Born Again Believers are Going Home Soon

Philippians 3:20-21 "But our citizenship is in heaven, and we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, / who, by the power that enables Him to subject all things to Himself, will transform our lowly bodies to be like His glorious body."

Many believers do not realize they are not citizens of earth anymore when they become born again, they are citizens of heaven on this earth with a heavenly mission.

This is the rapture of the church.

1 Thessalonians 4:16-17 "For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a loud command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will be the first to rise. / After that, we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will always be with the Lord."

Christ will not come down to earth at this time, He will call His church up to Him in the clouds.

Father's Lead whether good or bad, they lead!

There have been many times down through history when God gave the people what they wanted to show them that what they wanted was not good for them and would ultimately lead to their downfall.

Many mothers have done this as a parent too, when their adult teen children loved something that was not godly or good for them, they spoke once and then left them alone to make their own choice.

Wise mothers know it does no good to "force" an adult, and teens are adults, to do what they want. The rebellion in the hearts of the adult teens is so strong and supported by all their family and peers in the community that one person has no influence.

Sadly, they despised their mother for speaking at all while they had the approval of everyone else around them, making her seem like a grinch.

This constant approval of society for things that would corrupt their minds solidified their anger and disrespect toward their mother. This is common now because of the continual influence of society as a whole, which accepts many ungodly actions and attitudes.

Disrespect is promoted as long as the adult children think they have a good reason. The only reason that is needed in their minds is merely instruction or correction in righteousness.

I once heard a mother lament to me that her husband instructed her to never "lecture" her children, and he did it in front of the children. The children learned to ignore the mother because of the lead of the father. The father led the children in disrespect for the mother, and the children willingly followed him.

You see, fathers do lead; whichever way their attitude, good or bad, is, will be the way the children go.

Now we see why the culture has become apostate, having a form of religion and awfully proud of themselves for their determination to resist those who would instruct them.

2 Timothy 3:1-5 "Difficult Times Will Come
3 But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come.
2 For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, slanderers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy,
3 unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good,
4 treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God,
5 holding to a form of godliness although they have denied its power; avoid such people as these."

It is no wonder we are in the last days of apostasy; false religion has replaced the principles of Christ because it has replaced Him with a false religion based on the two P's, prosperity and pleasure.

Thank the Lord that our time on earth is almost over, and we will be going home.

God never told us to observe Christ's birth.

The Catholic church brought in pagan ways to entice them to join that system. The reason the holidays have gone almost entirely back to paganism is that they began as paganism.

 
Santa is a false god, an idol, people pray to, expect miracles from, and speak of continually, while the name of Christ never comes from their lips.

 
If someone had never heard of the holiday at all and just read the Bible, they wouldn't see anything in the scriptures that resembles what our culture does today concerning holidays.

 
Also, ask the question, "why do unsaved people love this holiday so much?" The reason is that it appeals to the emotional senses and pleasure.

 
There are no physical things we do for God as born-again believers, except one: the Lord's Supper, which He gave to us. Everything else He never commanded, we are to worship in "Spirit and Truth", no artifacts or items to look at longingly that almost always take priority over Christ.

Christ gave everything there was to give to mankind; there is nothing mankind can give back to God in the form of rituals or physical gifts that would have any significance. We worship God with our lives in Spirit and in Truth.

 
Romans 12:1-2 "1Therefore I urge you, brothers, on account of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.

2 Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what is the good, pleasing, and perfect will of God."

Protect Your Own Character

Notice that those who celebrate Christmas are focusing on Christ being born and being a baby, which any human being does when they come into this world.

Christ came through birth to die for mankind and rise from the dead, proving He is God.

Satan always knows how to take the focus off of God's Word by adding some of it to paganism, making it look sweet and lovable when in reality it spits in the face of God.

The only celebration God gave believers was the Lord's Supper, when we remember Him the way He commanded us.

Over my many years of attending various churches and learning doctrines, I have seen how many, if not most, "Christians" take much scripture out of context to fit their culture. They do not seek God's Word to obey Him; they seek it to find what fits with their favorite doctrine and appeals to their emotions.

And most of all, they want to be accepted by the rest of the culture. They are willing to fight against the truth to maintain what is comfortable and pleasurable.

The narrow way God speaks of in His Word is one that will be flowing in the opposite direction of the rest of cultural Christianity. Those who walk this narrow path will not fit into mainstream society.

Matthew 10:21-22 "…21 Brother will betray brother to death, and a father his child; children will rise against their parents and have them put to death. 22 You will be hated by everyone because of My name, but the one who perseveres to the end will be saved. "

All born-again believers who have been transformed by Christ will endure to the end. Those who are pretenders doing their Christianity their own way will not endure to the end; they will drift little by little into the flow of the rest of the culture while despising those who do not go their way.

Do not be dismayed by this rejection; praise God for it because it is human nature to follow those who praise one another. Be excited that you do not fit in and that you are free to be what God intended you to be, without the culture pressuring you to be like them.

Luke 21:17-19 "And you will be hated by everyone because of My name. / Yet not even a hair of your head will perish. / By your patient endurance, you will gain your souls."

Christ gives us the endurance, the perseverance and the joy needed to remain free from cultural mandates.

James 1:2-4 "Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials... because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything".

Romans 5:3-4 "Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope".

Galatians 6:9 "Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up".

We may not see the rewards of our perseverance in this life, but we will protect our own character and receive our reward when we leave this life.

Born Again by the Holy Spirit of God

No one is born again by their own effort; if Christ did not transform them, they remain unsaved.

Changed by Christ or not Changed at all!

Those who think they can lose salvation do not understand that it is Christ Who changes us into a new creation when we repent and desire Him. They are still earning their way to heaven without a transformation from Christ. They deny that Christ changes them and that He seals us with the Holy Spirit of Promise as a Guarantee of our salvation.

Ephesians 1:12-14 "…12 in order that we, who were the first to hope in Christ, would be for the praise of His glory. 13 And in Him, having heard and believed the word of truth— the gospel of your salvation— you were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, 14 who is the pledge of our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession, to the praise of His glory.…"

No one can undo what Christ does; if we could, that would make us more powerful than He. When He transforms us into an entirely new creation, only He gets all the glory.

If someone is working their own way to heaven and they have not been changed by Christ, they are not born again.

There is Safety in Discernment

Something I have noticed over the years with dogs. When they need to go out during the day to do their business, they are noisy in letting us know, but during the night, if they must go out, they are very quiet as if they know there is danger in the darkness outside and they must remain unseen.

Where we live, we have coyotes come through, thankfully not as much as we used to, but they are still a threat to cats and small dogs.

 
We have had about 7 cats taken, but the one we have now is very smart, able to hide effectively from the coyotes. He comes in at night but is in and out frequently, day and night. One of our neighbors' small dogs was dragged off by a coyote.

We have had dogs most of our married life, and they are adept at discerning the character of people they have never known before. Most people they like, but on rare occasions, there is someone they do not like; they show this by their lack of ability to calm down in the presence of someone. It is clear they do not like that person and will not allow them to come close.

 
Sometimes people have this sixth sense too; they can sense something is off in someone, but they have been trained by their culture never to judge, so they ignore warning signs, even signs that come from the prompting of the Holy Spirit.

Often, people trust their culture instead of the Holy Spirit because of the lack of faith that the Holy Spirit from Christ actually exists, even if they would say they do. They have mixed their religion with pagan fantasy and believe in the Holy Spirit in words, just as they believe in Santa in words, but have no real trust in Him.

 
Our "cult...ure" places more importance on words and feelings than it does on wisdom from above. Many rules and unbiblical thinking take priority over what the Bible says, which is the very Word of Christ.

 
1 John 4:1 "Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world."

Hebrews 5:14 "But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil."

Philippians 1:9-10 "And it is my prayer that your love may abound more and more, with knowledge and all discernment, so that you may approve what is excellent, and so be pure and blameless for the day of Christ,"

Hebrews 4:12 "For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart."

Romans 12:2 "Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect."

The sixth sense of animals to discern danger is an instinct God placed in them to keep them safe. In human beings, we have also been given a sense of danger that the culture has trained out of us through human rules and trust in one's own self instead of in God.

 
James 1:5 "If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him."

1 Corinthians 2:14 "The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned."

The person who does not trust in Christ will lack this vital and life-saving discernment, but the one born of Christ will have it, and it will save them from many trials.