2009-03-27
Hi There God’s Treasures,
As a point of reference, I repeat MT 7: 1-2, 6 from Christ’s Sermon on the Mount. “Do not judge others, so that God will not judge you, for God will judge you in the same way you judge others, and He will apply to you the same rules you apply to others…Do not give what is holy to dogs-they will only turn and attack you. Do not throw your pearls in front of swine-they will only trample them underfoot.” My discussion last week dealt with gaining discernment in making judgments. This week, we will look at assessing who will listen to the truth of the Gospel and who is unlikely to do this. We must do this with JN 8: 31-32 clearly in mind. “So Jesus Said to those who believed in Him, ‘If you obey My teaching, you are really My disciples, you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.’”
The uninformed potential believer and the stubborn rejecter of the truth will not be able to see how one could be free even though he embraces enough trust in the Lord Jesus to accept the guidelines for a Christian life our Lord teaches. What is working here is the truth of 1 COR 2:14, “Whoever does not have the Spirit cannot receive the gifts that come from God’s Spirit. Such a person really does not understand them; they are foolishness to him, because their value can be judged only on a spiritual basis.” What I’m getting at is the supernatural part of the “bringing one to faith” equation. No human actually brings another person to faith. What the human witness accomplishes is setting the stage for the Holy Spirit to bring the person to faith. And yes, even through we don’t always like it, there are people whose hearts are so hardened by the evil one or who are so badly confused, that the Holy Spirit either can’t penetrate their hearts or He chooses, for reasons we don’t always understand, not to do this. This doesn’t mean that God loves only some of His human creation. It means that some of them have allowed themselves to be so vulnerable to the evil one, that the Holy Spirit is not assigned to them. The tough words of such a situation can be understood by the wording of Christ’s mission statement in JN 6: 39-40. “And it is the will of Him Who sent Me that I should not lose any of all those He has given me, but that I should raise them all to life on the last day. For what My Father wants is that all who see the Son and believe in Him should have eternal life. And I will raise them to life on the last day.” The words here don’t say “everybody,” but instead say, “all those He has given me.” This would imply that there are people on earth who will not be given faith, for whatever God’s righteous reason may be. We are not privy to God’s reasons for not raising any individual or God’s sense of disappointment or lack thereof.
As I see it, the problem for us is in recognizing who is a potential believer. Our perception of that is not nearly as sharp or mature as that of the Lord Himself. Such is our plight, as Paul expressed it in 1 COR 13: 12, “What we see now is like a dim image in a mirror; then [when we are in heaven] we shall see face-to-face. What I know now is only partial; then it will be complete-as complete as God’s knowledge of me.” That still leaves us with the problem of how to recognize the potential true believer from the person so impacted with Satan’s evil that he has no such potential. When Paul was dealing with Judaizers and others bent on form over content of God’s teachings, he wrote in PHIL 3: 2-3, “Watch out for those who do evil things, those dogs, those men who insist on cutting the body. It is we, not they, who have received the true circumcision, for we worship God by means of His Spirit an rejoice in our life in union with Christ Jesus. We do not put any trust in external ceremonies.” Paul’s best way to get gaining discernment started in the early church was to use Christ’s example and that of himself and other more mature believers as something to follow. PHIL 3 :17-19 “Keep on imitating me, my brothers. Pay attention to those who follow the right example that we have set for you. I have told you this many times before, and now I repeat it with tears: there are many whose lives make them enemies of Christ’s death on the cross. They are going to end up in hell, because their god is their bodily desires.” As can be seen, the early church believers were faced with some of the same problems of judgment we face today.
We are kept on our toes, because of people like Paul himself. Before the Holy Spirit entered and melted his heart, he was working for the Sanhedrin [Jewish ruling council] chasing and persecuting Jewish believers in Christ! Who would have ever guessed that this same man would be one of the greatest apostles of Christ that ever lived? As far as Judaizers were concerned, they needed to understand that the physical act of circumcision did not guarantee entrance for eternity in heaven. We also need to understand this about the ceremony of baptism. The latter is a welcome into the family of God. But really confirmed membership must come at the time a person himself repents of his sin and believes in Jesus Christ. For example, GN 15: 6 shows us God’s attitude toward Abram. “Abram put his trust in the Lord and because of this the Lord was pleased with Him and accepted him.” Abram was justified, based on his heart-attitude, not some outside ceremony. That attitude was Abram’s; the decision was God’s. As in the past, we have many false teachers and prophets all plying their trades with gusto now. Such is the case with seminaries and publishers teaching replacement theology. People who convey that God is through with the Jews and has turned his sites only on Gentiles as a replacement for the chosen people to receive His blessing are playing havoc with their own salvation. RO 11: 25 if proof of this theory’s falsehood.
PRAYER: O Lord, You have yet to give us a neatly compiled, useful list of what to look for in recognizing who will listen to the truth an who will not. We are faced with Christ’s wisdom in judgment and His Great Commandment [MT 28: 19-20] to go forth and spread His message of salvation and peace [1 COR 15: 1-4]. Yet we do not have prior knowledge of the exact right time in a person’s life or the ability to be sure who will listen and who will not. You have given us many opportunities to witness to our faith, and we should make it our practice to look for them and act on them. The same person who rejects Your Gospel at one point, may come to accept it several months or years later. Only You know ahead of time who will become a true believer, a person who is obediently faithful to You. Since we are all still sinners, having inherited sin from Adam and having committed sin ourselves, we are often vulnerable to the evil one. It is the encouragement You give us, in EPH 1: 18-20 and in 1 JN 4: 4, for example, that keeps us working hard to expunge our sins [with Your help] and to look for opportunities to guide unbelievers to the Holy Spirit. Dearest Abba, we look to You for guidance, knowing the poverty of our own spirits without You. We offer You thanks and praise for bringing us into relationships with other believers who can encourage us and help strengthen our faith. And we pledge that we will always keep alert to opportunities to share our faith with others who may be potential believers. In doing that, we understand that we will have to take some insults for You. Thank You for letting us know, 1 PET 4: 14, “Happy are you if you are insulted because you are Christ’s followers; this means that the glorious Spirit, the Spirit of God, is resting on you.” We thank and praise You for always being available to us. In Christ’s holy name, we pray. Amen.
Next week, I am led to continue writing about this intriguing and important issue-how to recognize who will listen to the truth. The judgments we must make and the help that we are offered from heaven figure heavily into this kind of discernment. We must pray PS 119: 125, “I am Your servant; give me understanding, so that I may know Your teachings.” With that must come wisdom, the kind that can only come from God. PS 51: 6, “Sincerity and truth are what You require, fill my mind with wisdom.” As a believers in Jesus Christ, who have repented of their past sins, we must accept the “Believer’s Commission” given to us by the Lord Himself. 1 PET 2: 9, “But you are the chosen race, the King’s own priests, the holy nation, God’s own people, chosen to proclaim the wonderful acts of God, Who called you out of darkness into His own marvelous light.” There is nothing here which says Gentiles only, no Jews. Instead, RO 1: 16 reveals, “I have complete confidence in the Gospel; it is God’s power to save all who believe, first the Jews, and also the Gentiles.” Those are words God gave to Paul to say. Just think about this: JN 3: 16, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, so that all who believe in Him will not perish but will have everlasting life.” Furthermore, JN 14: 16-18 tells us, “I [Christ] will ask the Father, and He will give you another Counselor, Who will stay with you forever. He is the Spirit, Who reveals the truth about God. The world cannot receive Him, because it cannot see him or know Him. But you know Him, because He remains with you and is in you.” If you are beginning to feel encouraged by all of this, then, I have done my job this morning. For now, we need to thank and praise our wonderful Father for His guidance and His blessings.
Grace Be With You Always,
Lynn