A tribute to a Saint: An Occasion for Examining Self

The Word of Truth Ministries

_____________

The Dying of a Saint:
An Occasion for Examining
_____________

Last week, a dear sister in the Lord died at a relatively young age. Her death surprised many of us, but in many ways I envy this dear sister and rejoice with her at her home-going. For she is removed from the toils and troubles of this world that she went through with the beauty, grace, and dignity of a saint in light. I remember seeing her face a great hardship with the beauty of God, and I had a spirited debate with a brother about her godly response to that hardship. She, like no other young sister I know, marched to the drumbeat of the word of God in her response to trouble and the living of her life, and I praise God for the modeling in godliness she gave by her life.

I had known this sister for almost 30-years, and her faith in God and desire for the truth of God's word was consistent, never declining with age, as far as I could see. She had been a member of one of the assemblies I had been a major part of establishing and in which I preached to her and others the undiluted word of God. She was a sister who sought the truth in its raw purity, she believed the word and made it a way of her life's behavior. When bishops, pastors, ministers, and once-saved Christians have backslidden almost in mass today and nonetheless attempt to rationalize their sinful behavior as if it were godly behavior, she did not go through naive self-serving rationalizations of deceit; she didn't need to; she was consistent in her faith, she always desired the truth of God's word, and rejoiced when it was preached, even when I preached it among hostile and false brethren bent in their pernicious ways. To do as she did, to the love the truth, to seek the truth, and to make her life conform to God's undiluted truth is a saved life, and nothing else is!

I do not pity or sorrow that the dear sister had an early departure; I rejoice with her, because her rejoicing is in the Lord. She has achieved that which I am, and all saints in light, still are working and looking for--to ever be with the Lord and to be released from this veil of tears, an unreal and ungodly world that knows not God. [1 Thes. 4:15-18]

I pity the false brethren that fill many assemblies today--from the porch to the altar--rationalizing sinful and deceptive lives for the sake of carnal and material gain that cannot be taken unto death. [Joel 2:17] These pernicious men must stand before an angry God and give an accounting to Him who cannot be deceived, even as they have deceived themselves, through the foolishness of man's reasoning. [2 Pet. 2:2-4]

The home-going of this dear sister prompts me to look back over the past, 41-42 some years of my saved life. I was saved from my sins, redeemed from the curse that God placed upon mankind through Adam (I was never under the Law, therefore, I cannot say as Paul said, redeemed from the curse of the Law--Gal. 3:3) some years ago. [Gen. 3] It was not that I was not churched, for I had been in the Baptist Church from the time of my birth--before I knew who I was, that I was, or what I was, my parents were taking me to church, but it was in 1963 that I was saved in direct accordance to the prescription of the new birth that Jesus said to Nicodemus (and hence to all mankind) and in direct accordance to his words, even as the apostles carried out his command. I was born again of water and spirit. [John 3:3-5; Acts 2:4, 38]

And how happy I was to be among real saints of God, to be in the company of the general assembly of God's people and to have direct and real communion with God--not a distant fellowship, but a real sonship with God, the creator of all things, where I could talk with him and he with me directly and get a real response to prayer. That is the basic inheritance of everyone born again in accordance to God's word. [Rom. 8:17] Was it not Jesus who said, If you abide in me and my word abide in you, you can ask what you will and it shall be done unto you? [John 15:7]

But over the 40-some years since I have been saved, I have seen many who were once saved turn from God both suddenly and gradually and are no longer saved. They now walk in their own ways, begetting others like unto themselves--children of reprobated minds, alienated from the life of God because they have rejected God's word and He has rejected them, they have ensnared themselves in unscriptural and ungodly marriages, [a major problem among ministers] gone after the things of this world, as they are filled with a demon of lust for money and carnal desires. And they are so ensnared that to do what is necessary to be saved again is just too difficult for them and out of the question--they have received a strong delusion and will die in their sins, clinging to the few earthly possessions that cannot extend beyond these few years upon this earth. Yet those meaningless possessions and their uncontrolled lusts can and have destroyed a present life with God and one that is to come. These are the ones I pity, because they cannot be reached any longer and they do not know the terror of God! [1 Sam 8:7; Hos. 4:6; Rom. 1:28; 2 Cor. 5:11; Eph. 4:15-18; Tit. 1:11]

No longer do they have communion with God. Many of these once anointed of God ministers have gone far from God, yet remain in churches and positions of leadership as though they were saved, polluting God's Holy Assembly and perverting God's people by teaching things they should not teach, making those who follow them two-fold more children of hell than they are themselves. So perverted and deceived are many that they would be so brazen in Satan as to declare that one can be an adulterous person, a homosexual, a liar, a thief, and other types of profane creatures and still be saved if he has faith. What form of perversion of the Gospel Of Christ would allow this corruption of thought and reprobated mindset? [1 Tim. 6:4] The only faith that can overcome man's profane behavior is the faith in the Gospel of Christ, and once one has that faith, he turns from such behavior because he is born of God. The Bible is plain, but the fool is blind to this truth: He that is born of God sins NOT because he is born of God. He that is born of God does not commit sin, for he is born of God! [1 John 5:8]

Today, there is such a great exodus and popular departure from God's word by many who take on God's name only to take away their reproach that many think that it is OK to not adhere to all His counsel and that partial obedience is also OK. But they are blind; they have a strong delusion under which they labor and cannot see themselves correctly. Partial obedience was a fatal flaw of King Saul and God rejected him. [Isa. 4:1; Acts 20:27; 1 Tim. 4:1]

Sometime ago, I met a sister and brother whom I had not seen in many years, and the sister asked me if I were still married. I wondered why she would ask such nonsense, and I circulated the word that her question was nonsense so that it would get back to her that I was offended by the rashness and nonsensical nature of the question's suggestion. When the answer got back to me, she said she asked because it seems that most ministers today have gone away from the truth of God and the right way of holiness and are doing what is right in their own eyes. She was right!

Many preachers and pastors who once knew God in the beauty of Holiness and who esteemed the words of God's mouth more than their necessary food have long since lost all regard for the truth of God's word and are doing that which is right in their own eyes and will not take counsel from anyone except their own minds and their own carnal desires, as they burn in sexual lust against God.

What we see is that many ministers, and they model behavior for God's people, are doing as Jesus prophesied they would do, they are marrying and being given in marriage. They are putting down in divorce one wife and taking up another without the benefit of God's word guiding them. And when one would be so stout in God's word as to counsel them in truth, they, in their own feeble reasoning, would attempt to rationalize, post hoc I might add, that those wives they have unscripturally put down in divorce were not saved from the start. And if that is not bad enough (and trust the word of God, it is) they put down the newer wives and get even newer ones. How can these ungodly men be saved? Why would anyone follow them on their road to perdition? This well-pronounced and now statistically normal sinful behavior is a clear sign that the end is near! [Mat. 24:38]

But that which is statistically normal may not, and in this case it is certainly not, clinically or biblically normal. The sister was right, so many ministers are marrying and giving themselves into multiple marriages so that one sociologist has called this generation's multiple marriages serial polygamy. Hence, these ministers are polygamists.

What we know from God's word is that this marriage behavior we see among many ministers and supposed Christians is wrong, yet it is statistically alarming how many ministers and supposed Christians are engaged in marriages that do not pass the scrutiny of God's word. And as these ministers engage in this corruption and call it correct, they beget others like themselves and gather around them others like unto themselves. Yet God's word is the definitive authority on this matter. God's word says, except it be for fornication and if a brother has an unsaved wife who is not pleased to dwell with him, let her depart; such a one is not bound under such circumstances. God's word says be not unequally yoked with unbelievers. [Mat. 19:9; 1 Cor. 7:12; 2 Cor. 6:14]

Today, many have ensnared themselves to such a degree that they cannot get free of their confusion; they have put down one family at the behest of their lust and begotten another family with children as well and fused their confusion with yet other wives and affairs. And that state has continued so long they think that continuity of existence of their situation means correctness or acceptance by God. It does not!

God gave a pattern of repentance from these situations through Ezra, instructing them what must be done to get back to God--the people of God had to put away their wives of bad marriages to get back to God. [Ezra 10:3] One cannot repent [make some verbal utterance noising a supposed repentance] of that he is contuning to do; such behavior is antithetical to the very meaning of repentance.

The second level of confusion that once-saved ministers and Christians have ensnared themselves in is the love for money. This is particularly acute in this nation--USA. This capitalistic nation breeds a paradigm that money is the quintessential factor of our existence and the goal of every citizen; the brief Dotcom period in this nation's history has fueled many into thinking that money is all things, yet when money becomes all, people become mere chattel. But Paul says that those who have the love of money have erred from the faith and pierced their souls with many sorrows. This sin particularly a sin of many pastors and bishops today. And their love of money has led them to all forms of other sins, for it is the root of all evil. Hence, where there is this lust for money you will see many other forms of sin as well--liars, sexual predators, thieves, etc. But the first thing they do is to make merchandise of God's people, actually harming them financially and more importantly the people are harmed spiritually by being placed under the law and therefore become bound to do the whole law, as these wicked ministers teach a doctrine of tithes that is TOTALLY inapplicable to the New Testament Church! [Gal. 5:3-5; 1Tim. 6:5-12; 2 Pet. 2:3]

Furthermore, the very act of teaching the people to tithe is to take God's people under the Law and to cause them to fall from grace! [Gal. 5:4] Gentiles were never under the law, never intended to be under the law, and when the question was raised by Jews, the apostles at Jerusalem rose up and said NO. [Acts 15] And for a minister to use the flimsy argument that tithes were before law is evidence of his incompetence to lead God's people as well as a direct indication that he is a babe in scripture and needs to be taught by someone who has an understanding of God's word. [Heb. 5:13. See our analysis on the issues of Tithes]

But they will not be taught, nor will they even get in the company of someone who has his eyes open and knows the word of God better than they do; although the word of God teaches us that in the multitude of counselors is there safety, they keep company with themselves and men of no understanding even as they, so they can never know the truth. They are as blind men in a darkened room looking for a black cat that is not there. And as the proverb is, so are they: The Lord has put both the horse and the rider asleep. [Psa. 76; Prov. 11:14] Their eyes are closed and their minds are empty of the things of God. And because they are asleep, they think the blessing of God is accorded and reckoned by dollars and cents, and cannot see that they are of the world!

One sad brother frequently argues, as he resists all godly knowledge, it is a matter of us believing things differently. I would to God that were the problem. Were it so, that problem could be resolved quite easily. Instead, it is a matter of some loving the truth and some rejecting the truth. When one loves the truth a gap between differences of belief could easily be eliminated by mere reasoning and prayer together. Instead, there are ministers and pastors, members and congregants who are haters of truth, rejecters of truth, and God has rejected them! As they have persisted in their rejection of God's word, God has sent them a strong delusion that they believe their own lie and be damned.

So many once-good saints have gone back into the world and become darkness, while they still walk among the few saints in light that remain. But Jesus said, few there be that find that strait and narrow way. [Mat. 7:14-15] Jesus also said that we are to be aware of false prophets. I am sorry to say this, but most of the preachers I once grew up with have gone away from God, and to them church has become a business and a place for social and psychological vaunting of self, a place of their profiteering.

Dear saints in light, saints of the Living God, allow me to conclude this message by saying, there are two types of normality--statistical normality and clinical normality. Because a matter is being done by many, even the majority, that does not make it right; that is only statistical normality. When a thing is healthy for you, regardless of how many people are engaging in it with you, that healthy act is clinically normal. Sadly, most ministers and people in the church world of Christendom are not saved. They are going according to their own counsel, not the word of God, and because they are, that is no signal or indication from God that He is now accepting anything less than total and absolute obedience to his word. The many may be the statistically normal, but they are the spiritually and clinically dead to the life of God and fellowship with the household of faith. Foolishly, they puff themselves in this world through deceit and guile, but this is the lesser world, which they chose instead of the greater and eternal world that is to come. But when they stand before the living God, the words of this preacher and everyone who preaches the undiluted truth of God's word will come back to judge them as the rejected truth of God!

What a terrible day that will be, but they cannot now be reached as they have hardened themselves in their sin and deception and counted themselves unworthy of the kingdom of God, as they lust after the trinkets of this life. But I hear God's word saying, He that is unjust, let him be unjust still; he that is filthy, let him be filthy still; he that is righteous, let him be righteous still; he that is holy, less him be holy still; for behold the Lord comes quickly, and his reward is with him to give every man what his work shall be. No simple deception of man's wisdom can affect God; he will give every man what his work shall be. [Rev. 22:11-14]

Sinners must rent their hearts and not their garments; they must do the real, serious work of God and turn from their way of sin and partial obedience to God's way and obey His word fully and wholly as a way of their life walk and behavior. Anyone of you who can be reached by this word from God, contact me immediately that I may show you the way of God more perfectly.

CONTACT ME NOW WHILE YOU HAVE THIS CHANCE.

Home
___________