n the news I occasionally hear stories of people who claim God instructed them to do some horrific act that is contrary to His law and what He has revealed to us in His Word. On that same note, while at the Shepherd's Conference, I took a class on Church discipline in which the elders at Grace talked about how often they have married men and women claim that God's will for them was that they leave their husband or wife to pursue a relationship with another person. I had a friend (now former) who started dating a married man, and she claimed that it was God's will that this sin occur otherwise God would not have allowed them to meet. As absurd as that sounds, I am sure there are many other so-called Christians out there rationalizing and justifying their sin in similar ways. Using that same logic...if I was offered some crack, does that mean that God's will for me is that I become a crack head? Any Christian with half a brain should know these things obviously do not harmonize with the Word of God, so how is it that so many Christians have such a skewed view of what God's will truly is? I believe the number one reason why people have absolutely no clue what God's will for them is that they are not in the least bit familiar with Scripture. In the epistle to the Romans, Paul tells us how we can know the will of God, saying...

Romans 12:1-2
"Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect

So...by default, our minds become fashioned after and adapted to the external,
superficial customs of this world system. The Greek verb "conformed" is in the passive tense, which means this progressive downward spiral of sinful thinking which, of course, leads to sinful actions (James 1:14-15) happens to us regardless of our opinion or will in the matter. We will be indistinguishable from the fallen world without the transforming power of God's Word. Scripture alone transforms and renews our minds into Christ-likeness, which arms us with the wisdom to know that certain situations and circumstances will arise, but they are trials and temptations, and through a knowledge of God's Word we should see them for what they truly are and cling to the solid rock of Christ so as to become victorious through Him. I think its so interesting that the Greek word for "transform" is where we get our English word "metamorphosis" from. Just as a caterpillar is made into a beautiful butterfly, we too through the miraculous Word of God are made into awesome new creatures with godly new desires that can, and only then, please our Creator. One of those new desires should be a hunger and thirst for His righteousness. We should long to know who God truly is and as I have said time and time again, we can not know that apart from yearning to know what God has revealed to us through His Word. This is why Peter says...

"like newborn babies, long for the pure milk of the word, so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation" - 1 Peter 2:2

I recently became a father and seeing how often a child needs to be fed really made this verse hit home all the more. My son, like any other new born baby, would wither and die off without being fed every few hours, and we to will wither and die spiritually if we neglect to feed on the pure milk of the Word of God. I am sure this is why the hymn writer wrote "I need Thee every hour, teach me Thy will" Which brings us back to the verse in Romans. We can not claim to know God's will if we are not constantly feeding ourselves with His Word (Matt 4:4). Before you speak presumptuously of God and say that His will is this or that for your life, ask yourself if you have been transformed by the renewing power of His Word. Examine yourself to see if you are so intimately familiar with Scripture that you are sure that what you are about to do does not violate the Law of God. It is only through a constant diet of God's Word that we will know His good and perfect will.

However, do not forget that having a mere head knowledge of Scripture will lead to a cold orthodoxy if it is not accompanied with charitable love (Rev 2:2-5). That is exactly why Paul ties together our minds being transformed with how we ought to be presenting ourselves as living sacrifices. We should be continually denying ourselves to the point of death (Luke 9:23; Phil 2:5-11), giving ourselves wholly to God, so as to put aside our desires, and crawling upon that alter before the Almighty and allowing Him to slay us, so that it is no longer I that live, but Christ in me (Gal 2:20) who works and accomplishes His will through me, so that all the glory may be His and His alone.

have no idea why I am so surprised when I come across things like so-called Christians claiming that it is biblical to murder babies in the name of "choice". I suppose there is still a part in me that is still naive enough to think that someone who claims to be a Christian would actually be intimately familiar with who Christ truly is and what doctrines His Word holds. I guess I tend to forget at times that the title of Christian is so loosely and widely used that it no longer even carries a real definition. I realize that the Church is predominately made up of purely nominal believers who not only lack a true knowledge of Christ and His Word but they do not show even the slightest bit of fruit in their life, but still I am dumbfounded when I see things like professing Christians twisting the Holy Scriptures to justify the mass murder of innocence. If you can stomach such blatant hypocrisy then read this.

As you can see they go into this insanely long (and that's coming from me whose blogs tend to be...well if you read them, you know how long winded I can be, although I am trying to fix that...thanks to Dan Phillips from Team-Pyro) in-depth (can you call something that is completely filled with error in depth?) explanation on how you can not take certain verses out of context (which is true, even though they take verses out of context themselves...aww sweet irony) to prove your point, and they claim the pro-lifers have done just that; taken certain Psalms out of context to justify their stance on being anti-abortion. I am going to bypass both "in-depth" arguments made by pro-lifers and pro-abortionists alike and just present to you one passage from the very lips of our LORD

Matthew 5:21-22
"You have heard that the ancients were told, 'YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT MURDER' and 'Whoever commits murder shall be liable to the court.' But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother shall be guilty before the court; and whoever says to his brother, 'You good-for-nothing,' shall be guilty before the supreme court; and whoever says, 'You fool,' shall be guilty enough to go into the fiery hell."

Think about this...really soak it in. The Lord God Almighty says that if you call someone a fool you are guilty enough to enter eternal damnation. Do you honestly think that God is not going to hold those who murder babies accountable for their sinful actions? Forget debating...its obvious that God's standards are so high that you can't even call someone a name without being condemned, much less physically murder an infant. Furthermore, 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 lists all those who will not "inherit the Kingdom of God" which includes "revilers" and "covetous" people. So if I can be more transparent, if you speak "abusive language", or desire someone else's possessions you will go to hell, but some so-called Christians would have us believe that abortion, however, is OK in the eyes of Christ? Seriously, if you think that you can be a Christian and at the same time be pro-abortion, you are self deceived at best. I also want to note that the early Church who were taught first hand by the Apostles realized the sinfulness of abortion, and they recorded it in the Didache saying, "Thou shalt not murder a child by abortion." Lastly look at what God hates...yes, God hates things...and these things He hates are an abomination to Him.

Proverbs 6:16-19
"There are six things which the LORD hates, Yes, seven which are an abomination to Him: Haughty eyes, a lying tongue, And hands that shed innocent blood, A heart that devises wicked plans, Feet that run rapidly to evil, A false witness who utters lies, And one who spreads strife among brothers."

Before I go, I just have to say this...with the election coming up, if you claim to be a Christian and plan on voting for anyone who has been known to vote "pro-choice...aligning yourself with those who are directly responsible for legislation that brings about the death of millions of babies a year, then you too are guilty of shedding innocent blood. If those who covet and those who speak abusive language will not escape judgment, neither will those who give hearty approval (Rom 1:32) to the death of innocence. Do not be self deceived.

recently saw Jay Bakker, son of false teachers Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker, on Larry King Live, although, I think that the original interview actually took place back in 2006. The date is really irrelevant because the false doctrines that Jay Bakker propagated in that interview have been gaining more popularity as each year passes. You can find the specific statements I will be referring to, here at YouTube, and also at this online magazine.

It seems that Jay has decided to take up the cause of fighting for gay rights. His so-called ministry is focusing on reaching out to homosexuals, however, he does not call them to repentance, NO, instead he claims that God told him that homosexuality is no longer a sin. Jay Bakker's direct quote is, "This sounds so churchy, but I felt like God spoke to my heart and said '[homosexuality] is not a sin'". Now, this really opens up the flood gates of craziness and chaos. With this way of thinking, any person can claim a "new revelation" from God. I mean, seriously, this is so absurd, maybe someone will say that God told them adultery was no longer a sin, or how bout stealing? Maybe lying will be ok...ya never know, murder might be the next sin God will change His mind on. The fact of the matter is that God has made it unquestionably clear in His Word that not only is homosexuality a sin, but God does not change His mind.

1 Corinthians 6:9-10
"Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God."

Numbers 23:19
"God is not a man, that He should lie, nor a son of man, that He should change His mind."

Seems pretty cut and dry doesn't it? However, Jay Bakker says, "Well, I mean, I know the arguments. I know the scriptures. And the scriptures are very – you could argue on them all day. I believe they’ve been taken out of context, and I don’t believe that, you know, we’ve researched enough of the background on those scriptures." False teachers like Jay Bakker claim that 1 Corinthians 6:9 is narrowly speaking of homosexual prostitutes, and that it does not at all encompass the damnation of a supposed monogamous homosexual loving relationship. This is a lie, plain and simple. The word translated, "effeminate" does speaks of male prostitutes, however, "homosexuals" is a totally different word, and is differentiated from these effeminate prostitutes with a "nor". Thus God is declaring that neither of them will enter the Kingdom of God. Jay Bakker's doctrines are exactly what Peter warned of when he said that unstable and untaught men would distort the Scriptures in hopes of catching some off guard as to carry them away (2 Pet 3:14-18), because of this constant threat, we should be on the alert and diligent to be established in the truth of our Lord Jesus Christ (2 Pet 1:12).

Romans 1:18-32

Here, Paul under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, shows us that God's wrath is revealed against men who suppress the truth. The Bible says these men fail to honor and thank God even though He has made His power and divine nature evident to them through His creation, and because of their lack of honor and thankfulness toward God, "God gave them over to degrading passions". Before we go wondering what that means, Scripture explains that degrading passions consist of "women exchang{ing} the natural function for that which is unnatural, and in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another, men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error." This really couldn't be more clear, I mean, seriously, it couldn't. If God meant to condemn merely homosexual prostitution, it would have been easy for Him to make that obvious. Or would false teachers like Jay Bakker think that when God said adulterers would not enter the Kingdom of Heaven, that we should question if God meant all adulterers, or only a narrow specific kind of adulterer. We know that God is holy (Rev 4:8; Rev 15:4), perfect in purity (Deut 32:4; 2 Sam 22:31), and free from all sin (2 Cor 5:21; 1 John 3:5), so when we consider Him and His character wouldn't it make more sense to err on the side of righteousness than to assume that a holy God would tolerate willful sin?

Especially when He so clearly states, through Paul, in Romans that the act of homosexuality itself is impure, improper, depraved, wicked, evil and ranked among all unrighteousness, whether it is greed, envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice, gossiping, slandering, insolent, arrogant, boastful, being disobedient to parents...all of this behavior is considered by Christ as unloving, and those who practice such things are worthy of death. (Rom 1:28-32)

Many people debate whether homosexuals are born gay, but that debate is pointless. King David says rightly that from birth we are sinful (Psalm 51:5) and Paul proclaims that by nature we are children of wrath (Eph 2:3). Since we know that mankind is fallen through Adam (Rom 5:12-14), we should be aware that all of us have an innate sin nature (Gen 4:7) and we are all prone to sin (Jam 1:13-15) within ourselves. Homosexuals may say that from a young age they had certain "feelings" and "tendencies" toward being gay, however, from a young age I had tendencies to lie, and to steal, just as we all have sinful tendencies. Being a liar and a thief came naturally to me, so because of this, do I try and justify my lying thieving ways? No, for Christ calls us to repentance, we are commanded to turn from our sin (John 8:11) and we are commanded to deny ourselves to the point of death (Matt 16:24). Practically speaking, through the power of the Holy Spirit, I am to renew my mind in the Word of God, being transformed by the living and active Word into the image of Christ (Rom 12:1-2), so as to die to self, which is sinful, and live to Christ. The same goes for a homosexual, if he is to be saved, he must die to his desires turning from his sin, and follow Christ in all obedience.

Now...this teaching, although biblically accurate is attacked by men like Jay Bakker who say it is external religiosity to ask someone to "change" and is exactly what the Pharisees stood for, and that it is the very thing Jesus spoke out against. Jay Bakker claims that all you have to do is love God with all your heart, and it doesn't matter if you are a practicing homosexual or not. The problem with this argument is that, the Pharisees had taken God's law and added all sorts of externals to it, TEACHING AS DOCTRINES THE PRECEPTS OF MEN (Matt 15:9). Whereas I, and many others who are like-minded with me, am merely pointing to Scripture, and echoing the words of Christ, the Prophets, and Apostles in saying do not be deceived (1 Cor 6:10)...no sinners will inherit the Kingdom of God, that goes for liars, and adulterers, just as it applies to homosexuals. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 6:11 that the Corinthians were once all those things...liars, drunkards, thieves, idolaters, homosexuals...but they were washed, they were sanctified and they were justified through Jesus Christ. This did not happen because of some hypocritical love for God, in which they continued to wallow in their sin...NO...they were ONCE those things, meaning they had turned from them, they had abandoned them, they had deserted them for Christ. It is not a coincidence that Paul says do not be deceived before listing all the characteristics of those who would be banished from entering God's Kingdom. Paul said do not be deceived because we are prone to justify our sin, and we are prone to deceive ourselves into thinking we are not that sinful.

Please, do not be deceived in thinking homosexuality is not a sin. Do not be deceived in thinking obeying Scripture is legalistic...because on judgment day, many will stand before Christ and say, "Lord, Lord"...these men are deceived, thinking that they know Christ...saying "Lord, Lord" you know me! But He will tell them, "I never knew you! DEPART FROM ME, YOU WHO PRACTICE LAWLESSNESS" (Matt 7:23). The very ones who will be cast into hell are those who have no law, they are lawless, and they continually practice that which transgresses against God's Word, but, in spite of what Jay Bakker teaches, the true disciple of Christ "delights in the law of the LORD" (Psalm 1:2). Practicing homosexuals do not pay heed to the warnings of being self deceived (Gal 6:7) found in the Word of God. These men loved their sin more than they loved Christ, they loved their sin so much they would not stop practicing it.

"This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil." - John 3:19

Repent and be saved! Christ will justify and cleanse you from every filthy thing that has stained your soul. Do not be deceived by your own wicked heart (Jer 17:9) into thinking God tolerates sin. If we truly trust in Christ, it is written that the old things have passed away, and we ought to be new creatures with new desires...new creatures who no longer love the darkness of our evil deeds which we once were slaves to. If we are new creatures, we have been sealed with the Holy Spirit, and if we "walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh. For the flesh sets its desire against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; for these are in opposition to one another, so that you may not do the things that you please" (Gal 5:16-17). Self denial is a characteristic of Christ's disciples, self indulgence is a characteristic of an unregenerate person.

f you have not read the first part of this series, I suggest that you read it before you read this, and that first post is located here.

After having established that God causes His Church to grow through the preaching of His Word (Rom 10:14, 17) in the first post, we will now see that Scripture clearly shows that God also grows His Church when there is purity within the congregation. Now, for this to occur there are some things that are umm...prerequisites if you will. The Church must be made up of regenerate believers. This may seem like a no brainer to some, especially since the word Church itself literally means "called out", so of course the Church should be made up of a body of believers who have been called out, elected, or divinely selected by the Almighty. However, there are organizations of Church planters who poll the non-believing community to ask them what they would like to see in the Church. They ask these unregenerate people what would bring them in the doors, and that is why you see so many Churches now that are indistinguishable from the world system. Since these so-called Churches have become like the world to appeal to worldly people, they are then obviously made up of those who are not truly saved, and since they are not born again, they are utterly incapable of being pure (Rom 3:10-18) and it is impossible for them to please God (Heb 11:6), or for them to live righteously as God has called us to be holy just as He is holy (1 Pet 1:16). As I pointed out in the last post, for the Church to grow, it must be continually devoting itself to the teaching of Christ and the Apostles (Acts 2:42), and in doing so it can't help but be offensive to the unregenerate sinner (Jer 6:10). We are destined to be hated as Christ was, but we also ought to be blameless as Christ was. That is the importance of the Church having purity, that we do not suffer reproach that is due us because of sin. That is why Jesus Himself set up a system of discipline that the Church is to practice, however, it is almost never practiced today, mainly because most Churches have become so much like the world that they tolerate sin, to their detriment, but do not be deceived, Christ is not in their midst (Rev 2:20)

Matthew 18:15-17
"If your brother sins, go and show him his fault in private; if he listens to you, you have won your brother. But if he does not listen to you, take one or two more with you, so that BY THE MOUTH OF TWO OR THREE WITNESSES EVERY FACT MAY BE CONFIRMED. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector."

Here, Jesus is clearly stating that something must be done about sin which involves those who are in the Church. True Churches can not tolerate such behavior or they run the risk of having their lamp put out and not having the blessing and authority of Christ behind them (Rev 2:5). Now, I am not saying that we should be critical fault finders who nitpick every single sin that we may see, or make ourselves out to be junior detectives that go around searching for sin in peoples lives. For instance, if someone misspeaks and says something they shouldn't have, or maybe has an outburst of anger one time, we overlook such things because "love covers over a multitude of sins" (1 Pet 4:8). We should be understanding that our flesh has not yet been redeemed and because of that we are unable to be free from every and all sin. However, since our sinning is a reality of our life until we are brought into glorification upon the return of Christ, that does not at all mean we should take sin lightly. Romans 6:1-2 says, "What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin so that grace may increase? May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in it?" Paul, here, is giving the strongest negative in the Greek saying, God forbid that we continue in sin because we are forgiven for our sins, that type of attitude shows a total lack of thankfulness and respect toward the sacrifice that Christ made on our behalf (Heb 10:26-31). We are to deny ourselves to the point of death (Matt 16:24), no longer living for our selfish desires but by faith for the glory of Christ (Gal 2:20). Our lives should be sacrificially yielded to Christ in complete obedience, clinging to the Word of God so as to allow it to transform us into the image of our Creator (Rom 12:1-2). The process of sanctification should be continually taking place, making it so that our sins are happening less frequently and farther apart (1 Thess 4:1-8). Just because we are still in the flesh and prone to sin, that is never an excuse for our sin. We should realize that each and every sin that we commit is the exact thing that killed the Son of God. Our sin is precisely what held Jesus to the cross, so upon sinning, we should be mournful and weep over the fact that we have offended and transgressed against our Lord and Savior (James 4:8-10).

The Apostle John makes all this crystal clear when he says, "If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us" (1 John 1:8), showing us that yes, we are prone to sin, and yes, because of our innate sin nature we will stumble from time to time. However, John explicitly says "No one who abides in Him sins; no one who sins has seen Him or knows Him" (1 John 3:6). In saying this, John is telling us that anyone who habitually sins, or whoever has a life that is characterized by constant sin has not been redeemed. They are deceived in thinking they are a Christian. The sticky area is that there are times when a legit believer will fall into a season of sin, but upon being confronted, they should respond to the voice of God, repent and turn away from their sin (1 Cor 5 & 2 Cor 2:4-11). So, a verse like 1 John 3:6 should really strike fear and doubt within the heart of a person about the legitimacy of their calling and they should wonder if they have ever truly believed with a faith that brings forth fruits in keeping of repentance (Luke 3:8).

Now, according to today's market driven Church paradigm, Church discipline is not in the least bit conducive to their visions of expeditious massive growth. They are more interested in packing the pews than in being obedient to the Word of God. But, look at Acts 5, where Ananias and Sapphira after having sold a piece of their property, went to the Apostle Peter and lied. In a vain attempt at appearing generous, they claimed to be giving ALL the money they had received for that property, to the Church, but in reality they had secretly kept a portion for themselves. What happens next is the ultimate in Church discipline..."Ananias fell down and breathed his last" (Acts 5:5). God disciplined both Ananias and Sapphira to the point of death for lying, which caused a "great fear {coming} over the whole church, and over all who heard of these things" (Acts 5:11).

Now, take into account, that during this time in the early Church, the Apostles, by the power of the Holy Spirit, were preforming great signs and wonders, causing the blind to see, the lame to walk, and the dead to rise (Acts 5:12). The miraculous would have attracted the masses into flocking to the Church, but they would have been coming for the wrong reasons. Just like today's Church planters that try to get people in the doors for all the wrong reasons, whether its Starbucks, Crispy Creme or some form of entertainment...God must purify His Church from sin and from those who are there for selfish ambition through discipline, no matter how counter productive it may seem to Church growth. Because, in spite of the disciplinary death of Ananias and Sapphira and the fear that spread throughout the Church because of it, "all the more believers in the Lord, multitudes of men and women, were constantly added to their number" (Acts 5:14). So far we have seen from the Scriptures, that the way that God grows His Church is totally opposite from what the modern Church says we should do to see growth in the congregation.
This deals a deathblow to the wisdom and scheming of men. It is written that "God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong, and the base things of the world and the despised God has chosen, the things that are not, so that He may nullify the things that are, so that no man may boast before God" (1 Cor 1:25-29) If only those who profess to follow Christ would read His Word so that they may know this, so that they too will "BOAST IN THE LORD" (1 Cor 1:31) alone.

t always disgusts me when I see the History Channel air its specials on the Apocrypha and how it makes false assertions that the Bible was somehow just tossed together carelessly by self righteous men with agendas, who supposedly decided to leave out some books which are just as valid and true as the ones that were canonized. In reality the books found in the Bible (not the Catholic "Bible" or Jehovah Witness "Bible") are the very mind and words of God, spoken through Jesus and elect men for the purpose of being recorded and given to us in order that we may have a true knowledge of God and His counsel.

2 Peter 1:20-21
"But know this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture is a matter of one's own interpretation, for no prophecy was ever made by an act of human will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God."

Peter is pointing out something that is so important, so imperative, so vital that he says we ought to know this before anything else. The importance of this is shown in the Greek which carries a meaning of something being chief...holding much honor, and being the first in a procession of many things. This essential thing is that all Scripture is absolute, direct revelation from God Himself, it is supremely divine in origin, and not at all derived by an act of human will. Paul echos this same sentiment in 2 Timothy 3:16 when he says that "all Scripture is God breathed." To really soak this in and meditate on this is utterly mind blowing. Many Christians will call the Bible the Word of God, but they do not at all live as if they truly believe that statement. Take Genesis 1 for example. How many Christians actually believe in a literal 6 day Creation? Instead of taking God at His word, they try to harmonize the theories of man with the Word of God, consequently, claiming that Scripture doesn't really mean what it says. 'How can we argue with science' is the cry of modern man?! "Let God be found true, though every man be found a liar" (Rom 3:4). 'That's archaic!' some may say...while at the same time it is written, "For, 'ALL FLESH IS LIKE GRASS, AND ALL ITS GLORY LIKE THE FLOWER OF GRASS. THE GRASS WITHERS, AND THE FLOWER FALLS OFF, BUT THE WORD OF THE LORD ENDURES FOREVER' And this is the word which was preached to you" (1 Pet 1:24-25)

So it really comes down to a question you have to ask yourself in your heart of hearts, which is, do you really believe what Peter is saying here? It is so monumentally crucial that we do believe Scripture, if we profess to be a Christian, because our faith completely hinges on it. When I say believe, I mean that we believe every single jot and tittle because, either the Bible is the Word of God or it is not. If it is not, then why even bother with it at all? It is foolish to look at the Bible as merely a loose guide of morality, because that is not what Scripture claims to be. It claims to be the very Word of God, the revelation about Christ, who alone brings Salvation. Scripture claims to be living and active, able to awaken the sinner from death and bring him into the light and life of God. Do not make the mistake of trivializing the Bible into some glorified, Confucius type book. It claims to be so much more than that. Now, since it does, we have to make the decision to believe it, or we must discard it. "How long will you waver between two opinions? If the LORD is God, follow him; but if Baal is God, follow him" (1 Kings 18:21).

Jesus was clear when He said that we can not be a slave to two Masters, (Luke 16:13) and since God's name is Jealous (Ex 34:14) He will not tolerate us splitting our allegiance, but demands that if we are truly His, that we must bow the knee of submission (Psalm 95:6) before Him alone. Who are we to pick and choose what certain doctrines we like or what we want to believe from God's Word? If we attempt such things, we have fallen into the same trap as Eve, thinking we are like God and able to discern between good from evil. How can a professing believer think only some parts of the Bible are trustworthy? Is Almighty God only partially powerful, partially knowledgeable and partially faithful? Do you then think you are only partially saved? Scripture affirms its sufficiency, and God can not lie, so then, professing Christians ought to obey the direct command "to pay attention {to the Word of God} as to a lamp shining in a dark place" that is why Peter is telling us how important it is that we realize the divine origin of the Scriptures, so that we can completely and totally rely on it in our lives to guide us through this dark world. This is why Jesus said"do not be called Rabbi, for One is your Teacher", it's not that a child in school can't call his teacher a teacher, but we are not to set anyone up, or honor anyone in our lives as having the authority to teach us on life issues besides Christ and His Word.

It is written that "His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness" (2 Pet 1:3) so a Christian ought not to trust God in some issues of life, only to turn around and look to man's wisdom in cults, self help books, 12 step programs, psychology or any other "lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God" (2 Cor 10:5). We either follow Christ with a whole heart or we are rebellious, there can be no duality. Either God has given us everything pertaining to life and godliness or this infinite omnipotent, omniscient God did not foresee that we would end up needing further teaching in a certain area of life, thus lying to us when He said that EVERYTHING has been given to us that we need in this life.

Do we honestly think that we as humans have come upon something that is profitable through the accumulation of our knowledge that God did not know or had overlooked or did not include in His Word? If that is the case, what are you then saying about God? Is that not implying that He is not omniscient? We as Christians must be completely and totally devoted to God (Mark 12:30) and we can not truly know Him apart from His Word. A split heart is as lifeless (and useless) before God as the small child would have been who was taken before Solomon had he been cut in two. This is why throughout the entire book of 2 Peter, while Peter is warning of false teachers, he continual points to growing in a "true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ" and in the midst of telling us that over and over, then points to the total importance of knowing that Scripture is God breathed.

So, looking back at our original verse, Peter says that Scripture is not up for debate when it comes to interpretation, because ultimately there is only One Author, so there are no contradictions found in Scripture. If it is read historically, literally, and grammatically it harmonizes together perfectly...error only comes into play when the reader is not looking to see what Scripture truly says, but looking to fit Scripture around their beliefs, alagorizing or spiritualizing the text. For times sake I won't go to far into this, I will save that for a later blog, but I would recommend reading some books by some very solid teachers on proper hermeneutics. Not only does Peter point out that there is One Author in saying that Scripture is not a matter of one's interpretation, but he really solidifies that fact by stating that Scripture never came about by an act of human will. He is really saying the same thing twice in two different ways to make sure that no one misses the truth that Scripture is divine in origin. The Holy Spirit caused men to write what was written. That is how Paul can say "all Scripture is God breathed", and also why Paul says, "For this reason we also constantly thank God that when you received the word of God which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men, but for what it really is, the word of God, which also performs its work in you who believe." Paul not only affirms that the Word of God is the very mind and words of God, but also that it had absolutely nothing to do with an act of human will.

Now, when you take into account that 2 Peter is written as a warning against false teachers, and look at it knowing that, you see certain patterns. Peter reestablishes foundational truths to the Christian faith that false teachers continually attack. Peter points to the truth of the trinity, election, the divinity of Jesus, that true faith produces good works, and the sufficiency and divine nature of Scripture. This is so important to know, because it is under attack today. Those in the emergent Church deny absolute truth, and the divine nature of Scripture. Others not so blatantly turn their congregations away from the Word of God and onto various best selling books. Today is judgment day, judge your own heart and judge it rightly (1 Cor 11:31). Are you a follower of Christ? Do you believe Scripture to be the Word of God? If you are and you do put aside everything else and be like Job who said "I have treasured the words of His mouth more than my necessary food." (Job 23:12) and learn the lesson that God has repeatedly tried to teach us, that "MAN SHALL NOT LIVE ON BREAD ALONE, BUT ON EVERY WORD THAT PROCEEDS OUT OF THE MOUTH OF GOD." (Duet 8:3; Matt 4:4) The Creator has written a book, and we claim to be His followers, shouldn't we be intimately familiar with everything our Creator and our Redeemer has to say?

recently blogged about how God causes His true Church to grow, mentioning that it does this by the means of divine selection in which the Word is the instrument that God has ordained to reach those who He has chosen. I wanted to spend some time in this post focusing more on the doctrine of election and how, what is often referred to as Calvinism, is actually completely and totally a biblically sound doctrine, and also what that means for us practically speaking. At the same time, I will show the faulty thinking in what is usually called Arminianism, and how having a Soteriology based on such error leads to folly in various practical issues of the Christian walk.

1 Peter 1:1-3
"Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, To those who reside as aliens, scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, who are chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, by the sanctifying work of the Spirit, to obey Jesus Christ and be sprinkled with His blood: May grace and peace be yours in the fullest measure. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead"

This verse is a great starting point. Peter says here that we are "chosen", which literally means "elect" in the original Greek, and as we all should know, election itself carries the notion that someone besides ourselves has decided to pick us, because obviously, you can not elect yourself. So right away Peter is unapologetically pointing to the fact that us being elected in Christ was apart from any decision we made on our own behalf. On top of that, Peter then says that our election was made by the foreknowledge of God, which tells us that there was some sort of pre-arrangement involved. Paul elaborates on this point in Ephesians 1 by saying that we were chosen before the foundations of the world, giving further proof that this election has nothing to do with us whatsoever. These themes are not unique to Peter's epistle but are found in practically every book of the New Testament. There is a continual mention of being called, chosen, and elected, all by the foreknowledge or predestination of the Almighty. Now, this election by the foreknowledge of God is then compounded here with Peter saying God's "great mercy has caused us to be born again." This is an extremely important analogy because no one causes their own birth, we can not contribute to that at all whatsoever, it is solely based off of the decisions of someone other than ourselves. This fact and analogy is echoed in the 3rd Chapter of the Gospel according to John.

John 3:1-8
"Now there was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews; this man came to Jesus by night and said to Him, 'Rabbi, we know that You have come from God as a teacher; for no one can do these signs that You do unless God is with him.' Jesus answered and said to him, 'Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.' Nicodemus said to Him, 'How can a man be born when he is old? He cannot enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born, can he?' Jesus answered, 'Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not be amazed that I said to you, 'You must be born again.' The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but do not know where it comes from and where it is going; so is everyone who is born of the Spirit.'"

Do you see the profoundness of what Christ said? No one will see the kingdom of God unless they are born again. No one will enter heaven unless they are chosen. No one will have eternal life unless they are elect. Nicodemus, desperately wanting to know what he can do to be born again asks his question, and Christ explains how one is born again purely by the will and divine selection of the Holy Spirit, telling Nicodemus that just as the wind blows here and there as it wishes, so does the Holy Spirit do as He pleases, bestowing grace and a new birth to those who have been elected. God's sovereign election is not some new idea to the New Testament, but found all throughout the Old Testament Scriptures with the Lord of Hosts saying, "Israel, Mine elect", and seen even more specifically when YHWH says to Moses, "I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show compassion on whom I will show compassion" (Exodus 33:19). There is not a shred of wiggle room for anyone to take credit for the fact that they have been saved lest anyone should boast, because God has made it abundantly clear that we are called...taken from darkness while we were dead in our trespasses, being slaves to our lusts and sins but God being rich and mercy and compassion has caused us to be born again. (Ephesians 2:1-9) Think about that...we were dead in our trespasses...dead men don't make decisions, dead men are exactly that...dead, lifeless, a corpse, that is, until God intervenes breathing life into us and taking us from that darkened state and transferring us into the light of His kingdom. Over and over we see these analogies of how we were utterly helpless to do anything about our sinful state and would have stayed there without the sovereign election of God.

Now, what about free will? Everyone always talks about how we are free and have free will...that God endowed us with freedoms and has given us the gift of free will so that we can choose to do whatever it is that we may want to do whether it be good or evil. However, is that true in the light of Scripture? The Scriptures makes it clear that the only freedom that we truly have is that we are free to choose what type of sin appeals to us the most, that is the limit of our freedom. We are free to pick our poison concerning iniquity and sin. Beyond that we have no freedom, we are definitely by no means free to choose to follow Christ because Romans 3:10-18 says, "as it is written, 'THERE IS NONE RIGHTEOUS, NOT EVEN ONE; THERE IS NONE WHO UNDERSTANDS, THERE IS NONE WHO SEEKS FOR GOD; ALL HAVE TURNED ASIDE, TOGETHER THEY HAVE BECOME USELESS; THERE IS NONE WHO DOES GOOD, THERE IS NOT EVEN ONE. THEIR THROAT IS AN OPEN GRAVE, WITH THEIR TONGUES THEY KEEP DECEIVING, THE POISON OF ASPS IS UNDER THEIR LIPS; WHOSE MOUTH IS FULL OF CURSING AND BITTERNESS; THEIR FEET ARE SWIFT TO SHED BLOOD, DESTRUCTION AND MISERY ARE IN THEIR PATHS, AND THE PATH OF PEACE THEY HAVE NOT KNOWN. THERE IS NO FEAR OF GOD BEFORE THEIR EYES.'" Clearly man is utterly depraved and incapable of coming to any sort of saving faith in Christ apart from God's sovereign election and that is why God says "no one seeks God". This passage deals a deathblow to all those "seeker sensitive" Churches out there that have tried to make Church more appealing to the non believer in hopes of getting him in the doors. These Churches are believing the lie that we ourselves are sovereign and have the ability to choose between good and evil. This is the exact lie that was told to Eve in the Garden, when the serpent said to her, "You surely will not die! For God knows that in the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil." (Gen 3:4-5) The word "knowing" can also be translated to discern, to discriminate, to distinguish, giving the idea of choice. Do you see Satan's lie? Telling Eve that she would be sovereign, that she would be her own god, able to choose between good and evil. This is why Arminianism is faulty, it contradicts what Christ said in John 15:16 which says, "You did not choose Me but I chose you, and appointed you that you would go and bear fruit"...forget what you heard, or what you thought you knew, we are unable to come to Christ for salvation, but rather, the Father draws us to Himself (John 6:44). Arminianism gives us the impression that we are sovereign over our own lives, and leads us to believe that we can distinguish and choose between good and evil, when Scripture is totally clear that it is God who plucks us from the fire and makes us follow after Him so that all the glory would be His alone (Phil 4:20). That way no one can say they were smart enough or clever enough to have found God, or take credit for having lead someone to Christ, for the Almighty has predestined and chosen them from infinity past to be His people and His possession by His own sovereign will for His own good purpose and pleasure (Eph 1:3-12).

If we believe that we have the ability to get people saved, and that through the manipulation of a person's will, we can get them to produce their own salvation, then we might as well support the idea to market Christ like any other thing for sale on any given T.V. commercial. It would make sense then to do whatever it takes to scheme and find any way possible to finagle a person with anything that would stir their emotions, whether it be music, videos, light shows to the point that truth is minimized and manipulation is maximized. We would then ignore knowing nothing but Christ and Him crucified (1 Cor 2:1-5), and instead focus on style, technique and gimmickry. The big crusades have the counselors, ushers and whoever else is working there go with their wives and stand in the midst of the crowd and once the invitation is given, they are instructed to start flooding the isles making their way to the stage as the Evangelist points at them and says, "look! they are coming to Christ!" in hopes of getting others to be caught up in the flow so as to come forward and say their little prayers and get saved. But is it even a true conversion? You can not manipulate people into the Kingdom. That is exactly why Paul said that he did not come with craftiness or cunning speech but only preached Christ and Him crucified, he did this so that no one could ever point to Paul as being persuasive or that salvation came by any means except the Holy Spirit, Paul wanted it to be clear that the Word was the power of God unto salvation (1 Cor 2:1-5).

Besides producing humility in the believer, knowing that we do not at all deserve this mercy, within this humility there should be thankfulness, and thankfulness should promote righteous living. When we really grasp the concept that we have been elected for no other reason then God's good pleasure and because He has willed to do so, this should move us to be so thankful that we want to honor the One who has chosen us by living an obedient life. Our eyes should not be focused on temporal earthly things but on the things above, not becoming entangled with the affairs of this world so as to live a life pleasing to God (2 Tim 2:3-4). It pleases Him to proclaim His Word. As I have already shown from the Scriptures, God has elected those who will believe and we are instructed to proclaim the truth. Because Christ prayed that we would be sanctified by truth, and the Word of God is the lone source of truth (John 17:17). We are told to preach the Word in and out of season (2 Tim 4:2) and those who are elect upon hearing the Word preached will then be convicted and come to a saving faith (Rom 10:14, 17). This takes all the guess work out of how to evangelize and how to grow the Church. Since we know that upon hearing God's word those who are elect will believe, then we ought to be giving attention to the public reading of Scripture, to teaching and to exhortation (1 Tim 4:13), plain and simple. That is why in Paul's final words to the Ephesian elders, he said, "Now I commend you to God, and to the word of His grace which is able to build you up" (Acts 20:32), he did not commend them to the latest fads and trends and marketing or the latest popular books, for it is the Word alone that plants seeds in the good soil which produces lasting roots that will never be moved (Matt 13). Everything else plants seeds on bad soil that although may produce a plant, it will lack fruit much like the fig tree that was cursed by Christ (Matt 21).

We recently had some computer problems...the computer just wouldn't turn on, it kept getting stuck in the very beginning Windows loading screen. However, thanks to the genius of my buddy Toan, we are back up and running and new posts will be making there way on here very shortly.