Moral declension's 'godliness'

“Satan, the real master of the New Age, delights in mysterious code words and (symbols) because they allow his agents, when questioned, to escape public censure by hiding behind a verbal mirage.”

-- Texe Marrs, author of Dark Secrets of the New Age.

In detailing characteristics of the last days of the dispensation of grace, Paul gives generalized morality kinds of things in which man is the measure of everything.

“Paul tells us that, in spite of all of the excess of human depravity, men have ‘a form of godliness,' " explains Jordan. “Man is naturally religious; he just can’t ‘get over it’ and that’s why Romans 1, after he’s ‘changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things’ . . .  he simply takes God and reduces Him to something he can control and you have to understand there’s a WORSHIP. There’s a desire to worship and control things.

“There is an external religious form of godliness. Even the Antichrist uses the Baal worship system in Scripture to rise to power. So human depravity isn’t going to leave out religion and it will have a zeal for what it’s committed to with a religious fervor and the ferocity of religious commitment.”

Here is post from 10/29/16:

The other week Donald Trump was sitting with Hillary Clinton at a white-tie affair in Manhattan’s Waldorf-Astoria with only Cardinal Timothy Dolan, archbishop of New York, between them.

At the end of Trump’s speech to this very elite NYC crowd (Henry Kissinger among guests) gathered for the annual Jesuit-run Catholic fundraiser put on by the Al Smith Foundation (the same dinner Trump has attended with his father since he was a teenager), he said, “We can also agree on the need to stand up to anti-Catholic bias.”

Giving the “666 sign” with his right hand, as he's come to be noted for, Trump said, “And we’ve got to come together, not only as a nation, but as a world community . . . and the great religious leaders here tonight give us all an example that we can follow.”

*****

“Satan’s policy and M.O. involves human good; you always want to remember that,” Richard Jordan once advised. “His attempt is to ‘solve’ problems apart from God, and every attempt at solving the problems of mankind apart from God’s Word is only a satanic delusion, whether it’s socialism, communism, internationalism, capitalism, reformation, humanitarianism, welfare, government intervention, government coercion, liberalism, conservativism, organized Christianity, religion . . . 

“Whatever it is, no matter how humanly good you might think it to be, a satanic policy of evil is to use human good to solve men’s problems apart from God.”

*****

In his book A Woman Rides the Beast, Dave Hunt writes of the Inquisition in the 12^th Century, “Failure to give wholehearted allegiance to the pope was considered treason against the state punishable by death. Here was the basis for slaughtering millions. As Islam would be a few centuries later, a paganized Christianity was imposed upon the entire populace of Europe under the threat of torture and death.

“ . . . The inquisitors seemed to be drugged into insensibility until their normal sense of horror and sympathy had been numbed. Indeed, to be able to impose the most extreme torture without a twinge of conscience or compassionate thought became a mark of holiness and fidelity to the Church.

 “ . . . Imagine the torment of dislocated joints, torn and seared flesh, internal injuries, broken bones on the rack and other devices, mended by doctors so they could be torn asunder again by fresh torture . . . Such was the fate of millions.

“These were real people: mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, sons, and daughters—all with hopes and dreams, with passions and feelings, and many with a faith that could not be broken by torture or fire.

“Remember that this terror, this evil of such proportions that it is unimaginable today, was carried on for centuries in the name of Christ by the command of those who claimed to be the vicars of Christ . . .  Remember that the doctrines which supported the Inquisitions remain in force within the Roman Catholic Church even at this present time.”

*****

Hunt writes, “If Antichrist pretends to be Christ and is worshipped by the world (Rev. 13:8), then his followers are of course ‘Christians.’ Not Communism, but Christianity will take over the world, and not real Christianity but an Antichrist counterfeit thereof.

“. . . Part of the apostasy is the ecumenical movement, which is literally setting the stage for a union between all religions and even influences evangelicals as well.  An Antichrist ‘Christianity’ must be created which embraces all religions and which all religions will embrace—precisely what is occurring today with astonishing speed.

“. . . The Latin equivalent of the Greek ‘anti’ is ‘vicarius,’ from which comes ‘vicar.’ Thus ‘vicar of Christ’ literally means Antichrist. Although the Roman Catholic popes have called themselves vicar of Christ for centuries, they were not the first to do so, but inherited that title from Constantine. 

“As already noted, in the ancient Roman Empire the Emperor was worshipped as God. As such he was the leader of the pagan priesthood and of the official, state-sponsored pagan religion of the empire. An image was made to the Caesars, before which the citizens were required to bow in worship. Those who refused to acknowledge the emperor as God were killed."

'I'll follow my Christ who loves me so'

"It was 1936 and two friends serving together at a Sunday school conference in Alabama were at lunch, sharing what God was doing in their lives," writes Aaron Earls. "One, a missionary to Brazil home on furlough, told the other, a hymn writer leading the music for the conference, that a health issue would keep him from returning to the country he had grown to love. The news, received just days before, had broken his heart.

"The hymn writer asked, 'What will you do?' And through tears, the missionary, R.S. Jones, told the hymn writer, B.B. McKinney, 'Wherever He leads, I’ll go.' McKinney was so moved that he penned the classic hymn that afternoon and sang it that night after Jones had preached, recounts Terry C. Terry, a musicologist who wrote his doctoral dissertation about McKinney. Since then, this song has been sung at invitation times and crusades, revivals and worship services."

*****
"Katherine Hankey (1834-1911) was 32 years old when she wrote the hymn, 'I Love to Tell the Story,' out of her heart's deep desire to tell the simple gospel story wherever she was in life," explains writer Helen Salem Rizk. "First, it was in the Sunday school of Clapham, England, where she became a devoted, refined, consecrated woman. Then, it was in the heart of Africa, where she spent most of her life, giving the sales of all her writings to missions. Finally, it was in the hospitals of London, where she spent the last minutes of her life telling lonely patients of God's beautiful love. When Hankey wrote the song in 1866, she was doing more than expressing a feeling in her own being, she was projecting that same feeling into the minds of thousands of people through the years who would sing her song and receive the same challenge."

The song goes:

I love to tell the story of unseen things above,

1. Of Jesus and His glory, of Jesus and His love;
   I love to tell the story, because I know ’tis true,
   It satisfies my longings as nothing else would do.
   • Refrain:
     I love to tell the story,
     ’Twill be my theme in glory,
     To tell the old, old story
     Of Jesus and His love.
2. I love to tell the story, more wonderful it seems
   Than all the golden fancies of all our golden dreams;
   I love to tell the story, it did so much for me,
   And that is just the reason I tell it now to thee.
3. I love to tell the story, ’tis pleasant to repeat,
   What seems each time I tell it more wonderfully sweet;
   I love to tell the story, for some have never heard
   The message of salvation from God’s own holy Word.
4. I love to tell the story, for those who know it best
   Seem hungering and thirsting to hear it like the rest;
   And when in scenes of glory I sing the new, new song,
   ’Twill be the old, old story that I have loved so long.
5. *****
6. Christianity is really, as Ephesians 3:20 makes clear, the outworking of the indwelling life of the risen Savior in us. Paul exhorts in Ephesians 5, "Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light.
   [15] See then that ye walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise,
   [16] Redeeming the time, because the days are evil.
   [17] Wherefore be ye not unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is.
7. “You know how you walk circumspectly?” asks Jordan. “You walk carefully. You watch where you put your feet. You give attention to the details of your life to bring it all into conformity with who you are in Christ.
   “He’s saying, ‘When you wake up to all the things that are yours in Christ . . . Awake, arise, look at what Christ has given you! Wake up to who you really are in Christ!
   
   
   “You’re not looking for the place NOT to put your foot; you’re looking for the place TO put your foot. I don’t want to put it on the (garden) snake, I want to put it over here where there’s nothing but good ground. I’m walking circumspectly, looking for the opportunity to be who I am in Christ. To let that be what’s important. To buy up the time.
   
   
   “Somebody said the difference between an optimist and a pessimist is the optimist sees the doughnut and the pessimist sees the hole. You’re looking for the opportunities. Paul says, ‘Awake, let who you are in Christ have an impact.’
   
   
   “That’s why he starts in verse 18 and following telling you the proscribed social order for the Believer. We walk intelligently, in love, distinctly, and we have a life that simply reflects who we are in Christ.
   
   
   “These chapters in Ephesians show us the difference between what it looks like when we do it and when He does it. What I’ve discovered through the years is that a lot of people think it looks like this, and they’re thinking religion, and when they hear it’s really this, they say, ‘Woah, wait a minute, what a difference.’ Probably one of the greatest impetuses toward getting people to trust Christ alone is that!
   
   
   *****
   
   
   “In II Corinthians 3, Paul talks about the Corinthians being the living epistles. He explains, ‘Forasmuch as ye are manifestly declared to be the epistle of Christ ministered by us, written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God; not in tables of stone, but in fleshy tables of the heart.’
   
   
   “It struck me one day, ‘If they were the epistles ministered by Paul, didn’t Paul write some epistles?’ In essence, he’s saying that you and I are really ‘Romans through Philemon.’ THAT’S what He writes in your heart!
   
   
   “Now, God doesn’t automatically write it in there. It’s what He writes in your heart as you take in that truth. It’s the intake.
   
   
   “Paul said, ‘The outward man perishes but the inward man is renewed day by day.’ How’s it renewed?  You’re renewed in the SPIRIT of your mind. Paul says, ‘And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.’
   
   
   “How often should your mind be being renewed? Day by day. It’s that daily intake, that moment-by-moment application of the truth of God’s Word in the details of your life. That’s really called prayer.
   
   
   “It’s looking at everything that happens in your life and thinking before God; talking to God about what’s going on, and what His Word says about what’s going on, and how His Word can be applied to that--how what His Word says your attitude should be about that insult, that temptation, that rejection, etc.
   
   
   “You say, ‘Well, I don’t know what it says.’ But you do know! Because when you don’t know, what do you do? You go find out!
   
   
   “Now all of a sudden I need to know how to ‘rightly divide.’ You wouldn’t have to talk people into rightly dividing if they lived like THAT!
   
   
   *****
   
   
   “You see how this thing just becomes life; becomes living? Why? Because He is our life. That’s how He IS your life. Folks, these are not mindless clichés designed for preachers to have something to talk about and you go, ‘Uh-huh, uh-huh.’
   
   
   “This is the living reality for the way God made your soul, your inner man, to function and a guy like me is trying to say them in 15 different ways so that maybe one of them will, ‘DING!,’ turn on the light for you and make it real.
   
   
   “If it isn’t real in your life, it’s just because you haven’t believed it; the verse says the ‘word WORKS in you that believe.’
   
   
   “You can say, ‘I don’t really care,’ but there will be a day when you do. You can say, ‘It’s not for me.’ There will be a day when it will be for you. Just remember some little old nut told you there was an answer and get in Romans through Philemon and find it.”
8. (new article tomorrow)

'Legion' is military term for armies of the Adversary

“The amount of sound doctrine resident in the populace of a nation determines the direction or the course of that nation."----Richard Jordan

Under the headline "Dystopian State Upon Us?" here is my post from October 26, 2019:

World War III? U.S. Civil War? Mega-catastrophes? "Natural" disasters, including earthquakes, tsunamis?  Europe included? Regular electrical blackouts? Gas-produced fires? Buy batteries, candles, even generators?

Rockets, submarines, helicopters, blimps? Marines, Navy? Total-controlled government, media, corporate world? Trauma for young ones? No income for many? Special persecution of Christians? "Credit scores" like China? Democracy done away with?

Internet down a lot, monitored severely? No "hate speech" allowed whatsoever? Elites rule everyday life, picayune details? Whites maligned at every turn?

This is the kind of stuff being "buzzed" about on the internet. Who knows???!!!

*****

Mark 5: 8-9 says, [8] For he said unto him, Come out of the man, thou unclean spirit.
[9] And he asked him, What is thy name? And he answered, saying, My name is Legion: for we are many.

"Jesus says there's one spirit who is controlling all the other spirits in the man," explains Pastor Richard Jordan. "That term 'Legion,' if you look at the end of verse 13 where the parenthesis is, means there were about two thousand unclean spirits in that guy: [13] And forthwith Jesus gave them leave. And the unclean spirits went out, and entered into the swine: and the herd ran violently down a steep place into the sea, (they were about two thousand;) and were choked in the sea.

"Legion is a military term that describes the organization of the armies of Rome. It also describes the organization of the armies of the Adversary. God uses exactly the same terminology to describe the world you can see and the invisible spirit world that you can't see. That world is as real as this world. This world is organized in a certain way and that world is organized just like it.

"That guy is there for the purpose of a military conflict, and when Jesus Christ shows up, He comes to repossess His possession. That guy's there to keep Him from doing it; he didn't want to give it up.

"In verse 10, he didn't say, 'Don't throw me out of the man.' He said, 'Don't throw me out of the land.' There's one Israeli with 2,000 unclean spirits in him. That tells you two things. No. 1 there weren't enough Israelis to have it be one on one.

"In other words, Satan's brought all of his demonic forces back in to the land of Israel at that time because Christ is there. If you're going to have a fight, you want your soldiers there. He's got his army gathered together to keep his palace. What Christ has come to do is literally throw the Adversary out of the land."

*****

Here are a few old posts:

When Paul warns Timothy that "perilous times shall come," the term "perilous" means dangerous. Talking about his life, Paul writes in II Corinthians 11:26, "In journeyings often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils by mine own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren."

“All of those conditions are dangerous conditions that can kill you, can overwhelm you; they're horrendous and can overpower you,” explains Jordan. 

“In Romans 8, Paul uses the term in an interesting way. Verse 35 says, ‘Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?’

“Perilous times can have to do with you just being taken out and slaughtered. They’re dangerous times.

“When he describes them in II Timothy 3, the nature of the age under grace—it’s not going to be getting better.

“I remember in the ’80s, right after I’d come up from Alabama to Chicago, preaching a message at North Shore Church and I quoted a verse in Ecclesiastes. Afterward, I had three people come up to me and ask, ‘Where is that verse?’ I thought everybody knew the verse but I came to find out people don’t read the Book of Ecclesiastes.

“Ecclesiastes 8:11 says, ‘Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil.’

“Isn’t that what Peter said about the dispensation of grace? II Peter 3 says, ‘The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.’

“Man doesn’t say, ‘Wow, I’m glad I missed the wrath! Thank you for not destroying me!’ He says, ‘Oh, He doesn’t see. I’ll go out and do some more.’

“Isaiah 26:10 says, [10] Let favour be shewed to the wicked, yet will he not learn righteousness: in the land of uprightness will he deal unjustly, and will not behold the majesty of the LORD.

“You know what the longsuffering of God demonstrates? The complete depravity of humanity. And the longer the dispensation of grace goes on, the longer you’re going to see a more and more mature depravity overtake mankind.

"De-evolution, not evolution, is man’s pattern. That’s why that image in Daniel 2 starts at the head and winds up at the feet. Man doesn’t go from the dust to glory; he goes from glory to the dust."

*****

“Pauls says the reason the times are perilous is ‘for men shall be lovers of themselves’ and all the things he lists in verses 2-5. Those things produce perilous times.

“We got a song in the book that goes, ‘Am I a soldier of the Cross? Are there no foes for me to face?' Paul says I’m to be a soldier so there must be an enemy.

“II Corinthians 11:23 says, [23] Are they ministers of Christ? (I speak as a fool) I am more; in labours more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequent, in deaths oft. [24] Of the Jews five times received I forty stripes save one.
[25] Thrice was I beaten with rods, once was I stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I have been in the deep;

“Does that sound like a peaceful, gentle little life? Verse 26 says, [26] In journeyings often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils by mine own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren;
[27] In weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness.

“Notice he uses that one word ‘peril’ eight times in that one verse. That’s what perilous times he’s talking about. He’s not talking about times when your neighbor says something nasty to you. He’s talking about real trouble.

“You can pray all you want to and you’re not going to get out of that. In fact, the more you pray and live godly in Christ Jesus the more of that you’re going to find.

*****

"II Timothy is the last book Paul wrote but it’s not the last book in his epistles. He puts Titus after II Timothy because it deals with, ‘Okay, now that you’re living in complete apostasy, here’s how to function in that age.’

“Philemon is sort of a little capstone that says, ‘Taking everything I’ve taught you about grace at this point, let me show you how to operate in the assembly; the effectual communication of your faith.’

“Anytime God puts in a one-chapter book in the Bible that book is powerful because generally it’s overlooked.

“He writes, [4] I thank my God, making mention of thee always in my prayers,
[5] Hearing of thy love and faith, which thou hast toward the Lord Jesus, and toward all saints;
[6] That the communication of thy faith may become effectual by the acknowledging of every good thing which is in you in Christ Jesus.

“Paul says in I Timothy 1:18-19, [18] This charge I commit unto thee, son Timothy, according to the prophecies which went before on thee, that thou by them mightest war a good warfare;
[19] Holding faith, and a good conscience; which some having put away concerning faith have made shipwreck:

“That’s how serious it is not to follow Paul’s pattern in the work of the ministry. That’s what happens to you when you don’t. If you’re going to leave grace and go back to the law, you have to leave Paul and go back to Peter and Moses. That’s the only way you can do it.

“So when you’re in I Timothy, this is one of the places people’s prayer life goes wrong and they run back in Israel’s program and try to get God to remove all the problems and send an angel and kill all their enemies and all that stuff.

“That isn’t who we are and if you don’t understand where we are in the dispensation of grace and what God’s doing today, you’re never going to have a quiet and peaceable life. Paul’s talking about your inner-man attitude.

“Whatever the circumstances you’re in, rather than going to pieces and being destroyed by them, you can have a quiet and peaceable life in those circumstances. You can have a quiet, peaceable inner man. You can be at peace and not tossed to and fro when in turmoil. How do you do that? That’s what prayer does.

“Prayer takes the instructions in God’s Word, and you talk to God about how to apply those instructions to your circumstances, and it begins to work and produces the peace of God, a quietness in your inner man.”

(new article tomorrow)

Loss that sets you up for gain

In a post entitled, "Loss Aversion", a blogger writes, "We all make irrational decisions everyday simply to avoid losing. We buy things we don’t need (or Groupons we won’t use) because a sale’s ending soon. We grab an item of clothing because there’s only one left and someone else might take it—even if we aren’t really sure we want it. We keep gym memberships we aren’t actively using if we know we won’t be able to get that same rate again.

"And then there are the bigger things. We turn down opportunities that could be rewarding to avoid the risk of losing something else that feels good enough. We use our time in ways that feel unfulfilling because we fear losing time on a decision that might be wrong. And we fail to invest in ourselves, even though we’re aching to expand, because it can feel painful to part with our money.

"Whenever you have a choice to make, recognize in what way you’re motivated by the fear of losing something, whether it’s comfort, security, control, money, companionship, or something else.

"The reality is that loss is inevitable. We will all lose relationships, situations, and states of being that we enjoy and love. Even if we practice non-attachment, on some level we will get comfortable with people and circumstances.

"You could say that this is what makes life beautiful and meaningful—since nothing lasts forever, each moment presents unique possibilities worth fully appreciating and savoring."

*****

“When you look at something and you’re afraid you’re going to lose it—how many Believers are afraid of losing?” asks Pastor Richard Jordan. “Losing your possessions, losing your financial security? Losing your health, your comforts? Losing the approval and respect of others?

“Why do you fear losing those things? Did you know that every one of those things you’re going to lose anyway? Naked you came in and naked you’re going to go out.

“The only thing that’s going to last forever are the spiritual things you have; your identity in Christ, your riches in Christ.

“Why do we fear then? Because we have this idea that our identity and our future resides in our own abilities, our own resources. It’s unbelief--a lack of dependence on who God has made you in Jesus Christ and who God has made Christ to you—that makes you want to get your identity out of anything but Him.

“It’s not what you do; it’s what He did that makes you valuable. It’s not what you accomplish; it’s what He’s accomplished that gives you worth and meaning. Because He’s given you HIS value.

“At the most basic level, sin is a refusal to trust God to give you what you’re looking for in Christ. Fear really is unbelief.

*****

“If you can get that monkey off your back that you got to be ‘good enough’ to measure up and belong and have value, then you’re FREE to let His life produce His work in and through you. As soon as you do that, there’s that humbling of your mind, that ‘lowliness of mind.’

“Listen, being right doesn’t depend on you. Would you relax and realize that? Paul says, ‘You can do nothing against the truth but for the truth.’

“In Acts 20, when Paul’s talking to these elders and bishops at Ephesus--when he called them together and met with them at Miletus--he says in verse 19 about his own manner with them, ‘Serving the Lord with all humility of mind, and with many tears, and temptations, which befell me by the lying in wait of the Jews.’

“Notice he says, ‘Serving the Lord with all humility of mind.’ That’s the inside attitude he had: ‘It’s not about me; it’s not about me being right. I don’t have to defend myself, I don’t have to make it look like I’m okay and I’m ‘qualified,’ but ‘with many tears, and temptations . . . ’ He was willing to appear weak so that the power of Christ might be the real issue.

*****

“Paul says in Galatians 2:20-21, 20] I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.

[21] I do not frustrate the grace of God: for if righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain.

“What he’s saying there is that, in the Lord Jesus Christ, you see the way God designed man to live . . . when you see that obedience of faith in God’s Word that led to the ultimate sacrifice at Calvary, trusting in the Father’s Word, you see the way He created mankind to live. It’s the way He created you and me to matriculate through life today. The challenges, the excitements, the excesses, the necessities of life as we experience them . . . 

“The Lord Jesus Christ had that kind of faith in His Father that He would say, ‘Of my own self I can do nothing.’ That’s the choice He made. He said, ‘I value and cherish my Father’s plan so much, I couldn’t even imagine being separated from it.’ You know what that is? That’s ‘the faith of Christ.’

“He was not out here on a journey doing His own thing. He came to do the will of His Father and that’s what ‘the faith of Christ’ is. It’s HIS faith in the Word and the will of His Father, and that’s what Paul says our life as Believers is designed to be.

“That’s what it is to worship God in the Spirit. That’s what it is to have Christ as our life. These are not religious clichés even though sometimes we use them that way. Sometimes we get to trafficking in unfelt truth, but they weren’t for Jesus Christ and if they get that way with you, you need to sit down and look back at Him and see in Him who God designed you to be, because He’s the one living in you.

*****

“In John 14:10, Jesus says to Philip, [10] Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works.

“Philip doesn’t get it. He says to Christ, ‘We’ve been with you all this time and who you talking about?!’ You’ve had a bad day like that, haven’t you? You’ve looked up and said, ‘Lord, where in the world are you today?! Don’t you care?! Are you on a trip?! What’s going on?!’

“When you get that way, it’s not because you’re looking at Him. It’s because you’re looking at circumstances; self. It’s not because you’re trusting Him; it’s because you’re trusting your own resources. So don’t get too mad at Philip because you do this.

“Later in the same chapter, Jesus says to Judas, ‘He that loveth me not keepeth not my sayings: and the word which ye hear is not mine, but the Father's which sent me.’

“You see, He was so perfectly abandoned to the will of His Father that the Father dwelt in Him and SPOKE through Him. It was the Father’s wills, words and works. What Jesus Christ is doing is demonstrating the supreme, absolute value of the way He cherished His Father and He did it by putting His faith in the Father’s Word, so that the things He did in His life were what the Father gave Him to do.

“He’s in the Garden of Gethsemane praying and He says in John 17:18, ‘[17] Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.
[18] As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world.

“How did Christ come into the world? By faith in the will and the word of His Father. And He said, ‘So send I them into the world.’ The men were sent with the same commission as the Son received from the Father. To go live exactly the way He lived. Can I say the same is true of you and me as it was with them. Paul says, ‘[20] Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us: we pray you in Christ's stead, be ye reconciled to God.

“The realization to make is, ‘I’m here in His place, doing what He’d be doing if He was here. In fact, He is here in me, living His life out through me.’

“That’s why we’re called the Body of Christ. We’re the vehicle through whom He lives and works today. That’s why Paul says, ‘I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.’

*****

“We’re not talking about religion; we’re talking about a RELATIONSHIP with the God of heaven and earth, the Creator. The one who made you originally. The one whom your sins have alienated you from. Your self-will has taken you off in a different direction. Paul says, ‘I’m dead to that.’ How? ‘Through Christ. I died with Him. But I didn’t just die with Him; when He put away my sin, He gave me His life.’

“Paul says, ‘A spiritual transaction took place on a supernatural level inside of me, where I received His life and so that the life I now live, I live by the faith of the Son of God. I have His life and it’s Him living in me.’

“The way He does that is when I live in my flesh the way He lived in HIS flesh! How did He live? ‘Without the Father I can do nothing. The works I do, the words I speak, are the ones the Father gave me,’ and I just put my faith in the Father and I’m living the life He gave me.

“So how does Christ live in me? He lives in my flesh the way He lived in His own flesh, 2,000 years ago and faith is just the issue of depending. Whatever you depend on is going to control you.

“The Lord Jesus Christ, my friend, is most magnified, most exalted, when we’re satisfied in life with Him and He’s enough. All the other stuff, even if we lose everything else, we’ve got Him and we’re still ahead.

“Paul said, ‘For me to live is Christ and to die is gain.’ To live is to know Christ and to die is gain because now I just get more intimacy with Him. I’ve heard that word defined ‘in-to-me-see.’ That’s really what it is.

“More and more there’s the ability to see into Him, and Him to see into me, the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord. In your life, when He is preferred above everything else, that’s how He’s cherished and demonstrated to be the treasure.

“When we’re satisfied with Christ, when we’re prizing Him, cherishing Him, treasuring Him as a prize, and His gain is our heart’s delight above all else, that’s what Paul means in Philippians 3:9 when he says, ‘[9] And be found in him, not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith:
[10] That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death;

“You notice ‘and be found in him,’ how that’s a passive voice? I’ve come to love the passives. The essence of life is not DOING! The essence of the Christian life is BEING, not doing! It’s who you are, not what you do.

“It’s who God has made you in His Son, and when that becomes the focus of your life, and you learn to just relax and enjoy life in the identity God has given you in Christ, rather than trying to do things and look over your shoulders and see if God’s happy with you, you’ll find yourself doing plenty. But it won’t be to gain something from God; it’ll just be because that’s who you ARE and that’s who people who ARE this, that’s the way they live.

*****

“When I had cancer several years ago, someone sent me an email saying, ‘You’ll never know if Christ is all you need until he’s all that you have and when He’s all that you have, then and only then, do you discover that Jesus is really all that you need.’

“If you don’t count all that you can do ‘but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ’ . . .  if you’ve never come to that point in your life and you’re still trusting something of yourself, can I tell you that’s a dead-end road?

“Maybe you haven’t learned that yet, but when you do learn it, can I tell you it’s a dead-end road, and when you really do do what the Psalmist said (‘I came to the end of myself’) can I tell you there’s one standing there at the end of your rope who is the answer.

“You go bloody your nose to learn, ‘It ain’t me.’ Whatever it is you hope to rely upon, whatever it is you hope to cling to, whether it’s in yourself, if you’d be honest enough in your own self to know you can’t trust yourself . . .

“We put the bravado on, but in your heart of hearts you know yourself. We kick at the slats, we don’t like to believe that, but the grace of God is only available when all of our resources are gone. You’ll never do it until you come to the end of yourself.

“Compared to everything else, He is the one who really is the treasure of your life. God help us to let that be the reality. Instead of screaming and hollering that, ‘But I’m going to lose it all,’ just say, ‘You know what, I’m really FINDING the real source of life.’ Paul said, ‘For me, Christ is gain. I just want to be found in Him, not having my own righteousness. That old song says, ‘Oh, how I love Jesus because He first loved me.’ ”

(new article tomorrow)

Earthen Vessel Principle

Leviticus 6 says, [28] But the earthen vessel wherein it is sodden shall be broken: and if it be sodden in a brasen pot, it shall be both scoured, and rinsed in water. Paul, who frequently used vocabulary and contexts from the Old Testament, writes in II Corinthians 4:6-7: For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

[7] But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us.

“In antiquity the earthen vessel was nothing but a cheap expendable clay pot," explains Pastor Alex Kurz. "Why is it that God has deliberately determined to do something by placing Himself within the clay pot? Why does God seek to do it with clay?

“The earthen vessel expresses something about the character of who we all are as humans. It communicates our frail, fragile state. We’re vulnerable, we’re susceptible. We have hairline fractures all of us. We have little chips and cracks and fissures and scratches and flaws.

“Sometimes, though, we convince ourselves that to be a good Christian we need to polish the vessel up a little bit, right? We sometimes think we need to present ourselves as precious vessels of shiny, vigorous strength; vessels that are self-controlled with this quiet, rugged, individualistic character.

“God says no. God deliberately wants us to go through a process of brokenness. He wants us all to face the emotional battering. The Apostle Paul describes the psychological trauma; the emotional pressures and stresses. Paul recognized, ‘I am a failure!’ over and over again. God says that’s okay. God says, ‘That’s my design!’

*****

“God knows we’re made of dust and we’re filled with flaws and blemishes and we do make mistakes and we’re going to fail Him over and over, but that doesn’t result in defeat. What we discover is that is exactly the way God has designed to do what He’s trying to do!

“It is now IN the weakness, IN the brokenness, IN the place and point where we abandon who we think we are and we can stop . . . what a joy it is not to have to worry about trying to live a phantom Christianity where I’ve got to make myself strong and viable and present myself to God as somebody who’s always in control. NO!! God says, ‘I don’t want you to be in control!’

“Paul writes in I Corinthians 1:27, [27] But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty;

“Do you ever feel foolish? Do you ever feel like you made a mistake and you wish you could get a do-over; a mulligan? You lament, ‘Man, I wish I could go back and change things.’ Listen, God has chosen the foolish things. That’s you.

“Is it a good thing or bad thing to be foolish? It’s consistent with what God’s doing. Always remember that. When you fail that is not indicative that you’re operating against the will of God.

“God factored it into the equation, the formula, the need for you to be a failure. Now, shouldn’t that maybe help take some of the pressure off? You see, religion is like a vice grip. It says, ‘You’ve got to get right, get clean, get better, improve, make yourself worthy, present yourself.’ In Christ, though, it’s just, ‘Let it go; be who you are.’

*****

“When Paul says in I Corinthians 2, ‘And I was with you in weakness, and in fear, and in much trembling,’ is he saying he’s an inferior Christian because he was weak? Is he saying, ‘Oh, wow, I don’t have the courage; I don’t have the boldness.’

“He says, ‘Listen, I am terrified sometimes. I’m terrified by the situations taking place.’ Is that a good thing or a bad thing? God has you right where He wants you. Remember, God’s going to confound the things that are mighty by using the brokenness.

“You’re beat up, battered, bruised, don’t have all the answers and God says, ‘I’ve got you right where I want you.’

“Paul says in I Corinthians 4:10, ‘We are fools for Christ's sake, but ye are wise in Christ; we are weak, but ye are strong; ye are honourable, but we are despised.'

“Over and over again he talks this way, especially when he writes to the Corinthians, because the Corinthians were victimized by the ‘selfie culture’; by the ‘me’ mentality: ‘Look at me, self-absorbed.’

“II Corinthians 11:29 says, ‘Who is weak, and I am not weak? who is offended, and I burn not?’ Paul was honest with himself: ‘I’m not the poster child of immense vigor and personal strength. I don’t always have this spiritual fortitude. Sometimes I fail and I fail again and I fail miserably. I am weak and I am offended and I am frustrated, and sometimes I want to throw my hands in the air and pull my hair out.’

“That’s a good thing, though. It’s okay. You’re an earthen vessel, aren’t you? Who do you think you are? Who do you think I am? The sooner I adopt and claim my status as a weak earthen vessel then God has me right where He wants me.

*****

“Of course, Paul really sums it up best in chapter 12. It’s fascinating if you study the Corinthians, to them weakness was abhorrent—‘You don’t want to present yourself as a fool; you want to have respectability! You don’t want to portray yourself as not being in control; you want to have the bull by the horns!’ Paul says, ‘That’s not who I am because I want Christ to be magnified.’

“In II Corinthians 12:9, Paul writes, [9] And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.

“God’s process is you’ve got to die to yourself that the life of Christ might be made manifest. We want to take shortcuts, right, because our DNA won’t allow us to be weak, foolish and offended? God says that’s part of the formula!

“The power of Christ is perfected, not when you’re in control, but when you're at the point of the most desperate need. We’re left with nothing but who? Christ. Paul said, ‘I want to win Him. I want to have fellowship with His sufferings. I want to be made conformable unto His death. I want to win Christ.’ Wow!

“In the next verse he says, [10] Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ's sake: for when I am weak, then am I strong.

“Listen, only a lunatic can talk like that! Who here enjoys infirmities, reproaches, necessities, persecutions and distresses?! Paul doesn’t say, ‘I enjoy it,’ by the way.

*****

“We have to have a renewed way of thinking about life. Life is not an enemy. Adverse circumstances are not an enemy. We have to renew the way we interpret what's happening in life, and when life beats us to a pulp, whether it’s physically, psychologically, emotionally, economically, we can go through the whole gamut. 

“Why does Paul say, ‘For when I am weak then am I strong’? That’s the difference between ‘having the eyes of our understanding enlightened’ and living with the eyes of the flesh. You see the difference there?

"That’s how God is going to confound the mighty, because it goes against all that we instinctively believe about what we’re supposed to be doing. God says, ‘Stop doing; start being.’

“Religion tries to convince, ‘You’ve got to do it; you’ve got to do to get.’ God says, ‘It’s already done; you already have.’ Wow, we can rest, but we can have a different way of pursuing.

*****

“When II Corinthians 4:6 says God ‘hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, but we have this treasure . . .’ the treasure is the ministry; the Good News of Jesus Christ and Him crucified.

“The treasure is this knowledge of the glory of God; the plan and the design and the purpose of God Almighty. It’s the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

“God entrusts all of that to a bunch of vulnerable, susceptible clay pots who are going to feel the hurt and the pain and the trauma and are going to fail. God says, ‘That’s a good thing.’ Why? ‘That the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us.’

“The message is, ‘Get out of the way.’ That’s what Paul is saying to the Corinthians and quite frankly, that’s the key to having meaning and fulfillment in life—the sooner we get out of the way.

“The excelling power of God is when He deliberately equips us in the realm of the inner man to do something while we’re an earthen vessel, so that He is free to do something IN and THROUGH us.

*****

“II Corinthians 1 says, [3] Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort;
[4] Who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God.
[5] For as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation also aboundeth by Christ.

“That’s the excelling power of Almighty God! Our Father who personally desires to carry us through the circumstances. It’s when He can function as a ‘Father of mercies,’ as 'the God of all comfort,' that He is happy, because He literally desires us to go through this process of being broken. We’re not alone.

“II Corinthians 1: 6 says, ‘And whether we be afflicted, it is for your consolation and salvation, which is effectual in the enduring of the same sufferings which we also suffer: or whether we be comforted, it is for your consolation and salvation.’

“That’s what Paul means when he says ‘faint not.’ Don’t surrender, don’t quit, don’t abandon ship. Don’t wave the white flag of surrender. The excelling power of God is the ability to endure, because God’s design is, ‘I want you busted, I want you broken, I want you to be that earthen vessel.’ Why? ‘Because I’m trying to do something here!’

*****

“Verse 9 says, ‘But we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God which raiseth the dead.’ Having a ‘sentence of death in ourselves,’ means we abandon the ‘selfie life;’ the ‘me’ approach.

“Death leads to complete trust and reliance on what God is teaching us. You see why it’s necessary to be a busted and broken container? Because our 'Father of mercies,' what He wants us to do is render 'self' dead so now we’re left with Him.

“Verse 10-13: [10] Who delivered us from so great a death, and doth deliver: in whom we trust that he will yet deliver us;
[11] Ye also helping together by prayer for us, that for the gift bestowed upon us by the means of many persons thanks may be given by many on our behalf.
[12] For our rejoicing is this, the testimony of our conscience, that in simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom, but by the grace of God, we have had our conversation in the world, and more abundantly to you-ward.
[13] For we write none other things unto you, than what ye read or acknowledge; and I trust ye shall acknowledge even to the end;

“The sooner we abandon 'self'--our own independence and self-sufficient reliance--the sooner we now do what verse 13 says. We operate with the spirit of faith. ‘So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.’

“It may look one way, but God says, ‘Here’s the eternal reality.’ Faith, by the way, is ‘according as it is written.’ Jesus Christ is the capital ‘W’ word of God. We have the small ‘w’ word of God; the life of Christ is nothing short of believing by faith obedience what God has written and said about what He’s doing.”

(new article tomorrow)

It's here!

By the time this current winter period ends (expected to be around 2025) this decade the world could be a vastly different place.

“We’re living today in the most impactful decade of the life of anybody alive,” says Pastor Richard Jordan. “I don’t care how old you are--you can be my age or you can be as young as my grandchildren--this decade RIGHT NOW is going to be the decade that sets the course for the next 80-100 years afterward. That has to do with the cycle of nations that God set up in Genesis 8-10. We just happen to be in that cycle right now.

“How you come out of this wintertime into the spring is up for grabs. It’s up for grabs during the winter.

“When trouble, testing, difficulties come, what they test is ‘tribulation works patience,’ and having this information (in II Timothy)--having it erected in your inner man, having that edifice built up--will give you the capacity to handle whatever comes.

“They test whether you will be patient and stick with the truth of God’s Word, and evaluate the things (going to happen) based on what His Word says about them, or whether you’re going to go off in the vanity of your own mind; your own resources and thinking where you start thinking like lost people think.

“If you don’t have that sound understanding, then the Word of God will be of very little benefit to you. If you don’t know how to rightly divide the Word . . . Paul says in II Timothy 2, ‘Consider what I say; and the Lord give thee understanding in all things.
[8] Remember that Jesus Christ of the seed of David was raised from the dead according to my gospel.’

“The understanding comes through thinking the way God thinks. In Ephesians 4:17, Paul writes, [17] This I say therefore, and testify in the Lord, that ye henceforth walk not as other Gentiles walk, in the vanity of their mind,
[18] Having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart:
[19] Who being past feeling have given themselves over unto lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness with greediness.
[20] But ye have not so learned Christ;
[21] If so be that ye have heard him, and have been taught by him, as the truth is in Jesus:

*****

“So the way you avoid that completely self-oriented, self-fixed, arrogant life of sinful pursuit, described in verse 19, is by learning Christ; hearing Him.

“Now, notice he writes in verse 17, ‘This I say therefore, and testify in the Lord.’ Paul’s saying, ‘I’m telling you this, and this is part of the message God gave ME!’

“Look at what he says in verse 20. How were they taught by Christ? They didn’t see Jesus in His earthly ministry. They heard Christ speaking to them through Paul. They were taught by Christ THROUGH Paul. Now, my point is, you can’t have a life that’s going to produce victory over your old sinful life except you hear what Paul teaches.

“You go back to what Moses taught, or what Christ in His earthly ministry taught, and it won’t produce victory; it won’t produce a successful Christian life.

“When I think about that, listen, if you don’t take what God through Paul gives to us, the way He gives it to us, you might as well hang up your cleats and go fishing. Because you’re going to make void the Word of God. You’re going to follow the commandments of men and in vain you’re going to seek to serve the Lord.”

*****

Bible teacher Keith Blades writes in his book, Satan and His Plan of Evil, “Satan seeks most of all to drown the ‘hidden wisdom of God’ in a quagmire of doctrinal confusion, chaos and uncertainty . . .

“When he is able to produce among Christ’s members such ignorance of His ‘manifold wisdom,’ and such contrariness in their own conduct to the program God’s actually administering in this dispensation, Satan is able to convincingly slander, ridicule and defame the ‘new creation’ in the heavenly places.

“In this Satan gloats and exults. He is able in all of this to display both to himself, and his own cohorts in the heavenly places, his manipulative powers. He shows them that he is able to successfully deceive and lead about the members of Christ’s own body, as effectively as if they were still his own. Upon doing this his wounded pride comforts itself . . .

“Only by keeping Christians from knowing the very thing they need to know, and rejoice in so as to make that designed impact, is Satan able to hinder any such impact from being made at all.

"That he is clearly engaged in keeping Christians ignorant of what they ought to know is described by Paul, for example, in Ephesians 4:14: ‘That we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive.’ ”