When people reject living for Jesus Christ in every part of their lives, attempting to blend Christ and the world together, beware. Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in them. For everything in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—comes not from the Father but from the world. The world and its desires pass away, but whoever does the will of God lives forever. (1 John 2:15-17) When people compromise with the world, they will eventually find themselves worse off than when they first believed. Christians have been set free from the entanglements of this world by the blood of Jesus Christ. They have become acceptable to God by their faith in Jesus Christ and his works. Faith in Christ brings right relationship with God. Abraham found acceptance through his faith in God’s promises. As Abraham, Christians are people of faith. God, through the works of Jesus Christ on the cross, has made us holy in his sight, for Jesus is the propitiation for our sins. Jesus paid the price for all unrighteousness; He suffered the pain of death for us, experiencing the consequence of sin: death. The cancer of sin exterminates eternal life. Therefore, Christ’s blood must eradicate sin from our lives for us to inherit eternal life. Christ’s perfect life, his righteousness for our unrighteous, perfection taking the place of imperfection, provides the antidote to death. Jesus personified holiness, righteousness to all people. We who are IN CHRIST by faith have that same holiness; we are part of the body of Christ. We no longer have to work to please God, for the Bible says, you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. (Colossians 3:3). Some Christians are not satisfied with Jesus only as their lifestyle. False teachers exploit this dissatisfaction by introducing fleshly ideas, either more works, self-denial faith, or self-pursuing, self-absorbed Christianity. Regardless of the tack false teachers take, they dilute the message of Christ. Pursuits that detract from Jesus are fleshly in nature, magnifying self-will over God’s gift of life: Jesus Christ. When Christians want to win the world by becoming like the world, they are in danger of losing their souls. If they have escaped the corruption of the world by knowing our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and are again entangled in it and are overcome, they are worse off at the end than they were at the beginning. Because of this adulterous affair with the world, their minds become damaged by the effects of sin. Sin never stops debasing a person; the trajectory is always downward. Often in war, soldiers will find themselves acting in ways that they never thought possible when they were civilians. Horrific violence has no stopping place. Depending on the circumstances, a soldier in warfare may trespass society’s norms of civility. In the book, A STRANGER TO MYSELF, the journal of a German soldier on the Eastern Front in WWII, we read about cruel and sadistic acts he participated in, acts he would not have conceived of doing before the war. He was raised in a home with Christian values and morals, but war accentuated the iniquity within his human nature, bringing out the barbarian in him. When the conscience becomes frayed, we are capable of anything. There is no stopping place. When a Christian leaves the haven of grace and mercy from God, choosing all the world has to offer, there is no stopping place. The depths of sin are a bottomless pit.
A more serious condition than just an individual straying from a full commitment to Christ is when a person leads others to this dark place. Peter says, These people are springs without water and mists driven by a storm. Blackest darkness is reserved for them. For they mouth empty, boastful words and, by appealing to the lustful desires of the flesh, they entice people who are just escaping from those who live in error. These people claim freedom in their new way of living, but they are chained hand and foot to their self-willed nature. What they believe is true liberty is nothing more than servitude to darkness. They are trapped behind the bars of worldly living, filthy language, and dangerous indulgences. They profess freedom from the restrictions of holiness, but in reality they have sold their souls to the Prince of Darkness. Rebellion is his theme, self-interest is his focus. People who leave the cloistered warmth of the Good News: loving your neighbor as yourself, servanthood to others, preferring others above yourself, will usually focus on what others should be doing for them or how others hurt them. Rather than presenting Christ as the answer to life, they focus on what people can do for them. A valid Christian life will focus on loving others. When people focus on Christ plus something else, either works or secular living, they are in danger of not living a Christian life of faith in Christ and his works. If we try to find the solution to life any place else other than Christ, we will find little or no peace. Man is intent on doing what is right in his own eyes. He will blame others for his failures, his sins. Sadly, often what he determines is best for him is divisive, leading to discontent, arguments, battles, and even wars. Fundamental to the scriptures is that we all have gone astray, all have gone our own way. Consequently, we must look at ourselves first before judging other people. Of course, society is a milieu of turmoil and sickness. Christianity should bring healing by doing good to others. Christianity presents to the world not only the message of salvation, but also the message of doing good, of being a servant. Jesus demonstrates a servant behavior when he cooks breakfast for the seven disciples who toiled all night without catching any fish on the Sea of Galilee. Jesus, recently down from the cross for humanity’s sake is now seen cooking breakfast for his disciples. Some of them abandoned him when He was on the cross. Our Lord demonstrated his love for these men. (See John 21:1-14) Jesus did not teach a self-serving life. He did not teach worldliness. He did not teach a me-only road to heaven. No, He preached sacrificial love, a dedication to others. He gave living water to the thirsty; He was not as those who are springs without water and mists driven by a storm. Peter speaks very harshly of those who reject Christ’s true message, and Paul told the believers at Galatia, If anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let them be under God’s curse! (Galatians 1:8)
Sin is the great escape artist—the Houdini of our time, of any time. Sin is the desire to escape from God’s authority. In the Garden of Eden, the genesis of rebellion began rather innocuously: Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden?’” (Genesis 3:1) This simple question led to a self-serving existence, a clarion call to rebellion. The false prophets of any era begin with the notion that we will create a better existence. We will provide a better way of living, even a better way of serving God. But this talk is exploitive, mostly for the benefit of the false prophet. In their greed these teachers will exploit you with fabricated stories. (2 Peter 2:3) Out of their own imaginations, false teachers manipulate God’s word and his authority to fit their own purposes: to gain power, wealth, and notoriety. Some take on the mantle of speaking for God or claim divinity. They often separate themselves from the body of Christ. Dear children, this is the last hour; and as you have heard that the antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have come. This is how we know it is the last hour. They went out from us, but they did not really belong to us. For if they had belonged to us, they would have remained with us; but their going showed that none of them belonged to us. (1 John 2:18-19) The false prophet will reveal his true identity by lessening the authority of Christ and his redemptive power. This is the antichrist spirit, easily detected. But a more pernicious threat to the church’s stability is when false prophets bore into the fabric of the church. They become powerful within the church, carrying with them ideas that are antichrist. Usually this type of false prophet will magnify their own experiences and emphasize their name. Everything within their purview will have their name tacked onto it. They are magnified, not Christ. This is an antichrist spirit; the replacement of their lives for Christ’s life. Seemingly the elevating of man is harmless, but it is so dangerous because people begin to believe the views of a man over the word of God. Many people today follow this kind of leaders, relating the truth of the word to everything their leader has said about the word, quite innocuous, but quite dangerous. If any doctrine or anyone leads you away from your dependence on Jesus Christ and his righteousness, you are being led away from your SAVIOR. He alone has made you right with God. He alone is pleasing to God. Place your faith every day in him and in his works on the cross. If so, you will experience daily the intimate presence of the Holy Spirit. His words will be rich in you and sustain your life in the SPIRIT.
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