Acts 16:31 "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved."
Most of the people who I know believe in God (or believe there is a God) and most of them probably claim that they believe in Jesus. This has recently perplexed me. Have you heard this one "I'm a Christian I believe in Jesus"? This coming out of the mouth of people who bear "zero" fruit. Their lives don't show a bit of Jesus's love and they are living the same life that they always have (self serving in nature). There has been no change and they couldn't tell you any testimony of what Jesus has done in their lives. I have often thought "how can these people be going to the same heaven that I am". Sure that is a sinful judgmental thought, one that I repent of however it is a real thought that needs to be addressed in my life. I felt the need to exhaust this issue a little bit to the degree to which I could put it on the shelf and out of my way. In final, I needed an answer.
James 2:26 "... faith without works is dead also."
If you go downtown you will find drunks on the street who believe in Jesus, you will find drug-dealers who believe, even Satan and his demons believe in Jesus. With this being said I feel that the word belief has a stronger meaning, one that demands a deeper dig than the one we currently are involved in. Delight in the Lord (Psalm 37:4), dive in deeper, press in to get closer to Him. Make every ounce of your being believe, study the scriptures, or even easier spend time in conversation (fellowship) thus seeking out the Lord. Paul counted everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus (Phil 3:8). He actually knew Him, he felt His prescence in his life, wow, how amazing that experience must have been? Why can't that be us? Men; belief isn't enough there is more to it than that. Our culture has dumbed down the term belief and it has been relegated to a "sure that sounds right mentality". We can't be fooled by this and think that praying for salvation is enough and then we wait for the Rapture. Bump that, we need to hit the streets, proclaim Him in the clubhouse, never shy away from admitting that you are a Christian. When we get involved in conversations about laying down chicks, getting hammered, popping pills (illegal drug use), and bouncing curse words off eachothers chests we are denying that we know Him. Ya, I said it, we are all guilty. Just the other day I laughed along with the crowd when a guy was blantantly dropping G.D.'s and J.C.'s to be funny, how upset must God have been? Shameful on my behalf, I'm a hypocrit and I'm tired of falling off and backsliding. Belief isn't enough, let's dig deeper, read, fellowship, dig through the archives on this blog, and get into prayer more (bless your food before you eat it, bless a friends meal too- challenge!).
Lord; forgive us for denying that we know you too often, cleanse us of our sinful past, we praise you for your grace and mercy, strengthen us to do work, to battle, and to be courageous to stand alone if the situation predicts. We love You and worship You for You alone are worthy. Amen.
4 comments:
Jules, I'm right there with you man. I've had a problem with my own testimony over the last few years. I've claimed to be a christian since 10th grade but supposedly didn't surrender my life to Christ until 2006. I've recently come to realize that I wasn't a Christian all those years that i claimed to be. I think I've only been a true christian for a little over 3 years now. Sure, I repeated the sinner's prayer that time in 10th grade but I did it over and over again because I never felt any different. Maybe thats because I didn't truly repent and turn away from my self-centered life and turn to a life of submission to my King. How many more people are stuck in that same trap that I was in for so long? Jules, you are absolutely right. Believing is not enough. Jesus called his disciples to drop everything and follow Him. He told the rich man to sell all that he has and follow Him. He said that you must die to yourself to follow Him. To be a christian is to be a follower of Christ and Jesus preached that following Him would cost you everything. That means surrendering everything in your life to Him and getting rid of any self-centered motives that you may have. You can't believe that Christ died on the cross for your sins and then still live a life that pleases your own desires and think you're saved. What do you guys think? I could go crazy on this because this exact topic has been on my mind for a solid year now. Thanks Jules. What do you guys think? I'm so interested in this particular discussion so I'd love to hear everyone's thoughts.
-Terry
PS - The Authentic Gospel - read it! Its only like 20 pages but covers this exact issue.
HAHA...I just put up a post that echoes this one. I hadn't read it before I put it up. It's cool how God works. There must be some reason why this message is on at least 3 of our minds...He must be trying to make a point with us.
Terry is right..."The Authentic Gospel" is a must read. It's only 2 or 3 bucks...no excuses!!!
Also the books of 1 John and James are absolutly nails on this subject.
Hmm...
This is a good subject. I know, for me, that I made a distinct change in my life in 99' and everyone noticed. Maybe, it is because of my personality of going insane on something when I get a passion for it (cigars, chess, ping pong, books, etc..) but everyone in my life knew that I had become a christian. Parents, friends (that I stopped hanging out with immediately) teammates all knew that I was now different. I was a teeeeerrible kid before so the change was drastic. So, I definitely felt it. Then, I went to college and got back into myself, then came back strong, then back cold. So, where does that leave me? I don't know, but it is good to have on my mind.
Jules - in your first paragraph you talk about people you hear who say "I am a Christian, I believe in Jesus" but you say they have zero fruit. I would challenge you to view that as a huge opportunity. Those are lay ups to open up discussions. They are the ones that you can hear that sentence and expand on them to what it truely takes to believe. We all have our little project person that we know is a tough sell (athiest, deist, believe we all go to heaven, nobody goes to heaven, all religions are equal) They are the hard eggs to crack, but the people that say they are in the same boat as you, you can take them to the promise land with you.
For all of us to be like Paul is just going to be a grind. Everyday we are going to have challenges. We will dominate in some and fail in the others. It is just about getting up the next day in our spiritual battle and doing better. I sometimes get confused reading Old Testament and just see God walking in Eden with Adam. Having open dialoges with Enoch and Elijah. Taking Moses up on the mountain. I want God to stop in on my cubicle and have a sit down. Or everyone that got to go hear a sermon by Jesus himself in the New Testament. I remember Terry one time just said this "Old Testament had God, New had Jesus and we now have the Holy Spirit". I know that is not the whole way of how it works, but just something that popped in my head as I'm writing this. We need to remember that it is a two way street. We can't just kick back with our size 12's up on the desk, hold our arms and hold out for our laptop to turn to flames and speak to us like a burning bush.
Somebody else follow up on this. I think this is a good topic to elaborate on.
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