BY J.FARRELL FISHER, September 29, 2014

I found it so interesting as I was reading in Proverbs recently, chapter 15 and verse 9, when the wise man wrote: “The way of the wicked is an abomination to the Lord, but He loves him who follows righteousness.” The absence of Biblical faith is the way of the wicked, yes, even an abomination to God, but the present walk of the man of redemptive faith is a delight to God because He sees a man following divine righteousness – “self-righteousness” is as filthy rags! And then I came to Proverbs 15:11 that tells us: “Hell and Destruction are before the Lord; so much more the hearts of the sons of men.”

In Job 26:6 Job told his friends, “Sheol is naked before Him, and Destruction has no covering.” No doubt this is why the author of Hebrews, chapter 4, verse 13, wrote: “And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but ALL THINGS ARE NAKED AND OPEN TO THE EYES OF HIM to whom we must give account.” David made it even plainer when in Psalm 33:13-14 he wrote: “The Lord looks from heaven; He sees all the sons of men. From the place of His dwelling He looks on all the inhabitants of the earth.” God knows us all by name!

If “Hell and Destruction” are before God’s eyes and He reads the heart of every man, does He sense in you a heart for “My Way” or a heart for “God’s Way”? It is so vital that you examine your own heart in Light of God’s mercy or in Light of God’s wrath because a Day is coming in which EVERY MAN will stand before Holy God at the judgment seat as He renders to you “Hell” or “Heaven”, determining whether you chose your way or God’s way!

Oswald Chambers, in his “My Utmost For His Highest,” [p.131], quoted Matthew 5:30. It says: “And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and cast it from you; for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish, than for your whole body to be cast into hell.” Chambers then said, “There never has been a saint yet who did not have to live a maimed life to start with. But it is better to enter into life maimed and lovely in God’s sight than to be lovely in man’s sight and lame in God’s.” If you didn’t know, “self-righteousness” is the picture of a “maimed life” needing the eternal redemption only God can give. But, it’s true, some men choose a “hellish” life apart from the Blood Atonement!

Three times in Mark 9:42-48 Jesus spoke of those who offended God by their refusing to accept His healing grace with the result that God, yes, casts them into hell, into the fire that shall never be quenched – where “Their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched.” It burns and burns and burns, and never dies out, with the recipients of hell forever experiencing the fire! Spurgeon made an eye-opening statement when he preached long ago: “Many of you are hanging over the mouth of hell by a solitary plank, and that plank is rotten!” If I were you I’d consider WHO I’m standing on, examining whether Jesus is your Solid plank or you’ve wandered to rotten planks!

Do you think John Milton in his “Paradise Lost”, [Bk.1,1.61], was writing about Hell? “A dungeon horrible on all side round As one great furnace flamed yet from those flames…

No light, but rather darkness visible, Served only to discover sights of woe, Regions of sorrow, doleful shades, where peace

And rest can never dwell, hope never comes That comes to all, but torture without end.”

If you deny God, refuse His saving grace through the blood of the Lamb, and go your own crippled and cursed way, void of the Savior and Lord of life, Jonathan Edwards wrote about you in his “Men Naturally God’s Enemies,” [Works,VII,168], “The devil is waiting for them, hell is gaping for them, the flames gather and flash about them…When you come to be a firebrand of hell…you will appear as you are, a viper indeed…Then will you as a serpent spit poison at God and vent your rage and malice in fearful blasphemies.”

Let me point you to “TRUTH MANIFESTED”! There are two passages from Revelation I want to share with you. In Revelation 21:8 John, inspired by the Holy Spirit, gives ALL a warning: “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.” [And the “second death” is the death that will not die!!].

In Revelation 20:15 we read, “And anyone not found written in the Book of Life was cast into the lake of fire.” Oh, but then Revelation 21:27 informs us that this Book of Life is “the Lamb’s Book of Life”! “But there shall by no means enter it anything that defiles, [can a person ‘defile’ Truth because they don’t accept God’s revelation?], or causes an abomination or a lie, but only those who are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life.” Are you unaware that every single person on earth has their own “book of life” as they see it with some personally rejecting God’s Word of Truth? Truth defiled, but also there are those who see Biblical Truth as ‘abominable’ – The Random House Collegiate Dictionary defines ‘abominable’ as that which is “repugnantly hateful; detestable; loathsome; very unpleasant, disagreeable” – oh, and then Revelation 21:27 tells us there an those interpreting “TRUTH” as a lie! AND, THEY HAVE NO PART IN THE REDEMPTIVE WORK OF GOD EVEN IF THEY’RE CHURCH ATTENDERS!

My heart is absolutely broken, shattered, and I find myself in a grieving state for a long time when I hear those who, yes, denounce the God-inspired Holy Word! But I grieve also because Jesus speaks in Matthew 10:28 and tells us: “And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. But rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.” The Greek word for ‘hell’ is Gehenna – I’d define that as ‘good intentions,’ or ‘gross’, ‘godless’, ‘guilt-ridden’, a ‘gad-a-bout’ who wanders away from the God of Truth aimlessly with no God-given purpose, plan, or life in the Spirit!

“Truth-Manifested”? Do you have any idea at all about “eternal remorse”? Again, the Collegiate Dictionary defines “remorse” as “deep and painful regret for wrong-doing…regretful, pitiful, sad”, because one has ignored God’s calling to him/her, His personal calling, through His Word to YOU!!

Follow carefully Jesus’ words in Luke 16:19-31! “There was a certain rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen and fared sumptuously every day. But there was a certain beggar named Lazarus, full of sores, who was laid at the gate, desiring to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man’s table. Moreover the dogs came and licked his sores…

So it was that the beggar died, and was carried by the angels to Abraham’s bosom. The rich man died also and was buried. And being in torments in Hades, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom. Then he cried and said, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy upon me, and send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame.’

But Abraham said, ‘Son, remember that in your lifetime you received good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things; but now he is comforted and you are tormented. And besides all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed, so that those who want to pass from here to you cannot, nor can those from there pass to us.’

Then he said, ‘I beg you therefore, father, that you would send him to my father’s house, for I have five brothers, that he may testify to them, lest they also come to this place of torment.’ Abraham said to him, ‘They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.’

And he said, ‘No, father Abraham; but if one goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’ But he said to him, ‘If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.’”

“TRUTH MANIFESTED?” What did Jesus say in Matthew 16:25? But Abraham said, ‘Son, remember…” Can you even begin to comprehend the thoughts of a man who thought by his earthly prominence he was assured of a place in heaven but all he ‘inherited’ was “pictures of the past” with no film of saving grace and mercy?

Memory? Thoughts of his past existence because it certainly was not heavenly living on earth – a life that never gave Jesus a silly inch of consideration but only miles of “fleshly, sinful, shameful” unbelief, rebellion, and denial as he wasted his living on indulging himself in Christ-less living!

Thoughts? Do you comprehend “torment” when the purity of Christ could have been yours through His shed blood, broken body, and eternal sacrifice, but you stood on your “intellectually prowess”, never understanding “raised with Christ, seeking the things above” settling in where Christ IS, seated at the right hand of God! So, you become a part of those who “set their minds on things above, not on the things of the earth,” because you “died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God!”

Horrifying considerations of ‘torment in the flames’? Do you ever read Holy Scripture and sense the depth, breadth and height of God’s love for you as He alerts you to an eternity of an absence of His love, grace, and mercy, and experiencing only the Devil’s hell with all his demons and, yes, the godless who deny Christ as the Savior and Lord of all of life?

Can you even begin to comprehend every man, woman, boy, or girl, who heard of the saving grace of God, of Calvary’s great love, of the suffering and death on innocent Jesus who knew no sin, but took their sin upon Himself and died a cruel death, hearing Him say, “I never knew you. Depart from Me, you workers of iniquity!” What tormenting shame for the rejecters of Christ!

Eternity in Hell with unbelievers, sordid companions, sick sinners of body, mind, heart, and soul? Revelation 22:15 Jesus Himself testified of those who weren’t allowed to enter the Holy City! “But outside are dogs and sorcerers and sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters, and WHOEVER LOVES AND PRACTICES A LIE!” Loves a lie, practices a lie? “Jesus isn’t divine, Jesus wasn’t born of a virgin, Jesus was not Emmanuel, Jesus wasn’t the Sinless Son of God, Jesus doesn’t save, Jesus doesn’t give us Resurrection Life, Power, and Hope for Eternity – he was just a man!” So they GO TO HELL!!

Oh, hear the Word of God!! John 3:36!! “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.” Wrath? Hell? Punishment? From God? You do understand that there are some who believe it to be impolite to even speak of Hell and who goes there, but if Jesus does, so should all born-again believers! There are those without grace and mercy in their hearts, living hopeless of hope and heaven without Jesus as Master, Savior, and Lord of their lives.

Have you read 2 Thessalonians lately? Verses 7-10 “…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 [trust in, rely upon, rest in], because our testimony among you was believed.” Tell me what YOU believe?

Would you be surprised if you discovered that Jesus had more to say about Hell than He did Heaven? Why don’t you “use” the Word and see the difference between Hell and Heaven! I don’t know what you’ve discerned about Hell in God’s Word, but more importantly you need to truly know the heart of God! 2 Peter 3:9 says, “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.” [And especially related to the “church”, how does the last verse apply when “repentance” is a word missing from the church’s daily dictionary? Too many pastors have no desire to “offend” regular attenders and especially those who are big tithers!]

Let’s examine “Truth Manifested” as it relates to Heaven! In John 14:1-4 Jesus speaks to our hearts today: “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.”

Jesus talked clearly, plainly, passionately about those who believed in, trusted fully, and followed Him faithfully, that He had gone after His death and resurrection to “prepare a place for you”! But one doesn’t merit Heaven as he/she mixes, messes, or mangles the profession of faith in Christ while daily dancing the devil’s or fallen flesh’s tunes! It’s “I surrender all” or one is not His “at all”!

But in 2 Corinthians 4:16-5:9 Paul encourages true believers with the hope of our eternal Heaven: “Therefore we do not lose heart. Even though our outward man is perishing, yet the inward man is being renewed day by day…

For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, while we do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal…

5:1-9, For we know that if our earthly house, this tent, is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed with our habitation which is from heaven, if indeed, having been clothed, we shall not be found naked…

For we who are in this tent groan, being burdened, not because we want to be unclothed, but further clothed, that mortality may be swallowed up by life. Now He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who also has given us the Spirit as a guarantee…

So we are always confident, knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord. For we walk by faith, not by sight. We are confident, yes, well pleased to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord. Therefore we make it our aim, whether present or absent, to be well pleasing to Him.” Heaven? Paul said later in 2 Corinthians 5:18 that “Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ…” If you’re not experiencing Heaven now, in Christ, what do you think will make His Presence more pleasing when you’re with Him there?

Do you understand “joy in Heaven”? Luke 15:7,10 says, Verse 7, Jesus speaking, “I say to you that likewise there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine just persons who need no repentance.” Then Verse 10 says, “Likewise, I say to you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.” Heaven? The Holy Presence of God, the Presence of Jesus who is King of kings and Lord of lords, and the Holy Spirit bathing the redeemed in eternal, heavenly fruit of the Spirit, and multitudes after multitudes of Heaven’s angels singing the “Hallelujah Chorus” along with the born-again Family of God!

R.A. Torrey wrote the book entitled “Heaven or Hell?” In it, [p.72] he wrote: “There will be no unpleasant or degrading companions in heaven. The devil will not be there. The lewd, the vulgar, and the obscene will not be there. The greedy and the scheming and selfish will not be there. The liar, the slanderer, the backbiter, the meddler, and the gossip will not be there. The mean, the contemptible, and the hypocrite will not be there. The profane, the blasphemer, and the scoffer will not be there. No money, influence, or cunning will get them in. ‘And there shall in no wise enter into it anything that defiles, neither whatsoever works abomination, or makes a lie. [Revelation 21:27]”

And YOU don’t know, refuse to believe, yes, doubt and try to refute daily that you have a great High Priest in Heaven whose name is Jesus? Hebrews 4:14 tells me, “Seeing then that we have a great High Priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession.” Beyond this eternal truth the author then tells us in verses 15-16, “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.”

[But how many do you know who deny Jesus as our great High Priest, have no confession, certainly recognize in themselves no weaknesses, void of temptation and sin, and vow they don’t need mercy or grace because their “flesh” and “sin” is of no consequence to God!]

“Heaven”? Can you even begin to fathom the fullness of perfect love, perfect peace, perfect identity, as the son/daughter of God Almighty? What did John write? I John 3:1-3 says, “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.” [Would you call that “preparation for Heaven”? But there is no purity of heart and mind apart from “the blood of the Lamb of God” WHO IS JESUS ONLY!]

“Heaven”? You just read R.A. Torrey’s summation of “absence”, but consider the absence of all of God’s enemies of true faith, your enemies of saving grace! Can you rejoice because you understand there’s the eternal absence of that which sought to mar your life and journey of faith? Life’s pains become His perfect peace, life’s troubles become His triumphant spirit, life’s poverties become His eternal riches, life’s laborious conflicts become His eternal “rest” of faith, life’s fleshly questions become His heavenly answers, life’s “sleepless nights” become the dawn of His bright days, life’s baffling questions become our Lord’s clear answers, life’s tears will be transformed into His rivers of sweet memories, life’s bitter and hateful seconds will become His eternal moments of blessed peace that passes all understanding!

I’m telling you: As true children of redemptive faith, we inherit an eternity of perfect praise, perfect love, and perfect “on key” rejoicing! What does Revelation 7:9-12 tell us? “After these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could number, of all nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, with palm branches in their hands,…

And crying out with a loud voice, saying, ‘Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” All the angels stood around the throne and the elders and the four living creatures, and fell on their faces before the throne and worshipped God, saying:…

‘Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom, Thanksgiving and honor and power and might, Be to our God forever and ever. AMEN!!”

“WHAT ABOUT HEAVEN’S DOOR”? I know you’re not unfamiliar with what Jesus said about Himself – reject Him if you choose, but Jesus Christ of Nazareth, the Promised Messiah, Emmanuel, King of kings and Lord of lords, IS HEAVEN’S DOOR, and there is no other way to enter! In John 10:9 Jesus said, “I am the door. If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved, and will go in and out, and find pasture.”

“WHAT ABOUT HEAVEN’S HOUSE”? In Hebrews 3:1-6 we read: “Therefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the Apostle and High Priest of our confession, Christ Jesus, who was faithful to Him who appointed Him, as Moses also was faithful in all His house…

For this One has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses, inasmuch as He who built the house has more honor than the house. For every house is built by someone, but He who built all things is God…

And Moses indeed was faithful in all His house as a servant, for a testimony of those things which would be spoken afterward, BUT CHRIST AS A SON OVER HIS OWN HOUSE, whose house WE ARE “IF” we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm to the end!!”

Once more, consider R.A. Torrey’s comments in his book, “Heaven or Hell?”, [p.86], “Do you know the difference between a hog and a sheep? A hog will fall into the mud, and he will stay there. A sheep may fall into the mud, but he gets up as quickly as he can. Many people that we think are Christ’s sheep are only washed hogs. A hog that is washed will return to the mire, but a sheep will not stay in the mud.” [2 Peter 2:22 says, “But it has happened to them according to the true proverb: ‘A dog returns to his own vomit,’ and ‘a sow, having washed, to her wallowing in the mire.’”

And also if a “Heaven-bound saint”, one truly ‘set apart’ for the glory of God alone, what gives with the man as an unbeliever whose goal is self-actualization?

Read Oswald Chambers’ comments on Philippians 3:10 where Paul said, “That I may know Him..,” [Jesus Christ!!]. [“My Utmost For His Highest,” pps.140-141], “The initiative of the saint is not towards self-realization, but towards knowing Jesus Christ. The spiritual saint never believes circumstances to be haphazard, or thinks of his life as secular and sacred; he sees everything as dumped down in as the means of securing the knowledge of Jesus Christ. There is a reckless abandonment about him. The Holy Spirit is determined that we shall realize Jesus Christ in every domain of life, and He will bring us back to the same point again and again until we do. Self-realization leads to enthronement of work; whereas the saint enthrones Jesus Christ in his work. Whether it be eating or drinking or washing disciples’ feet, whatever it is, we have to take the initiative of realizing Jesus Christ in it. Every phase of our actual life has its counterpart in the life of Jesus. Our Lord realized His relationship to the Father in the most menial work. “JESUS KNOWING…that He was come from God, and went to God…took a towel…and began to wash the disciples’ feet.”

If you didn’t know it, Jesus was ‘Heaven’ come to earth, and ‘Heaven’ for the true saint is, “that I may know Him’!! And Heaven’s goal in each true believer? Ephesians 4:13, “till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.” The “FRIEND OF HEAVEN” is Jesus – the “friends of earth” are those, yes, who bring “heaven” to earth! What did John say in I John 3:14? “We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love the brethren,” and our Lord even tells us, “Love your enemies”! THAT’S HEAVEN!

No doubt this is why Peter wrote: I Peter 1:8, “whom having not seen you love. Though now you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory..”

What did Jesus tell us in John 15:13? “Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends.” AWESOME!! I love what Jeremy Taylor said long ago: “By friendship you mean the greatest love, the greatest usefulness, the most open communication, the noblest sufferings, the severest truth, the heartiest counsel, and the greatest union of minds of which brave men and women are capable.” JUST HOW BRAVE WAS JESUS? HOW BRAVE ARE YOU? DO YOU STAND FOR THE ETERNAL TRUTH OF HEAVEN AND, YES, HELL?

By: J.Farrell Fisher, Nov. 19-21, 2017

Interesting verses for your consideration in 1 Corinthians 15:44b-49 for Paul wrote saying: “…There is a natural body and there is a spiritual body. And so it is written, ‘The first man Adam became a living being.’ The last Adam (Jesus) became a life-giving spirit. However, the spiritual is not first, but the natural, and afterward the spiritual.

The first man was of the earth, made of dust; the second Man is the Lord from heaven. As was the man of dust, so also are those who are made of dust; and as is the heavenly Man, so also are those who are heavenly. And as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly Man,” telling us that true manhood IS the exact image, likeness, presence of Christ in His Resurrection Presence highlighted by the Holy Spirit who, yes, “guides us into all Truth”!

But “nutty-natured” unbelievers and pretenders of religious activity? In Titus 1:15-16 Paul enlightened a young disciple named Titus, telling Him, “To the pure all things are pure, but to those who are defiled and unbelieving nothing is pure; but even their mind and conscience are defiled. They profess to know God, but in works they deny Him, being abominable, disobedient, and disqualified for every good work.” Are “nutty natured” people ‘defiled’ because they do not possess the nature and character of the Resurrected Christ? Does ‘unbelieving’ describe the atheist, the agnostic, the unbelieving, or the pretender?

Oh, but then look at Paul’s words in Titus 2:11-15! He said, “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 the 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.”

Dare I say it? I believe I will! “It’s a ‘nutty-natured’ individual that denies the need of the “Blood Redemption” in and through Christ alone! Impure hearts deny the need of a “Redeemer”! Self-pride and love of their fallen sin-natures easily identifies ‘unbelievers’! There are those among men who live selfishly to be admired by ‘world-captured, sin-bound men, and Satan himself’, and this because they are ‘lovers of themselves’ and not God, ‘lovers of money’ rather than Truth treasures, they are boastful, fleshly proud, blasphemers of biblical truths and those who stand for Truth, being unloving, unforgiving, unholy, easily slanderous, void of self-control, at times ‘brutal’, especially some ungodly ‘bosses’, resentful of the good, easily even a traitor to friendship, vows, or oaths, headstrong rather than heart-strong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, some even possessing ‘a form of godliness’ but deny its power, resisters of Truth, corrupt in the mind AND heart, bankrupt of any faith but experts in what God calls foolishness! (Be sure you check that very last statement out!)

Tell me: “Lately, have you heard preachers, teachers, religious leaders, even disciples, talking about God’s JUDGMENTS when He sends ‘the mighty angels, in flaming fire taking vengeance of those who do not know God, and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, punished with everlasting destruction from the glory of the Lord and from the glory of His power’?” (2 Thessalonians 1:8-9). Sadly, it’s not only unbelievers we ought to be concerned about but also the uninformed, who’ve never seen, sensed, or heard one word of truth about the need of the Savior and Lord! Who is accountable for that situation?

Even as ancient, early men sought to live apart from God, even today there are those who live under a ‘cloud’ of indifference and unbelief because there still are recurring tides and strong waves of encroachment against the Author and Finisher of eternal salvation. Many men are, yes, obstinate to God and His will, His Word, and His way! ‘Self-willed individuals’, cemented and set in their own ambitions and fleshly, even religious desires, will, like the ‘religious Pharisees’ of Jesus day, live today to deny, reject, cloud over, and darken anyone’s attempts at turning them to “revealed Truth”, yes, even to King Jesus, the Promised Messiah!

Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ really laid out heavenly concerns, biblical heartaches, and personal examinations for all life situations, believers or unbelievers! In Mark 4:13-20 Jesus declared a Word you must have understanding about! He said: And Jesus said to them, “Do you not understand this parable? How then will you understand all the parables? The sower sows the word. And these are the ones by the wayside where the word is sown. When they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word that was sown in their hearts.

These likewise are the ones sown on stony ground, who, when they hear the word, immediately receive it with gladness; and they have no root in themselves, and so endure only for a time. Afterward, when tribulation or persecution arises for the word’s sake, immediately they stumble.

Now these are the ones sown among thorns; they are the ones who hear the word, and the cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches, and the desires for other things entering in choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful. BUT these are the ones sown on good ground, those who hear the word, accept it, and bear fruit; some thirtyfold, some sixty, and some a hundred.” From this parable do YOU gain understanding about “Nutty Natures” or “New Minds”?

“Nutty Natures”? That’s not only the “stars” of flesh achievement but also the “slow minded” who have no confidence at all in what it truly means to have ‘faith’ in God – both intuitively knowing, yes, ‘there is God for sure’, and they are sovereignly designed for Him but with a ‘free will to choose’ their sinfulness, their ‘shallow’ minds, and their devotion to “natural individuality”, blinding most unbelievers because they take great pleasure in satisfying their ‘tyranny of fleshliness’ with no concern for reconciliation to Holy God!

In 1 Corinthians 15:33-34 we read: “DO NOT BE DECEIVED: ‘Evil company corrupts good habits.’ Awake to righteousness, and do not sin; for some do not have the knowledge of God. I speak this to your shame,” and Paul was writing to the church in Corinth!

Oswald Chambers had Spirit-instilled understanding when in “My Utmost For His Highest” (p.59) he wrote: “If the Spirit of God detects anything in you that is wrong, He does not ask you to put it right; He asks you to accept (what) the light (exposes), and He will put it right. A child of the light confesses instantly and stands bared before God; a child of darkness says – “Oh, I can explain that away.” When once the light breaks and the conviction of wrong comes, be a child of the light, and confess, and God will deal with what is wrong; if you vindicate yourself, you prove yourself to be a child of darkness.” WOW!

In 2 Chronicles 14:9-12 Zerah marched out against (God’s people) with a vast army…(As God’s people or God’s person of faith, do YOU know about “the enemy” that comes against you and your faith?). Then Asa called to the LORD his God and said, “LORD, there is no one like you to help the powerless against the mighty. Help us, O LORD our God, for we rely on you, and in Your name we have come against this vast army. O LORD, you are our God; do not let man (the world, the flesh, the demons, or Satan!) prevail against you.”…and The LORD struck down the Cushites.”

I don’t know who wrote the following, but it is so true! “We cannot kindle when we will The fire which in the heart resides, The spirit blows and is still, In mystery our soul abides; But tasks in hours of insight willed Can be through hours of gloom fulfilled.”

And the task in you is accepting ‘the light’ the Spirit brings, exposing in you, what He needs to make right, IF you will let Him! But ‘self-effort’ of correcting ‘sin’ always fails, but The Holy Spirit convicts, convinces, yes, and corrects what He knows only He can eternally correct what is opposite the nature and character of Holy God!

The New Living Translation of 1 Samuel 17:45-47 tells us: David shouted to Goliath, “You come to me with sword, spear, and javelin, but I come to you in the name of the Lord Almighty, whom you have defied. Today the LORD will conquer you, and I will kill you and cut off your head…And everyone will know that the LORD does not need weapons to rescue His people. It is His battle, not ours. The LORD will give you to us.”

I know you’ve heard of “prayer warriors”, but I’ve wondered at times if they are also truly “trusting warriors”! Are you aware that “big ships” don’t leave shorelines at low tides? And could we say that “big believers” (which all are who are truly “born again”) are those who don’t trust themselves but are those who yield to “High-Tide, Holy God” as He says, “I’m able to handle your warring enemy – give Me My place in your “low-tide moment” – I can take care of you and defeat your Enemy of darkness, deceit, and devilishness!!” No doubt this is why Paul wrote: (Galatians 2:20b-21a), “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 the better translation of “faith IN THE SON OF GOD”, what about “the faith OF THE SON OF GOD”? Oswald Chambers wrote: [“My Utmost For His Highest”, p.58], “This faith is not Paul’s faith in Jesus Christ, but the faith that the Son of God has imparted to him “the faith OF the Son of God”. It is no longer faith in faith, but faith which has overleapt all conscious bounds, the identical faith OF the Son of God.” AMEN?

“Nutty Natures OR New Minds”? Do I dare to say that there are those “New Minds” that displace the Resurrected Christ within them for moments, days, weeks, and years for “illusions of a self-conscious ability of self-improvement in the faith” for “Christ in you the hope of glory”? Of course it happens! Immature, young disciples, at times, betray their ‘saving faith’ for a “best-effort” mentality that they ‘think’ will free them when it’s not emancipating but enslaving them to one’s old sin-nature! Is that the ‘ancient, rampant individualism’ of the Pharoahs of the past who saw no need for the True God because they’ve invented their own or, yes, ‘determined believers today’ who are deceived they can live “Christ-like” without the Christ!

“Nutty Natures OR New Minds”? Does ‘religious thinking’ define “new-born sons and daughters”? I don’t think so! ‘Religious thinking’ apart from Holy Spirit conviction and Holy Spirit conversion leads to the establishment of ‘false religions’, even much of modern-day ‘Christian’ (?) thinking! Societal secularization can, and often is, birthing ‘false faiths’ and, yes, birthing enemies of the crucified and resurrected Christ Jesus!

David F. Wells, in his book, “No Place For Truth”, (William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, Grand Rapids, Mich. (1993),p.84) wrote: “Amid the peals of freedom, there are the modern thunderclaps of damnation.” In Psalm 87:7, didn’t the singers sing, “All my springs (my fresh springs) are in You, God”? Best-effort in Christian living is a contaminated spring – if you are His, you were “crucified with Christ”, and any hope you have for victorious living in the Faith is when daily you take the sentence of death to yourself that His Resurrection Presence be manifested in your mortal flesh – that’s Jesus being Jesus “in YOU!” “New Minds!!” How?

From the world, the flesh, or demonic bondage of darkness to the Kingdom of Life in the Lord of Light AND to the Victor over darkness and spiritual death in and through and by the Lamb’s shed blood…

From the temporal, outward beauty and pleasure of the flesh-nature-indulgence to the gift, the blessing, and the power of His Resurrection Life in one being “born again”, “born the second time by repentance and faith,” and “born again by the power of the Promised Holy Spirit who came and still comes”!!

From the darkness of the soul’s night to the Day of the Savior’s Light, from the bondage of slavery to the nature of sin and death under the devil’s and demons control TO the freedom of liberty and LIGHT and everlasting love, crucifying the soul’s drought of faith, and by the Holy Spirit giving the gift of eternal life!

From the seizure of sin, ‘self-paralysis’, and soul death to the Savior’s healing grace and “New Life’s giftings”, including a “new creation”, a “new garment of eternal righteousness”, “NEW FRUITS OF THE SPIRIT”, a “new name”, a “new heart”, a “new testimony of a re-born life”, a “new and living way”, a “new name written down and recorded in glory for even angels to rejoice in”!

It was E.Edwin Young and Gypsy Smith who wrote the old hymn, “Jesus, Revealed in Me”, (Copyrighted in 1931 and printed in London, England). 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 joy divine, And victory over sin.

Oh, to reflect His grace, Causing the world to see, Love that will glow Till others shall know Jesus, revealed in me.”

In Psalm 16:8-9 David came to a clear, convicting, consecrating understanding of “New Minds” rather than “Nutty Minds”! He wrote: “I keep the Lord always before me; because He is at my right hand, I shall not be moved. Therefore my heart is glad, and my soul rejoices; my body also rests secure.”

One of the Verses of the old hymn, “A Child of the King”, written by Hattie E. Buell and Rev. John B. Summer, says: “I once was an outcast stranger on earth, A sinner by choice, and an alien by birth; But I’ve been adopted, my name’s written down, An heir to a mansion, a robe, and a crown…I’m a child of the King, A child of the King; With Jesus my Savior, I’m a child of the King.”

I don’t know of a better word in closing: “Nutty Natures or New Minds”!! Amen?

WITH “THE SAVIOR”?

BY: J.FARRELL FISHER, JUNE 5-6, 2019

IT MIGHT BE EASIER TO SAY, ‘DANCING WITH SIN’ WHICH ALL MEN HAVE DONE & SOME STILL DO, “OR”, A “DALLIANCE WITH SIN” WHICH SOME ‘CHOOSE’ TO CALL IT WITH THE WORD ‘DALLIANCE’ IN “THE RANDOM HOUSE COLLEGE DICTIONARY” OF 1973 DEFINING ‘DALLIANCE’ AS “A TRIFLING AWAY OF TIME;DAWDLING, AMOROUS TOYING, FLIRTATION.” THAT WORD MAY NOT FULLY DESCRIBE THE SERIOUSNESS OF A ‘SIN-INDULGER’, BUT SADLY THE WORD IS ENOUGH TO DESCRIBE HOW EASILY THE ‘SIN-NATURE’ HIDES ITSELF IN ITS OWNER!

SOME SEE IT AS A ‘SPORT’ RATHER THAN WHO OR WHAT THEY INDULGE IN REGULARLY; OTHERS DECEIVE THEMSELVES IN DEFIANCE TO THE “LAWS OF GOD”, LIKE “YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT ADULTERY”; BUT IF ONE DOESN’T CARE WHAT GOD SAYS, HE/SHE CONTINUES IN “SELF-WORSHIP” & “SELF-PLEASURE” CONSIDERING, “I AM WHO I AM, DOING AS I PLEASE!” A ‘DALLIANCER’ STRUTS PROUDLY BEFORE HOLY GOD UNASHAMED OF HIS WORLDLY, FLESHLY, SATAN-INSPIRED RENDEVOUS WITH ‘DEADLY INDULGENCE’!

‘A DALLIANCE WITH SIN’? DOES IT HAVE CONSEQUENCES? FOLLOW PETER IN THE INSPIRED WORD OF GOD IN 2 PETER 2:9-22!! IT’S SERIOUS & SOVEREIGNLY UNVEILING BY HOLY GOD WHO INSPIRED PETER TO WRITE IT!!! “THE LORD KNOWS HOW TO DELIVER THE GODLY OUT OF TEMPTATIONS, & TO RESERVE THE UNJUST UNTO THE DAY OF JUDGMENT TO BE PUNISHED; BUT CHIEFLY THEM THAT ‘WALK AFTER THE FLESH’ (OR OLD SIN-NATURE!) IN THE LUST OF UNCLEANNESS, & DESPISE GOVERNMENT. PRESUMPTUOUS ARE THEY, SELF-WILLED; THEY ARE NOT AFRAID TO SPEAK EVIL OF DIGNATARIES. WHEREAS ANGELS, WHICH ARE GREATER IN POWER & MIGHT, BRING NOT RAILING ACCUSATION AGAINST THEM BEFORE THE LORD.

BUT THESE, AS NATURAL BRUTE BEASTS, MADE TO BE TAKEN & DESTROYED, SPEAK EVIL OF THE THINGS THAT THEY UNDERSTAND NOT; & SHALL UTTERLY PERISH IN THEIR OWN CORRUPTION; & SHALL “RECEIVE THE WAGES OF UNRIGHTEOUSNESS”,AS THEY THAT COUNT IT PLEASURE TO RIOT IN THE DAY TIME. SPOTS THEY ARE & BLEMISHES, SPORTING THEMSELVES WITH THEIR OWN DECEIVINGS, WHILE THEY FEST WITH YOU: HAVING EYES FULL OF ADULTERY, & THAT CANNOT CEASE FROM SIN; BEGUILING,UNSTABLE SOULS:AN HEART THEY HAVE EXERCISED WITH COVETOUS PRACTICES; CURSED CHILDREN; WHICH HAVE FORSAKEN THE RIGHT WAY, & ARE GONE ASTRAY, FOLLOWING THE WAY OF BALAAM THE SON OF BOSOR, WHO LOVED THE WAGES OF UNRIGHTEOUSNESS;

BUT WAS REBUKED FOR HIS INIQUITY; THE DUMB ASS SPEAKING WITH MAN’S VOICE FORBAD THE MADNESS OF THE PROPHET. THESE ARE WELLS WITHOUT WATER, CLOUDS THAT ARE CARRIED WITH A TEMPEST; TO WHOM THE MIST OF DARKNESS IS RESERVED FOR EVER. FOR WHEN THEY SPEAK GREAT SWELLING WORDS OF VANITY, THEY ALLURE THROUGH THE LUSTS OF THE FLESH, THROUGH MUCH WANTONNESS, THOSE THAT WERE CLEAN ESCAPED FROM THEM WHO LIVE IN ERROR. WHILE THEY PROMISE THEM LIBERTY, THEY THEMSELVES ARE THE SERVANTS OF CORRUPTION; FOR OF WHOM A MAN IS OVERCOME, OF THE SAME IS HE BROUGHT INTO BONDAGE.

FOR IF AFTER THEY HAVE ESCAPED THE POLLUTIONS OF THE WORLD THROUGH THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE LORD & SAVIOR JESUS CHRIST, THEY ARE AGAIN ENTANGLED THEREIN, & OVERCOME, THE LATTER END IS WORSE WITH THEM THAN THE BEGINNING. FOR IT HAD BEEN BETTER FOR THEM NOT TO HAVE KNOWN THE WAY OF RIGHTEOUSNESS, THAN, AFTER THEY HAVE KNOWN IT, TO TURN FROM THE HOLY COMMANDMENT DELIVERED UNTO THEM. BUT IT IS HAPPENED UNTO THEM ACCORDING TO THE TRUE PROVERB, THE ‘DOG’ IS TURNED TO HIS OWN VOMIT AGAIN; & THE SOW THAT WAS WASHED TO HER WALLOWING IN THE MIRE.” HOW SERIOUS, HOW SAD, HOW SCARY DO YOU FIND THOSE WORDS? “A DALLIANCE WITH SIN?”

IN LUKE 11:34 JESUS SAID, “THE LIGHT OF THE BODY IS THE EYE; THEREFORE WHEN YOUR EYE IS SINGLE, YOUR WHOLE BODY IS FULL OF LIGHT; BUT WHEN YOUR EYE IS EVIL, YOUR WHOLE BODY ALSO IS FULL OF DARKNESS.” ARE ‘YOU’ DOUBLE-EYED OR SINGLE-EYED? DO YOU SEE YOUR VIEW OF SELF & YOUR WORLD FROM ONLY YOUR POINT OF VIEW OR HAVE YOU ALLOWED HOLY GOD TO SOLVE THE ‘DOUBLE-EYED SPIRITUAL STUPIDITY’? IS YOUR ‘LIFE’ THE “DEW-NITED-STATES OF THE USA” SOAKEN ‘WET’ WITH THE SATANIC MOISTURE OF ‘SELF-INDULGENCE’? HOW MANY DO YOU KNOW WHO ARE “ANCIENT IN UNBELIEF” OR “AGED IN BONDAGE TO SIN” LIKE THE WORLD, THE FLESH-NATURE, OR SATAN HIMSELF?

‘FLESH-AMBITION’, ‘SIN-NATURE ENSLAVED’, ‘WORLDLY DECEIVED’, OR ‘SATANICALLY BLINDED’ TO THE WORD, THE WILL, THE WAY OF HOLY GOD IN & THROUGH CHRIST ALONE THROUGH HIS SHED BLOOD, THE CRUEL CROSS, & THE HISTORIC BURIAL,THEN RESURRECTION AFTER THREE DAYS IN THE BORROWED TOMB, PRESENTLY RULING & REIGNING AT THE RIGHT-HAND-THRONE OF ALMIGHTY GOD, &, YES, STILL KNOCKING ON THE HEARTS’ DOORS OF ALL MEN IN ALL THE WORLD, YES, ASKING, “OPEN TO ME & I’LL COME IN” – & IF “YOU” DO, YOU’RE INVOLVED IN ETERNAL BLESSINGS BY MERCIFUL GOD WHO “GAVE HIS OWN SON FOR THE CRUEL CRUCIFIXION” IN ORDER TO DELIVER US FROM THE BONDAGE OF SIN & DEATH & SLAVERY TO SATANIC CONTROL & BLINDED WITH A FALLEN WORLD’S MISCONCEPTION OF WHAT “LIFE” HERE IS ALL ABOUT!!! THERE ARE THOSE WHO WANT “MY WORLD, FOR MY SELF, ACCORDING TO MY MIND, HEART, & FLESHLY AMBITION – NOT THE WILL OF SOME FOREIGN GOD!” THAT IS “FALLEN AWAY”!! THAT IS “BLINDED TO THE LOVE OF GOD”!! THAT IS “DECEIVED BY THE POWERS OF DARKNESS” & “LURED INTO THE WORLD OF UNBELIEF, THE WORLD OF SELF-INDULGENCE, & THE WORLD OF SATAN’S CONTROL”!! WHERE & WITH WHOM ARE YOU LIVING & WHAT IS YOUR STYLE OF WORSHIP & BELIEF?

IN THE “AMAC MAGAZINE” (MAY/JUNE 2019) IS AN ADVERTISEMENT ABOUT DAVID HOROWITZ’S BOOK, “DARK AGENDA: THE WAR TO DESTROY CHRISTIAN AMERICA.” THOUGH JEWISH, HOROWITZ EXPOSES, YES, A WAR AGAINST CHRISTIANS WITH THE AIM OF ELIMINATING ANYTHING ‘CHRISTIAN’ IN AMERICA! (EXCUSE ME, BUT I THINK AMAC’S INTRODUCTION OF HOROWITZ IS VITALLY IMPORTANT!). HERE GOES: “DARK AGENDA:THE WAR TO DESTROY CHRISTIAN AMERICA,” IS DAVID HOROWITZ’S EXTRRAORDINARY LOOK INTO THE LEFT’S CALCULATED EFFORTS TO CREATE A GODLESS, HEATHEN AMERICAN SOCIETY. HE ARGUES THAT EVEN JEWS – & ANYONE WHO BELIEVES IN GOD-WILL BE IN DANGER IF CHRISTIANS ARE NOT PROTECTED. HOROWITZ IS A “NEW YORK TIMES” BESTSELLING AUTHOR & LEADING CONSERVATIVE THINKER. HOROWITZ ARGUES THAT JUDEO-CHRISTIAN VALUES ARE AT THE VERY ROOT OF AMERICA’S DEMOCRACY & SUCCESS. KILL OFF SUCH VALUES & ALL OUR FREEDOMS COULD PERISH. EVERYBODY COULD BE IN DANGER….!!.”DARK AGENDA” BRINGS VITAL INSIGHTS INTO THE WAR AGAINST CHRISTIANITY & NAMES THE GLOBAL RADICALS, LEFTISTS DEMOCRATES, & FAT CATS OF HOLLYWOOD & WALL STREET RESPONSIBLE FOR IT. FINALLY, A CLEAR & SENSIBLE AMERICAN VOICE –ONE THAT IS JEWISH, THAT MAKES AN IMPASSIONED PLEA WARNING OF THE GRAVE DANGER TO OUR FREEDOMS & OUR VERY LIVES IF WE LET THE SECULARISTS WIN & CHRISTIANITY IS DESTROYED.” “A DALLIANCE WITH SIN”?

IN MARK 13 YOU’LL FIND AN AMAZING, ASTONISHING, ACCURATE UNVEILING OF THIS “DALLIANCE WITH SIN OR ONE’S DESTINY IN & THROUGH CHRIST JESUS”!!! IN VERSES 5-26 YOU’LL FIND MULTIPLE ENLIGHTMENTS BOTH TRAGIC & TRUTHFULLY TRIUMPHANT! JESUS SPOKE FIRST OF FALSE CHRISTS IN VERSES 5-6, SECONDLY HE ENLIGHTENS ABOUT ‘WARS’ IN VERSES 7-8, THIRDLY, HE SPEAKS ABOUT PERSECUTIONS, VERSES 9-13, FOURTHLY, HE HEIGHTENS UNDERSTANDING OF CONTINUING DANGEROUS TIMES, VERSES 14-23, IN THE FIFTH PLACE, VERSES 24-37, HE UNVEILS A CLIMAX TO THE WORLD’S STRUGGLES & THE CLIMACTIC VICTORY OF THE SON OF GOD!!

IN “THE AMERICAN HYMNAL” (PUBLISHED IN 1933 BY BROADMAN PRESS, NASHVILLE, TENN.), PAGE 364, IS A HYMN WRITTEN BY WM.F.SHERWIN ENTITLED “SOUND THE BATTLE CRY”. IT SAYS: “SOUND THE BATTLE CRY! SEE, THE FOE IS NIGH; RAISE THE STANDARD HIGH FOR THE LORD; GIRD YOUR ARMOR ON, STAND FIRM, EVERY ONE; REST YOUR CAUSE UPON HIS HOLY WORD.

STRONG TO MEET THE FOE, MARCHING ON WE GO, WHILE OUR CAUSE WE KNOW, MUST PREVAIL; SHIELD & BANNER BRIGHT, GLEAMING IN THE LIGHT; BATTLING FOR THE RIGHT WE NE’ER CAN FAIL.

O! YOU GOD OF ALL, HEAR US WHEN WE CALL, HELP US ONE & ALL BY YOUR GRACE; WHEN THE BATTLE’S DONE, & THE VICTORY’S WON, MAY WE WEAR THE CROWN BEFORE YOUR FACE.

ROUSE,THEN,SOLDIERS, RALLY ROUND THE BANNER, READY, STEADY, PASS THE WORD ALONG; ONWARD, FORWARD, SHOUT A LOUD HOSANNA! CHRIST IS CAPTAIN OF THIS MIGHTY THRONG.”

GRACE IS NOT GREASE, MY FRIENDS, YOU ‘TRYING YOUR BEST TO OVERCOME’ – GRACE IS GOD IN ACTION THROUGH YOU!! GRACE IS NOT GREASE, BUT THE GLORIOUS CONQUEST OF CHRIST OVER YES THE WORLD, YOUR OLD SIN NATURE, & SATAN HIMSELF! GRACE IS NOT “GUTTING IT UP” BUT LEARNING TO BE FINISHED WITH YOUR OLD SELF ALLOWING CHRIST IN YOU TO BE YOUR HOPE OF GLORY! IN ROMANS 8:24-39 PAUL ENLIGHTENS US & INSPIRES US!! HE SAID: “WE ARE SAVED BY HOPE; BUT HOPE THAT IS SEEN IS NOT HOPE (IT’S BEYOND PHYSICAL VISION – IT’S SPIRITUAL REALITY!). FOR WHAT A MAN SEES, WHY DOES HE YET HOPE FOR? BUT IF WE HAVE HOPE FOR THAT WE SEE NOT, THEN DO WE WITH PATIENCE (STEDFASTNESS) WAIT FOR IT.

LIKEWISE THE SPIRIT ALSO HELPS OUR INFIRMITIES; FOR WE KNOW NOT WHAT WE SHOULD PRAY FOR AS WE OUGHT; BUT THE SPIRIT ITSELF MAKES INTERCESSION FOR US WITH GROANINGS WHICH CANNOT BE UTTERED. & HE THAT SEARCHES THE HEART KNOWS WHAT IS THE MIND OF THE SPIRIT, BECAUSE HE MAKES INTERCESSION FOR THE SAINTS ACCORDING TO THE WILL OF GOD. & WE KNOW THAT ALL THINGS WORK TOGETHER FOR GOOD TO THEM THAT LOVE GOD, TO THEM WHO ARE THE CALLED ACCORDING TO HIS PURPOSE. FOR WHOM HE DID FOREKNOW, HE ALSO DID PREDESTINATE TO BE CONFORMED TO THE IMAGE OF HIS SON THAT HE MIGHT BE THE FIRSTBORN AMONG MANY BRETHREN.

MOREOVER WHOM HE ALSO DID PREDESTINATE TO BE CONFORMED TO THE IMAGE OF HIS SON THAT HE MIGHT BE THE FIRSTBORN AMONG MANY BRETHREN. MOREOVER WHOM HE DID PREDESTINATE, THEM HE ALSO CALLED: & WHOM HE CALLED, THEM HE ALSO JUSTIFIED; & WHOM HE JUSTIFIED, THEM HE ALSO GLORIFIED. WHAT SHALL WE SAY THEN TO THESE THINGS? IF GOD BE FOR US, WHO CAN BE AGAINST US? HE THAT SPARED NOT HIS OWN SON, BUT DELIVERED HIM UP FOR US ALL, HOW SHALL HE NOT WITH HIM ALSO FREELY GIVE US ALL THINGS? WHO SHALL LAY ANY THING TO THE CHARGE OF GOD’S ELECT? IT IS GOD THAT JUSTIFIES. WHO IS HE THAT CONDEMNS? IT IS CHRIST THAT DIED, YES, RATHER, THAT IS RISEN AGAIN, WHO IS EVEN AT THE RIGHT HAND OF GOD, WHO ALSO MAKES INTERCESSION FOR US. 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 THE DAY LONG; WE ARE ACCOUNTED AS SHEEP FOR THE SLAUGHTER. BUT NO, IN ALL THESE THINGS WE ARE MORE THAN CONQUERORS THROUGH HIM THAT 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 CREATURE, SHALL BE ABLE TO SEPARATE US FROM THE LOVE OF GOD, WHICH IS IN CHRIST JESUS OUR LORD.”

BUT, SADLY, ROMANS 8, THOUGH CLEAR ABOUT THE “SECURITY IN REPENTANT, FAITH-GRIPPED LIVES”, ROMANS 1 ALSO REVEALED ‘THE DALLIANCE DANCERS WITH SIN THAT DECEIVES’ & LEADS TO CONTINUED ALIENATION & A FOREVER SEPARATION FROM HOLY GOD, FROM THE SON, & FROM THE HOLY SPIRIT! REFLECT SERIOUSLY UPON ROMANS 1:18-32!! “FOR THE WRATH OF GOD IS REVEALED FROM HEAVEN AGAINST ALL UNGODLINESS & UNRIGHTEOUSNESS OF MEN, WHO HOLD (OR SUPPRESS) THE TRUTH IN UNRIGHTEOUSNESS; BECAUSE THAT WHICH MAY BE KNOWN OF GOD IS MANIFEST IN THEM; FOR GOD REVEALED IT UNTO THEM (1 TIMOTHY 6!).

FOR THE INVISIBLE THINGS OF HIM FROM THE CREATION OF THE WORLD ARE CLEARLY SEEN, BEING UNDERSTOOD BY THE THINGS THAT ARE MADE, EVEN HIS ETERNAL POWER & GODHEAD; SO THAT THEY ARE WITHOUT EXCUSE: BECAUSE THAT, WHEN THEY KNEW GOD, THEY GLORIFIED HIM NOT AS GOD, NEITHER WERE THANKFUL; BUT BECAME VAIN IN THEIR IMAGINATIONS (SPECULATIONS), & THEIR FOOLISH HEART WAS DARKENED. PROFESSING TO BE WISE, THEY BECAME FOOLS, & CHANGED THE GLORY OF THE INCORRUPTIBLE GOD INTO AN IMAGE MADE LIKE TO CORRUPTIBLE MAN, & TO BIRDS, & FOUR-FOOTED BEASTS,& CREEPING THINGS. WHEREFORE GOD ALSO GAVE THEM UP TO UNCLEANNESS THROUGH THE LUSTS OF THEIR OWN HEARTS, TO DISHONOR THEIR OWN BODIES BETWEEN THEMSELVES: WHO CHANGED THE TRUTH OF GOD INTO A LIE (‘YOU CAN SIN & NOT DIE’!), & WORSHIPPED & SERVED THE CREATURE MORE THAN THE CREATOR, WHO IS BLESSED FOREVER. AMEN.

FOR THIS CAUSE GOD GAVE THEM UP UNTO VILE AFFECTIONS: FOR EVEN THEIR WOMEN DID CHANGE THE NATURAL USE INTO THAT WHICH IS AGAINST NATURE: & LIKEWISE ALSO THE MEN, LEAVING THE NATURAL USE OF THE WOMAN, BURNED IN THEIR LUST ONE TOWARD ANOTHER; MEN WITH MEN WORKING THAT WHICH IS UNSEEMLY, & RECEIVING IN THEMSELVES THAT RECOMPENCE OF THEIR ERROR WHICH WAS MEET (‘SIN PLANTED PRODUCES A SIN-HARVEST’!!).& EVEN AS THEY DID NOT LIKE TO RETAIN GOD IN THEIR KNOWLEDGE, GOD GAVE THEM OVER TO A REPROBATE MIND TO DO THOSE THINGS WHICH ARE NOT CONVENEIENT;

BEING FILLED WITH ALL UNRIGHTEOUSNESS, FORNICATION, WICKEDNESS, COVETOUSNESS, MALICIOUSNESS; FULL OF ENVY, MURDER, DEBATE, DECEIT, MALIGNITY; WHISPERERS, BACKBITERS,HATERS OF GOD,DESPITEFUL,PROUD, BOASTERS, INVENTORS OF EVIL THINGS, DISOBEDIENT TO PARENTS, WITHOUT UNDERSTANDING, COVENANTBREAKERS, WITHOUT NATURAL AFFECTION, IMPLACABLE, UNMERCIFUL: WHO KNOWING THE JUDGMENT OF GOD, THAT THEY WHICH COMMIT SUCH THINGS ARE WORTHY OF DEATH, NOT ONLY DO THE SAME, BUT HAVE PLEASURE IN THEM THAT DO THEM.”

“A DALLIANCE WITH SIN”? OR: “ONE’S DESTINY IN & THROUGH CHRIST JESUS & GOD’S SAVING GRACE, MERCY, & LOVE?” HOW VERY CLEAR, ETERNALLY CLEAR, WAS PAUL WHEN IN GALATIANS 5:16-17 THE APOSTLE WROTE, “THIS I SAY THEN, WALK IN THE SPIRIT, & YOU SHALL NOT FULFILL THE LUST OF THE FLESH (OR OLD SIN NATURE). FOR THE FLESH LUSTS AGAINST THE SPIRIT, & THE SPIRIT AGAINST THE FLESH: & THESE ARE CONTRARY THE ONE TO THE OTHER: SO THAT YOU CANNOT DO THE THINGS THAT YOU WOULD”,THEN IDENTIFYING “THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT” IN VERSES 22-25 SAYING, “BUT THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT IS LOVE, JOY, PEACE, LONGSUFFERING, GENTLENESS, GOODNESS, FAITH, MEEKNESS, TEMPERANCE: AGAINST SUCH THERE IS NO LAW. & THEY THAT ARE CHRIST’S HAVE CRUCIFIED THE FLESH (DAILY!) WITH THE AFFECTIONS & LUSTS. IF WE LIVE IN THE SPIRIT, LET US ALSO WALK IN THE SPIRIT.”

IN “THE AMERICAN HYMNAL” (P.211) IS A SONG BY P.P.BLISS ENTITLED “ALMOST PERSUADED”. IT SAYS: “ALMOST PERSUADED” NOW TO BELIEVE; “ALMOST PERSUADED” CHRIST TO RECEIVE; SEEMS NOW SOME SOUL TO SAY, “GO, SPIRIT, GO YOUR WAY, SOME MORE CONVENIENT DAY ON YOU I’LL CALL.

“ALMOST PERSUADED”, COME, COME TODAY; “ALMOST PERSUADED,” TURN NOT AWAY; JESUS INVITES YOU HERE, ANGELS ARE LINGERING NEAR, PRAYERS RISE FROM HEART SO DEAR, O WANDERER, COME.

“ALMOST PERSUADED,” HARVEST IS PAST! “ALMOST PERSUADED,” DOOM COMES AT LAST! “ALMOST CANNOT AVAIL; “ALMOST” IS BUT TO FAIL! SAD,SAD, THAT BITTER WAIL – “ALMOST – BUT LOST!”

IT WAS THOMAS a’KEMPIS WHO LONG AGO SAID, “WERE THE WORKS OF GOD READILY UNDERSTANDABLE BY HUMAN REASON, THEY WOULD BE NEITHER WONDERFUL NOR UNSPEAKABLE,” AND BECAUSE, YES, THEY ARE BEYOND ‘HUMAN REASONING’, WE MUST “REST” IN GOD’S DIVINE REVELATION OR UNVEILING OF TRUE SALVATION IN & THROUGH CHRIST’S BLOOD ATONEMENT & NOTHING ELSE, EXCEPT A REPENTANT, TRUSTING, FAITHFUL LIFE COMMITTED TO HONOR THE KING OF KINGS & THE LORD OF LORDS! IS THAT “YOU”?

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BY: J. FARRELL FISHER, SEPT. 3-4, 2017

Thank Holy God that Paul was inspired to write in 2 Timothy 3:16-17, “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.”

And don’t you think or consider that it is advisable, essential, absolutely necessary that we proclaim “Sour Grapes” to the insatiable devourers of those eating from the wrong tree? In Jeremiah 31:27-30 the Lord God Almighty spoke concerning His “chosen people” who were to usher in the blessing of His grace, mercy, and love to, yes, the nations of the known world, but something happened spiritually in their hearts and minds, and they ‘back-tracked’ to sin and self-indulgent ‘religious activity’ rather than the “Redeemer’s Ministry”! The Word says:

“Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, that I will sow the house of Israel and the house of Judah with the seed of man and the seed of beast. And it shall come to pass, that as I have watched over them to pluck up, to break down, to throw down, to destroy, and to afflict, so I will watch over them to build and to plant, says the Lord. In those days they shall say no more: ‘The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge.’ BUT EVERY ONE shall die FOR HIS OWN INIQUITY; every man who eats the sour grapes, his teeth shall be set on edge.”

And, how deviant do you find those determined in their own minds and hearts that “Sour Grapes” is OK? Have you ever been around the unashamed “indecency of trash talkers and trash takers and trash tossers” who so desire for you to be a part of what they are up to in their, yes, reckless lives and old ‘sin-nature choices’?

Ezekiel 24 is a convicting, challenging, life-changing chapter if one has chosen “sour grapes” rather than “sure grace”! In Verses 13-14 Holy God arose! (Does He still arise at times to confront “abominable walkers” who believe “flesh choices are OK” if you “believe in the blood of the Lamb”? HEAR ALMIGHTY GOD! “In your filthiness is lewdness. Because I have cleansed you, and you were not cleansed, you will not be cleansed of your filthiness anymore, Till I have caused My fury to rest upon you.

I the Lord, have spoken it; it shall come to pass, and I will do it; I will not hold back, nor will I spare, nor will I relent; According to your ways and according to your deeds they will judge you,” says the Lord God.’” And God’s charges against His “chosen people” Israel? Idolatry, sexual immorality, and shedding of innocent blood as they, yes, sacrificed their babies on His altar!

And a few verses down God told them: Verse 21, about their “arrogant boast, the desire of your eyes, the delight of your soul…and their sons and daughters they just left on their own, and THEY end up “falling by the sword”!

Oh, and true disciples in the midst of all this “sour grapes living” surrounding you, when His judgment falls, they’ll come running to you for an answer to their sin-stained lives and tattered existence! Ezekial 24:25-27, God speaking to a faithful servant: “And you, son of man – will it not be in the day when I TAKE THEM FROM THEIR STRONGHOLD, THEIR JOY AND THEIR GLORY, the desire of their eyes, and that on which they set their minds, their sons and their daughters: that on that day one who escapes will come to you to let you hear it with your ears. On that day your mouth will be opened to him who has escaped; you shall speak and no longer be mute. THUS YOU will be a sign to them, and they shall know that I am the Lord.” [But do they learn too late?].

I’m telling you: individual, married couple, family, friends, city, state, or nation: “It’s time to seek the Lord who has sought you out, even with a heavy-hand, to turn you from vainness, bad-choices, defiance, disobedience, and RECEIVE AMAZING GRACE AND MERCY to no longer be your own master, but fully desiring to be Mastered by the Master, King Jesus!” He’s not a bad king, but King of kings and Lord of lords!

In Ezekiel 34:25-27, how necessary to hear and receive these words!! “I will make a covenant of peace with them, and cause ‘wild beasts’ to cease from the land, (lions, tigers, jackals, fierce bears, poisonous snakes, alligators, crocodiles? I don’t think so! ‘Wild beasts’? How about ‘sinners’, cruel and callous mean men, super-intelligent, godless professors, independent owners of much of the world’s wealth, or the angry, poverty stricken who know nothing, really, about ‘deserving more’, or, yes, “the pretenders” who CAN BE the strongest roadblocks to the True Pathway to the fullness of the blessing in Christ?), Back to the passage!!,; and they (The established in the Faith under the True Shepherd!),will dwell safely in the wilderness and sleep in the woods. I will make them and the places all around My hill a blessing; and I will cause showers to come down in their season; there SHALL BE SHOWERS OF BLESSING.

THEN the trees of the field (Who are they? The apples, the oranges, the mangos, the pears? NO! The trees of God’s field are His reborn, replanted, resurrected men and women planted, cared for, nurtured by the Holy Spirit!), then the trees of the field shall yield their fruit, and the earth shall yield her increase. (Where YOU’RE PLANTED, GOD GIVES THE PROMISE OF INCREASE! DO YOU LET HIM?). They shall be safe in their land, and they shall know that I am the Lord, when I have broken the bands of their yoke and delivered them from the hand of those who enslaved them. (Who’s that? The world, the flesh, and Satan!)….Oh, Verse 29!! “I will raise up for them a garden of renown, and they shall no longer be consumed with hunger in the land, nor bear the shame of the Gentiles anymore. Verse 30-31? Thus they shall know that, I, the Lord their God, am with them, and they, the house of Israel, who are My people,” says the Lord God.” THERE WAS AND IS TODAY THE TRUE REMNANT! VERSE 31, “YOU are My flock, the flock of My pasture; you are men, and I am your God, “ says the Lord God.

Can you say, “Glory to the Father or Glory to God, Glory to the Son, Glory to the Spirit, the blessed “Three-in-One”? Can YOU say, “I know I am God’s child, birthed by the Holy Spirit through the “seed” of the Word of God”?

But, “Sour grapes”, or “wild beasts”? Does that describe “the perpetually desolate”? Are you aware, though they don’t see it or know it, there are folks, who are, according to Psalm 35:26, “Clothed with shame and dishonor who exalt themselves against Me”?

“Sour grapes”, “wild beasts”, independent, self-sufficient, the disdainers of God’s Truth, the worldly, self-centered, humanly sufficient crowd, the haters of knowledge, the refusers who choose to “fear the Lord”, the spiritually complacent though ‘glowing’ in their human attributes and abilities and attitudes and actions, constantly patting themselves on their backs with their own ‘self-imagined award winning of human capability’, and yet no true security or, for the day of death, no ‘door’ to eternal blessing but only the ‘door’ to Satanic oversight!

Dare I tell you? There is nothing ‘pleasant’ to the man who lives faithlessly, lives cemented in his fleshly desires, lives in the deep, dark waters of human abilities void of the “Life-Preserver” of true blood redemption, “New life”, “eternal purpose”, and the Word of God and the Spirit of God and the Family of God surrounding and overseeing, and boosting and encouraging your every step in His “blessed Kingdom-Rule”!

To be gut-level honest with you: I don’t know how any man, without Christ, lives a ‘confident life’ that has no true benefits, no spiritual provision, no wealth of the Word feeding Him the True Bread and the Meat of Life daily, and with No Spotter, (the Spirit), guiding His every step! It’s a “roll-of-the-dice”, but that was and is not God’s design or desire for YOU! Jesus said, “Come unto Me, and I will give you rest!”

“Sour grapes”? Do you see, sense, yes, and sympathize for those who reject God’s compassion, mercy, and love, and choose for themselves to walk in the paths of sin and death, caught in the strong cords of sinful natures, entrapped by the ‘wild schemes of Satan’ like an animal-like man or woman laying their traps to take you down?

“Sour grapes”? That’s no desire to welcome at all God’s cords of conviction because ‘fleshly pleasure’ is their supreme desire, and “pleasing God” is the furthermost step away from them! Goodness even may be a trait of both the ‘lost’ and the “found”, but only Godliness is the fruit, character and nature of God alone, but He’s willing to live in you if you’re tired of a “sour-grapes mentality”!

Why not turn from, yes, your “sour grapes” but Merciful God’s “SURE GRACE”? Yet, sadly, many turn willful deaf ears and willful blind away from Eternal Truth about God and His love and man and his deceived sin-nature that, as I’ve already said, some ‘believers still give into, because of their ‘love affair’ with that old sin-nature, because the world looks down on the call to holiness, and because Satan himself deceives, lures, tempts, ensnares with his mocking ways of Kingdom living! [Why don’t you study and check out: “Imprisoned In Babylon”? Consider seriously, intently, purposefully about resolving the reality of Satan’s desire for YOU to choose ‘darkness’ OR to see the blessing of “walking in the Light”, studying “best effort still opening the door to ‘sin’” OR “Blessed by Emmanuel, “God in flesh” willingly laying down His life for the glory of God !].

And, if you resolve, yes, your dilemma about whether to “stay” devoted to your old nature or “rest” in Christ’s finished work at Calvary and the Empty Tomb, you may “see the Light”! And the angels will arouse all of Heaven to rejoice over you! In “sour grapes” living, you are definitely in the ‘world’ and a part of the ‘world’ that shuts the door into the Face of Almighty God! In the “old man dilemma”, YOU are surrounded by a dark cloud of sinfulness, But the Son shines on you, your ‘storms’ still blow, but He speaks and says, as they blow, “Peace be still!” Your problems may abound, intensify, try to overcome you and break you down, but King Jesus arises saying, “Peace, be still!” Your ‘problems’ invite Jesus, yes, to be YOUR “Problem Solver”, because not many flesh men can solve their dilemmas – they just try to survive them, but the “faithful in Christ” still says: “Peace be still!”.

Be assured: You’ll either lean on yourself, trying your best, or you’ll look to the Helper, you’ll either “look for another, better day, OR you’ll “rest” in Christ alone now, come what may! You also need to understand that those “dark nights of the soul” will be unveiled by the Light of the Lord Jesus Christ to shock the Hell out of every human soul that leans to his/her own understanding, closing out the Redeemer, The Victor, the Conqueror over anything you face!

What would you do if you secretly sinned and shamed the Savior, then He comes, He knocks on YOUR DOOR, and says: “I’m going to expose you – REPENT OR ELSE YOUR EXPOSURE COMES!” Yes, the day comes when Holy God is ready to pull back the curtains of one’s self-indulgent life, even in some ‘professing believers’, darkened in secret sins, and He comes not with ‘blind eyes’ but to let you know, He’s seen! Nothing, nothing, nothing is hidden unless “washed away by the blood of the Lamb of God, not to be resurrected or unveiled or broadcasted”!!

The ‘dark nights of the soul’ WILL hang around and seek to shudder the “Eternal Light of the Abiding Christ in you” that is your only hope of overcoming, yes, the darkness you allow! Many, yes, true believers are targets of their enemies, and their ‘enemies’ will do WHATEVER to split your allegiance, invert your eternal priorities, cloud your spiritual mind, pierce it, anyway possible, for leakage, heighten the, yes, at times, the influences, strong opposition, and deceitful doors they want to open to “bring you down” from “Throne-Living In and Through Jesus”, demoralizing your True Identity in Him and emphasizing the ‘pleasures’(?) of the world, the flesh and the devil!

Oh, but Christ Jesus is ALIVE AND WELL AND PRESENT AND DESIRES TO REIGN VICTORIOUS IN YOU AS ONE WHO IS MORE THAN CONQUEROR! He’s Redeemer, He’s Atoner, He’s Master and Lord over life, over death, over temptation, over deceit, over your ‘flesh’, over the demons of Hell who want you blinded to His All-Sufficient Grace, Mercy, and Love, and to be the “More than Conqueror in you as He fights your battles if you allow Him! “SURE GRACE”? Let me sum it up in Matthew 5:3-12!! “Blessed are the POOR IN SPIRIT, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the meek (teachable), for they shall inherit the earth.

Blessed are those WHO HUNGER AND THIRST For Righteousness, for THEY shall be filled. Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart (washed in the blood of the Lamb!), for they shall see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 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 CHRIST” YOU are “salt of the earth”, “light of the world”, “Let YOUR light shine!”

BY: J.FARRELL FISHER, October 24-26, 2018

How prophetic and convicting do YOU find Jeremiah’s words from the Lord in Jeremiah 18:1-12? The word which came to Jeremiah from the Lord, saying, “Arise and go down to the potter’s house, and there I will cause you to hear My words.” Then I went down to the potter’s house, and there he was, making something at the wheel. And the vessel that he made of the clay was marred in the hand of the potter, so he made it again into another vessel, as it seemed good to the potter to make.

Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying: “O house of Israel, can I not do with you as this potter?” says the Lord. “Look, as the clay is in the potter’s hand, so are you in My hand, O house of Israel! The instant I speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up, to pull down, and to destroy it, if that kingdom against whom I have spoken turns from its evil, I will relent of the disaster that I thought to bring upon it. And the instant I speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it, if it does evil in My sight so that it does not obey My voice, then I will relent concerning the good with which I said I would benefit it.

Now therefore, speak to the men of Judah and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, saying, “Thus says the Lord, ‘Behold, I am fashioning a disaster and devising a plan against you. Return now every one from his evil way, and make your ways and your doings good.”

And they said, “That is hopeless! So we will walk according to our own plans, and we will every one obey the dictates of his evil heart.” THE MORTAL SPHERE OF MISGUIDED MEN!

The Lord Jesus so clearly understood the deception of earthly treasures and the opposite of it, being a life, a mind, and a heart set on the “true treasures of heaven”! In Matthew 6:19-24 Jesus said: “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal; but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

The lamp of the body is the eye. If therefore your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness! No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.”

Examine carefully WHERE your mind, heart, will, and spirit is truly set! In 2 Corinthians 10:3-5 Paul wrote, “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…”! IS THAT TRUE IN YOUR WALK AS A “PROFESSING DISCIPLE OF CHRIST JESUS”?

How sad that many, in comparison to the grace gifts of Christ, live unaware of the “flesh-bondage”, though some are even religious, but void of the power, freedom, and victory of His Overcoming Life over the flesh-nature, the world-spirit, and the demonic-deceptions!

Oswald Chambers, in his book “My Utmost For His Highest”, (pps. 185-186), highlighting 2 Corinthians 10:5, wrote: “Deliverance from sin is not deliverance from human nature. There are things in human nature, such as prejudices, which the saint has to destroy by neglect; and other things which have to be destroyed by violence, i.e., by the Divine strength imparted by God’s Spirit. There are some things over which we are not to fight, but to stand still in and see the salvation of God; but every theory or conception which erects itself as a rampart against the knowledge of God is to be determinedly demolished by drawing on God’s power, not by fleshly endeavor or compromise (v.4).

It is only when God has altered our disposition and we have entered into the experience of sanctification that the fight begins. The warfare is not against sin; we can never fight against sin: Jesus Christ deals with sin in Redemption. The conflict is along the line of turning our natural life into a spiritual life, and this is never done easily, nor does God intend it to be done easily. It is done only by a series of moral choices. God does not make us holy in the sense of character; He makes us holy in the sense of innocence, and we have to turn that innocence into holy character by a series of moral choices. These choices are continually in antagonism to the entrenchments of our natural life, the things which erect themselves as ramparts against the knowledge of God. We can either go back and make ourselves of no account in the Kingdom of God, or we can determinedly demolish those things and let Jesus bring another son to glory.”

How often have you witnessed, yes, seen ‘professing disciples’ who “stand still and see the salvation of God”, yes, being fully unveiled before them AND before Christ Jesus as He waits to see if, by the clouds, His people trust in Him? Have YOU flippantly read Revelation 1:7? John said, “Behold, He is COMING WITH CLOUDS, and every eye will see Him, even they who pierced Him.” I truly often wonder if, at times, when dark clouds surround people, especially true believers, that those ‘clouds’ ARE the awareness for them of the Lord’s abiding Presence! If He says, “I’ll never leave you nor forsake you,”, is that only true of peaceful times, or does it include perilous times? As well as the Word of God, I treasure the past hymns of the ages, and especially one hymn by H.G.Stafford and P.P.Bliss found in the old Broadman Hymnal published by The Broadman Press, Nashville, Tennessee, in 1940. It was entitled “It Is Well With My Soul”, saying:

“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, tho’ 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’, cemented in Christ’s eternal victory over sin, over Satan, and, yes, over death itself? “BEHOLD, HE COMES WITH CLOUDS!”

Are you familiar with Psalm 97 which is so important for the ‘lighting up’ of “The Mortal Sphere of Misguided Men”? It says: Verses 1-2,“The Lord reigns; let the earth rejoice; let the multitude of isles be glad! Clouds and darkness surround Him; Righteousness and justice are the foundation of His throne.” Oh, but then reflect upon Verses 4-6! “His lightnings light the world; the earth sees and trembles. The mountains melt like wax at the presence of the Lord, at the presence of the Lord of the whole earth. The heavens declare His righteousness, AND ALL THE PEOPLES SEE HIS GLORY”, followed by Verses 10-12:

“You who love the Lord, hate evil! He preserves the souls of His saints; He delivers them out of the hand of the wicked. LIGHT is sown for the righteous, and gladness for the upright in heart. Rejoice in the Lord, you righteous, and give thanks at the remembrance of His holy name.”

In John 6:63 the Lord Jesus said, “It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak to you are spirit, and they are life.” And the Lord Jesus was not speaking about human reasoning or human understanding, but human minds and human hearts enlightened by the Holy Spirit in the grace of “eating His flesh and drinking His blood”, and he or she who does so “abides in Jesus, and Jesus in him or her”!!

Are YOU aware of ‘religious folks’ who ‘mouth’ words apart from the WITNESS OF THE HOLY SPIRIT? Jude said the following in Verses 3-25, and I close this message with Jude’s powerful Spirit-anointed words! He said: “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 our God into lewdness and deny the only Lord God 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.

Likewise also these dreamers defile the flesh, reject authority, and speak evil of dignitaries. Yet Michael the archangel, in contending with the devil, when he disputed about the body of Moses, dared not bring against him a reviling accusation, but said, “The Lord rebuke you!” But these speak evil of whatever they do not know; and whatever they know naturally, like brute beasts, in these things they corrupt themselves. 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.

These are spots in your love feasts, while they feast with you without fear, serving only themselves. They are clouds without water, carried about by the winds; late autumn trees without fruit, twice dead, pulled up by the roots; raging waves of the sea, foaming up their own shame; wandering stars for whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever.

Now Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about these men also, saying, “Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of His saints, to execute judgment on all, to convict all who are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have committed in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him.” (That’s against Christ Jesus the Lord, Emmanuel, the Promised Savior!).

These are grumblers, complainers, walking according to their own lusts; and they mouth great swelling words, flattering people to gain advantage. But you, beloved, remember the words which were spoken before by the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ: how they told you that there would be mockers in the last time who would walk according to their own ungodly lusts. These are sensual persons, who cause divisions, not having the Spirit. 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.

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.”

Are YOU a “contender for the true faith”, or have you been captured, chained, and been fully corrupted by, yes, your old sin-nature colored black and dark by Satan himself or his band of rebellious, renegade, run-amok-demons?

Why not “choose YOU this day whom you will serve through all eternity, choosing especially and literally, day by day, to be led by the Resurrected, Reigning, Victorious Christ over sin, over death, and over Satan? Amen?

THE REIGN OF LIGHT?”

By J. Farrell Fisher, June 22-23, 2017

You do realize that multitudes of people today, even like the ‘play-actors’ in Jesus’ day – the ‘religious’ Pharisees, rulers over Israel – ‘professed’ the reign of Light, yet crucified Him, as they devoted themselves to “the rule of darkness”! And in Matthew 24:31-36 we read, Christ Jesus speaking, “Therefore you are witnesses against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers’ guilt. Serpents, brood of vipers! How can you escape the condemnation of hell?

Therefore, indeed, I (CHRIST JESUS) 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.”

And, Jesus said, “I say to you – judgment is coming upon this generation.” Which it did! And in 70 AD the world witnessed the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple they so desecrated!

My only concern? As a result of God’s faithful judgment upon Israel because of, yes, their submission to the rule of darkness even though they ‘professed’ loyalty to the light they had, is the same judgment on the rule of darkness occurring even if one “pretends” allegiance to the reign of light? Has the rule of darkness so blinded some that they naturally devote their ‘religious hours’ to creating “fetishes” of their assumed faith that has nothing to do with being “born again”, supposedly becoming disciples of Christ when their heart-allegiance is, yes, to the “rule of darkness” under Satan’s manipulating strategies?

Here’s how Oswald Chambers saw it in his day: “My Utmost For His Highest”, (p.237), “It is easier to be a fanatic than a faithful soul, because there is something amazingly humbling, particularly to our religious conceit, in being loyal to God.” Have you ever witnessed “warped loyalty” as one professes Christ but his/her fruit is more of Satan’s manifestation through his trees in his vineyard?

“The Rule of Darkness Or The Reign of Light?” How clear and revealing do you find the words of Paul, when inspired by the Holy Spirit, he wrote in Galatians 5:24-25, “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.” A ‘flesh-walk’ unveils an allegiance to the world, the flesh, and to Satan, But a “Spirit-walk” IS “Christ in you the hope of glory” led by the Indwelling and anointing of the Holy Spirit!

In Galatians 5:22 Paul unveiled the evidence of a Spirit-anointed, Christ-honoring life! “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.” But in Galatians 5:16-21 he unveiled “the works of the flesh” which have Hell’s inspiration and Satan’s “rule of darkness”! Paul said: I say then: “Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh (inspired by Satan!). 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 the law. (Dare I say “under the law of sin and death?”).

Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: (Dare I say “Satan’s portrait unveiled by the Holy Spirit?”), 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 times past, THAT THOSE WHO PRACTICE SUCH THINGS WILL NOT INHERIT THE KINGDOM OF GOD.”

The “Rule of Darkness” IS the devil’s domain – and the citizens of his ‘kingdom’ feed eternally on the bad fruit of death in Satan’s rule! But, at the same time, I must ask: “Have YOU rested in the immutability of God’s Word, God’s promises, and God’s grace, mercy, and love?” Or, are you out to ‘prove’ your best, your strategy, and your self-dependence? Does ‘your best’ change? Has your ‘self-dependence’ ushered in “the kingdom of God on earth”, or is it “improved flesh” camouflaged by Satan? Christ’s presence in you is unchangeable, but Satan’s image is like an impish, mischievous, fleshly desires-rebel doing as he pleases!

The “Rule of Darkness” is every man’s ‘right’ to choose for himself what he/she determines to have their time and effort – and “If it satisfies my sin-nature, let it be!” And Satan certainly considered, and still does, “The hope of self-righteousness, as I determine what self-righteousness is, is my ‘religion’ even if it produces only a ‘death-state; because for me, Satan, that’s better than being under the Sovereign Rule of your Holy God’!”

Yes, there is a huge difference between Satan’s “Rule of Darkness” and God’s “Reign of Light”! Have you bathed yourself recently in Psalm 91? Follow with me!!

“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 my fortress; My God, in Him I will trust.” Surely He shall deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the perilous pestilence. [ Satan’s snares? Satan’s ‘perilous pestilence’?].

He (Holy God) 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. (Examine someday what “the high wages” really are that Satan uses to subsidize his deception on the “free-swingers away from God’s oversight”!).

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. (Yes! Hallelujah! ANGELIC OVERSIGHT!!).

In their hands they shall bear you up, lest you dash your foot against a stone. You shall tread upon the lion and the cobra, the young lion and the serpent you shall trample underfoot. (In my early days as a child and a teen-ager, on a Saturday morning usually around our Courthouse, I would watch the ‘snake handlers’ as they professed their stupidity not having a clue about metaphorical language that “lions and cobras” were Satan’s soldiers who promoted demon’s “sharp teeth” and demons ‘poisonous venom’ – yes, even a child of faith knows Truth and Christ or Falsehood and demons!).

In their hands they shall bear you up, lest you dash your foot against a stone. You shall tread upon the lion and cobra (the demons are under your feet of faith!), the young lion and the serpent you shall trample underfoot.

Because he has set his love upon Me, therefore I will deliver him; I will set him on high, because he has known My name. He shall call upon Me, and I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble; I will deliver him and honor him. With long life I will satisfy him, and show him My salvation.”

Godless lives live not only with the absence of ‘divine life’ but they live under the curse of the sin nature, corralled by a ‘flesh-centered’ world, and corrupted by Satan with ‘solemn groans, and hollow moans, and shrieks of tortured ghosts’! And Satan wants to seal in you, in your state of unbelief or even ‘half-hearted allegiance to Christ’, his “curse” of death, not life, his “purpose” of poisoned pleasure, not eternal blessing, his “award” for a reputable performance, not a Spirit-transformed new creation! Without Christ as Lord and Savior every man lives under the domination of the devil’s darkness – and to him and them, “The Light of the world” makes no sense since he takes pleasure in the darkness of men’s souls!

In the ‘mortal nature’ of all men there is ingrained the kingdom of darkness, the dominion of evil, the sway of Satan, the lure of demonic activity, the marks of fleshly imperfections, the ‘floating phantoms’ of the defiled sin-nature that is not of God but from the heart, mind, soul, spirit of “born in sin”! The ‘old self’ is enough to open Hell’s doors for us, but Satan wants to insure he takes advantage of any crack in your life that will allow him in to reside and re-assign you from God’s purpose and plan to his perverseness and Hell’s ‘peasant’ status!

It’s so encouraging and powerful and, yes, redemptive to read John in 1 John 3:7-8, and then Verses 10-12: “Little children, (in the Faith, not age), let no one deceive you. He who practices righteousness (Biblical righteousness, not one’s fleshly or demonic interpretation!) is righteous, just as He (Jesus) is righteous. He who sins (present tense, continuous action) is of the devil, for the devil has sinned from the beginning.” Then…

Verses 10-12, In this the children of God and the children of the devil are manifest. Whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is he who does not love his brother. For this is the message that you heard from the beginning, that we should love one another, not as Cain who was of the wicked one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? BECAUSE his works were evil and his brother’s righteous.”

Cain was “of the wicked one”? And you’re not sure that was Satan? Do you remember Jesus talking to His disciples in Matthew 13:36-43? The disciples had asked Jesus to “Explain to us the parable of the tares of the field.”

Jesus answered and said to them, “He who sows the good seed is the Son of Man. The field is the world, the good seeds are the sons of the kingdom, but the tares are the sons of the wicked one.[Do you think there is someone else other than Satan who is the wicked one?]. The enemy who sowed them is the devil, the harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are the angels (or messengers of God!), (the end of the age is the end of the Old Covenant, the Judaisation system). Therefore as the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of this age. (70AD & the end of the Judaistic system!). The Son of Man will send out His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and those who practice lawlessness, and will cast them into the furnace of fire. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”

In 2 Timothy 2:19-26 Paul, again, is instructing his spiritual son, Timothy, and us – and I believe here he’s nailing down understanding for all believers about Satan’s snares! He said: Nevertheless the solid foundation of God stands, having this seal: “The Lord knows those who are His,” and, “Let everyone who names the name of Christ depart from iniquity,” (unless you’ve been ingrained by “false professors” that ‘YOU CAN’T DO ANYTHING BUT SIN UNTIL YOU GET TO HEAVEN’!!).

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 from the latter, he will be a vessel for honor, sanctified and useful for the Master, prepared for every good work (not the works of Satan!). Flee also youthful lusts; but pursue (press into) 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!”

Are there in God’s awesome, created world men of honor and men of dishonor? Are there ‘clay vessels’ that are invaded by Satan, and through his demonic agents take up ‘residence’? It’s interesting to read in Amos 4:11 where the prophet illumined the danger Israel was in as a nation BECAUSE, hearing God, he wrote: “I overthrew some of you, as God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, and YOU WERE LIKE A FIREBRAND PLUCKED FROM BURNING; yet you have not returned to Me,” says the Lord.

Again, why did Jesus teach His disciple to pray, “Deliver us from evil” or “Deliver us from the evil one”? Do you receive the biblical truth of Hebrews 2:14-18? “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 (sons of redeeming faith!). 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.”

Have you come to the understanding, by the grace of God, of the need of “The Reign of Light IN and Through Christ ALONE”, because you’ve been made aware through ‘life experiences’ of “The Rule of Darkness” in your life apart from Christ? Yes, are YOU assured, that Christ Jesus, in YOUR behalf, “that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil (or Satan), and release those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage”? Have YOU prayed to Jesus: “Lord Jesus, free me from the law of sin and death, AND destroy Satan, in my behalf, because I know he still wants me all of my lifetime subject to his bondage and seeking to blot out of my life Christ Jesus’ “rescue story” for me!”

I pray for you right now: “Lord Jesus, enlighten every reader to the blessings of the Master’s blood redemption, and open every believing eye to His ransom purchase of their freedom from the bondage of the old sin nature and the bondage and blasts from my Satanic enemy and demonic forces, in honor of Christ alone! Amen!!”