I am again compelled by the Spirit of the Lord to bring at this point to the foreground those ministers of the Lord, who may be preaching “another Gospel” than that preached and recorded in the New Testament by Apostle Paul. They may preach it honestly, ignorantly, unconsciously, yet, if they do, they are under an “indirect” curse. (Gal. 1:8,9) How can that be? Their natural, uncrucified soul cannot receive the Word inspired by the Spirit. (1Cor. 2:14) Hence, they select the points and passages of the Word which suit their own doctrines, understanding and convictions leaving many spiritually important matters undeclared, unexplained, untaught. They rely on their own feelings, knowledge and wisdom and many times handle the Word of God with their intellect and emotions for their own goals and purposes!
In this way, it is quite possible even easy to preach the Gospel originally breathed by the Spirit with a different meaning, with the truth as understood by man and thus turn it into “another Gospel”. If then such ministers are shown the light from the Lord and they still ignore it, or if they purposely use the Word of God to suit their purposes, then their curse is established and the Lord will not be with them any longer.
That is the same reason why brother Watchman Nee wrote in his book “The Messenger of the Cross[1]” (p. 135) this sentence: “If instead of sensing our utter weakness and leaning entirely on the power of the Lord, we try to edify saints on the strength of our knowledge of the Bible and our excellent speech, in God’s eyes we will be SINNING WHILE PREACHING!”
A very peculiar curse is found at the end of Paul’s first letter to the Church in Corinth. It is closely related to the MOST IMPORTANT ISSUE discussed in this book. The Word of God says:
“If ANY MAN LOVE NOT the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be ANATHEMA MARANATHA”, (1Cor. 16:22) which means: “LET HIM BE CURSED AT THE LORD’S COMING”.
Let us SEE and understand here two basic facts:
1) ANY MAN means ANY MAN and may include any believer, any evangelist, any preacher, any pastor, any elder, any teacher, any “pew sitter”, any organist or musician or secretary or helper or any one in the entire Church of Jesus Christ, who does not TRULY love the Lord Jesus Christ! Paul writes to the Church, not to pagans though pagans are, of course, definitely included in ANY MAN.
From this we may SEE that the believers which do not TRULY love the Lord Jesus Christ are in a sense GROUPED TOGETHER WITH PAGANS… THOUGH THEY ARE NOT PAGANS. The reason is that their souls are principally the same – they are not governed and living by the Spirit of God! They are the same natural sinful souls which they were born with and no measurable spiritual change occurred in them. And that is the principal reason why such believers CANNOT TRULY love the Lord Jesus Christ; they first love themselves with their selfish love. And then they may love their spouses and family more than the Lord. (Mt. 10:37) They may think or believe or declare that they love the Lord, but it is their soulish persuasion not a spiritual fact and the Lord knows it (this was discussed before).
2) Why is such a man cursed? Is it really sin not to love the Lord Jesus Christ? Is it not enough to believe in the Lord, be born-again and baptized and blessed and not cursed? It may be enough at the time of our spiritual childhood and the basic development of our consciousness. But when our time comes to begin to mature, to fulfill the Commandments of Our God for the destruction of the sinful nature in our souls and to love Him with all our heart and all our mind and all our soul and all our strength, and we refuse, oppose, resist or ignore His Will-Desire, ignore these Commandments of God, we are inviting upon ourselves a curse from God as opposed to His blessing! We are thereby disabling ourselves from fulfilling the first and the second Great Commandments of God in Mt. 22:38,39. No natural, carnal soul can ever hope to fulfill these two Commandments or any other Commandments in the New Testament as they can only be fulfilled by our spiritual New Man. But when we oppose the Will of Our Father and refuse to do His Commandments, we are sowing to our flesh and we shall reap corruption because the Word of God cannot be modified for our sake and convenience! (Gal. 6:8a). Also, we will not be allowed to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven, but will be called “workers of iniquity” and will have to depart from the Lord! (Mt. 7:21-23// Lk. 13:25-30)
Considering the above two facts, we should be able to SEE, that the circumstances and conditions leading to a curse are very real, serious and not to be taken lightly by any one, who calls himself/herself a born-again believer. The shortest and clearest fact is that EVERY NATURAL MAN IS SINFUL AND, THEREFORE, CURSED.
We may conclude before the Lord that His Word in 1Cor. 16:22 is closely tied with His Word in 1Cor. 13:1-8, which is closely tied with Eph. 4:22-24, which is, again, closely tied with many other passages of the Word of God. These passages have been already mentioned and discussed in this book and they closely relate to the above aspect of LOVE OR CURSE. True love only comes from our “New Man”. Our old, natural man CANNOT TRULY LOVE the Lord Jesus Christ because he is selfish in his nature and thus loves himself intensely, and that, openly or more often than not, secretly. Therefore, any man living in his “old man” is accursed and is an abomination to God whether he is a pagan or a believer.
THIS IS THE TRAGEDY of too many believers, who may not even be aware that they may be living under a curse; that they may be committing iniquity and wickedness and that whatever their hand touches may be cursed and not blessed. EARTHLY PROSPERITY OF BELIEVERS OR THEIR MINISTRIES DOES NOT NECESSARILY MEAN AN ABSENCE OF A SPIRITUAL CURSE! THERE ARE MANY PAGANS WITH THEIR MANY INSTITUTIONS WHICH ARE RICH AND LIVE IN PROSPERITY AND ARE CURSED AND DAMNED ALREADY!
If believers are truly ignorant of this fact in their life, if they keep sinning and committing iniquity in their life, if they remain wicked in the eyes of God and are not aware of it, then the Lord will require their blood from those that were called to watch over them, to care for them and warn them and who did not care for them and did not warn them. (Ez. 3:17-21) This principle from the Old Testament is very much applicable in the New Testament as well. The Lord had sovereignly chosen various “watchmen” over His people. They all are called to watch over them, care for them, teach them and feed them spiritually. If they fail their calling and responsibility before the Lord, the above Word of God to Ezekiel applies to them just the same.
Many times this TRAGEDY applies not only to the “ordinary” believers, but also to their “watchmen”, pastors, preachers, teachers, elders, who fail their calling in this area. They may be very diligent in studying the Bible, knowledgeable, zealous, honest, sincere and productive, producing “tons” of sermons, leaflets, pamphlets, books, tapes, DVDs, etc. Yet, they may have no spiritual discernment and thus are not discerning the true spiritual state of their own person as well as of their “sheep”. Many of them might be spiritually wicked, departing from their righteousness, committing iniquities; they may be proud, loving themselves and their own ways, doing their own will and desires and thus living their “Christian life” under a curse from God. This is a great TRAGEDY of too many believers, who keep refusing to take up their cross and be separated from sin and evil; they thus deprive themselves of immense blessings from God both now and also in their future.
Let us consider at this point a few more spiritual facts about the CROSS, FREE WILLand PREDESTINATION.
Satan does not hate the cross as such; he will give you many “crosses”, if you wish. He hates what is done on the true cross. This is the place where he loses his ground in us, his opportunities in us, his chances and his “last hopes”. Until Christ was crucified, Satan had great hopes to realize his old dreams and desires to usurp His Glory and Lordship. He lost them all in himself only after Christ was crucified and resurrected. When Christ destroyed death, Satan knew he lost his war and all his power. All power was given to the resurrected Christ. (Mt. 28:18) It is the same with us. Satan keeps his hopes to get us back until we are crucified on our cross and resurrected. His hopes are not an unrealistic illusion; they are founded in the spiritual realities described in the Word of God. Satan knows the Scriptures much better than all the theologians of this world put together. He personally knows the Author of the Scriptures – God Himself. He knows the facts and principles with which man was created. He has no foreknowledge as God has, but he has his successes with vast multitudes of men, who are his followers by their own free will whether they are aware of all the ramifications of their decisions or not.
All the millions of pagans around the world which march to an eternal damnation and suffering in the lake of fire (Rev. 20:14,15) constitute a great “victory” for Satan. Had we not used our faith and confessed the Son of God with our mouth, we would have belonged to them without being fully aware of our eternal condemnation. He also managed to deceive, in one way or another, the whole Israel and the whole Church of Jesus Christ! NO BELIEVER IS ABLE TO SAY: “I AM NOT DECEIVED IN ANY WAY.” And if any believer says so and believes so, he is a FOOL knowing nothing about Satan and his ways and deceptions, and knowing precious little about God and His Ways and Truth.
Let us realize not only in our mind, but also in our heart and conscience the character and deviousness of DECEPTION, which in its very basic character is a purposeful leading from truth to error. Such an error may be either insignificant causing little damage or colossal causing great tragedies. In our physical life we also do many errors and we have to bear their consequences whether they are minimal or very painful and costly; ultimately they may cost us our physical life. Spiritual errors are no exception. The ultimate price we may have to pay for our errors is our very eternal life! Only the Lord knows how many painful or costly consequences we have to bear due to our manifold spiritual errors which are chiefly due to our pride, selfishness, stubbornness, foolishness and darkness.
MAN HAS NO WAY TO DISCOVER AND DELIVER HIMSELF FROM ANY DECEPTION THAT HE IS DECEIVED WITH! IT TAKES GOD TO SHOW IT TO HIM (DIRECTLY OR THROUGH OTHERS) AND DELIVER HIM FROM IT. THE WHOLE REDEMPTION AND SALVATION OF MAN IS THE PROCESS OF DELIVERING MAN FROM THE LIES OF THE DEVIL TO THE TRUTH OF GOD.
The Fall of Adam and Eve started with a lie; hence, our Salvation must start (and continue) with Truth.
Never in the history of the Church were deceptions so subtle, deep, persistent and so abundant reaching even to all levels of leadership of the Church, as they are today. And never before had God such “problems” with believers as now seeing that their hearts are not truly sincere, honest, contrite or open to Him to receive, believe and be delivered. It is primarily the soulish, religious believers which are the victims of the deepest and most dangerous deceptions. PRIDE ATTRACTS DECEPTIONS. Believers are first deceived by their own religious life, zeal, interest and willingness to immerse themselves into religious activities and projects of every kind and shape “working for the Lord”. It appears that there is no way to show these believers their deceptions and bring them out of them in some rational, reasonable way of sharing with them the light that the Lord had given for them. They keep walking in their delusions being unaware of anything and refusing any corrections, any advices, anything that is coming straight from the Lord and from His Word. If this is not a true TRAGEDY IN THE CHURCH then I don’t know what is.
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To be continued next week in chapter 7 – part 3
brother Hanola
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