Book 4 of Musings Pleasure at the Expense of Others

I believe God is looking to observe how we behave, to see if we are worthy of being a part of the new world of righteousness He is preparing.

One type of person who does not belong in God's new world is the individual who obtains pleasure at the expense of someone else.

There is a new world, a new age, just over the horizon. I believe it is true that the purpose of the present world is to determine eligibility for participation in the next, and also who is to be assigned the roles of nearness to God, and authority and service, that will be part of the Kingdom of God.

It may be true that one of the qualities that God is examining is our willingness to gain pleasure at the expense of other people. It is a common practice today to gain pleasure at the expense of other people. The idea is, "I will get what I can, and it is too bad if someone is in the way." This is the law of the jungle.

As the Apostle Peter said, there are some people who are like brute beasts, made to be caught and destroyed.

But these men blaspheme in matters they do not understand. They are like brute beasts, creatures of instinct, born only to be caught and destroyed, and like beasts they too will perish. (2 Peter 2:12)

Our "civilized" society is becoming too "nice" to think such things about people. The people, in the meanwhile, are becoming worse!

It is common today in America for a husband or wife to desert his or her family in order to find pleasure with another person. The deserter does not seem to care about the grief he or she leaves behind, the anxious, fearful children, the betrayed mate now saddled with all kinds of financial and other problems.

"I am happy so is all that matters."

God sees this. Such an individual is unworthy of the Kingdom of God. Unless the person comes to a realization of how he has injured other people, does what he can to make amends, and bears as cheerfully as he can the chastening that God sends on him, he will not be permitted to live among decent people in the coming age.

I wish I could get into words the problem with current teaching. We have made Christian grace a means of subverting God's intentions under the new covenant. Somehow we have twisted the New Testament to mean if we take the correct religious stance, God is forced to ignore the things we have done and to receive us into Paradise. It simply does not matter what kind of person we are. Just as long as we say "Jesus is Lord," we are qualified to have fellowship with Christ and the saints.

The demons understand better than we how much of a lord Jesus actually is!

We are putting a religious formula in place of godly behavior. It is wrong! wrong! wrong!

If God is examining our character to see where we belong in the coming age, why would He give us a plan of salvation that sidesteps the righteous behavior that will be required in the new world of righteousness? Is this the purpose of imputed righteousness-to count us righteous when we are not?

Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought you to be? You ought to live holy and godly lives As you look forward to the day of God and speed its coming. That day will bring about the destruction of the heavens by fire, and the elements will melt in the heat. But in keeping with his promise we are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth, the home of righteousness. 2 Peter 3:11-13)

"A new earth, the home of righteousness."

Am I saying we can be saved by ignoring Jesus Christ and living righteously?

I am not stating anything of the kind. I am saying Jesus Christ came into the world to turn the ungodly to righteous behavior, not so God will view the persistently ungodly as qualified by grace to become part of the new earth, the home of righteousness! What have we been thinking of? We surely have been terribly deceived?

Of late a man and his wife kidnapped a young girl. It was several months before he was caught with the girl. Can you imagine the anguish of the parents? This man, so typical in America, regarded his own pleasure of supreme importance. What did it matter to him if the mother and father were tormented all that time!

Unless this individual turns, and does works of repentance, he will never have a place among decent people in the home of righteousness.

Child molestation is a common practice in America at the present time. When the person who has been molested becomes an adult he or she is haunted by what happened to him or her. Sometimes the molested individual is unable to have a happy marriage.

The molester thinks only of his own pleasure. He doesn't care what happens to the child he molests. Sometimes the molester murders the child, casting the body aside as so much garbage.

Such a person is not worthy of the Kingdom of God.

"But," we say, "if he accepts Jesus Christ he will be forgiven."

Yes. I agree with you. The Bible says if we confess our sins God is faithful and righteous to forgive our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." The Bible says also that if the wicked forsakes his wickedness and begins to act righteously, his wickedness shall not be mentioned.

God has made abundant provisions for people to make amends.

The problem today is we have made entrance into the Kingdom too cheap.

First of all, repentance is a gift. Unless God leads a person to repentance, he or she is not going to repent.

Second, we receive back in this life the evil we have done. If I am not mistaken, this chastisement will continue into the next life.

There are lashes that are given to the Lord's servants who have practiced wickedness.

I suppose where our thinking goes astray is that the coming world is not real to us. Perhaps we are under the impression somehow the people who have "accepted Christ" are magically different or will be magically different after they die and "go to Heaven."

I have been around church people enough to know we are not magically different. Many of us have made some improvement in our personality. Some have made no improvement at all and see no need to change. "After all, we are saved by faith alone!" (What a monstrous doctrine "faith alone" is! How utterly destructive of God's intentions under the new covenant!)

It is not so. What we are, we are. Death does not change us.

Let us suppose there is a man who is an adulterer, a slanderer, a liar, a drunkard. He lives for his own pleasure.

Let us suppose further that toward the end of his life of debauchery God grants him the gift of repentance. Perhaps a saint has clung to God on behalf of this person.

What then? How will this man who lies and deceives by his nature, thinking only of himself, fit among the decent people of the new world?

The answer is, God will have to change him if he is to have fellowship with the righteous.

How will God change this corrupt individual?

By intense suffering. If I am correct, some of the suffering may take place in this world and some in the next.

How long would it take to burn the conniving nature out of an individual?

I am not certain. From what I have seen of people, as a former educator and now a pastor, I would say many years of suffering before the corruption is removed and the person is fit to live among peaceful, God-fearing people. You could put such an individual in a mortar and pound him with a pestle, and when you let him out the first thing he would do would be to attempt to deceive you.

This is the way Satan is, along with all his followers.

Do you remember how God instantly forgave King David? Do you remember the things that happened to David after that because of the single incident? And David was a righteous man who served God!

We read of the repenting of Ahab and Manasseh and how quickly God forgives. God knows how difficult life on earth is, and He is ready to help anyone who seeks help.

But our idea of grace today seems to ignore the reality of the coming world of righteousness. It is as though we can be a self-seeking person on the earth, leaving a trail of destruction as we harm other people in order to insure our own pleasure, and then say the right words about Christ-presto! we are qualified to rule with Christ over the nations of the earth.

The truth is, profession or no profession, we are not qualified even to enter the Kingdom of Heaven as the lowest citizen until we are healed totally of the willingness to gain pleasure at the expense of someone else.

The Kingdom of God is the rule of the Father through Christ through the saints over the nations of the earth. After the thousand-year Kingdom Age, there will be a new world of righteousness. The people therein will be righteous, every one of them.

Then will all your people be righteous and they will possess the land forever. They are the shoot I have planted, the work of my hands, for the display of my splendor. (Isaiah 60:21)

The above does not mean they will be righteous by imputation, it means they will be righteous in character. People who think they are righteous by imputation but behave wickedly cannot display God's splendor. Only good works on our part cause people to glorify God.

God sends many fiery trials upon those whom He has called. These fires are designed to burn the worldliness, lust, and self-will out of us. These fires are judgment, and by this judgment we are saved.

God's goal for man has never changed. God wants people who behave righteously, love mercy, and walk humbly with God. God can have fellowship with such. God want His world filled with these kinds of people.

But we have perverted God's Gospel until God is supposed to have fellowship with wicked, self-serving people who are perfectly willing to gain pleasure at the expense of other people.

Those who are willing to acquire pleasure at the expense of another individual are not fit for the new world of righteousness, not by grace, not by mercy, not by God's love. They can profess Christ, but this makes no difference. Until they are willing to turn, make amends, and suffer patiently the fires necessary to drive this corruption from their personality, they do not belong with decent people.

But those who are considered worthy of taking part in that age and in the resurrection from the dead will neither marry nor be given in marriage, (Luke 20:35)

"I tell you the truth," Jesus said to them, "no one who has left home or wife or brothers or parents or children for the sake of the kingdom of God Will fail to receive many times as much in this age and, in the age to come, eternal life." (Luke 18:29-30)

All this is evidence that God's judgment is right, and as a result you will be counted worthy of the kingdom of God, for which you are suffering. (2 Thessalonians 1:5)