Tuesday, March 7, 2017

Stay Close To Me

My five-year old had an ear infection one day last week, so I had my little side-kick tagging along with me while running my never-ending errands.  We got out of the truck and as she got about two feet ahead of me, I reached out, pulled her back and said, "Stay close to me."  As I held her against my body, protecting her with my presence, I thought about how God does the same thing with us.  Even two feet away from me could expose her to getting hit by a distracted driver in the parking lot, but having her right by my side means that I could at least keep my body between her and any potential harm.

Her proximity to me doesn't determine whether or not she is my daughter, neither does it determine the degree of my love for her.  She is my daughter all the time, no matter where I am or where she is.  My love for her is the same, whether she is in my arms or whether she is at school.  But her proximity to me does determine my ability to have a tangible influence upon her and her circumstances.  During this present darkness and time of increasing confusion and deceit, we need to fully grasp the implications of what this should look like in our spiritual lives.  Scripture says, "He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High Will abide in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say to the Lord, 'My refuge and my fortress, My God, in whom I trust!' For He will deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the deadly pestilence. He will cover you with his feathers, and under His wings you will find refuge; His faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.'" (Psalm 91:1-4).

God says to us, "Stay close to Me".  He says this because our proximity to His truth is the only way a person can be rest-assured that they are not being deceived.  He is the truth, and His truth is the way, because it is His truth that gives us life (John 14:6; John 6:63).  Mysticism, sexual immorality and idolatry have invaded the church and most people are too asleep or scripturally ignorant to see it.  God has given us His word in scripture to ensure that we have a way to see through the devil's lies, but we have become so bold in our ambivalence toward truth that we now sit at the table with the devil and critique God's word over coffee.   For the most part, the church today is drowning in a sea of ambivalence, lulled to sleep by the rocking waves of apathy.  So many of us are like my 5-year-old daughter, wandering out alone into the parking lot, led by our own ideas and desires, oblivious to oncoming traffic that could harm us.

The farther away from God's word we drift, the harder it is to receive the life-giving sustenance that comes from its truth.  Without the life-giving sustenance of God's truth, we simply practice a dead and empty religion fed by emotional experience.  Over and over again, it seems we find ourselves back in the Garden, giving audience to the enemy of our soul.  If you are compromising God's word in any area of your life, you are exposing yourself to deceit.  And the sole purpose of deceit is to lead us to destruction.


"The coming of the lawless one will be accompanied by the working of Satan, with every kind of power, sign, and false wonder.  He will use every kind of evil deception to fool those on their way to destruction, because they refuse to love and accept the truth that would save them. For this reason, God will send them a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie, in order that judgment will come upon all who have disbelieved the truth and delighted in wickedness." (2 Thess 2:9-12)

"..hold firmly to the trustworthy message as it was taught, so that by sound teaching he will be able to encourage others and refute those who contradict this message. For many are rebellious and full of empty talk and deception" (Titus 1:9,10)

"Do everything without complaining or arguing, that you may be blameless and pure, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world, as you hold firmly to the word of life." (Philippians 2:14-16).

Thursday, March 2, 2017

Almost Right

Often times, speaking truth will make you unpopular, ostracized, ridiculed, and even hated. We need only to look to Jesus to see the effect His truth elicited from the religious establishment of His day. When I read about His ministry, I see how people were either irresistibly drawn to Him or irresistibly repulsed by Him. His truth was like a sword that divided dark from light, bone from marrow, or as Spurgeon says about discernment: "knowing the difference between right, and almost right." 

But God does not call us to be popular or to pursue the approval of men.  He calls us to be obedient (John 15:14) and to be lights upon a hill (Matt 5:14).  And we shine that light from the hilltop by being beacons of truth.  He calls us to shine the light of "right", so that we can dispel the darkness of "almost right".  Which brings me to the point of this post, which is the tapestry of truth and untruth woven together in the book/movie, "The Shack." 

I read the book when it first came out, years ago, at the behest of a friend.  I had no interest in it before I read it, and I had even less after I read it.  For me, personally, all I needed to know was that God is misrepresented as a woman.  You misrepresent our holy God, Who is worthy of deep reverence, obeisance and awe-inspiring fear,  and you've lost me at "hello".  In God's personal revelation to us through His word, He has chosen to manifest Himself with male characteristics.  He describes Himself as a Father, He came as the Man, Jesus Christ, and for whatever reason He has chosen to reveal His amorphous Self with male characteristics is not only His prerogative, but also according to His infinite wisdom and purpose, which requires no explanation to us.  That one, major scriptural inconsistency in "The Shack" is enough for us to reject it altogether, but there are a whole host of other scriptural errors to choose from.  Should you like to explore them, I have included links to articles that expound on such errors at the end of my post.

I anticipate many a response to say, "It's just a story".  Yes, it is just a story, but it is a story that points us away from scripture and towards a deceitful portrayal of God, His character, and His purpose.  "The Shack" is just a story, but it is a story through which we are seeking to be entertained by a misrepresentation of God.  That is the black-and-white issue here.  Not only are we seeking entertainment through a misrepresentation of God, but entertainment which also delves into further misrepresentation of scripture.  I feel that this is just one of the many testaments to the rampant spirit of compromise that pervades the church today.  We see this story as one man's journey to find truth, so we join him on this journey, only to find that his journey leads him to the same, sweetly hissing serpent who is ever-eager for an audience to listen to his lies, "Did God really say....?" (Gen 3:1). 

The devil is a great story teller and we are no match for his brilliant schemes of deception.  When it comes to God's church, Satan will never attack us head-on.  He will never seek to deceive us through any expected or anticipated means, which is what makes him a master deceiver.  The way Satan works is through subtlety and incremental compromise.  He is a master strategist who specializes in "almost right."  And by the time you are aware of his presence, by the time you are aware of his schemes, he has long-since been at work all the while, right under your nose.  That is because the devil doesn't approach us dressed in a red cape and pointy horns, "He comes as everything you’ve ever wished for.." (--Tucker Max).

As Christ's representatives on earth, as His lamps upon a hill, we are entrusted with His word, to hold it in our hearts, pure and undefiled, "As for God, his way is upright; the word of God is pure;" (Psalm 18:30); "..And the words of the LORD are flawless," (Psalm 12:6); "Every word of God is pure.." (Prov 30:5).  As His people, as His holy ones, as His treasured inheritance, we must be zealous about upholding God's word, with a zero-tolerance policy towards compromise.  We must be zealous for our Father's house, because the enemy of our souls is zealous to defame and malign it.  We shine as beacons of light from atop a hill when we have hearts that long to glorify God by standing for truth.  In this day of gross compromise within God's church, in this present darkness, in this time of waywardness, rebellion and deceit, we cannot afford to be complacent and ambivalent towards a radical pursuit of truth, and a willingness to persevere by shouting that truth from the rooftops to anyone who will listen.

God calls His church to be "without stain or wrinkle or any such blemish, but holy and blameless." (Eph 5:27); "..holy, unblemished, and blameless in His presence.." (Col 1:22); "make every effort to be found at peace with Him, without spot or blemish." (2 Pet 3:14); "..keep the commandment without stain or reproach until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ," (1 Tim 6:14).  "Almost right" is a wrinkle in truth, it is a blemish smudged upon flawlessness, and a stain splashed across  the narrow way.  "Almost right" is the most tenacious and devastating of Satan's schemes, therefore "almost right" is our enemy, no matter how appealingly it is woven together with "right".
 

"This false teaching is like a little yeast that spreads through the whole batch of dough!" (Gal 5:9 NLT)

"...Do you not know that a little yeast leavens the whole batch of dough?" (1 Cor 5:6)

"Because zeal for Your house has consumed me, and the insults of those who insult You have fallen on me." (Psalm 69:9)

"The decrees You issue are righteous and altogether trustworthy. My zeal consumes me, because my foes forget your words. Your word is completely pure, and Your servant loves it. I am small and despised, Yet I do not forget Your precepts." (Psalm 119:138-141)

"With my whole heart I seek You; let me not wander from Your commandments! I have hidden Your word in my heart that I might not sin against You." (Psalm 119:10-11)

"You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its savor, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men. You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a basket. Instead, they set it on a lamp stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven." (Matt 5:13-16)

What Does 'The Shack' Say About Your Pain?

The Shack- Impressions

The Shack- CARM