The Word of Truth Ministries
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The
Godhead used to cripple saints
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As an evangelist I attend many churches at various locations. Last week I was at an Apostolic Faith Church--note, I say, an Apostolic Faith Church, that is a church of that denomination--Apostolic Faith. But what has happened to these churches, as that church so amply demonstrated, is that many individuals, whole churches, and entire organizations who once espoused the teachings of the apostles and who once loved truth have long since gone away from the faith of the apostles and now despise God's truth, and have gone about to establish their own righteousness [truth]. What this church and its leadership showed was that many churches of the Apostolic are using the discussion of the Divinity of Christ, which is loosely called the Godhead by them, to actually lead the people of God to infantilism and retardation. Jesus told Peter and all whom he has called to feed His sheep and His lambs. Feed them so that they may grow; grow to perfection! Instead, the pattern is clear and widespread in these churches: The people of God are not being fed the word of God to grow to perfection, which is a command of the Lord! [Mat. 5:48; Heb. 6:1-3] Instead, the people are being fed food not fit for saints; they are being made merchandise of by a leadership that has long since left God and His righteousness; they are being given milk to keep them babes in Christ; and after many years of being in the church, many, far too many, saints are still babes in Christ and have turned to pleasing pastors and not God. And that is their righteousness. What occurred in this church occurs in many Apostolic Faith Churches today. There is not a concern for truth; there is a concern for pleasing pastors and men who are not men of God. And every form of rhetoric these ungodly men of the cloth can conjure up is being conjured up and used to keep God's flock lambs and merchandise for the financial benefit of the leadership. The pastor took a text from Exodus that reads, We should serve no other God beside the Lord. That is an excellent text for the conditions of the church, the world, and certainly the Apostolic Faith Church's leadership--which has widely gone away from God's word. But instead of treating this passage as its need was, the minister went to the old tried and true Jesus name crowd pleaser. He preached the Godhead, such as he could, and the people were aroused! I sat, listening to this minister belabor a point that the Jesus name people have heard over and over and a point that does not grow the people into the likeness of Christ at all! This is the trickery and the deception that many ministers have used to cripple God people. When they should be feeding them meat by which they can grow, they feed them the Godhead. And sadly the people shout and know not that there are greater truths in God's word that need to be plundered, known, and lived up to than the Divinity of Christ. The tragedy of it all is that most of these ministers who so aptly grab the Godhead, actually mutilate it--they don't really understand it at all. However, any minister who can read, can compare scriptures and show that Jesus is God. The difficulty is not to simply show that Jesus is God by comparing scriptures in the Old Testament with those of the New Testament. The difficulty--a difficulty the vast majority of these apt-to-tackle-the-Godhead-ministers avoid--is to take the scriptures the Trinitarians use in claiming God is a Trinity and show how these seemingly discordant scriptures are to be understood and reconciled. That is the task and that is the complexity they avoid. But when I hear them talk that which they think they know of the Divinity of Christ, I recognize that they should avoid the topic all together until they can treat the subject competently. But whether they can treat the Godhead competently or not, the repeated and constant treatment of the subject by Apostolic ministers demonstrates something even more profound and significant: these ministers have nothing else; they do not have enough of the word of God in them to properly feed God's people to grow God's people into God's perfection. Yet Jesus is coming back for a church that looks like him; a church that is alive and remaining in him; a church that is not of this world but out of this world because their minds have been transformed and renewed; a people who are pilgrims and strangers down here getting ready to meet their Bride Groom and king, not a people who have set themselves to live the good life down here and have their affections here. This will be the downfall of many Apostolic ministers and members today--they are given over to worldly affections! Be assured, I do not diminish the fact that Jesus is God, but knowing that, I teach the people of God how to bring the discordant scriptures into focus and explain them, as well as comparing the Old Testament and the New Testament scriptures. Furthermore, no minister should just focus on this aspect of the scriptures; that is to have a false balance, which is an abomination to God. God has demanded that we grow in grace and in the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. That is our call! That is God's demand! Peter said, as new born babes, desire the sincere milk of the word that we may grow thereby. [1 Pet. 2:2] It is not enough to be baptized in Jesus name and filled with the Holy Spirit, as you continue to live; it would be enough if you were to die thereafter. After one has been born again, as baptism in Jesus name and receiving the Holy Spirit mean, a person is commanded to grow into HIM and not remain yourself, but grow into the very image and likeness of Jesus Christ because we are born into the Sonship of God. [Mat. 5:48; John 3:3-5; Heb. 6:1-3; 1 Pet. 2; Eph. 4: 13-15; Phil. 3:12-15] We must grow to look like, act like, think like, talk like, and be like our father, God. Furthermore, God has given ministries in the church to bring this end of perfection to His people. [Eph. 4:11] If these ministries are not at work in the church you attend, you will never grow to perfection regardless of how long you remain in that church! Allow no one to deceive you; these ministries are not found solely in a pastor; the pastoral ministry is just one of the ministries needed for perfection. No pastor, not evangelist, no prophet, etc., alone can take the people of God to the state they need to travel to be like Christ. It takes all the ministries. If you are not getting all of us, you are still a babe--an old babe, but a babe nonetheless! My mother sat in my father's car for 60 years of their marriage. She did not learn to drive simply by being there. She needed instructions. And receiving no instructions, she died without ever learning to drive an automobile. Many of you are babes in Christ after all these years because you have been fed a diet that is malnourishing and that will cause starvation and retardation.This is not the type of saint Christ is coming back for. And be assured, you and only you are responsible for your salvation; if a minister is leading you astray, you must do something about it; you have to save yourself. As my children look like me, act like me, think like me (because they are my children, hence me), we, as the children of God, MUST be as Christ was when He was on the earth. He left an example that we should follow in His steps. My children need not say they are my children--Look at them, and you will see me! Likewise, we must grow in grace and in the knowledge of the Lord Jesus, and if a minister is so blind to think that to grow in grace and in a knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ means only to know the Godhead, that person needs MUCH training before he/she ever has the high and holy honor of standing before God's people. The Godhead as taught by many ministers in the Apostolic Faith Churches today is used to pacify and placate God's people, when those people, today like never before, need feeding the meat of God's word so that they can be ready to return with the Lord when He comes for his church and so that they can stand in this evil day. But today, many once-saved people, especially many in the leadership who have gotten fat off God's people--both physically and financially--are not at all ready for Jesus to return and simply hope he does not come now! They are enjoying the things of this world and have long since forgotten the way of the Lord, and the hope of the believer has been lost in them! Once there was a love for truth above all things in these churches and among these saints, but now there is a love for the flesh above God's word, there is an ethos of ma-pleasing rather than God-pleasing; there is a fear of a pastor more than a fear of God. When did they become lords over God's inheritance? The current leadership in many Apostolic Faith Churches, as well as other denominations as well, has caused God's people to err. [Isa. 9:16] The leadership in so many Apostolic Faith Churches and organizations has given itself over to homosexuality, avarice, various perversions, and they have made merchandise of God's people so that the people serve them and not God; the people fear them, and not God; the people bow down to them, and not God! They have become gods unto themselves. The scripture the brother took for his text was good, but he could not and did not follow the leading of God. We shall have no other god before us. But we have; his name is man! Finally, it was prophesied years ago: The prophets prophesy falsely, the priests bear rule by their own means, and my people love to have it so. But what, God asks, will I do in the end? [Jer. 5:31] This is the sad condition of the church today. These once-saved ministers and pastors have established their own brand of righteousness that is not of God, but themselves. And they have used God's name to cover their unrighteousness. [Isa. 4] He will destroy these worthless servants! Today, God's people are taught obedience to a minister/pastor and not obedience to God's word. Such teaching is a gospel of men and not Christ. Jesus is the word of God; God is his word. [] . | |
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