25 THESES FOR CHRISTIAN CHURCH LEADERS
CHURCH IMMATURITIES:
25 Theses for Christian Church Leaders
Wherein We Must Either Laugh, Cry or Change
By Robert Winkler Burke, copyright 2005
Reno, Nevada USA
www.inthatdayteachings.com
1) Praying for Uncorrected Revival vs. Repenting of Wrong Doctrine
John the Baptist said to repent. Jesus said to repent. And their sharpest words were directed against the religious leaders of the day. But the religious leaders of today say that they, themselves, have nothing much to repent about. Instead they call for revival for an unrepentant, uncorrected Church. American preachers now find revival chiefly in Third World countries who are hearing the mega ministry spiel for the first time. But in America, faith-movement leaders are finding very little new manna. In the modern nations, who have heard the faith message for many years, revival waits. Like Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn we “got to decide, forever, betwixt two things.” The Church either must massively repent regarding wrong doctrine or pray giddily for heavenly affirmation for an uncorrected Church’s revival. The Church tells us it is righteous, blessed and needing only our money. To believe anything else is, well, to be wrong, damnably so. But perhaps we can help this Church self-enslaved to wrong doctrine escape its shackles of deception. Perhaps we can say, with irony as did Huck when he went against his religious upbringing and helped his friend Jim escape slavery, “All right, then, I’ll go to hell.”
2) Teach How to Hear God vs. Teaching Anything Else
The Church teaches many things, but it rarely teaches the disciplines to hear God’s rhema instant-now voice. If platitudes were sufficient for tomorrow’s emergency, Confucius or Lao Tzu or preacher Tom, Dick or Harry would be fine. But some of us have a sneaking suspicion that Father God Almighty just might be able to tell us individually what we really need to do better than, well, the placebo pandering, opinions or promptings of anybody else. This ability to hear God’s rhema voice, by the way, trumps rule-based activity, which is why Jesus so often seemingly violated His own Father’s laws. If the letter of the law (any law, even the law of tithing) kills, it is the Spirit of God (for example, prompting one person to give to another, rather than tithing into the ministry bucket) which gives life!
3) Escape by Rapture vs. Survive Overflowing Scourge
One thing a person can say with certainty about the rapture is that we haven’t seen anybody raptured yet. A less certain observation is that whereas rapture books have sold in the millions, no good answer is available to the question that since rapture authors believe themselves soon gone, what need have they of rapture profits? Nevertheless, rapture makes for delightful mental escape. However rapture theology fails to prepare its believers for the Lord’s fierce and overflowing scourge which the prophets of the Bible so emphatically warned about. This makes believing in fly away fallacies a rather unsafe bet.
4) Irresponsible Eternal Security vs. Free Will Responsibility
Whereas a new citizen of the United States of America renounces his former citizenship and promises to obey the laws of the land, our dear Church of Eternal Security believes we can at once become citizens of God’s kingdom, but not be truly concerned with obeying our King’s laws; since we somehow become “eternally secure.” However, if a naturalized citizen of America would follow that same advice and rob a bank, he most likely would find himself in a federal prison and unhappily “secured” for what may seem like “eternity.” Of course, the Eternally Secure Church believes God’s gift of free will responsibility magically disappears after a salvation prayer. Why, then, doesn’t the United States Immigration and Naturalization Service also cover its new citizens with such wonderful absolution? If they did, perhaps we citizens would become foreigners just for the opportunity to become new citizens of America, free from the recompense of high crime!
5) Tarry in Me Baby vs. One In Whom He May Be
“Should JEEE-ZUS tarry!” so many preachers like to say. But one might ask, how can they be so bold as to imply our Lord is late for their party? Isn’t it the reverse? Doesn’t Jesus want to manifest himself in every man, woman and child? Or is He who they believe will fix everything instantly, late with the instant fix? Yet the last page of the Bible tell us three times: “Behold, I come quickly” (to manifest Myself in all who have prepared themselves by shunning unjustness and filthiness and paying the high price to be righteous and holy.) Are we baby theologians in need of an instant-fix God who will appear independent from us to right all wrongs; or are we mature believers instructed to be prepared, ready and watch for Christ to manifest Himself in ourselves and others and rejoice in that day? So, we can choose to be either a “Tarry in me baby” or “One in whom He may be!”
6) Worshiping Worldly Profits vs. Honoring Rebuking Prophets
The five-fold ministry includes prophets, but rare is the church with a prophet operating in Biblical fullness. More common is the church with profits to grow buildings, grow staff, grow television ministry and grow sometimes huge convention meetings. If a living prophet is heralded, is it one who rebukes as did Moses? Is it is one who rebukes as did Jeremiah? Is it one who rebukes as did John, Jesus and even Paul? Or do we find prophets who prophesy rainbow stew for me and you? Sadly, we find the latter and not the former. No church serves two masters, and the master of the world is often the master of the church. And the master of the world will not be rebuked by a prophet. Perhaps this is why so few churches want correction, but so many revival; so few a prophet, so many entertainment; so few steak, so many milk.
7) Tithing Rule vs. Jesus’ Three Red-Letter Tithing Denouncements
Many ministers excitedly herald Malachi 3:10 and sing the virtues of rule-based tithing. However, few pastors just as excitedly herald the three Red-Letter-Denouncements of Rule-Based-Tithing of our Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus taught that when you hear from God, there are no rules. He and His disciples didn’t wash before eating corn, He healed on the Sabbath, He wasn’t ordained by man and He taught rule-based tithing was not necessarily pleasing to our Father! Jesus said, “Blessed are they who hear my (rhema) word and obey!” Perhaps the reason people cannot hear Jesus’ rhema word on how much to give to whomever is because so many ministers have exalted their teaching above that of God’s Son. Martin Luther said “to go against conscience is neither right nor safe.” Three times the gospel record has Jesus’ red-letter-words denouncing those who tithed and didn’t please God. Satan can indeed tempt a person to tithe wrongly. Jesus said so. But modern ministries refuse to line up with Jesus and get tithing right. They are guilty of a kind of subornation of sin, getting others to do something in a way that displeases God. Worse yet, prosperity pastors add self-service to the mix by selling the idea of “give to me to get from God.” The problem is the pyramid scheme is too small unless the givers can turn to a lower tier and say, “Give to me to get from God.” But the tier under the prosperity preacher may not have the higher tier’s self-service advantage.
8) What Would Jesus Do (WWJD) vs. Obeying Jesus’ Rhema Voice
Youth ministries have embraced the “What Would Jesus Do” doctrine and encouraged sales of jewelry, clothes, books and anything marked “WWJD.” However if WWJD where tried by any real organization it would fail. For example, what if every person in the US military acted upon the thought, “What Would President Do?” Chaos would follow! The US military must, in the end, do what our President, as Commander in Chief, says. Jesus said, “Blessed are they who hear my (rhema) word, and obey.” Granted, at first we may not hear from God well, and must settle for doing what we think He wants. The trick is to rapidly advance to hearing directly from God. Jesus is very much alive, contrary to what the WWJD doctrine implies, and He will tell us precisely what to do, if only we believe and pay the price of righteousness to hear!
9) The “About” Factor vs. Enough “About” Already, for Christ’s Sake!
Ministries which forever teach “about” Jesus and never involve themselves with manifesting Jesus (including love, healing, tongues, prophesy, gifts of the spirit, miracles, etc.) are like an F-15 flight school that forever teaches “about” the fighter jet but never expects anyone to be its pilot. Granted, an F-15 Eagle is an extremely complicated machine. Some could choose to blab “about” it for eternity. Likewise, an errant minister may blab on “about” Jesus eternally but never manifest much of His Spirit. God help the ministries trapped in such rotten and despicable doctrine. Such “about” preachers can be detected by the fact that their sermons are among the world’s most boring, and have they themselves nothing of the spirit of Chuck Yeager, or an eagle, or our Lord, or anyone you must ever be.
10) Spirits? What Spirits? vs. Understanding God’s Spirit Realm
God is a Spirit. God breathed His Spirit into us. Jesus promised the Holy Spirit would teach us all things. But most preachers avoid teaching the dynamics of God’s spirit realm. So the world turns to New Age because the Church cannot explain this age. The world turns to fortune tellers because the Church turns away prophets. Christians are full of evil spirits because the Church says it cannot happen. Television preachers are proud of their ranting spirits, their money-extracting spirits and especially their uncorrectable spirits. God created a kingdom of spirits, but the modern church hides from the knowledge of it. The Church believes it has God’s truth in the form of the word, usually only the logos and seldom the rhema. God believes His Church must have His Spirit, as evidenced by signs which the Church tends to reject. The Church must stop its hide-from-spirits-but-seek-truth game. God says you cannot have His Truth without His Spirit. The Church which settles for one, has neither.
11) Unhappy Heresy Hunters vs. Happy Hear-and-See Campers
Unhappy heresy hunters want to kill the doctrine of those who say that a strictly literal interpretation of God’s word is wrong. Jesus was crucified by unhappy heresy hunters. Jesus did not interpret scripture literally. Woe to any person similarly filled with God’s Spirit, who steps outside their literal word mind-prison, and comes under their gun sights. For unhappy heresy hunters have rejected the Holy Spirit, and are spiritually blind. And it upsets them to discover others who see spiritually and help others to also see spiritually. So heresy hunters live to kill the two witnesses of life on earth: God in man and man in God. But those who seek God’s Spirit will not be stopped, nor will their happiness.
12) Doing Dispensational Dogma vs. Making the Crooked Paths Straight
If a gay midget who was missing a leg, an ear and half his private parts was elected President of the United States, somewhere a dispensational preacher would say, “This too is in the Bible!” For about a hundred years end-times eschatologists have distorted history, blasphemed His story and encouraged histrionics regarding their know-it-all theories about the appearance of Mr. Antichrist, the mark of the beast, the avoidance of tribulation and the fly away, false salvation promise of rapture. But what can be expected from such misguided teachers who take the Bible literally? They literally interpret it like a psychological ink blot. Instead of the Holy Spirit teaching them all things, God lets them provoke themselves to the confusion of their own faces. And so, the mad dispensational teachers ignore John the Baptist’s admonition to do the hard and necessary work of tearing down mountains (of a soul’s lies), filling in the valleys (of a heart’s missing good spirits) and making the crooked paths (of a mind’s wrong doctrine) straight. But if the dispensationalists’ literal interpretation of the Bible is correct, then let us seek first a good, used bulldozer.
13) Weeping in Ramah vs. Laughing in Rehma
The truth that some Christian ministries are guilty of preaching a baby Gospel is proven by how they celebrate Jesus’ birth. The season of Christmas is often simply taught as a pageant of nativity. However, a cursory review of Luke’s telling of the story reveals that Father God arranged for eight members of Jesus’ family and friends who were extraordinarily spirit-filled, prophetically spirit-speaking, spirit-led or spirit-obedient. This spirit-led living enabled them to avoid the kill zone of infanticide. This message is lost on ministries who poorly prepare their sheep to similarly avoid modern kill zones. So, Christmases come and go without families being filled with the Holy Spirit, as this part of the story is ignored. And then for some families who subsequently experience tragedies that could have been avoided by hearing from God’s Spirit, instead of being able to laugh in rhema, they weep in Ramah. For this the Church tells them to tithe? Christmas should be merrier.
14) Beam Me Up, Scotty! vs. Give God-In-You a Chance
The word “rapture” is found in the Bible precisely as often as the phrase “Separation of Church and State” is found in the United States Constitution, Bill of Rights or Declaration of Independence. However, the American Civil Liberties Union has no problem making their anti-god agenda succeed, somehow. Likewise rapture preachers, somehow. We have been sold a pack of lies because neither America’s founding documents nor the Bible respectively bars God from America’s public arena nor promises the world a fly-away escape from tomorrow. Nevertheless, truth will prevail in these matters. And the truth of God’s end-times plan is that He really must dwell in us, or else! Stated roughly (but actually quite accurately), the saints go marching in God while the butt-heads get themselves eliminated. For God so loves the world, that in that day of judgment which now is, He will manifest Himself in us to perform His word. This is both our hope and God’s plan for tomorrow.
15) Getting Abomination of Desolation Dollar$ vs. Building Holy Abodes
The dispensational teachers’ dream is for a Third Temple to be built in Jerusalem which will some day have a Mr. Antichrist appear with a pig which he sacrifices on an altar, thereby causing all dispensational book sales to soar to astronomic levels. However, a spiritual reading of the matter reveals that we are Christ’s third temple, and we choose to be either antichrist-like or Christ-like. And in choosing to put either our own piggish selves on the throne, or Christ; we can cause either our own abomination of desolation to keep God forever banished from our soul, or we can work with repentance and truth to get and keep God dwelling in us and we in Him. God’s dream in these latter days is, well, the latter.
16) Mining for Armageddon Million$ vs. Death to Almighty Self
Ooh, ooh! Is this war or the next one the biggie of the Bible? Should we subscribe to the Jerusalem Post or support the preacher who does? When we buy a book or watch a movie on the Battle of Armageddon, should our fear of the future be small, medium or super-size? Should our attention be diverted away from dethroning self, which is the Armageddon for most every individual and family, or with imagining the mother of all wars? Saddam Hussein was wrong when he prophesied about the First Gulf War being such a mother, but why do we still support teachers who divert attention from the battle of self (which enables Christ-likeness) to some future mother of all wars (which promulgates fear.) Answer: The death-to-self Gospel doesn’t allow much self-promotion, self-exaltation or self-aggrandizement; but fear-mongering does.
17) Betting Bad News Brings Big Buck$ vs. Empowering to Overcome
EXTRA! EXTRA! Read all about it! Bad news SELLS dispensational books, tapes, conventions and television shows! What a surprise! There is bad news! Wow!!! And so go the dispensational programs under the banner of Christ. At the end of most breathless presentations of their bad news gospel, is their fear-of-the-future-without-dispensational-insight altar call. “UNHOLY BAD NEWS, Robin!” says Batman, “Where is Superman when you need him?” Comics and bad news aside, real shepherds must teach their sheep to be disciplined and hardened overcomers, who can acutely hear and obey God’s rhema voice, so that they are equal to any emergency.
18) Mining Omega Codes for Million$ vs. Who Is the Christ?
The Bible certainly contains mysterious codes. Maybe it has Adolf Hitler’s name, or Charlton Heston’s. Maybe it has your name, my name and sister Sue’s. Does any of this help us to be more like Jesus? Let us hold ministries accountable for where they put the attention of their followers. Do the shepherds fixate on factoids? Do the shepherds fixate on selling their factoids? How do these factoids help their sheep get in the right fold? Having bought and read yet another Christian book of amazing facts, real and imagined, can you hear, obey and expand God’s kingdom better than before money went from your wallet to the author’s? Is it mere knowledge, or spiritual knowledge; is it mere worshiping in truth, or worshiping in spirit and truth; is it mere logos facts or partnership with a living Holy Spirit that helps Christ in us be? Then let all taught of the Lord with eyes to see, ears to hear and hearts to obey, witness to the world who is the Christ. Let all who can, witness who is the Christ. Let all who can, see who is the Christ. Let all who can, be who is the Christ. From the east to the west, let Christ, then, return in a cloud of His sanctified vessels, at His sudden time, in His awesome power, with His conquering love and His perfectly sound mind.
19) Mining Believers for Billion$ vs. Lessons Freely Received and Given
In better times, Christian television programs had modest appeals for funds. But now programs seem to be mostly commercials. They hawk DVDs, CDs, VCR tapes, cassette tapes, books, Bibles, electronic Bibles, software, clothes, trinkets, candles, anointing oil, seminars, conventions, crusades, cruises, indulgences (oops, Martin Luther stopped that years ago, didn’t he?) and perhaps their own mothers if they could. The Gospels don’t tell us much about what was sold under Christ’s watch. However Christ did admonish his disciples who received freely to, well, give freely. To paraphrase Peter: “Silver and gold have we none, but such as we have we freely encourage you to shop on our website, or use our toll-free order line, and pay by credit card and be fulfilled by our mega-ministry warehouse center! Use VISA or MasterCard to buy my Jesus Wants You Debt Free book! Malachi 3:10, brother. Wave that check! Support me and get your one-hundred fold blessing! No, make that a thousand fold blessing with your next thousand dollar love gift! These incredible offers won’t last forever! Help me pay for my NEXT BIGGER, FASTER… (Watch this! Watch this!) EXECUTIVE JET!!! And, of course, We’ve got to buy aircraft rapture insurance! (WINK! WINK!) Call and pledge today! Sow your NEED to our GREED! (You didn’t hear that!) Act now, and sign up for our LUXURY SEA CRUISE! Attend our Jesus Wants You Skinny Seminar and then enjoy the ship’s all you can eat buffet. Or attend the Don’t Be a Gullible Christian Seminar for an additional $2,000. Or for just $10,000 more, you can attend our Means Justify the End Times Conference. To purchase this life-changing cruise all we ask is that you pay for you and your family, and ME and MINE!!! PAY-RAISE THE LORD!”
20) We Don’t Need Maturity vs. Be Ye Spiritually Mature, and Live
Current popular Church teaching discourages the very mandate God requires in this day, which is to die to self at ever increasing levels, manifest God at ever increasing levels and expand God’s kingdom at ever increasing levels. Why is this so? Because: Common Christian doctrines about the future, which typically includes the rapture, the imminent second coming as a spectacular singularity and eternal security, are delusional. Why die to self, if a “Beam-Me-Up-Scotty-God” is going to get us out of our life’s battle zones? But when a hard thing comes to the unprepared (and, by the way, unraptured) believer, that believer is unable to conquer the situation if he can’t hear and obey God’s rhema voice. Ditto for eternal security believers. Why try the rugged road of righteousness, when a simple sinner’s prayer and the belief that “Jesus did it all” is so much easier? But when a hard thing comes to the (supposed) eternal security believer who doesn’t know God’s voice, he is slaughtered by the enemy. Same goes for believers of the Imminent-Return-of-Mr.-Fix-It-All-Jesus. Why learn the disciplines to hear and obey Jesus’ rhema voice, when He “soon and very soon” will set foot on the Mount of Olives and make everything so blessedly perfect? So when most every opportunity to manifest Christ fails to happen in the unsanctified life of a baby-doctrine-taught Christian, the purposes of heaven are massively frustrated. And it is so sad. Because today’s Church clings tenaciously to its wrong doctrines, which result in multitudes dying in ignorance and failure because they learned little more from the Church than unrighteous love mush. When God’s small quiet voice prompts believers to leave off unjustness and filthiness, and acquire righteousness and holiness; likely as not that believer’s preacher on Sunday will repeat rapture, eternal security and imminent return teachings, which is today’s lazy, hazy, crazy, give-up-gospel message saying: Why try?
21) No Pride of Life Here! vs. Prospering in Circumcised Humility
To walk in God’s abundant, overflowing prosperity without fierce warfare against pride-of-life puts us in danger of becoming world-class hypocrites. Knowledge makes us prideful. Success makes us prideful. Money makes us prideful. Luxury cars make us prideful. Executive jet travel can really make us prideful. Exclusive, isolated-from-the-plebian mega-ministry living absolutely can make us prideful. But it apparently doesn’t affect any mega-ministers of this age, according to their incessant lifestyle boasting. And when confronted, they protesteth too much. The result: Mega-ministry followers don’t fight pride-of-life as they themselves prosper. Just count the jaywalking masses as they leave the next ministry conference event. Watch them walk past the downtown needy. Watch them butt in line at the airport, with no decent concern for others already in line. Pride of life puts leaders and followers above the laws of man and God every time. And it is a shame. It hadn’t ought to be happening, but it is. The cut of our covenant needs be hidden, lest we be prideful and our boasting interfere with God’s work.
22) Give One to Another vs. Give Tithes and Offerings to Ministries
The ministries of Jesus and John are summarized quite compactly in the Gospels. Jesus said His ministry boils down to loving God and loving your neighbor. Then He modeled that by giving His life and death as a demonstration of that agape love. However, the taught-of-mega-ministry sheep often focus on tithing, prosperity, rapture, end-times dispensation doctrine and anything but giving one to another. John’s ministry was summarized by the question, What should we do? John said give your extra coat to another. Then he said the second thing is as the first, but with food. The emphasis is on giving one to another. This agape love of one giving to another is God’s definition of heaven on earth. But the mega-ministers’ message of tithe-to-ministry-and-prosper-until-rapture too often absolves devotees of their agape duty to give one to another. Stated scripturally, the ministries whose top-of-mind-awareness message is “tithe-and-reap-blessings,” well… their force is not right. Though their ministry coffers are full, and though ministries themselves often give to each other’s ministries, the message the sheep learn from mega-ministers is to first give to the ministry, then all will be well, even as they as individuals walk past persons in need as they boast of their so busy life which can’t give another even a moment of time. Such sheep make hell, not heaven on earth. Until the mega-ministries emphasize giving (love, gifts, respect, honor, time) one to another trumps giving (love, gifts, respect, honor, time) to ministries, their Gospel remains tragically skewed, and God’s kingdom coming to earth tragically delayed, and those supposedly taught-of-the-Lord will remain tragically unable to manifest their Lord’s Behold-I-Come-Quickly return. This is the latter day abomination of desolation: God unable to indwell in abodes of wrong doctrine and deceived spirits.
23) Madness, Lunacy and Mojo vs. Feeding Sheep
Television Christian ministers sometimes present inane, bellicose banalities pretending to be profundities of the highest order You’re NOT getting it, they say. Other ministers sometimes give manic, emotional diatribes spewed out with machine-gun furor, along with endless scripture quotes of bounce-back-and-forth-scripture-chasing confusion and misdirection of thought. Other ministers employ a staccato of claptrap clichés, background musical crescendos and witchcraft-controlling rapid fire directives: Turn to your neighbor, say this, do that, turn to a Bible verse, turn to another, go back to the first, consider this verse but don’t turn to it, rub your belly, pat your head, finish my sentence, Simon says don’t think! This allows the Lords of Lunacy to hypnotize their sheep to say B-A-A-A-A-A, and A-A-A-A-A-MEN and T-I-I-I-I-I-I-THE and do everything disconnected from God’s Spirit to convince themselves of their happiness without ever truly being fed Christ or being ever able to manifest Him. The sheep are not being fed Christ, they don’t act Christ-like but they do continue to have a craven desire to get “filled” again at the next expensive show. Deca-millionaire ministers regularly extract from followers, some in poverty, to give their ministry ten percent of their income and buy their next “life-changing” book or other must-have-to-be-in-God products, conventions or cruises! It is beyond scandalous. Christ-fed sheep are wise, not suckers; quickened, not dead-looking; independent, not grotesquely obsequious. Sheep that are fed Christ are healthy. Sheep that are fed ego and deception look like some of the misshapen, beguiled troops who now attend ministry meetings. Such conference shepherds teach how to be obnoxious to the Lord and useless to man. This is the fruit of some modern ministries: Abodes of prideful desolation teaching more abodes to be proudly desolate, unable to please or manifest Christ, but nonetheless manically thrilled with ministry witchcraft mojo deception. Turn to somebody and say He’s in the house. This is Revelation’s last page warning against whosoever loveth and maketh a lie.
24) Manifesting Our Devilishly-Deceived Selves vs. Manifesting Christ
Amazingly, the bottom line message of the Bible has been lost in centuries of clutter. Christ’s message is that He must come and manifested Himself in us now. With the Holy Spirit He can indwell in us, if – and it is a big if – we have our heads screwed on straight, meaning we have Father God’s doctrine (i.e. hard truth) and its discipline, which disallows every form of pride, vanity and self-exaltation; despite what television preachers blithely witness to the contrary. All would be fine except the horrific fact that conventional Christian religion is seemingly opposed to that singular good thing from ever happening in its body. Many of conventional Christianity’s habits, traditions, beliefs and doctrines are perversely opposed in everlasting enmity to the ultimate realization of Christ actually indwelling in us. All of the Bible’s transcendent truths, of Christ transitioning Himself into our selves, as seen in John’s chapters 14 through 17, or Isaiah’s call-outs to this high way, or the Bible’s first page command to have dominion over the spirit realm, or the Bible’s last page’s triple iteration that Jesus comes quickly have been lost to truth. It is well understood that Christ was filled with the Holy Spirit without limit, but the Church has taught to receive Christ without His Spirit. Even those who opt to receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit, often stay content at an extremely miniscule portion of spirit-led life. Out of this hellish stupor believers in Christ must rise up and demand to receive full baptism of the Holy Spirit and full baptism of the fire of sin-revealing and sin-overcoming tribulation until we in humility and obedience hear, obey and manifest Christ at levels all creation groans in anticipation to see the revealing thereof. In other words, we must be in whom comes quickly our God. When we read Behold, I come quickly, we must agree with Jesus that in our lives, yes, He certainly came and was, He certainly comes and is and He certainly will come and be. Who we are must be who Christ is. Who Christ is must be who we are. He is the great I am. And He calls to us and says: Now, with Me be. Behold, I come. Are you ready? Behold, I come: I in you, you in Me. Behold, then, the Body of Christ rise and shine!
25) Unrighteous Capitulation vs. the Sword of Truth and Spirit
Country western singer Waylon Jennings wrote, “Lord, it’s the same old tune, fiddle and guitar. Where do we take it from here?...It’s been the same way for years. We need a change.” Many television preachers teach rule-based tithing, rapture, eternal security, dispensational dogma, the imminent return of Just-Fix-Everything-Instantly-Jesus (their own miscreant selves excluded, of course!) and that the only prophet is an entertaining one. Such prophets could not get even a dog that wet the carpet to show remorse. Yet the Church itself is neither housebroken nor repentant enough for God to indwell at sufficient levels. In truth, there is no rapture, no eternal security and Jesus comes quickly in the prepared-for-Him-inside now. Giving must be rhema-based not percentage rule-based. The Church’s end-times dispensational doctrine is a colossally wrong misdirection and poorly prepares the Church, much less the world, for tomorrow’s troubles. Tribulations come with opportunity to be sanctified because hard circumstances penetrate a soul’s stupor. Only when the Church teaches the disciplines required to worship God in spirit and truth and then hear and obey Christ’s rhema voice will the Church be equal to tomorrow’s emergencies, opportunities and potential revivals. Truly, the Church has missed it by a mile. Ministries will have to massively repent of wickedly hanging on to wrong doctrines, which make them unable to manifest Christ themselves, and for their brazen audacity in hawking their worldly antichrist opinions like voracious whores. Why should God’s people buy Satan’s doctrines from the Church? Church leaders, wash the inside of the cup. Church leaders, die to self. Church leaders, stop extracting dollars unrighteously. Church leaders, stop flailing at the world with a scabbard of puerile doctrines, and pick up Christ’s two-edged sword of spirit and truth. And use that sword against your wrong beliefs and your wrong spirits. And then publicly repent of your misdeeds of proclaiming truth that was not truth and being of a spirit that was not of God. The world will see you become more and more as God’s very truth and even as God’s very spirit. And then, verily verily the Lord God Almighty says unto you, you will see true revival.
Amen, Amen and Amen.
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