Who is on the Lord's Side?

WHO IS ON THE LORD'S SIDE?

Josh.5: ¹³ And it came to pass, when Joshua was by Jericho, that he lifted up his eyes and looked, and, behold, there stood a man over against him with his sword drawn in his hand: and Joshua went unto him, and said unto him, Art thou for us, or for our adversaries?

¹⁴ And he said, Nay; but as captain of the host of the Lord am I now come. And Joshua fell on his face to the earth, and did worship, and said unto him, What saith my Lord unto his servant?
¹⁵ And the captain of the Lord's host said unto Joshua, Loose thy shoe from off thy foot; for the place whereon thou standest is holy. And Joshua did so.

God is on no one’s side. He calls everyone to come before Him and worship. Leave the things of this world and find a sacred place which shall have no end and which has no shadow of turning. The world plays all kinds of moral high ground and power struggles games, but we have been called to bow before Him, and speak His words, and remain humble and broken before Him. We care not about the cares of this present world. They are like the chaff and the wind. They are here today and gone tomorrow. They are not only a distraction away from our precious Lord, but they are set against His kingdom even if they seem like they fight for something right.

On Tuesday the conservatives were dancing because of the Supreme Court decision removing a section of the Voting Rights Act, and then just 24 hours later the liberals were dancing and the conservatives were decrying the court because of the decision concerning DOMA. And both decisions were of a 5 to 4 vote. It’s better than a Laurel and Hardy cartoon and people get apoplexy over it on both sides. But when you are on the Lord’s side the decisions have already been made.

Oh dear brothers and sisters do you not see to whom we must run? Are your eyes so blind that they cannot see that this world is an enemy of the Holy One? Are we so absorbed by the things of this world that we leave the shelter of His wings and go chasing after that which has no eternal substance? These are the days in which hell has emptied its evil spirits and they now roam with a designed viciousness around the world. But do not be deceived. These spirits know how to be pro-life and pro-traditional marriage and how to categorically state how they believe the Bible but all the while they have come as angels of light but are doing Satan’s bidding. The systems of this world are like cotton candy…once placed in the mouth they disappear as nothing. They are like running on a treadmill, burning up energy, but going nowhere.

Turn your eyes and ears and hearts toward Jesus alone. The spirit of the world is powerful and has a wicked undertow. It continues to sweep believers into many a fallen endeavor that is not only worthless in God’s kingdom but is counterproductive to the everlasting gospel message. When we are on the Lord’s side we reject all the labels of man. I am not a conservative or a liberal; I am not a Republican or a Democrat; I am not an American or a German; I am not some denomination. Although I may seen as such by some men, in truth I am a servant of Christ who has been redeemed by God’s grace through the blood of the Lamb. I cannot have a greater moniker and I take no glory in anything but Christ.

It is most sad to see how many professing believers are moved by the ebbs and flows of this fallen world. Do you believe that before gay marriage was made legal that righteousness reigned? Marriage is nothing more than a piece of paper recognized by the government. But in Christ marriage is a sacred covenant which is recognized by God. Unrighteousness reigned in Noah’s day just like today.

But did Noah attempt to change the culture or did he get involved with earthly endeavors? No, he had a call from God and he continued to build the ark. We as believers also have a call from God. We are now living arks that carry the presence of God within us. Look past all the fallen commotion and do not pin any of your hopes upon anything on this earth. It is all like withering grass and fading flowers. Only the Word of God will last for all eternity.

This world does not need legislation or morality or more money. This world needs redemption which is only found in Jesus. Let us, His body, be Jesus to these precious souls and refuse to sell our birthright for some political and moral pottage. The calling we have is the most sacred calling anyone can have while still in this earthly habitation. Better to be a doorman in God’s house than to be the king of all the earth.

I wish to relate a story which was reported in the magazine “The Voice of the Martyrs”. It is a great periodical which brings to our attention the realities which are so often lost in American evangelicalism. Oh my dear brothers and sisters who claim His matchless name, we are blinded by our culture and so often miss the glory of God being truly manifested in the lives of His servants around the world.

His name is Pastor Matak and he ministers in Sudan. In 1982 he was arrested and then arrested again in 1986. He spent the next 8 years in prison where he endured much torture. He was beaten relentlessly with wooden slats and iron rods. Electrodes were attached to his ears, his genitals were crushed, his fingernails were pulled out, and he was whipped with wires. Even through the most unthinkable agony this servant of Christ would not renounce his faith. Upon his release Pastor Matak told his fellow believers that “God showed me that “I am with you”. God reminded me that the body can die but the soul cannot.” He said to his tormentors, “You can torture me, but if you kill me, I will just see Jesus Christ!”

This precious pastor’s testimony and witness has been used by God to lift up Jesus and His gospel message. Is this not the way of Jesus? Can you compare all the political nonsense with the glory that is revealed in the servants of Christ who endure such hardships but still give Christ all the glory? This, my dear friends, is only a glimpse of how God is manifesting Himself in the hearts and lives all over the world. And in the most violent places on earth God’s glory shines brightly in and through believers who remain faithful under the most trying of circumstances.

You see, we do not call God to come to our side. We run to His side and there we live and breathe and have our being. God will not be used for the strategies of man. The Captain of the Lord of Hosts calls those that are His to stand still and see the salvation of the Lord. The ground we walk upon is holy ground. Drenched with and made holy by the blood of the Lamb, we now are crucified with Christ and the lives we now live we live by the faith of the Son of God who loved us and gave His life for us. Amen. Selah.

DOMA

DOMA

UPDATE.
Traditional Evangelical Marriage: One woman with one man one at a time.
 

The Supreme Court ruled that DOMA was unconstitutional which opens wide the door to same sex marriage being recognized by the government. Does that change the kingdom of God? Does that change the gospel? Does that change Christ? Does that change our discipleship? Does that change the Scriptures? Does that make lost people more lost? Does that change the coming of the Lord Jesus?

Then why should we be upset at all? Let us be about our Father’s business regardless of how the dead are burying their dead. The kingdom of darkness lives by their rules and the kingdom of God lives by God’s Word. Jesus did not come to change the world. He came to change lives and to seek and save that which was lost. And we should walk in His steps and not get embroiled in the issues of the dead. The church of Jesus Christ has done little to protect Biblical marriage and even much less to protect her betrothal to her Bridegroom.

BTW – I have no opinion as to what by-laws the church of Satan adopts. I hope the analogy is obvious.

The 4th of July = Baal Worship

THE 4^TH OF JULY

BAAL WORSHIP

The word “Baal” is generally used to represent the god of gods and is considered a pagan deity in both the Old Testament as well as in the New Testament. It is a false deity which can be manifested in many different ways and forms. Many times it is viewed as a god of fertility as well as a god of earthly blessings in general. The country known as America has become a Baal in the eyes of millions upon millions of people which includes professing believers in Jesus. This is shocking, sinful, and profoundly sad.

We have a God so wonderful, so powerful, so loving, so gracious, and who gave His only begotten Son for our redemption and yet we turn to idols? And this idol called America is closer to a mirror image of the golden calf than many could imagine. How can we measure such spiritual infidelity? What words are sufficient to describe such spiritual adultery? This is spiritual treachery manifested with carnal joy and vigor. This kind of idolatry is welcomed right into the church and shakes its patriotic fist right in the face of the Risen Christ. It is a monstrous betrayal that has entered the hearts of professing believers, festered through many decades, and emerged as a full blown departure from the faith.

Why do we not often identify it with such arresting language? It is because this kind of idolatry has been nurtured into our souls since we were born and then it was taught and practiced with such regularity and with such unquestioned energy that to even question its spiritual validity one must break through an atmosphere of deception that is fed and guarded by even the most revered preachers among us. Yes, to embark on an honest and vulnerable journey to uncover God’s truth about nationalism will require a rejection of what you have been told and what you have come to automatically believe, and then some levels of rejection from your peers. This is not a game, and this journey is not for the faint of heart.

But before you research the topic of nationalism and the kingdom of God you must realize you are not looking for some minor differences. This is not something you can do in moderation and still be walking in the Spirit. This is a journey to see if this is modern day idolatry with all the bells and whistles. Yes, most will not even question it and they will just assimilate it into their lives with no thought whatsoever. But there will be a remnant who will begin by sensing something is wrong, and then little by little more light comes shining through until one day – Boom! – there it is, a revelation from God’s Spirit.

Jam.4: ⁴ Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.

I Jn.2: ¹⁵ Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.

¹⁶ For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.
¹⁷ And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.

How can I tell a story which has many central figures and in fact has seen millions of believers who have walked out this narrative in some form and in some way? This issue has bonded us together even though we still may be in different parts of the journey. This is a story of blindness, sincere and dedicated, but still blind. Yes, it begins with blindness and ends with sight. It begins in bondage and ends with freedom. In many ways it begins with man and ends with Jesus.

This is the story of one who came to faith in Jesus Christ and was changed forever. Once Jesus was an historical figure and maybe even a part of a religion but Who now is seen as the Lord of Lords and the only way to eternal life. Yes, this is a story of a born again believer whose life was changed. And that change took place first inside and then it worked its way out.

But the verses I posted and more throughout the New Testament point us to a different way, a different life, and a different spirit. The Scriptures use the word “world” to identify a pattern, a system, and a spirit which is employed by the world instead of the Spirit of God. It encompasses a variety of things including the love of the material universe, the lust for power, and the elevation of man and his wisdom. But at its core is man.

Man has always been busy creating his own little utopias designed for his pleasure and enjoyment and power. The lust for power over other human beings is immense. The dream of having other humans not only do your bidding but also help accumulate your wealth is an ongoing project and sought for with great energy. There is a symbiotic relationship between fallen man and money. That relationship dictates the direction of the entire world. In fact, it rules the world through the hearts of men. So when God tells us not to love the world or be its friend this is exactly to what He is referring.

We have so often been told that not loving the world is not attending certain movies or not smoking or not drinking, but those are only shadows compared to the colossal power and allurement of power and money. We live in a system which not only beckons us with the power of Greek sirens, but it imprisons us with strongholds of the mind, the body, and the heart. The world’s systems play for keeps and employ all kinds of nefarious strategies. And it is not enough to use and abuse those who remain spiritually fallen, but it is relentless in its quest to invite those who belong to Christ to return to the filth from which they just came. 

But even though so many people are not only gullible but passionate about their own wealth and pleasure, the world still uses a sophisticated strategy to enchant the visible church. By a patient but clever process the spirits of antichrist have led a clandestine campaign to incorporate the love of money and the love of self into the very practices and belief systems of the church. To say they have been successful is to grossly understate the achievements that the forces of evil have enjoyed. The modern church is now not only chasing after that which deeply displeases Christ, but it has embraced almost every aspect of this fallen planet and incorporated them into their practices. If you can step back and juxtapose God’s Word upon the current ecclesiastical scene you should be aghast. But if you do not do that, your barns will be filled while your heart will be empty.

And now I can hear some moan “Here he goes again about nationalism”. Oh dear brothers and sisters this has never been about nationalism. This is about Christ and His kingdom. What is in our hearts will determine if we can actually understand God’s kingdom and if the Spirit can supply the power with which to overcome this present world and not join in it. The choice is profoundly simple. Will we be of Christ and His kingdom or will we be of this world and all its fallen systems?

Imagine a collection of people start a baseball game. They had never known about the game before, and as they begin they have to understand the elements of the game by reading the rules and by the advice of those who have played the game for many years. At first they enjoyed the game but after a while they began to long for something more. They watched those who were playing baseball on a different field and seem to be having much more fun. The other field was playing a game that stepped outside the rule book but even so they were enjoying a great amount of pleasure.

And as they gazed over at the other field from which they themselves had come they saw that those people were playing baseball with a basketball and instead of playing by the rules they were making up rules which most pleased those players. Hmm. So what did these new people do? They studied the game that was being played without a rule book and with an eye to what appealed to those who played the most, and they copied them.

Again, this issue is not about nationalism which is only an observable symptom. This is about Jesus. Who was He, who is He, what did He do, what did He teach, and what does it mean to follow Him? Those seem like basic questions but in fact they are the essence of the faith. If we actually desire to define the faith, it is Jesus – plain, simple, and immeasurable profound. The issues about which we sometimes get caught up are many times distractions even if some of them are truths. If our faith is not about Jesus then it is about nothing. The church has taken Jesus, dissected Him, and presented a disjointed collection of half truths and moral pontifications. We have pulled out a few issues and made them our standard, but in reality Jesus has become an aside.

Following Jesus is now defined by political positions, moral crusades, conservative values, and allegiance to America.

You cannot serve two masters. If you desire to serve Jesus you must forsake all. I hope someday to fully discover what that means. But if we do not recognize what His steps look like we will walk a path that the culture has laid out for us. You see, nationalism is just a vehicle whereby the culture and the evil one can get us to live apart from the kingdom of God. Are you saying that to be a patriotic America is against the will of God?

Yes, that is exactly what I am saying. But please understand that nationalism is just a vehicle which takes us away from Christ and that is THE spiritual issue. And on the 4^th of July millions upon millions of people will celebrate that which is against the kingdom of God. But it continues to be an incredible conundrum to see so many professing believers who claim to believe God’s Word and yet worship and pledge allegiance to a fallen system. In the 1960’s young people began to worship the Beatles. What affect does worship have? It changes people. The people that sat before the Beatles began to cut their hair like the, dress like them, speak like the, and they began to change in order to be like these young men. And they formed a camaraderie among all the rest of those who worshiped the same thing.

So when a person worships a nation what happens? They begin to change the way they think and act. They turn over their hearts to that nation. They join with all who have the same love and allegiance for that nation. Like those who chose their favorite Beatle these people chose their favorite politician and leader. They sing songs to that nation. They claim that their nation is superior to all the rest and in essence form a literal fan club. They love the nation with such strength that they will even kill for that nation and give their very lives for it. That is how professing believers are changed because they refused to separate themselves from the Baal worship called nationalism. It is inevitable. Whatever you give your heart to will change you.

And so as we approach another pagan holiday of which they all are, we as believers must remind ourselves that this is not our celebration. We do not belong here and we have no enduring city here. If we rejoice we rejoice in Christ and in Christ alone. God forbid we join hands with the pagan kingdom and celebrate the modern Baal. And why do people celebrate America? It’s because they love their lifestyle and the prosperity they have experienced. And it’s because they have been taught to do so since birth. In essence they are celebrating this fallen and temporal world because they feel it has benefited them. This is the pagan way and it is the essence of all the pagan religions to celebrate mother earth and all she has given us. Freedom, wealth, land, protection, fellowship, and everything else.

I will not, I cannot, bow down to Baal.

I used to do that years ago but by God’s grace I have been set free.

I will not look back.

Remember Lot’s wife.

Compacted Stones

COMPACTED STONES

Land is a collection of compacted stones. It all belongs to God, however men will die fighting for it. What if land was like air and everyone shared in all of it? Would that end all wars? No, not until the evil heart of man is changed will war seem like a non-option. But in a surprising twist, even professing believers who have had their hearts changed still embrace war as an option when your compacted stones are threatened.

Witnessing for Jesus - Breaking the Mold

WITNESSING FOR JESUS

BREAKING THE MOLD

God has sent His Son to this fallen world, and His Son, Jesus, has paid the price for our sins. So now any sinner who believes upon the Lord Jesus as the Son of God who paid for his sins and provided the only way to eternal life can be saved. There is no other way. None. Jesus Himself said no man can come to the Father God but through Him. Forget about all these fallen heresies that try and show that some of the attributes that Jesus showed while here on earth can be found in other religions and therefore Jesus can be found in these other religions. That is diabolical and profoundly false.

Just before Jesus left this earth He exhorted us to be His witnesses. And the main conduit for that witness is the everlasting gospel. We can use different words to present that gospel, but Jesus and His redemptive work must always be at the core. And Jesus and His redemption is the divine calling of the church. Jesus is not schizophrenic. What I mean is that He came to seek and save that which was lost the first time and now His body, the church, has been given the very same mission. Jesus is still seeking to save the lost through us, His body. Every time the church gets involved with fallen causes of this earth it does damage to the gospel message.

But surrounding the gospel and buttressing its message must be a manifestation of the person of Christ. Selfless works of kindness and generosity should be what ministers to the lost and what the Spirit can use to soften hearts. So often the church has confined witnessing to tracks and preaching and some Roman’s road plan. The concept of evangelism has all but excluded the salt and light of our lives.

Matt.5: ¹³ Ye are the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men.

¹⁴ Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid.
¹⁵ Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in the house.
¹⁶ Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.

And herein lies a great mystery that is filled with power and glory. In Acts chapter one Jesus commands the disciples to wait in Jerusalem until they are endued with power when the Spirit descends upon and in them. But the Word of God has a power all its own, and sinners sometimes get saved through a message spoken by a man secretly involved with some great sin. Yes, the Word of God is powerful on its own. Some sinners have picked up a Bible in a hotel room and read a portion and miraculously come to Christ.

So what is this power that the Holy Spirit gives us and just what is it for? This is the power to walk in the Spirit and both resist the lusts of the flesh as well as be a beacon of light through all kinds of selfless acts toward our lost neighbors. And there is where the church has abrogated its divine responsibility. Much of the evangelical world looks suspiciously at good works that are humanitarian in nature since it is guarding the justification by faith fort. If a church has a pantry or a clothing drive it considers its religious obligation to be done. I have heard many a professing believer complain about those who they deem lazy and shiftless and therefore poor through their own devices. And armed with that sort of justification they take solace in living a moral and patriotic and even industrious life while being ambivalent about being a light to the darkness. With all the exhortations found in the New Testament about being aggressive about our ministry to the lost and poor and lonely, why are we not observably passionate about it?

I believe there are two major ports wherein the church has steered her ship and by which we have lost a significant part of the gospel ministry. One which I have outlined continually is the issue of nationalism and being in love with a nation. Patriotism is a poison pill to the gospel of Jesus Christ. It subverts the message and drowns it in selfishness, pride, and a moral inspection of the lost rather than a perspective which is filled with God’s love and Christ’s redemption. It continues to be a major part of the road to apostasy. It has captured the hearts of millions of professing believers and has rendered them spiritual impotent if not even an enemy of the gospel.

But another way in which the church has altered the Word of God and constructed her own brand of the Christian faith is how we have formulated our doctrinal statement and how we define liberal theology. For instance when a man denies the virgin birth but is dedicated to helping the poor he is deemed at least liberal because he doesn’t believe the Word of God. But if a man does believe in the virgin birth but he does almost nothing to help the poor he is deemed orthodox. You see what has happened? We have made the Christian faith a system of answers to Biblical questions and completely downplayed any demonstrations of the redemptive love of Christ Jesus. When James teaches us the importance of works he doesn’t mention going to church or giving or even witnessing. Look what the Spirit says:

Jam.1: ²⁷ Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.

Jam.2: ¹⁵ If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of daily food,

¹⁶ And one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit?
¹⁷ Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone.
¹⁸ Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith, and I have works: shew me thy faith without thy works, and I will shew thee my faith by my works.

Let us painfully honest here. Through education and the consistent pressure of the western culture we have made a brand of Christianity which is ultimately a system of doctrinal truths, albeit important, but we have almost despised the humanitarian and self denying works which Jesus manifested and taught throughout His entire earthly ministry. So why isn’t the professing believer who checks all the orthodox doctrinal boxes but cares very little about ministering to the poor and needy not considered “liberal” because he openly forsakes large portions of God’s Word? I could give reasons like intellectualism or patriotism or hedonism, but in the end it all goes back to self righteousness.

In this post I am attempting to expose something crucial that has been all but abandoned in the western brand of Christianity. And yet throughout the New Testament an undeniable and vital element of the faith manifests itself in works that minister to the least among us. And allow me to expose another aspect of our self righteousness. So many believers dismiss people who seem lazy or shiftless and we believe they are unworthy of our help. We see people using food stamps to buy things that they should not and we feel justified in judging them and withholding any help we might offer. Do you see what has happened here?

Why are we who were so unworthy and yet were shown the grace of God requiring lost people to live their lives with some integrity before they meet our standards for humanitarian help or gospel ministry? Where did we get this kind of attitude? From the political world. If you will only help those who you believe deserve it than you will help very few if any. Do not the lazy and the shiftless and the thief and the drug addict deserve to be ministered to through the gospel and the works of God’s love which see their eternal need in spite of their open sin? Are we going to weigh people’s sins and only reach out to those whose inventory of transgressions do not exceed a certain level? What kind of Christianity is that? We have not been called to assess people’s character before we help them. Many people who take advantage of the system can be moved by our love and kindness. Away with this kind of Christianity which only loves and ministers to those who are supposedly deserving of it. None of us would have been saved if God had placed that requirement upon us. No one is deserving of anything. No one is worthy of anything. It is all by God’s unfathomable love and amazing grace.

So it is up to us to set out to demonstrate the love of God in hopes that sinners will see and hear and believe the everlasting gospel of Jesus Christ. Help those who you might not normally help. Love those who are difficult to love. Reach out to those who might be taking advantage of you in the natural but who might be reached by God’s Spirit through your kindness. How do you measure a depraved and fallen sinner who has earthly character against a depraved and fallen sinner who exhibits little earthly character? Does the man who murders twenty people deserve more sympathy than the man who murders five?

In the end, we are not called to judge the lost. They already stand condemned. We are called to witness Jesus to them by word and by deed. It is time for us to break out the mold that religious spirits have created for us. It’s time to preach and to BE Jesus to those who dwell in darkness. All of them.

Heroes or Servants

HEROES

or as God calls them

SERVANTS

Nick Wallenda successfully crossed the Grand Canyon on a wire. The world loves it because it entertains.
But many believers today will clean up an AIDS infected African child, risking their own lives, and without any fanfare.
Earthly heroes are forged in the fallen mind of man. But heavenly heroes who are the servants of Christ are only created and recognized by God's Spirit.

Here Come the Mission Fields

HERE COME THE MISSION FIELDS

There are approximately 12 million undocumented people who came in from Mexico who now live somewhere in the United States. What would have happened if all evangelical churches saw it as a mission field coming TO us and we passionately ministered to them through word and deed? But I guess it is easier to see them as a threat to our prosperity rather than souls who need Jesus. The church is now more American than it is Christian.

The Continuing Metamorphosis of the One Called Jesus

THE CONTINUING METAMORPHOSIS OF THE ONE CALLED

JESUS

In my spiritual experience of almost forty years it has been gut wrenchingly sad to watch as Jesus the person and His message have been so changed and so altered in order to accommodate the fleshly desires of religious man. Some have made His gospel so bland and so inclusive that it has no meaning at all. Others have made many litmus tests which keep sinners at bay and make them run from God’s grace. And others have clothed Him with garments of red, white, and blue and paraded Him around like one of the signers of the Declaration. And still others have stored Him within the walls of some building used primarily on Sundays and then for all purposes leave Him there during the week. And there are others who claim that Jesus is on their side and they alone are His vocal servants. Yes, it has been oh so tragic.

The question is this: Will the church, or each individual believer, actually take the precious time to investigate these things or will most of the evangelical world enjoy being part of the metamorphosis that actively is transforming Jesus instead of being transformed by Jesus?

But this has been an ongoing strategy conducted by the evil one and his spirits of antichrist. There is nothing which activates the forces of deception more than the Person and message of Jesus. If they can deceive people about Jesus then they have accomplished something much greater than just an unproductive spiritual life. They have damned a soul. Yes we are all sinners and without Christ we stand condemned or damned. But the Holy Spirit seeks to illuminate the human heart as to Jesus and His gospel, but a great obstruction is present when that sinner has embraced a falsehood which names the name of Jesus and makes perfect sense and is even compatible with the American lifestyle and philosophy. And within that deception that sinner feels content, fulfilled, and eternally secure.

The question is this: Will the church, or each individual believer, actually take the precious time to investigate these things or will most of the evangelical world enjoy being part of the metamorphosis that actively is transforming Jesus instead of being transformed by Jesus?

But let us be perfectly clear and honest. We all have been affected by these personal forces of evil as well as the impersonal forces of philosophy. Instead of living and breathing under the shadow of His wings, the church has built local centers where people can get enough religion to keep them going but not enough to observably alter their lives by changing their hearts. And when there is some personal change, and there are some valid testimonies of the power of Christ, it is usually stifled and prevented from going into the extreme by the overwhelming force of those religious peers among which the new life has been birthed. This new life, naïve and pristine, sets out to follow Jesus in many unorthodox and fanatical ways which are completely at odds with the culture of the world and the church. But that fire is soon extinguished by reasoning, by logic, by the advice of the spiritual elders, and by the sheer weight of the evangelical culture already established and working like a well oiled machine.

The question is this: Will the church, or each individual believer, actually take the precious time to investigate these things or will most of the evangelical world enjoy being part of the metamorphosis that actively is transforming Jesus instead of being transformed by Jesus?

So in essence the Person, the work, and the message of Jesus Christ has been homogenized and presented in an orderly and nonintrusive fashion that blends in with the culture so well that unbelievers feel comfortable in joining forces with professing believers in all kinds of earthly endeavors from legislation to moral crusades and even war itself. You see, when the Son of God walked the earth the world hated Him and murdered Him, but this new Jesus is embraced by Hollywood, politicians, leaders from other religions, and even moral pagans.

The question is this: Will the church, or each individual believer, actually take the precious time to investigate these things or will most of the evangelical world enjoy being part of the metamorphosis that actively is transforming Jesus instead of being transformed by Jesus?

This is not to say we as believing followers of the Lord Jesus should be so obnoxious or abrasive that we elicit rejection from the world and then suggest we are being persecuted. But I am saying that if we truly desired to follow Jesus we would speak His words and do His works with love and grace, and that would be so out of step with the culture it might be seen as self righteous or at least like the Amish an observable curiosity. As it is we are little more than an accepted segment of a western culture which almost prides itself on its religious heritage and diversity.

The question is this: Will the church, or each individual believer, actually take the precious time to investigate these things or will most of the evangelical world enjoy being part of the metamorphosis that actively is transforming Jesus instead of being transformed by Jesus?

But how does that happen? How does a Divine Person live and teach things that are so against the cultural grain and then gather followers who claim His example and teachings as their own, but blend in so comfortably with a culture that is profoundly hedonistic and violent? How can those diametrically opposing manifestations be reconciled? My point is that how can a follower of Jesus or the church at large live so outside His teachings and yet claim to still be following Him? When I was young my mother used to warn me about my behavior outside the home. She used to remind me that I had the Frueh name and I was not only representing myself but my behavior would reflect on the Frueh name as well.

And this leads us to my original premise. The name of Jesus and all He lived and taught has been cleverly and conveniently altered so that we can now live just like the heathen and exegete the Scriptures to show that Jesus approves of our lifestyles. And while we squawk about men who deny the divinity of Christ we ourselves have stripped Him of His very own teachings and replaced them with ours. It is a most clever sleight of hand propagated by preachers and gladly received by pew dwellers.

The question is this: Will the church, or each individual believer, actually take the precious time to investigate these things or will most of the evangelical world enjoy being part of the metamorphosis that actively is transforming Jesus instead of being transformed by Jesus?

 

The answer is not easy and it requires much more than some alterations here and there. In fact it will mean a return to the real Jesus and His real teachings. It will demand a return to the faith as a whole. The entire faith that uses the name of Jesus has become so disfigured that it now seeks to be a peacemaker between the world and Jesus. And it has been quite successful, but instead of the Risen Christ it has presented some caricature called Jesus.

Where is this story going to take us? Like a rushing river stream the church has been carried to a place called apostasy, and in fact this is exactly where the American church now lives. The word apostasy means to leave something or to walk away from something or as Webster states, “an abandonment of a previous loyalty”. The overwhelming collection of professing believers in America are so deceived, so entrenched, and so numbed that even if they believed in their minds that the church was in apostasy they could not embrace it with their hearts. The practice of church is too good, too normal, too blessed, and just too entrenched as a part of our western experience. You see, the path to repentance is way too costly on all levels even if they could understand.

This Jesus, the new Jesus, has become so familiar and He seems to fulfill our religious needs so that to see Him in a more Biblical light and find He was quite different than what we have come to embrace would be devastating. It would alter the way we now think. It would alter the way we now pray. It would alter the way we now love. It would alter the way we now spend. It would alter the way we now “do church”. It would alter the way we teach and preach. It would alter our earthly involvements. You see, if we truly embraced the Jesus of the gospels, not just doctrinally and in our statements of faith but dramatically in our hearts as our template, it would require us to allow the Spirit to lead us into a life realm that was heretofore unknown to the church. But between peer affirmation, life commitments and life pleasures, and just the profound strength of spiritual lethargy now seen as the norm, there seems to be little interest in any kind of serious examination to say nothing of serious change. And so the church can continue to exist and practice with a predictable redundancy that soothes the religious conscience and manifests an Eli Whitney type of church membership process.

 

The question is this: Will the church, or each individual believer, actually take the precious time to investigate these things or will most of the evangelical world enjoy being part of the metamorphosis that actively is transforming Jesus instead of being transformed by Jesus?

The clever industriousness of the western religious mind is astonishing. A few years ago there was even a commercialized movement that sold earrings and bracelets and book covers and shirts and all kinds of religious trinkets. And printed on them all was the phrase “What would Jesus do?” Of course there are many ironies concerning that phenomenon. Firstly Jesus would not wear something that said that as if we wanted the public to know just how dedicated we were to Jesus. But the core of the irony was that it is the exact question that the church should be fervently asking through fasting and prayer and not bracelets. But believers loved it and smiled as if we are all in partnership to do whatever Jesus would do in every area of our lives. It was by God’s grace He doesn’t strike us all dead.

So the metamorphosis continues. The transformation of our own lives has ceased and we now reconcile the Scriptural teachings by Jesus and the obvious deviations from them by our lifestyles by transforming our vision of Jesus to be much more compatible with what we believe and practice. The force of the earthly culture has overtaken the church so deeply and it has gone on for so long that the church as a whole is now walking in a spiritual Stockholm syndrome. That means that some people who remain captive for a time begin to identify with their captors and some like Patty Hearst even develop a sympathy and even a camaraderie with those who had taken them by force. That is where the western church is today.

 

The question is this: Will the church, or each individual believer, actually take the precious time to investigate these things or will most of the evangelical world enjoy being part of the metamorphosis that actively is transforming Jesus instead of being transformed by Jesus?

The remedy is a colossal challenge. It requires seeing things that go against almost everything we were taught and almost everything we can imagine. It is to suggest that what is being taught and practiced concerning Jesus and the faith that follows Him has been rejected in favor of a more leisurely faith which overwhelmingly reflects a western mindset and lifestyle and not the true and living Jesus. Wow. To even seriously and sincerely entertain such a statement would at first shatter our world and ultimately lead to a spiritual path that is filled with repentance, uncertainty, sacrifice, self denial, brokenness, humiliation, loneliness, but would also be filled with great glory and an unfolding revelation of the Crucified and Risen Christ.

Now if that is what we cannot live without then that is our calling.

But if we can live without it we will continue to do so.

 

The question is this: Will the church, or each individual believer, actually take the precious time to investigate these things or will most of the evangelical world enjoy being part of the metamorphosis that actively is transforming Jesus instead of being transformed by Jesus?

Who is Jesus and What is His Message?

WHO IS JESUS

and

WHAT IS HIS MESSAGE?

So let us begin once again. Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. No man can come to the Father but through Him. That is the gospel. That is the foundation of our faith. But so often we have molded that truth to accommodate our lives and disenfranchise the lives of others. What would you say to this scenario?

A man murders ten people. Another man murders fifty people. The man who murdered ten gets saved by faith in Jesus, but he now claims that the man who murdered fifty is a major league sinner who God really hates. The saved man cannot stop murdering altogether but now the man who murdered ten now only murders one at a time, but he claims that unless the one who murdered fifty stops murdering altogether he cannot be saved. You see, his view of redemption carries with it a quantitative essence concerning murder. He contends that certain murders or a certain quantity of murders are special cases with God as it pertains to the gospel of redemption.

Now redemption is either free through faith or it has some works caveats. And the gay issue has been adopted by the evangelical church as the major issue. Forget about all the sinners who come to faith in Jesus who still cling to unforgiveness, greed, lust, addictions, nationalism, and an impressive array of all sorts of sins. But if they have same sex attractions they are funneled off into a different redemptive room where they will be interrogated fully concerning their variety of sin and what they plan to do about it.

A major part of this view has to do with a misrepresentation of repentance. It is widely assumed that unless a sinner forsakes his sin, and in particular certain unseemly sins, that he cannot come to Christ. This theology equates repentance with forsaking and that is a classic and self righteous perspective. How many sins and which sins must be completely forsaken before salvation is legitimate or even made available? I have dealt with the issue of repentance HERE.

 

What then is the pristine and uncompromised essence of salvation? It is exclusively through Jesus Christ without one single shred of human works. No, not one. Most “orthodox” believers would agree that feeding the poor or clothing the naked or ministering to the earthly needs of people regardless of how noble are not a part of salvation and the gift of eternal life. But some of those same people would require someone to forsake, or completely stop, certain sins before that sinner can be saved or at least after he has been saved to be fully vetted as a authentic believer. That again has subtly and surreptitiously carried the works of man into the equation.

The Lord knows those that are His and only the Lord knows with complete certainty. But do not believe that your experience is at odds with the salvation experience of others. All of us have fallen far short of what we could be and surely of what we should be. All of us have sinned in thought, word, and deed even after we were converted and even on our most spiritual day. This is not a license to sin, but it is an illumination of God’s grace. But by culling out a certain sin which has never tempted us and holding that sin as the gold standard of true repentance by insisting it must be completely overcome is measurably self righteous.

Paul tells us that we are not to sin so that grace can more abound, but neither does Paul claim to be sinless. And somewhere between those two pillars is the experience of a true pilgrim of Jesus Christ. This redemption issue is a matter of the heart and it belongs to God. There are fruits, but in all of us there are many, many fruits which should be there but are not. The group called Exodus probably had good intentions, however they came across a very strange phenomenon. The same sex attractions that they attempted to eradicate would not stay eradicated. And much of the church will not accept a person as a true believer who continues to have them.

If true redemption eradicates all same sex attractions than why does it not eradicate the attractions for the scantily clad woman or the attractions for greed or the attraction toward self righteousness? We should all walk in holiness, but since even the most surrendered among us still sin we all need God's grace before and after conversion. If a person stands up and claims Jesus was not God, or that only through their church can people be saved, or some other unbiblical doctrine than we can assume that person does not know Christ. But it is quite another thing to measure a person’s conversion with a ruler that that we so often do not apply to ourselves.

I have never met a Christian who lives in the west who has not been infected by the culture and therefore sins by omission and by commission. Just observing the way we spend and borrow and save money is observably unbiblical, and yet no one questions our salvation. Committed believers buy cars and homes which are way above their actual needs. Our closets are full of clothes we do not need or even wear. We purchase things just because of the changing styles the world has laid down. We watch television as an addiction and yet the prayer chambers are almost empty. Believers by the millions speak hateful words about political figures they despise and also about Muslims and yet these same believers affirm themselves because they are for traditional marriage.

The church is full of men and women who are divorced and remarried and who are openly welcomed into the fold. Preachers play many hours of golf each week and most do not spend that amount of time in prayer and yet no one questions their conversion. How many saved men look at pornography each week including preachers? My point being if you conclude that anyone who is committing sins on a regular basis cannot be saved then there are no saved sinners at all. But the church has turned a blind eye to its own sins and now plays pin the tail on the gay sinner. The local church has borrowed millions from the heathen banks and pays horrific and obscene amounts of interest to the same world which lends to abortion clinics and gay enterprises, and the church feels no hypocrisy about itself. And yet we all sing worship songs and consider ourselves saved to the uttermost. But we can affirm each other by demanding gay people come completely in line and begin to feel different sex attractions and never waver.

We as believers must first take personal inventories as to how the grace of God has and continues to work in our lives. This utopian view of our own spirituality is a mirage and is based largely upon our heterosexual credentials as well as our national patriotism. How shallow can it get? But we have consistently spiraled into a self righteous collection of Americans who spout out our brand of morality, and while rejecting gay people because of their sin we are copulating with the money system of our fallen culture.

In the end we are faced with a question and indeed a quest that should have long ago been discovered and implemented within the hearts and lives of those who believe in and strive to follow the Son of man and of God. Who is Jesus, what was His mission, and what does He call His followers to? Oh but would you not think those questions would be not only clearly laid out in our statements of faith, but also observably manifested in our lives? Yes we can cling to the legalistic demands that breed self righteousness and a clique mentality. Yes we can state our case for moral issues and a desire for a fallen culture to become less fallen. Yes we can display our doctrinal credentials which give Scriptural clarity about the divinity of Christ Jesus.

But even after all those truths and moral pronouncements, we are still left with a colossal vacuum which if not filled renders our faith one of words and not deeds. Hold your breath for a moment and incline your ears. Listen as the constant static and drone of exhaled wind is manipulated and sent out as a steady stream of words. Words, words, and more words. Men and women are addicted to talk shows and form opinions based largely upon what their favorite talk show hosts say and make them think.

But this is not the company which is walking in His steps. What has been created in these times is a shadow, a ghost, and a pitiful projection of some kind of religion which uses His name but which bears no resemblance to He Who walked the pages of the gospel narratives. This is not Jesus. This is man masquerading as someone called Jesus. But if we truly wish to spread His message of redemption then we will have to become less obsessed with the sins of men and more obsessed with the souls of men.

Robert McCheyne, that faithful Scottish preacher, shared this story of servant hood and ministering the good news to sinners. About the beginning of the 1800’s there were many lepers in the continent of Africa. It was a miserable disease and most contagious. There were many camps to which lepers must go and live and be removed from society.
One day a missionary from England happened to be on a hilltop in South Africa, and as he glanced over the wall that surrounded the leper camp he saw two lepers plowing a filed. One had lost his hands to this horrible and painful disease while the other had lost his feet. The one without hands was carrying the one without feet, and they would stop at each pre-dug hole in the field. The one with hands, riding on the other’s back, would drop a seed into the hole while the other would cover it with dirt by his foot. The missionary was undone. Who could, who would go and be a gospel servant for such as these?
Two young boys, Moravian missionaries, heard about the situation. They began to pray, and both boys felt the leading of the Spirit to go into the leper village and be Jesus to these pitiful souls. They knew the consequences. Once a person enters such a village they were forbidden to come out again. It was a death sentence. But both boys did not hesitate since they were both convinced by the Spirit that this was to be the filed to which they were called.
Those two boys willingly and humbly forsook their entire lives and went to preach to and love these people. And through their example the Spirit drew others that hoped they may soon join them. That my friends is servant hood. That is the faith once delivered to the saints. That is Jesus.

My friends, if we ever hope to find and serve the Savior we profess we will have to walk into the leper colony that surrounds us and forsaking all that we have and all that we are, we must reach out to them with the love of Jesus. Regardless of the sin or the sinner, the gospel must come forth through our lips and lives without respect to our reputation or even our very lives. Jesus didn’t just love sinners of all genres. He died for them. It is time for the church to die once again through His wounds and walking out of His tomb we must carry the flame of redemption to every creature, even to the uttermost parts of the world. If you are worried about the decline of the culture than you can go to the voting booth. But if you are concerned with the eternal destiny of those within the culture than you must go to the empty tomb and receive His power.

The redemption of Jesus when spoken and lived carries with it the power of the universe which can secure eternal life for the vilest sinners among us. The Spirit awaits our crucifixion so that His crucifixion can go forth.

Important Issues

IMPORTANT ISSUES

Over 100,000 people have been killed in the Syrian civil war. There have been well over that wounded, and 1.5 million refugees have fled to neighboring countries and are living in inhuman conditions. One rebel cut open a dead enemy and ate his heart. Lethal gas has been used against the rebels. The death and violence is unfathomable. Children are suffering in unspeakable ways.

But in a more important issue some states are allowing gay marriage. What is happening to our world?

Exodus International Disbands

EXODUS INTERNATIONAL DISBANDS

Exodus International was one of the oldest, if not the oldest, organization that helped gay people overcome their same sex attractions using a number of different "techniques". They began in 1976 under its founder Michael Bussee who later became one of its most outspoken critics. This week after its president offered gay people an apology for hurting people, Exodus International disbanded.

HERE IS THE STORY

Of course there will be the expected knee jerk reactions from all the many and varied perspectives. Much of the evangelical community will lambast the decision and the apology, while organizations like GLAAD will applaud it as a step in the right direction. The lines will be drawn and there will be overtures from moral outrage all the way to moral inclusiveness and everywhere in between. But this issue deserves more than just convenient stone throwing especially from those of us who know and try to follow Jesus.

This should, this must, generate a deeper discussion about the depth, the expanse, and the power of redemption. Through prayer and an inspection of God’s Word that also is painfully honest about ourselves, we should strive to have a voice which is covered with love and grace without compromising God’s truth. But as usual we will hear the well worn mantras which elicit the desired applause from the specific choir to which you are preaching. I have begun another post, not about the gay issue, but about Jesus, redemption, faith, and eternal life. At the foundation of everything is this absolute truth: No one can find eternal life except through a personal faith in Jesus Christ.

I hope to provide my continuing perspective which reveals my love for Jesus and His eternal Word as well as my compassion for those who have same sex attractions. I realize this is an area that make many believers feel uncomfortable, however I sincerely believe that if Jesus walked the earth today He would most certainly eat with sinners including gay people. And I also believe He would be roundly criticized and condemned by many in the Christian community for such behavior. You see, most professing believers cannot see redemption as anything but carved in stone and that Jesus only extends grace to those who need it in less quantities than people like gay sinners.

 

"Jesus we ask for Your help and the Spirit's guidance in seeking the truth found only in You."

A Border Fence

A BORDER FENCE

If only the American Indians had constructed a border fence they might not have had all those problems like…oh…uh…genocide for instance.

Resting on Our Discernment Laurels

RESTING ON OUR DISCERNMENT LAURELS

I am considered on some level a discerner since I point out error in the church and I sometimes name false teachers. I do not breathe fire and use all kinds of vicious invectives as do some bloggers, and I certainly do not roast lost sinners on a verbal rotisserie. But there are some who cannot understand what is wrong with Joel Osteen or Rob Bell or Rick Warren. And so my blog is considered a discernment blog with some uniqueness’s on certain issues.

But I am often, and I mean very often, convicted on a personal level about how easy it is to shoot false teachers in a barrel and walk away from my own mirror. What I mean is that we have so much spiritual ground yet to take in our own lives that we must never feel any sense of having arrived. And just because we are “orthodox” in our theology we cannot see that as a badge of honor. In fact, it is only by the grace of God and the ministry of the Spirit and the Word of God that we have come to our beliefs. In fact many of us use to embrace things that were false and many of us use to be much meaner than we are now. We should rejoice in God’s grace and not in our own devices.

But the feeling that I get is not just a feeling. It is the gentle yet strong convicting power of the Holy Spirit. You see God is on no one’s “side”. He calls all men to come to Him. And even though the Scriptures direct us to discern the spirits, we cannot make that our exclusive journey. No, our journey is to allow the Spirit to conform us into the image of Christ Jesus, and that, my friends, is a monumental and miraculous task.

This is the journey set before us. These are the steps of a true disciple. They walk as He walked; they speak as He spoke; they think as He thought. These steps do not follow the easy and broad way. They lead against the grain of this world. They depart from the path of politics or national allegiance or moral debates. These steps demand a denial of self. They demand all kinds of sacrifices. They are filled with glory as well as filled with the fellowship of His sufferings. They lead to both death and life. Your death and His life.

The speaking out about obvious heretics is necessary, but that is such low hanging fruit. And men like the ones I mentioned provide a continuing stream of ammunition which the evil one can use to distract us from our own pursuit of Christ. Pursuing Christ and walking in His steps requires much more than pursuing a pristine doctrinal statement. Believers can sometimes take an orthodox statement of faith and theology and present it as evidence that they are following Jesus when in fact that is insufficient and many times spurious. Exercising saving faith in Christ Jesus is profound and yet very simple. It is so simple a child can be saved. However surrendering all your hopes and dreams and thoughts and desires and allowing your entire being to be completely controlled by His Spirit is a labor of glory, but a labor nonetheless.

The flesh is ready and willing and able to spring into action at the first sign of spiritual lethargy. In fact, the flesh masquerades as pursuing good and having good intentions when all the while it has deceived us and led us astray from the things of Christ. The flesh has succeeded in deceiving the church in many ways including those churches which are considered “orthodox”. You can stand solidly for the virgin birth and yet exhibit nothing of Jesus. You can stand and boldly proclaim  the Trinity, the inerrancy of Scripture, the substitionary death of Christ, the bodily resurrection, and other truths and yet exhibit none of Jesus.

Doctrine is important, however without a personal manifestation of Jesus it is little more than an organized collection of truth that could be compared to a Biblical form of the Dewey Decimal System. The Spirit desires to guide us into all truth doctrinally but also as it pertains to our lives. The Psalmist said “Thy Word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path”. He didn’t say that God’s Word is a source for us to compile a systematic theology term paper at Bible school. There have been hundreds of thousands of books written about the Bible and about theology and about doctrine, and yet our lives are supposed to be the observable epistles that make the pages of Scripture come alive! We are supposed to be Jesus in this world in thought, word, and deed.

The world is not interested, nor can they understand, our discernment concerning false teachers. They need us to be salt and light in this world. It is so easy to preach to the choir and applaud each other because we can identify the same heretics, but far more demanding is to live so that Christ radiates through us. What does it even mean to be crucified with Christ anymore? The church teaches all kinds of clever and relevant stories designed to help us navigate successfully through this present world, but where are the teachings that call for complete surrender and even a personal crucifixion? Like politics, the current ecclesiastical construct takes sincere men of God and places them in an environment that immediately compromises them and ultimately they become marionettes of the culture rather than crucified servants of the Most High God. And those that are taught by them are molded into good citizens rather than sacrificial disciples of Jesus.

The path that follows Christ has long since been covered over by nationalism, politics, greed, and a variety of avenues which lead to self. And in its place we have laid down asphalt paths of doctrinal orthodoxy and discernment of error. And yet we fail to see the error in our own hearts and lives although we have no energy to search for that. And this is what haunts and convicts me. It is no great feat to see the error in Rob Bell or Joel Osteen or Rick Warren. Like I said, low hanging fruit. But God desires to do something significant in us, but if we continue to have an unspoken attitude which assumes we have arrived and the path ahead of us is guided primarily by what we see in others than we will remain blind.

But let me take it somewhat further.

I Cor.13: Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal.

² And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing.
³ And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.

Paul goes on to tell us that between faith hope and love that love is the greatest. Now with love being the greatest among all the elements of faith why isn’t love the major test of orthodoxy? And when you ask someone what should distinguish a follower of Jesus why isn’t love at the top of the list? Why isn’t love on the list of the fundamentals of the faith? And why isn’t the church obsessed with exploring how God’s love works itself practically through a believer and into the world?

Let us be painfully honest here. It is light years easier to confront the heretics than it is to love the brethren and lost sinners the way God does and the way John 3:16 tells us how He acted on that love. God gave His only begotten Son for His enemies because He loved them. So against the backdrop of that unfathomable truth, how should we manifest our love toward our enemies? These are the issues which keep me from ever feeling smug about myself and my doctrinal positions.

And if we just took the issue of love we could spend a lifetime searching out ways to work out the love of Jesus in our lives. In fact, that is exactly the path to which we are called. Resting on our discernment laurels keeps us from being what God desires for us.

If Killing is the Way of Jesus...

IF KILLING IS THE WAY OF JESUS

THEN YOU MUST BE CONSISTENT

 

As an addendum to my post on war and killing I would like to present you with a fact that presents your view with a stark choice. If you believe that killing is necessary sometimes to protect people and lifestyles than you must incorporate all that view entails.

Imagine you were living in Nazi Germany and you were a believer and you were hiding two certain Jews who were sought after by the Nazis. They had been sentenced to the ovens but they ran to your house and you took them in. Well the SS came to your house and busted in your door and headed for the closet in which the Jews were hiding. Would you be justified in using violence to protect those innocent Jews? If you had a gun would you as a believer use it to defend and protect them?

Many believers would say yes to that question. They would use force to protect innocent life even though they would be breaking Nazi law. Well do you today believe life begins at conception? If so then abortion is murder and it is happening all over the country. And it is legal. But if you believe violence can and should be used to protect and defend innocent lives, then you have an obligation to do so by preventing abortion even though it would be against the law.

If you can support killing many thousands of miles away because that country “might” present a danger down the road, how can you sit by and allow the murder of millions of unborn babies happening in the present? The hypocrisy of such a position is obvious. But what does that reveal about the church’s position? It shows that the church’s position concerning war is due to a nationalistic culture and not Scripture. Believers will enthusiastically support any war that the government deems “necessary” but they will only talk about the evils of abortion.

What else does it reveal when believers will go to war to prevent something but allow abortion in their midst? It reveals that they are embroiled in hedonism. You see they support war because they fear their lifestyles may be in jeopardy, but their lives can be lived without intrusion even when abortions number in the millions. So if my material goods or even my family’s lives are at stake I can kill the enemy, but if murder is being performed and paid for in my midst I can live with it as long as my material goods and my family’s lives are not at stake.

Ok class, what do we call that? Hypocrisy. You see, killing is not the way of Jesus.

By the way, China has the largest number of abortions in the world, and if your view of killing people to prevent them from killing others is consistent we should go to war with China or the number two country Russia or the number three country Vietnam. The United States is number four on that list. If the Revolutionary War was the way of Jesus because we resisted taxes without representation, then how much more would Jesus approve of a violent overthrow of the United States government who slaughters millions of unborn babies?

You see, when you attempt to measure the teachings of Jesus through the world’s measuring cup all you have is a sieve.