Category: False Teaching

When the Church Confers

Friday, July 18, 2014

“…[G]ive attendance to reading, to exhortation, to doctrine” (1 Timothy 4:13).

Having attended a grace Bible conference via the internet these last six days, I devote today’s devotional to reflecting upon it.

Anytime we meet with like-minded believers in Jesus Christ, it should be the most enjoyable experience this side of heaven. Moreover, when two-dozen Holy-Spirit-filled, knowledgeable yet humble, preachers of God’s grace to us in Jesus Christ, teach from the King James Bible rightly divided, the lost will hear the Gospel of Grace many times over, and the saints will be greatly edified many times over.

The conference was a very refreshing time for people who were confused about soul salvation unto justification and eternal life, and an equally encouraging time for Christians who needed either establishment or stabilization in sound Bible doctrine. No one went home without hearing the Gospel of God’s Grace (Jesus Christ’s finished crosswork as sufficient payment for our sins), no one went home without hearing about proper Bible study (Paul’s apostleship to us), and no one went home without having heard about the infallibility and reliability of the King James Bible. What they do with that information is their decision, not ours.

In accordance with today’s Scripture, attendance was indeed given to reading, exhortation, and doctrine. Attendance to “study[ing]… rightly dividing the word of truth” was certainly given (2 Timothy 2:15); attendance to believing those verses, however, that is the hearer’s prerogative. Those who did trust the Gospel presented, they passed from death to life; those who believed the sound Bible doctrine presented, they were liberated from denominational yokes and prisons, and Bible perversions. Yea, some heard more sound Bible doctrine in six days, than they heard in all their lives in “church!”

Such a conference of sound Bible doctrine redounds to the Lord Jesus Christ’s glory alone, it resounds throughout the heavenly places, and it abounds in the hearts of us who believe. O, the manifold grace of God to all mankind! O, the manifold grace of God that enables us in Christ to tell all of lost mankind about that manifold grace of God to them! 🙂

NOTE: I highly recommend the 2014 Grace School of the Bible Summer Family Bible Conference to you. You may access its archived videos and MP3’s here.

Aerial Attack! #7

Saturday, July 12, 2014

“And let it be, when thou hearest the sound of a going in the tops of the mulberry trees, that then thou shalt bestir thyself: for then shall the LORD go out before thee, to smite the host of the Philistines” (2 Samuel 5:24 KJV).

Some 3,000 years ago, Israel had aerial military support, and it is only a preview of the “fighter jets” yet to come!

“Thou [Ariel /Jerusalem, verse 1] shalt be visited of the LORD of hosts with thunder, and with earthquake, and great noise, with storm and tempest, and the flame of devouring fire” (Isaiah 29:6). At His Second Coming, Messiah (Jesus) will come with “flaming fire” to cleanse His land and His nation Israel of apostates/unbelievers, those who have followed Satan’s policy of evil (Psalm 97:3-5; Ezekiel 20:38; Zechariah 13:8,9; Matthew 3:7-11; Luke 3:7-9,16,17).

Through Moses, JEHOVAH prophesied in Deuteronomy 32:22: “For a fire is kindled in mine anger, and shall burn unto the lowest hell, and shall consume the earth with her increase, and set on fire the foundations of the mountains.” (See also verses 35-43, which speak of God’s vengeance.) The fire that will attend Jesus Christ will burn into the Earth’s surface to expose a shaft leading into hell itself. Christ will toss His enemies, Israel’s enemies, right into hell (Revelation 14:9-11), and His people on Earth will see those carcasses/souls suffering in hell (Isaiah 66:22-24; Mark 9:42-50).

The Prophet Micah wrote: “[3] For, behold, the LORD cometh forth out of his place, and will come down, and tread upon the high places of the earth. [4] And the mountains shall be molten under him, and the valleys shall be cleft, as wax before the fire, and as the waters that are poured down a steep place. … [7] And all the graven images thereof shall be beaten to pieces, and all the hires thereof shall be burned with the fire, and all the idols thereof will I lay desolate:…” (1:3,4,7). Using this fire, Jesus Christ will purge the world of its idols.

Indeed, the fire at Christ’s Second Coming will throughly cleanse the world of everything that pollutes and opposes Israel….

Liberated to Serve

Friday, July 4, 2014

“For, brethren, ye have been called unto liberty; only use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by love serve one another” (Galatians 5:13 KJV).

Today, as we in the United States celebrate the 238th anniversary of our nation’s independence, we invite our Christian brethren worldwide to rejoice with us concerning our freedom in Jesus Christ.

When we proclaim Romans 6:14—“Ye are not under the law, but under grace”—people tend to assume “loose living.” Does “grace living” really mean we can now live any way we want? Lest anyone be misled in that regard, God the Holy Spirit moved the Apostle Paul to write in the next verse, “What then? shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid [May God never let that happen!]” (Romans 6:15). Grace living is not Law-keeping, but it certainly is not Law-breaking either.

God still cares how we live, albeit He is not operating the “weak and beggarly” system of “bondage” (Law) that He once did with Israel (Galatians 4:9). God proved to the entire world that since Israel could not keep His commandments perfectly, no other sons of Adam (the Gentiles) could either: “Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them [Israel] who are under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world [Gentiles] may become guilty before God” (Romans 3:19).

We sinners cannot keep the Law. However, God in His grace provided us a way to escape that condemnation by sending Jesus Christ to offer Himself on Calvary’s cruel cross to pay for our sins. By simple faith in Jesus Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection as the fully-satisfying payment for our sins, we can now be “made the righteousness of God in [Christ]” (2 Corinthians 5:21). We can be delivered from the penalty of sin (hell and the lake of fire) and the power of sin (flesh-walking).

Why are we Christians free? To selfishly live any way we want? NO! Today’s Scripture says we are liberated to now serve others, especially our Christian brethren, just as Jesus Christ selflessly served His Father and selflessly died on our behalf. That is grace living!!!!

Please see our 2011 Fourth of July Bible study “Proclaim Liberty Throughout All the Land,” which can be watched here or read here.

Your “Home” Grace Church

Thursday, July 3, 2014

“These things write I unto thee, hoping to come unto thee shortly: But if I tarry long, that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth” (1 Timothy 3:14,15 KJV).

Searching “to no avail” for a local grace church? (Search no more, for you already know its address!)

Replying to yesterday’s devotional, one of our readers emailed me. Like so many we hear from, she voiced her discouragement and asked where she should “go to church” when no pure local church could be found! My family and I were in a similar predicament years ago, until I heard a Christian brother and ministry coworker say, “Walk out your front door, stand in your front yard, turn around, and voila—your local grace church building!” 🙂

Until organized religion began to dominate Christianity during the first few centuries A.D., and construction began on elaborate cathedrals and other monuments to man’s “goodness,” God’s people met in homes. We read about the “church” that met in Rome in Priscilla and Aquila’s house (Romans 16:3-5)—note, not Peter’s house! Scripture also mentions the “church” in Nymphas’ house in Laodicea (Colossians 4:15), and the “church” in Philemon’s house in Colosse (Philemon 2).

In Paul’s ministry, a “church” was not a building, for the God of the Bible lives in Christians instead of manmade structures (Acts 17:24). “If therefore the whole church be come together into one place…” (1 Corinthians 14:23)—the “church” is not the place, but the Christians in the place. “Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?” (1 Corinthians 3:16).

As King James Bible-believing, Pauline-dispensational Christians, we are God’s church. Our homes are where the “church” meets! If we have no teacher or pastor, we can locate sound grace Bible study material and utilize it (you are more than welcome to use our studies). We have no desire to attend “worship services” that abound with denominationalism and religious tradition, so we stay at home with our Bibles and invite any like-minded Christians to join us!

Meat and Bones

Wednesday, July 2, 2014

“Prove all things; hold fast that which is good” (1 Thessalonians 5:21 KJV).

Eat the meat but do not choke on the bones!

A discouraged Christian friend once emailed me to explain his dilemma. He had discovered a source that contained sound Bible doctrine and church tradition. He recognized the doctrinal error, yet he was so disturbed that he was questioning everything in the source (even the sound doctrine). My advice to him was simple, “Eat the meat but do not choke on the bones!” (The same advice conveyed in unique phraseology was also helpful to me when I was in the same predicament years earlier.)

Having visited our local “Christian” bookstore recently, I could not help but chuckle at much of the literature I saw there. There were shelves after shelves after shelves of volumes that had nothing to do with the God of the Holy Bible, nothing to do with the Holy Bible, nothing to do with the Christian life God has given us in Christ. If were were to purge today’s average “Christian” bookstore of everything non-Christian, doubtless the store would soon declare bankruptcy!

Since organized religion has corrupted pure Christianity, Christendom is a spiritual minefield—it is dotted with thousands of gimmicks, heresies, and other traps. If the Christian is to survive Satan’s military tactics and assaults, he or she must be grounded in God’s Word rightly divided. The Christian must always remember that the Holy Bible rightly divided is the “minesweeper,” detecting and destroying the mines that would otherwise destroy the Christian. As today’s Scripture says, we need to sort truth from error. Our standard as English-speaking Christians is the King James Bible rightly divided. That which fails the test is worthless, so we toss it out; that which passes the test is “good,” so we retain it!

Dear saints, we will never find a perfect local church, but that is not our desire anyway. We “make no bones about it”—we seek a pure church, for that is what the Holy Spirit desires us to have (2 Corinthians 6:14-18; 2 Corinthians 11:1-20). We seek neither “milk” nor bones, but “meat” (1 Corinthians 3:2)! 🙂

Cain Came and Brought Shame #8

Sunday, June 29, 2014

“And Adam knew Eve his wife; and she conceived, and bare Cain, and said, I have gotten a man from the LORD” (Genesis 4:1 KJV).

Can you identify the very significant phrase our King James Bible contains in today’s Scripture, and why it was said?

With our completed Bible in hand, we can look back and see what damage Cain inflicted—especially the long-term effects. His wickedness not only caused the murder of God’s first prophet (Luke 11:50,51), but it began a way/method to approach God on the basis of our will and our preferences. Even today, the same works-religion system afflicts and deceives the (Jesus-rejecting) world.

Describing unbelieving Jews living during the seven-year Tribulation, the time period after our Dispensation of Grace, Jude wrote: “Woe unto them! for they have gone in the way of Cain, and ran greedily after the error of Balaam for reward, and perished in the gainsaying of Core [Korah]” (verse 11). Although beyond the scope of our current discussion, suffice it to say that Jude selected three specific Old Testament accounts of rebellions against the God of the Bible. The Holy Spirit led Jude to mention Cain first. Again, instead of being God’s Messiah/Christ (as Eve assumed; today’s Scripture), Cain was the person who began a “way” (system, manner) of attempting to approach the God of creation on the basis of our will, trying to reach Him how we choose rather than how He instructed.

Cain was certainly not the Messiah. Actually, he paved the way for the Antichrist, the counterfeit Messiah, and his satanic religious system (which would arise at least 6,000 years later)! Cain is a picture of the Antichrist and his followers; Abel is a type of believing Israel, God’s remnant of believers whom the unbelievers persecute. The Prophet Daniel described how the Antichrist will “destroy the mighty and holy people… and by peace shall destroy many” (8:24,25) and “speak great words against the most High, and shall wear out the saints of the most High” (7:25). In the spirit/attitude of Cain, the Antichrist will speak against the God of the Bible and execute God’s people….

Cain Came and Brought Shame #6

Friday, June 27, 2014

“And Adam knew Eve his wife; and she conceived, and bare Cain, and said, I have gotten a man from the LORD” (Genesis 4:1 KJV).

Can you identify the very significant phrase our King James Bible contains in today’s Scripture, and why it was said?

Whilst Eve assumed that Cain would be a man who would serve the God of the Bible, 1 John 3:12 says, “Cain… was of that wicked one.” Cain was not a man of faith; he was eventually manifested to be Satan’s tool, not a believer in God’s Word. Like Satan (Isaiah 14:12-15), Cain wanted to be his own god, his own authority; moreover, like Satan, Cain wanted to get rid of God’s people, those who testified of God’s Word and who hindered the “progress” of Satan’s evil world system (the real reason why Cain killed Abel).

Spiritually, Cain was Satan’s son. Jesus commented to Israel’s lost religious leaders, “Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning…” (John 8:44). Beloved, the same godless, sinful spirit (attitude) that operated in Satan controlled Cain and Israel’s religious leaders. It operates in today’s religious people (Ephesians 2:1-3), and it will operate in future religious people. They all want to do what they want; they starkly disregard the will and instructions of the God of the Bible. Like Cain, they offer the sacrifice they want, the sacrifice God never instructed them to bring. They refuse to depend upon Jesus Christ’s blood sacrifice for acceptance before God (the ONLY sacrifice He will accept); they prefer to offer their own “good” works, the fruit of their own hands. The Bible is clear that they, like Cain, will be rejected of God.

Satan’s chief way of corrupting the nation Israel was to infiltrate it with pagan religion (spiritual lies had been successful with Adam and Eve in Eden, and with Cain; Satan uses the same old tactics!). Baal worship, pagan idol worship, began in Israel in Judges 2:11-13 and it has yet to lose its grip. Beyond our present day, after our dispensation, Satan will make one final attempt to bring about what Cain started, and many “Abels” will perish….

Cain Came and Brought Shame #5

Thursday, June 26, 2014

“And Adam knew Eve his wife; and she conceived, and bare Cain, and said, I have gotten a man from the LORD” (Genesis 4:1 KJV).

Can you identify the very significant phrase our King James Bible contains in today’s Scripture, and why it was said?

As dispensational Bible students, we understand that the Bible books of Hebrews through Revelation are God’s dealings with mankind following His dealings in this the Dispensation of Grace. Hebrews speaks of “the world to come” (Hebrews 2:5)—Hebrews through Revelation encompass the future resumption and fulfillment of Israel’s program. Once our Dispensation of Grace ends with the Rapture (when we, the Church the Body of Christ, are caught up into heaven to meet our Saviour Jesus Christ; 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18), the nation Israel will have to consult the books of Hebrews through Revelation to see how God will recommence and accomplish her program.

To appreciate the prophetic significance of the story of Cain and Abel, we must consult two end-time Bible books, 1 John and Jude (two of the books of Hebrews through Revelation). Let us examine 1 John 3:11-16 first: “[11] For this is the message that ye heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. [12] Not as Cain, who was of that wicked one, and slew his brother. And wherefore slew he him? Because his own works were evil, and his brother’s righteous. [13] Marvel not, my brethren, if the world hate you. [14] We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren. He that loveth not his brother abideth in death. [15] Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer: and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him. [16] Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.”

The Apostle John warns Israel in the seven-year Tribulation, how unbelieving Jews will hate and slay their believing Jewish brethren. As Cain killed Abel, so lost Jews—misled by false religion, which wicked “way” Cain began—will kill their own relatives who believe and obey JEHOVAH God….

Cain Came and Brought Shame #4

Wednesday, June 25, 2014

“And Adam knew Eve his wife; and she conceived, and bare Cain, and said, I have gotten a man from the LORD” (Genesis 4:1 KJV).

Can you identify the very significant phrase our King James Bible contains in today’s Scripture, and why it was said?

The Bible says, “By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts: and by it he being dead yet speaketh” (Hebrews 11:4). Abel brought the blood sacrifice that God specified, but Cain did not believe God’s Word, so he did not bring the proper sacrifice (Genesis 4:1-5). Cain simply did what he wanted, and literally offered the fruit of his own efforts; thus, God rejected him.

Verses 6-8 continue, “And the LORD said unto Cain, Why art thou wroth? and why is thy countenance fallen? If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door. And unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him. And Cain talked with Abel his brother: and it came to pass, when they were in the field, that Cain rose up against Abel his brother, and slew him.”

Despite Adam and Eve’s high hopes for their firstborn son Cain, he brought them unspeakable heartache: he mercilessly murdered his younger brother, Abel. Moreover, the son they once thought was the Redeemer (“a man from the LORD;” today’s Scripture cf. Genesis 3:15), Cain, was now exposed to be a Bible-rejecter and a murderer. What disappointment they felt that he exacerbated Satan’s corruption of creation, and especially of mankind! Adam and Eve were now bereaved of one son due to fratricide, and they would soon lose their remaining son to organized false religion (see Genesis 4:9-17).

The historical narrative of Cain and Abel—yes, it literally happened—seems to many to be nothing more than “boring antiquity.” We fervently disagree. Dear friends, there is a prophetic significance to this account, and it affects the world even today. We should not think of the account of Cain and Abel as “a thing of the past….”

Cain Came and Brought Shame #1

Sunday, June 22, 2014

“And Adam knew Eve his wife; and she conceived, and bare Cain, and said, I have gotten a man from the LORD” (Genesis 4:1 KJV).

Can you identify the very significant phrase our King James Bible contains in today’s Scripture, and why it was said?

Unfortunately, modern English translations water down today’s Scripture (like they do with countless other verses!). The NIV, representative of the modern English “bibles” and their underlying (and corrupt) Hebrew and Greek manuscripts, complete with an extra wresting by minds polluted with textual criticism and its vain theories, reads in today’s Scripture: “Adam made love to his wife Eve, and she became pregnant and gave birth to Cain. She said, ‘With the help of the LORD I have brought forth a man.’” (And this is “more scholarly” than the “archaic” King James Bible?!)

It is a very subtle rewording, but, “With the help of the Lord I have brought forth a man,” notice how God’s Word is retranslated so that it exalts Eve—Eve did it with God’s “help!” Friends, we sinners do not need God’s “help” to do anything; we sinners need God to do everything for us!

However, unlike many (if not nearly all) of the modern Bible translators, we are people of faith, and we have God’s Holy Spirit to teach us. We do not look at the Bible with unbelieving minds and eyes and “correct” it when it does not make sense to us. God’s preserved Word in English, the King James Bible, says exactly what He wants it to say, and how He wants it said. Re-translation causes us to miss subtleties in vocabulary and semantics; if we simply leave the King James Bible alone and just believe it, it will correct our thinking and cause us to appreciate a seemingly insignificant doctrine.

Indeed, it takes some thoughtful study (which Bible readers rarely do!), but there is something special being communicated in Eve’s words as found in our “old” King James Bible. Take this time to consider why Eve said what she did, and, in the coming devotionals, we will discuss why she said, “I have gotten a man from the LORD….”