We can follow the rule book of life written by the Stoics, living a good life and still be headed for hell.
Believing in Christ is more than head knowledge. It is a recognition of our inability to be good enough to earn heaven, knowing that Christ died to pay our debt for sin and wanting to submit to Him on everything all the time.
Those who say they are Christians but fight and argue against the principles of God when it irritates their demons, are not born again. Those who think the Bible is a book of "some" good suggestions and live they best they can in their own flesh, are walking in rebellion.
An authentically born-again believer has the fruit of the Holy Spirit, desires to be changed by Christ and loves the conviction of the Holy Spirit that leads to righteousness.
Any time someone is proud of how good they think they are, placing human rules and traditions on others that Christ never commanded we are witnessing someone who is walking in self-righteousness and very likely not born again.
Those who think they "have arrived at righteousness" judge others as unrighteous for things that God never said were sin, such as whether or not we attend a large building called a church, or speak the truth about the sin in the church.
Those who are rebellious must do whatever it takes to ruin the reputation of the one who follows Christ, growing in holiness and emotional and Spiritual maturity.
Those who remain immature in their response to the word of God are those who make up their own ideas of righteousness and oppress others with them, even though God never commanded those things.
Mark 7:13 "13 Thus you nullify the word of God by the tradition you have handed down. And you do so in many such matters.”
Romans 10:3
"Because they were ignorant of God’s righteousness and sought to establish their own, they did not submit to God’s righteousness."
Colossians 2:8
"See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, which are based on human tradition and the spiritual forces of the world rather than on Christ."
1 Timothy 4:1-3
"Now the Spirit expressly states that in later times some will abandon the faith to follow deceitful spirits and the teachings of demons, / influenced by the hypocrisy of liars, whose consciences are seared with a hot iron. / They will prohibit marriage and require abstinence from certain foods that God has created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth."
We are living in times of deep deception and rampant rudeness. Those who love Christ and ALL His principles will be maligned, mocked, gossiped against, and persecuted in many other ways as they are seen as evil for standing for the word of God and His principles.
Bad is being called good and good is being called bad just as God said would happen. Knowing the Word of God helps us to navigate through this mess in the world until Christ calls us home in the clouds.
Thankfully it will be soon, we see the signs everywhere and the biggest sign of all is Israel. God said that the time is close for the church home-going when Israel is back in the land. Israel has been back in the land since 1948 and the other signs leading up to the antichrist rule are many and increasing every day.
The more we ponder God's Word and the prophesy He gave the more excited we should be and the more vexed we feel by the ugliness of the apostate church and the world in general.
2 Peter 2:7-8
"7 and if He rescued righteous Lot, who was oppressed by the perverted conduct of unscrupulous people 8 (for by what he saw and heard that righteous man, while living among them, felt his righteous soul tormented day after day by their lawless deeds),"
We are not different from Lot, we are full of joy but we are also vexed by the evil around us and especially by those who say they are Christians but fight against His principles from His own Word.
Keep Looking Up!!!!
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