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Robert Kelley's weekly instruction, observations and reflections inspired by the Lord posted each Sunday night.


The Spiritual Gift Of Faith
On April 27, 2014 in The Faith by Robert Kelley Robert Kelley

            “But whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to sin, it would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck, and he were drowned in the depth of the sea,” (Matthew 18:6, NKJV, emphasis mine). In the event some arrogant person thought I was only giving an opinion in the warning of my last blog that God will hold “whoever” accountable for hurting any soul that has believed on Christ with a heretical doctrine, Matthew 18:6 (with 7) is among many in Scripture to give similar warning. Do you not fear God? The churches are not commanded to destroy heretics, but God surely will! Therefore, no so-called “theologian,” pastor or teacher has any authorization from Christ to invent and disseminate any other doctrines but His!

 
             Just because the Lord has not swooped down and cleaned out all of the offending churches and institutions of Christianity the religion of men as He did the first century money changers at Jerusalem’s temple (John 2:13-17), does not mean He is postured in the same academic niceties of worldly tolerance and is pleased with all of the compromised and heretical doctrines they teach.  I laugh at the irony with great sadness when I think about how diligent pastors are ostensibly seeking to be in protecting their sheep by keeping me out of their pulpits to preach the uncompromised Word the Chief Shepherd has commanded; the Chief Shepherd who is going to deal with them in accord with their arrogant corruptions of that same Word (1 Corinthians 3:5-17; 1 Timothy 5:24-25).
 
            In their quest to portray their theological system as plausibly biblical, like all other heretical teachers from history many of today’s Calvinists are disingenuous in not telling their hearers that they are processing the Bible through their system. They stand and read a Bible verse and acknowledge how if the passage were interpreted as it is plainly written, it would be understood. But immediately they either change the plain sense of the text or misapply it to conform to and support their theological system. The gift of faith is one example. There is such a gift in the Bible, but it is not tied to men receiving it from God to be saved as Calvinists contend--some of whom even deny God still equips the saints with spiritual gifts. Learn more about this in my final blog repost of the month.
 

Originally Posted August 12, 2012

 
             In a two-part blog entitled, The Faith That Saves back in June this year (see the category, “The Faith”), the Lord led me to write contending for Christians to faithfully keep to His biblically recorded instruction on the exclusive place of common faith in saving human beings. Now, in this offering today, I am led to briefly discuss the place for faith as a spiritual gift in God’s dealings with His people. Such times have only occurred in biblical history when the Lord called mortal men through whom to display His mighty power and to trust Him in extremely difficult situations. Immediately Old Testament figures such as Moses, Joshua, Samson, David, Elijah and Elisha come to mind. As impossible as the miracles done through and for them was their amazing faith in God!
 
            Every miracle of our Lord Jesus before His death, burial and resurrection was done out of His mortal Humanity by the Holy Spirit as an example of faith (trust, confidence, reliance) in God to us (Matthew 3:13-17; Luke 4; John 14:12-18; Philippians 2:5-8). Indeed, this is where the famous instruction to His disciples concerning “faith as a mustard seed” gets its traction in reality--He was operating in such faith (Matthew 17:19-20)! To our Lord Jesus this faith was very small; for us--even with the outstanding accomplishments of men using common faith, trusting God for in the moment impossible, supernatural miracles and deliverances are beyond our normal pedigree as fallen, mortal men.  Nevertheless, it was (and still is) the will of God that redeemed mortals; aspiring strong men of God in the image of Christ be vessels of His power following the Master’s example (John 20:19-23; Acts 1:4-8)!
 
            The coming of the Holy Spirit and spiritual gifts made it strategically possible for redeemed men in this New Testament era to exercise the power of God in various ways proportionate to their developing common faith (Romans 12:3-8; 1 Corinthians 12:11). In accord with His will, the spiritual gift of faith is selectively given to some aspiring strong men of God in the image of Christ to enable them to believe Him for impossible works of power in miracles and healings outside of and in the local churches (1 Corinthians 12:9-10, 28-30, 13:2). Outside of the church for example, the apostles did the miraculous works of Christ as authenticating signs for the Gospel (Acts 3:1-16, 13:4-12).  Within the community of believers they ministered His healing works in mercy (Acts 9:36-41, 20:7-12). Nonetheless, without faith gifted persons to be vessels of God’s miraculous power, the saints are to pray for each other in their common faith to see His power displayed in their cause (James 5:13-18).
 
            God nowhere in the Bible declares an end to any spiritual gifts until Christ returns (Zechariah 13:2-6; 1 Corinthians 13:8-12). And why is this the case? His purposes of equipping and enabling His people to serve His will through spiritual gifts continue until then. When so-called “expert” professing Christian scholars of this age declare God did not intend for the Church on earth to operate through all of the spiritual gifts resident in and beyond its first century infancy, they consign her to a spiritually weakened and inferior state to Satan’s delight and advantage. They assert knowledge of the Word is all that is needed for Christians and their churches to thrive. But clearly, this is not what Jesus and His apostles taught. Somebody is lying and it is not Jesus or His apostles empowered by the Holy Spirit (Romans 7:14-8:1; 1 Corinthians 2:1-5, 4:19-20)!
 
            Many Western Christians and their churches are withering having in large measure by arrogance of scholarship and proud ego (1 Corinthians 1:18-31), along with sin driven self-sufficiency, spiritual blindness, worldly compromise, manmade religion and toleration of sin cut themselves off from Christ, the true vine and the Holy Spirit; fulfilling to the letter the apostle Paul’s prophecy about them in these last days (2 Timothy 3:1-5). The only hope for a reversal is Holy Spirit fired revival not to come on a wide spread basis without confession, repentance and heartfelt petition beginning with the leaders (Jeremiah 29:13). Then the simplicity of Christ and the foolish message of His cross as well as the spiritual gift of faith and all of the spiritual gifts will again become to you the power and wisdom of God not to be abandoned again in the short time that is left!

Related Posts

  • The Faith That Saves, Pt. 1

                I  am  reposting  this  blog  and  those  that follow the rest of this month for the original, still relevant reasons I stated back then. I did not name any specific group that held to the idea that God gives predetermined men the faith they need to believe the Gospel and be saved forever, but do so now to sound the alarm as this group (splintered as the rest of professing Christianity) in the main is attempting to pass off their theological system as biblical. Calvinists trace themselves back to European reformer John Calvin and have taken his original teachings to places it is not clear he would have gone in the development of their theological system with the acronym, TULIP.

     
                 By the way, I make no apology for identifying the European and post-Reformation origin of many of the major heretical teachings that twist professing Christianity in confusion today because it is fact. The over a millennia long dominance of Rome specifically and Europe in general over manmade Christianity the religion was once a matter of great boast. But now that God in His great wisdom has made His Word accessible to readers in many languages, men can and I am strongly advocating for especially those of color around the earth to imitate the diligence of the Bereans when Paul came preaching the Gospel to see if things truly lined up with Scripture (Acts 17:10-12).
     
                In love, I also remind the arrogant among my Christian white brothers that they are not and have never been the final authority concerning the faith. The Word of God accurately interpreted and applied as it is written is! If this had been consistently done during and after the Reformation, I would not now be writing as a son of former slaves made so by professing white Christians who freely corrupted Scripture to justify their evil desires. Finally, for the men of my seed and ethnic heritage, I write factually about the origins of major deceitful doctrines not because we have no heretics among us, but because by the grace of God this is the legacy of a free black man that did not allow bitterness over our experience to turn me from God who was innocent, but to run to Him to learn the truth of our suffering that He will set eternally right in His timing.
     
    Originally Posted June 3, 2012
     
                As the Lord enabled me, I wrote back in February of this year on the issue of faith spurred by Whitney Houston’s death and the huge number of folk automatically putting her into Heaven. I return to the issue in this and the next blog because I am troubled by the widespread confusion on faith and its important role in salvation. I write as an aspiring strong man of God in the image of Christ standing up as I have challenged other Christian men “for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints” to the end that many are strengthened against or liberated from satanically inspired confusion on the subject (Jude 3, NKJV).
     
                According to the Bible, the faith that saves a man is not of some great size or of a special nature beyond the natural ability of any human being to exercise. Indeed, as it concerns size, Jesus taught that faith the size among Israel’s smallest seeds--a mustard seed--could literally move a mountain (Matthew 17:19-20). How large really then is the faith needed to believe the Gospel and be saved? Concerning supernatural help from God to produce the faith in a soul needed to believe the Gospel because we are so totally wicked; the Bible teaches no such thing. Jesus does say the Father draws us to Him (John 6:44). But drawing has to do with timely revelation, wooing, exciting the interest of and convincing the heart not giving a man the faith he needs to believe. God must draw us because we are dull hearted to spiritual matters or actively pursuing them in all of the wrong places being spiritually dead in our sins (1 Peter 4:3).
     
                God does not give us a special faith to believe in Him or His Word for salvation because faith is as common to mankind as breathing. Men for all manner of situations and reasons use faith daily. They place faith (trust, confidence, reliance) in each other knowing sinful men lie, cheat and steal. Men even fly airplanes by faith (and jump out of them too) knowing the law of gravity that “what goes up, must come down!” On and on we could go giving examples of how commonly we use faith in our human experience. Now, to insist that when it comes to God and the Gospel it requires some higher order faith or a special gift from God, I find this nowhere in Scripture. God has chosen common faith as the means for us to connect to Him because He makes the process as simple as possible; so, simple in fact, faith filled children are our role models (Mark 10:13-16).
     
                Simple, child-like faith has been all a man has needed to please God since Adam. Adam disobeyed God in part because he did not have faith enough in his Creator who he could see to take Him at his word and not eat of the tree He forbid to him (Genesis 2:16-17, 3:1-6). Furthermore, Cain killed his brother Abel after he was specifically warned in an up close and personal encounter with God. He could have exercised faith in His Creator and taken heed, but instead, willfully chose to go his own way in sin (Genesis 4:1-8). Neither Adam before the fall or Cain after was given a special gift of faith to believe God. They and all humanity after them were expected to use the common ability God had given in the divine image and likeness at man’s creation to have trust and confidence in as well as reliance on many things, but above all, God.
     
                Every man must make a personal choice to believe God. Adam as a sinless man chose of his own volition to disobey God, while his sinful descendants Abel, Seth, Enoch, Noah and Abraham chose to obey God in faith. God credited righteousness to them for their willingness to exercise common faith in Him (Genesis 4:4, 25-26,5:21-24, 6:8-22, 15:1-6; Hebrews 11:4-12). The Bible records no instance where God gave these men a special gift of faith to believe in Him and His promises in spite of the fact every one of them were sinners. The faith they exercised in some mighty incredible promises from God rose up from their willing hearts. To insist one needs a special gift of faith to believe God, is to charge Him with sin in being unjust because He did not give Adam such a gift to avoid sinning. Every sinner on this planet now has the opportunity to willingly believe or reject God’s Word of salvation from sin through the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

     

  • The Faith That Saves, Pt. 2

                The teaching gift’s aim with the leading of the Holy Spirit is to give men the ability to explain and make plain the Word of God for the simplest hearts. Quickly straying from the reform intent of Martin Luther, European Protestants set aside the simple Gospel and the precious teachings of salvation revealed to the apostles by the Holy Spirit in Scripture and began inventing all manner of heretical and complicated schemes they attempted to support with Scripture. In that free for all and volatile environment Catholics and Protestants were killing folk who did not hold to their respective theological positions. Even so, the schemes and divisions have just kept coming to this very hour.

     
                Those that align themselves with the teachings of John Calvin have taken his theological point of view and thinking about salvation namely that only persons handpicked by God are given the faith needed to believe the Gospel and persevere in it. Many Scriptures are corrupted to prop up this very confusing theological system including Ephesians 2:8 where in context, the emphasis that salvation is “the gift of God” is purposely replaced with faith as the divine gift (NKJV). With Calvinists, “the sovereignty of God” covers a multitude of indefensible suppositions in their system which stands primarily on a blatant misapplication of Romans 9:6-24.  They contend the passage communicates God’s approach to saving all men when in context, Paul is beginning to teach us Gentiles how it is that Israel continues to hold a special place in the sovereign God’s program (Romans 9-11).
     
                If I did not make it plain enough previously, let me stress again that heretical doctrines impact and hurt real people. As a son of slaves and a people mercilessly oppressed by white men claiming to be conducting themselves out of the permissible theologies of Scripture, I now write pleading in the name of Jesus Christ that professing Christians from all hues repent where guilty and come back to the Word of God as it is written (Ephesians 4:1-6)! Otherwise, know that you--whoever you are--will give an account to God for every soul hurt in any way by your proud and haughty teaching of doctrines not drawn directly from Scripture. I will take some time off to celebrate my Lord’s finished work to save sinners like me and post the next blog on Sunday, April 27th. A glorious Resurrection Sunday to the redeemed of the Lord! 

     

     
    Originally Posted June 10, 2012
     
                “The just shall live by his faith” was first spoken by God to the 7th century BC prophet Habakkuk (Habakkuk 2:4, NKJV) and is quoted several times in the New Testament.  In spite of the often meticulous and stringent efforts of the religious to be righteous before God, His singular means of connecting to men and making them righteous is through their placement of common faith in Him and His Word! Salvation from sin and its consequences is a gracious promise offered by God to every person on earth that will by faith receive the Gospel; the good news heralded since the 1st century AD that Jesus Christ the Son of God died in our place on the cross, was buried and on the third day after rose again from the dead. In doing these things He made it possible for God to forgive the sins of those who believe and declare them righteous or just (Romans 1:16-17, 3:21-26)!
     
                Please note the consistency of God in that just as from the beginning with the ancients, He gives His Word (in this case, the promise of salvation through the Gospel) and men are expected to exercise common faith in response. Implied in the transaction is a rudimentary faith in God who makes the promise. God has only made a promise of which absolutely nothing happens until a man accepts it on faith. Thereafter, however, God begins to fulfill His promise by forgiving the sins of the faith filled, repentant heart (Romans 10:6-13). Then God the Holy Spirit indwells that heart and brings the spiritually dead person to new spiritual birth and life (John 1:12-13, 3:3-8, 7:37-39, 14:16-20). The freshly forgiven, declared just spiritual newborn now lives and is expected to live every moment by the same common faith he exercised to enter salvation and relationship with the triune God.
     
                Ideally, as the spiritual newborn develops in much adversity, his faith enlarges, strengthens, matures and is joined by love for the God that brought him into His promised salvation (John 14:21-24; Romans 5:1-5). Still, salvation as a completed promise which includes resurrection from the dead and immortal glory awaits the Second Coming of Christ. We do not yet have salvation as a finished work but as a hope by faith in God and His Word (Romans 8:23-25; Hebrews 11:1). So, what has God done to assure our hearts while we wait in faith on His promise? He gives a guarantee and has sworn an oath (2 Corinthians 1:21-22, 5:1-7; Ephesians 1:13-14; Hebrews 6:9-20). The same Holy Spirit who gives us new birth and spiritual life is also our living guarantee from God that what He has started in us of His promised salvation, He also for His part intends to complete (Philippians 1:6).
     
                It is not some complicated, human invented doctrine of irreversible salvation as some teach that serves as our secure assurance of God’s completed promise, but it is the Person of the Holy Spirit! While that may not be enough for the religious educated elite and flesh driven religionists who are always trying to go beyond God if somehow they might impress Him with what they think they know (Matthew 22:23-33, 23:15-22; 1 Corinthians 2:1-5, 8:1b-3; Colossians 2:18-23), the Holy Spirit is God’s tangible guarantee to those who live by faith in Him (Galatians 5:5-6). It is He who wields the power of God in us to assure, guard and protect the hearts of the willing in our persevering faith while we wait for salvation’s completion (Romans 8:12-16; 1 Peter 1:3-5; 1 John 3:18-20).
     
                If we continue and stand firm in faith until death or Christ’s return, we will receive the fullness of the salvation we have waited for (Mark 13:13; Hebrews 10:32-39; 1 Peter 1:6-9; Revelation 2:10). But if in unbelief, we give up and turn back to willfully embrace sin again without repentance or quit on God in apostasy, such ones “cast away” their hope of salvation without the possibility of renewal (Ezekiel 18:24-26; Matthew 24:45-51; Luke 14:25-35; Romans 11:19-22; Hebrews 3:12-14, 6:1-8, 10:26-31). It is not that God lost or failed to keep from snatching predators anyone that desired in faith to be kept. These individuals--as Adam among many biblically named others--chose of their own, God-given volition to no longer put faith in Him and His Word and receive the consequences. The faith that saves as all of Scripture bears witness is common faith in God and His Word held firm until death or fulfillment.

     

              
  • The Testing Of Our Faith

                As the Lord has led, I have been writing  a  lot  about  His  testing  of  saints  and sinners.  Christians new to the faith especially have to be asking “why does God need to test men since He already knows what is in our hearts?” The question is valid with multiple answers in which I will focus on Christians and our faith momentarily. In general, though, while God knows our hearts, we often do not. Also, we easily deceive ourselves thinking we are better and stronger than we are. God tests men’s hearts to prove the content He knows of that we may be judged accordingly, see our true state and repent or praise Him for His work in us (Psalm 7:9-17, 17:3-5; John 3:16-21)!

     
                Every would be faithful Christian; every aspiring strong man and great woman of God in the image of Jesus Christ must come to accept that our God and Father is going to test our faith to the end of our journey on this side of glory. He tested His only begotten Son who afterward became “the Author and Finisher of our faith” (Hebrews 12:1-2, NKJV); so now, He tests us who have become adopted sons through faith in Him (Galatians 3:26; Hebrews 2:10-18). The most elemental expression of faith has brought us into God’s promise of salvation; thereafter, God expects and labors so that our faith will grow and mature into settled character (Romans 5:1-5; James 1:2-4).
     
                With that end in mind, Peter teaches that God purposely allows us to go through painful trials that test the “genuineness” of our faith. God has every right to insist that our faith be real along with deep and enduring since what we get as the end result is so overwhelmingly glorious (1 Peter 1:3-9, NKJV)! Superficial professors do not long hang around when serving Jesus involves personal pain as the Master taught in His excellent parable (Matthew 13:3, 5-6, 20-21). This is why as a matter of faith’s authenticity, willingness to persevere through the fire of painful trials is a fixture of God’s testing because faith can be real, but without depth and endurance it is useless in the marathon we run.
     
                The truth is all of us authentic, born again Christians and saints on the way to glory fail to display the requisite situational faith in our God more often than we care to admit. I have seen and heard unbelief in pastors, elders, teachers, faithful church members and most of all, myself. This past year I cost our Ministry and my family dearly by making what I thought was a sound, prayed over business decision that turned out to be wrong. In the midst of the natural consequences, I asked the Lord to show me my sin and He did. I had failed the test of faith in and waiting upon Him by putting more stock in outcomes I feared. Everything I had feared in my decision came upon us!
     
                Nevertheless, God rich in mercy and grace picked me up in forgiveness after this seemly millionth time of confession and repentance for failing to walk with Him in faith as I should have. In the fire of the righteous consequences which are exceedingly far less than what my sin deserved (Psalm 103:8-14), God has re-tested me in a similar set of circumstances and this time to His praise and glory, the Father who disciplines us for our good has proven me obedient to His will for faith in Him (Hebrews 12:3-11). With the humiliation and joy of the lesson freshly learned, I have shared my most recent faith test and results to encourage you, but I also have a sober warning from the Lord.
     
                Indeed, God has made faith the foundational character trait He forges in His sons and aspiring strong men of God in the image of Christ because of the impossibility of pleasing Him without it (Hebrews 11:6) as I discuss in The Strong Man Of God. However, the corollaries of faith as character such as perseverance, patience, joy, hope and love for God are also important in enabling our endurance through still even more painful trials to come until we reach the finish line of the race marked out for us. Each one of us runs our own race before the Lord. Then there is the race we run together as the Church in this present age which by faith in joy we see nears its finish.
     
                Up until now, God in great patience and longsuffering has given us many do overs as I just testified of my own recent faith test. However, the days are fast approaching when like suicide, failing a faith test will become fatal and not subject to re-testing. For the record, a Christian that commits suicide is not displaying biblical faith or knowledge (Genesis 1:26-27, 9:5-6; Exodus 20:13; 1 Corinthians 6:19-20) nor is one that in spite of stern, fair warning from God in His Word denies Christ or worships and takes “the mark” of the beast to save himself or his family (Matthew 10:34-39; Mark 8:34-38; Revelation 13:14-17, 14:9-13, NKJV). As it is written, ‘“Now the just shall live by faith; but if anyone draws back, My soul has no pleasure in him,”’ (Hebrews 10:38, NKJV). The risen, living Christ continues His cry among American churches, “Who is on the Lord's side?” 
  • Juneteenth: A Fitting Faith Illustration

                This post was originally made as an illustrative application of a two-part 2012 blog entitled, “The Faith That Saves” under the category, The Faith.1  The faith of my Christian slave forefathers that came forth out and in spite of the mesh of oppressive confusion bound up in Christianity the religion of men practiced American style,2 is a last days marvel of immense proportions.  Clearly, the deliberate providence of God was at work to draw them to Himself (John 6:44-45; 12:32), but also in His foreknowledge, the fertile heart ground for the seed of His Word to bear fruit unto faith when preached in truth was in them (Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23; Romans 10:6-17).

     

                My West African forefathers as with all other Gentiles were not punished for having no faith at all, but faith that was misplaced for example, in ancestor worship, idols and other false deities (Acts 17:16-23; 1 Corinthians 12:2; Galatians 4:8).  Having been failed by those departed or not gods that could not help and with no hope from any other source, slaves that did, responded to the Gospel and the true God with the same and even greater devotion of faith than they had previously accorded what was false in their native land (Acts 17:24-34).  Truly, only God could have orchestrated this marvel since as I have written, the oppressed received the means of freedom from their oppressors!3

     

                Now, in God’s equality, it is time for the Christian descendants of America’s slaves to return the spiritual favor (Matthew 5:43-48; Romans 12:17-21).  For we will need to look to and draw encouragement from the legacy of faith our Christian slave forefathers that endured one of the most brutal forms of slavery in history left us, while also urging all other professed American Christians facing a hostile and soon to be oppressively violent nation in rebellion against God to do the same (Hebrews 10:36-39; 1 John 5:4-5).4  Reflectively reading this edited 2012 repost is a good place to get started if you have not already.

     

    Originally Posted June 17, 2012

     

                I extend a heartfelt “Happy Father’s Day” to all the men who have taken that role and responsibility from God seriously.  My book, The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics is an excellent resource for gaining a basic and biblical perspective on being a father.  I invite readers who have not obtained a copy to do so for yourself or one of the males in your life that is or will soon be a father.5

     

                On this Father’s Day--as I have done previously through other forums, I write briefly on the celebration of Juneteenth which falls on June 19th each year.  Juneteenth is a black American commemoration of the end of slavery by way of celebrating the June 19th anniversary date in 1865 when Texas slaves learned a full two years after that President Lincoln had signed the Emancipation Proclamation setting them free.6  Typical of most American summer holidays there are parades, speeches, concerts, picnics and very importantly in this post-Christian era, worship services.  It is here that I briefly join in the celebration and honor the faith of my Christian slave forefathers.

     

                Presented Christianity by colonial whites mostly as a religious means of calming and controlling hearts that were not comfortable with the idea of perpetual servitude, the rigid, high-brow form of religion was not embraced in large numbers by African slaves.  However, with the coming of the Holy Spirit fired preaching and worship fervor in the Great Awakenings and Camp Meeting Revivals of the South, conversions by slaves to the Christian faith exploded as the new American nation moved toward Civil War over the trafficking in human souls. 

     

                The mostly Western uneducated slave believers in Jesus Christ left their descendants and the world a legacy of persevering faith displayed in songs of hope called “Spirituals.”  Embodied in their “Spirituals” was hope in the promise of physical deliverance found in the Bible proclaimed clandestinely by slave and some sympathetic white preachers.  Many died waiting for the promise of God in His Word as have many of the saints from ancient times (Hebrews 11:8-16).  They waited for physical freedom through faith in the God who did the same for Israel when He brought them out of Egyptian bondage by Moses (Hebrews 11:23-35a). 

     

                In the process, my Christian slave forefathers endured being spoon fed a corrupt form of Christianity that attempted to justify the evil brand of bondage they experienced including the demoralization of their souls, brutal whippings, the tearing apart of their families, rape of their daughters and sharing of their wives with slave owners and other white men bent on oppressing them in perpetuity (Hebrews 11:35b-40).  Such was their simple, child-like, persevering faith in the God who remembers the oppressed according to His Word (Psalm 103:6; Luke 4:16-19).  This faith is also resident in the heart of every aspiring strong man of God in the image of Christ!7

     

                And so, God did in His mercy remember my Christian slave forefathers who had been faithful in their long wait on Him for physical freedom.8 While there would be bitter opposition and battles to secure the reluctant sharing of the rights of citizenship still to come, the day the slaves heard they were free was a day of great celebration; for those who had specifically waited on the Lord--breathless joy!  Therefore, it is fitting that black Americans and all the inhabitants of the earth commemorate the day our people were set free lest we ever forget.  Moreover, may we always include in our celebration, worship of the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who perpetually honors simple, child-like, persevering faith placed in Him.

     

    1 I  made  an edited repost of part one of this blog on April 6 and part two on April 13, 2014.  I stand by every word the Lord led me to write not consciously operating

       out  of  any preexisting theological position or presupposition (there being a resemblance to any unintentional).  I am a Biblicist; not caring in the first instance what

       sinful, mortal men including myself think, feel or believe, but what God’s Word in totality actually says to inform my doctrine!

    2 Read  the  two-part,  August 2016 post, Christianity The Religion Of Men, under the category, Instruction and Christianity The Religion American Style posted Sep-

       tember 4, 2016 under the category, Call To Repent.

    3 Read the three-part Commentary, The White Man’s Religion in the Journal Archives of the FSTVEP.

    4 At  whatever point you may choose beyond Scripture to believe the evacuation of living saints by translation occurs, you still must stand and endure by persevering

       faith until it happens (Matthew 24:29-31; Mark 13:24-27; 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17).

    5 The book is available at all major internet booksellers, by order at your favorite brick and mortar bookstore or in the Strong Man Store.

    6 This  Juneteenth 2019, be among those that hear the summary retelling of the black American experience from slavery to the present in the roll out of the From Sla-

       very To Victory: One Man’s Journey Webcast!

    7 Such  was  Harriet  Beecher  Stowe’s  vilified  fictional  character,  Uncle  Tom, in her American Classic, Uncle Tom’s Cabin.  Read Uncle Tom’s Cabin Revisited on

       the FSTVEP Web Site, an article the Lord led me to write restoring Uncle Tom as the actual aspiring strong man of God in the image of Christ the book intends.

    8 They waited for physical freedom to follow the spiritual freedom they already had in their souls by salvation through faith in Jesus Christ (John 8:31-36)!  Learn more

       on the Freedom Page at the FSTVEP Web Site.

  • Gifted With A Prophet’s Heart

                In this positional chronology on April 27, 2014, the Lord led me to repost The Spiritual Gift Of Faith, under the category, The Faith as the first of what was a related sequence of four 2012 blogs.  I urge the reader to read that April repost as a prelude to this post and what will be the other three 2012 reposts that follow.  The primary theme in all of them is the necessary real time involvement of Christ as Lord and the Holy Spirit as Participants in the life and work of the Church on earth (Mark 16:19-20; Acts 13:1-3).  This thematic reality is the desperate need of many professing American Christians and churches as well as an urgent purpose in the Lord’s call to repentance and revival.

     

                Did any of the regular readers notice in my blog of August 21, 2016, Christianity The Religion Of Men, Pt. 1 under the category, Instruction, that two older women were the only instrumental mortals to my coming to the immortal Christ on Easter 1977 and providing godly counsel during the first three years of my life in Him?  When in churches and around Christians of both genders during those days, I was clearly moving in another stream of experience apart from the religious operation of most due to being on white-hot Holy Spirit fire!  Oh, as is typical of babes in Christ (I later learned), I stumbled and fumbled in struggle against my old sin nature and suffered many shameful defeats.

     

                However, no seasoned professing Christian man to include leaders put an arm around me to provide knowing, purposeful and continuing guidance to help me develop in Christ.1  Instead, I was hurt by the evil and exploitive ways I was handled by churchmen that were resigned to an inferior practice of Christianity which as a religion of men, it is.  I saw very few godly male role models among my age peers either, but only those like me in need of help beyond showing up to Sunday school and church as the traditional counsel obviously not working for those that offered it.  In fairness, some older men did empathize with my situation, but were not prepared to engage anyone about it. 

     

                I was uncomfortable with the religious status quo since the Bible was already understood by me to be the authoritative Word of God.  Hard for me too, was bearing with duplicity, hypocrisy and apathy in these churches because in that same Bible God kept rebuking and judging this type of behavior.  Indeed, like a bee to a fragrant flower, I was especially drawn to the heavy heart of God for the repeated unfaithfulness of Israel in the Old Testament and its display in the passionate exhortations of the apostle Paul in the New as he rebuked sin in the churches.  The Lord had first introduced me to His heavy heart twenty-two months into my salvation during a seven day fast without food or drink He commanded.

     

                While I now know the Lord was then beginning to make His gifting and calling known to me, I had no idea as a babe what was happening.  I had no Ananias to provide even a basic understanding since also unknown to me at the time, many churches did not (and to this day, do not) embrace the supernatural character of biblical Christianity or instruction on spiritual gifts (Acts 9:6-19).  Though in the summer of 1979 the Lord spoke specifically to my heart that I was to serve Him in broadcasting, even after coming to the Emmanuel Baptist Church, San Jose, CA in the fourth year of my salvation where I finally met some godly, dedicated men, I remained in ignorance about spiritual gifts.

     

                I had moved in that summer of 1980 to study broadcasting at San Jose State University.  At Emmanuel, Rev. Jay Wells taught the first new member orientation I had ever had.  Seeing my eager participation in his Sunday school class and unbridled fire of the Holy Spirit in me, Rev. Tom Kelly (now with the Lord) took me under his wing and allowed me to teach.  At his recommendation, I was invited to take over his class with amazing Spirit empowered results!  After this came seminary at Southwestern Baptist.  The best it and the Southern Baptist machine could do was confirm I had a calling; a calling that led to one recognized thing: a black church pastorate.2

     

                After graduating from seminary in December 1984 with no real prospects to serve in what it seemed the Lord had in mind, I was ordained and licensed to the ministry by Emmanuel in June 1985 and founded Open Door Communication Ministries, Inc. later in August.  As I have shared on other occasions, when the Ministry did not garner any serious initial support, I sought the Lord about what was wrong in the spring of 1986.  He made known to me from Ezekiel 33:1-9 that I was gifted and called to serve Him as a watchman/prophet among the churches (Luke 4:24).  Finally, by His instruction I understood that the heavy heart in me for the holiness, righteousness and faithfulness of His Church was the way He wired the prophet’s heart to reflect His own (Ephesians 4:7-16, 5:25-27).

     

                I know from experience the tragedy of Christianity the religion of men in the churches.  With no male spiritual mentors to help me develop as a babe and man in Christ, I floundered in the faith far longer than necessary.  And because such churches reject the critical Lordship of Christ and power of the Holy Spirit in Church existence and function, it took nine years to learn about and accept all of my spiritual gifts and calling plainly taught in Scripture.  This is unacceptable and sin!  Therefore, without repentance and revival, these churches are worthless to the Lord and will be dealt with accordingly (Matthew 5:13).  The risen, living Christ continues His cry among American churches, "Who is on the Lord's side?"

     

    1  Many  predominantly  black  American  churches  have  traditional  and largely honorary “mother boards” to help younger women, but nothing for even the pretense

        of  mentoring  men  in  the  faith and biblical manhood.  Seeing this grave error repeated in many churches to  this  hour, I call  for pastors in repentance to return to

        the biblical model and purposely equip seasoned men to be spiritual fathers to younger men in my book, The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics. 

    2  I   share  more  details  of  my  experience  with  racism  among  professing  white  Christians  and  their entities in the booklet, The Scourge Of Racism available in

        the FSTVEP Resource Store.

  • The Need For Spiritual Fathering

                Of the greatest sins manifested among many church leaders today is the arrogance to believe that they can somehow improve upon and expedite God’s program for making and teaching disciples of Jesus Christ!  Though ancient now, the methods Christ and His apostles empowered by the Holy Spirit used to make disciples (preaching the Gospel) and teach them to obey God’s whole Word were effective (Mark 1:9-20, 3:13-19, 4:10-12, 33-34, 8:27-38; John 20:19-23; Acts 2:1-16, 36-47).  Even so, 100% of the people who heard their preaching and teaching did not accept it (John 6:60-71; Acts 4:1-4).  Our problem is we want that 100% even if it means doing stuff in the flesh to get them!

     

                The Lord’s approach and example to teaching men as disciples was Self-denying, labor intensive and time consuming.  But these are the inescapable realities of spiritual fathering our Lord embraced as well as called, equipped and charged His disciples turned apostles to also do.  Church pastors are imperative in the work (John 21:15-17)!  Having been a pastor and mentor of boys and men I fully understand the demands especially of time spiritual fathering make on one’s life.  However, this is why a pastor equips those he spiritually fathers to do as he does.  If he is too busy to do what the Lord has commanded as his priority, then he is too busy!  As the Lord leads me to point out in this edited 2013 Commentary, men are being hurt because of disobedience to His commands.

     

    Originally Published September 2013

     

               While our Ministry celebrates every brave incarcerated man that steps out before our Strong Man Of God Rally assemblies to publically pray to receive Christ or rededicate to Him, it saddens me personally to see the great numbers that rededicate.  Most of these rededications are men that were Christians before their incarceration for a second or third time.  It is certainly true Christians that commit crimes must take personal responsibility for their actions.  However, after talking to many of these men it becomes clear that they are not getting the one on one mentoring of a “spiritual father” needed to deepen their walk with Christ in the churches they are members of as I did not early on.1

     

                To be sure, the failure to make committed followers of Christ is a wide spread problem in the churches.  Spiritual infancy dominates today in a Western church culture that is more concerned with the numbers than whether members are maturing in Christ.  This lack of emphasis on the slow process of making disciples as our Lord commanded is hurting men the most since they are God’s chosen leaders in the home and churches.  Many sit and the relative few that serve largely do so as babes in Christ with no intentional plan to disciple them.  Once a month meetings and the annual golf tournament are not enough to turn baby Christian men into fiery, maturing disciples of Christ!

     

                As I write in my book, The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics, teaching his family is a responsibility God assigns every man.2  As the head of the house, a man teaches his wife and children.  As a father, he teaches all of the children, but with a special duty to mentor and guide his sons into manhood; his wife, their daughters into womanhood.  Beyond their families, aspiring strong men of God in the image of Christ imitate Him in taking newborn Christian men under their wing to spiritually father them into maturity.  We know this process is slow because our Lord spent more than three years of intensive time with His twelve disciples, then the rest of the lives of those who became faithful apostles (Matthew 4:18-22; John 14:18, 16:12-15).

     

                In the Lord’s “Great Commission,” He commands His disciples to make, baptize and teach new disciples from all of the nations (Matthew 28:19-20).  As it concerns teaching, veteran disciples are to teach the new “to observe all things that” Christ had commanded them (vs. 20, NKJV).  Teaching what Christ “the Author and Finisher of our faith” (Hebrews 12:2, NKJV) commanded entails more than just important doctrines, but also all of the thinking, attitudes and behaviors of Christ-likeness we are also to possess in pleasing God the Father as He did (Philippians 2:5).  To this end, the apostle Paul also instructed his spiritual sons to teach and pass on what they had learned to men who would do the same with other men also (2 Timothy 2:1-2; Titus 1:1-9, 2:1-5).

     

                To their shame, not only do many pastors and churches not encourage spiritual fathering or mothering in their ranks today, but too many have no formal discipleship instruction at all much less for newborn Christians in the pews who need the “pure milk of the Word” not the philosophical musings of men (1 Peter 2:1-3, NKJV).3  And for the churches that pride themselves on offering lofty sectarian seminary level courses such as Systematic Theology as sufficient to fulfill Christ’s command to teach especially babes, repent!  You are causing them to gag and choke in confusion on what is not even biblically organic, but sinful humanly processed and genetically altered meat (1 Corinthians 3:1-2; 2 Timothy 2:14-16, 3:14-17).

     

                Shame too on you guilty pastors that look down on my work in the prisons as though it were inconsequential when Christ your Judge is recording for Judgment Day how many of the Christians I find there that are members of your churches (Romans 14:10-13; 2 Corinthians 5:9-11)!  We salute all of our fellow workers in the prisons filling in what lacks in the churches.  To the pastors that need help setting up a discipleship plan for new believers or want to know more about teaching biblical manhood to and spiritually fathering men contact this Ministry.4  The risen, living Christ continues His cry among American churches, "Who is on the Lord's side?"

     

    1 Read Part 1 of the August 21, 2016 post, Christianity The Religion Of Men, under the category, instruction.  I lament the early lack of spiritual fathering that potentially

       could  have saved me from many painful failures and shortened the inordinate length of my infancy in Christ in the opening of this post and also that of the October 2,

       2016 post, Gifted With A Prophet’s Heart, under the category, Call To Repent.

    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 See  the  September  25, 2016 post, A Leadership Caused Failure and Pastors As Developing Christian Men posted on December 17, 2017 both under the category,

       Call To Repent.

    4 Get contact information for Strong Man Ministries and learn about for example, the Strong Man Of God Men’s Group Study as an important help in making disciples of

      men and teaching them biblical manhood on our Web Site. 



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