Confession

Well I think I am going to take a break from the teaching mode and write about some other things. I do however have a confession to make. I found out that in my “Knowing God” post I made an error in something I wrote, I have since corrected it on my post. Although it was not an error of heresy, I was convicted to do a little bit better job in checking out what I write. For those of you wondering it was a statement about me not holding the view that one of the reasons Abraham was willing to sacrifice Isaac because he believed that God could raise him from the dead. Well, I was reading Hebrews yesterday and as it turns out that was probably one of the reasons for the Abraham’s willingness to take that step of faith. Although this did not change the content of my article, I felt the obligation to point out my error. Sorry I will do a better job in the future.

All that being said I think I am just going to write about some opinions and issues that I have had lately. I have recently found out that youtube.com can be very educational. I found full length sermons and old clips of political figures, (which is great because you can look back and hold them to what they say!). You can even take a stroll down memory lane be checking out some old 1980’s rock videos, ok that part is neither spiritual or educational, but I must admit I still like all that big hair guitar rock. I did however find something that troubled me. While I was searching out information about some good Bible teaching I ran across some that was not so good. I expected to find that, but what I didn’t expect to find is Bible teachers blasting each other about who is going to heaven and who is preaching heresy. Now I have my opinions about a couple of the big name mega church leaders. Therefore I did agree with some of the analysis about heretical statements coming from one or two of these guys. I was however more then a little discouraged by this, because of the volume of vitriol that some preachers would spew out towards others. I even found one guy lambasting Charles Spurgeon (Pastor from England that preached from around 1850 to the turn of the century.) I couldn’t believe I found that one but I guess you can’t please everyone! I found myself having the attitudes of judgment that I was seeing from some of these guys. I was convicted by the Holy Spirit about my short comings when it comes to compassion sometimes in my attempt to be right. Now for those that have read some of my stuff I am not someone who is loose with doctrine and I am not backing off from that one iota. However I am not always right and don’t always know all the proper information to make an informed decision about someone. So I guess the Lord allowed my to be convicted in my spirit to put a little more focus on brotherly love and achieve some balance in my walk with the Lord. That is part of the reason for not writing these last few weeks. Sometimes we need to reflect and evaluate where we are with the Lord, with our children, with our wives and with our brothers in Christ. I must admit that I did not like all that I saw, therefore I felt compelled to step off the bully pulpit for a little while and exercise a little humility, as well as fellowship with my brothers and more worshipping the Lord in spirit and truth.

All of this leads me to my overall point and that is the balance between rigid spiritless legalism and “spirit filled” charismatic  churches with no doctrine is harder then you think it is. Depending on your background we seem to want to swing one way or the other. Whichever side you tend to end up on it is fruitless both ways. The balancing act is impossible without the Holy Spirit leading and giving the ability to understand sound doctrine in the Holy Word. When I am leading my own life I tend to get rigid spiritless and legalist. So I guess a little spirit filled charismatic expression might not kill me after all. I’m sure glad the Lord will get rid of all my rebellion when I get home. I would however like to get as close to him as I can while I’m here. This life we live in Christ is hard sometimes, but it sure beats the alternative don’t you think? 

Church of Children

A friend of mine posted a blog that he read about the feminization of the church. Now we have heard of the society at large being feminized, a lot of talk radio most notably Rush Limbaugh have talked about this topic frequently, but I have not heard a lot of commentary on the church being feminized. However, I concur with the evaluation about the church. I think this issue creates a twofold problem. First of all if the church is geared towards things that are important to women outside of women’s groups that church must choose to move away from things more masculine. That creates a leadership void that women step into and therefore created problems in how a church is supposed to be run. The second I believe to be intended consequences of this is men who are never challenged to become the men God wants them to become. Essentially we get a church filled with women acting like men and men acting like children. You might wonder why I said men act like children? Well, I don’t think a Christian man will totally take on feminine characteristics even if his wife is a type A take charge personality. Therefore I don’t think what we have is a total reversal of roles, although sometimes I wonder! Before I continue I don’t think the church’s issues are the fault of women taking over it is the fault of men not fulfilling their roles. (Another one of my disclaimers to make sure I am not misunderstood!) What I think happens is men find their worth apart from the roles in the home, church and the heavy lifting of ministry, and instead find them in their leisure time. How many guys have motorcycles, trucks, watch ESPN, go golfing, etc. I am not saying that these things are in and of themselves bad because I do all these things (except the golfing I just added that because I think other people do.) What I am saying is that a live filled with these things in an effort to hide from your wife, kids, or the hard work of what God is calling you to do is childlike. Let’s be honest hear all of these things are toys and entertainment and a live focused on those things is the life that you had when you were a child. It is repulsive to see a man with a ton of high priced toys that is afraid of his wife and a Bible that has never been taken off the shelf. It is just as bad however to see a man going to all of the programs at church and going through the motions but only his wife is really excited to be there. I must admit that I have been less then thrilled to go to men’s fellowships at churches. They really have turned into female chat sessions, we never DO anything we just talk about stuff. It is like stepping into an episode of the view that is masquerading as a deep men’s study. Look I am not saying that there is a bunch of heresy being preached everywhere (although you do have to be careful about that.) What I mean is that it is an inch deep and a mile wide, anybody tried to fish in a lake that is an inch deep, not much good is it. That has become the church to men, not much good but they go because there wife wants them to.

John 14

It has been awhile since I have written but my recent journey through the book of John has inspired me to write again. I did not expect to get as much out of this book as I did. It’s amazing what you can capture from the Bible when the Holy Spirit illuminates what you are reading. All of chapters 14 and 15 stood out in ways that I had not discovered before. I will probably break this down into two or three writings so I do not rush through and miss what I think is important. It is not like me to write about the feel good part of the Bible because I think the feel good health and wealth name it and claim it gospel has saturated the church enough. So rest easy there is some meat here but these two chapters are extremely comforting for the nomadic believer struggling through this world. I’m not sure how far I will get but I’m going to start with verses 1-3.
“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.”
What a beautiful and soothing statement for the believer. This is a verse that has been used frequently in the church today and rightfully so. However, if you search the gospels you will see that the Lord speaks through parables and does not speak in a straight forward manner to anyone except those that truly follow him. I mention that because this is a rare occurrence when Jesus is this candid when describing the glory that awaits His disciples when they get to heaven. So this is significant that He is issuing these comforting statements to His inner circle of disciples and there is reason for this. I’m not going to get into this next point in depth I just want to give it to you as a side note. All of 14 and most of 15 are very straight forward and comforting words from Jesus to his disciples (not as common as you would think in the gospels.) In chapter 16:1 (read it on your own time) Jesus tells them what they will face as far as persecution when He returns to heaven. Essentially He is giving them a picture of what the prize is before He issues the bad news of what is to come before that prize. Remember that Jesus himself endures all of the persecution while on this earth, but He is preparing His disciples for greater responsibility after He ascends to the Father in heaven.
I just thought it was important to make that point briefly so that you could get a picture of why Jesus was saying this and what He is preparing His disciples for. Now let’s get back to the comfort and excitement of what is to come that this chapter shows us. I want to jump ahead to verse 12 that says,
“Most assuredly, I say to you, he who believes in Me, the works that I do he will do also; and greater works then these he will do, because I go to My Father.”
It sounds blasphemous that His disciples will do greater things then He did. Jesus also said that the servant is not greater then the master, so what are we to make of this. After all isn’t the greatest of all to die for the sins of the world, how can we compare to that. Well, clearly because we are sinners we cannot so this must mean something else. If you fast forward to Pentecost in Acts chapter 2 where 3,000 were saved and before Peter and John were imprisoned 5,000 were saved. Wow! Has anyone seen that kind of fruit in that short of a period of time!? The day of Pentecost also fulfilled a prophecy in Joel which states:
“And it shall come to pass in the last days, says God, That I will pour out of My Spirit on all flesh : Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your young men shall see visions Your old men shall dream dreams. And on My menservants and on MY maidservants I will pour out My Spirit in those days and they shall prophesy. I will show wonders in heaven above and signs in the earth beneath; Blood and fire and vapor of smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness. And the moon into blood. Before the coming of the great and awesome day of the Lord. And it shall come to pass That whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.”
In light of all of this we can conclude that the Lord through the Holy Spirit is telling us that through Him we can do all things. So at first it seems like blasphemy to say that we will do greater things then Jesus and ultimately we didn’t because His death on the cross is what opened up all of this to be, so even our works are through Him. So what I think this is saying is that in this world the Holy Spirit (third equal part of the triune God) now working with the Father and Son with all power can bear much more fruit. Therefore the passage in John is stating that through this power we can bear much more fruit as far as salvation of souls now then before Jesus’ resurrection. We are blessed with access to the full power Christ with more revelation of Him then any other people in all of human history, what a privilege! All of the Old Testament was pointing to Jesus coming as the Messiah to set His people free and He accomplished that task (although not how we thought He would). Therefore all power that can be available this side of heaven is available to all believers more then ever before. Why? Because the scripture has said so! A lot of this has been espoused from pulpits all around the world and with all of the churches around and all of this power and anointing available to the believer why is the world in such shambles?
The answer to that question and many others lies in John 14 verses 15,21,23 and 24. Here in these verses you will find word that sends the modern day church into a tailspin of accusations towards someone who dares to bring it up. That word is obedience and it is not talked about enough in our Christian circles. The bible has plenty to say about it in the Old and New Testaments of scripture. So let’s break this down.
Verse 15, “If you love me keep my commandments.”
Verse 21a, “He who has My commandments and keeps them, it is he who loves Me….”
Verse 23a, “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My Word;…”
Verse24a, “He who does not love Me does not keep my words,….”
All of these verses are right after all the promises that we have talked about above. People seem to miss this when we talk about miracles, healings, and God’s love. It is clear that the Lord will not dispense all that He is to an unbelieving man. These things great blessings are only reserved for the true followers of Christ, not Christians in name only and certainly not the unbelieving world.
Here is where people start saying that I am discussing a works based merit system. As if God is waiting on you to obey enough so that He can dispense blessings. Not at all! Ephesians 2:8-9 is clear that salvation is grace and grace alone. That grace is in fact the beginning point of salvation and if it were not so no one would be saved ever! However when we talk about grace it is not cheap grace where you walk to the front of the church make an emotional acceptance of Jesus as your savior and then remain unchanged. Not so, grace is sufficient to sustain you and powerful enough to change you. Therefore obedience is a response to grace based upon an attitude of gratitude towards the Lord. This means that in the beginning you are compelled because you have to and when the Lord changes areas of your life you have the blessing of wanting to obey Him!
I thought it was necessary to briefly submit that disclaimer (again! For those that have read some of my writings before.) My point is that if you want the blessings you will never get them, but if you have been changed and now you want to know the risen Lord you already have the heavenly blessings and the earthly works will soon follow. More on this in the next writing, I’m outta here!