How can a culture move so far from reality? A fascinating verse in the book of judges is found in chapter 21 verse 25  “In those days Israel had no king; all the people did whatever seemed right in their own eyes. Did you catch that?—All the people did whatever seemed right in their own eyes. God’s moral law is the anchor that holds a society together. When God’s law and truth are thrown to the wind we have exactly what Judges 21:25 lays out. We have a society that does whatever seems right to them. The Apostle Paul also gives us a keen insight into a  society that turns away from God—-He says in Roman 1:21 …they become vain in their imaginations and their foolish hearts became darkened. 

We are now living in a time where truth can’t be known. We are living in a time where truth is relative. We are living in a time where there is no absolute truth, thus, 2+2 can = 10. As long as someone “feels” that 10 is the answer for them, then, 10 is the answer. The call for the Christian and the Church of Jesus Christ is to bring out the sword of truth to cut through all the errors and deception of our day. My challenge for the Christian today is dare to be a Daniel. Dare to take a stand. This is not our best life now for sure. In today’s culture standing on God’s truth will certainly cost you something. It could be friends, a job or your reputation. Take some advice from a long standing pastor, Dr John MacArthur “ Love and truth must be maintained in perfect balance. Truth is never to be abandoned in the name of love. But love is not to be deposed in the name of truth... Truth without love has no decency; it's just brutality. On the other hand, love without truth has no character; it's just hypocrisy.“

There is no end in sight how far this insanity will go. The slippery slope argument makes a lot of sense when we see how far our culture has removed itself  from our Judea/Christian heritage. I think of the book of Genesis where it says, God looked down and saw every imagination of man’s heart was continually evil, see Genesis 6:5. 

I’m thankful that this world is not our home. The writer of the book of Hebrews sums it up so perfectly when he says in Hebrews 11:16 “ Instead, they were longing for a better country—a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.”

A Christian world-view must be developed in order to navigate in this spiritually dark culture that we live in. Since I’m a simple man, I’ll give you the “how” on developing a Christian world-view, are your ready? Read your Bibles daily. Take notes. Use good, solid commentaries. Discuss Biblical themes with others in the body of Christ. Get a book on Biblical hermeneutics. Hermeneutics is a must. We have to understand context…the author…the recipients…why the letter written, and the date of the letter.  Manners and customs of the times is of vital importance. 

One can’t go to far in the New Testament without instruction on HOW we should think. The Apostle Paul in the book of Philippians even gives us specific things to think on, like…things that are pure and things that are lovely, see Philippians 4:8. The book of Proverbs personifies wisdom. Proverbs tells us that wisdom calls out to us  to forsake wickedness and run after righteousness.  Godly wisdom is also pure, gentle and full of good fruit, see James 3:17. 

We see in the book of Romans the first chapter that when a culture turns from God’s wisdom their minds become empty and their hearts become foolish. We can see this so clearly in our present culture where it is accepted that a man can be a woman or a woman can be a man. The call of the church to our present culture must be a call to repent and trust in Christ alone. The Christian must keep himself immersed in God’s word. God’s truth must be the only thing that matters, all else is rubbish and waste.

How is the Christian to navigate in today’s Twilight Zone culture.

 

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Most of us older folk remember the 1959 TV series the Twilight Zone crated by Rod Serling. The episodes are in various genres, including fantasy, science fiction, absurdism, dystopian fiction, suspense, horror, supernatural drama, black comedy, and psychological thriller, often concluding with a macabre or unexpected twist. Sounds very familiar to where we are now as a culture. We have fantasy: Men can become women and women can become men. Absurdism: We have over a virus shut down our economy…We have American wearing masks and we have a new vaccine that is being forced on the American people.  Horror: We had last summer our cities burning, cops assaulted and stores pillaged and with all that we had many in our government and all of MSM completely ignoring the chaos while calling it the summer of love. 

There will be no unexpected twist to the Christian. God has revealed Himself to His people through the Holy Scriptures. We find that God’s patience will one day run out on this wicked, dark world and His wrath will be poured out like nothing this world has ever known, see Romans 1:18:“ For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven upon all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, suppressing the truth by unrighteousness”

For God’s people the Lord is a strong tower and we run into it and are safe, see Proverbs 18:10. God is our refuge and the follower of Jesus seeks his safety there, see Psalm 461-2a “God is our refuge and strength, a helper who is always found in times of trouble. Therefore we will not be afraid, …”

So in the middle of all this absolute craziness let us take hope and courage in our Refuge and our strong tower. March on Christian soldiers and keep your armor on and keep look up ^. 

Our Struggle With Sin

The life long struggle for the follower of Jesus:

The Christian will struggle with sin from the day he is saved until he closes his eyes for the last time. We carry around our corrupted flesh...or old man...or sin nature. The Apostle Paul talks about this in chapter seven in his letter to the Romans.  Hear the struggle of the Apostle:

For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate... For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing" (Romans 7:15, 18b-19).

We can pretend that we are outstanding church folks who have done away with sin in our lives. We can walk with our heads high with the Bible under our arm and all the while the sin of pride is written all over our forehead, and we can’t even see it. Blessed is the man that recognizes his own sin and by God’s grace hates it and confesses it to his Lord.

The Christian who does not struggle with sin is in a very dangerous way. The one thing that a Christian should hate in his life is sin…his sin and the sin that is in the world. I believe that those that do not see their sin are those who have never been regenerated by the Holy Spirit. Those who do not feel the weight of their own sin are those who compare themselves to those around them and to the rest of the world. The reasoning goes like this, I’m not that bad, I never killed anyone…I don’t steal...I go to church on Sunday…I help others when I can. This is the thought process that goes through the mind of an unregenerate man.

On the other side, the Christian compares himself to the holiness of God. The Christian looks at the Father and measures himself against His perfection. Here’s a thought: The Bible commands us to love God with all our hearts, minds, bodies and strength. If we are are not loving God like that every second of ever minute of every hour of every day we have fallen short of God’s standard of perfection, and the same would go for loving others all day every day, and yes, even on those days when things are going badly.

The hope for the Christian is the righteousness of Christ.That righteousness is given freely to the believer who has put his faith in Christ’s death, burial and resurrection.  The Christian will stand before God and God will not see his sin, for they have been removed as far as the east is from the west, but the Father will only see the righteousness of his son as he looks at us. I’m always reminded of that great hymn written by Edward Mote:

“My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus’ blood and righteousness…
 On Christ the solid rock I stand all other ground is sinking sand….”

The hope of the Christian is not in our performance. The hope of the Christian is in the atonement of Jesus Christ to cover our sins. When my sin gets me down, I’m always reminded of the saying by Robert Murray McCheyne, “ For every look at self, take ten looks at Christ.”

What to do when your heart is cold

There will be times in the life of a follower of Jesus Christ that he will be spiritually dry. God is sovereign and could fill every moment of our lives with his presence, but for purposes unknown to us He does not. Could it be that God wants us to walk by faith and not feelings? Could it be that God wants His children to trust alone His promises He’s given to us in His revealed will?

What has God given us when He seems so far away and our hearts are cold and lonely? God has given us the promise that He will never leave us or forsake us, see Hebrews 13:5. God has given to the church the marvelous promise that nothing can separate us from His love, see Romans 8: 31. We hide these truths in our hearts and dig down and rest in them when we don’t feel close to God or when He seems so far from us.

God has also given His people the fellowship of the church. God’s people are to be practicing the one another’s of the Bible. Here are just a few:

• Love one another (John 13:34 - This command occurs at least 16 times)

• Be devoted to one another (Romans 12:10)

• Honor one another above yourselves (Romans 12:10)

• Live in harmony with one another (Romans 12:16)

• Build up one another (Romans 14:19; 1 Thessalonians 5:11)

How many times have you lifted up another brother or sister in Christ? How many times has another brother or sister in the body of Christ lifted you up? I don’t believe that God’s workings in the church or in the lives of Christians is something nebulous. I believe that God has ordained means and His means are His word, the fellowship of the saints, worship, and the two observances He’s given to the church. 

Christians must avail themselves to the means that God has ordained. If we are looking for or depending on feelings we will never grow beyond baby Christians who are ever wandering and always looking for an experience, which will leave you out in the cold without any real spiritual footing.  

What is your authority?

What is your authority as a Christian? This question asks on what basis does the church make any spiritual decisions. Many churches and Christians have left the authority of God’s word and have allowed the culture to become their authority.  I feel deeply that unless we allow God’s word to speak we will become just like any secular organization. The church has to be distinguished by the way she worships and by how she stands against the shifting winds of whatever the culture is asking the masses to conform to.

The Bible is not a story book for our amusement, no, the Bible is our daily food and drink. The Bible is God’s revelation to the church. When the church moves away from the authority of God’s word she moves away from God’s revealed will of Himself. The consequences of this departure from God’s word have taken an enormous spiritual impact on the church and in the lives of God’s people.

One reason for this departure from God’s authoritative word is the pride of man. Man wants to do things his way...so the church thinks that they can do church “better” than what God has said. Another reason for this departure from the authority of God’s word is the church wants to be “liked” by the world, so she courts the world and bows to whatever cultural moray is most popular at the present time. In the end what the departing church has become is a spiritual whore, she has left her husband and head to be married to another. The church and the world holding hands dirties the church and makes her unfaithful to her head.

Let the true church rise up and call out this spiritual adultery. Let the true church call out  false  teachers who by their fair speeches and dynamic personalities lead many to that place of destruction.

Every Christian goes through dry periods. Every Christian goes through the valley of despair. Charles Spurgeon would suffer from severe bouts of depression, it was said of Spurgeon  by an artist who once tried to paint his portrait “I can’t paint you. Your face is different every day. You are never the same.” To be sure, the most popular preacher in the Victoria era was also one of the most burdened.

Spurgeon owned more than thirty books on mental health. He read about depression, wrote about depression, and suffered from depression. Spurgeon’s letters contain numerous references to his sinking spirits. He often called himself a “prisoner” and wept without knowing why.

“I pity a dog who has to suffer what I have.”

So, how do we deal with these dry times? These times when the clouds roll in and God seems so very far from us. As a counselor, I always tell others that their feelings can’t be trusted. Feelings are like the leaves blowing in the wind. Those who have no anchor are tossed to and fro by their feelings...feelings lie to us...feelings tell us that we have no worth...feelings tell us God does not care about us...feelings tell us that we will never know joy and peace again. 

What I know is that feelings lie. What I know is the anchor that grounds us is truth, the truth of God’s word is the anchor that will keep us moored to the dock. I’m always amazed at how much the Bible deals with our thinking process, like Philippians 4:8 “ Think on these things....” How about 2 Corinthians 10:5  Casting down human reasoning and all knowledge that is contrary to God’s thoughts.  This is how lying feeling are defeated, God’s truth must replace our old thinking patterns and when old thinking patterns are challenged and changed our feelings follow. 

Fellow Christian keep battling on. Keep fighting the fight. When those dark clouds of depression roll in flee to the one who is true and let his voice through the Scriptures be your anchor.

The Inevitability of Sorrow

Everyone will suffer a broken heart sooner than later in life. We have all experienced the sting of emotional pain and sorrow. Fay Weldon expressed the inevitability of sorrow quite well when she said, “there's no such thing as old age, there is only sorrow”. Well maybe Miss Weldon overstated the degree of sorrow, but we can all agree that sorrow will find us sometime in this life.

Sorrow and happiness have to be understood from a Christian perspective. There is no other worldview that can make sense of pain, sorrow and the attainment of happiness in this life; it is only the Christian worldview that offers a satisfying answer.

Philosophers and men of all walks of life have struggled with the question, if God is good why do we have pain and sorrow in this life? Why does God allow men to suffer? We hear from Leo Tolstoy’s character Anna Karenina who once said, “I’m simple unhappy. If anyone is unhappy, I’m.” We can all identify with Tolstoy’s character, Anna, to some degree; for we have all tasted the same pain and sorrow expressed by Anna Karenina.

We can see this sorrow and suffering in the first book of the Bible, the book of Genesis. We have the scene set: Adam and Eve are placed in perfect surroundings. They have all their needs met by the creator Himself. They enjoy each other’s love, warmth, and friendship. They have all the food they will ever need and they don’t even have to run to the supermarket to get it. It’s all right there. They have all of creation right in their back yard and the best thing of all they are in perfect fellowship with the God of creation.

We all know the story. Both husband and wife disobeyed the Creator’s direct command not to eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and baam, it all starts to unravel. Their relationship with God is estranged. The perfect paradise now becomes thorns and weeds. Adam and Eve are now estranged from each other. For the first time in their lives they experience sorrow. We do see God’s mercy and grace immediately, for God makes atonement for them. He provides a covering for them. Adam and Eve did what all mankind has been doing from day one --- they tried to fix the sin problem, the sorrow problem, on their own. They sought to make a covering for their sin with fig leaves, but God would not have it. Instead of Adam and Eve running to God, they ran from Him and sought their own remedy for their sin.

If we pay attention to our lives, and the lives of others, we find out that at the core of all existence is the desire to be happy. The problem is that man has followed in the same path as Adam and Eve. The truth is that man is not happy at his core and is still trying to find his own remedy for happiness. Just like Adam and Eve, man is not running toward God, but running away from God. This running away from God is the root of all man’s pain and sorrow.

How Man Seeks Happiness.

What seems to be an easy solution has eluded man from the beginning of time. Jesus gave us the path to happiness in his Great Sermon called The Beatitudes. In it, Jesus tells us that true happiness is gained by being poor in spirit. When man comes to the point that he realizes that happiness cannot be found inside himself or from anything in this world, he starts down the path to find what Jesus Christ can offer --- and that is life, abundant life. The paradox is when a man becomes poor, when a man senses his own sin --- it’s then when God’s conviction makes him feel poor, he can look to the provision that God has provided and that is the cross of Christ.

Instead of man becoming poor in spirit and looking to the One who can heal his brokenness, he gropes in the dark for an elusive happiness. Some seek this happiness in the Epicurean way. Sensual pleasure becomes for them the goal of life, but at the end it does not satisfy. Some seek happiness in their religious institutions, but in the end it does not bring happiness. Still, others seek fulfillment in philosophy and higher education but, again, it turns out to be a dead end. Christianity offers hope and fulfillment now and in the life to come. The Holy Scriptures offer the most precious of all hopes and promises: the hope that God will wipe away every tear from our eyes and we will never again know pain or sorrow (Revelation 21:4).

The world’s way to happiness and God’s way to happiness are certainly antithetical. The world is fixated on happiness and there are all kinds of voices ever present, calling out, telling us how to find happiness .Today, the smorgasbord of choices on ways to be happy abound. How happiness is defined by these many voices is different. For example BJ Gallagher and Mac Anderson in their book, Road to Happiness speak about happiness in this manner:

“Many of us tie our happiness to external factors…Or feel on the short-end of the stick when comparing our lives to those of other people. But, sometimes, appearances can be deceiving. In fact, freeing ourselves from perfection can be one of the keys to being happy with who we are. The truth is, if you can’t find happiness inside yourself, you’ll never find it in the outside world, no matter where you move. Wherever you go, there you are. You take yourself with you. This is the essence of happiness—learning to find inner contentment in any situation”.

Does the history of mankind teach us that man can be happy by simply finding happiness inside of himself? Is happiness really down in there somewhere and we just can’t find it? Or is happiness really just not there. Here’s the big question: Can man be truly happy and fulfilled apart from being in fellowship with his creator? This is where the Christian worldview comes in and speaks to the idea of happiness.

Think of man this way: He’s a created being was created with a purpose and that purpose was to glorify his creator and enjoy him forever. Apart from man fulfilling that purpose, he will never be happy. Man trying to be happy apart from his creator is like the man who lives his life in the cold, gray, darkness of self delusion; happiness will always be just a concept, a cloud, which he can never capture without being born into God’s Kingdom.


The Battle of the Mind

One can’t read through the New Testament without soon coming upon instructions on what to think and how to think. The Apostle Paul tells us that we are to literally cast down any imagination in our thought life that would be contrary to the knowledge of God. We are to have our thoughts trained to be in accordance with the very thoughts of God, as contained in His divine revelation, as found in the Holy Scriptures. The Apostle Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians 10:15, “Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ.”

The human mind and heart are battlefields. The description of the heart and mind of man, as given by the prophet Jeremiah paints a bleak picture. Here’s what Jeremiah, says of the condition of the heart: “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? (vs. 17:9)

The thoughts of God are high and pure. Every word of God is pure; he is a shield unto them that put their trust in him (Proverbs 30:5). When we train our thoughts to think God’s thoughts, we are lifted up and we work holiness into the very fabric of our being. We are commanded as Christians to let the word of Christ dwell in us richly in wisdom (Colossians 3:16). We see how far the world is from being happy and fulfilled in this life without being connected to God. The very thoughts and ideas of the natural man are wedded to the things of this life and rise no further than his carnal lusts and desires, but oh what a blessing the child of God has, he has the very words of the creator living inside him.

Albert Mohler sums up the life of the mind very succinctly in The Glory of God and the Life of the Mind when he says:

“In the end, Christianity honors the life of the mind, not because it celebrates the power of human intellect, but because Christ himself instructed Christians to love God with heart, soul, and mind. The fact that God would command that we love him with our minds indicates in a most profound and unmistakable sense that our Creator has made us to know him in order that we would love him and to seek his glory above all else. Understood in this light, our intellectual capacity and the discipleship of the mind are to culminate in the development of a Christian worldview that begins and ends in the glory of the self-revealing God of the Bible.”



The Good News

What is this good news? Where is this good news to be found? The good news is how man can find happiness and fulfillment and reconnect with God. I used the word reconnect because of the estrangement that has taken place by the fall. The Bible tells us “all have sinned and come short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). We also read in the Scriptures that our sins have separated us from God (Isaiah 59:2).

The good news is that although we are estranged from God, although we are separated from God and although we have fallen short of God’s standards, He has provided a way for our sins to be forgiven and for our alienation to be made right. God has provided reconciliation for all who believe in His Son as their only hope of salvation.

The answer to all life is found in the person of Jesus Christ. On more than one occasion Jesus would ask, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is…But who do you say that I am?” (Matthew 16:13,15) This is the one answer that we don’t want to get wrong: our life now and our eternal destiny depend on how we answer.

Where do we go to find the answer to this life or death question? There is only one source for that information, and that is the truth propositions as found in the Holy Scriptures as to who Jesus is. Now this truth can be found in the preaching of pastors, in books, and in others proclaiming the good news, but the source of their information was gotten from the Holy Scriptures. Martin Luther, the Great Reformer, said this about the importance of the Holy Scriptures:

“The neglect of Scripture, even by spiritual leaders, is one of the greatest evils in the world. Everything else, arts or literature, is pursued and practiced day and night, and there is no end of labor and effort; but Holy Scripture is neglected as though there were no need of it. Those who condescend to read it want to absorb everything at once. There has never been an art or a book on earth that everyone has so quickly mastered as the Holy Scriptures. But its words are not, as some think, mere literature (Lesewort); they are words of life (Lebewort), intended not for speculation and fancy but for life and action. By why complain? No one pays any attention to our lament. May Christ our Lord help us by His Spirit to love and honor His holy Word with all our heart. Amen.”

The good news of the Gospel is that it offers us eternal life now. The Gospel tells us that Jesus’ promise of peace is for this life now (John 14:27). Think about that offer of peace from the second person in the Trinity as you are going through the most painful of life’s experiences.
In the deepest of sorrows and pains in this life we have the offer of peace from the Prince of Peace. This peace is both experiential and conceptual. We hold onto and believe the promises of God as found throughout the Scriptures. One of the most prized of these promises that God’s people have loved and cherished down through the ages is found in the book of Romans:

“And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose” (8:28).

There is no earthly remedy for sorrow and pain that can stand against this precious promise of God to His people. The promise to God’s people in the midst of their pain and sorrow is that their present circumstances are working for their good, not only now, but for all eternity. We understand that the Christian thinks different; yes, his worldview is the antitheist of this worlds thinking. How could our present suffering and pain be working for our good? How can deep sorrow mean anything other than deep sorrow? Well for the Christian, God is using pain and sorrow to bring His children to be conformed to the image of His Son.

The life of the Christian is not lived unto himself; no, his life is lived to the glory of his creator. The Christian’s life is defined by dying to his own wants and desires, so in dying to himself, he finds his true life in Christ. The good news that the Creator offers man is to come and die to his own wants and desires and find his life in God’s purpose and Divine will. This journey of true blessedness starts at the cross and ends in eternity with all praise, glory, and honor going to the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of all who would believe. And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.

The Inevitability of Sorrow and the Search for Happiness

Everyone will suffer a broken heart sooner than later in life. We have all experienced the sting of emotional pain and sorrow. Fay Weldon expressed the inevitability of sorrow quite well when she said, “there's no such thing as old age, there is only sorrow”. Well maybe Miss Weldon overstated the degree of sorrow, but we can all agree that sorrow will find us sometime in this life.

Sorrow and happiness have to be understood from a Christian perspective. There is no other worldview that can make sense of pain, sorrow and the attainment of happiness in this life; it is only the Christian worldview that offers a satisfying answer.

Philosophers and men of all walks of life have struggled with the question, if God is good why do we have pain and sorrow in this life?  Why does God allow men to suffer? We hear from Leo Tolstoy’s character Anna Karenina who once said, “I’m simply unhappy. If anyone is unhappy, I’m.” We can all identify with Tolstoy’s character, Anna, to some degree; for we have all tasted the same pain and sorrow expressed by Anna Karenina.

We can see this sorrow and suffering in the first book of the Bible, the book of Genesis. We have the scene set: Adam and Eve are placed in perfect surroundings. They have all their needs met by the creator Himself. They enjoy each other’s love, warmth, and friendship. They have all the food they will ever need and they don’t even have to run to the supermarket to get it. It’s all right there. They have all of creation right in their back yard and the best thing of all they are in perfect fellowship with the God of creation.

We all know the story. Both husband and wife disobeyed the Creator’s direct command not to eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and baam, it all starts to unravel. Their relationship with God is estranged. The perfect paradise now becomes thorns and weeds. Adam and Eve are now estranged from each other. For the first time in their lives they experience sorrow. We do see God’s mercy and grace immediately, for God makes atonement for them. He provides a covering for them. Adam and Eve did what all mankind has been doing from day one --- they tried to fix the sin problem, the sorrow problem, on their own. They sought to make a covering for their sin with fig leaves, but God would not have it. Instead of Adam and Eve running to God, they ran from Him and sought their own remedy for their sin.

If we pay attention to our lives, and the lives of others, we find out that at the core of all existence is the desire to be happy. The problem is that man has followed in the same path as Adam and Eve. The truth is that man is not happy at his core and is still trying to find his own remedy for happiness. Just like Adam and Eve, man is not running toward God, but running away from God.  This running away from God is the root of all man’s pain and sorrow.

Dump the Christian Cliches

Today I’d like to deal with Christian clichés that have found room in the Christian church. First, what is a cliché? A quick Google search will tell you that a cliché is a phrase that betrays original thought or a trite, stereotyped expression, usually expressing a popular or common thought or idea that has lost originality, ingenuity and impact by long overuse. Now a cliché can be true or it can be false. I’ll just be dealing with those cliché’s that are false and leave the corny ones for another day.

One phrase that I’ve come across lately is that we are all theologians, it’s just a matter if you are a good theologian or a bad one. I like Titus 2:1 but you must say the things that are consistent with sound teaching. One sentiment you will come across if you’ve been in the church for any time is people don’t need more theology, they just need Jesus. We know the problem with this thinking is that it assumes that we can have Jesus apart from reference to theology or Scripture.

I’ve actually had people tell me that they don’t need all that Bible stuff, and they then tell me that they have Jesus, and that’s all they need. I always reply, which Jesus do you have? The Mormon Jesus, the Jehovah Witness’ Jesus or the prophet Jesus as found in the Koran.

Here’s the great danger in divorcing the person Jesus from the Scriptures…you end up with an idol which makes you an idolater. Now back to those Christian clichés that are false.  They divorce truth from the Scriptures which is always dangerous.

The one cliché that is heard often is let go and let God.  Let go of what? Let God do what? The danger here is that it relieves the Christian of any sense of duty or action that God tells him to take. For instance the Bible tells us to flee fornication, see (1Corinthians 6:8). The list goes on how we are commanded in Scripture to stop, start, or flee sin. How about, let him that stole steal no more, (Ephesians 4:28).  Do you see that the let go and let God has no Biblical warrant?

Someone might say, well we should let go of our worry and let God take care of whatever you are worrying about. That might work, but even here if someone is doing things that cause their worry they are responsible to get that area straight before God.

How about this one: God hates the sin, but loves the sinner. We really need to rethink this erroneous cliché. We are quick to tell those in sin that God loves them, but hates their sin. This may give non-believers a warm, fuzzy feeling but it is not true. The sin of the sinner cannot be separated from his person. Sin is not some abstract entity, no; sin is the very fabric of who the sinner is.

My theological concern is that the cliché is doctrinally ambiguous. It makes it sound as if God is only angry at some abstract entity, but God is angry with the sinner, see Psalm 7:11  God is angry with the wicked every day. Sin is inextricably tied to persons…at the second death when the unbeliever is thrown into the lake of fire it will not be just his sin, no, it will be the sinner who will be thrown into the lake of fire.


Instead of telling the sinner that God hates their sin but loves them, share the gospel with them. The good news that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners from God's wrath.

The Real Battle is Within

To borrow the words of the Apostle Paul the Christian life is a fight. Why? What are we fighting? Well, it not so much what, but who are we fighting. I think any Christian who has journeyed long enough knows that the battle is inside of him. The battle, the real war is not outside somewhere, but in his very being, in his own mind and heart.

Let me define the battle for us. This battle cannot be won with guns, and swords. This battle cannot be won at the ballot box or by what political party is in charge. This battle cannot be won by our friends or our families or even us; and this is because the enemy is sin, and sin can only be defeated at the cross.

The Bible from front to back tells a story of how man fell. From Adam and Eve’s disobedience in the Garden to the final uprising of man in the book of Revelation we see man is in a bad way. Some of the language used to describe man throughout the Bible is really quite disturbing. Jeremiah tells us that the heart of man is deceitful and desperately wicked (Jeremiah 17:9). Jesus said from within the hearts of men come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder and adultery (Mark 7:21).

The Christian knows this battle all so well. The fight can be tiring at times and frustrating. Just when you think you have a victory up comes that ugly old man reminding you that you will need God’s grace until the Captain of the battle calls you home for final rest. Recall the words of Jahaziel as he encouraged King Jehoshaphat; do not be afraid or discouraged because of this vast army. For the battle is not yours, but God’s (2 Chronicles 20:15).

Think about that. Think about what the Apostle Paul said when he humbly confessed that when he is weak Christ is strong (2 Corinthians 12:10). Paul even delighted in his weaknesses. Why would anyone delight in their weaknesses? Well, Paul found out that when he was helpless against sin, and that sin was much bigger and stronger than his will to fight it, he realized at that moment that Christ was big…that Christ was strong, oh what a blessing Paul discovered.

Scottish pastor Robert Murray McCheyne left us with on quote that has become quite famous, and for good reason. It goes like this: “For every look at yourself, take ten looks at Christ.” This quote is short and will sticky and it can keep us from discouragement and tiring in the fight against our own sin.

The Social Justice Gospel in no gospel at all.

Something has been galling me of late, and that is the Social Justice Warrior gospel that is now pervasive in our modern church culture. This movement is not new, the phrase “social gospel” is usually used to describe a Protestant Christian intellectual movement that came to prominence in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
"Those who adhered to a social gospel sought to apply Christian ethics to social problems such as poverty, slums, poor nutrition and education, alcoholism, crime, and war. These things were emphasized while the doctrines of sin, salvation, heaven and hell, and the future kingdom of God were downplayed" (got Questions?org). Let us be clear, Jesus did not come to help us get along or teach us to take care of the poor or to restore ‘social justice’. To some, this assertion is a bold stroke, since they have been told just the opposite. When we view the gospel and the mission of the church as just restoring social justice we are left with a different gospel than the Apostle Paul preached. Paul even said, "but though we or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let them be accursed (Galatians 1:8).

These are very strong words by the Apostle. He used the word accursed to be applied to those who preach and teach any other gospel than the gospel that he preached and taught. I'm writing today to proclaim that the Social Justice gospel in "another" gospel than the gospel of the Apostle Paul.

This may come as a shock to some, but Jesus did not come to heal the sick and feed the hungry. You can eliminate every single thing Jesus ever said in his life about the poor and social justice, and still you will not undermine his main message one bit. The whole of the Old testament's sacrificial system... and all the Old Testament prophets point to One who was to come to feed the hungry...to give sight to the blind, but if this is understood in the physical sense only the gospel is missed.

Jesus told the Samaritan woman at the well that the physical water that you drink will quench your thirst for a time, but the water that I give you will quench your thirst for eternity,see (John 4:4-26). Jesus told the crowds after he feed them that you seek me for the bread that is temporal, but Jesus claimed, I'm the bread of life, whoever partakes of this bread will live forever, see (John 6:25-59).

Jesus did heal those with physical maladies for sure, but that is all the Social Justice Warriors see, but the deeper meaning of those physical healings pointed to a spiritual healing that would come in time at the cross...His death, burial, and resurrection. I think the prophet Isaiah sums it best when he prophesied about Jesus' first coming, he said, But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities; The chastisement for our peace was upon Him, And by His stripes we are healed (Isaiah 53:5).

God did not send His Son to suffer and die on a cross for social justice, no, He sent His Son to satisfy His justice so that a way could be opened for sinful man to come before Him and be in fellowship with Him for eternity.

Error all around us.

There is a grave danger floating around in our current Christian culture today; now keep in mind that no doctrinal error is new, as the old sage told us, there is nothing new under the sun. The insidious error that I come across often is the separating Jesus from the written word.

Let me provide an example what this looks like in real life. Suppose a person says to you, I have a personal relationship with Jesus. Okay, here we go, since I like to dig down and flesh out terms and particular cultural Christian cliches, I would ask this person what they mean by a person relationship with Jesus. At that point, I would ask them very specific questions about the "Jesus" that they have as their "personal" savior.

I might say, well you know, Jesus said, except people repent they will perish, or I'd tell them Jesus said that a man has to hate his own family before he can become a disciple. There a many other texts that I would share with them, oh, I forget the big one, Jesus said that he was the only way to God.

This then is the usual reply that just shakes me to the core, well, that's your Jesus, I have my own Jesus, and He's love. They usually digress into a diatribe that the Bible cannot be understood or that everyone has their own interpretation, and therefore the Bible is not the only source to tell us about Jesus.

I hope you all can see the grave error whenever we separate Jesus from the written word. The natural outcome is that we have people creating their own Jesus. They mold and shape their Jesus to their own carnal and sinful thoughts and desires. In the end what we have is flat out idolatry.

Christianity is the acknowledgement of the propositional truth claims that the Scriptures make about the person and work of Jesus. The crux of the matter, and the central point of what anyone believes, is what authority do you base your belief on? The Canon of Scripture is the churches final authority for all matters of faith and practice.

The Psalmist exclaimed so very long ago, thy word have I hid in my heart that I might not sin against you (Psalm 119:11).  Then we move to the New Testament and the Apostle Paul tells us to let the word of Christ dwell inside of us (Colossians 3:16).

The Renewing of the Mind

I've have written in the past on the life of the mind. I cannot stress enough the importance for the Christian to develop the life of the mind. One very important aspect to note is the mind and the heart are not entirely separate entities. Often the Scriptures speak of the mind and the heart as one "For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he..." (Proverbs 23:7).

From any casual reading of the Scriptures we are struck with all of the admonitions to guard and protect our hearts. We are instructed over and over to pay attention to our thinking process,Jesus tells us that we are to love God with all our our minds (Luke 10:27). The Apostle Paul gives us a serious contrast between a mind that is patterned after our carnal appetites (death) and a mind that is set on the things of the Spirit of God (life)(Romans 8:6). One of my favorite texts is Paul's words in (Romans 12:2) where we are told not to conform to this world, but we are to be transformed by the renewing of our minds. Think about that for a moment, Paul is telling us that if we live with renewed minds it will have a direct impact on the way we live out our lives in this world.

All wrong actions find their starting point first in wrong thoughts. The mind of the Christian is to be saturated with the wisdom and knowledge of God. We have many admonitions to mediate on God's word, the most well known is Joshua 1:8 where Joshua tells his people that that the law of God should be mediated on day and night.

Think about this for a second...there are only two kinds of minds or thinking processes. One is the carnal mind, the mind of the flesh, the mind that is at enmity with God, the mind that is dead spiritually. The other is the mind that has been made alive in Christ, the mind that has been renewed, the mind that is set on the things of God, the mind that is filled with the wisdom and knowledge of God.

The discipline for the Christian. The call of the Christian is to cultivate the life of the mind, to set his mind on the things of God. Paul even tells us specifically what to think on in Philippians 4:8 ( whatsoever is true, whatsoever is honest, whatsoever is just, whatsoever is pure, whatsoever is lovely).

The beauty of the Christian life is that all change is from the inside out, unlike the secular world where change can happen, but it is only outward change. The Christian change is wrought by the Spirit of God for the glory of God, the carnal mind can know nothing of this kind of change.

So Christian set your mind on the things of God. Make the meditation of God's word a daily habit and walk in a new and transformed way of thinking.

Our Mind's Matter

Thinking, thinking, thinking, always thinking. The life of the mind is the heart of the Christian life. As I think through the Scriptures, I'm struck with how much emphasis is placed on our thought life.

One text that we are all familiar with is "as a man thinks in his heart (mind)so he is (Proverbs 23:7). Take time and park there...as our thought life is, so we are. What we chew on every day. What we allow into our minds, is the real indicator of who we really are. Any man can hide who he really is from others, but our inward-self reveals the true us.

With that in mind think of the One who knows the mind of man. We are told by the prophet Jeremiah that God searches the heart and examines the mind (17:10). Paul tells us that it is God who searches our heart (Romans 8:27). The writer of Hebrews tells us that God's word judges the thoughts and attitudes of our hearts (4:12).

How about Psalm 44:21 "Would not God find this out? For He knows the secrets of the heart." There are hundreds of other passages that tell us that God knows our thoughts, desires, and our attitudes. How incumbent on the man of God to develop the life of the mind in a God honoring way.

The battle in the Christian life is not out-there, no, it's inside each one of us. The battle is the fight against any ungodly  thought that tries to make it in to our life, and find root. We then through the power of the Holy Spirit have the choice to smash that thought or let it in where it will take root and estrange us from God and others.

Let's move from the abstract to the real world of every-day life. Suppose you had a fight with your spouse and you are now harboring sinful feelings. Let's say you are acting out your feeling in the expression of anger. You can trace that anger back to a thought...anger is an emotion, but you have to give it room...you have to allow it a place to come and reside,you have to start to listen to his voice for it to have an effect.

Now think about the love that the Bible commands us to have toward our spouse. Paul tells us in that great chapter in 1 Corinthians that love is kind. Now, here we go, we don't have to feel kind first toward that person to act, no, we put on kindness, we smash those thoughts of anger, we kick him out, and invite kindness in. We allow the voice of kindness to speak to us.

So, even when we still feel anger, we act-out the fruit of love, kindness. Is it hard?  You bet it is, matter of fact you cannot do it alone, you have to walk in the Spirit and keep your heart tender toward God.

Let's therefore put off all that is contrary to God's thoughts and put on Christ in our daily thought life.

Robert Murray McCheyne:

“What a man is on his knees before God, that he is, and nothing more.”

A Day Without Women...What?

A Day without Immigrants, A Day without Women, The Women's March on Washington...all have one thing in common, that is a common ideology and a common political agenda. What is really behind the myriad of marches and protests that we have seen is a hatred of Trump and the Republican Party.

I've seen some of the signs at the Day without Women march the other day, one sign read, "Stop the war on women," I didn’t know there was a “war” on women, at least in the Unites States, and in the West. I think we all know what religion is waging a war on women, but we can’t say that in this climate of political correctness.  We've heard Madonna’s rant about blowing up the White House. We have seen Linda Sarsour, the Executive Director of the Arab American Association of New York, who was also arm-in-arm with Maddona and has some dubious ties to Hamaas. When one digs into the money behind these protests and the prime organizers we see the real ideology behind it all….can you say George Soros.

This is what someone has said of Muslim activist Miss Sarsour, “What I object to is a woman of the most female-demeaning religion in the world criticizing a nation that tries to help women. … And … she has the audacity to say she speaks ‘for all women!’ Really! She needs to take the plank out of Islam’s eye before she complains about a splinter in the eye of other religions.”

The other day in support of the Women’s Day dozens of women in red walked out of Congress and spoke their true heart….they railed against Trump….they said that Trump was going to set  women back a hundred years…that is code for, Trump will try to take away the right for a woman to murder her unborn child.


Now here’s the sad part, we’ve Christian women who think that by locking arms with this movement that they are doing women a service. I would remind and admonish those women who profess Christ of the words of the Apostle Paul. “Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common? Or what fellowship can light have with darkness? 2 Corinthians 6:14.

One of the celebrities today in the modern Christian church is Jen Hatmaker.  Here’s Jen Hatmaker’s post from her Facebook page concerning the recent women’s day celebration:

Today, on InternationalWomensDay, if I haven't made this abundantly clear ten thousand times, I am WILD about women and am gobsmacked by our courage, resiliency, and pluck every single day.
I was having lunch with a dear friend this week, and we were talking about our community, and I told her: "My heart would fail without the women in my life." She just nodded, because we've said this to each other for a decade. I mean that as sincerely as possible. My best friends, my little inner tribe, the women in my church, and you: my heart would fail without you. I almost love you too much.
For me, it started at the beginning: my mom, who is consequently 66 years old today. She always, always had girlfriends, and they were deeply a part of our life. So did my Grandma King, for that matter. Those were all my extra mothers and grandmothers, the backdrop to my entire childhood, thus I do not have a single memory without a chorus of women parenting and grandparenting me over rivers of Tab, Sanka, dominoes, and backyard barbecues.
It never occurred to me that women were anything less that the fuel of the earth. They hold families and communities together in every corner of the world, and they do it with incredible moxie. The women in my life are, sincerely, one of the small handful of treasures I could not live without.
Happy birthday to my mom, and happy International Women's Day to you: the kindest, bravest, smartest, funniest, loveliest, most interesting, inspiring, encouraging women on earth.
I love you. Proud to be your sister. (Photos of the Women in My Life in the link below.)
Shout out to your best girls below!

Now there’s nothing out right unbiblical about Jen’s post, but what disturbs me about a professing Christian woman, (who has advocated for same sex marriage, calling it a holy union), is an unbalanced view of women.  I don’t find anywhere in Scripture that our genders are to be praised and exalted, and in Jen Hatmaker’s words she is, WILD about women and am gobsmacked by their courage, resiliency, and pluck every single day.  She even notes herself, “. I almost love you [women] too much.”

God’s plan is that the woman is to be a companion of the man…she’s his help-meet….she’s his compliment. This is the union and the tie that binds the man and the woman. To overly exalt and lift male or female is not the picture that is given to us in the pages of Holy Writ.
So, I ask all women to ask this question about these protests, and marches: what are they doing out there?” “What do they want?” “What’s their goal?”

The simple, official answer to “What do they want?” is easy to find in the first paragraph of the march’s official policy platform, a four-page document titled “Guiding Vision and Defining Principals” that was released in advance of the event. Noting that it aims to bring together people of all genders and backgrounds, the organizers proclaim its goal is “to affirm our shared humanity and pronounce our bold message of resistance and self-determination.” One of the planks in the document calls for: Comprehensive reproductive rights, LGBTQ rights, and immigrant and refugee rights.

I can say unequivocally that no Christian woman should be linking arms with this secular, leftist movement. No Christian woman as a child of light should link arms with a movement that has as  part of its agenda a call to kill the unborn and the support of gay marriages.

God loves His people. Christ redeemed His elect from before the foundation of the world. The Great Apostle Paul tells us in Romans 5:6 "For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly." 


The one thing we get from this text is that before our conversion we were helpless in every way. We had no power to obey God or keep his commandments. We see some lost people who are highly religious, they have an outward form of Godliness, but inwardly their motives are stained with sin.

The Bible is crystal clear that man in his natural state is separated from God by his very nature...theologically speaking, man before conversion is in Adam, and in Adam man is an enemy of God, and under God's judgement.

The Romans text gives us a bad and a good. The first half is that man in his lost condition is weak and helpless. There is nothing man can do to be right with God, no religious works will suffice. The second half of the verse tells us that Christ died for the ungodly.

The key in the second clause of the text is that Christ died...this is now the heart of the gospel. Man is in a bad way, he's estranged from God, but God provided a means of reconciliation, His very Son. God in His Son provided atonement for the sins of those who will believe.

The gospel is the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Man needs a Savior, and the mission and calling of the Church is to proclaim this message without apology in the full power of the Holy Spirit.

Fight For the Faith.

There is the Jesus of the cultural Christian and then the Jesus of the Bible. There is the Jesus of the modern, progressive liberal church and there is the Jesus of the Scriptures.

The postmodern church culture has placed doctrine and theology on the shelf to collect dust, while they hold up relationship and community as the all-in-all of Christianity.

The push of the postmodern church is to be less preachy, less sure of your own convictions, less sure of any absolute truth. Doctrine and theology is anathema and is to be avoided at all costs. Those in the new church place an inordinate emphasis on always being agreeable.

While Christians are certainly to avoid foolish and ignorant disputes, we should never avoid speaking truth and defending the truth of God.

We are called to fight the good fight...we are called to earnestly contend for the faith...we are called to proclaim the truth of the gospel to all people at all times.

What we are left with in these so called new churches is nothing but fluff and feathers. They have their community, but they have not the truth of the Scriptures as the glue to hold them together. They have their meetings, but they do not have the presence of the Holy Spirit to anoint and bless their gatherings.

In the end, they are no different than any secular, social gathering. They may have some Christian speak, but that's all it is, it is having a form of Godliness but not the power of God.

Here's how one great theologian of the past felt about God's truth:


A dog barks when his master is attacked. I would be a coward if I saw that God's truth is attacked and yet would remain silent. John Calvin.

And another:

I cannot and will not recant anything, for to go against conscience is neither right nor safe. Here I stand, I can do no other, so help me God. Amen. Martin Luther.

I cannot and will not recant anything, for to go against conscience is neither right nor safe. Here I stand, I can do no other, so help me God. Amen. Martin Luther
Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/m/martinluth403720.html

 Dear friends, although I was very eager to write to you about the salvation we share, I felt compelled to write and urge you to contend for the faith that was once for all entrusted to God’s holy people. Jude 3.

A dog barks when his master is attacked. I would be a coward if I saw that God's truth is attacked and yet would remain silent. John Calvin
Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/j/johncalvin144215.html

A dog barks when his master is attacked. I would be a coward if I saw that God's truth is attacked and yet would remain silent. John Calvin
Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/j/johncalvin144215.html

A dog barks when his master is attacked. I would be a coward if I saw that God's truth is attacked and yet would remain silent. John Calvin
Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/j/johncalvin144215.html

I cannot and will not recant anything, for to go against conscience is neither right nor safe. Here I stand, I can do no other, so help me God. Amen. Martin Luther
Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/m/martinluth403720.html

A dog barks when his master is attacked. I would be a coward if I saw that God's truth is attacked and yet would remain silent. John Calvin
Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/j/johncalvin144215.html

A dog barks when his master is attacked. I would be a coward if I saw that God's truth is attacked and yet would remain silent. John Calvin
Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/j/johncalvin144215.html