The Scourge Of Racism
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Palm Sunday is certainly different though, not unusual this year as pestilence goes. The world is under siege by a new strain of microscopic viral elements that is sickening and killing human beings by the thousands across the earth. Right out of a science fiction movie scientists are scrambling to find a remedy and governments to quell panic and effect policies such as social distancing that are hoped will slow the spread of the Coronavirus or Covid-19. Meanwhile, the unsaved “where’s God in a crisis” crowd spew their blasphemy and closely related scoffing professed Christians deny He has anything do with much less to say in the midst of it. Really?
Each year for nearly 2,000 years we Christians have commemorated Palm Sunday as the one and only full on public assertion by Jesus of Nazareth to be Israel’s Messiah. He did so not with words, but the actions of fulfilling the prophet Zechariah’s prophecy of how He as the Messiah would one day enter Jerusalem--“Lowly and riding on a donkey, a colt, the foal of a donkey,” (Zechariah 9:9; Matthew 21:1-11, NKJV). Later in the same week He as the Messiah would be arrested, tried and condemned to death by crucifixion fulfilling yet other prophecies of His action to save His people from their sins. God resurrected Him on the third day after certifying His successful mission (Psalm 22)!
From just the foregoing it is clear God speaks with not just words, but actions past and present as Scripture attests (Psalm 19:1-6; Romans 1:18-23). He is speaking to all the earth right now for those that will give heed! However, as the prophet Isaiah some 700 years prior cried out, “Who has believed our report” in response to Israel and the world’s unbelief at what God accomplished in His Son, Jesus Christ, to save all from sin and eternal death (Isaiah 53, NKJV), so, today, many even among professing Christianity refuse to hear Him speaking not just in the current Coronavirus, but the many foretold latter day calamities occurring in the world (Luke 21:9-11; Revelation 6:1-7).
So, what is God saying? The Coronavirus is a major magnitude “shot across the bow” to the world that God has turned a corner on His forbearance with mankind. As the Lord led me to write in social media posts that began March 15, 2020 blowing the trumpet of warning He gave me in 1986 (Ezekiel 33:1-9; Amos 3:6-8), He foretold “such things as we are experiencing in our world today would occur and uptick in the rhythms of a pregnant woman’s birth pains as Christ’s return nears (Matthew 24:3-8).” “Gracious, merciful and ‘longsuffering,’ God has given mankind nearly two millennia to get saved by Him through the Gospel (1 Corinthians 15:1-4; 2 Peter 3:9, NKJV).”
“Time is about up!” “God has presently humbled the world with microscopic organisms, but worse is coming not because He hates and wants to destroy mankind, but to cause stubborn rebels that refuse to repent to look up and recognize Him as He to whom all must give an account as sinners (Isaiah 45:22-24)!” For He in love “commands all men everywhere to repent” to be saved from His coming set day to judge the world for sin (Acts 17:30-31, NKJV). This is why no God called preacher (Romans 10:14-15) should be refraining from preaching the Gospel or Christian witnessing Christ (Acts 1:8) during this Coronvirus outbreak or any calamity while comforting and helping the affected.1
Because of rampant disobedience to even the most basic commands and instructions of the biblical faith along with overflowing falsehood and apostasy, Christians and their churches are being spoken to by God too!2 Professed Christian pastors and teachers where guilty are called to repent from their own agenda, messaging and false teaching building followings, legacies and church empires.3 With many cancellations and churches not able to meet for services, God in remedial judgment has called a timeout and is making this a time for us to consider our practice of the biblical faith as stewards4 and what the Church is truly about under Christ as Lord; repenting as needed!
In a March 17th social media post I wrote, “Churchmen, this time of righteous social distancing required by governments is also God’s merciful advance look at what not being able to go to church looks like. Will you be instructing your household from the Bible and leading them in worship as God expects or has your exclusive dependence on the local church to do this for you made you clueless about how to do this as the Lord led me to write would be the case for many if there is no church to go to?”5 If not, you need to repent from your dereliction at home and co-dependence on the local church. Likewise I wrote, “Church leaders you know you are guilty and need to repent to whatever extent you have caused men and women to depend more on you and ‘the church’ than on the Lord!”
Moreover, “the world as we have known it is never going to be the same again after this Coronavirus episode. Will you be leading the church you serve to return to what in too many cases is sin in disobedience as it regards not teaching men to lead in their house or allowing them to do so in God’s or will you repent as you ought setting an example (1 Timothy 2:8-3:13; 1 Peter 5:1-4)?” As the Lord Jesus showed, God from the beginning of His Kingdom cause in the Gospel has been reaching and restoring men as His crucial assigned leaders (Matthew 4:17-22); a fact I write about in my book, The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics.6 There is much to repent from! The issue is will you hypocritically go into these holy days beginning today refusing His gracious chance to do so?
(There will not be a post on Resurrection Sunday. I will be taking it off to do as I do annually to celebrate the triumphant resurrection of my Lord and His grace to save a wretch like me on the same occasion in 1977--some 1,944 years later! Lord willing, my next post will be on April 19, 2020.)
1 Some falsely teach contrary to Scripture God is not behind this or any other calamity and only seek to comfort and help. See the January 3, 2016 post, The Never
Changing God and Now Is The Day Of Salvation posted December 4, 2016 both under the category, Call To Repent. Preachers, read also my January 10, 2016 post,
God’s Appointed Preacher, under the category, Instruction.
2 Take your pick of the many posts the Lord has had me to make under the category, Call To Repent, looking for reasons rooted in sin and disobedience He is calling
professed Christians and their churches to repentance!
3 Pastor, reflect deeply on the September 27, 2015 post, Empire Building On God’s Program, under the category, Call To Repent. You have no biblical mandate or ex-
cuse to build an empire; only your ego and selfish ambition drive you as those of old (1 Samuel 15:10-12; Daniel 4:28-30; Acts 20:28-30) and God has humbled you.
4 Read my recent two-part post, Torn Between Two Masters that began on March 15, 2020 under the category, Call To Repent.
5 Read the two-part post beginning January 5, 2020 Revelation’s Seven Churches In Time, under the category, Bible Prophecy. Also, the Lord led me to write a free one
sheet resource, Men Leading Family Worship At Home. It is intended to help willing Christian men step up to lead worship in their house during this Coronavirus pan-
demic and going forward as part of their regular spiritual leadership responsibility in the home in addition to leading the family out to participate in a local church when
that option is available. Get this free resource now in the Strong Man Store!
6 Get a print copy or digital download of the book at major internet booksellers such as Amazon, Barnes & Noble, ChristianBooks.com and Apple (digital only). You can
also get a print copy in the Strong Man Store.
The challenges professing Western Christianity has of maintaining any kind of relevancy and authoritative standing as “ambassadors for Christ” in the world are rooted not so much in the strength of its secular and religious messengers in opposition, but our failure to stay consistently on biblical point in Word and deed with our own message! While it is true Christians are not perfect or become so on this side of glory, we have, in spite of this, been commissioned by our Lord to represent His glorious resurrected reality, the truths and power of His Word in our lives and deeds as His ambassadors (Luke 24:44-49; John 13:34-35; Acts 2; 2 Corinthians 5:17-21, NKJV).
Alas, though, in these latter days professing Western Christianity is willfully fractured many thousands of ways with equal numbers of voices speaking outside of the Word while at the same time claiming adherence to it; confusing many within and especially without that are watching and listening as they are continually summoned to join in (1 Corinthians 1:10-13, 14:33). No less of an issue in this madness by way of example, is divorce. While some professed Christian leaders as solace attempt to tout that the divorce rate among Christians is far less than what it is among those of the world, the Lord’s standard of zero beyond the two instances He allows means He is not pleased!1
The divergent permissions guilty pastors, elders and other leaders are giving to allow divorce beyond what the Lord does is a shameful spiritual and social disaster! Some, as Rev. Pat Robertson did on his 700 Club television show in 2011, honestly seek to help folk in painful struggles. But this does not alter the truth that the Lord’s instructions are being disobeyed. This edited 2011 repost is presented not to put Rev. Robertson in a bad light, but to call us all who genuinely care in the Body of Christ to sober up and consider what we are doing even for compassion’s sake when we go against and lower God’s standards and very importantly, how the watching world really processes it.
Once again, unless we delight in being hypocrites, the Lord reminds us as Christians we have no rebuke for the world from His Word on any topic much less divorce if we ourselves are actively guilty of the same and without His allowed just cause (Romans 2:1-3). To his credit, I recently heard Rev. Robertson give counsel affirming the biblical worldview that the marriage vow is for life.
Originally Posted September 18, 2011
I have admired Rev. Pat Robertson, Founder of the Christian Broadcasting Network and host of its 700 Club for over thirty years. I have all of the empathy in the world for him in the times he has mis-spoken, interpreted or applied Scripture outside of biblical orthodoxy. The Lord knows I do not believe I know it all either, but have as my unbreakable guiding principle to stick unequivocally with the plain teaching of the Bible even when it does not seem fair or right to my sinful flesh or popular. This is where I believe my elder and brother in the faith went wrong this past week in offering his opinion on marriage to a person with Alzheimer’s as I watched the program.
Shamefully, only because the secular news outlets monitor Rev. Robertson’s 700 Club show watching for him to say something they can seize upon to hold him up to ridicule, did they pick up on his suggestion to a viewer question that divorce would be acceptable in the case of one married to a spouse suffering with Alzheimer’s because, technically, that spouse may as well be dead. My brother is wrong, of course, to give a permission the Lord does not! As I write to men in my book, The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics,2 the Lord’s design of marriage is until death as we commonly understand it as the total cessation of body life (Matthew 19:4-6; Romans 7:1-3; 1 Corinthians 7:39).
Traditional Christian marital vows are based on the Judeo-Christian teaching of the Bible that physical death is the only God ordained separation of a husband and wife. Divorce and desertion as separating factors are accounted for as accommodation to human sin, not perfect divine will (Matthew 19:7-9; 1 Corinthians 7:10-16). Dementia and other debilitating issues of the mind were present in the first century too (Matthew 4:23-24), but were not taught by the Lord Jesus or His apostles as reasons to divorce.3 Therefore, in God’s program there is no instance of technical death or anything else other than what He has permitted that gives a Christian release from his marital vows.
Sickening to me was the hypocrisy of the secular media that actually found a reason tied exclusively to emotion and sentimentality to support lifelong marriage and gloat over the mistaken preacher. It is a lesson for every aspiring strong man and great woman of God that we are to stick with God’s script, the Bible and “lean not on” our “own understanding” even attempting to be sympathetic as our dear brother was obviously seeking to do with the husband whose wife suffered with Alzheimer’s (Proverbs 3:5, NKJV). The better, biblical answer would have been to counsel the man to honor his marital vows and seek strength from the Lord to bear up under this admittedly excruciating trial (Philippians 4:13).
1 See the March 24, 2019 post, Restoring Marriage As God Designed, under the category, The Cause.
2 The book is available at all major internet booksellers, by order at your favorite brick and mortar bookstore or in the Strong Man Store.
3 I have heard most if not all of the reasons professed Christians like persons of the world want to divorce in these latter days and they differ little from those of history
in which God has witnessed it all. Yet, He does not grant divorce except as narrowly allowed in His Word because He hates it (Malachi 2:13-16)! God is not cruel,
but we even as professed Christians can be very selfish and wicked--both men and women; willing to break the marital covenant vows and denigrate marriage
originating from God to have our way. This is also what is so spiritually disgusting from the Lord’s perspective about the way many churches and Christian entities
treat almost any divorce as an unfortunate event that a doting God wills to help them overcome by remarriage, rather than as a painful tragedy of immense propor-
tions in which an offended God will help heal only the injured party in obedience to His Word; forgive with repentance the offender, but allow the natural conse-
quences to unfold on both parties involved to head them off from repeating the same errors again that led to divorce in the first place--if they will give heed. The Bi-
ble's God will never let divorce be “no consequence!”
The holy days of Passover, Good Friday and Resurrection Sunday have come and gone now, and the Coronavirus pestilence has continued to take its toll in human suffering and death across the earth as many in the medical community feared. The frantic hunt for a remedy continues also though, it has actually been available from the outset. However, the world in sinful pride and obstinacy does not want to seriously consider it. Like it or not this is due in some measure to especially professed Western Christians not being willing to implement the remedy themselves and credibly proclaim it to the world or in follow up to my April 5, 2020 post, did anybody repent as called upon by God?1
Since the Coronavirus is not His ordained end for mankind, let the scientists keep working for a cure and vaccine that God in grace and mercy may grant them to finally obtain though, this pestilence will remain with others to follow. That said, I understand why the unsaved wicked have an aversion to repentance from sin having once been among them. But I confess to continuing amazement that this is the case among professed Christians to whom at the Lord’s command since 1986, I have been blowing the trumpet of warning He gave me and sounding His call to repentance (Ezekiel 33:1-9)! Professed Christians have ostensibly only gained entry into Christ through repentance and faith.
Supposedly, the Gospel was to them as it should have been the joyous announcement that God is willing to forgive all of the past transgressions, sins and iniquities of fallen sinners that repent and believe in the atoning death, burial and resurrection of His Son, Jesus Christ. Those that did so were supposedly brought to new birth and eternal life by the Holy Spirit as He indwelt them and reconciled to God in New Covenant relationship (Acts 2:36-39; Romans 1:16-17, 3:21-26, 5:6-11, 8:1-6). Knowing salvation’s cost and our Holy Father’s eternal hostility to sin, supposedly they were regularly confessing and repenting from it to avoid breaking fellowship (Romans 6; 1 John 1:5-2:2).
Alas, though, in the likeness of my ministry predecessors I have been blowing the trumpet in futility to a professed people of God that refuse to hear! From the leaders to the people the many are open rebels against the will, way and Word of God as was ancient Judah right up to and during His judgment that sent them to Babylon in 586 B.C. Indeed, as with Judah in those days so, the wickedly bold in the churches today answer God’s call to repentance with ‘“What have I done,’” (Jeremiah 8:4-7, NKJV)? Consequently, the prophet Ezekiel was commissioned and sent to Judah labeled a “rebellious nation” and “house” as captives in Babylon (Jeremiah 10:17-18; Ezekiel 1:28-2:5, NKJV)!
I learned to read the old fashioned way using simple books with simple phrases like, “See spot run.” The accompanying picture helped me understand what I was reading. Now, God has made the commandments of His Word plain enough as written for the simplest minds and hearts to understand (2 Corinthians 1:12-14). He has also given us the Holy Spirit as our Teacher to make things even plainer (John 14:15-26, 16:12-15; 1 John 2:26-27). Thus, when Christ, for example, commands with supporting doctrine through His apostle that women are not to stand in usurpation “to teach or have authority over a man,” it is plain enough to understand as “See spot run” (1 Timothy 2:11-15, NKJV)!
But like the rebels of ancient Judah, after a century of incremental disobedience many in the churches today have fully cast off what the Word of God says about women teaching and taking authority over adult men; attempting with the world to re-define sin and sign God’s name to it in the process (Psalm 2:1-3).2 They also insist the teaching of Christ’s handpicked apostle was parochial, wrongheaded and uninspired personal thinking not proper for a more enlightened time.3 Instead, what they think, feel and believe has taken priority.4 As a result, they do not answer God’s call to repent because in their eyes and that of the god they have invented in idolatry, they have not sinned!
As He spoke to Israel’s tribes, God would know what else can He do and what He did to you that you spurn His love and great salvation (Hosea 6:4-6; Micah 6:1-5)? In His Coronavirus judgment where you cannot go to church (Isaiah 1:10-14; Amos 5:21-24), you cajole and hope speaking to God of His love and mercy. You also fast and make prolonged public prayers for the pestilence to end and revival. But the Lord does not hear you because there is no soul deep repentance or turning from sin (Isaiah 1:15, 59:1-8) like king David (Psalm 51:1-17) and when we first came to Him (Acts 19:18-19; 2 Corinthians 7:10-11).5 There will be no revival except among those individual Christians that have met with God and thoroughly repented from their sins (Isaiah 1:16-19)!6
Evidence of His reviving work is men restored in the Body of Christ as the whole of God’s Word instructs.7 Without complete soul deep repentance and Holy Spirit fired revival that comes to individual believers and sweeps widely across Western Christianity, expect more severe judgment for all the world to see as befell Jonah who also rebelled against God (Isaiah 1:20; Ezekiel 33:10-11; Jonah 1:1-16). Afterward, those restored in revival will be wholly obedient to the Lord as was Jonah after his time in “the fish’s belly,” (Jonah 1:17-2:10, NKJV). Too, the world’s resistance to repent as ancient Nineveh once did at the preaching of Jonah will be briefly, but fruitfully overcome (Jonah 3).8 The risen, living Christ continues His cry among American churches, "Who is on the Lord's side?"
1 The post is entitled, God Is Speaking, under the category, Call To Repent.
2 See the November 9, 2014 post, Re-defining Sin, under the category, Call To Repent. Not doing what the Word as it is written says is willful disobedience; hypocrisy
and self-delusion if one also claims to love the Lord (1 John 5:3).
3 This is all biblically refuted by me as the Lord leads in the second Appendix of my book, The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics. Get a print copy or digital down-
load of the book at major internet booksellers such as Amazon, Barnes & Noble, ChristianBooks.com and Apple (digital only). You can also get a print copy in the
Strong Man Store.
4 Read the May 31, 2015 post, What Does God’s Word Say?, under the category, Instruction. It culminates a month of posts in which the Lord led me to take on the ar-
guments of “I think (which includes the popular, but unbiblical construction of personal theologies and truth statements), I feel and I believe.” It does not matter what
you or I think, feel or believe about God and His Word no matter how educated. Only what God’s Word objectively and honestly interpreted and applied actually says
matters (Proverbs 3:5)! This is a point the Lord also led me to stress in posts directed to the religious educated elite within Christendom. See the October 18, 2015
post, Pursuing Credentials And Authority and the two-part, Religious Educated Elite Wiser Than God? beginning October 25, 2015 all under the category, Call To Re-
pent.
5 See the August 31, 2014 post, Soul Deep Repentance, under the category, Call To Repent.
6 Read The Sham Cry For Revival under the category, Call To Repent, posted on August 17, 2014. Spiritual revival from God is not a public event though it may take
place in such a setting. It is the aftermath of soul deep repentance in the individual hearts of believers that have totally forsaken their rebellion and turned back to God!
Guilty women, for example, would renounce their transgressions and iniquities involved in serving the worldly feminist cause; voluntarily walking away from pastorates,
leading worship and all positions where they take authority over and teach adult men in the churches and related entities. Guilty male pastors would completely re-
nounce their pride, ego and selfish ambitions that have led to phony, entertainment rooted so-called worship with lights and smoke to attract a crowd not to God, but
their churches.
7 This is in accord with the three-part post the Lord gave me that began on January 8, 2017, In God’s Revival Men Are Restored, under the category, The Cause.
8 Read the six-part post that begins July 30, 2017, Restoring Men In the Two Minute Drill, under the category, The Cause.
It is truly unfortunate, but not surprising that with all else our nation must deal with at this hour, unresolved racial issues have recently come to the surface again through the citizen and police murders of black Americans, freshly proving racism is not a past thing. The incidents and resulting explosion of initial violent rioting, looting, protest marches and rallies not just by black Americans, but Americans from every hue were sparked by the recorded video of a Minneapolis, MN police officer’s murder of black American male, George Floyd. I wrote about this incident as the Lord led June 21, 2020 in a post under the category, Black History, entitled Has Racial Justice Arrived in America?
This time, among the early voices speaking empathy and counsel into as well as engaging with the crisis are a number of especially younger conservative white Christians. Along with the manifold increase of white Americans across the political and social spectrum in general, conservative white Christians as America’s “moral majority” speaking anything but condemnation into a riotous racial crisis is recent. While there have been apologies for slavery and Jim Crow segregation and endless talking by white conservative Christians with amicable black clergy about racial reconciliation since the 1960s, as I have written in other posts, there has not been any real, widespread progress.1
Our majority white society as a once professed Christian nation propped up supposedly by morals and ethics drawn from the Bible, has far too long tolerated the abuse of its black and other citizens of color in many forms that actually run counter to it (Zechariah 7:8-12; Mark 12:28-34; Luke 10:25-37; Romans 13:8-10). Not biblical Christianity as the order of the day since the nation’s founding, but corrupt, counterfeit manmade forms of it that even allowed for slave owners to commit adultery on their wives with their female slaves; church pastors, deacons and congregants to brutalize and terrorize blacks using burning crosses as a symbol of hate among many other evil acts.2
Such deeds were done while police, judges, educators, businesses, legislators (often as active participants) along with the larger white society through silent indifference were complicit.3 Over the past hundred years the most vocal champions of maintaining the morality of the Bible among professed Christians has been white Americans that self-identify as conservative in their religious, social and political convictions. Many are also intensely patriotic, devoted Americans who ascribe to the phrase “God and Country” as their motto though, on such issues as allowing systemic racism in their churches and other entities, God’s will in Christ has clearly been secondary (John 13:34-35).
However, at this strategic moment during God’s Coronavirus judgment when the festering sore of racial injustice has ruptured once more, younger conservative white Christians are speaking up perhaps finally perceiving, God Himself keeps bringing up the matter because those professing to know Him among their ranks have not dealt with it in accord with His written Word! After all, as I have offered in other posts, a “biblically conservative Christian” is supposed to be about objectively interpreting, applying and preserving the whole Word of God as it is written! In no place does it advocate for or tolerate hating a brother in Christ for any reason (1 John 2:7-11, 3:10-15, 4:20-21).4
Besides being and presenting the world a corrupt if not outright counterfeit form of biblical Christianity, guilty conservative white Christians (to include those calling themselves “Evangelicals”) have been hypocritical by insisting “our nation” uphold their cherry-picked morals and ethics from the Bible while they undergirded its systemic racism to this hour. This reality has been among the chief reasons many former biblically conservative black American Civil Rights activists searching for righteous allies over the years have abandoned the effort among their ostensible like-minded white brothers. Instead, those that are guilty through lack of faith in and impatience with God have to their shame taken up with rebels against Him for help (Psalm 2:1-3; Isaiah 30:1-5; Philippians 3:17-21).
The guilty among de facto apostate black Americans will give an account to God, but so will conservative white professed Christians who have been more loyal to a humanly invented religious, social and political philosophy that permits such sins as racism under the guise of Christianity than to the Lord who calls all to repent! Indeed, why but for sin am I as a black Ministry leader who has remained faithful as a biblical conservative not fully embraced and supported by conservative white professed Christians? Your sinful flesh built conservative philosophy does not welcome those of any race much less inferior black males who speak biblical truth challenging the wicked status quo; one white church elder once intimating this to me by essentially saying I needed to shut up!5
Now, though, the Lord during His Coronavirus judgment is plainly showing racism is one of the issues He is calling the guilty to repentance from among professing Christianity emptied out of its buildings. The authentic younger conservative white Christians coming forth repentant and in the power of the Holy Spirit to actually take a stand with their black brothers are representative of those I spoke of in my June 21st post.6 May the Lord bless you and all others to follow in what is very likely a last chance for conservative white Christians to get on the right side of the Bible and help forestall the eruption of greater ethnic conflict awhile longer in America; conflict ongoing in many parts of the world that fulfills another of the Lord’s foretold occurrences to precede His soon coming (Matthew 24:7a).
1 See the posts, Moral Pressure Rightly Applied, May 4, 2014, Biblical Equality And Equity, July 5, 2015 and Professing Christian Racism Is Sin Too, December 11, 2016
all under the category, Call To Repent.
2 Read the two-part post beginning August 21, 2016, Christianity The Religion Of Men, under the category, Instruction followed by Christianity The Religion American
Style (which shows how even many black religionists to this hour mimic the practice of it by their former masters so pervasive is it) posted on September 4, 2016 and
the two-part post beginning September 11, 2016, American Culture’s Religion, all under the category, Call To Repent.
3 Read the August 9, 2015 post, Silent Endorsers Of Evil, under the category, Instruction. Whether Christians or not, like the white pre-Civil War Abolitionists, it has been
heartening to see current white protest marchers for racial justice carrying signs with wording like “Silent no more” and “Not silent and complicit.”
4 See footnote #9 in the two-part post, The Racial Divide, under the category, Call To Repent, that begins July 29, 2018 to see how the Lord led me to make a distinction
between “conservative” and “biblically conservative” to avoid any confusion about the Christians faithfully obeying His whole Word as it is written! Also, read the April
19, 2015 post, On The Lord’s Side, under the category, The Cause, cited in the footnote for a discussion of why all professed Christians ought to be standing with the
Lord Jesus as Bible conservatives!
5 Get my book, The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics to understand why aspiring strong men of God in the image of Jesus Christ from every hue must be willing to
stand and speak as He commands (Matthew 10:24-33)! Get a print copy or digital download of the book at major internet booksellers such as Amazon, Barnes & Noble,
ChristianBooks.com and Apple (digital only). You can also purchase a print copy in the Strong Man Store.
6 I invite those that are biblically conservative from all hues to stand with and support us at this like-minded Christian black American founded Ministry! The Ministry is cur-
rently engaged in a campaign to raise my 2020 full-time salary and is 63% there. Learn more at https://fundrazr.com/salarycampaign1. I am also seeking to raise the
funds necessary to license the music used in and Webcast our still relevant 1994 radio docu-drama, From Slavery To Victory: One Man’s Journey that presents a biblical
worldview of the black American experience from West Africa on our From Slavery To Victory Education Project Web Site, https://fromslaverytovictory.org.
Since I can remember from my youth marchers protesting injustice of some kind have loudly chanted, “No justice, no peace!” No doubt they are serious about what they chant. Also sincerely stated is what I have heard from the Lord and must declare in accord with my calling (Ezekiel 33:1-9) concerning the guilty among my fellow countrymen that are not Christians and those professing to be who obstinately refuse to repent from their iniquity driven rebellion against Him: “No repentance, no peace!” This word from the Lord is easily and powerfully verifiable in His written Word for those wanting proof God would say such a thing. Otherwise, open your eyes and look around you!
The standing judgment of God Almighty has been upon this world since the excruciating death on the cross, burial and resurrection of His Son on behalf of all sinful mankind in 33 A.D. just outside of Jerusalem, Israel as the Lord Jesus announced (John 12:27-33). But for God’s plans from eternity to punish Israel for her greatest sin of all in being the driving force behind His suffering and have the Gospel of His Son preached in every nation, the fullness of His judgment in wrath would have come upon this world long before now (Luke 19:41-44, 21:20-24, 24:46-49; Acts 2:1-40). Truly, the rebellion against God is not just from among the Gentiles, nor did it start recently (Acts 4:1-31).
Some fourteen hundred years before Christ came at first, during and since the days of Moses and the Exodus, God has had to deal with even foretold rebellion from among those He called to be His chosen people (Exodus 19:1-6; Deuteronomy 4:25-40). Now, the Lord spoke repeatedly to them through His prophets calling the guilty to repentance and carrying out increasingly severe remedial judgments among them warning there would be no peace unless they did repent (2 Chronicles 15:1-7; Isaiah 57:14-21, 59:1-8; Amos 4:6-11). Why is this so? Why doesn’t the Lord just let rebel humanity have its way, go away and leave them alone since they don’t want to do His will?
Surely, beginning in 70 A.D. Israel with the destruction of Jerusalem, the Temple, the dispersion of the people to the nations and desolation of the land, the Lord within measured restraint left them and the world to their own devices and no peace in judgment until now, as the prophets and He Himself foretold (Hosea 3, 5:8-15; Matthew 10:34-39, 24:3-8; Luke 13:34-35; Revelation 6:1-8). He restrained lawlessness until recently for the preservation of the Jews many of whom are back in the land since 1948 and sake of the spread of the Gospel.1 But seen at this hour in our nation and around the earth, His restraint is easing as the demonically instigated lawlessness of mankind upticks as a precursor to the coming of “the lawless one” again, as foretold (2 Thessalonians 2:6-8, NKJV).2
Too, is it not because the universe, the earth and man are of the creative handiwork of God? He created all to be in harmony with Him in holiness and righteousness. But man’s sin corrupted and brought the whole creation down into a state of ruin. God has never renounced ownership over His creation even as He has allowed fallen man and angels to temporarily hold sway in it until He would save willing men and restore it! This world ultimately belongs to the sovereign God who created it and retains His right of say so in it. Thus, the wicked kingdoms of fallen man and angels are about to give way to His Kingdom and Anointed King (Psalms 2:6-12, 97, 98; Revelation 11:15, 19:11-20:3)!
The foregoing is the ominous lesson of His wrath in the day of Noah’s flood and fiery destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. Though in these mortal days of man we do not typically behold Him in His awesome glory, God reigns enthroned from Heaven and judges the affairs of men in the earth (Psalms 29:10, 33:10-11; Jeremiah 50:35-40). Concerning God’s wrath upon and destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, He did not do it without prior longsuffering and even grace toward the wicked men (Genesis 13:13, 14:1-24) as well as careful consideration of the gravity of their sin and persons. Indeed, the Lord disclosed His deliberations and negotiated with Abraham about what He would do.
Having appeared with two angels as men, the Lord’s first stop on a Personal visit to earth in Human form was to His “friend,” Abraham, to deliver a word of prophetic assurance to him concerning the son He had promised him (Genesis 18:1-15; 2 Chronicles 20:7; Isaiah 41:8; James 2:23, NKJV). Then, the Lord’s attention turns to the other matter for which He was making a Personal appearance on earth in Human form and determines to disclose to Abraham (Genesis 18:16-19). Speaking to him He says, ‘“Because the outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is great, and because their sin is very grave, I will go down now and see whether they have done altogether according to the outcry that has come to Me; and if not, I will know,’” (Genesis 18:20-21, NKJV). From where was the outcry coming?
1 Read the four-part post beginning February 26, 2017, God Of Restoration And Judgment, under multiple categories starting with Bible Prophecy. In the face of calamities
natural and brought by God during this period until now, unbelievers always demand “where is God” as though He only exists to prevent these, not realizing that humanity
lives on borrowed time graciously provided by Him to repent and be saved from His far worse wrath and Hell if they will (Luke 13:1-9).
2 Besides wanting Him to produce for them a calamity free world, God’s doubters, scoffers, critics and angry haters also want Him to deliver one without the kind of grow-
ing lawlessness we now, see. Ah, but what they fail to appreciate is that they can only perceive the uptick in lawlessness because in former days it was not this bad due
to His gracious restraint of it! Now that the Holy Spirit sent to restrain lawlessness fomented by demons is stepping back out of the way to allow its rise with warning
judgments, the godless world the rebels against God clamor for is unfolding leading to the coming of a lawless global ruler. Speaking from former experience, rebels
never think through the ultimate end of their rebellion!
Besides the history of Israel as biblical precedent, the apostle Paul provides compelling New Testament instruction concerning why God would judge so harshly. Having praised the church at Corinth for remembering him and his teaching as he had presented it, the apostle could not praise them for the “instructions” he now, wrote in their failure to properly reverence “the Lord’s Supper“ when they met together for that purpose (1 Corinthians 11:1-2, 17-22, NKJV). They had ego driven divisions and factions when they met; some were selfishly eating their own food ahead of and not sharing with others leaving a hungry person while another came to the meeting drunk.
Such behavior showed not only contempt for “the church of God,” but Christ who is the holy Object of the memorial supper He instituted (1 Corinthians 11:23-26)! Paul is very clear, “whoever eats this bread or drinks this cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord.” Thus, we are to “examine” ourselves thoroughly for sin to the end of confessing and repenting from it before partaking of the Lord’s Supper. We do this to avoid eating the bread representing the Lord’s body and drinking from the cup with His blood “in an unworthy manner” and bringing judgment upon ourselves (1 Corinthians 11:27-29, NKJV).
The guilty may not, but God plainly takes the sacrifice of His Son that has saved us from our sins very seriously (Ephesians 5:1-7)! As a result, the apostle reported in his time that many were “weak,” “sick” and dead from divine judgment for their disrespect of the Lord’s body and blood while practicing sin. And we can be sure this has been the case for every guilty soul until now, because “God shows no partiality,” (Acts 10:34-35, NKJV)! “For if we would judge ourselves, we would not be judged” by the Lord who calls us to repentance and chastens to help us avert eternal condemnation “with the world” if we will (Romans 1:18-2:11; 1 Corinthians 11:30-32, NKJV).
“Lest you come together for judgment” is the spiritual reality the apostle Paul sums up his Lord’s Supper instruction with; warning the Corinthian church and every other to this hour if they would pay heed (1 Corinthians 11:33-34, NKJV). The evidence of history is that many churches have not given heed either to the apostle’s warning about proper reverence for the Lord’s Supper or his instruction from Him on the order of their assemblies. Already during and after the first century many local churches became the pride of sinful flesh and manmade religion; their leaders also driven by selfish ambitions to pursue and relishing power and control over them (3 John 9-11).
Furthermore, as foretold, these men (and wickedly now, women too) in sin have purposely drawn away especially the gullible and weak among Christ’s sheep after themselves and made membership in their local church false proof of true salvation (Acts 20:29-30; 2 Timothy 3:6-9; 2 Peter 2:12-22). Something is wrong when like a drug addict people have a need to go to church, take their favorite seat, hear their pastor preach, the music team sing their favorite song or irrespective of gifting, work in their desired humanly invented position. Something is also wrong when pastors need to be up preaching to “their people.” This is textbook co-dependency God never intended!5
As houses of ill-repute, all manner of evil, impropriety, vice, false teaching, dysfunction, torture and murder of enemies in sin to name only a few things have been practiced and tolerated while the Lord’s Supper is featured and regularly taken as their grand display of Christianity in them! Arrogant, defiant and obstinate; those that are guilty in our times reached critical mass in much of the foregoing and practicing disorder in the Lord’s house. For they not only have rejected the Lord’s order of mankind from creation to be practiced by Christian men and women He gives through Paul, but the place, use and order of spiritual gifts in their assemblies as well (1 Corinthians 11:3-16, 12:1-14:40).6
The question is not why God would judge guilty local churches so harshly by shutting them down, but why did He take so long given how widespread the wickedness among them is? Is it not again the longsuffering of our God that in grace waits as long as possible for repentance since He knows when He finally does judge, it will not be a lightweight slap on the wrist (2 Peter 3:9)? As with Israel’s past judgments, He also knows His faithful though not guilty, will nonetheless, be impacted. He waits making the way and opportune time to minimize that impact (Ezekiel 9; Luke 21:20-24). The Lord’s Coronavirus judgment came suddenly and invisibly out of nowhere first in China last fall and then, upon our shores this past January en route to spreading fatally over the inhabited earth.
In the frantic mix of government solutions to fight the spread of the plague, churches along with others that host public gatherings were required to shut down. As the Lord also led me to write previously, the upside for Christians and their local churches that will survive is the fact He has provided opportunity for soul searching and repentance as needed.7 Too, the Lord has graciously given all an advance look at the near future and reality check about just how important the local church really is in His grand scheme of things. In a moment, churches can be no more as happens to our persecuted brethren in many places. Recognizing this, should not leaders be intentional about lining up the churches they can still serve with God’s will, way and Word as it is written?
(Thoroughly grateful to God to remain employed full-time in His service, I will be taking Sunday, September 6th off as my Labor Day rest. Lord willing, my next post will appear on September 13th. Enjoy your Labor Day and if you are looking for work, seek the Lord who is merciful for help.)
5 I write about this tragic spiritually, mentally and emotionally unhealthy reality of local church life which crosses ethnic and cultural lines in a March social media post
that I repeated and added to in the April 5, 2020 post, God Is Speaking, under the category, Call To Repent. We are to absolutely ever need only Christ (Deuteron-
omy 31:6; Psalm 23; Acts 18:9-10, 23:11; 2 Timothy 4:16-18; Hebrews 4:14-16)! Also pastor, you do not own His authentic sheep, they belong to Christ who “pur-
chased” them “with His own blood.” You sir, are a shepherd under Him if He appointed you and steward that must give an account (John 10:11-16, 21:15-17; Acts 20:
28; 1 Peter 5:1-4, NKJV). Consequently, you should fear lest you through wickedness be found the cause of even one of Christ’s sheep being “scattered,” “lost” and
devoured by that spiritual wolf, Satan (Ezekiel 34:1-10; Mark 9:42-48, NKJV)!
6 Contrary to the deceit planted by Satan and slowly cultivated by professed Christians over the past century, God has not changed His order of mankind from creation
as I also maintain in my book, The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics. A print copy or digital download of the book is available at major internet booksellers such as
Amazon, Barnes & Noble, ChristianBooks.com and Apple (digital only). You can also purchase a print copy in the Strong Man Store.
7 See God Is Speaking.
While the Lord Jesus most assuredly initially speaks to the seven messengers and the corporate assemblies of Asia they lead, He concludes every message speaking to the individuals that make them up. The proof of this beyond His repeated use of the phrase “He who has an ear...” in Revelation 2-3 I have already referenced is another like it: “To him” or “He who overcomes.” The Lord unmistakably addresses Himself to any individual within the particular church He is speaking to that will give heed to His words. This is not unusual since His Church is made up of individuals that have believed on Him as “the Christ, the Son of the living God,” (Matthew 16:13-18, NKJV)!
Nevertheless, an elementary truth Christ knows, but many religionists especially fail to grasp is that not everyone assembled together in a local church is truly a born again believer in Him (John 3:1-8). There are “false brethren,” “impostors” and de facto apostates in many ostensibly “Christian” churches that even hold titles of authority (Galatians 2:1-5; 2 Timothy 3:13; Titus 1:10-16, NKJV). This is due to a number of reasons to include the lowered, unbiblical standards of membership many have tied to the practice of Christianity as a religious invention of men and the purposeful infiltration of Satan’s emissaries (2 Corinthians 11:10-15; Jude 3-4). Thus, a local church anywhere on the planet is not necessarily the Church in miniature!5
As a consequence, membership in a local church is not tantamount to membership in the Church of Jesus Christ either. So-called “opening the doors of the church” to invite non-members “to join” without ascertaining their actual spiritual status or presenting the biblical Gospel (1 Corinthians 15:1-4) with the requirement to repent and believe it is traditional in many religion bound Protestant churches desperate to fill empty pews.6 However, it is not membership with benefits as in a worldly social club affiliation that the writer of Hebrews advocates in his exhortation, “not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together,” (Hebrews 10:24-25, NKJV).7
His advocacy is for the regular gathering together of the Lord’s faithful as individuals to Him in any number and kind of settings to include jails and homes (Acts 1:12-14, 2:40-47, 12:1-12, 16:23-25; Romans 16:5). The well intended and wicked religionists that have made membership, regular attendance and participation in local, corporate brick and mortar churches alone the standard and core of the Christian experience rather than relationship with Christ and the New Testament understanding of assembling together as His Church have set the unknowing, biblically illiterate and weak among them up for spiritual disaster in these latter days. Truly, what will these folk do when they can’t “go to church” anymore as is the case for our persecuted brethren in many places?
The Lord Jesus also speaks to the individuals that make up the seven churches of Asia because His standards of Church membership and discipleship are high. This is the second part of His prophetic warning. Contrary to popular manmade Christianity, people are not just going to get into Heaven and receive immortal glory “any old how.” Repeatedly the Lord declares it is “him” or “he that overcomes.” The two churches of Asia He commends in full are composed of saints that have endured persecution driven “tribulation,” “poverty,” “prison” and testing; persevering as our Lord “Faithful and True” to the death in faithfulness (Revelation 2:8-11, 3:7-14, NKJV). These faithful saints keep His “works until the end,” (Revelation 2:26, NKJV).8
That the end for persevering faithful saints on earth includes going through “the great tribulation” is bound up in the unfolding prophetic content the apostle John is to write concerning “the things which will take place after this;” that is, prophetic reality contemporary with the seven churches of Asia, but also beyond them (Revelation 1:19, NKJV). Revelation 5:1-10 shows Christ as the “Root of David” and “the Lamb” along with “the saints” and His Church to that moment already in Heaven (NKJV). In the overview prophetic sweep of earth activity up to Christ’s Second Coming embodied in the seals of Revelation 6, the fifth seal (vs. 9-11) makes clear martyrdom in suffering among His saints on earth will be God’s permitted norm--something they are prepared for (Romans 8:31-39).
Revelation 7:9-17 indisputably shows individual saints from “all nations, tribes, peoples and tongues” “come out of the great tribulation” which along with what God does in the heavens and upon the earth, involves all manner of suffering and martyrdom in the all out war finally prosecuted against us by the Antichrist (think Hitler’s “final solution”) as other parts of Bible prophecy and Revelation corroborates (Daniel 7:15-25, 8:15-25; Matthew 24:9-22; Revelation 12:7-13:18, 14:6-13, NKJV). God will also permit the Antichrist to destroy brick and mortar church buildings as is already occurring in many places amidst all of his destructive acts; eliciting a cry from Heaven for God’s people to exit she that is “The Mother Of Harlots” and owns treasured property (Revelation 17:1-18:8, NKJV).
Nevertheless, at the end of the three and a half years of the great tribulation and before the full outpour of God’s wrath, as He promised, the Lord will suddenly appear in clouds of glory. With His thunderous shout, the commanding voice of an archangel and blast of God’s trumpet, the Lord will gather all of His saints to Himself in the sky. The dead in Christ will be raised first and take flight to Him, while the remnant of faithful saints still alive will bypass death, be translated and follow after them (Matthew 24:29-31; Mark 13:24-27; 1 Corinthians 15:50-57; 1 Thessalonians 4:13-5:11; 2 Thessalonians 1:3-12; Revelation 14:14-16, 16:15, 19:6-16)! The risen, living Christ continues His cry among American churches, "Who is on the Lord's side?"
5 It is the universal Church made up of His faithful followers that Christ builds “and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it” (Matthew 16:18, NKJV) not every
single local church calling itself Christian (2 Timothy 2:19-21).
6 When unbelievers “join” they are by default impostors, false brethren, devils and tools of Satan as are willful or de facto apostates whether they realize it or not. Is
it any wonder the inevitable historic real life carnal church drama created is making for great film and television drama in these latter days while simultaneously
bringing shame to Christ?
7 Temporal membership in a local brick and mortar church certainly does have its benefits, but they do not exceed the greater benefits of membership in the univer-
sal Church of Jesus Christ! As a result, the value of membership in a local church apart from authentic relationship with Christ and membership in His Church is
exalted well beyond its value and over sold. Moreover, churches that use joining as a test of loyalty to them especially when they are unfaithfully sinning against
Christ are hypocritical and wicked (Matthew 23:15)! Even so, a local brick and mortar church that faithfully preaches the biblical Gospel for salvation, teaches and
diligently strives to model obedience to God’s Word as it is written, equips the saints for and facilitates them in biblical ministry and mission as a priority is well
pleasing to the Lord and useful in His Kingdom causes during the time that is left to operate openly. See the July 23, 2017 post, Churchmen In The Two Minute
Drill, under the category, The Cause. Also read the timely essay, What Hath The Church Fathers To Do With Your Local Church by Stephen Presley, in the Fall
2019 edition of Southwestern News, P. 54-57, to see that even in scholarly circles there is an appreciation of the consequential increase in hostility of Western cul-
tures including our own toward Christianity and discussion of the right response among the churches.
8 Such is every aspiring strong man and great woman of God I write and instruct about from God’s Word in my book, The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics. If
you want to learn the foundational biblical expectations of Christ for His followers and be equipped to faithfully live them out to the end, get a print copy or digital
download of my book at major internet booksellers such as Amazon, Barnes & Noble, ChristianBooks.com and Apple (digital only). You can also get a print copy
of the book in the Strong Man Store. If you would like a foretaste of what is taught in the book, read my two-part 2019 post that begins August 18, Lined Up Be-
hind Jesus, under the category, Instruction.
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