Book 3 of Musings Keep My Commandments
Love for God without obedience to God is an impossibility. "If you love me, keep my commandments."
God is our Father, isn't He? He also is a great and dreadful King. We know this.
The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom. One reason America has so much foolishness in its culture is because we have lost the fear of God.
From the beginning of the world God has required obedience. He has every right to insist on obedience, given that we are His creatures. Don't you feel that this is right? I do.
God tested Abraham severely in the area of obedience when He requested that Abraham offer Isaac as a burnt offering. All the nations on earth will be blessed through Abraham's offspring because Abraham obeyed God in the matter of Isaac.
And through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me. (Genesis 22:18)
Then came the Law of Moses. The idea of the Law was, if you wanted to please God you were required to keep His commandments.
Then came the Lord Jesus Christ. Christ informed us that if we love Him we will keep His commandments. Christ Himself obeyed God to the point of agreeing to become an atonement for our sin.
Christ told us to go into the all the world, make disciples from the people of the nations of the earth, and teach them to obey everything Christ commanded.
And teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age. (Matthew 28:20)
The Great Commission is often referred to today as the basis for our going forth to every nation, in obedience to Christ. We are supposed to make disciples and teach them to obey everything Christ commanded. Instead we teach them that because they are saved by grace they do not have to do everything Christ commanded. It would be nice if they did, as long as they didn't get the idea they somehow were adding to their sovereign salvation.
If this is not asinine I do not know what is.
I believe the Lord Jesus thinks it is asinine.
We have a religion that teaches the opposite of Christ and His Apostles, and yet we call it after the name of Christ. This is asinine, counterproductive, destructive, and otherwise reprehensible.
We are not obeying the Great Commission when we go forth and persuade people to "accept Christ," and then build a church. We are not obeying the Great Commission until we make disciples and teach them to obey everything Christ commanded. A disciple is not someone who just makes a profession of belief in Christ. A disciple is someone who denies himself, takes up his personal cross, and follows Jesus every day. He is not just a church member!
The Apostles wrote the New Testament, giving us numerous commandments that would help us overcome sin until Christ had come to maturity in us. These commandments were coming from the Lord Jesus.
To the married I give this command (not I, but the Lord: A wife must not separate from her husband. (I Corinthians 7:10)
When Paul gave his own opinion he told us so. The rest of his writings, as well as the writings of the other Apostles, are the commandments of Jesus Christ. We are supposed to teach the disciples to obey every one of them.
All of the above is indisputably true. The whole concept of being a member of God's elect of the royal priesthood, is that we are servants of God who carry out His every wish.
Now, would someone please explain to me, how in the world did the idea get started that if we are saved by grace we do not have to keep the commandments of God and of His Son? I am not referring to the Law of Moses, I am speaking of the commandments given by Christ Himself and then through His Apostles. There are many such commandments to be found in the New Testament.
We have literally millions of Christians in the world today who have been taught that they do not have to keep Christ's commandments because they have been saved by some kind of grace.
Let us look carefully at this doctrine.
We come to Jesus Christ for salvation. According to current teaching, to be saved means we will go to Heaven when we die. This is not the meaning of salvation according to the New Testament, but let us set that aside for now.
We come to Jesus Christ so He will forgive our sins and admit us into Heaven when we die.
Here we are, a human being with a sinful nature. We have been forgiven. Hopefully we will start attending church on a regular basis.
Depending on the church we attend, we may begin to improve morally. We do not do this so we can go to Heaven. We are going to be admitted to Heaven on the basis of grace, meaning unqualified forgiveness.
However, the pressures on us are enormous. Everywhere we turn there are temptations to physical lust, to be covetous of material wealth, to respond violently when we are frustrated. We have good intentions, we want to please the Lord. But it is just about impossible.
We are wrestling against angels who previously had occupied places of importance in the heavens. They are skilled at deceiving humans.
We may, while a church-attending Christian, molest our child; murder our spouse; become addicted to alcohol; use profanity; become addicted to pornography.
Why do we do these things? Because we have a sinful nature. Because our environment if filled with unclean spiritual influences. Because the media keeps presenting worldly values to us and our children.
We don't want to practice destructive behavior, but we do in spite of ourselves.
What is our church telling us? It is telling us not to worry because God is saving us by grace. Our sins have been cast behind His back. The commandments of the New Testament are for the purpose of showing us we need a Savior who will forgive us unconditionally. There is no need to worry or to prepare ourselves for the future because at any moment we will be caught up to Heaven where all our troubles will vanish. We can prepare for the catching up by jumping up and down next to our pew.
You may not believe it, but what I have just presented is proclaimed in numerous Christian churches throughout the United States.
If you were a sociologist, given the pressure to sin in the United States, what would you predict concerning the moral strength of the Christian people?
Let us think further. Let us imagine how God pictures us.
Here is a Christian mother and father with two children. The mother has worked hard to put her husband through medical school. During this time she has borne two children. She was slim when they were married but now has not been able to shed the pounds she gained during pregnancy.
When her doctor-husband comes home he finds, two screaming children, dirty dishes, and a distraught, overweight wife who is at her wits end trying to keep her two-year-old under control. They are saved and attend church.
When the doctor goes to his office he finds peace, quiet, and is carefully attended by his young, pretty secretary. She thinks he is wonderful and lets him know about it every day.
There come times during the day when the office is empty except for this Christian doctor and his doting secretary. The inevitable takes place.
After a pleasant interlude he returns home to his overweight, distraught wife and her screaming children.
The doctor is a good man, a righteous man. He is sincere about being a Christian.
But he thinks to himself: "How wonderful it would be if I could just pack up and move to another state with my secretary. She is so understanding whereas my wife yells at me from time to time.
"I will divorce my wife and send enough money each month to take care of the children. She has office skills and can get a job.
In the meanwhile my new wife and I will have a blissful marriage and attend church.
"I am not worried about going to Heaven when I die because our pastor says we are saved by a sovereign grace. How we behave may be regrettable, but it only makes God's grace shine more brightly."
God looks down at this scene. He remembers the marriage vows the husband uttered at the altar. God sees the two children, a boy and a girl, without the guiding influence of a father.
God sees the wife faced with the prospect of being away from her children eight hours a day. She was barely able to cope with the two children when she was home all day. Now she returns from eight hours at the office, the housework to do, the children just as cranky as ever.
When she goes to church the people gawk and ask about her husband. Finally she stops going.
What does God think about this?
The current teaching is God would be displeased, but as far as Heaven goes, the husband and wife have their ticket and will be admitted when they die.
The Spirit seems to be indicating that America is facing severe judgment because of the lack of morality on the part of the American people. Since the teaching of the "pre-tribulation rapture" is unscriptural, the mother is going to have to try to survive with her two children during the age of physical and moral horrors that is ahead.
What does God think about this?
What if their pastor had preached the New Testament, warning the doctor and his wife that those who commit adultery will not inherit the Kingdom of God. Would it have made a difference? Would the doctor have behaved differently if he knew he was going to be punished severely, perhaps in both this world and the next?
Would the American churches be different if the New Testament was preached instead of grace-Heaven-rapture?
Personally I believe they would. I think there would be at least some believers who would be restrained from sinning if they realized they were going to stand before Christ and receive the bad thing they had done.
God sees everybody on earth at all times. He sees all they do at all times-right down to the least detail.
God has given us righteous commandments in the New Testament. He has forgiven our sins and freed us from the Law of Moses. This is an act of Divine grace.
Now, what possible benefit would accrue to the Lord if the people He forgave kept on with their former way of life? What would be the sense of this?
The individual accepted Christ as his Savior. But he still watches pornography. Is still mean to his wife. He engages in fornication every once in a while. He drinks alcohol and smokes cigarettes. He has a violent temper such that his wife and children are terrified on occasion.
Current teaching maintains that there is no problem here. He has accepted Christ and will go to Heaven on the basis of sovereign grace.
Do you know how modern theologians approach this obvious farce? They maintain that if a person acts like this he never was saved in the first place.
Now let us think carefully about this. If a person lives according to his sinful nature he never was saved in the first place. The Bible does not teach this.
If they have escaped the corruption of the world by knowing our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and are again entangled in it and overcome, they are worse off at the end than they were at the beginning. It would have been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than to have known it and then to turn their backs on the sacred command that was passed on to them. (2 Peter 2:20-21)
It sounds to me as though the above people had really known the Lord at one time and then had turned from the way of righteousness.
Are such scholars not saying the evidence of salvation is a godly life?
Also, with this doctrine in mind, no individual could know he had been saved. Suppose he slipped and became violent, and punched his wife. Does this mean he is not saved?
How wickedly can he behave before he crosses the line and it becomes evident he never was saved in the first place?
Can you see how ridiculous such reasoning is?
On the one hand the scholars state we are saved by a sovereign grace independently of our behavior.
On the other hand the same scholars state if we behave wickedly we never were saved in the first place?
Are they not saying the only proof of salvation is moral transformation?
Let's think back to our Christian doctor. Can any sincere Christians, or non-Christian for that matter, argue that God does not see the sinful selfishness of the doctor
The current teaching is, "It's under the blood." I think the crux of the matter is right here. Does God see the sins that Christians commit? Or does He just overlook them?
God does suspend the judgment of the sin of the Christian while he is working with. However, that same believer experiences many, many painful judgments as the Fire of God seeks out and destroys the sinful nature.
So we are in need of a reformation of Christian thinking. The traditional "sovereign grace" concept, that our behavior is not related to our salvation, has ruined the Christian churches in America. They are filled with silly believers who are worthless as members of Christ's army. He will have to look elsewhere for those who will be raised when He appears, be caught up to meet Him in the clouds, and descend in the mighty cavalry charge that will begin the installation of the Kingdom of God on the earth.
Picture the warriors of the Lord descending through the clouds and taking up their positions, probably on the dried-up bed of the Euphrates.
Antichrist will have his forces arrayed at Har Megedon.
The cavalry may be in a line, three deep. At the command the lances are leveled. Although Antichrist will be using physical weapons, the spiritual lances of the Lord's army will pierce through the enemy's ordnance. God Himself will destroy the enemy's air cover. God has stored up His hailstones for the day of battle.
At the command of the officers the lances will be leveled. The three ranks will begin their ride across the desert.
When they draw near the enemy the huge war stallions will begin to charge at full gallop. The enemy will have drawn up his battle lines. The Lord's cavalry will not stop. They will hit the enemy lines with full force. The shock will be overpowering. Everything will be smashed before them.
The second rank will follow, destroying those who were overthrown by the first rank. The third rank will complete the work of destruction.
This is how I picture what will take place when the Lord Jesus returns.
Now, can you imagine the fatuous believers of today participating in such an assault? As I said, the teaching of unconditional grace has made them worthless as far as the work of the Kingdom of God is concerned.
I hope many young people will read the New Testament and see how utterly corrupt present-day teaching has become. Perhaps some of them will see the folly and madness of the "faith alone" doctrine and deny themselves, take up their personal cross, and follow the Commander in Chief each day as He prepares His soldiers for the conflict of the ages.
He has been deceived who maintains, "God has saved me by grace, therefore I do not have to keep His commandments." He shall come to a hard end.
If you love me, you will obey what I command. (John 14:15)