If you haven’t done so, read or re-read Proverbs 30. It is packed full of Godly principles for living. One of my favorite ones is the prayer for God to provide for my needs – not too much and not too little. This prayer and principle supports the reading at Hebrews 13:15 we had last night at Bible study regarding what true praise to God is, i.e., it is a worshipful and obedient life daily vs. the occasional foot-stomping and hand-clapping we may do of a Sunday morning. (all of heaven and several here on earth are watching!). Check out Proverbs 30 and see what catches your attention. The link is to Biblegateway.com; it is helpful viewing the Proverb in a couple of different Bible translations because of how the original Hebrew is written.
Enjoy!
Wednesday, April 12, 2017
Are Christians in Places Like Africa, Asia, and Several Other Countries the Only Ones in the Church of Christ under Attack?
Good question. It is true we are called as Christians to care and pray for our persecuted and suffering brothers and sisters. We are also commanded to stay alert – to view this world through Christ’s eyes, watching for His return. And His high priestly prayer in John 17, that He offered to His Father on his last night on earth, concerned the physical and spiritual welfare of those whom His Father has chosen to follow His Son. He recognized that this call to be a Christ follower would be no easier for us than it was to be Christ in the flesh, and knew that we would also come under attack just as He did. We would suffer. (Matthew 16:21; Romans 8:16-18; 1 Peter 4:12-13)
We’ve heard the readings in the past few months of Jesus’ temptations from the devil, and the devil’s and his demons’ persistence in trying to disrupt Jesus’ ministry, and thwart His ultimate purpose for coming to earth (His calling), which outlines some of the ways His followers would be attacked. Violent persecution and hostility are only a couple of ways that the devil satan attacks followers of Christ. We should remember that the devil is not new. He's been doing the same thing in the same way for thousands of years on humankind. And is still finding the same success against Christians and believers in contemporary times. He has experience in attacking, and he is always in attack mode, as we’ll see below.
1 Peter 5, beginning with verse 6, we are cautioned to remove pride from our hearts, to cast our anxieties on God so that they will not prove to be distractions or untoward burdens that take our focus from Christ. We are further cautioned to discipline ourselves, to learn to follow Christ, set up guardrails founded on the Word of God to protect ourselves, to be alert to those things that take us off the path of God's will for our lives. Why? Because the enemy, satan, “walks around like a roaring lion seeking to devour someone.” Not just trip up. Not just coerced to tell a little white lie or just a little pilfering. He seeks to devour. He tries different ways: through violent persecutions, harassments, and other hostilities, to erode our belief in an Almighty God, to make us think we are alone in our suffering (as Pastor Melana’s sermon spoke to). He uses circumstances and people in authority to restrict Christian's movements and activities. But one of his favorite ways to devour Christians is to nullify us and our usefulness to God, to find ways to knock us down so that our faith suffers. To raise doubts so that our trust in God pales. To mask the course of rebellion against God and the One who is The Way, The Truth, and The Life so that we see it as an innocent venture into self-fulfillment and self-determination, or ‘getting a life’. He gets us to doubt scripture so that we do not see it as the relevant, authoritative Word of God.
As 1 Corinthians 10 reminds us, God provided the record of Israel's rebellion against Him so that we would not be ignorant. A character who first appears in the Bible book of Numbers (thank you Holy Spirit-led Bible study!) named Balaam was instrumental in luring God's people away by appealing to their flesh, that is, their sin nature by using divination - spiritism, devil worship, magic, astrology, numerology, and the like, and by inducing them towards acts of lust that violated God's moral laws, so that they became prey to idol worship, greed, sexual immoralities. In the New Testament, in Jude and Revelation 2, God calls this kind of falling away, typifies it, as abandoning oneself to the error of Balaam. And do you know what is the saddest thing in all of the above? The fact that many Christians are ignorant of, have no understanding, that they are in a war with the devil daily and to know what that entails! And that their faith and/or relationship with God is on the brink of being devoured, severely damaged, because of that ignorance.
If we are alert, if we are paying attention, we will see that the devil has not changed his methods of disarming God's people. The Church in the U.S. and in so-called Christian-friendly countries - while it may not be suffering the wholesale persecutions we've been reading about - is nevertheless suffering, and many within the Church are falling prey to the same things the devil has utilized to neutralize Christians and God-followers in times past. The devil's tactics are succeeding: churches are populated with members who see much of the Biblical mandates as old-fashioned, outdated, and not viable in a modern world culture. They are churchgoers who are weighed-down with misbeliefs, who follow their horoscopes and practice astrology – believing that a constellation can control their lives, who find magic and witchcraft/sorcery both entertaining and worthy of noting; who idolize people and things (and even themselves), who lust after riches, status - feeding off the culture’s obsession with these things; who no longer regard fornication, adultery, homosexuality as sin or a departure from God’s moral law, and rather than observing and accepting God’s moral law, are deceived to accepting the culture’s view (shaped by satan) that the Bible’s teachings are out-of-step, and that advocating such behaviors will attract more people to the Church, that the whole ‘sin thing’ is narrow-minded; who feel good Christians should accept modern viewpoints on sex because to not do so shows a lack of Christian love, and is discriminating and judgmental. (I have heard mothers from different denominations who identify themselves as Christian, and some youth pastors/leaders advise their teens that premarital sex is acceptable, as long as you are mature enough to handle it.) Some churches and church denominations have re-set their agendas, that were once Bible-driven, so that they can accommodate such behaviors, and realign and re-interpret the Bible to adapt to their postmodern view of Christianity. The Church is under attack to be drawn away from Christ, and like the Israelites, it doesn’t even recognize it is at war. And when the consequences of falling prey to the devil’s tactics are finally felt, it is easier to blame God than to recognize the error of Balaam. (Revelation 2:12-29)
Compromised believers or worship communities may be in a worst state than the persecuted church. The persecuted church, as we have viewed in the many articles and news from those churches – see their numbers are growing even under persecution, see the work of God in miraculous ways, and many of those suffering brethren have seen their faith become so much stronger, and their resolve so much deeper, by God's grace and blessing. They recognize their temporary condition cannot compare to eternity with Christ – which has already begun in the here and now. Christ crucified and risen is still being preached and taught even under hostile conditions, and many are coming to belief in Christ. In the compromised church, however, a Christ of convenience constructed on emotional whims and eddies, fashioned on a revamped, syncretistic framework of idealism is being proffered, and truth has been replaced by relativism. Often the numbers in the compromised church dwindle, yet, more often in the western churches, they can flourish because the message being offered appeals to the flesh, are not morally demanding, and offer worship on an entertainment platform that entreats people to a few minutes of happy, rather than sound Biblical teaching. (compare Luke 9:23-24 and Romans 5:3-4 with 1 Timothy 4:1-3, and 2 Timothy 3:1-7)
As we pray for our persecuted brethren, let us not also forget to pray that all who profess Christ will be aware that they, too, are under attack in such a subtle way that they may not recognize the danger. Pray the prayer in Colossians 1:9-12 for the entire Church – those persecuted and those deceived – that they will be focused on Christ and grow into a deeper relationship with Him, and be faithful conquerors. (Ephesians 6:10-18; John 16:33; Romans 8:31-39)
We’ve heard the readings in the past few months of Jesus’ temptations from the devil, and the devil’s and his demons’ persistence in trying to disrupt Jesus’ ministry, and thwart His ultimate purpose for coming to earth (His calling), which outlines some of the ways His followers would be attacked. Violent persecution and hostility are only a couple of ways that the devil satan attacks followers of Christ. We should remember that the devil is not new. He's been doing the same thing in the same way for thousands of years on humankind. And is still finding the same success against Christians and believers in contemporary times. He has experience in attacking, and he is always in attack mode, as we’ll see below.
1 Peter 5, beginning with verse 6, we are cautioned to remove pride from our hearts, to cast our anxieties on God so that they will not prove to be distractions or untoward burdens that take our focus from Christ. We are further cautioned to discipline ourselves, to learn to follow Christ, set up guardrails founded on the Word of God to protect ourselves, to be alert to those things that take us off the path of God's will for our lives. Why? Because the enemy, satan, “walks around like a roaring lion seeking to devour someone.” Not just trip up. Not just coerced to tell a little white lie or just a little pilfering. He seeks to devour. He tries different ways: through violent persecutions, harassments, and other hostilities, to erode our belief in an Almighty God, to make us think we are alone in our suffering (as Pastor Melana’s sermon spoke to). He uses circumstances and people in authority to restrict Christian's movements and activities. But one of his favorite ways to devour Christians is to nullify us and our usefulness to God, to find ways to knock us down so that our faith suffers. To raise doubts so that our trust in God pales. To mask the course of rebellion against God and the One who is The Way, The Truth, and The Life so that we see it as an innocent venture into self-fulfillment and self-determination, or ‘getting a life’. He gets us to doubt scripture so that we do not see it as the relevant, authoritative Word of God.
As 1 Corinthians 10 reminds us, God provided the record of Israel's rebellion against Him so that we would not be ignorant. A character who first appears in the Bible book of Numbers (thank you Holy Spirit-led Bible study!) named Balaam was instrumental in luring God's people away by appealing to their flesh, that is, their sin nature by using divination - spiritism, devil worship, magic, astrology, numerology, and the like, and by inducing them towards acts of lust that violated God's moral laws, so that they became prey to idol worship, greed, sexual immoralities. In the New Testament, in Jude and Revelation 2, God calls this kind of falling away, typifies it, as abandoning oneself to the error of Balaam. And do you know what is the saddest thing in all of the above? The fact that many Christians are ignorant of, have no understanding, that they are in a war with the devil daily and to know what that entails! And that their faith and/or relationship with God is on the brink of being devoured, severely damaged, because of that ignorance.
If we are alert, if we are paying attention, we will see that the devil has not changed his methods of disarming God's people. The Church in the U.S. and in so-called Christian-friendly countries - while it may not be suffering the wholesale persecutions we've been reading about - is nevertheless suffering, and many within the Church are falling prey to the same things the devil has utilized to neutralize Christians and God-followers in times past. The devil's tactics are succeeding: churches are populated with members who see much of the Biblical mandates as old-fashioned, outdated, and not viable in a modern world culture. They are churchgoers who are weighed-down with misbeliefs, who follow their horoscopes and practice astrology – believing that a constellation can control their lives, who find magic and witchcraft/sorcery both entertaining and worthy of noting; who idolize people and things (and even themselves), who lust after riches, status - feeding off the culture’s obsession with these things; who no longer regard fornication, adultery, homosexuality as sin or a departure from God’s moral law, and rather than observing and accepting God’s moral law, are deceived to accepting the culture’s view (shaped by satan) that the Bible’s teachings are out-of-step, and that advocating such behaviors will attract more people to the Church, that the whole ‘sin thing’ is narrow-minded; who feel good Christians should accept modern viewpoints on sex because to not do so shows a lack of Christian love, and is discriminating and judgmental. (I have heard mothers from different denominations who identify themselves as Christian, and some youth pastors/leaders advise their teens that premarital sex is acceptable, as long as you are mature enough to handle it.) Some churches and church denominations have re-set their agendas, that were once Bible-driven, so that they can accommodate such behaviors, and realign and re-interpret the Bible to adapt to their postmodern view of Christianity. The Church is under attack to be drawn away from Christ, and like the Israelites, it doesn’t even recognize it is at war. And when the consequences of falling prey to the devil’s tactics are finally felt, it is easier to blame God than to recognize the error of Balaam. (Revelation 2:12-29)
Compromised believers or worship communities may be in a worst state than the persecuted church. The persecuted church, as we have viewed in the many articles and news from those churches – see their numbers are growing even under persecution, see the work of God in miraculous ways, and many of those suffering brethren have seen their faith become so much stronger, and their resolve so much deeper, by God's grace and blessing. They recognize their temporary condition cannot compare to eternity with Christ – which has already begun in the here and now. Christ crucified and risen is still being preached and taught even under hostile conditions, and many are coming to belief in Christ. In the compromised church, however, a Christ of convenience constructed on emotional whims and eddies, fashioned on a revamped, syncretistic framework of idealism is being proffered, and truth has been replaced by relativism. Often the numbers in the compromised church dwindle, yet, more often in the western churches, they can flourish because the message being offered appeals to the flesh, are not morally demanding, and offer worship on an entertainment platform that entreats people to a few minutes of happy, rather than sound Biblical teaching. (compare Luke 9:23-24 and Romans 5:3-4 with 1 Timothy 4:1-3, and 2 Timothy 3:1-7)
As we pray for our persecuted brethren, let us not also forget to pray that all who profess Christ will be aware that they, too, are under attack in such a subtle way that they may not recognize the danger. Pray the prayer in Colossians 1:9-12 for the entire Church – those persecuted and those deceived – that they will be focused on Christ and grow into a deeper relationship with Him, and be faithful conquerors. (Ephesians 6:10-18; John 16:33; Romans 8:31-39)
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