The need for Bereans to walk extra circumspectly – Part 2
For part one of this article, please click here.
Waking Up
God opened the eyes of a certain disciple eight years ago, and has been his leader keeping him from greater error though certainly not error proof.
This disciple threw out certain teachings not witnessed to by the early church which he had gotten in a former time. He began with the motto “test all things, hold fast that which is good.” And, “test the spirits.”
Some things he kept – teachings leading to holiness, and utter dependence upon the Lord.
God the refining fire also began a work of deliverance and repentance in him. It is ongoing, and God does want us to know that in our flesh, “dwells no good thing.” He shows us ourselves. We must hate ourselves in Adam, and seek His replacement with Himself. This is the work of God, but our will and clarity and faith determine much as well – and these too depend on God!
We must throw ourselves back onto God for all. We must come to trust this as effective.
By Their Fruits You Will Know Them
Dead religion can deceive itself into saying it knows all this, then set about assuming God is “in” (supportive. in back of) what they are doing, but the proof of what they really have is what results and spirit are produced.
A proof of whether Christians’ professed “faith” is in line with the true faith “once delivered to all the saints” is what results it produces – individually and corporately.
The apostle Paul’s goal was that “Christ be formed in you.”
Here also is much disagreement in defining terms (where is there NOT disagreement?) but the Word speaks of the life of a disciple as being serious as a heart attack.
He who loves his life will lose it, and he who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. – Jn 12:25
If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple. – Lk. 14:26 “
But Jesus said to him, “No one, having put his hand to the plow, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God. – Lk. 9:62
And if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye, rather than having two eyes, to be cast into hell fire … Mark 9:47
Sin – which sent Jesus to the Cross – is never OK.
We believe grace gets abused in some circles, and the teaching surrounding it can be shades of error that may seem right, but yield not fruit of holiness pleasing to God.
Jesus commanded his followers to make disciples, not just “get people saved” as the western parlance puts it.
The Protestant Reformation did not restore authentic Christianity in full, and we must see that!
If one says he or she is a Christian, they declare themselves a bond slave of God; a disciple. Do people really self identify in such terms very often? What is Christianity to them?
God did not send His Son on account of sin to mean for us – in any way expressed or implied – to turn around and not do all we can to press into God for all deliverance from the sin nature inherited in Adam. This, indeed is the promise of “salvation” as the Word fully speaks of it – salvation from sin and living union with God by obedience and faith.
A core litmus test, a linchpin question, is “what manner of spirit” is a person of? The goal of the gospel, and the promise of the New Covenant is to produce Christ in us. We are to have His Holy Spirit, and this is NOT merely thinking a lot about God in our minds inherited from Adam. It is not having one’s talking points all lined up and rehearsed, or being a better arguer than someone else. Great is the mystery of godliness.
Abiding in Christ is a spiritually transcendent state that cannot be faked.
All people lost or saved emanate a spirit, a flavor. God’s people are to have the fragrance of life to those who are receiving life, and of death to those who are headed for death (lost, though they may repent and be saved).
Proofs – The Witness to the World
Question: How did Jesus indicate the world would know of Him?
Answer: By our conduct and what we are as much if not more than any words we express.
By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.” – Jn 13:35
“I in them, and You in Me; that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved Me.” (Jn. 17)
Again, definitions vary for what marks Christian “love.”
Our contention is the standard we too often see or what constitutes a Christian life truly pleasing to God is watered down, dumbed down, falls well short in peoples’ lives compared to the early church, and standard of the Word.
Unfeigned love is a miracle as much as being born again is a miracle.
Actually, the entire life “hidden with Christ in God” is a miracle and teachings should be abandoned that do not place a priority on laying hold of eternal life, and running in such a way that we may please God.
People may claim to love Him, but are they yet carnal, bound in the Adamic nature?
The meaning of “walk in the Spirit” has also fallen well short of what the Word of God would show. The meaning of “abide in Christ” – essentially one and the same as walking in the Spirit – is also dumbed down or not given its proper emphasis.
Cheap grace marks American Christianity in too many quarters like a stain. It produces compromisers with the truth, and a form of godliness that denies the power of God.
It defines as “faith” what is otherwise unbelief. For example, “belief” in a passive, slow road to sanctification or effective holiness, or re-defining what God expects of His sheep is unbelief in the miraculous life of Christ in you, the hope of glory. It changes terms of what God expects of those who love Him.
The kingdom of God is not in word but in power. The power of the outpoured Holy Spirit – not a counterfeit or the wisdom of man – is essential. Nothing else gives God glory. Works of man not originated by God are to be considered dead, with no reward. Same also for words spoken. He wants to be our all in all.
While grace exists, we fear so few take this life of discipleship as seriously as the Lord would have them. His stern warnings in the Book of Revelation should hint at what the resurrected Jesus the King expects.
Actual Good News: God does NOT expect such a walk of holiness to come from us – as from ourselves in Adam. Rather, the same Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead and who abides in our mortal body is the glory and power we either know, or do not know. God can make this demand because he demands Adam to do nothing but lie dead in the grave, having been crucified. God demands the obedience and faith that yields eternal fruit of His own life. We are in Christ, but do we know (gnosco) it?
God can make great demands because He makes the demands of His own life. It is our duty under the New Covenant to seek this reality and lay hold of it. It is a promise to those who believe. Yes we have grace, and this is why grace was given.
I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me. – Gal. 2:20
There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus,[a] who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death. 3 For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh, 4 that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. – Rom. 8:1-4
The eternal purpose (Eph. 3:11) is why God made man, why He sent His Son, and why the Son wants a Bride. Every Christian should ask what is faith to him or her and what does their love consist of?
