The Falling Away: Guard your Heart

by Pedro Anosike | Apr 11, 2011 | Eschatology

No one fights those he has already captured. If you have the love of God, hold on to it tightly. Those who do not have love, their love cannot grow cold Matt 24:12 NIV. It is only those that have grace that can fall from grace. Being lukewarm does not afflict unbelievers only believers, is only those in the faith that can depart from the faith. Unbelievers are never warm towards God.

An enemy cannot betray – it is only friends that can betray friends. May the Holy Spirit grant us understanding!

We all need to be still before Christ Jesus the lover of our souls. It helps us hear His instructions clearly.

It is not wisdom for the captured to continue barking on the captor; as many Christians do- practicing wickedness which is of the devil yet they claim to fiercely bind the devil in their prayers.

2 Tim 2:26, shows clearly, he that does the will of the devil is captured. Wisdom demands that the captured looks for exit and escape from the captor before he finally kills the captured with the same wickedness they are indulging Gal 5:15.

As Christians, we repent, submit to God, resist the Devil and he will flee at least for that season James 4:7, Luke 4:13. And, because he flees only for a season, we are to resist him steadfastly each time. We bind devils (demons) and cast them out (Matt 10:1, Luke 10:19). But, no Christian has authority to bind Satan the devil.

God has left us a window of escape that the devil cannot stop. The window is called repentance-each person should use it sincerely as the Blood of Jesus propitiates for us 1 John 2:1-2.

If you are entangled in sin, though you are God’s servant, please use the window of escape (repent) before your conscience gets seared and you begin twisting doctrines to suit your purpose 1 Tim 4:2. This dangerous situation does open up spiritual people for the beast to download the anti-Christ into them 1 John 2:18, 2 John 1:7.

Without apology, we must note that no one becomes a false Apostle, Prophet, Teacher, Evangelist, Shepherd or a deceitful “server of tables”- (a term for describing seemingly not too important aspect of service Acts 6:2, treasurer John 13:29 NLT), without having first been seriously intending to pursue spiritual life. For this reason, submitting oneself sincerely to God and resisting the devil is an individual daily walk that cannot be communalized.

2 Peter 2:1 opens with a firm indication that false prophets and teachers will align to destroy the Church (saints of God). They will accomplish this by introduction of heresies (mere human thoughts minced with seemingly fine ideas inspired by demon spirits).

It is important to note that Peter’s admonition and exhortation is not towards those doomed prophets and teachers. You may ask why? Well, no one becomes a false prophet or teacher by accident- there is always a deliberate submission to the beast that infuses the anti-Christ spirit into them. So, no one is a false prophet or teacher because they impropery taught God’s word as a result of over zealousness and ignorance (James 3:1, 1 Cor 7:7, Eph 4:11).

We must avoid being quick to call people false prophets and teachers in order to discern between the wheat and tare. Thus, reveal the real culprits and the danger they pose.

Given the doomed condition of those false prophets and teachers, Peter, concluded all he had to say about them in verse 1 and moved on to elaborate on their strategies which can be narrowed down to this one thing; belittle and make public ridicule of Christ and turn the people who have already embraced Him away and stop those intending to embrace Him. This is done by their doctrines and lifestyle Heb 6:6. He was concise, direct and vehement for the sake of the saints!

So, Peter’s main theme is this; many who were previously in the faith will depart from the faith as a result of the doctrines of these false prophets and teachers 2 Pet 2:2. Please, beware many of them now bear the title Pastor which is a designation used to overshadow all of the “ministry gifts”, against God’s wise opinion to keep them separate Eph 4:11.

In 2 Peter 2:8, he gives the saints a hint on how to escape the onslaught. This hint comes from the lesson learnt from the servants of God of old like King David and Prophet Isaiah Psalm 31:10, Isaiah 21:2, 51:11. Sighing (broken and contrite heart) has never failed to bring down the mercy of God on His people whose consciences are not yet seared or reprobate.

In 2 Peter 2:10-19 NLT, he states the characteristics of the reprobates and those departing from the faith and declared how the end will look for them in 2 Pet 2:20-22.

A person that was once not deceived can later be deceived Mark 13:5, 1 Cor 10:12. If you say you have grace, has that grace helped you make up your mind to honor God, humble yourself before His word consistently and resolve to endure to the end? How do you answer?

Or have you been indoctrinated with the modern understanding of being “under grace” and “Jesus is my righteousness” that permit Christians to:

(a) Neglect keeping clear conscience
(b) Deliberately do evil now in hard circumstance and repent later
(c) Deliberately lie against people including fellow believers to appear holy and accepted
(d) Tell fabricated lies against individuals in other to protect the “church”
(e) Cheat and batter their spouse
(g) Permit men to sleep with men and even marry men
(h) Admit women into eldership to appear trendy
(i) Knowingly employ occultic packages to grow the “church”
(j) Run tactical programmes that get wives to be more loyal to church leaders than their OWN husbands
(k) Permit men who neglect their families to jump around in the name of working for God

These things are a stench to the nostril of God. God is merciful- all we need do is quickly repent and follow the gospel (narrow way) again.

Hopefully you have not joined those that think they can never fall- because they that are down need not fear fall.
Well, the day a man can never fall is the day; he most urgently needs to be lifted up!

Falling and not knowing it is a significant sign that one’s life is in danger. Using the Blood of Jesus as a magic wand to cover our continuous hatred, bitterness, craftiness, wickedness, plotting ones achievements at others expense, secret immoral life, wishing others evil future, praying in Jesus name against others, envying, partisan spirit, mockery of others and harbouring deep dissatisfaction with God is deceptive.

Professing the finished sacrifice of Christ on the cross, His resurrection and grace while disregarding it’s power to cleanse from those exceeding evils and to keep one away from them is unprofitable 2 Cor 13:5.

Jesus said, “Pray that you do not enter into temptation” How do you understand the admonition? Given temptation is inevitable in this present age whose god is a god of temptation and the fact we are clothed with mortal flesh Rom 7:23, 6:12, 1 Pet 2:11. Have you considered the statement to mean, pray that you’re not deceived- because deception is not just dangerous but extremely difficult to recover from because deceived people can hardly figure out they have been deceived.

God is not like the joker in the park! God is God- May God speak to your heart that He is God- it is impactful when man hears directly in his heart and mind that God is God.

God has desire and His desire is that His people continue in “well doing”.

The phrase “well doing”, references the will of God. So, see these passages Isaiah 3:10, Romans 2:7, Gal 6:9, 2 Thess 3:13, 1 Peter 2:15, 3:17, 4:19. Please dear friend, pause! If you did not read through those scriptures, I will plead with you to go back and patiently read them.

We will continue our meditation on “The falling away” in the next post

May the grace of God and the knowledge of Christ Jesus guide and guard you in His love and peace. Amen

Maranatha!

The Falling Away

by Pedro Anosike | Apr 9, 2011 | Eschatology

To us Christians, we can do all things through Christ who enables us. However, as offensive as it may sound to some Christians, the reverse is also true that we can do most things without God. Let us examine the truth in the above assertion.

The events of this day and age have lent credence to the above statement, that is to say, doing or achieving things without God’s enablement. This present generation is determined to prove it and is proving it. See this, Dolly the Sheep.

The unfortunate thing is that the generation that works the hardest to proving it is the one that was prophesied to usher in the anti-Christ. The anti-Christ is powerful and as predicted, will even give inanimate things life- that is the length he will go in order to convince this generation to worship him.

He will deal out not only amazing power but also, evil wisdom and knowledge. But, having accredited him, it is intriguing to know that without man none of his power or wisdom has potency. In other words, he is a created being and as such, he is a weak fellow who must use created being to enhance his plot.

As an individual Christian and as a church, there is an urgency to resist the anti-Christ and his cohorts from using you covertly or openly John 13:27, 11:9, 8:12, 11:10. The mind of the devil (image of the beast) MUST be steadfastly rejected!

But, God’s power and pure wisdom does not depend on created being- both His power and wisdom has been in display even before He created all things and man. Man benefits when he submits to the creator. His wisdom and power becomes available to us in worship and service to Him. Our minds MUST be submitted to the mind of Christ Rom 15:5 NIV, Phil 2:5, and James 3:17.

The generation that despise God and shun His grace will surely discover things to support their depravity. The evil wisdom and power of the beast will be amply available to them to direct their destruction through false teachers whose condemnation had long been predicted 2 Peter 2:3 NIV.

Over many decades and in recent times, slick and smooth talking folks have tried selling finely packaged extreme poisons e.g. short term hell (purgatory), ultimate reconciliation, homosexuality, reincarnation, dominionism etc to the Church and on the milder side, but diffused, ten percent tithing. These false teachings do greater damage to the souls of God’s people compared to the flexing of mere money.

Think of how weak the Church is because of these teachings that rob us of God’s grace and the many Christians carrying guilt and unable to pray and serve God enthusiastically, because of ten percent tithing scheme, they are hardly ever faithful to keep as required by their denominations while on the one hand teaching grace glibly.

Also, the gross lack of perseverance, chaste attitude and honesty amongst us which, is resulting in the shameful rising numbers of divorce in total disregards to God. There is no grace that accompanies false doctrine! And without grace, where will the power to persevere, purity and honesty come from!?

We need to watch out for the many more stupid discoveries within and without the church that will forcefully challenge the revealed knowledge of God’s word in the bible. Everything that will encourage and pacify man’s heart to continue in rebellion against God is being pumped into the world (man’s mind).

Good luck to man as he discovers things and grow bold to disapprove those God approved in the scriptures. Surely, discovering long buried document(s) as announced recently will help a sinful generation engulfed with harlotry to persist in her shameless unfaithfulness while shouting on top of her voice grace! Grace! More grace! Psalm 106:15 KJV, 2 Peter 2:22.

If you love Paul the Apostle for his teaching on grace, but disapprove James the Apostle secretly in your heart or openly in your doctrine and actions, then, you must hear this; you know nothing about the grace of God. Repent!

The personal question we MUST ask our self and answer it sincerely is this, “the power and wisdom you and I are gaining what, is it leading us to DO?” Is the wisdom making us change the knowledge of God to a lie and is the grace (power) making us practice licentiousness? If yes, we need to abandon empty profession of faith in Christ and seek Him with an honest heart.

If the grace of God is what God’s word says it is? And of course it is, two things cannot fail to happen where ever it is found Titus 2:12. Those two things are this, truth and goodness. And, because grace is dynamic, truth and goodness grows- are you seeing growth in grace or you are experiencing a dwindling life.

Have you challenged God before? If not, this is the time to do so. Challenge Him to prove in your own life that with His grace, you can DO all things through Christ. In order words, you can serve Him faithfully in and through all circumstances. So, in weakness (bad times), you hold to His grace worshipping and serving faithfully and in strength (good times), you stick to His grace knowing it is His grace producing the strength. Doing this, we will ALWAYS be productive at all seasons and we will always abound in His work 1 Cor 15:58.

If the anti-Christ will give evil powers for people to increase in wickedness at this close of the age 2 Tim 3:1-4, scriptures and common sense tells us that God will unleash His awesome grace in a measure we are yet to know-this grace is found in Christ Jesus our Lord. And He is unlashing it now! Rom 5:20, 2 Cor 9:8.

Reading through 2 Tim 3:1-4, and calling to mind that, since the fall of man, it’s been only God fearing people who have lived without those vices mention both in the Old and New Testament. Therefore, is only those who have once lived without those evils can be tempted to go back to them. Let the Holy Spirit speak to each one of our hearts and each man be persuaded accordingly.

How I pray we will learn to handle our suspicions as just suspicion and not treat it as a fact. Telling your suspicion about people to others as if it were a fact is a besetting sin that is gripping many professing Christians Heb 12:1.

We need to go to the throne of grace and ask to see what gracious grace He will make available to us, much more than you and I have ever known.

How I wish people who had divorced, committed suicide or gave up their Christian faith, or maybe about to do any of those, had or can just go once more before the throne of grace!

Obtaining grace is receiving the unmerited power of God that propels us to take decisions and actions that otherwise, we could never do on our own John 1:12 KJV. Wow! How beautiful is the dispensation of grace. What a time of abundance of grace! John 1:16, Heb 4:16.

Listen with the ears of your heart and you can hear the sound of the trumpet of God at a distant calling His people to alertness. If Satan the devil was to come from where men have predicted, this present call for alertness that have started since the morning of the end times up until this late noon of the end time will not be but because he will emerge from a quarter least expected, the warning is coming on strong from the Apostolic, Prophetic, Teaching, Evangelistic and Shepherding ministries to encourage those who have ears to hear, to heed to what the Spirit is saying to the church.

We will carry on this meditation on part two of this article.

May God give you more and more grace and peace as you grow in your knowledge of God and Jesus our Lord (2 Peter 1:2 NLT).

Maranatha!