|
Home
Archive
August
July
June
Comments
and/or Questions
|
Tuesday, August
26, 2008
Road Rage
Williams New Testament translation
of Galatians 5: 1-7
[Freedom is not the gratification of the
lower nature] 1. This is the freedom with which Christ has made us
free. So keep on standing in it, and
stop letting your necks be fastened in the yoke of slavery again. 2. Here
is what I am saying to you: If you let yourselves be circumcised, Christ
can do you no good. 3. I again insist that if any man lets himself be
circumcised, he is under obligation to obey the whole law. 4. You people,
whoever you are among you, who try to get into right standing with God,
through law have cut yourselves off from Christ, you have missed the way of
God's favor. 5. For we, by the Spirit, are awaiting the hoped-for blessing
which our right standing with God will bring us. 6. For in union with
Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor lack of it counts for anything; but
only faith that is spurred on to action by love. 7. You were running
beautifully! Who was it that cut
into your way and kept you from obeying the truth?
Can you hear the frustration in Paul’s
message to the Galatians, like watching someone on the road who cuts in
front of someone else? It doesn’t matter how the lie manifests, whether it
is by those that claim circumcision, water baptisms, or any other dead
works of the law is still important, it takes away from the liberty and the
message of faith and deliverance by Christ and puts it back into the fallen
realm of works. Those who keep their eyes open on the road can see a hazard
ahead of time and avoid an accident which can be deadly, while many others get
distracted or cut off (detoured) and end up in a deadly situation. It can
happen so quickly; you were running beautifully, moving forward in your
walk with Christ and the liberty in Him, who did you let get in your way
and cut you off from the path of life? Oh, how about yourself? Were you
paying attention to the message delivered by Christ, or did you cross over
into another lane (another doctrine) without looking and ended up in a
wreck?
Williams New Testament translation
of Romans 10:16-18
16. However, they have not all given heed
to the good news, for Isaiah says, "Lord, who has put faith in what we
told?" 17. So faith comes from hearing what is told, and hearing
through the message about Christ. 18. But may I ask, They had no chance to
hear, did they? Yes, indeed: "All over the earth their voices have
gone, to the ends of the world their words."
Well didn’t those idiots see the road
signs back behind them that said ‘slow down congestion ahead’, and yet they
still got into a wreck or cut someone off at the last second? Isn’t it
frustrating sometimes to watch people so reckless in their driving
especially when it is in a life or death situation? How many times have you
watched someone going down the road with no regard for where they are going
or how they are getting there and then end up putting others at risk? Talk
about road rage! With all the directions and warning signs that are put out
there, there is no excuse for all this recklessness is there? With all the
warnings and exhortations the Bible has in it, is there any excuse for us
either if we end up in a wreck or a ditch spiritually? Who did you let cut
you off and detour you from your intended destination, and why weren’t you
paying attention to the message being delivered by Christ to you personally
so that you could avoid these pitfalls? Without faith it is impossible to
please God. A simple faith apart from any works of the law which are now
considered dead, and so are those that try to find justification in them.
So what path are you following today? Do you have a clear lane in front of
you, or are you following the crowd in bumper to bumper traffic going
nowhere fast because you choose the works of the law and not the liberty in
Christ?
Romans 10:17 So then faith cometh by
hearing, and hearing by the word of God. (KJV)
By the way, you are not waiting for faith
to come because you already received ‘the measure of faith’ when you
accepted the Lord’s plan of salvation. The word ‘cometh’ is an added word
and doesn’t really add anything to the verse. Faith is your ability to hear,
to believe, and to act on the word of God. So basically all you are doing
is seeing more of the measure of faith you were given in the beginning of
your walk and how to operate in it. Like with a car, you have everything
needed to get down the road, now you are just learning more and more on a
daily basis on how to operate it in a manner that will get you to your
destination.
Hebrews 5:11-14 Of whom we have many
things to say, and hard to be uttered, seeing ye are dull of hearing. (12) For
when for the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have need that one teach you
again which be the first principles of the oracles of God; and are become
such as have need of milk, and not of strong meat. (13) For every one that
useth milk is unskilful in the word of righteousness: for he is a babe. (14)
But strong meat belongeth to them that are of full age, even those who by
reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil. (KJV)
There is a reason why you don’t let a
child drive and why they must wait until a certain age before getting
behind the wheel of a car. There are a lot of spiritual infants out there
who rather than teach, they need to be re-taught themselves the first
principles of God, many times because rather than learn the simplicity of
the gospel they got detoured by the works of the law which kept them in a
preschool state of mind. Oh there are many that may have gotten saved years
ago and still attend the same organizations week after week, or should I
say weak, but never grow or mature in the Lord because now it is more of a
ritual and not an actual way of life. Get dunked in water here, throw a few
bucks there, and you got this salvation thing covered, well not exactly. It’s
not hard to see how dull of hearing they have gotten because they didn’t
continue in the faith and exercise their spiritual senses which became dull
and so did they. You know, everyday you pick up the paper it seems where
you read about someone in a fatal accident, which according to surveys 99
percent are avoidable. According to the word of God 100 percent of man’s
destructions are avoidable, that’s why our Father sent His Son to heal us
and deliver us from our destructions which were a result of sin.
Hebrews 6:1-3 Therefore leaving the
principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on unto perfection; not
laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith
toward God, (2) Of the doctrine of baptisms, and of laying on of hands, and
of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment. (3) And this will we
do, if God permit. (KJV)
Perfection means maturity, graduating
from the old into the new; not trying to incorporate the old and new
together, like an adult that acts like a child. If you are in an
organization that holds to the old law and its dead works you may want to
look for the next exit so that you can avoid a wreck and not get involved
in an eternal road rage incident.
|
