This week Michael writes that due to our sin nature, far too many American Christians are vulnerable to the worldly philosophies of secular humanism, materialism, and hedonism. Pollster George Gallop in his book “The Search for Faith in America” wrote, never before has the gospel of Christ made such inroads yet made such little impact on the culture and the ways people live. Jesus said, people will forsake true righteousness and instead choose the pleasures of the world over the calling of God. Their lust for material things would prevent them from becoming disciplined followers of Jesus Christ. Weak faith would cause Christians to be ashamed of the Gospel of Christ and this would prevent God from continuing to bless their land. The sinful lifestyle of pseudo-Christians would discourage many from seeking the true light of Christ. Theologian Francis Schaeffer cited the crumbling moral foundations of the media, the government and education. He said Americans would prefer to seek material things and preserved happiness instead of the things of God. In short, it will get tougher and tougher to be a true Christian.
This is an excerpt from the book “Idol Signs” coauthored by Barna and McKay in 1985. The ways of the world are upside down from the ways of the beatitudes... the beautiful attitudes of Jesus Christ. The values of the world are paradoxical to the values of our Heavenly Father. The world emphasizes self-confidence, self-preservation, self-actualization and self-aggrandizement.... with the emphasis on self. These selfish priorities appeal to pride and self-sufficiency. They are the tools the devil uses to turn men’s hearts away from seeking God and His righteousness through Jesus’ sacrifice for sin on our behalf. However, the beatitudes emphasize humility in mourning over sin and poverty of the Holy Spirit. These blessed attitudes prioritize meekness to receive God’s instruction in righteousness... to be blessed through the filling of the spirit of Christ in us for Jesus said, I am the bread of life and the fountain of living waters.
Those who embrace Jesus’ beatitudes are His peacemakers who deliver a peace treaty from the kingdom of heaven to reconcile with our Heavenly Father through Jesus Christ, those whom God has called. After Jesus taught the beatitudes He said, you are the salt of the earth. Salt is a preservative that keeps food fresh by preventing decay and corruption. Salt represents truth. Salt also preserves from degradation, decomposition and decay. The truth of the Word of God makes us free from the rottenness of the world. Jesus said, If you continue in my Word you shall be my disciples indeed, and you shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free. Like salt, the truth of the Word of God is the antiseptic and disinfectant to free Christ followers from the world’s corruption.
Recently there has been an emphasis on mental illness that has proliferated as our culture and society has turned its back on the truth of the Word of God. The battlefield is in the mind. As Americans have forsaken and forgotten true liberty in Christ, our country is increasingly succumbing to the consequences of sin that holds men and women captive. Without the full armor of God, there is no soundness of mind; For God has not given us (who are born again of God’s spirt) a spirit of fear, but of power, or love, and of a sound mind.
The godless philosophies of this world lead to hopelessness and meaninglessness, without God and without hope in a world of darkness. Jesus Christ came to give sight to those born spiritually blind. It used to be that there were standards for truth. There was no question regarding “sexual identity.” Until recently the prevailing standard was that a person was either male or female. Today however, many in our culture embrace the secular teaching that insists that gender is “fluid” and can change at the whim of the individual. There is a proliferation of confusion regarding sexual identity and this confusion divides and pits those who believe the truth of the Word of God from the so-called politically correct who insist that truth is relative to the individual’s preference. Jesus Christ is the Word of God made flesh. He is the standard for truth and life worth living. He said, I am the way the truth and the life. No man cometh to the Father except by me.
Without the truth of the Word of God and Jesus Christ (the Word of God made manifest), the world will sink into degradation, decay and self-destruction. Any system of order will degrade, disintegrate, and fall apart without the infusion of power directed by God’s will and purpose. He is the One who directs, orchestrates, manages, and sustains all things according to the purpose of His Sovereign will. When we who believe in the truth of His Word delight in His Word and align our hearts with His heart, then it is God that works in us and through us to will and to do of His good pleasure.
Genesis 6 says that the Spirit of God will not always strive with mankind. God has set up His Word as His righteous standard. God is no respecter of persons. He is, however, a respecter of His word. His laws are intended to protect those who choose to enter into fellowship with Him and live under the canopy of His blessings ... under the shadow of the almighty ... under the Banner of God. However, when God’s people commit two evils by forsaking Him (the fountain of living waters) and hewing out for themselves cisterns, broken cisterns that can hold no water, left to their own devices they will not break God’s law ... they will break themselves upon the pillar and ground of the truth by leaving of the canopy of God’s protection.
Those whom God has called will be blessed when they witness the truth of the Word of God ... when they taste and see the love of God, and the truth manifest in the lives of Christians who speak and live the savor and salt of God’s truth. As the salt of the earth, we preach not ourselves, but Jesus Christ and Him crucified. To them that are called, we are the savor, the sweet-smelling fragrance of salvation. But to those who do not believe, the followers of Christ are the stench of death unto death.
Let's conclude Michael's message on bing the Salt of the world in the next post.
In Christ, Brian
No comments:
Post a Comment