How is the Church Going Astray?

A Review of Trends of the Last Hundred Years:

Note: these trends are not really the source of the problem.  The source is because the church is, in general, law-less, meaning they do not recognize the Law of God as their mandate.  Also, they don’t recognize that they are meant to be grafted in branches, joining the natural branches of Israel, not Israel joining them.  It’s similar to the state of Israel when they were freed from the bondage of Egypt…and before they received the Law at Sinai.  There the Gentiles took the form of the ‘mixed multitudes’ that received freedom along with Israel.  This entire multitude were ‘free’ but this is not the state they were meant to remain in.  They were meant to willingly exchange one form of ‘bond-servant’ for another, not remain wandering in ‘freedom’.  This the church has by and large, never done. 

1. Lack of Biblical Knowledge and Discernment: Satan deceives believers into thinking the study of God’s Word, in order to seek His truth and expose our sins, is no longer as relevant or not appropriate for seekers. In an effort to make Bible studies appeal to a modern and post-modern mindset, a main focus of study has become identifying personal opinions of the meaning of Bible passages, or of studying religious books of personal opinion, instead of carefully searching out God’s will in every matter.

Busy-ness in family life and a greater focus on leisure activities have also contributed to lack of Bible study. The Bible teaches us to study God’s Word to learn His will, to be sure to obey what He teaches us, and to teach others (Joshua 1:8, Ezra 7:10, Psalm 119:15, 2 Timothy 2:14-15).

2. Women in office: (maybe not the way you’ve thought of it before) Satan deceives women, first in society in general, and then in the church, into thinking they are not equal to men, and that they have to rise up and set themselves in positions of authourity with and over men in order to become equal. In the church, women seek headship over men, usurping the equal-but-different role God gave them (Genesis 2). Paul refers to these ordained earthly roles in 1 Corinthians 11 and 1 Timothy 2. In general, men are more reason-oriented, and women are more feelings and emotions oriented. Most modern churches now have strong feminine leadership influence, which has helped prepare the way of experience based faith.

3. Charismatic ‘revival’: Satan deceives believers into thinking they need to have an emotional experience to ‘prove’ they are saved; also, that if they didn’t have this experience, they are missing out on the fullness of God’s intent for them. A life of simple obedience is no longer considered complete. Believers who are uncomfortable with this are told they have set limitations on God, and are counseled to let go of inhibitions in order to attain this experience and enhance their ‘spiritual formation’.

The Biblical idea of worship as encompassing a lifestyle and mindset of obedience to God, has been redefined to mean a time period of singing, dancing, praying and spiritual manifestations as ‘the Spirit leads’. Most modern believers lack a sound Biblical basis to examine and test these spiritual experiences. The Bible teaches that it is faith (trust) in God and His Salvation (Yeshua) that saves us (Genesis 15:6, Psalm 78:22,32, Mark 16:16, John 3:18). The Bible also teaches that true faith requires us to turn from our own way (repentance) to God’s way (Ezekiel 18:31-32, Revelation 3:2-3) and live a life of purity (James 1:22, 2:26, 1 John 3:3-6) according to God’s commandments.

4. Kingdom Now theology: This false teaching, also called Dominionism or Reconstructionism, is a loose blend of Reformed/Calvinist (even hyper-Calvinist) doctrines with charismatic overtones, and has broad and remarkable influence in the modern church.

The three foundational beliefs are:

 - Satan usurped Adam and Eve’s authourity to rule the world;

 - having replaced Israel and having appropriated Israel’s covenantal rights, the church is viewed as God’s instrument to take back control as she evangelizes the whole earth;

 - Christ will not return until the church has gained dominion over the world by establishing right human relations.

In contrast, the Bible teaches that:

 - it is not man, but Christ who will establish his Kingdom on earth, after man’s efforts have failed (Isaiah 2, Micah 4:6-7, 2 Thess 2:3-4).

 - the visible reign and earthly Kingdom of Christ will come when he returns in glory (Isaiah 11, Mark 13:24-27, Rev 1:7).

 - God will never forget Israel and His covenant with her (Jeremiah 31:35-37, Isaiah 49:7-8, Hosea 2:17-19, Zechariah 4:9).

5. Ecumenism: Churches of every denomination and sect struggle with the same declining attendance and lack of a sense of relevance of religion to personal life. Satan deceives church leaders into believing a sense of unity is more important for the church to survive than a continued separation over doctrinal differences. A similarity of charismatic spiritual experiences among denominations and sects, through forms of contemplative prayer, and a secular mandate of tolerance for all difference have aided this movement.

6. Freemasonry: Freemasonry is a secretive cult that promotes a New World Order with a united religion, common market and single universal government, with one leader, which the Bible describes as a false 'anointed one' (false christ).  The influence of freemasonry within the church, religious (rabbinic) Judaism and secular culture is far-reaching.

7. Co-Creators: Genesis 1:26-27, which states that man is made in God’s image, is redefined to mean that since God is Creator, man is co-creator with God. This is a basic tenet of New Age belief but is being welcomed in churches. A focus on human creativity is especially emphasized in worship or prayer experience. Emergent theologian Rob Bell goes so far as to state in his DVD ‘Open’ that the ‘creation poem’ teaches that God purposely left creation unfinished, ‘and invites people to take part in the ongoing creation of the world.’ In the fullness of this new age/ancient teaching, all creation together is viewed as “God”, or all creation is IN God. 

8. Emergent church: This movement is characterized by an often subtle but distinctly subversive attitude towards authourity, particularly that of church, Scripture or parents, as well as irreverence towards God. Worship and preaching style is often designed to shock or offend the status quo in crass or base ways. Sexuality is frequently emphasized. Those who hold to Scripture authourity and simple faith are mocked or shown disrespect, though this is often done in subtle ways. Emergent theology is frequently linked with beliefs of new age and dominionism.

9. Contemplative prayer: Though the Bible teaches that Scripture is the “norming norm,” many Christians give precedence to other supposed forms of revelation, and particularly promptings, leadings or “the still, small voice”.  They do this without knowing or seeming to care about testing the spirits.  Most people who embrace contemplative prayer turn to these ‘voices’ or experiences as the supreme form of revelation from ‘God’. Ultimately this is an issue of authority, with too many Christians willing to trust their own or an authority they perceive as ‘God’s’ (but rooted within themselves) over the Bible’s. This is an experience-based form of prayer and is not found anywhere in Scripture. However, it is widespread, with forms of the same prayer style found in every major religion on earth, each pray-er finding their own translation of ‘God’ within this prayer form.  It’s also called ‘ancient-modern’ or ‘centering’ prayer.

Predestined or Free to Choose?

Very simply put, the Christian religion’s doctrine of predestination teaches that God alone chooses, in advance, who will be saved to eternal life, and who will be doomed to eternal destruction. It claims that man does nothing to influence God’s choice, and that nothing man subsequently does changes God’s decision. 

Again very simply put, the doctrine of free will teaches that God offers salvation to everyone, and it is entirely up to the individual to either accept or reject this offer. It claims that man is entirely free to make this choice. 

Are these teachings mutually exclusive? Or is the truth a combination of some elements of both?
Many Bible verses can be found which seem to support predestination. They can be countered by an almost equal number of verses seeming to support free will. 

The problem with just looking at verses is that not all are taken in their fuller context, and many are meant to be taken in the context of the entire Scripture, limiting their proper meaning when taken on their own. We do know that God has given us many ‘pictures’ or examples of truth, in the accounts recorded in the Scripture (Old Testament). They're a great place to begin a study of this subject. 

Let's start by looking at a few verses which describe the ‘heart’ of man, and do some word study. 

The Hebrew word translated in English as ‘heart’ in the Scripture carries a meaning of the inner man, the thoughts, feelings and motives of the self. In Hebrew, the heart was considered to be the source of thought and motives. It was the kidneys which were considered to be the source of emotion! So where you see ‘heart’ in the Scripture, you can generally substitute ‘mind’ to get a more accurate meaning in today’s English. 

Jeremiah 17:9 tells us the heart (mind) of man is deceitful (not to be trusted, with a motive to gratify self instead of God), and desperately wicked. The word translated wicked here actually carries a meaning of sick, frail, feeble, incurable, full of trouble or woe. 

Yet despite this natural state of ‘bad’, man was expected to turn from his own way to trust God’s way, and obey Him. Deuteronomy 30:14 tells us God has given us the ability to choose what is good, meaning that there is the possibility of doing so. The entire Torah is given to show man what is the right choice, to point out what sin is. 

God expects us to choose righteousness, and He has equipped us with the ability to do so. What stands in our way? Genesis 6:5-7 tells us that God saw that ‘every intention’, every desire and thought of man was evil (wretched, displeasing to God, having no value) continually, so that He was sorry He had made man. Yet in the very next verse, Genesis 6:8, we read that Noah found grace in the eyes of God. 

The word ‘grace’ carries the meaning of acceptance, compassion, of a sense of being pleasant and agreeable. We read in Genesis 6:9 (confirmed in Genesis 7:1, Ezekiel 14:14 and 20 and 2 Peter 2:5) that God considered Noah a righteous man, that Noah walked with God, that he was blameless among men. We also read in some of the account of Noah’s life that, for example, when God said ‘Make yourself an ark’ (Genesis 6:14) and gave exact specifications, Noah made the ark, ‘according to all God had commanded him, he did’ (6:22 and 7:5, 9, 16). We see Noah’s right actions stemmed from his faith and trust in God.

What we do not see is that God caused Noah’s choices and actions to be righteous. The text quite clearly gives credit for trusting in God to Noah. The text does not say God created Noah pre-programmed to only trust. This is important to note. 

Young’s Literal Translation (a word for word equivalent translation) reads: 

8And Noah found grace in the eyes of Jehovah. 9…Noah [is] a righteous man; perfect he hath been among his generations; with God hath Noah walked habitually. (Genesis 6:8, 9b) 

1And Jehovah saith to Noah, `Come in, thou and all thy house, unto the ark, for thee I have seen righteous before Me in this generation… (Genesis 7:1) 

We also see that God’s law, His instruction or Torah, was available to men. God instructed Noah to take seven pairs of every kind of ‘clean’ animal into the ark. Since man had not yet been given animals as food (this permission is recorded as given in Genesis 9:3) the reference to ‘clean’ at this point was only in respect to sacrifice. Noah already knew what ‘clean’ meant, and how to make proper sacrifice. Part of his right response to God was that he followed the Torah. 

We see this demonstrated in the account of Noah’s burnt offerings recorded in Genesis 8:20-21, according to Exodus 29:25 and 42. In the Exodus verses we see that the burnt offering was given on an altar ‘at the entrance to the tent of meeting’ where God said ‘I will meet with you, to speak to you there’. And God did. He continued to bless Noah’s trust in Him, trust demonstrated through Noah’s obedience to God’s instructions. 

Could it be that while ‘every intent’ of every person is by nature (due to sin) wicked from birth, the one who is willing to trust in God is enabled to not obey the wicked impulses, but instead is enabled to obey His good ways? Could this simple willingness to trust be what causes God to have compassion on them, despite the constant wicked impulses of human nature? 

In Genesis 15:6 we read that Abraham believed God (when God gave him His promise) and God credited Abraham’s faith to him as righteousness. The word translated ‘believed’ carries a sense of being faithful, trusting in, permanence, absence of strife, morally right, to be firm, established, continued. Its primary meaning is that of providing stability and confidence, like a baby would find in the arms of a parent (Strong’s Concordance #H539). The implication is that Abraham received the promise from God as something true and sure, as a baby trusts in the arms of a parent. And that attitude, that belief, pleased God greatly. 

The word translated ‘righteousness’ that God credited to Abraham, carries a sense of truth, integrity and blameless right conduct. Abraham’s faith (trust) in God was counted by God as righteousness. Note it was not any action of Abraham’s that God counted as righteousness, for that would mean he was considered righteous through his works. It was Abraham’s faith (trust, continued reliance) in God and his acceptance of God’s promise that God counted as righteousness. His works were the natural fruit of that.

Just as we’ve seen in the account of Noah, Abraham’s right actions stemmed from his trusting confidence in God. With both of them, obedience was the result of faith. Note that this righteousness did not lead to eternal life. It was not salvation, the deliverance from the consequence of sin (eternal separation from God) that is needed by all. It is my understanding that this salvation could only be brought about by Yeshua. In each of these situations, it was clearly God who chose. It is made equally clear that the faith of the ones chosen, the unreserved trust in Him, mattered to God. 

Now let’s consider the account of the Israelites. In Deuteronomy 7:6-9 God makes it clear that Israel was chosen to be His ‘treasured possession’ because HE had set His love on them, and because of the promise He made to their forefathers. Again we see that it is God who chooses. And that He is pleased to bless those who are faithful to Him, to a thousand generations of their descendants! 

Even though Israel was a chosen people, not all of them would be accepted by God. God’s acceptance of them also depended on their response to Him, on their willingness to trust in Him and obey His instructions. We can see this clearly in the account of the Passover recorded in Exodus 11 and 12. The Israelites were given specific instructions. Following these would preserve them and bring about their deliverance from bondage. Not following them would mean the same loss of life as God was going to cause among the Egyptians. They were given choice, free will. Only those who demonstrated their faith in God by their acceptance of and obedience to His instructions were delivered from slavery into freedom. A second aspect of predestination is more specific. In the account of the Exodus, it is also very clearly stated that God ‘hardened’ the heart of Pharaoh and his servants. See Part Two...