They Believe Others

“I have come in My Father’s name, and you do not receive Me. If another comes in his own name, him you will receive.”  John 5:43

 

Certainly we know this to be a prophetic statement.  Truly there will come a time where the Antichrist will arise and lead the world astray (Rev. 13:14).  Pretending to be God (2 Thes. 2:4), he will become both the political and religious leader of the world (Rev. 13:3).  During that time, the “time of Jacob’s trouble” (Jer. 30:7), better known as the Great Tribulation, many will be deceived.  That is a time like no other and Jesus warned about such a time. 

 

“For then there will be great affliction, such as has not been since the beginning of the world until this time, no, nor ever shall be.  And unless those days were shortened, no flesh would be kept safe alive; but for the elect’s sake those days will be shortened.  Then if anyone says to you, Look, here is the Christ; or, There; do not believe it.  For false christs and false prophets will arise and show great signs and wonders to lead astray, if possible, even the elect.  Behold, I have told you beforehand.”  Matthew 24:21-25

 

Yet we have seen precursors in many ways since Jesus went to sit at the Father’s right hand (Mk. 16:19).  Already the mass majority believe others, instead of believing Jesus Christ, the author and finisher of our faith.

 

“Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so persistently harasses us, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.”  Hebrews 12:1-2

 

We know that God does not change.  Quite simply the character and moral standards set by God are the same.

“For I, Jehovah, change not.”  Malachi 3:6a

 

“Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today, and forever.”  Hebrews 13:8

 

So why has man changed the standards of God?  Why has the simplicity of Salvation, for a sinner to repent and by faith believe into Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, become so watered down, that there are literally flocks of people who falsely name Jesus as their Savior, never having been Born Again, those who claim, but do not truly know Jesus in their hearts?

 

“All things have been delivered to Me by My Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father. Nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and the one to whom the Son wills to reveal Him.  Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.  Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and you will find rest unto your souls.  For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”  Matthew 11:27-30

 

“Truly, these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now commands all men everywhere to repent, because He has established a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has appointed. He has given assurance of this to everyone by raising Him from the dead.”  Acts 17:30-31

 

 

“And he brought them out and said, Sirs, what must I do to be saved?  So they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved, you and your household.”  Acts 16:30-31

“Then Peter said to them, Repent, and let every one of you be immersed in the name of Jesus Christ to the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.  For the promise is to you and to your children, and to all who are afar off, as many as the Lord our God will call.”  Acts 2:38-39

 

“Jesus said to him, I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.”  John 14:6

 

“If we receive the testimony of men, the testimony of God is greater; for this is the testimony of God which He has witnessed about His Son.  He who believes in the Son of God has the testimony in himself; he who does not believe God has made Him a liar, because he has not believed the testimony that God has given concerning His Son.  And this is the testimony: that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son.  He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life.  These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life, and that you may continue to believe in the name of the Son of God.”  1st John 5:9-13

 

Jesus said, “I tell you, no; but unless you repent you will all likewise perish.”  Luke 13:3

 

Understand what has become a complex issue.  Salvation is simple, repent and by faith believe into the Lord Jesus Christ as your Savior, truly an issue of the heart of a sinner before their Creator.  Yet what we have is an extremely complex issue whereas many are on the broad path that leads to destruction, with the thought that they will be in Heaven after they die.  Many are chasing after false religions, who offer pretences based upon works or other unbiblical rites that they purport are the correct path to Heaven.  These are not new ideas or a new problem, but what has confounded the simplicity that is found in Christ (2 Cor. 11:3) is that fact that nowadays there are all of these preachers who speak lies, who preach a dangerous doctrine, one that does not fit into the Word of God.  They twist their words and proclaim that this is what God proclaims, yet He does not.  He hasn’t changed, they have changed, changed from the Truth, if they were ever even there, to spewing words of death to their unfortunate and often willingly participating congregation.  They believe others, instead of believing Jesus Christ.

 

“Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many entering in through it.  Because narrow is the gate and distressing is the way which leads unto life, and there are few who find it.  Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves.  You will know them from their fruits. Do men gather grapes from thornbushes or figs from thistles?  Even so, every good tree produces excellent fruit, but a corrupt tree produces evil fruit.  A good tree is not able to produce evil fruit, nor is a corrupt tree able to produce excellent fruit.  Every tree that does not produce excellent fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.  Therefore from their fruits you will know them.  Not everyone who says to Me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of Heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in Heaven.  Many will say to Me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many works of power in Your name?  And then I will declare to them, I never knew you; depart from Me, you who work out lawlessness!  Therefore whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock; and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock.  And everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be likened to a foolish man who built his house on the sand; and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat upon that house; and it fell. And great was its fall.”  Matthew 7:13-27

 

“Now the Spirit expressly says that in latter times some will depart from the faith, being devoted to corrupting spirits and doctrines of demons, speaking lies in hypocrisy, having their own conscience seared, forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from foods which God created to be partaken with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth.”  1st Timothy 4:1-3

 

“But know this, that in the last days perilous times will come: For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, unyielding, slanderers, without self-control, savage, despisers of good, traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having a form of godliness but denying its power. And from such people turn away.  For of this sort are those who creep into households and make captives of gullible women loaded down with sins, led away by various lusts, always learning, but never able to come to the full true knowledge of the truth.”  2nd Timothy 3:1-7

 

“For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own lusts, desiring to hear pleasant things, they will heap up for themselves teachers; and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to myths.”  2nd Timothy 4:3-4

 

Dangerous times, dangerous times indeed!  For now the preacher from the pulpit likes to tell lies.  They enjoy their large buildings, their full congregations of the doomed, who seem to portray the rightness of their false doctrine, just by the mere numbers of people who sit amongst the spiritually dead week after week.  Certainly who will rise up against them and speak the truth?!  Who will dare tell those wealthy, those in high positions, those with respect amongst the leaders of their respective community, that indeed their doctrine of self, wealth and relative morals are lies that they enjoy hearing, because their companions certainly say it is so?!

 

Just as Stephen Hawking will now have his confidence in a scientific formula of there being no God shattered, that which he preached, as the unnamed king of the atheists, tested, so too they will stand before their Creator, not in joy, not with the gates of Heaven being opened, but in fear of knowingly that whether willingly or unwittingly, they are doomed for all eternity to the Lake of Fire.  For all will stand before their Creator, if your name is not written in the Book of Life, then the judgment against you is known already. 

 

“And I saw a great white throne and Him who sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heavens fled away. And there was found no place for them.  And I saw the dead, small and great, standing before God. And books were opened. And another book was opened, which is the Book of Life. And the dead were judged according to their works, out of the things which were written in the books.  And the sea gave up the dead who were in it, and Death and Hades delivered up the dead who were in them. And they were judged, each one, according to their works.  And Death and Hades were cast into the Lake of Fire. This is the second death.  And anyone not found written in the Book of Life was cast into the Lake of Fire.”  Revelation 20:11-15

 

“The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, and with all unrighteous deception among those who are perishing, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved.  And for this reason God will send them strong delusion, that they should believe the lie, that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.”  2nd Thessalonians 2:9-12

 

These issues have been addressed in the past.  The reality of the situation that more than ever nowadays, we as Americans, and indeed much of the world face, is that the amount of preachers who are called by God to preach and indeed do not water down God’s Word is becoming more and more sparse.  As a preacher is called to be faithful, so to must those who are Believers in this dark age.

 

“All Scripture is breathed by God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.”  2nd Timothy 3:16-17

 

“I charge you therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who will judge the living and the dead at His appearing and His kingdom: Preach the Word. Be ready in season and out of season. Convict, rebuke, exhort, with all longsuffering and teaching.”  2nd Timothy 4:1-2

 

“Moreover it is required in stewards that one be found faithful.”  1st Corinthians 4:2

 

“Therefore we strive, whether at home or away, to be well pleasing to Him.  For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive the things done in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad.  Knowing, therefore, the terror of the Lord, we persuade men; and we are well known to God, and I also hope are well known in your consciences.”  2nd Corinthians 5:9-11

 

We certainly live in world where they believe others.

 

They believe others rather than God who Created the heavens and earth.

 

“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”  Genesis 1:1

 

“Professing to be wise, they become foolish, and change the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man, and birds and four-footed animals and creeping things.”  Romans 1:22-23

 

They believe others rather than God who says there are two genders.

 

“But from the beginning of the creation, God made them male and female.”  Mark 10:6

 

They believe others rather than God who states that sodomy is an abomination.

 

“For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh; so then they are no longer two, but one flesh.”  Mark 10:7-8

 

“You shall not lie with a male as with a female. It is an abomination.”  Leviticus 18:22

 

They believe others rather than God and continue on in their sexual perversions.

 

“Flee sexual perversion. Every sin that a man does is outside the body, but he who commits sexual immorality sins against his own body.”  1st Corinthians 6:18

 

“Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be led astray. Neither prostitutes, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God.”  1st Corinthians 6:9-10

 

“And they did not repent of their murders nor their sorceries nor their sexual perversions nor their thefts.”  Revelation 9:21

 

The list could go on and on, nonetheless, for those who know Christ, for those who have repented and by faith believed into the Lord Jesus Christ, remember and keep this close to your heart.

 

“And if it seems evil to you to serve Jehovah, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods which your fathers have served that were on the other side of the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my house, we will serve Jehovah.”  Joshua 24:15

 

For those who believe others and like to listen to soothing words from the preacher, take to heart these words of warning from Jesus.

 

“And to the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write, These things says the Amen, the Faithful and True Witness, the Beginning of the creation of God:  I know your works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I would that you were cold or hot.  So then, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will vomit you out of My mouth.  Because you say, I am rich, have become wealthy, and have need of nothing; and do not know that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked;  I counsel you to buy from Me gold refined in the fire, that you may be rich; and white garments, that you may be clothed, that the shame of your nakedness may not be revealed; and anoint your eyes with eye salve, that you may see.  As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten. Therefore be zealous and repent.  Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me.  To him who overcomes I will grant to sit with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne.  He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.” Revelation 3:14-22

 

Amen!