICANT WORD OF GOD IS FOUND IN 1 SAMUEL 16:7 WHEN THE LORD SAID TO SAMUEL ABOUT ‘MOURNING FOR SAUL’, “LOOK NOT ON HIS COUNTENANCE, OR ON THE HEIGHT OF HIS STATURE; BECAUSE I HAVE REFUSED HIM: FOR THE LORD SEES NOT AS MAN SEES; FOR MAN LOOKS ON THE OUTWARD APPEARANCE, BUT THE LORD LOOKS ON THE HEART.”

WHAT AN AWESOME WORD FROM HOLY GOD! WHY? BECAUSE IT’S TRUE THAT ‘NATURAL MAN, BIRTHED IN ADAM,CHOOSING TO WILLFULLY SIN FLESHLY & IN THE BODY & MIND’, IS BIRTHED WITH THE CHOICE OF YIELDING TO THE ‘FLESH’ OR WILLFULLY SUBMITTING TO HOLY GOD & FAITH IN CHRIST JESUS BY, YES, REPENTANCE TOWARD GOD & FAITH IN CHRIST’S FINISHED WORK ON CALVARY’S CROSS!

BUT MAN, FALLEN AWAY FROM GOD IN HIS BIRTHED ‘SINFUL NAURE & CHOOSING TO SIN WITHOUT ANY CONCERN OF A RELATIONSHIP WITH GOD’, WILL OFTEN CHOOSE ‘RELIGIOUS APPEARANCE’ APART FROM “REDEEMED BY THE BLOOD OF THE LAMB OF GOD”, THE LORD JESUS CHRIST! “TALL IN THE BODY & MIND, BUT TAINTED IN THE HEART” ARE MEN, EVEN SOME ‘RELIGIOUS MEN’, WHO ‘LIKE’ RELIGIOUS APPEARANCE & WILL WORK FOR IT, BUT THE “HEART” IS TRULY SPIRITUALLY DEAD AND IN NEED OF THE “SECOND BIRTH THAT IS SPIRITUAL”, NOT “BEST-EFFORT RELIGIOUS ATTAINMENTS”!

DO YOU REMEMBER “THE ‘WISDOM’ OF SOLOMON IN PROVERBS 1:22-33? “HOW LONG, YOU SIMPLE ONES, WILL YOU LOVE SIMPLICITY? & THE SCORNERS DELIGHT IN THEIR SCORNING, & FOOLS HATE KNOWLEDGE? TURN YOU AT MY REPROOF;BEHOLD, I WILL POUR OUT MY SPIRIT UNTO YOU, I WILL MAKE KNOWN MY WORDS UNTO YOU. BECAUSE I HAVE CALLED, & YOU REFUSED; I HAVE STRETCHED OUT MY HAND, & NO MAN REGARDED:

BUT YOU HAVE SET AT NAUGHT ALL MY COUNSEL, & WOULD NONE OF MY REPROOF; I ALSO WILL LAUGH AT YOUR CALAMITY; I WILL MOCK WHEN YOUR FEAR COMES; WHEN YOUR FEAR COMES AS DESOLATION, & YOUR DESTRUCTION COMES AS A WHIRLWIND; WHEN DISTRESS & ANGUISH COMES UPON YOU. THEN SHALL THEY CALL UPON ME, BUT I WILL NOT ANSWER; THEY SHALL SEEK ME EARLY, BUT THEY SHALL NOT FIND ME;

FOR THAT THEY HATED KNOWLEDGE, & DID NOT CHOOSE THE FEAR OF THE LORD; THEY WOULD (HAVE) NONE OF MY COUNSEL: THEY DESPISED ALL MY REPROOF. THEREFORE SHALL THEY EAT ‘THE FRUIT OF THEIR OWN WAY, & BE FILLED WITH THEIR OWN DEVICES.’ FOR THE TURNING AWAY OF THE SIMPLE SHALL SLAY THEM, & THE PROSPERITY OF FOOLS SHALL DESTROY THEM. “BUT”,VERSE 33, WHOSO HEARKENS UNTO ME SHALL DWELL SAFELY, & SHALL BE QUIET FROM FEAR OF EVIL.” OH, BUT THE “WISEMAN” WAS NOT THROUGH WITH HIS ‘RECEIVED, ACCEPTED, & WISE WORDS FROM HOLY GOD’!

IN PROVERBS 3:5-12, THE “WISEMAN” WROTE: “TRUST IN THE LORD WITH ALL YOUR HEART; & LEAN NOT TO YOUR OWN UNDERSTANDING. IN ALL YOUR WAYS ACKNOWLEDGE HIM, & HE SHALL DIRECT YOUR PATHS. BE NOT WISE IN YOUR OWN EYES: FEAR THE LORD, & DEPART FROM EVIL. IT SHALL BE HEALTH TO YOUR NAVEL, & MARROW TO YOUR BONES. HONOR THE LORD WITH YOUR SUBSTANCE, & WITH THE FIRSTFRUITS OF ALL YOUR INCREASE.

SO SHALL YOUR BARNS BE FILLED WITH PLENTY, & YOUR PRESSES SHALL BURST OUT WITH NEW WINE. MY SON, DO NOT DESPISE THE CHASTENING OF THE LORD; NEITHER BE WEARY OF CORRECTION: FOR WHOM THE LORD LOVES HE CORRECTS; EVEN AS A FATHER THE SON IN WHOM HE DELIGHTS.” WHAT AN AWESOME, ENCOURAGING, INSPIRING WORD FROM A TRULY WISE MAN!!

QUESTION! “ARE ‘YOU’ A SEEKER AFTER HOLY GOD”? IT ALWAYS AMAZED ME TO READ THE HOLY SCRIPTURES, OLD TESTAMENT AS WELL AS NEW TESTAMENT, LEARNING THOUSANDS OF YEARS BEFORE HE CAME, THAT GOD THE FATHER “PROMISED” THAT HIS SON, THE LORD JESUS, WOULD COME TO RECONCILE SINFUL MAN TO GOD THE FATHER BY HIS OWN SHED BLOOD ON CALVARY’S CROSS! IN ISAIAH 55:1-7 WE READ,

“HO, EVERY ONE THAT THIRSTS, COME YOU TO THE WATERS (THE ‘WATERS OF THE HOLY WORD OF GOD’?), & HE THAT HAS NO MONEY; COME YOU, BUY, & EAT; YES, COME, BUY WINE (THE ‘WINE OF THE WORD OF GOD’?) & MILK WITHOUT MONEY & WITHOUT PRICE. WHEREFORE DO YOU SPEND MONEY FOR THAT WHICH IS NOT BREAD? & YOUR LABOR FOR THAT WHICH DOES NOT SATISFY?HEARKEN DILIGENTLY UNTO ME, & EAT YOU THAT WHICH IS GOOD, & LET YOUR SOUL DELIGHT ITSELF IN FATNESS.

INCLINE YOUR EAR, & COME UNTO ME; HEAR, & YOU SHALL LIVE; & I WILL MAKE AN EVERLASTING COVENANT WITH YOU, EVEN THE SURE MERCIES OF DAVID. BEHOLD, I HAVE GIVEN HIM FOR A WITNESS TO THE PEOPLE, A LEADER & COMMANDER TO THE PEOPLE. BEHOLD, YOU SHALL CALL A NATION THAT YOU KNOW NOT, & NATIONS THAT KNEW NOT YOU SHALL RUN UNTO YOU BECAUSE OF THE LORD YOUR GOD, & FOR THE HOLY ONE OF ISRAEL; FOR HE HAS GLORIFIED YOU.

SEEK YOU THE LORD WHILE HE MAY BE FOUND, CALL YOU UPON HIM WHILE HE IS NEAR; LET THE WICKED FORSAKE HIS WAY, & THE UNRIGHTEOUS MAN HIS THOUGHTS: & LET HIM RETURN UNTO THE LORD, & HE WILL HAVE MERCY UPON HIM; & TO OUR GOD, FOR HE WILL ABUNDANTLY PARDON.”

ON JUNE 12,2019, I WILL CELEBRATE MY 83^RD BIRTHDAY! IT IS AMAZING TO “ME” BECAUSE MY GRANDDAD FISHER & MY DAD, JIM FISHER, BOTH DIED AT 78 YEARS OF AGE! I’M SURELY CONVINCED THAT HOLY GOD HAS EXTENDED MY LIFE, EVEN FOR THE ‘SOVEREIGN PURPOSE’ OF HIGHLIGHTING, & I PRAY, INSPIRING YOU TO “REST” IN THE LORD LIKE “WISE” SOLOMON, “WISE” PROPHETS & TEACHERS & FOLLOWERS OVER THOUSANDS OF YEARS, WHO ‘WAITED’ IN FAITH ON CHRIST’S LITERAL COMING, HIS EARTHLY MINISTRY, & HIS SACRIFICIAL DEATH AS THE TRUE “LAMB OF GOD” SHEDDING HIS OWN BLOOD TO “WASH AWAY SIN & ITS NATURE” ON HIS “CALVARY’S CROSS”!! AND THE EMPTY TOMB PROVES IT! HE AROSE FROM THE DEAD AFTER THREE DAYS, & STILL, THOUSANDS OF YEARS LATER, SAYS, “COME UNTO ME, & I’LL GIVE YOU REST!”

IN THE OLD “BROADMAN HYMNAL” (P.84), (PUBLISHED IN 1940 BY BROADMAN PRESS, NASHVILLE, TENN.), IS A HYMN THAT IS ENTITLED: “REST FOR THE WEARY.” IT SAYS: “IN THE CHRISTIAN’S HOME IN GLORY THERE REMAINS A LAND OF REST; THERE MY SAVIOR’S GONE BEFORE ME, TO FULFILL MY SOUL’S REQUEST.

HE IS FITTING UP MY MANSION, WHICH ETERNALLY SHALL STAND, FOR MY STAY SHALL NOT BE TRANSCIENT, IN THAT HOLY, HAPPY LAND.

PAIN & SICKNESS NE’ER SHALL ENTER, GRIEF NOR WOE MY LOT SHALL SHARE; BUT, IN THAT CELESTIAL CENTER, I A CROWN OF LIFE SHALL WEAR.

DEATH ITSELF SHALL THEN BE VANQUISHED, & IT’S STING SHALL BE WITHDRAWN; SHOUT FOR GLADNESS, O YOU RANSOMED! HAIL WITH JOY THE RISING MORN.

THERE IS REST FOR THE WEARY, THERE IS REST FOR THE WEARY, ON THE OTHER SIDE OF JORDAN, IN THE SWEET FIELDS OF EDEN, THERE IS REST FOR THE WEARY, THERE IS REST FOR YOU; WHERE THE TREE OF LIFE IS BLOOMING, THERE IS REST FOR YOU.”

IN GENESIS 27:41-28:5a, WE READ ABOUT JACOB ESCAPING FROM ESAU WHO HATED JACOB & WANTED TO KILL HIM. SO INTERESTING WHAT ‘SPIRITUAL BLINDNESS’ DOES IN MEN’S HEARTS & MINDS & WILLFUL DISGRACE TO HOLY GOD! FIRST,GENESIS 27:41-46 SAYS, “SO ESAU HATED JACOB BECAUSE OF THE BLESSING WITH WHICH HIS FATHER BLESSED HIM, & ESAU SAID IN HIS HEART, ‘THE DAYS OF MOURNING FOR MY FATHER ARE AT HAND; THEN I WILL KILL MY BROTHER JACOB.

AND THE WORDS OF ESAU HER OLDER SON WERE TOLD TO REBEKAH. SO SHE SENT & CALLED JACOB HER YOUNGER SON, & SAID TO HIM, “SURELY YOUR BROTHER ESAU COMFORTS HIMSELF CONCERNING YOU BY INTENDING TO KILL YOU. NOW THEREFORE, MY SON, OBEY MY VOICE: ARISE, FLEE TO MY BROTHER LABAN IN HARAN. & STAY WITH HIM A FEW DAYS, UNTIL YOUR BROTHER’S FURY TURNS AWAY, UNTIL YOUR BROTHER’S ANGER TURNS AWAY FROM YOU, & HE FORGETS WHAT YOU HAVE DONE TO HIM; THEN I WILL SEND & BRING YOU FROM THERE. WHY SHOULD I BE BEREAVED ALSO OF YOU BOTH IN ONE DAY?”

OH, THEN FEAST ON THE FAITH OF ISAAC! GENESIS 28:1-5A: THEN ISAAC CALLED JACOB & BLESSED HIM, & CHARGED HIM, & SAID TO HIM: ‘YOU SHALL NOT TAKE A WIFE FROM THE DAUGHTERS OF CANAAN. ARISE, GO TO PADAN ARAM, TO THE HOUSE OF BETHEL YOUR MOTHER’S FATHER; & TAKE YOURSELF A WIFE FROM THERE OF THE DAUGHTERS OF LABAN YOUR MOTHER’S BROTHER. & MAY GOD ALMIGHTY BLESS YOU, & MAKE YOU FRUITFUL & MULTIPLY YOU, THAT YOU MAY BE AN ASSEMBLY OF PEOPLES; & GIVE YOU THE BLESSING OF ABRAHAM, TO YOU & YOUR DESCENDANTS WITH YOU, THAT YOU MAY INHERIT THE LAND IN WHICH YOU ARE A STRNGER, WHICH GOD GAVE TO ABRAHAM. SO ISAAC SENT JACOB AWAY.”

SECOND,QUESTION! ARE YOU A “DESCENDANT” OF A BLOOD-BOUGHT FAMILY OF FAITH & OBEDIENCE & TRUST IN THE COMMISSIONING & ORDERS & INSTRUCTIONS OF GOD THE FATHER THROUGH HIS HOLY WORD? IN GALATIANS 4:3-20, PAUL IN A LABOR OF LOVE ‘EXPOSED’ COMPROMISE AS AN ENEMY OF GOD WHEN HE SAID OF SOME ‘PROFESSING GALATIANS & EVEN ‘MODERN-DAY’ PRETENDERS,’ “EVEN SO WE, WHEN WE WERE CHILDREN, WERE IN BONDAGE UNDER THE ELEMENTS OF THE WORLD. BUT WHEN THE FULLNESS OF THE TIME HAD COME, GOD SENT FORTH HIS SON, BORN OF A WOMAN, BORN UNDER THE LAW, TO REDEEM THOSE WHO WERE UNDER THE LAW, THAT WE MIGHT RECEIVE THE ADOPTION AS SONS.

AND BECAUSE YOU ARE SONS, GOD HAS SENT FORTH THE SPIRIT OF HIS SON INTO YOU HEARTS, CRYING OUT, ‘ABBA,FATHER’! THEREFORE YOU ARE NO LONGER A SLAVE BUT A SON, & IF A SON, THEN AN HEIR OF GOD THROUGH CHRIST. BUT THEN, INDEED, WHEN YOU DID NOT KNOW GOD, YOU SERVED THOSE BY NATURE WHICH ARE NOT GODS. BUT NOW,AFTER YOU HAVE KNOWN GOD, OR RATHER ARE KNOWN BY GOD, HOW IS IT YOU TURN AGAIN TO THE WEAK & BEGGARLY ELEMENTS, TO WHICH YOU DESIRE AGAIN TO BE IN BONDAGE? YOU OBSERVE DAYS & MONTHS & SEASONS & YEARS. I AM AFRAID FOR YOU, LEST I HAVE LABORED FOR YOU IN VAIN.

BRETHREN, I URGE YOU TO BECOME LIKE ME, FOR I BECAME LIKE YOU. YOU HAVE NOT INJURED ME AT ALL,YOU KNOW THAT BECAUSE OF PHYSICAL INFIRMITY I PREACHED THE GOSPEL TO YOU AT THE FIRST. & MY TRIAL WHICH WAS IN MY FLESH YOU DID NOT DESPISE OR REJECT, BUT YOU RECEIVED ME AS AN ANGEL (OR MESSENGER) OF GOD, EVEN AS CHRIST JESUS. WHAT THEN WAS THE BLESSING YOU ENJOYED? FOR I BEAR YOU WITNESS THAT, IF POSSIBLE, YOU WOULD HAVE PLUCKED OUT YOUR OWN EYES & GIVEN THEM TO ME. HAVE I THEREFORE BECOME YOUR ENEMY BECAUSE I TELL YOU THE TRUTH?

THEY ZEALOUSY COURT YOU, BUT FOR NO GOOD;YES, THEY WANT TO EXCLUDE YOU, THAT YOU MAY BE ZEALOUS FOR THEM. BUT IT IS GOOD TO BE ZEALOUS IN A GOOD THING ALWAYS, & NOT ONLY WHEN I AM PRESENT WITH YOU. MY LITTLE CHILDREN, FOR WHOM I LABOR IN BIRTH AGAIN UNTIL CHRIST IS FORMED IN YOU. I WOULD LIKE TO BE PRESENT WITH YOU NOW & TO CHANGE MY TONE; FOR I HAVE DOUBTS ABOUT YOU.”

THIRD:DARE I SAY IT? BELIEVE I WILL! HAVE YOU EVER HAD ‘DOUBTS’ ABOUT YOURSELF, OR ‘DOUBTS’ ABOUT FAMILY MEMBERS, OR ‘DOUBTS’ ABOUT ‘FRIENDS OF THE FAITH’, OR ‘DOUBTS’ ABOUT A WANDERING, MISGUIDED, WORLDLY INDULGENT TEACHER OR PASTOR? I READ AN ANONYMOUS QUOTE YEARS AGO THAT SAID, “A GREAT MANY PEOPLE ARE ALWAYS READY TO PRAY WHEN THE DEVIL GETS THEM INTO TROUBLE; BUT WHEN THEY GET OUT OF TROUBLE THEY SOON FORGET GOD.” IT WAS E.STANLEY JONES, IN HIS WRITING, “THE WAY”(P.235, ABINGDON PRESS), WHO WROTE: “THE CHRISTIAN UNDER TROUBLE DOESN’T BREAK UP – HE BREAKS OUT.” SO TRUE!

“TALL IN THE BODY & MIND, BUT TAINTED IN THE HEART”? IN ONE OF HIS WRITINGS ENTITLED, “HYMN” (ST.5), HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW WROTE: “O HOLY TRUST! O ENDLESS SENSE OF REST! LIKE THE BELOVED JOHN TO LAY HIS HEAD UPON THE SAVIOR’S BREAST, & THUS TO JOURNEY ON!” HAVE YOU ‘COLLAPSED’ AS A DISCIPLE OF CHRIST? HAVE YOU CRUMBLED? HAVE YOU SETTLED FOR A FAITH THAT TELLS YOU TO TRY YOUR BEST, EVEN IF YOU FAIL 0R FALTER, BUT NEVER TELLS YOU: “FINISHED WITH ‘FLESHLY BEST’ THAT CHRIST JESUS MAY BE MY ALL IN ALL – EVEN EVERY TROUBLING, DISABLING, STRUGGLING, HEART-BREAKING EVENT I MAY FACE?”

“TALL IN THE BODY & MIND, BUT TAINTED IN THE HEART”? MAYBE SO, BUT JOHN KEATS, IN HIS WRITING, “LETTER TO J.H.REYNOLDS” SAID, “THERE IS AN AWFUL WARMTH ABOUT MY HEART LIKE A LOAD OF IMMORTALITY.” FOR SURE, THE HEART OF MAN IS EITHER TAINTED IN SINFUL, SELF-INDULGENCE, OR TRIUMPHANT THROUGH THE SHED BLOOD OF CHRIST, HIS RESURRECTION FROM THE DEAD, & HIS PRESENT REIGN ON THE THRONE OF TRULY REPENTANT, TRULY “BLOOD-BOUGHT SAINTS”, GUIDED & GUARDED BY THE PRESENCE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT IN THE REDEEMED LIFE “IN CHRIST”!

FOURTH,“TALL IN THE BODY & MIND, BUT TAINTED IN THE HEART?” THAT DESCRIBES ‘PROUD’, ‘SELF-INDULGENT’ ‘RELIGIOUS PRETENDERS’ WHO SEE ‘RELIGION’ AS MEN’S MINDS TRYING HARD TO IMPROVE THEMSELVES RELIGIOUSLY, BUT VOID OF “WASHED IN THE BLOOD OF THE LAMB”! MAN’S INVOLVEMENT IN “ESTABLISHED RELIGIONS” WORLDWIDE IS WHAT WALTER BAGEHOT SAID YEARS & YEARS AGO, THAT “MAN’S INVOLVEMENT IN ESTABLISHED RELIGIONS WHICH ARE “STREWN WITH CREEDS & INSTITITIONS WHICH WERE INVALUABLE AT FIRST, & DEADLY AFTERWARD.” AGAIN, SO TRUE!

“TALL IN THE BODY & MIND, BUT TAINTED IN THE HEART?” THAT, TO ME, IS ‘ANTSY RELIGIOUS PARTICIPANTS BIRTHING ITCHY MINDS, FLESHLY WILLS, ‘DECENT PERFORMANCES’, BUT IT IS NOT “GRACED LIVING IN DIVINE PRESENCE WITH CHRIST REIGNING IN THEM AS THEIR THRONE OF ETERNAL GLORY!” HOLY GOD HAS NO INTEREST IN RELIGIOUS MEN’S “PRODUCTION” OF ‘AFFILIATED BIRTHING’ BUT NO “TRANSFORMED LIVES” THROUGH FAITH ALONE IN THE “SHED BLOOD OF CHRIST JESUS” THE CRUCIFIED “LAMB OF GOD”!

‘RELIGIOUS GENIUSES’ ARE INNUMERABLE IN THIS DAY OF RELIGIOUS ‘HISTORY’, BUT I WROTE YEARS AGO A WORD THAT CHILLED A GREAT NUMBER, EVEN CHURCH-FOLK WHO RESENTED IT! I SAID: “IN THE ABSENCE OF TRUE BIBLICAL FAITH MEN ESTABLISH RELIGIONS, & ALL OF A SUDDEN REALIZE THEY’VE ENTERED INNUMERABLE GORILLA CAGES!”

FIFTH,IN JAMES 1:26-27 THE BROTHER OF JESUS WROTE: “IF ANY AMONG YOU SEEM TO BE RELIGIOUS, & BRIDLETH NOT HIS TONGUE, BUT DECEIVES HIS OWN HEART, THIS MAN’S RELIGION IS VAIN. PURE RELIGION & UNDEFILED BEFORE GOD AND THE FATHER IS THIS: TO VISIT THE FATHERLESS & WIDOWS IN THEIR AFFLICTION, & TO KEEP HIMSELF UNSPOTTED FROM THE WORLD.”

IT’S MORE THAN ‘NORMAL’, IT’S “ABNORMAL”! “ABNORMAL” WHAT? THAT’S ‘RELIGIOUS PRETENSE’ VOID OF THE “NEW BIRTH, THE NEW HEART, THE CRUCIFIED LIFE MIRACOUSLY RAISED UP “IN CHRIST” BY THE POWER OF THE HOLY SPIRIT”! THAT’S ‘DECEIVED, RELIGIOUS INDIVIDUALS’ WHO CANNOT, WILL NOT ‘UNDECEIVE THEMSELVES’ BECAUSE “GOD SHOULD ACCEPT JUST AS I AM”, WHEN GOD “CRUCIFIED THEM WITH CHRIST” JUST AS THEY WERE OR STILL ARE IN, BECAUSE RELIGIOUS PRETENSE IS AS DEADLY AS ‘BORN IN SIN’!! ACTS 3:19 SAYS, “REPENT YOU, THEREFORE, & BE CONVERTED THAT YOUR SINS MAY BE BLOTTED OUT.” AGAIN & AGAIN & AGAIN! “CRUCIFIED WITH CHRIST” “IS” “THE ONLY WAY” YOUR OLD SIN-NATURE IS DONE AWAY WITH! “TRYING NOT TO SIN” IS NOT “TRUSTING IN OUR SAVIOR’S FINISHED WORK AT CALVARY’S CROSS!!!

IRA D.SANKEY & E.PAGE,IN THE OLD “BROADMAN HYMNAL”, PUBLISHED BY BROADMAN PRESS, NASHVILLE, TENN., IN 1940, P.328, IS A HYMN ENTITLED “TRUSTING JESUS.” IT SAYS: “SIMPLY TRUSTING EVERY DAY, TRUSTING THROUGH A STORMY WAY; EVEN WHEN MY FAITH IS SMALL, TRUSTING JESUS, THAT IS ALL.

BRIGHTLY DOES HIS SPIRIT SHINE INTO THIS POOR HEART OF MINE; WHILE HE LEADS I CANNOT FALL; TRUSTING JESUS THAT IS ALL.

SINGING IF MY WAY IS CLEAR: PRAYING IF THE PATH BE DREAR; IF IN DANGER, FOR HIM CALL; TRUSTING JESUS, THAT IS ALL.

TRUSTING HIM WHILE LIFE SHALL LAST, TRUSTING HIM TILL EARTH IS PAST; TILL WITHIN THE JASPER WALL, TRUSTING JESUS, THAT IA ALL.

TRUSTING AS THE MOMENTS FLY, TRUSTING AS THE DAYS GO BY; TRUSTING HIM WHATE’ER BEFALL, TRUSTING JESUS, THAT IS ALL.”

SIXTH,BUT, GOD CALLED & YOU REFUSED? JESUS KNOCKED, BUT AWARE OF YOUR ‘SUPREME RELIGIOUS DEVOTION’ YOU SAW NO NEED TO OPEN THE DOOR & INVITE HIM IN TO DO ONLY WHAT HE CAN DO? THE HOLY SPIRIT CONVICTED YOU, BUT YOU CONVINCED YOURSELF “YOU’RE ABLE; TRY YOUR BEST, GUT IT UP, BE STRONG!”, WHEN IN GALATIANS 1:6-10 THE SPIRIT-INSPIRED WORD DECLARES, PAUL THE APOSTLE WRITING: “I MARVEL THAT YOU ARE TURNING AWAY SO SOON FROM HIM WHO CALLED YOU IN THE GRACE OF CHRIST, TO A DIFFERENT GOSPEL, WHICH IS NOT ANOTHER; BUT THERE ARE SOME WHO TROUBLE YOU & WANT TO PERVERT THE GOSPEL OF CHRIST.BUT EVEN IF WE, OR AN ANGEL FROM HEAVEN, PREACH ANY OTHER GOSPEL TO YOU THAN WHAT WE PREACHED TO YOU, LET HIM BE ACCURSED. AS WE SAID BEFORE, SO NOW I SAY AGAIN, IF ANYONE PREACHES ANY OTHER GOSPEL TO YOU THAN WHAT YOU HAVE RECEIVED, LET HIM BE ACCURSED. FOR DO I NOW PERSUADE MEN, OR GOD? OR DO I SEEK TO PLEASE MEN? FOR IF I STILL PLEASED MEN, I WOULD NOT BE A BONDSERVANT OF CHRIST.” ARE “YOU” ‘TRYING’ OR “TRUSTING”, ‘ATTEMPTING OR “ATONED FOR”, ‘STRIVING’ OR ACCORDING TO COLOSSIANS 1:11, “STRENGTHENED WITH ALL MIGHT, ACCORDING TO HIS GLORIOUS POWER…”, WHICH MEANS: “WE TAKE THE SENTENCE OF DEATH DAILY TO OUSELVES, & ALLOW THE HOLY SPIRIT TO FAITHFULLY “GUIDE US INTO ALL TRUTH”!! AMEN? IN THE OLD “AMERICAN HYMNAL” OF 1933 PUBLISHED IN NASHVILLE, TENN., BY BROADMAN PRESS, IS A SONG ENTITLED “LORD, I AM YOURS, ENTIRELY YOURS.” IT SAYS: “LORD, I AM YOURS, ENTIRELY YOURS, PURCHASED & SAVED BY BLOOD DIVINE; WITH FULL CONSENT YOURS I WOULD BE, & OWN YOUR SOVEREIGN RIGHT IN ME.GRANT ONE POOR SINNER MORE A PLACE AMONG THE CHILDREN OF YOUR GRACE; A WRETCHED SINNER,LOST TO GOD, BUT RANSOMED BY IMMANUEL’S BLOOD.

YOURS WOULD I LIVE, YOURS WOULD I DIE, BE YOURS THRO’ ALL ETERNITY; THE VOW IS PAST BEYOND REPEAL, & NOW I SET THE SOLEMN SEAL.HERE AT THAT CROSS WHERE FLOWS THE BLOOD THAT BOUGHT MY GUILTY SOUL FOR GOD, YOU, MY NEW MASTER, NOW I CALL, & CONSECRATE TO YOU MY ALL!PRAISE GOD FROM WHOM ALL BLESSING FLOW; PRAISE HIM ALL CREATURES HERE BELOW; PRAISE HIM ABOVE,YOU HEAVENLY HOST; PRAISE FATHER, SON, & HOLY GHOST.” AMEN?