Christianity – A Fad or Faith?

I have been thinking about this faith that we now claim is Christianity and the way we live as believers. I wonder if what we now have is really what it is. If it is, why did people need to die for this faith? Were they just a bit too fanatical or are the ones who got it right? If this life we live now is what it rightly should be then what is there to die for? There won't be anything to die for if we can twist and bend the word of God to align with what is acceptable to us at every point in time. This entire thing is beginning to look like a joke and I know it is not. I wonder if we really believe that God is who He says He is. We act and talk like God is confused and says things He does not mean otherwise why would we live like we do and yet claim to be believers in this faith that is the opposite of what we do and then we laugh and argue that God understands our frail frame and will accept us just as we are. We give up nothing and so pay no price. The only thing that changes is the fact that we now say we are born again. We, like pigs rolling in mud, ravel in iniquity whilst He says anyone who goes by His name should depart from iniquity. Could that be a joke also?

 

2 Timothy 2: 19 "But God's truth stands firm like a foundation stone with this inscription: The Lord knows those who are his, and all who belong to the Lord must turn away from evil.

1Peter 1: 16 "For the scriptures say you must be holy as I am holy."

I have heard severally and even from preachers, for example that it is impossible for man even the regenerated man to be holy yet the word of God says God demands that we be holy. These things are confusing because I know God Is not confused and certainly expresses Himself very clearly but we sound like He may not quiet mean what he says or like we could help Him say what He intended to say much better than He has done. Indeed, how can we then be holy when we already insist that it is impossible to do so? Honestly, I don't think unbelievers are the greatest problem of our faith; we make nonsense of it ourselves thereby making our God appear smaller than He is. Like I heard a preacher say, the word of God is not a buffet where one is allowed to pick and choose what they prefer to eat, it is a served meal where we take on all that is served for the meal to be impactful. How can the word be powerful in the life of a believer who picks what word they want and then dumps the rest of it? The word is a personality who is either going to be powerful in our lives or powerless in a life because he is inhibited in that  life. God is unchanging but He will be in your life who you decide He should be and that is only in your life because in reality, He is unchanging and it is only to the extent that our existence is in Him that we experience His power. His desire is that we live totally in Him.

 

Acts 17: 28 "For in him we live and move and exist. As some of your own poets have said we are his offspring.'

This faith has been so watered down that I wonder if the angels recognize who we are. We are not the world yet we are not what God's offspring should be so who really are we? When we are neither here nor there, we become an aberration - a being that doesn't exist anywhere but I guess in truth that means one is in the camp of the devil. How then do we expect the ministering spirits sent to minister to us as we speak the word to move when there is no power released in what we say because it is often not the word of God and even when it is, it is like the devil speaking the word because it is not coming from the right vessel- the vessel is not unto honor. Hence we often find ourselves wondering whether or not there is power in the word of God but it is this same word that released power in the time of the Apostles and the times of saints that have gone before us like Kenneth Hagin, Oral Roberts and is still releasing power in the mouth of some today. Unfortunately, instead of fixing our issues, believers are running from one lesser god to the other seeking power and help.

Hebrews 1: 14 "Therefore, angels are only servants-spirits sent to care for people who will inherit salvation."

What exactly is wrong? Is the problem with us, the word or the God of the word? I believe the problem is with us. God has not changed and will never change. If He was consistently changing then variableness would be found in Him which is not the case and that is why we can trust Him. We need to make decisions. God is not changing the faith to suit us. He loves us so much He is doing all to ensure we align with the faith.

The Word Of God – WCO Prayer Conference

Thank God for our last WCO Prayer Conference where we were reminded of and taught the word of God. For me, every minute at the Conference was an experience I would like to relieve but I guess God would prefer for me to go forward with what I received instead of relieving the experience. The one thing that was certain is that God desires for us to go forward so He let us know that He is all we need to go forward. Of course that does not mean that God does everything and we do nothing; it only means that because He is God who creates and also knows all the path we could ever take as well as the end of the journey, He is able and willing to provide all we need if we could trust Him enough to seek counsel from Him and just obey His instructions and I guess this is where it gets tough because His instructions sometimes can be very confusing particularly in the face of current day realities. Moreover, we live in a world that likes to believe that God is so outdated He does not understand the present day realities. Of course to the world, those instructions are totally silly. No wonder the hymn writer says “He works in a mysterious way, His wonders to perform.”

 

1 Corinthians 1: 27 – 28 “Instead, God chose things the world considers foolish in order to shame those who think they are wise. And he chose things that are powerless to shame those who are powerful. God chose things despised by the world, things counted as nothing at all, and used them to bring to nothing what the world considers important.”

 

So we were counseled to listen out for instructions from the Word and the Word is Jesus Christ the son of God. He can choose to speak to us directly or through His written word which suggests that we must pay attention to His written word. The only way we learn the voice of God is by building on our relationship with Him and there is no achieving that without building a relationship with the written word. No one who stands afar would be able to discern His voice accurately. The stronger our relationship is with people, the easier and faster we are able to recognize their voices even when we can’t see them and in the midst of many voices. Relationship definitely plays a major part in identifying the voice of Christ not withstanding how and when He speaks. Sometimes we hope to learn to discern His voice without building on our relationship with Him but that isn’t really possible. It is like saying you will know when I speak without knowing me. You have to have heard me a number of times to recognize my voice when you hear it. You can get to know me so well that even when I write you recognize me even without seeing my name.

 

John 10: 26 - 27 “But you don’t believe me because you are not my sheep. My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me.”

 

Voice is very powerful because man is greatly impacted by what he hears. God speaks to His own and this has nothing to do with what generation one exist in but has everything to do with whether or not one belongs to Him. In every generation, there are people born of the Spirit, as a result of which they are known as the children of God, with whom God certainly communicates. These are people to whom God is Father and Redeemer and a father would definitely communicate with his children. No father consistently communicates with his child through another except if he is unhappy with the child. Sometimes we might be a little confused as to what our father is saying which is why he has other children that you can speak to with a view to getting a clearer understanding of what he is saying but he would speak to you. When we desire better understanding it is wise to speak to those children who also have a good relationship with Him but we very often prefer to speak to children who barely themselves speak to Him or have a relationship with Him; how then can they help us understand what God is saying? The mind of God is often times not revealed in one word. You put many words or sentences together to get a clear picture. You need to wait patiently to get a good understanding instead of rushing of with half a sentence.

 

1 Samuel 3: 9 “So he said to Samuel, ‘go and lie down again, and if someone calls again, say, Speak, Lord, your servant is listening.’ So Samuel went back to bed.”

 

We must listen to God in an attitude of obedience. Very often we already conceived what we want and how we will get it so that unwittingly we already put ourselves in that place of disobedience. When we make that decision to truly walk with God, we must be open to His instructions. Preconceived notions are usually a problem with walking with God. Our minds are made up in a particular direction so that it is even difficult to realize that God is saying something totally different from what we think He is saying all because of what we had assumed He would say. It is time to return to listening to God if we desire to go forward by Him. God definitely still leads His own.

Neither God Nor His Word have Changed; Don’t Change His Worship

I think every believer knows that the way of God is not compatible with the way of the world. In bible parlance the Spirit and the flesh are always at war. The flesh always wants to rule even in places where the Spirit of God is legitimately in control. Meanwhile the Spirit of God Is not unruly; He waits to be invited and given room to take charge but when He is in charge, He is absolutely in charge. No wonder the bible says when light comes, darkness has no choice but to leave. The truth is, darkness hates that and is consistently trying to return. Unfortunately, unlike light, darkness is not a gentleman and will go as far as it can push. It does not wait to be permitted but tries very hard to force his way into every life, space or anywhere he finds room. The life of a believer is therefore one of consistent struggle to ensure that He is permitting light into His life and exposing Himself fully to light. As we yield to light, He increases in us and impacts our life even more; but darkness is consistently trying to bring us under his control attempting to enslave us. Darkness is a mean slave master.

 

John 1: 4 – 5 “The word gave life to everything that was created, and his life brought light to everyone. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness can never extinguish it.”

 

The last time I checked, worship service is church organized gathering of Christians and unbelievers for the sole purpose of fellowshipping with the light. It is a time when our sole focus is to worship God who is Spirit in the Spirit thereby exposing ourselves to the light who is God so that our spirit man is empowered and our flesh is brought under control of our spirit which is controlled by the Spirit of God. God clearly demands to be worshipped in the Spirit and we Pentecostals lay strong claim to doing that very well: also accusing non-Pentecostal churches of not having the Spirit of God. It is therefore getting a little confusing to me when instead of exposing our spirit man to the spirit of God, in some of our worship services we fan the flesh. The excuse we often make give for this is that we feel a need to do everything during these our worship services because that is when we catch everybody so every and anything is allowed during these services and by the time we are done, we leave church even more carnal than we came in. It is not possible to leave a worship service filled with the spirit when all we did almost through it all, was feed our flesh. Could it be that we have lost sight of the purpose for this gathering? Believers came together for a purpose which certainly did not include feeding the flesh. Is it really correct to assume that the two can flow together despite that the spirit and the flesh war against one another?

 

Ephesians 5: 18b “Instead be filled with the Holy Spirit, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs among yourselves, and making music to the Lord in your hearts.”

Romans 14: 17 “For the Kingdom of God is not a matter of what we eat or drink, but of living a life of goodness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.”

 

Some leaders argue that congregation have very short attention span these days so they need to be engaged fully with activity during the service. It is interesting to note that we are talking about adults who should be controlled and disciplined enough to sit through these things. If this is a real problem then maybe we need to look inwards with a view to ascertaining whether or not God is still in our services. Unlike many would like us to believe, God is not boring; but if we must indeed do something to arrest the situation urgently, it would probably be wiser to spend less time in these services than to engage worldly means bearing in mind that these ways do not align with the ways of God and if anything, will make the Holy Spirit leave. If we so desperately want activities, then we must choose godly ones instead of the ones that make it difficult for the Holy Spirit to remain and definitely fan our flesh. Very often, the same people that complain about the length of worship services, sit for hours without end gossiping or doing other ungodly things feeding their flesh. Worship services must remain what they are and if we must entertain people then we must do it outside of these services. It is disheartening to see the way the church is going today even to the extent where comedians albeit Christian comedians are invited to minister. Please do not misunderstand me, I am not opposed to godly humor and have nothing against the comedians. I am only saying that they would serve their purpose in other church functions and events or Christian events. We appear to be getting everything mixed up and need to sort them out. As it is often said, the line between the flesh and the Spirit is really thin making it easy to crossover from the spirit to the flesh without really meaning to; we need to check to see if we have not crossed that line.

 

James 4: 4 “Ye adulterers! Don’t you realize that friendship with the world makes you an enemy of God? I say it again: if you want to be a friend of the world, you make yourself an enemy of God.”

 

The traditional churches which we often refer to as worldly appear to be doing better. They even understand about creating the right atmosphere for God. One enters these churches even when there is no service and one feels the presence of God; this is no longer a common experience in our Pentecostal churches. I understand that God loves us all with all our different personalities which He would have us express, but the worship of God has not changed. It could be done with a lot of noise or solemnity but it is still worship of our God and has to be spiritual for He whom we worship demands that He will be worshipped in the Spirit. I know that churches struggle to keep people in church but the longing of man will not be satisfied carnally. He will only get worse because He will yearn for more and more and would need to be entertained with even more carnality as time goes on. Any satisfaction carnality may appear to provide is very temporary; such people soon become restless again because this craving is for something deeply spiritual and can only be satisfied by the Spirit. Worship services must remain what they are - worship service; otherwise let us call them something else. We can’t claim to worship God applying the things He hates so much.