Fade to Black ~ Part 5

Evolution is just another form of intellectually masked, pagan worship, and it exist only to deny the one, true, Creator of all, God the father.  Pagan worship has evolved over thousands of years in to a more modern sophisticated form of teaching.  Whether it is a NASA scientist or a Harvard Evolutionary professor, the religion they preach is what pays their bills.  They will never leave it, and will defend it harshly, and quite thoroughly.  

Back to our original point in all this, it is why Geocentricty is the world view of the solar system.  It perpetuates the educational conundrums of our day.  Look at the state of our nation since the inception of Higher learning. Sixty plus years without prayer or God,  now we follow other nations instead of lead.

Clarence Larkin - “For a long time it was supposed that the Sun of our solar system was  stationary, and that the planets and comets circled around it.  But now we know that it is NOT stationary, but it (the sun) is circling, with all the members of our Solar system around some central point in the universe”

“He left not himself without witness”

It is understood that the predominant view is geocentricty, however I believe in heliocentricity, because it seems to be the position the bible takes. The following verses emphatically indicate that the Sun is indeed moving as stars do, and the Earth is a footstool, immovable, and fixed in it’s location.  

Traditions to Hold Fast

God gave the gospel that “we believe” to Paul.  Prior to Paul, it was a mystery.  The disciples didn’t get it either.  Peter certainly didn’t get it.  God had to go to a lost man, a religious man, a pharisee, a traditionalist, a zealot, and reveal himself to this religious  sign-seeking Jew, through a sign and wonder, a Jew, and convert him, by belief and faith alone in the risen messiah.

Any character you want to pick in the entire word of God, no other had such a unique  revelation or knowledge of this mystery.  It is for this risen alone, that our gospel messages, and preaching align with Paul’s sound doctrine on the matter.  If we therefore preach anything contrary to this mystery, the gospel of the grace of God, we will be found wanting, reproachable, blameable, and an offence to him, and the world. 

If you men dabble in the law, you are left wanting, you play in the prophets; If you are following the spirit of the prophets you are in open rebellion of God’s word, and the wholesome words of the Lord; If you flirt with the message of John the Baptist, you are following the spirit of error;  If you try to mesh the gospels and Paul’s distinct gospel of grace, you are carried about by another wind of doctrine; If you mistakenly assert some “repentant of all your sins” mentality into a gospel, you are preaching another gospel and are led away by the error of the wicked!

The Intended Effects of the Fruits of the Spirit

What is the purpose of passing out a tract?  What is the purpose of witnessing or testifying for Christ?  Why do preachers preach?  Why do believers tell others of their salvation?  

I hear preachers commonly say “Contend with them!” referencing sinners for salvation.  Contend with the unbelievers int he streets, they say! Contending was never a reference to any saved person dealing with the lost!   

Jude 1:3 Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints. 

Ephesians 2:12 That at that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world:

Titus 1:4 To Titus, mine own son after the common faith: Grace, mercy, and peace, from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ our Saviour.

This is a striking verse.  The term, “the faith” is only found in the New Testament beginning in Acts 3. “The faith” was no longer being preached.  It was delivered to “the saints” which is a OT and NT reference.  God’s collective bodies, the saints and the body  of Christ, are all considered saints now.

Jude said the “common salvation”.  “The faith was reference many times to mean the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ.  The faith IN Christ! To contend for the faith is to contend for the common salvation!  

Men were making it uncommon.  Men were apostatizing already.  Men were getting into unorthodoxy. Men were making things religious.  Preaching other gospels (Galatians 1)  Men were going back in to the Temple, men were keeping the law and the oblations.  Men were rejecting any gospel of grace.  Men were keeping to the old paths so to speak.  To do this was rejecting Jesus Christ.  To hold to the Law was to reject his payment for sins!  It was denying the Lord that bought them!

The “Abominable” Sodomite versus the “Froward” Preacher

We don’t believe this as a whole in the Bible believing society, or the Fundamental society for that matter, but a person can be saved, and never see much growth.  Their works will most likely go the reprobate route.  Disobedient and abominable.  A sinner can get saved and still do any wicked imagination of the heart.  This foundation must be understood, or you might as well not continue reading.

A saved, washed in the blood sinner, has a standing with God and a state in this world, and they are two different positions.

Does salvation bring good works?  No!  Salvation brings a new man.  There is MUCH scriptural support for this.  Salvation does not spiritually cut away our sins from our flesh.  We are still in our sins until our death or resurrection.   After salvation, yielding to God’s word and his spirit is what gives good works?  If a man or woman does not submit themselves to the spirit and the book,  they will never grow in grace.  

If sinners after salvation do not grow, it usually consist of lack of discipleship, lack of seeking God’s truth in the book, and other Christians making the mark of service so far attainable to the new Christian’s tender mind.  Some sinners don’t give up certain sins for years.  Some do.  Much like Jesus showed us in the parable of the sower.  As us Fundamentalist are wholeheartedly focused on fruit bearing, why do we not remember such a illustration from our Lord on seed bearing.

Matthew 13:18-23~Hear ye therefore the parable of the sower. 

19 When any one heareth the word of the kingdom, and understandeth it not, then cometh the wicked one, and catcheth away that which was sown in his heart. This is he which received seed by the way side.  

20 But he that received the seed into stony places, the same is he that heareth the word, and anon with joy receiveth it;  

21 Yet hath he not root in himself, but dureth for a while: for when tribulation or persecution ariseth because of the word, by and by he is offended.  

22 He also that received seed among the thorns is he that heareth the word; and the care of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches, choke the word, and he becometh unfruitful. 

23 But he that received seed into the good ground is he that heareth the word, and understandeth it; which also beareth fruit, and bringeth forth, some an hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty. 

The "Old Paths" for New Testament Christians?

"Ask for the old paths!"  Stop it already!!!  I realize I'm stepping on toes here, but I have thought about this for years.  Let me come right out of the gate and just say, the "old paths", whatever they are, whatever you may define them to be, whatever men in history  you may associate with it, they are not for us.  Why do men yell about the old paths so much? Men talk of the old paths, the same way men harp on the old time religion, and the ol' timers.  Some talk about how it used to be 100 years ago, as if they have some real inkling other then grand stories and romanticized nonsense.  Some focus the idea more on scriptural implications.  This ideology is so big in the Fundamentalist, hardcore, militant Independent Baptist ranks today. The glorious Old paths!  Old paths ministries, Old Paths Baptist church,  "We walk the old paths here!"  What does it all mean?

Jeremiah 6:16 says Thus saith the LORD, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where [is] the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls. But they said, We will not walk [therein].  This is the only time it shows up in the Bible.  It's amazing how men will focus so much on what God focused so little on isn't it. "We should ask for the old paths... " is inevitably followed by what the preacher says he thinks the "old paths" are!  And it usually has the ring of all the things the preacher stands for.  And if it is a pastoral authority control freak preacher, you already have a monster on your hands.

I used to prescribe to this notion myself when i was a Fundamentalist successionist.  The old paths!  It was a neat idea.  Many preachers love that Jeremiah 6:16 is in the Bible.  It is a good springboard for rabbit trails and hobby horses.  People?  Why are we messing around in law and prophets so much?  Why are we wanting to allude to some mystical old paths, some mystical realm that only exist in the preachers minds.  Whether you preachers keep trying to get your young preacher boys to be like Hudson Taylor, George Whitfield, Sam Jones, or Lester Roloff, or you are using the prophets as good examples of public ministry, you guys need to understand what age you are in TODAY!  You are using his word too loosely.  You are no longer teaching our young men to be individuals with a book.  But you  are pushing them to follow traditions of men, claim the same callings of men, follow the same commissions of men and to practice preaching styles that are not fitted for NT men.

Fade to Black ~ Part 4

IF the Evolutionist, or Atheist, or NASA astronomer, or astrophysicists, or pagan is RIGHT, and IF I am wrong, then when I die, I exist as one with the universe, or reincarnate, or get stuck on a tropical island in the south Pacific, or maybe just nothing at all, total blackness.  Big deal!  Sounds interesting, bring it on!  

Maybe I will start over as a spongy amoeba, or strand of DNA, in some enveloping, ever expanding universe, within other universes, within other galaxies! Lets roll the dice baby! Maybe I will be a monkey on another planet, and start the whole evolutionary process over again. Maybe I will be a star, that can move anywhere I want.  Maybe I will be a speck of galactic dust.  Maybe I will be an evolving ring on another planet, maybe there will be a great light, a big explosion. Maybe another Big Bang. Maybe I will enter a Stargate, trance-like  journey! Maybe I will start a life a new on a new Earth, maybe it will simply be the end.  The God Denier has all kinds of mumbo jumbo speculation too. Maybe it all will just fade to black, and there will be nothingness!

Now, since you love hypothesizing, and listening to new theories on life, and existence, listen the other argument, that IF the believer is right, there is two, ultimate, totally distinct, totally separate, totally final, eternal resting places.  That is, our celestial bodies, based upon the doctrines of the Bible will either be simply with God in Heaven, or with a literal figure, who is sometimes in fact called, “the devil”, in a place called in scriptures “a lake of fire”. Hell will not be in the new earth!  Hell in scriptures is a place of torments and flames and burnings within the present Earth. 

To hot for even technology we possess, elements we have found , and knowledge to explore the heat in the depths of the Earths core.  Remember, it’s HIS Earth! Everything in it since Adam has been cursed, but it serves a purpose.  Think about all the thousands of dormant underground volcanoes, those are there to serve a future purpose!

"Hyper-Deputationalism"

I coined a word!  I think? You know those bad words or terms in Baptist societies and churches that are thrown around to label people; such words like, "Hyper-dispensationlaist" or "Double Inspired" and many more.  What these terms and phrases mean are really a matter of perspective, due to so many people defining them differently. Let it be stated as well, that such words are used as divisive and incendiary comments! Therefore, I have created Hyper-Deputationalism.

But c'mon, joking aside, lets not beat around the bush, for every 10 decent, honest, true, laboring missionaries you know that are on the foreign field doing their "service" to the Lord, there is 50 that never made it to their intended fields.  For every 10 ten that answered "the call", there are 50 that also answered, but could never reach their place of burden, or calling.  There are many reasons for this.  The economy would be one. Lack of support from Christians. Family hardships would be another.  Financial strains of selling houses and quitting jobs, etc.  But what about the processes and turmoil of gaining ones support that many call "Deputation", why does it seem to work for some, but not for others?

Deputation defined is simply "the act of appointing a person or body of people to represent or act on behalf of others." Money, is not involved in the definition, nor the gaining of funds for the representation of anything.  What you find among a lot of Christians, is many of our divisions are because of our definition of terms and phrases.