Two little things.

The argument that protestants have a man-made tradition in their idea of things like guaranteed salvation and limited atonement and total depravity and all those other things is goofy. I shall touch on one that really hangs stuff in the wind for easy viewing. As a byproduct of this particular passage in case, another critical shot is placed right at the heart of doubt.  I would like to dedicate this hardly perfect but very important post, small as it is, to a small person who just joined us in the world today. I hope Julia will appreciate this. I hope everybody else will to.

Ephesians 1:1-10

Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God,

To the saints who are in Ephesus, and are faithful in Christ Jesus:

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.

 Predestination is NOT a man-made tradition. There’s nothing I can think of in the world today that would inspire the idea of predestination, to Calvin or my pastor or some atheist or anybody else. In reflection about my view of the world prior to my salvation, it would never have occurred to me that everything was already figured out, planned even, for my life and all those around me.

In the first part of Ephesians can be seen a statement of where the idea of Predestination came from. So we can start by arguing that Paul came up with it, in the context of Ephesians 1. But if all of us afterward haven’t come up with it, how could he have? I highly doubt Paul was any smarter than guys like MacArthur or Spurgeon or Calvin. Shoot, these guys have centuries more material with which to work than Paul did as far as references.

God came up with the idea. And not just came up with it, he is the idea. He knows everything, not from learning it, but from already knowing it. He started out knowing everything so how could God NOT have it all planned out. Like a race track, it’s there and laid out and all the cars on it will go around and around and everybody knows that’s what they’ll do. God knows it; he built this world and made all the things in it, including the people and he knows not just how they work but how they feel, individuals mind you (unlike Seldon in Asimov’s “Foundations”), and how they will live out their lives. Ultimately, God knows how all of everything works together all the way up to the end product. 

Romans 8:28 And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.

God knows Julia. He has already known her. He didn’t just know her before we did (which was as early as yesterday) but God has known her all along! In other words, God has never not known her. Or me or you. So if he already knows everything, and we accept there’s a purpose for everything he does, then he knows our purpose. Therefore he has planned out everything.

This ends my little discussion of predestination and the omniscience of God.

A couple things brought me to think for a few about our mission here on earth. Brief forays into some popular evangelists and recent studies at church and home have brought me to this:

What is the chief and highest end of man?

Man’s chief and highest end is to glorify God, and fully to enjoy him forever.

Romans 11:36 For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.

1 Corinthians 10:31 So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.

Above is the Westminster Larger Catechism’s first question and answer. Two reference verses are provided along with the answer.  If you’re interested in more about this, hit the link: Westminster Larger Catechism.

I’ve heard discussion that Catechisms and Confessions are way to Catholic or that they are Man Made or Legalistic junk. This is simply not true, though applications of these resources can certainly be Legalistic with little effort. The facts are that the Catechisms and Confessions are the same thing as if God gave us a written test that required us to put into our own words the Truths he has provided in the Bible. They are a distillation of doctrines that are found, widespread, throughout the Bible.

So, back to the subject at hand, I did a simple search at the ESV website (because that is a Bible translation I find to be as plain English as possible without going funky, cultural or relevant in the process) on glorify.

Click here: GLORIFY

The search found:

23 verses containing glorify.

And all those references were God and Jesus, just for extra credit.
Men glorified God because of what God did to them or for them. Men were commanded to glorify God in their bodies, in all that they did. Christ glorified the Father; the Father glorified Christ. Men glorify God because of his mercy, the Gospel, because of salvation, because of God’s deliverance, because God alone is worthy.

So my conclusion is…

Is God glorified through me? Is his glory evident in my life?

Am I seeking my own glory?

There are a number of evangelists and churches out there who teach about a God who is glorified by glorifying his people. These preach a message that, in essence, God is not glorified more than when his people are prospering, shiny, happy, self-sufficient, healthy, well-dressed, affluent, positive, sparkling.

Wait.  That last one was a reference to some vampire thing, I think. Did that slip in there somewhere? LoL. Side humor, I guess.

Back on topic.

Too many are churches and preachers who are glorified by the numbers they amass to themselves; who are communicating the disease of self-glorification through use of the Name of the Most High One. Too many of us believe that we bring glory to God by doing stuff that generally improves our personal situation and lives. This has two effects on the people who do not believe.

1. They are attracted to the show and treats offered by these self-help, family-improvement institutions and become well polished pieces of art, pock-marked by flaws that are glossed over with the diamond-hard shellac of superficial self-glorification. Look great, feel great, shot full of holes and dying. They come seeking and find what looks good on the outside and conceals horror on the inside

Matthew 23:27-28 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within are full of dead people’s bones and all uncleanness. 28 So you also outwardly appear righteous to others, but within you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.”

2. They are repulsed by the completely apparent stupidity of a faith group that claims to be God’s Children, who cannot defend their faith, falter under the first heavy storm in life, clearly fake the miracles, love people to death in hugs and money but do nothing for the soul. Some seekers seek the truth, and they are graced enough with sense to see the absolute inconsistency and corruption when they see it.

Matthew 23:27-28 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within are full of dead people’s bones and all uncleanness. 28 So you also outwardly appear righteous to others, but within you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.”

I, we, are still under this spell, I think; us post-modern/post-baby-boomer/generation-Y children. We instinctively seem to expect that God will provide, make a way, sugar-coat our lives.

B.S. and I mean it. We have it backwards. Look at the verses again. We’re not doing God a favor by pursuing Glorifying. We’re not getting paid for it.

Romans 12:1 I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.

We owe, not for payment for Services Rendered, but because it is our role as creation. God made us for that purpose.

A friend ran this through the media stream in my direction:

“The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.” (Galatians 5:22)

This stuff, right here, is not decoration to make us prettier (though it does just that), nor is it meat that makes us more substantial (though it also does just that). This stuff, the fruit of the Spirit, is what glorifies God, for it is the very characteristics that we should have as the righteous, properly conformed-to-his-original-design creatures that we should be.

Here’s the rub: We can’t do these things on our own and call it glorifying God. God installs these things within us. He takes our intellectual grasp of the fruits, which we vainly attempt to bring about on our own. He takes the understanding and brings it alive in us (re: Holy Spirit) so that we realize the real reason and method and application of the fruit. He makes it clean and pure fruit; sweetness and fragrance directed solely at Him.

No longer do we love others so that we can get their love in return. No more happiness based on those around us. No peace, patience, kindness, gentleness so we can get along well with others. No more goodness, faithfulness based on our own capacity and definition. There is freedom from legalistic and self-flagellating self-control.

Because we love others only because we see God’s love for them and how it glorifies him. Because we find happiness within our relationship with God, which transcends all worldly and bodily hardship. Because we find that peace, patience, kindness and gentleness only serve to Glorify God who alone has the right to vengeance and has demonstrated, through his own works, especially through Christ, that these are greater than fire and hell. Because goodness and faithfulness are found in God, through God and by God’s definition and point directly back to him. Because we constantly strive to limit ourselves from our sinful tendencies in order to glorify God more as the fruit of the Spirit fills the void left by our tidied minds and souls.

In summary: We must find a church, a preacher, a pastime all that focus not on the numbers or the miracles or the benefits of this pseudo-gospel; instead pointing entirely to God, calling us to holiness and the real Gospel which produces people devoted to glorifying the Most High.

As a pastor said, back in Cuba: “O Lord, that they see less of me and more of Thee.”

Short prayer, though I’m not so into praying over the intertubes.

Lord, I can’t seem to make this fruit thing work. I think I understand, through your Word, that I cannot, though I am sure to go back and try again with my own power. Lead me, through my failures, to turn to you for the love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control that should be apparent in my life. Lead me, through my successes, to realize that all of it is of you, through me, but entirely of you, for your glory and nothing more. Make my poverty your glory, my destitute spirit rely upon you for all things because all things must glorify you. Keep me from me and turn me to thee.

Lead me to be

what my beloved most needs

what my children most learn

what my church most should have

what the world should most see

Lead me to be

a lover of you

a servant employed

with but one chief end

your fame my sole joy

“…we agreed that it was like being born again, again.” 

I found a good bit to think about today as I read a post on Tim Challies’ blog, which is a daily staple for me. He almost always puts up something of relevant value for my day. This was no exception. The really good part was actually a comment by one of the readers. 

My little post here is going to be long-ish and probably not entirely coherent.  I want to try to capture what’s going through my head clearly but not lose it from distraction by other things.  So it’ll ramble, maybe not make sense entirely.  Bear with me.

From a background of mushy theology and easy-way Christian living, my recent salvation did not impart much real change in my understanding of theology. The Gospel took on new meaning. My relationship with the Lord was definitely established along with a great desire to know him “for real.”

But I had no foundation in serious theology (meat). I had a pretty soupy milk diet of what I remembered from my childhood lessons in the Word. I had Warren and Lucado, mixed up military chapels, charismatic tongue-flapping, “Left Behind” and Christian Psychology stuff which all gave me just that… Stuff. Not much to work with.

So, back to the commenter’s words:  “I remember discussing my discovery of solid doctrine, specifically reformed theology with a friend of mine from West Minster Seminary, and we agreed that it was like being born again, again.” This is what hit me most. 

There was a point, and I can’t really put a finger on it directly, where my leanings toward deeper, more solid theology became more of a downhill run. I wanted it, sought it, and then it started flowing in. This was mostly from study prompted by books I picked up. Good stuff, like Jim Berg’s “Changed Into His Image,” Calvin’s “Institutes”, MacArthur’s commentary, Challies “Discipline of Spiritual Discernment” and many others, which illuminated my Bible with questions and thoughts there was no way I could have come up with myself. 

I was initially spoon fed this stuff bit by bit, starting with my little brother, Ben, who was much more developed in his grasp of the fundamentals of the faith and the Word. He pretty much ensured I had a grounding in basic ways to look at God’s message and how I could take off with it.

A friend, Perry, who sort of just appeared from nowhere (not entirely), sent me a box of books that were particularly complex and hard to get through. I tried to wade my way through Iustitia Dei and the Cost of Discipleship. I don’t remember much about those or some of the theology books I picked up other than a general sense of what was good and not good (helps to have a Bible open when you’re reading stuff that is about the Bible). But what all my reading produced, during the first couple of years following the Lord’s call, was a desire for better and more stable understanding grew.

I can’t honestly say that my Christian “walk” improved as a result of all the study and ah-hah moments because it was intellectual stuff. I don’t think much had made it to my heart. 

This past year, however, I believe I can really relate to “being born again, again.” The solid meat that we’ve found at our church, the sudden (well-timed) switch from a congregation that was going south rapidly (and is now well south of right, only months after we left), a few moments at a Presbyterian church (not the liberal type), some good counseling sessions with a couple of pastors and some timely Bible studies, I’ve found a renewal of my faith and relationship with the Lord. 

That renewal is based on one thing first off:  Taking the Word of God as the Word of God. That means viewing the Bible as commandment and principle, not just as cotton-candy assent-worthy snacks. Our pastor preaches as such, our Bible studies follow suit and I find myself affected by that.  The Bible has become a clear description of God, his works and his commands that direct my perception of the way I live. It’s not just a self-help book or a series of enlightening truths anymore.

What do I mean by affected? I am increasingly convicted of the sovereignty of God and that nothing I do is outside of his specific direction. In other words, I didn’t choose to take this fresh stance and perspective on my own. Instead, I’m affected by the work of the Holy Spirit in all this new environment. Our counseling, our church, these things are God’s method of impacting me and changing me. 

The Word has a depth and value that far outweighs that first step into the waters of personal Bible study almost 6 years ago. I am convinced that what is referred to as a high view of God and his revelation is absolutely critical for the transformation into a lifestyle committed to righteousness. I didn’t have that. Now I see what it is and it’s working its way in.

Romans 11:33 “Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!”

Get this part though; I’m not bragging about some awesome turnaround in my holiness factor or some such. The battle there has, if anything become tougher and pitted with increased skirmishes with personal spiritual hygiene and my relationships with others. I think it’s harder, now that I am being more and more revealed for what I am, to consider myself improving in righteousness.

Psalm 1:2 “but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night.”

What I am bragging about is the wonder and joy of God’s revelation and how it is so amazingly clear how he maneuvers and sets up the situations all around to grow and teach me. That God has not crushed me in my resistance to change. That he has, instead, tweaked bits and pieces here and there to show me what I am and what he wants. And not just show but implant that below the belt in a way that both lifts up my head in hope and bows my knee in submission to his will.

The battlefield has, in the scarred remains, some pristine towers still standing. I really desire unity in my family, involving a real sense of devotion to our Lord and to each other. I really want to be involved in my church, more than just an attendee. I really hope to be a good witness at work. And these not for spiritual or worldly “attaboys” but because it really is my reasonable service.

Romans 12:1-2  “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”

Today I got the privilege of attending a class on The Institutes.

I can’t begin to explain all the coolness and faith-building and eye-opening I enjoyed there.  It was like a cruise to the North Atlantic and seeing a beautiful blue iceberg and realizing that, despite the awe-inspiring view, there was a monumental bit more that was there, but wasn’t visible, its effects seen but not completely perceived.  I’m not sure as that makes sense, just as the mysteries of God are just that, mysteries.

So I’m just going to put my notes down here, including some of what was going through my head as discussion developed the ideas.

First off, the topics were:  Predestination, Reprobation, Eschatology and a bit of Ecclesiology.  Fer us disedimicated folks, them’s technical terms that cover Salvation, Damnation,  End Times and Church.

Second off, lemme add my personal view of how the title track could run in this session:

Predestination Makes The Claim That God Does Not Wring His Hands.

I stole that twist of phrase about wringing hands from the meta of Pyromaniacs, but am not sure where specifically.  Suffice to say I definitely wasn’t intelligent enough to come up with it myself and am barely smart enough to use it properly.

As advertised in class itself, Predestination “Exalts God and Humbles Man.”

Okay.  On to what stood out to me as important.

1.  Calvin put predestination sort of in the middle of his work.  NOT in the front or in the back.  In other words, he apparently went against his own movement’s trademark focus and seems to have made priorities higher than predestination.  I personally gather that he took predestination as a given, not so worthy of massive defense and controversy.  IMHO, that is, kind of like Paul and the others didn’t really spend all that time defining and defending and elaborating something that God set up and apparently worked just fine without our perfect understanding.

2.  Slightly important.  Predestination is NOT unique to Calvin.  You don’t have to be a Calvinist to believe in predestination.  Arguably, all of us Christians believe in predestination whether we realize it or not.

3.  Mystery part.  God elects based on his mercy and for his good pleasure and his glory.  Pretty sure most will recognize the source of this statement.  Though I’m not a catechism or creed fed christian, I sure find that the Bible agrees quite a bit with the idea here (maybe because it’s bible-inspired?), that God does what he wills and how he wills, period.

4.  Election, the idea of the visible and invisible church, regeneration and all that take the glory away from the institution, the preacher and the witnesses, putting it back on the One Legitimate Recipient.  Can’t claim credit for saving somebody if the idea of Regeneration-within-Election is valid.  Fuzzy to contemplate in my mind, this is, so I may not be too clear.  I am, however unstable in terminology, stable in conviction.

5.  Reprobation (which leads to condemnation).  God PRE-DECIDES who is NOT gonna make it.  That part is very shocking, was for me to actually encounter it today, but it’s completely sensible and in agreement with the above predestination idea.  Therefore, God reprobates based on his good pleasure and his glory.  Read the story of Jacob and Esau for context.  One he loved and the other…

6.  Eschatology.  Unlike my christian education in the past, Calvin deals less with End Times stuff.  He paid attention to that stuff that was really meaty, valuable and apparently (I need to study more) of more consequence in the Bible.  Resurrection.  He didn’t focus so much on rapture details, Armageddon and all that which makes us shudder and look for Tim Lahaye to hook up the prophecy trough.

7.  Ecclesiology.  There again, the election and regeneration thing came up, giving us the visible and invisible church.  NOW there is an explanation for PKs (Pastors’ Kids) and GUBAs (Grown Up Born Again:   Those who have been christians all their lives) and how they either fall away or experience a sort of “second salvation” in the non-calvinist christian communities.  Strangely enough, this doesn’t seem to be a problem with these reformed guys.  It’s just as dreadful or awe-ful as reprobation, the notion that God chose before the dawn of time who was going to turn from Him for all eternity, to consider that there are people IN the church who APPEAR to be regenerate but ain’t gonna make it.

And finally, so much of this is just. plain. avoided in christian conversation.  The idea that just maybe God had EVERYTHING pre-selected, from heaven-bound souls to unrepentant rebels in parish suit-and-tie to druggies; every one of us to our destination, is really un-hip conversation material. Also un-hip is sitting back and NOT digging holes to China in our attempts to discern the details of the mysteries and prophecies of the Bible.

So, really, my question is…

How come Everybody is more than a little interested in dissecting the mysterious future of God’s end-times schedule (seals and plagues and fire and brimstone and who is that antichrist anyway), with movie after movie and book after book, fiction and speculation and “fact” oh my.

Yet we won’t address the lack of understanding of the real details that count, like God’s sovereignty and how we can glorify him.  I think, based on how my awe of God is greatly increased after this morning, that we could all benefit greatly on learning more about how God glorifies himself and causes everything he has made to glorify him.  More glory to him when we understand better how he is glorified, right?

In other news, I’ve been going to counseling with my beloved.  We’re studying marriage.  I’ve been sick for a few days along with the mama and our Molly.  I’m looking for a second job (one of those part-time things to cover differences between Navy pay and the money we owe).  Molly is a High Schooler (!!!!!).  Joscelin, Bo and Gwen are all in elementary school with no problems and lots of excitement.  The world is sorta rolling along around us.  It appears we’ve been led to a good church, and that is cause for excessive thankfulness.

More of the Chuck Colson I heard this week on the Focus On The Family radio broadcast.  Marines during the Vietnam war spent countless hours training every day to be able to fight and survive Over There.

Why don’t Christians, who have so much more to lose, to gain, even come close to that sort of preparation for combat?  I thought the same way when I was a Newbie to the faith.   I’ve distressingly slacked off on my PT and combat conditioning as a Christian since.  I absolutely must (and want) to get that back.

Also, an alarming thing that has been around a while, but is sparked by not just the Colson this week, but with Anika’s history course in college (her term paper) and a bunch of other stuff, including a sudden, rather interesting resurfacing at work of my writing from last year.

Truth.  We still have a massive problem with truth.  Apparently, over 50% of christians cannot grasp or commit to the concept of True Truth, of absolute truth.

Let me make this clear, any denial of absolute truth, the existence of such or the questioning of such in regards to the Bible, is a denial of the Gospel.  Introduce one speck of doubt that the Word of God is true and what follows is denial of the Gospel.  One can claim not to understand certain parts all day long.  One can be in sin, sad and in confusion about Biblical principles or whatever.

But if a christian claims to believe the Gospel, on the name of Jesus Christ (John 3:16), and says there are parts of the Bible that may not be true, or that they just can’t believe in absolute truth, that person is seriously WRONG.  Here is where rubber meets the road.

Allowing the Bible to have non-absolute truth is what has brought the Episcopal church in America to the swine-pens.  It is what has made good churches flop to eating peelings and offal with the animals.  It is what has led to the tarnishing of the name of God in the eyes of the world.

Lemme say, I’ve read over and over and I believe whole-heartedly that humans need boundaries.  We must have concretes and absolutes.  Kids must have their boundaries or they will face horrid challenges as adults to conform, to perform, to meet the face of their peers, cohorts and enemies and deal properly with each.  Adults must have the same.  I see the lack of boundaries and absolutes in the Navy as The One Most Devastating cause of morale and discipline failures we have today.

Absolute truth, concretes, laws (not the ones passed in the USG, but those which really are RULES) must exist, must be comprehended and must be committed to by the superiors and the subordinates in all places of our society.  There is no exception to the church or to individual christians.  Period.  In fact, I am certain that it is actually EXCEPTIONALLY true about Christ’s house and inhabitants.  We are the salt and light, and our projection upon the earth is that of God’s Absolute Authority over our lives, those outside God’s family and all of creation.  Period.

Colson said this problem is why so many are turning to Islam, because it is a source of concrete rules, of doctrine where the adherent is required (REQUIRED) to follow the rules.  Period.

SHAME on me.  Shame on us.  Shame on us for not following God’s rules, his directions throughout our lives.  Double shame on us in handling his word as a business manual for making our own names big and our pocketbooks fatter.  TRIPLE shame on us who deny that God’s testimony of himself could even possibly, even minutely unimportantly, be questionable.

If I don’t agree with the Bible, saying it is wrong in this place or that part, I am wrong, not the Bible.  Be my argument the handling of sex and relationships, I am on the losing end.  If my argument is health and wealth being mine and not at the sole discretion of my God in his unwavering will, I am at fault.  If I want to chill out with a cold one and a smoke and talk about the hot chicks at work for hours, giving up the chance to go to worship and renew my walk with my fellow christians in the race that we all swore we’d begin and complete without reserve, and I argue that the Bible has given me that freedom now, for I am free…  I’m wrong there too.

And I’ve done them all.  All three listed and plenty others.  Some still hurt, the miserable, sinful, horridness of my choices AS A PROFESSING CHRISTIAN and I shudder to recall them.  I am forgiven, but the chills remain, an inescapable cross that casts its shadow on my face, reminding me of how much argument with my God costs.  I still haven’t finished dealing with some of it.  Some of my sins’ shadows are going to come knocking here eventually,  and there’s really nothing I can do but wait for the color to show and seek the restitution as it becomes possible.

All that simply means that personal defiance, denial, departure in regards to God’s Word is the stuff of nightmares.  It’s death to testimony, death to ministry, to fellowship, to witness, you name it.  It might not destroy your salvation, which God has fore-ordained and pre-paid from before time and through Christ’s sacrifice for the death penalty, but it can render us with empty pockets and bare feet when we come home to him, asking in our groveling shame to be numbered among the lowest servants.

Worthiness to be called sons of God includes living up to the terms of adoption.  We enter a new house, we fall under its rules.  Children grow up under a set of rules in their homes.  If ever they return to their childhood home, the rules, I would think, would still be there.  We owe Our Lord that commitment, that very signature-in-blood-oath that is our own fundamental, unshakeable, absolute truth:  Obedience and belief.

Walking the fence?  Peril.  If you fall off, you’ll hit hard on either side.  There’s your ground truth.

I’m in Job right now.  Chapter 38.

“Who is this who darkens counsel by words without knowledge?  Now prepare yourself like a man; I will question you, and you shall answer Me.”

Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth?  Tell me, if you have understanding.”

We normally base our individual lives on what we have experienced.  We don’t take into account the fact that God Himself put in the controls and actuators in the world.  We judge people just as they judge us.  We accept or battle our circumstances, be they physical conditions or mental, personal or interactive, based on how other people appear to us (not even as the REALLY are, but how they appear).  We determine our status, attractiveness, capabilities, our very worth based on what everything around us sets as the standard.

Based on this concept, I can claim that I am the smartest man who ever lived, because I’ve never met anyone who thinks all the things I think about right now in my life. I can claim I am righteous above 99% of the population for I’ve seen everyone around me do evil that I would never consider doing.  I can claim there is nothing wrong with me for all the rest are just plain screwed up through and through.

Job 38:2-3, above, refutes this mess.  God set the mechanics of creation, including the emotional, spiritual concepts.  He is the sole judge of my condition.  My salvation is completely dependent on me seeing myself His way and not because I finally understood through experience that I am worthy.  Left to my own judgment, I would never have come to Christ.  I had to see what He saw and then surrender to that vision.

“Have you commanded the morning since your days began, and caused the dawn to know its place, that it might take hold of the ends of the earth, and the wicked be shaken out of it?”

We are raised by the world to know without a doubt that we control our circumstances and can change them and that everything we hate about our state is our fault or someone else’s.  Advertisements say “get the new you” and “you deserve it.”  Propaganda says “believe in change” and “here’s who you can blame.”  Based on this, my weakness, my evil thoughts and my unjust actions are something I can change.  I can remove myself from the bad guy next to me and everything will be okay.

Job 38:12-13 above completely argues against this.  I do not have the right to blame me or others, nor can I simply drop what galls me and become something else.  God runs the show because He wrote the play and only He can change the characters as He sees fit.  We comply or fail to comply based on whether we choose to see things as He has told us to see them or not.

There’s a lot of emotion that boils up in every portion of our lives.  When we are hurt, emotion, feelings, pile up and tip the scales of our attitudes.  When we are weak, the same happens.  Just as importantly, when we are strong or are in good situations, our emotions, our feelings, rise with us.

It’s a good thing to have the feelings, for they are God-given.  They support our actions with the energy to continue when things are going well and warn us when things are not going so well.  But feelings are not the basis for our judgment of condition. Yesterday my little article said a lot that included feelings, and I wanted to address that important point further.

Even our feelings are subject to failure because our world is corrupt.  What we think about anything is skewed by our corrupted nature.  What I feel about you is potentially all wrong and what you feel about me is potentially just as wrong.  We cannot trust our emotions, our thoughts without safeguards.

Here, then, is the safeguard.  God has directed us how to approach good events and evil ones.  God has told us the value of our own wisdom and philosophy.

Proverbs 18:12

“Before destruction the heart of a man is haughty, and before honor is humility.”

Proverbs 18:17

“The first one to plead his cause seems right, until his neighbor comes and examines him.”

Proverbs 19:3

“The foolishness of a man twists his way, and his heart frets against the Lord.”

Proverbs 19:21

“There are many plans in a man’s heart, nevertheless, the Lord’s counsel — that will stand.”

We don’t work on our own judgment.  We can’t.  But we do anyway.  This is why, many times, we need to shut up and take the Word for its word.  When God tells us that this is the way to do it, we must make the conscious decision to do just what He says and how, regardless of our own feelings about the subject.

When we fail, we take God’s opinion of the thing, not our own.  When we hate ourselves, we take up God’s position on our plight.  Yes, that seems impossible in almost every case, but it must be done.  We must, We Must, put ourselves to the side and choose to act as He would have us, as much as we do not want to.

NOTE:  By now, I believe I may appear exceedingly pretentious and high-and-mighty in my message.  In the back of my mind, that is what I’m feeling as well.  But I have consciously chosen to deny this pile of garbage sequence of feelings, because I have my Bible right in front of me and I am confident that I am coming from the viewpoint of the Lord and not of my own opinion.

Look at this verse:

Proverbs 20:22

“Do not say, ‘I will recompense evil’; wait for the Lord, and He will save you.”

We do not take action on our own judgment.  We take action on the Lord’s direction.  We wait for Him in all things.  We must, when faced with our own feelings, stop ourselves and consider what God has prescribed as proper view of the circumstances.

Many times those choices aren’t easy.  Many times we just can’t seem to bring ourselves to be emotionally attached to these Godly choices.  We can’t feel the motivation to pursue them.  That’s sin, still, putting out the final effort to keep us from turning from the old man.  We must, many times over, simply do that which we must do, regardless of how we feel about it.

Trust Him that through our cooperation with His viewpoint that He will bless us with the strength to comply and eventually even the understanding of His ways.

This, I believe, is the root of good works.  We rarely do good works out of a genuine desire that matches God’s desire.  We do them because we expect reward of some sort.  Better that we perform good works simply because our Master has told us to do so and trust that our reward (the only one that counts) is a closer walk with Him.

This applies to our character as much as our deeds.  We must unreservedly choose to act as God told us.  In truth, we cannot do better, for our corrupted nature prevents us ever being able to comply because it’s natural to do so.  We are holy because God declared us holy, not because of any innate ability to be so.

Ephesians 2:8-10

“For by grace have you been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.  For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.”

Our purpose is His purpose.  We do not set our own course, and that means our own opinions and convictions, on our own terms, are not valid.  He gives and takes away as He sees fit.  Our joy and misery are dependent on His point of view.

In other words, we should be joyful when we know His desires are being met.  We should be miserable when we know His desires are being resisted.

Here’s what repentance looks like to me, and I hope I will choose, consciously, to repeat this whenever I realize I have overstepped God’s point of view:

Job 42:2-6

“I know that You can do everything, and that no purpose of Yours can be withheld from You.

“You asked, ‘Who is this who hides counsel without knowledge?’

“Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand, things too wonderful for me, which I did not know.

“Listen, please, and let me speak; You said, ‘I will question you, and you shall answer Me.’

“I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees You.

“Therefore I abhor myself and repent in dust and ashes.”

We pride ourselves on being logical, most of us. There are two routes for logic. One is right.

One is based on perception. “As I see it…”
The other is based on assuming Conception. “As He made it…”

o mistake in the title. I backtracked to verse 13 because I learned something. This last passage is about certainty. John started it out in 13, giving several principles for Christian certainty. I already talked about one last time, but wanted to tie all of it together. Verse 13 is a pretty cool bridge for what John wrote before and after. All through the letter, he’s given us checks and validations for our faith, our performance and our instructions. Now he’s finishing up with the guarantees, or certainty of our condition, reaching all the way back to chapter 1 in the end.

(I broke this up into sections. It’s long)

“These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life, and that you may continue to believe in the name of the Son of God.

“Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of Him.”

Confidence is the bolstering of faith. We gain confidence and our faith grows by our actions. So when we pray for things that will please God (another way to say “according to His will”), we are acting as He would have us act. Prayer is an act of love, both love of God and love of brother. So our confidence is built up when we pray our praise, our needs, our desires for His will. And when we have love in our hearts, we will never run out of things to pray for.

God hears every single prayer. Note that there’s no guarantee that He’ll answer (act on) every single prayer as we’ve put it to Him. Though we pray in regards to His will, God’s plans and purposes usually surpass our miniature little lives. We can’t always know what He’s going to do. If I pray for my daughter to grow up big and strong, and she lives a life, physically frail and often sickly, is that a failed prayer? Not necessarily. Perhaps that is not God’s will, but instead to make her faith stronger through her physical weakness, and thereby impact the faith of many others.

A real example of this is the final months of my grandmother’s life. She wasn’t well at all. Many prayed for her to recover, or have peace and comfort with no more troubles as she neared her return to the Lord. It didn’t quite go as well as I’d envisioned it would, if the Lord answered my prayers. I think Grandma didn’t have a whole lot of comfort then. But the impact of what went on during that period was incredible. My grandpa, in his regular visits to Grandma’s hospital room, got to witness to many who worked or lived there. He made friends of many of the staff, and his faithfulness to Grandma really impressed them all. God worked through Grandma’s trial (and Grandpa’s, too, for he was probably very troubled by all this sad situation), to make a great impact on the people around both of them. So I think Grandpa was strengthened, my family’s faith was grown, and Grandma probably has a whole lot of positive things to say about her last day (and I can’t wait to talk to her in heaven and find out).

“If anyone sees his brother sinning a sin which does not lead to death, he will ask and He will give him life for those who commit sin not leading to death. There is sin leading to death. I do not say that he should pray about that. All unrighteousness is sin, and there is sin not leading to death.

“We know that whoever is born of God does not sin; but he who has been born of God keeps himself, and the wicked one does not touch him.”

This next part looks kind of difficult, but it really isn’t. One might decide, based on verse 16 that there are two types of sin (mortal and not mortal). Included with the package of verses 14 through 17, this sort of determination won’t work.

So what does John mean about this sin which leads to death? I can’t remember quite when or where this conversation took place, but I was involved in a discussion concerning a particular drug-user. This person became critically ill shortly after being saved. He was unable to conquer his drug addiction. I think most of the discussion group all agreed that the very best thing for that poor person was to be reclaimed by his Lord, freed from the trap into which he’d fallen. I think this situation illustrates what John is talking about.

It is very possible for a Christian to really mess up, and get locked into the repetition of this sin. We can’t argue much about this, for the Bible is constantly warning us, reminding us and exhorting us about our sinful nature. Pick a book in the Bible and you’ll see sin within. Try Romans, of course. Read 1st John over again. Ecclesiastes will certainly drive us into that dark time of the soul where sin seems to be on all sides. The pastoral epistles (Timothy and Titus and such), are full of instructions for leaders concerning combating that constant sin. Not only that, but those books in particular make very strong orders to the leaders, reminding them of their qualifications and conduct, which is a powerful indicator that though sin is defeated, it is still here among us, with very powerful death-throes.

So when a Christian fails, falls down into sin and gets himself into so much trouble that there is no hope for him, it is entirely possible that the Lord has designed to prune the defective part. It is sad, and we certainly would not be wrong to mourn such a loss, but at the same time, for us to pray in futility for a “lost cause” is simply wasteful. This is a hard instruction, but if we look at it from God’s perspective, we know that when He says “ENOUGH…” well, that’s it, isn’t it? Pray more ahead of time. We have the chance to catch and combat sin before it leads to death. For more reading on this serious issue, go to James 1:12-15. There’s no argument that God will, when He sees fit, bring someone home. It’s sort of like being benched, but we’re in the last quarter, so there isn’t going to be another chance to get back in the game.

All sin is unrighteousness, and if we work at it, fighting it through prayer, counseling, teaching and accountability (and LOVE), we will minimize the fatalities, for that goal is most certainly in God’s will.

The certainty we have, though, is simple. We know God answers prayer. Every time. Our faith is made more concrete through praying and receiving the answers. We have certainty that God will not only hear us, our pleas and our praises, but He will deal with them in ways far superior to the outcomes we envision.

“We know that we are of God, and the whole world lies under the sway of the wicked one.

“And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us an understanding, that we may know Him who is true; and we are in Him who is true, in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life.

“Little children, keep yourselves from idols. Amen.”

And John warns us very gravely that we still have to contend with the world. The whole world is corrupt, and it is constantly going to encroach on our territory. We can’t forget that we’re in the world. Our personal lives, our families, our thoughts, our habits and our churches, all those things which belong to Christ are all under attack. The world sneaks in and even barges in.

Our certainty is that the world will combat us. It’s not a fun certainty, but look at it from God’s perspective. He’s opposed to the ways of the world. Not just “against them” as though it was just His opinion, but He’s literally in opposition to the sin-coated mess we call earth. He wants it one way, and it will be so one day. If we look at it like this, it’s very clear when we’re acting in His will. The world is going to buck and bite us at every turn. That’s a very tangible certainty.

The blessing (the MIGHTY blessing) we have is that Christ’s sacrifice for us enabled us to receive the understanding of this whole equation. We can grasp the difference between what God is and what the world is. We can grasp the difference between what He wants and what the world wants. And we know what love really is, and can compare it, through our precious gift of understanding, to the world’s version of love.

And the finality? Almost too short? I love it. Makes me smile, even. It’s one of the best things John says in this really powerful letter. It’s akin to saying “mind your Ps and Qs” to the kids as you leave them with the baby sitter. Keep your hands to yourself! Keep away from those treats the wicked-witch of a world keeps offering. We get tempted, tangled, tied up and then strangled by our idols. Don’t get yourself killed by idolatry. Don’t kill your ministry, your relationships, your walk with God for those things of the world which give us only fleeting, false satisfaction.

John wants us to be free. God intends for us to be free. In the five chapters of 1st John, I’ve learned what the keys are for this freedom. The biggest key, you could call it the master key, is love. And the keys that work on that door into freedom are faith, prayer, good works, knowing God’s will, learning about Him, knowing the truth, standing for the truth, trusting in Him, believing in Him.

Look at God the right way. Look at the world the right way. Deal with sin as God would deal with sin. Pray as Christ prayed. All these things will lift our confidence, empower us to do greater things for Him and bring peace to our troubled lives.

ome victory for believers here. And tests of being born again. All in one assurance package.

“Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God, and everyone who loves Him who begot also loves him who is begotten of Him. By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and keep His commandments.

“For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not burdensome. For whatever is born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world — our faith.

Who is he who overcomes the world, but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?”

Test first. Victory later.

Remember the audience to whom John was writing? Gnostics, right? Two things we can know about Gnostics from previous reading in 1st John are that they keep trying to deny the truth about Christ and they keep failing to keep His commandments.

How do we know this? All through the 1st through 4th chapters, John is either talking about love or about the truth of Christ. Specifically, John is telling us about loving God (and what that entails) and loving the brethren (and what that entails). And he is constantly contrasting the assent and dissent concerning Christ’s divinity. So we conclude that Gnostics were exhibiting these problems and were communicating them to others via false teaching.

Sorry, had to backtrack a little, just to bring in the focus. Two tests here. One is personal and the other is external.

We can tell false teachers by their flavor. They don’t believe the entirety of Christ’s truth. Sound doubtful that it’s really that simple? Here are a couple of my logic experiments. Works for false beliefs or false teaching.

There are plenty of them. Find a truth about God in the Bible and there’s probably a teaching that denies it. If that teaching is not contradicted in the Bible word-for-word, we can certainly consider the nature of Christ, God, the Holy Spirit and determine the truth or error of a teaching (remember the part about discerning spirits?).

The next test is the internal one, and it’s a lesson as well as a test. If we love God and keep His commandments, we will love the children of God. Simple enough. Love, God, commandments and God’s children are all tied together here. If I love my brother, I am loving God. If I keep God’s commandments, I am loving my brother. If I love God, I am loving my Brother. You can make a whole slew of if-then statements out of these four words and they’re all true.

I know I am saved if I test these statements against myself. Do I love God? If I’m saved, I will continue to love God! Do I love my brother? I am only loving my brother if I love God, so there it is again — saved. Symptom, not cause, though. Don’t think that we can fake this stuff or get into legalese banter with God. One must be true to make the others true. Truly loving God depends on our salvation.

Recap on the test. A Gnostic isn’t going to be able to keep these if-then statements. One or more (likely all) will break down eventually. Gnostics didn’t teach all this stuff, because their concept of Christ, of God, was skewed away from the Gospel. False teachers today will demonstrate the same thing.

My convoluted notes on Believing that Jesus is the Christ. A couple of days ago I wrote about the assembly of ideas tied into believing Jesus is the Christ. I think it’s good to mention again what I understand about Him in this equation.

Jesus is God. Jesus is the Messiah, the Christ, the anointed one. He is the one who is the propitiation (payment) for our sins. Jesus is the Lord of every Christian’s life. Jesus is the example of Christian life.

To deny any of these, one is either confused and in need of instruction or one is not saved. How does this work? Each of the statements above are required for the salvation in the Gospel to function. How will God forgive us without sacrifice? Which sacrifice will suffice? If we are lawless and lordless before forgiveness, what are we afterward?

That was pretty simplistic, but I hope the point is clear.

On to the next part. Encouragement and victory! We love this part, right?

Building on the “not burdensome” statement. John says we’re not going to be burdened too much. That’s because we are born of God. God has already overcome the world (being the all-powerful, all-knowing Creator of everything), since nothing is out of His realm of Control. Christ did the work that defeated Satan, so we’re good to go as far as the Eternal Battle Between Good And Evil Goes (which isn’t exactly eternal, then, is it?). Based on that, we can’t doubt that no burden will overcome us. We’re on the winning team, not as in going to win, but has won. Victor’s circle is just a quick jog from the finish line.

Here’s the thing. John says first that we overcome the world if we’re born of God. Next (right after), He says, past tense, “And this is the victory that has overcome the world — our faith.” Not will, but has. Already did.

Christians, those who have their salvation, have overcome the world. We don’t usually feel like it, do we? Don’t usually act like it, either. Yesterday’s passage on comfort levels and conscience apply here. Once again, we have to continue in our faith, exercise it and believe in Christ in order to keep up our confidence. The fact remains, though, that Christ overcame the world and we join Him in that victory when we become His.

iscernment. This is reaching all the way back to the beginning of the letter. Remember that John was writing all this to a church plagued with a heresy. One called gnosticism.

“Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits, whether they are of God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is of God, and every spirit that does not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is not of God. And this is the spirit of the Antichrist, which you have heard was coming, and is now already in the world.”

What does test mean?

I’m going to refer to one of my new favorite authors here. He wrote a whole book on the term.

JUDGE

DETERMINE

PROVE

“…from the Greek word dokimazo, the root of which can also mean prove, try, examine, or discern. It points to a process of testing or validating in order to prove that something is genuine.” … Tim Challies, “The Discipline Of Spiritual Discernment”

Spirits can be of God or they can be of Satan. Easy enough to balance that one. But how do we know?

We have to figure it out. Challies’ book goes through the process (and it is certainly a process, scientific and all) far better than I can, so if you’re interested, grab it before supplies run out. Anyway (shameless plugs secured), John gives us the straightforward answer. There is a whole lot more depth in this easy-appearing explanation.

Every Spirit That Confesses That Jesus Christ Has Come In The Flesh Is Of God.

How many ways can we break this sentence down?

The spirit must Confess: This doesn’t mean “nod in assent.” Confessing means proclaiming (with conviction). It means clearly stating “Jesus Christ is the Son of God sent to earth.”

The spirit must confess that Jesus CHRIST has come. That means the Spirit is proclaiming that Christ, the ANOINTED one, the promised Messiah has come.

Now the spirit has not just agreed, but has clearly stated that he believes in these portions of the Gospel. Are you following my logic?

The spirit must confess that Jesus Christ came in the FLESH. He was human. Important? Yes, absolutely, for He must in order to die for our sins.

There is a LOT of depth to these confessions.  It’s not just a surface rippling sound from the mouth of a teacher.  It’s a resounding, explicit demonstration of conviction.

John has claimed that this is the test. Now how are we to confirm this test works? There are many ways for false teaching to get around all this statement and agreement stuff, right? Here is where all that earlier definition of test comes in.

If we don’t know our Gospel, how can we know what that spirit guy is saying? Just in case the spirit thing is misunderstood: A spirit is a teaching, a person teaching, not just some spiritual spirit. John’s audience was dealing with real humans claiming to be Christians, but who were teaching false gospels.

Again: if we don’t know our Gospel, how can we know what that spirit guy is saying? John is telling us that we’d better know our Gospel. We have to know God’s Truth, be walking in His commandments. I believe I mentioned a few posts back about knowing God’s will and his Word. Here is the test of that knowledge. We probably could get along with a pretty simple knowledge of God’s Word and will if all was good and there weren’t any false teachers around. But false teachers are everywhere, and they’re not wearing black polo shirts with red horn insignia on the front and “I’m on the other team”painted on the back. They’re SNEAKY. Remember that John, in chapter 2, refers to the false teachers as “They went out from us, but they were not of us…” This means they left the church. They left the believers. That means they were among the believers first! Scary! It is pretty clear that John was writing to people who didn’t even realize what kind of trouble they were in.

Here’s the final thing about this passage: The Antichrist, mentioned in chapter 2 is, in chapter 4, already among us in the world. The spirit that will eventually be introduced officially in the end times, is already at work here.  The spirit of deception and misleading partial truths is all over. This is where the cults and the heretics and craziness is coming from. If you look at the various Christian churches out there and into the history behind them, I’ll bet NOT ONE of our Gospel believing denominations has been unscathed by a false teacher amongst them. Not just a dissenting voice, but a false teacher who took off “Out from us” and brought a group of disciples with him into the world, all filled with some false variation of the Gospel?

I’ll bet that most of them false ones came from them Bible believin’ ones first.

The end?

Nope.

Once more with feeling: If we don’t know our Gospel, how can we know what that spirit guy is saying?

P.S. my personal input:

When someone says something to the tune of “I’m not one to judge” or “Who are you to judge?” I would raise my hackles and start to consider what’s at stake. This is a blatant indication that I need to be on firm ground with the Bible. The speaker is about to throw all number of verses or relativism into the debate, and a clear understanding of the word “judge”and its process (and prerequisites) is going to be in demand right off. I’ve learned this to my shame through not being prepared. Even now, though I would say my understanding of the Word and collection of prerequisites has grown, I am not up to the challenge set by people who have a skewed view of the Gospel and use the “JUDGE NOT” defense. They’re tough nuts to crack.

Personal pride is at stake when you refute a man’s bad theology. Stability and comfort are threatened. Self-image and all sorts of other worldly armor feel stressed when Christians proclaim the Truth. I know it well enough. I had all that armor and weathered the beatings when I was a pagan. Since being saved, I’ve seen it from the other side, and it’s really really hard to face the defensive flare of bad theology when it’s under attack.  Additionally, the command to love the ones who deny the Lord’s Gospel is very hard to accomplish.

So, along with all that close study of the Word and walking in the Light and Truth, we need desperately to pray. Pray for our own sakes and for those we love and seek to bring to the Lord’s feet.

egarding the difference between Christians and imposters, how do we know which is in our midst? Do we have to feel the presence of evil with some “Spirit led” spinal tremor? Is it someone else’s job to discern the truth?

The apostle John spends some time discussing the very different characteristics of children of God and children of the devil again here.

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

Why does John keep repeating himself in this long letter of his? Mommy and Daddy do the same thing with their children. They start with commands and the commands basically remain the same throughout their children’s’ tenure in the home (and hopefully after). If the parents are consistent and biblical in their instruction, they will come across in language very similar to John’s.

The point of this seeming repetition is that John is hammering the truth, in black and white, right into our minds. He’s making sure that, in no uncertain terms, we are clear on the qualifiers for being saved and unsaved.

Sometimes it seems John’s too harsh, unforgiving and too… well… black and white about things. Here is where I think Christians need to be today. This culture of ours is not black and white, and it is falling apart. People won’t accept concretes and they won’t tolerate finality. Read this next bit. I’m not hijacking the article to stand on a soap box or wedge in a different lesson, it’s going right to where we need to be.

At my weekly boss-n-me breakfast, during which we course out our plan for the week and discuss the issues at hand (while stuffing ourselves with crummy short-order eggs and juice), a newscast about the gay Mardi-Gras in Sydney, Australia popped on the television. So our meandering conversation headed over to the homosexual arena.

The topic on the table became “how can they help it, since they’re born that way.” My first reaction was to argue that homosexuals are not born that way. I won’t argue that they can’t help it, for sin is in control. But I had to explain that it’s written in black and white that homosexuality is sin. It’s not a birth condition. I used two reasons:

If you take 1 and 2 above together, it is absolutely clear (black and white) that homosexuality is not natural, it is sin, and there is no gray area anywhere around.

But the conversation at breakfast started with the belief that gays can be born gay. This assumption, probably at least partially gathered from the fact that the Bible doesn’t clearly state that it’s not genetics, introduced a non-absolute into what should have been concrete.

So John is being concrete right where we need it. We don’t have the black and white of a rigid, theocratic society to keep us straight (no pun intended). Even when there were such conditions available in the days of Israel, people still tried to insist on gray. See where it got them?

I think a really good way to put this mess poignantly is:

Back to the actual text. Whoever does not practice righteousness (does not have a characteristic of consistently striving to follow God’s commandments, recognize when committing sin and seeking to repent) is not of God. And neither is he who doesn’t love his brother. Period the end.

So when the Christian who Claims to be Christian gets unveiled in his sin, what does he do? What is the pattern of this sin? Is there a strong personal pattern of this sin? Is there any sign of remorse, repentance, seeking help, anything at all that might indicate a wayward Christian in need of correction? Or is there an impostor standing before us?

And are we aware enough of the clear-cut characteristics lined out in the Bible which enable us to see the truth?

Cain was probably guilty of muddling the rules in applying them to himself. How else would he have brought the wrong offering? He demonstrated the lack of Godly characteristics clearly in one aspect. He showed no love toward his brother at all. I doubt any could question that.

It is inferred from the text of Genesis 4 that Cain’s disregard for God’s will in the issue of sacrifice was a condition of sin that God warned him about in person. Apparently the warning fell on deaf ears, for Cain carried out the first act of murder and then continued in sin to lie, then whined about the rendering of judgment and curse (all of which points toward a selfish attitude in general, not leaving any room for “honest mistake” in the story).

John cites a pat black-and-white case that should satisfy a court investigation of the absoluteness of God’s will. The last sentence in the passage states, “Because his works were evil and his brother’s righteous.” Nowhere does John say “Cain was of the wicked as far as we know,” or “We can never be truly sure of whether God’s flexibility on the definition of what it means to be a His child because His rules of love and holiness and whatnot are …insert preference from modern term index here_____________:

1. outdated
2. outmoded
3. applicable only to
4. interpreted in too many differing contexts
   
5. blah
6. blah
7. blah

I haven’t read or memorized my way through the whole Bible enough to be an authority on all the ins and outs. I do know for fact, though, that if I have questions about a particular issue’s right or wrongness, I can find the direct answer or the means to discern the answer right in my Bible. That’s what the absoluteness of John’s letter implies. It is also what has been proclaimed over and over. “This is the message that you heard from the beginning…”

I’ll leave with an oldie but goodie:

I Timothy 3:16,
“All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.”