by words without knowledge? Now prepare yourself like a man; I will question you, and you shall answer Me"... Job 38:1-3 (NKJ)
What follows here is my own opinion on some things that I consider vital to our lives and thinking as true" Christians" after repeatedly reading the whole of both the Old and New Testaments and my own experience with The Lord over a number of years...
There's a lack of understanding that is causing a defective viewpoint in some of what it means to be Christian and of what the scriptures are saying. And in my opinion it's due in part to a lack of diligence and also to a process formed on an incomplete understanding due to that same lack of diligence. For example, how about the idea of just repeating a few words and all-of-a-sudden magically becoming a Christ Follower - a Christian. I know that some may well be prepared to argue, but consider this: If all we ever had to do was to repeat a few words, then why don't we just throw the rest of the New Testament away after having said them?
There's more to being a true follower of Christ than the perfunctory repeating of a prepared phrase that supposedly magically transports one into the state being saved and of "following" the Savior. Those things God made us aware of in the other passages that He had brought into the New Testament are essential for our faithful expression of our belief to Him and to our submission into the process of sanctification into the likeness of Christ's image. Making sure that a person has understanding of their own case before God and their learning about Christ in-depth before we provoke anyone to speak the words of acceptance of His salvation is something that we should make sure of. If our move to promote their confession is deprived of either of those things, I tend to think of it as more like creating robots or attempting to build a house on an already crumbling foundation. Confession should be provoked by a true understanding of one's peril before God and a real knowledge of the Savior without outside pressure to perform a recital of a few words. Jesus taught and people believed. It was their true belief and trust in Christ Jesus that saved them and the process of necessary sanctification ensued from that point as they "followed" Him and His teachings. The decision to believe God in Christ is the most important decision that we will ever make in our entire lives and should not be cursory or functionally processed. There's a difference between a heart truly calling out to God and mere perfunction ... and our God is not fooled. If the spirit or essence of what God requires of us is short cut, does He not know this?
We inherit things from previous generations and many of them we might accept without questioning their validity. I'm not about to trash previous generations or their traditions. It happens that my own years are beginning to speak to me about their approaching end being much closer than it used to be and of any space given for the occupation in my own mind and life for traditional things that still have a need to be passed on ... or eradicated. There's a need in my soul, crying out more certainly as the number of my own days grows shorter, to be sure and accurate in my limited understanding of, and submission to, the God Over All That Exists. In truth, none of us knows the number of our days and the certainty of our disposition before God, and that of our loved ones, is of the greatest consequence in all of this life since this life's purpose is directly our submission to, and relationship with Him and nothing else. My end or yours on this earth could come tomorrow or even this afternoon. We have no way of knowing. That's why it's important to do due diligence while we have the opportunity.
So many things are taken out of context these days by people that may or may not be well meaning and others jump on their bandwagon thinking that the original poster, texter, speaker, or whatever has a real handle on what's being conveyed. And in this day and age of deception viewpoints taken from snippets or even larger portions of scripture without the complete personal knowledge of the words coupled with the spirit that invoked them are indeed out there. What God is telling us is not just words, but His meaning and intention behind them that we need to posses in order for the words to have any real value to us at all. This means deeper devotion to reading God's inerrant word personally on a regular basis for many of us and seeking out the spirit of what He's conveying to us accurately. If there is no devotion to what God dictated to the hearts and minds of the writers of scripture, things of great importance to Him, I can't say what your future holds because that judgment doesn't belong to me, but if you're relying simply on just having repeated a few words or something someone told you ... I have concern for you. It's time to make sure that what we think we know and understand based on what someone's said about what God's told us in scripture is accurate and complete - both in words and in spirit. Our diligence to Him in all things matters more than any earthly thing and possibly more than we know now.
Our responses to God's questions about the things that we've done and some things that we may still be doing as "tradition" need to be given some serious thought because the day of His questioning is closer with every day and our blindness to it's coming will not be an acceptable excuse any more than just not taking the time to do our homework would be an acceptable excuse when we were in school. Our motives, sincerity and responses to Him are naked to His view and He may have questions for us that we, like Job will be required to face...
I would challenge you to check even me on what I've said both in word and spirit found in scripture... but in order to do so, you'll have to do due diligence.
God's blessings and peace on you as we all have need of them.
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