****** Warning: This is for servants of the LORD only.*******
If you love this life; if you are governed by the idol of your will, and are thus deathly allergic to the truth, get out. Now. Return to your delusion, where *you* call the shots, where *you* make the choices, where your will holds dominion, where *you* are captain of ship and master of soul. This message is not for you and you are not equipped to receive it.
You have two paragraphs to reach minimum safe distance.
Navigate to another page. Eat, drink, be merry, and await the moment in which the truth shall fall upon you and grind you and your will to powder beneath it.
If, however, you are given grace of the LORD to belong to Him and are therefore slave to the truth, I invite you to read on, and prepare yourself. Have the Helm of Salvation strapped to your skull. Check the bindings on the Breastplate of Righteousness and Belt of Truth and be sure they are snug. Steel the muscles of the arm to which the Shield of Faith is strapped and set your shoulder behind it. Take up then the Sword of the Spirit in your hand, and be prepared to have your will, your very self, slain upon it.
Yes, you read that correctly.
THE ENEMY IS OUR WILL, AND IT THEREFORE MUST DIE.
The thing screaming in your ears right now at the above statement... exhorting you to ignore it... telling you that it has every right... no, that *you* have every right to live as you please... that's your will. It is being insistent because it does not want to die without *you*. You have been a most gracious host, and no parasite wishes to be severed from the host which grants it sustenance.
It will, in fact, fight you for that self-proclaimed right to the very death, even though it means that it has to *end* you with it.
That is what your *good* will, and mine, looks like with its kindly, smiling mask removed and its true face exposed.
Your will is destined for eternal death, you see. It's fate is that of the devil and his angels, and does not want to go to meet it without you.
Brethren, the Fight To The Death is deeper than the struggle between us and the one who Accuses us before the Throne of God day and night; it is between our will, and what shall be the completed good work which Christ has begun in all whom He saved by His good pleasure.
You begin to see what this means, don't you.
The Sword of the Spirit within our hands; the Word of God, must claim our lives. Our will must be impaled upon it and die. The life of our will must be snuffed out by its diamond-cutting edges. Our pride must be run through by it and gutted. Our dreams and desires and wants must be put to the Sword before our nature tells us they have *as much right to exist as the finished work does*.
They lie, and they lie damnably. They have *no* such right. By transitive property, *we* do not have that right. A bought, paid for, ransomed slave has no right to do whatever it pleases. The clay has no right to tell the Potter what He *should* have made it into. The iron has no right to complain that the fire and pressure and additional elements it must endure in order to become steel are too much, too painfully inconvenient, and do not fit just now in the plan it laid out for its life because it changes what it is into something else it can not see.
Our will is, in the end, irrelevant.
The first time I was ever exposed to this fact came from hearing the words of my brother in Christ, Cyril Jermin. I heard this man say on blogtalk radio the following words regarding the Son of God when He walked on the earth, and what following Him means:
"He loved the truth. He loved His Father. He valued obedience to His Father before anything else. *Why don't we?* Why don't we understand that He said if we were going to be His disciples, that we have to pick up our cross? "Deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow". What did that mean? Die. *Die.* Die to *self*. Die to your self opinions. Die to your carefully crafted image. Die to your reputation. Because the truth is more important than your reputation."
He went on to say something that knocked me over where I stood:
"This is not a popularity contest. Being a follower of Jesus is not a popularity contest. It is a death sentence, and we need to understand that, but too few of us do."
The man even went on to find use for the content of my post entitled "Destroy Your Pride", and said this:
"It is a fight to the death. And that means two things. It is a fight. It is a struggle. it is a war to the death, which means something has to die. *We* think it is the Enemy, but *Jesus* said it's us."
May it please the LORD that we each accept this and bow before it in submission, beloved sister... dear brother. We can no longer afford to look away from our selves when seeking the enemy that needs to have the Word of God brought to bear against it. When *we* think one way, and the *LORD* says the other, we are in trouble of the worst kind.
It is we who must die. It is our will that must die. It is our pride that must die. All that we place as idol before God must die by the Sword.
No, there is no third alternative. There are only two:
1) Know your place as ransomed slave, bow before the Living God, surrender your will and die to your self while your heart beats, and dwell by His loving sacrifice, in His presence, when it stops beating, in life everlasting.
2) Be your own master, believe in *your* power to choose your path while your heart beats, stick out your chest before the golden calf of your pride and will and bask in its glow, until the day in which your soul is required of you, and exist in the judgment of the Living God, outside of His presence forever, where the worm which consumes flesh does not die, and the fire which burns is never quenched.
That is all. There is no easy grace; to live the one is to both utterly reject and be at eternal enmity with the other. One contains permanent death of the will and rejection of the world, the other everlasting torment of the soul with the majority of the world.
We must pray that it would please the LORD that we each be formed into that which serves and obeys Him at the cost of our will. We must seek His mercy from our knees and from upon our faces, our hearts contrite before Him--seeing our abject need for Him and utter helplessness without Him.
The Son of God spoke of the upside to living His way, and acknowledged what we would have to endure, while cutting through the lack of comprehension which His disciples expressed when He did so. He simultaneously removed any notion that there are other alternatives beyond those which He laid out.
"Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father's house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also. And where I go you know, and the way you know."
Thomas said to Him, "Lord, we do not know where You are going, and how can we know the way?"
Jesus said to him, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me."If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; and from now on you know Him and have seen Him." John 14:1-7
Many mansions. Ultimate security in that the LORD Himself prepares them for us. But one path. One. One way. One truth. One life.
Your will by now, as mine did, is asking what the point is of hoping for what you can not see, when you can instead spend your energies having everything right here and now. Plenty of church-going folk believe that.
Really? This crude, temporary matter? These "riches" which avail us nothing once the heart stops, or become broken flotsam once the tornado destroys, or the flood waters recede, or the earthquake shatters, or the fire consumes? Do you really want treasures stored here, where moths eat, and thieves steal?
No lie is too big for your will to whisper into your ear. For this it must die.
Thanks be to God, that when we are too slow to get the details, He is patient, and loves us enough to show us clearly what must be known and accepted.
"Philip said to Him, "Lord, show us the Father, and it is sufficient for us."
Jesus said to him, "Have I been with you so long, and yet you have not known Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; so how can you say, 'Show us the Father'? Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me? The words I speak to you I do not speak on My own authority; but the Father who dwells in Me does the works. Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father in Me, or else believe Me for the sake of the works themselves.
"Most assuredly I say to you, he who believes in Me, the works that I do he will do also; and greater works than these he will do, because I go to My Father. And whatever you ask in My name, that I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask anything in My name, I will do it.
"If you love Me, keep My commandments. And I will pray to the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever--the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you. I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you." John 14:8-18
Here are the conditions people don't talk about in steepled buildings. All the blessings, all the promises, all the security of abiding with the LORD forever, have the condition to love Jesus. To love Him, by His own definition and not our own; to KEEP HIS COMMANDMENTS. Not as best we can. Not in our own way.
Keep.
His.
Commandments.
The best way we can love Him is insufficient. Our own way of loving Him comes up like life; too short, and there is no "e" for efforts granted for any who are in disobedience to the Word of God.
If Jesus' definition of loving Him is to keep His commandments, then *our* own way of fitting Him in is failure to love Him at all, and therefore rebellion--by *His* definition, not our own. May it please the LORD that I bow in submission to this, which can never be unseen once seen.
"A little while longer and the world will see Me no more, but you will see Me. Because I live, you will live also. At that day you will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you. He who has My commandments and keeps them, it is he who loves Me. And he who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and manifest Myself to him." John 14:19-21
THIS is seeing the Father; having and keeping His commandments is OBEYING them. He reiterates the definition of loving Him, and says that by the act of loving Him, that of having and keeping His commandments, we are loved by the Father, and the LORD will love and manifest Himself to us. We then live forever; not through an act of our own, but because He lives in us.
That can not happen with our will in the way.
"You want to see Me? You want fellowship with me?" He asks us. "Show that you love Me by obeying Me." He then goes on to tell us that such obedience, and the revelation that comes with it, is not for the world, but for the one who obeys. He lays it out while speaking in no uncertain terms of the difference between those who follow Him and those who do not.
"Judas (not Iscariot) said to Him, "Lord, how is it that You will manifest Yourself to us, and not to the world?"
"Jesus answered and said to him, "If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our home with him. He who does not love Me does not keep My words; and the word which you hear is not Mine but the Father's who sent Me.
"These things I have spoken to you while being present with you. But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you. Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid. You have heard Me say to you, 'I am going away and coming back to you.' If you loved Me, you would rejoice because I said, 'I am going to the Father,' for My Father is greater than I.
"And now I have told you before it comes, that when it does come to pass, you may believe. I will no longer talk much with you, for the ruler of this world is coming, and he has nothing in Me. But that the world may know that I love the Father, and the Father gave Me commandment, so I do. Arise, let us go from here." John 14:22-29.
Jesus told us that so long as we love Him and keep His Word, He will live with us. His Holy Spirit would come and teach us all things, and remind us of what the LORD said. If we don't obey Him, we do not love Him.
Our will can not have this; do not take its silence for acquiesence. ALL of this means our will is dead with our sins, and it will sooner cajole you into thinking your will, which is subject to your flesh and your pride, can coexist with the will of the LORD than be revealed as your mortal enemy. So long as you buy it long enough for your heart to stop beating.
Just as our LORD had to die, so must we.
And no, *I* did not say it. *He* did.
In the 9th Chapter of Luke, Jesus *first* tells them that *He* must die.
"And he said, “The Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.” Luke 9:22
*Next*, and I mean RIGHT AFTER He says this, He tells them that all who follow Him, who are no greater than He is, must do the same.
"Then he said to them all: “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it." Luke 9:23-24.
*Lastly*, He speaks on precisely what I've mentioned regarding the world and its treasures.
"For what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world, and is himself destroyed or lost?"
Not only does your will lie to you, it adheres to no logic. We are ALL going to die. Every single one of us will pass away. It makes no sense therefore to preserve the earthly life of sin and pride and will on this earth, only to lose it all at an hour completely unknown to us.
We are provided by our LORD and Saviour the perfect illustration of the completely illogical lie of our will in the 12th Chapter of Luke.
"Then He spoke a parable to them, saying: "The ground of a certain rich man yielded plentifully. And he thought to himself, saying, 'What shall I do, since I have no room to store my crops?' So he said, 'I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build greater, and there I will store all my crops and my goods. And I will say to my soul, "Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years; take your ease; eat, drink, and be merry." ' But God said to him, 'Fool! This night your soul will be required of you; then whose will those things be which you have provided?'
"So is he who lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God." Luke 12:16-21
All arguments of our will are therefore empty, pitifully temporal, and self serving. The lies it deploys on its own behalf, seeking pleasure to the pride-infused flesh that worships it as an idol, consider the truth of its inevitable death as nothing, and will blind you with pleasure long enough for it to be too late.
It is Public Enemy Number One to the follower of the Christ.
Our task, as soldiers of the Truth War on the side of the LORD, is to hunt down our will and kill it with the Sword we are given by the LORD. The will is wanted dead. Not alive; Dead. When it begs for it's life, we must silence the pleadings immediately with the edge of the Sword. It must not be allowed to escape, or it will return and sink a knife into us when we are not prepared. If it tries to be clever and run to the altar and grab it by the horns, we are to spill its blood right where it is.
By the grace of the LORD Almighty. Amen.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Thursday, May 5, 2011
Not By *us*, But By Him Who Calls
This is going to rub brothers and sisters the wrong way. I know, because it treated this
son of ministers in the same fashion when I received it. So I encourage every reader to be
prepared to do their due diligence and verify what I say here in Scripture before
rejecting or saying Amen to it.
If we are saved by grace of God, through faith... and even this faith is a gift of God
and not of ourselves, lest any of us should boast (Ephesians 2:8-9), then what is being
done to people when they are "extended an invitation to Christian discipleship" during
an altar call and told to make a decision to choose Christ as Savior and Lord?
I say we do not choose, as God has already done it when it was just The Almighty and the Void. It should be noted that I say this from the context of what is written in Scripture, not what was written by a man named John Calvin.
"What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! For he says to Moses,
“I will have mercy on whom I have mercy,
and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.”
It does not, therefore, depend on man’s desire or effort, but on God’s mercy. For the
Scripture says to Pharaoh: “I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display
my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.” Therefore God
has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.
One of you will say to me: “Then why does God still blame us? For who resists his will?”
But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? “Shall what is formed say to him who formed
it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’” Does not the potter have the right to make out of
the same lump of clay some pottery for noble purposes and some for common use?" Romans 9:14-21
I say again, we do not have the power to choose. That's not our place. It is of grace,
lest any man should boast, and say "*I* chose to accept Jesus today!" This after hearing
in church service, "We invite you. Please come and make the choice to answer Him right now." to the tune of: Softly and tenderly, Jesus is calling...
It is as lovely and yearning an image as it is deceptive. Whether the deception is
deliberate or not is entirely irrelevant. Some churches do *not* claim that the call will save you, but the fact is that it was a recent fabrication of man in the first place. It was brought into Christendom in the 1830s by a man named Charles Finney, and evangelist who looked for forced decisions and results and got them with this method. Its newness may not identify it as "wrong" in and of itself, but it is notable that it was not a practice Jesus or his Disciples, or any of the early church practiced. And most importantly, is it explicit, or even implicit, anywhere in the Word, that we are to force decisions and get results?
Fred G. Zaspel conveys it this way: "The altar call is for a man to physically move from one point to another. The gospel call is for a man to flee to Christ. The gospel call is for a man to spiritually identify with Christ through faith, to reach out with the hand of faith and lay hold of Him Who is life. Accordingly, the duty of the evangelist is to command and even plead with men to run to Him for refuge. But this must never be confused with a command to move anywhere physically. Neither Jesus nor His apostles ever instructed anyone that in order to be saved they must "come to the front" or "come for prayer" or "go to the inquiry room" or go to any geographical location. They needn't go anywhere. They were exhorted to go to Christ and nowhere else. Moreover, they are exhorted and assured that going to Him they need go nowhere else."
He goes on to quote Charles Spurgeon: "Go to your God at once, even where you are now!" he would insist. "Cast yourself on Christ, now, at once, ere you stir an inch!" Spurgeon's practice was according to the Biblical model exactly. He would allow nothing to confuse the direction of the sinner's attention: it must be to Christ, and to Christ alone they are instructed look and go. Nor would they be allowed to entertain any notion that they should go somewhere else first. No! "Ere you stir an inch! Cast yourself on Christ now!"
Is salvation something which the spiritually dead can even respond to, through forced decision or otherwise, as we all were before we were given the gift of grace and faith in Jesus? They have to receive the grace to waken in their spiritual tombs, hear the call to "Come Forth!" and be dragged to the Savior.
Yes, I said dragged.
Jesus said in John 6:44 "No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me *draw* him: and I will raise him up at the last day."
That sounds like a decision was made, right; a choice to give in to calling and cajoling? If it does, it is because English translation from the original Greek dillutes the potent significance of the word translated as "draw".
There are two words in Biblical Greek, used by the Apostle John, translated into English as "draw". The one used by John for what Jesus said above means literally, to drag, used
elsewhere by the Apostle to describe the way a net full of fish is "drawn" in aboard a fishing vessel.
Fish in a net have no choice in the matter. They're not being wooed or cajoled by their emotions into the boat. This is not their desire. It is not even done through their effort. They're being dragged inexorably by something more sovereign over their fate than themselves.
We are like those fish. It is not our will to be saved while we are dead. A thing dead by sin and corruption sees nothing of its condition, and so neither acknowledges nor sees a need to be saved, and finds the whole idea complete foolishness.
But this is precisely what is being sold when people are told to come down to the altar late in the service and repeat a prayer after the caller. Not all altar calls, I have been admonished by my true brother, speak of easy grace in this way. Indeed, there are houses of worship where the call comes with a warning. But this takes the focus away from the spiritual act and makes it a physical one which *we* have control over.
My question is, in light of what has been written here, and the scriptures we've seen here, is all that the altar call implies scripturally correct? Is what the vast majority of altar calls are claiming the sinner can do for themselves true?
"Rogaine can restore your hair!!" is pedalled in the same manner of easy grace. It goes right at the pride of the balding person and starts soothing it without truly fixing the problem, or doing what it truly claims. It apparently can make some strands appear and make you feel like your hair is growing back... it *doesn't* tell you that the process can cause what natural hair you have left to fall out as it gets replaced by the peach fuzz Rogaine causes to appear... or that said peach fuzz rarely grows longer than half an inch.. or that it only lasts on the scalp for a limited time, and that once you stop using it (and therefore buying it), those feeble wisps fall right out and leave you with *less* hair than you started with.
"Make a decision for Christ today!!" is an even worse deception. The altar call declaring this, already not used by the Lord nor taught to His disciples, does the same disservice to the hearer, in that he or she is made to think the act of being cajoled down the aisle, (as though the Spirit of the Living God were an entity that created all things but we can somehow RESIST) to then sign a card, or repeat a prayer, will save them, because *they* have made the decision. Pride, feeding all those pricked emotions, is soothed deep inside, while the heart is still crafted from stone and sees no need to change anything; after all, they're saved as is, and no change is required, no life to be submitted.
The truth is, we choose nothing good for ourselves in the midst of our sin.
"The human heart is the most deceitful of all things, and desperately wicked. Who can know it?" Jeremiah 17:9
So without the grace of God, we respond only to emotions of guilt or fear, evoked from well crafted words, and run to an altar, only to have the decision cool once the fear abates and guilt subsides. *With* that grace, we focus only on running to Christ, right where we are, and having our hearts and lives changed by Him.
Altar calls, no matter the message delivered from them, do not save souls. Grace, through faith in the Son of God--all gifts from the Father--are what saves a soul. The moment of salvation is a moment where the attention needs to leave the sinner and where they are physically, and focus on the Savior.
What Altar Calls *do* often accomplish, however, is to take people and plant their behinds in the pews, as regularly as guilt can be pricked and pride soothed. They must be regularly overwhelmed by the treacherous emotion of guilt, which always up and vanishes in the face of a dearly loved pet sin. Meanwhile, the state of their repentance from their sin goes largely unaddressed, because it is too offensive for their pride to endure in full. Besides, grounds must be maintained. Massive buildings growing ever more massive must be heated and cooled. Staff must be paid. Utilities kept on. This is at *best* in the modern church; we won't even begin to go into what is required to keep some of these "bishops" and "prophets" in their luxurious lifestyles. This is not true of all, but no one can deny it is true of too many that get the facetime presented to the world to represent whatever *isn't* that way.
Unrepentant, guilt ridden people are made into paying customers, and leave out double doors riddled with the same guilt when the guilty *feeling* wears off, just like Rogaine. The problem is that they have not entered through those doors for the reasons they came in the book of Acts.
Numbers were added to the Body of Christ not through invitation, but because the disciples were
obedient and did what Jesus said would identify them as His; they loved one another. People saw the LORD when they saw the assemblage of the early Body of Christ, and they were *drawn* by grace of the LORD, through faith in His Son.
"They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe, and many wonders and miraculous signs were done by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved." Acts 2:42-46
The Lord added to their number *daily*.
Does this not completely fly in the face of what occurs within most church buildings every week? Do we fellowship together? Do we even know each other or sit near the same people? Do we speak to our brethren and share our burdens completely? Do we truly make their troubles *our* troubles, breaking bread together regularly, discussing the Word regularly? Or do we show up on Sunday for an hour or so and go back home?
The answer, sadly, is yes, it does. This is hard truth. No one likes the hard truth, and everyone hates the messenger of it. We are dashed upon it like a sailing vessel driven into it by a violent storm. Nothing can be done save to either be broken upon its impregnable, unyielding surface and reformed as the Living God wills it, or be eventually crushed under its inexorable weight.
We are clay in the Potter's hands. No matter what our pride and 1830s traditions whisper to the contrary, that's all we are. Clay has no say regarding how it is formed. That is the Potter's dominion.
That is our place. We can either slay our pride, bow and accept it; trusting and obeying Him, that the LORD may form us by His grace and mercy, or let our pride hurl curses at it because we don't like it, be dashed to ruin, and remain broken shards fit only for the refuse kiln.
For those still clinging to the idea that *we* do the choosing to accept invitations to be saved, consider the following scripture:
"Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will—to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace that he lavished on us with all wisdom and understanding. And he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ, to be put into effect when the times will have reached their fulfillment—to bring all things in heaven and on earth together under one head, even Christ.
In him we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will, in order that we, who were the first to hope in Christ, might be for the praise of his glory. And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession—to the praise of his glory." Ephesians 1:3-14
Who chose us in Him, according to SCRIPTURE? If you answered "we did," read it again.
Who predestined us to be adopted as His children through Christ Jesus, according to SCRIPTURE? If you answered "we did," read it again.
We were predestined according to Whose plan? If you said it was *our* or the *pastor's* plan to repeat a prayer and make an emotionally charged decision, read it again.
It was done according to Whose pleasure and will? If you said it was our will or our choice, read it again.
Not by *us*, but by Him Who calls.
Our pride will war against us over this and many other things we have owned previously, but we must accept that we are in a fight to the death, our spirit against our flesh and all that it loves. A wise man once told me, we think it is Satan who will die. But Jesus said it was *us*. Put your pride therefore to the sword, and give your life over in living sacrifice to the One Who ransomed us, and live. *We* are to be the temple of the Living God. *We*, not the building on the corner with the steeple that depends upon the government for its tax exempt status and will find itself in dire straits when it is soon revoked. *We* are the Body of Christ. May the LORD give us grace and mercy, to trust and obey the LORD, and be ready for His return.
Amen
son of ministers in the same fashion when I received it. So I encourage every reader to be
prepared to do their due diligence and verify what I say here in Scripture before
rejecting or saying Amen to it.
If we are saved by grace of God, through faith... and even this faith is a gift of God
and not of ourselves, lest any of us should boast (Ephesians 2:8-9), then what is being
done to people when they are "extended an invitation to Christian discipleship" during
an altar call and told to make a decision to choose Christ as Savior and Lord?
I say we do not choose, as God has already done it when it was just The Almighty and the Void. It should be noted that I say this from the context of what is written in Scripture, not what was written by a man named John Calvin.
"What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! For he says to Moses,
“I will have mercy on whom I have mercy,
and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.”
It does not, therefore, depend on man’s desire or effort, but on God’s mercy. For the
Scripture says to Pharaoh: “I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display
my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.” Therefore God
has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.
One of you will say to me: “Then why does God still blame us? For who resists his will?”
But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? “Shall what is formed say to him who formed
it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’” Does not the potter have the right to make out of
the same lump of clay some pottery for noble purposes and some for common use?" Romans 9:14-21
I say again, we do not have the power to choose. That's not our place. It is of grace,
lest any man should boast, and say "*I* chose to accept Jesus today!" This after hearing
in church service, "We invite you. Please come and make the choice to answer Him right now." to the tune of: Softly and tenderly, Jesus is calling...
It is as lovely and yearning an image as it is deceptive. Whether the deception is
deliberate or not is entirely irrelevant. Some churches do *not* claim that the call will save you, but the fact is that it was a recent fabrication of man in the first place. It was brought into Christendom in the 1830s by a man named Charles Finney, and evangelist who looked for forced decisions and results and got them with this method. Its newness may not identify it as "wrong" in and of itself, but it is notable that it was not a practice Jesus or his Disciples, or any of the early church practiced. And most importantly, is it explicit, or even implicit, anywhere in the Word, that we are to force decisions and get results?
Fred G. Zaspel conveys it this way: "The altar call is for a man to physically move from one point to another. The gospel call is for a man to flee to Christ. The gospel call is for a man to spiritually identify with Christ through faith, to reach out with the hand of faith and lay hold of Him Who is life. Accordingly, the duty of the evangelist is to command and even plead with men to run to Him for refuge. But this must never be confused with a command to move anywhere physically. Neither Jesus nor His apostles ever instructed anyone that in order to be saved they must "come to the front" or "come for prayer" or "go to the inquiry room" or go to any geographical location. They needn't go anywhere. They were exhorted to go to Christ and nowhere else. Moreover, they are exhorted and assured that going to Him they need go nowhere else."
He goes on to quote Charles Spurgeon: "Go to your God at once, even where you are now!" he would insist. "Cast yourself on Christ, now, at once, ere you stir an inch!" Spurgeon's practice was according to the Biblical model exactly. He would allow nothing to confuse the direction of the sinner's attention: it must be to Christ, and to Christ alone they are instructed look and go. Nor would they be allowed to entertain any notion that they should go somewhere else first. No! "Ere you stir an inch! Cast yourself on Christ now!"
Is salvation something which the spiritually dead can even respond to, through forced decision or otherwise, as we all were before we were given the gift of grace and faith in Jesus? They have to receive the grace to waken in their spiritual tombs, hear the call to "Come Forth!" and be dragged to the Savior.
Yes, I said dragged.
Jesus said in John 6:44 "No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me *draw* him: and I will raise him up at the last day."
That sounds like a decision was made, right; a choice to give in to calling and cajoling? If it does, it is because English translation from the original Greek dillutes the potent significance of the word translated as "draw".
There are two words in Biblical Greek, used by the Apostle John, translated into English as "draw". The one used by John for what Jesus said above means literally, to drag, used
elsewhere by the Apostle to describe the way a net full of fish is "drawn" in aboard a fishing vessel.
Fish in a net have no choice in the matter. They're not being wooed or cajoled by their emotions into the boat. This is not their desire. It is not even done through their effort. They're being dragged inexorably by something more sovereign over their fate than themselves.
We are like those fish. It is not our will to be saved while we are dead. A thing dead by sin and corruption sees nothing of its condition, and so neither acknowledges nor sees a need to be saved, and finds the whole idea complete foolishness.
But this is precisely what is being sold when people are told to come down to the altar late in the service and repeat a prayer after the caller. Not all altar calls, I have been admonished by my true brother, speak of easy grace in this way. Indeed, there are houses of worship where the call comes with a warning. But this takes the focus away from the spiritual act and makes it a physical one which *we* have control over.
My question is, in light of what has been written here, and the scriptures we've seen here, is all that the altar call implies scripturally correct? Is what the vast majority of altar calls are claiming the sinner can do for themselves true?
"Rogaine can restore your hair!!" is pedalled in the same manner of easy grace. It goes right at the pride of the balding person and starts soothing it without truly fixing the problem, or doing what it truly claims. It apparently can make some strands appear and make you feel like your hair is growing back... it *doesn't* tell you that the process can cause what natural hair you have left to fall out as it gets replaced by the peach fuzz Rogaine causes to appear... or that said peach fuzz rarely grows longer than half an inch.. or that it only lasts on the scalp for a limited time, and that once you stop using it (and therefore buying it), those feeble wisps fall right out and leave you with *less* hair than you started with.
"Make a decision for Christ today!!" is an even worse deception. The altar call declaring this, already not used by the Lord nor taught to His disciples, does the same disservice to the hearer, in that he or she is made to think the act of being cajoled down the aisle, (as though the Spirit of the Living God were an entity that created all things but we can somehow RESIST) to then sign a card, or repeat a prayer, will save them, because *they* have made the decision. Pride, feeding all those pricked emotions, is soothed deep inside, while the heart is still crafted from stone and sees no need to change anything; after all, they're saved as is, and no change is required, no life to be submitted.
The truth is, we choose nothing good for ourselves in the midst of our sin.
"The human heart is the most deceitful of all things, and desperately wicked. Who can know it?" Jeremiah 17:9
So without the grace of God, we respond only to emotions of guilt or fear, evoked from well crafted words, and run to an altar, only to have the decision cool once the fear abates and guilt subsides. *With* that grace, we focus only on running to Christ, right where we are, and having our hearts and lives changed by Him.
Altar calls, no matter the message delivered from them, do not save souls. Grace, through faith in the Son of God--all gifts from the Father--are what saves a soul. The moment of salvation is a moment where the attention needs to leave the sinner and where they are physically, and focus on the Savior.
What Altar Calls *do* often accomplish, however, is to take people and plant their behinds in the pews, as regularly as guilt can be pricked and pride soothed. They must be regularly overwhelmed by the treacherous emotion of guilt, which always up and vanishes in the face of a dearly loved pet sin. Meanwhile, the state of their repentance from their sin goes largely unaddressed, because it is too offensive for their pride to endure in full. Besides, grounds must be maintained. Massive buildings growing ever more massive must be heated and cooled. Staff must be paid. Utilities kept on. This is at *best* in the modern church; we won't even begin to go into what is required to keep some of these "bishops" and "prophets" in their luxurious lifestyles. This is not true of all, but no one can deny it is true of too many that get the facetime presented to the world to represent whatever *isn't* that way.
Unrepentant, guilt ridden people are made into paying customers, and leave out double doors riddled with the same guilt when the guilty *feeling* wears off, just like Rogaine. The problem is that they have not entered through those doors for the reasons they came in the book of Acts.
Numbers were added to the Body of Christ not through invitation, but because the disciples were
obedient and did what Jesus said would identify them as His; they loved one another. People saw the LORD when they saw the assemblage of the early Body of Christ, and they were *drawn* by grace of the LORD, through faith in His Son.
"They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe, and many wonders and miraculous signs were done by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved." Acts 2:42-46
The Lord added to their number *daily*.
Does this not completely fly in the face of what occurs within most church buildings every week? Do we fellowship together? Do we even know each other or sit near the same people? Do we speak to our brethren and share our burdens completely? Do we truly make their troubles *our* troubles, breaking bread together regularly, discussing the Word regularly? Or do we show up on Sunday for an hour or so and go back home?
The answer, sadly, is yes, it does. This is hard truth. No one likes the hard truth, and everyone hates the messenger of it. We are dashed upon it like a sailing vessel driven into it by a violent storm. Nothing can be done save to either be broken upon its impregnable, unyielding surface and reformed as the Living God wills it, or be eventually crushed under its inexorable weight.
We are clay in the Potter's hands. No matter what our pride and 1830s traditions whisper to the contrary, that's all we are. Clay has no say regarding how it is formed. That is the Potter's dominion.
That is our place. We can either slay our pride, bow and accept it; trusting and obeying Him, that the LORD may form us by His grace and mercy, or let our pride hurl curses at it because we don't like it, be dashed to ruin, and remain broken shards fit only for the refuse kiln.
For those still clinging to the idea that *we* do the choosing to accept invitations to be saved, consider the following scripture:
"Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will—to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace that he lavished on us with all wisdom and understanding. And he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ, to be put into effect when the times will have reached their fulfillment—to bring all things in heaven and on earth together under one head, even Christ.
In him we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will, in order that we, who were the first to hope in Christ, might be for the praise of his glory. And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession—to the praise of his glory." Ephesians 1:3-14
Who chose us in Him, according to SCRIPTURE? If you answered "we did," read it again.
Who predestined us to be adopted as His children through Christ Jesus, according to SCRIPTURE? If you answered "we did," read it again.
We were predestined according to Whose plan? If you said it was *our* or the *pastor's* plan to repeat a prayer and make an emotionally charged decision, read it again.
It was done according to Whose pleasure and will? If you said it was our will or our choice, read it again.
Not by *us*, but by Him Who calls.
Our pride will war against us over this and many other things we have owned previously, but we must accept that we are in a fight to the death, our spirit against our flesh and all that it loves. A wise man once told me, we think it is Satan who will die. But Jesus said it was *us*. Put your pride therefore to the sword, and give your life over in living sacrifice to the One Who ransomed us, and live. *We* are to be the temple of the Living God. *We*, not the building on the corner with the steeple that depends upon the government for its tax exempt status and will find itself in dire straits when it is soon revoked. *We* are the Body of Christ. May the LORD give us grace and mercy, to trust and obey the LORD, and be ready for His return.
Amen
Tuesday, May 3, 2011
Check the Integrity of your Gatekeeper
Check the Integrity of your Gatekeeper.
A brother in Christ by the name of Brian Jones wrote recently something so profound that it both laid me out from the sheer concussive force of it, and then led me to share and elaborate as the Spirit led me. He wrote the following;
"The Great Wall of China would barely be finished before they would be invaded three times. The invaders did not go over the wall, they didn't dig under it, they simply bribed the gatekeeper. Our mind has a gatekeeper. Have you bribed yours to allow an invasion? Check whom and what you are letting in, then tell me you don't have a security breech!"
As with all truth I have been exposed to lately, I first needed to get up off the floor from the sheer impact. Then, once I conveyed to him how much what he said blessed and edified me, I started writing.
When a member of the elect submits their life to the LORD, an eviction notice is served to all of the old inhabitants of *us*... what we are told is the temple of the Living God (2 Corinthians 6:16). All of them. The older, more entrenched ones, the ones which we came to love for the lying comforts they offered, the ecstasies they granted us; all which they made us feel before we were convicted of the sin, have rent controlled quarters within us. These usually have to be gassed, smoked out, bound, and dragged, kicking and screaming, from the premises, as the LORD grants us grace to do when we earnestly seek His face and bow to the Truth. We are then set free; the scales removed from our eyes so that they finally see and acknowledge the truth of our inherent sinfulness and need to be saved, the iron shackles removed from our wrists and ankles to allow us to at last be free, now that we are justified and made holy by the blood of the Son of God, to make war upon the enemy of our souls. We are supplied with armor, and by study of the Word of the LORD, shown how to wear them. We are supplied with the Sword of the Spirit, and by study of the Word of the LORD, shown how to wield the blade.
But the story does not end there.
"24 “When an evil spirit comes out of a man, it goes through arid places seeking rest and does not find it. Then it says, ‘I will return to the house I left.’ 25 When it arrives, it finds the house swept clean and put in order. 26 Then it goes and takes seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they go in and live there. And the final condition of that man is worse than the first.”" Luke 11:24-26
We are not given armor and weapons for show. We are not given sight to recognize our need for Him, supplied with weapon and armor, taught in their use, to then use them only on occasion, or when and where convenient. Our new way of life, from now until death, is the way of the warrior which champions the truth and lays down his or her life for it. We will be called to arms at all hours, day and night. We had best learn the practice of *sleeping* in the armor, with the Sword clenched in our fist, or we will perish, because that which left us by the Sovereign grace of the LORD will come back to test our mettle again. And again. And again. It *will not stop*, so we must depend ever more upon the LORD for our strength. The walls must always be vigilantly manned. The gatekeeper in the tower above the gates must have integrity such that they can not be bribed, nor feel pity or compassion when the unclean spirit we once harbored returns with another tactic, and by begging and bringing up how it comforted us before, or reminds us of how we once loved it, and thus seeks mercy to be allowed to enter in again.
To fail in any of this is to be overrun.
"1 They went across the lake to the region of the Gerasenes. 2 When Jesus got out of the boat, a man with an evil spirit came from the tombs to meet him. 3 This man lived in the tombs, and no one could bind him any more, not even with a chain. 4 For he had often been chained hand and foot, but he tore the chains apart and broke the irons on his feet. No one was strong enough to subdue him. 5 Night and day among the tombs and in the hills he would cry out and cut himself with stones.
6 When he saw Jesus from a distance, he ran and fell on his knees in front of him. 7 He shouted at the top of his voice, “What do you want with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? Swear to God that you won’t torture me!” 8 For Jesus had said to him, “Come out of this man, you evil spirit!”
9 Then Jesus asked him, “What is your name?”
“My name is Legion,” he replied, “for we are many.” 10 And he begged Jesus again and again not to send them out of the area.
11 A large herd of pigs was feeding on the nearby hillside. 12 The demons begged Jesus, “Send us among the pigs; allow us to go into them.” 13 He gave them permission, and the evil spirits came out and went into the pigs. The herd, about two thousand in number, rushed down the steep bank into the lake and were drowned.
14 Those tending the pigs ran off and reported this in the town and countryside, and the people went out to see what had happened. 15 When they came to Jesus, they saw the man who had been possessed by the legion of demons, sitting there, dressed and in his right mind; and they were afraid. 16 Those who had seen it told the people what had happened to the demon-possessed man—and told about the pigs as well. 17 Then the people began to plead with Jesus to leave their region.
18 As Jesus was getting into the boat, the man who had been demon-possessed begged to go with him. 19 Jesus did not let him, but said, “Go home to your family and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and how he has had mercy on you.” 20 So the man went away and began to tell in the Decapolis how much Jesus had done for him. And all the people were amazed." Mark 5:1-20
One thing that gave me deeper understanding and appreciation of the grace of sight without scales; every unclean spirit Jesus encounters knows Him by sight. The people knew Him as the carpenter Joseph's son. His disciples weren't sure in the beginning *who* He was. But these demons knew Him immediately. Not only did they know Him, they pointed at Him and called out to Him in the way the condemned behold their executioner at the time appointed for their execution. "What do You want with me?"
4 chapters earlier in Mark, Jesus encounters one in the synagogue, (That's right... *in the place of worship*. Let that sink in a few moments.) and it asks "Have You come to destroy us?" This is the same question which the condemned have answered for them unspoken, when the warden and the priest and guards assemble before the cell door and he says "It is time."
They know their fate. They know it is coming. Everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels. They commit their acts knowing there is no forgiveness, nothing but payment exacted for their audacity to rebel against their Creator. I read of the man with Legion within him dwelling near tombs, crying out and causing the man to cut himself.
Monstrous despair. It made sense that it would both be where it was and doing what it was doing to the host. Self hatred and loathing must be at the root of each of them, and the myriad ways in which they weaponize and deploy the weapons of their master the Accuser; "the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life" are proof that they have no other purpose than to use as many means to bring you to their level of misery and despair as possible, and see you tormented with them. They have nothing left.
CAST THEM OUT!!! By the grace and authority given to us, by the LORD and Savior who ransomed us with His own blood, cast them over your walls far from you AND DON'T LET A SINGLE ONE OF THEM BACK IN, no matter how piteous the cry or overwhelming the force arrayed is, FOR THEY THAT BE WITH US ARE MORE THAN THEY THAT BE WITH THEM.
Bring the gatekeeper of your mind, where the battlefield truly is, before the throne of God, and trade up for one with impregnable integrity. Because anything that gets in and does not glorify the LORD your God is only there to kill you. Submit therefore to the Absolute Truth of the Almighty, use what He has given you and taught you, be strengthened by your obedience to love Him with all you have, and among the brethren encourage and love one another, and live. Fail and be taken with those who see only their destruction in front of them, and share their fate.
A brother in Christ by the name of Brian Jones wrote recently something so profound that it both laid me out from the sheer concussive force of it, and then led me to share and elaborate as the Spirit led me. He wrote the following;
"The Great Wall of China would barely be finished before they would be invaded three times. The invaders did not go over the wall, they didn't dig under it, they simply bribed the gatekeeper. Our mind has a gatekeeper. Have you bribed yours to allow an invasion? Check whom and what you are letting in, then tell me you don't have a security breech!"
As with all truth I have been exposed to lately, I first needed to get up off the floor from the sheer impact. Then, once I conveyed to him how much what he said blessed and edified me, I started writing.
When a member of the elect submits their life to the LORD, an eviction notice is served to all of the old inhabitants of *us*... what we are told is the temple of the Living God (2 Corinthians 6:16). All of them. The older, more entrenched ones, the ones which we came to love for the lying comforts they offered, the ecstasies they granted us; all which they made us feel before we were convicted of the sin, have rent controlled quarters within us. These usually have to be gassed, smoked out, bound, and dragged, kicking and screaming, from the premises, as the LORD grants us grace to do when we earnestly seek His face and bow to the Truth. We are then set free; the scales removed from our eyes so that they finally see and acknowledge the truth of our inherent sinfulness and need to be saved, the iron shackles removed from our wrists and ankles to allow us to at last be free, now that we are justified and made holy by the blood of the Son of God, to make war upon the enemy of our souls. We are supplied with armor, and by study of the Word of the LORD, shown how to wear them. We are supplied with the Sword of the Spirit, and by study of the Word of the LORD, shown how to wield the blade.
But the story does not end there.
"24 “When an evil spirit comes out of a man, it goes through arid places seeking rest and does not find it. Then it says, ‘I will return to the house I left.’ 25 When it arrives, it finds the house swept clean and put in order. 26 Then it goes and takes seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they go in and live there. And the final condition of that man is worse than the first.”" Luke 11:24-26
We are not given armor and weapons for show. We are not given sight to recognize our need for Him, supplied with weapon and armor, taught in their use, to then use them only on occasion, or when and where convenient. Our new way of life, from now until death, is the way of the warrior which champions the truth and lays down his or her life for it. We will be called to arms at all hours, day and night. We had best learn the practice of *sleeping* in the armor, with the Sword clenched in our fist, or we will perish, because that which left us by the Sovereign grace of the LORD will come back to test our mettle again. And again. And again. It *will not stop*, so we must depend ever more upon the LORD for our strength. The walls must always be vigilantly manned. The gatekeeper in the tower above the gates must have integrity such that they can not be bribed, nor feel pity or compassion when the unclean spirit we once harbored returns with another tactic, and by begging and bringing up how it comforted us before, or reminds us of how we once loved it, and thus seeks mercy to be allowed to enter in again.
To fail in any of this is to be overrun.
"1 They went across the lake to the region of the Gerasenes. 2 When Jesus got out of the boat, a man with an evil spirit came from the tombs to meet him. 3 This man lived in the tombs, and no one could bind him any more, not even with a chain. 4 For he had often been chained hand and foot, but he tore the chains apart and broke the irons on his feet. No one was strong enough to subdue him. 5 Night and day among the tombs and in the hills he would cry out and cut himself with stones.
6 When he saw Jesus from a distance, he ran and fell on his knees in front of him. 7 He shouted at the top of his voice, “What do you want with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? Swear to God that you won’t torture me!” 8 For Jesus had said to him, “Come out of this man, you evil spirit!”
9 Then Jesus asked him, “What is your name?”
“My name is Legion,” he replied, “for we are many.” 10 And he begged Jesus again and again not to send them out of the area.
11 A large herd of pigs was feeding on the nearby hillside. 12 The demons begged Jesus, “Send us among the pigs; allow us to go into them.” 13 He gave them permission, and the evil spirits came out and went into the pigs. The herd, about two thousand in number, rushed down the steep bank into the lake and were drowned.
14 Those tending the pigs ran off and reported this in the town and countryside, and the people went out to see what had happened. 15 When they came to Jesus, they saw the man who had been possessed by the legion of demons, sitting there, dressed and in his right mind; and they were afraid. 16 Those who had seen it told the people what had happened to the demon-possessed man—and told about the pigs as well. 17 Then the people began to plead with Jesus to leave their region.
18 As Jesus was getting into the boat, the man who had been demon-possessed begged to go with him. 19 Jesus did not let him, but said, “Go home to your family and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and how he has had mercy on you.” 20 So the man went away and began to tell in the Decapolis how much Jesus had done for him. And all the people were amazed." Mark 5:1-20
One thing that gave me deeper understanding and appreciation of the grace of sight without scales; every unclean spirit Jesus encounters knows Him by sight. The people knew Him as the carpenter Joseph's son. His disciples weren't sure in the beginning *who* He was. But these demons knew Him immediately. Not only did they know Him, they pointed at Him and called out to Him in the way the condemned behold their executioner at the time appointed for their execution. "What do You want with me?"
4 chapters earlier in Mark, Jesus encounters one in the synagogue, (That's right... *in the place of worship*. Let that sink in a few moments.) and it asks "Have You come to destroy us?" This is the same question which the condemned have answered for them unspoken, when the warden and the priest and guards assemble before the cell door and he says "It is time."
They know their fate. They know it is coming. Everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels. They commit their acts knowing there is no forgiveness, nothing but payment exacted for their audacity to rebel against their Creator. I read of the man with Legion within him dwelling near tombs, crying out and causing the man to cut himself.
Monstrous despair. It made sense that it would both be where it was and doing what it was doing to the host. Self hatred and loathing must be at the root of each of them, and the myriad ways in which they weaponize and deploy the weapons of their master the Accuser; "the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life" are proof that they have no other purpose than to use as many means to bring you to their level of misery and despair as possible, and see you tormented with them. They have nothing left.
CAST THEM OUT!!! By the grace and authority given to us, by the LORD and Savior who ransomed us with His own blood, cast them over your walls far from you AND DON'T LET A SINGLE ONE OF THEM BACK IN, no matter how piteous the cry or overwhelming the force arrayed is, FOR THEY THAT BE WITH US ARE MORE THAN THEY THAT BE WITH THEM.
Bring the gatekeeper of your mind, where the battlefield truly is, before the throne of God, and trade up for one with impregnable integrity. Because anything that gets in and does not glorify the LORD your God is only there to kill you. Submit therefore to the Absolute Truth of the Almighty, use what He has given you and taught you, be strengthened by your obedience to love Him with all you have, and among the brethren encourage and love one another, and live. Fail and be taken with those who see only their destruction in front of them, and share their fate.
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