O you who love the Lord, hate evil! – Psalm 97:10 ~ There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death. – Proverbs 14:12
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I. It Is Right To Practice Biblical Judgment
One of the most misused verses in the Bible is, “Judge not, that ye be not judged” (Matt. 7: 1). Every Scripture verse should be read in its context, if we are to properly understand the true meaning. In vs. 2-5 of this same chapter it is evident that v. 1 is referring to hypocritical judgment. A brother who has a beam in his own eye should not be judging the brother who may have a mote in his eye. The lesson is plain, you cannot judge another for his sin if you are guilty of the same sin.
Those who cling to “Judge not, that ye be not judged, ” to condemn those who expose error should read the entire chapter. Jesus said, “Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing, ” (v. 15)…
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Christ’s birth was and is crucial. It’s the incarnation, the one-time only and only unique birth event, which the angels were celebrating. Salvation has come to the world! \o/ Did you know that Jews of Jesus’ day did not celebrate birthdays? Not even bar/bat mitzvahs (those are new innovations)! That is why we do not see any apostle celebrating the birthday of Christ Jesus. But the Jewish-pagans of His day did celebrate birthdays – Herod was of Judaism, but he was also enamored with the Roman culture as evidenced in the celebrating of his birthday. He was a Jew in name only. He was also an Idumean, aka, an Edomite, with that wicked Haman in his ancestry.
Has the Christ Mass celebration been changed from pagan to Christian lawfully? No. We do not see anywhere in scripture where God has said to steer clear of paganism until a certain amount of time has passed. This pre-Christ yule-tide season where the decorated tree-in-house tradition comes from is, in our day, a celebration of pagan Wiccans who adopted the holiday from the sun worshiping Druids. We are to keep from even the appearance of evil yet we look just like the Wiccans when we practice their decorated tree-in-house tradition. Putting Christ’s name on that which God hates is an evil we need to beware of if we love Christ Jesus. God warned the Israelites not to worship Him in the same manner as the heathen do their gods and we do not see a lifting of that command in the New Testament but instead see what the pagans did with their books in Acts 19:19. Its what we must do with our christo-pagan traditions and things. Hard to do? Yes! And yet easy when you love the Lord Jesus Christ and want to please Him in all of your ways.
May God open the eyes of His children and call them out of this iniquitous tradition of men/pagan/papist practice into a pure worship of Him in spirit and in truth, amen!
Yes, it’s true. We Christians live in a world of paganism. Everywhere we look its pagan. Pagan! Pagan! Pagan! Our churches are modeled after pagan worship centers, so we are told. Our days of the week are named after pagan gods! Some say worship on Sunday is pagan! And our dollar bill…GASP!!!…
So what? That’s right, I asked, so what? Maybe knowing that truth puts most Christians at ease about celebrating X Mass. “Paganism is hard to avoid.” Or they will say, “See, you can christianize paganism! Look at the church structure!” Well…not so fast, o clever one!
No. No you can’t christianize unredeemable paganism. Yes, we use, or practice, the things of pagan origin all of the time. But that pertains to worldly use for our benefit or as a person-to-person use. Many things we believe have a pagan origin didn’t just happen to be only for pagan worship after all. The practice simply existed before the time of Nimrod, where all pagan religions came from. Nevertheless, in our man to God worship we must not adopt the ways of the heathen to worship Him with. He hates it. He did not ordain it. It is Cain worship, i.e., man-made. God has the only right to sanction the worship of Himself and to call days “holy.” Not us. Some say that Jeremiah 10 has nothing whatsoever to do with X Mass trees. Fine. You can believe that. Some say that Deuteronomy 12:29-32 is not speaking about our modern-day X Mass trees and such other rituals and traditions. Fine. You can believe that way, too.
Here’s the problem: If you are decorating your homes in the same manner as the Wiccans then you are yoking with the idolatrous unbelievers. You are not being separate from them. How are you being holy as God is holy in this X Mass-Saturnalia “holy” day observance? You are not abstaining from even the appearance of evil! Are you a Christian or a Wiccan? Sure, today many would say you are a Christian but not the unbelievers. They don’t know the difference, nor do they care. It’s about Santa for them, no matter their age. The Wiccans are either laughing at you for doing as they do, or they are angry at you for hijacking their holy day and putting your false god (yes, its lower-case “g” to them) in the place of their true sun-god, unless they believe there is no difference between the two. But they should know it! Christians aren’t helping them in the matter with their copy-cat decor. Where are we different, then, by our appearance?
If you cling to your X Mass to the point of being rude or inconsiderate to your fellow Christians who do not celebrate it, then you are committing idolatry and brotherly love is not in you. If you use Scriptures to validate your celebration but say that the incarnation story is the “Christmas story” then you have no idea what the Christ Mass truly is about, and you are inadvertently sinning against God and calling the holy by an unholy name. Plus! You are misinterpreting the Scriptures you are using! If you are celebrating X Mass despite knowing its pagan roots (or similarity to the Wiccan’s “holy” day) then you are willfully sinning against God. It’s not just sinning, but willfully sinning. If you are celebrating X Mass for the kids’ sake, or for fear of what others might say, then you are not worthy of Jesus. He said it, I didn’t:
Matthew 10:36-38, “And a man’s foes shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after Me, is not worthy of Me.”
See also Bible Hub’s commentary and other like verses here.
It’s time to repent of Christo-paganism.
A refutation of the Roman Catholic’s Lord’s Supper and the exposure of its practice of idolatry.
This has been copied from the comment line of a J.C. Ryle FB post:
Andrew Strom. [4 April 2003]
I am writing on a rather unusual topic today. On Monday night (31 March) I was invited onto a Christian Radio show in New Zealand to discuss the growing numbers of “Out-of-church” Christians in the West – people who have left the churches for various reasons but still claim a strong Christian faith. It was a very interesting night, and the phones ran hot.
This “Out-of-church” phenomenon has now grown so large that books are being written about it. In fact, several years ago I heard an estimate that there are TENS OF THOUSANDS of such Christians just in our largest city (-Auckland) alone. And I believe it is the same right across the Western nations. I have personally come into contact with literally hundreds of such people. The surprising thing is that they are often the most committed kind of Christians – praying, insightful, deep-thinking. Yet they have grown tired of “playing the game” inside our church system and have opted out. Often their involvement goes back many years. In fact, they had commonly been leaders of various kinds.
But now they have left. Why? The church obviously finds this a very difficult thing to explain or deal with. The usual accusations are often trotted out: “So-and-so has been hurt and has a root of bitterness”. Or they are in “rebellion”. Or they are “not a team player”. Or they are “backsliding”.
But if you talk to these people you will often find that they have been sitting in church for years and years, and they simply cannot stand to sit and watch the same old game being played any more. The LACK OF GOD is what gets to them – even in our most “Spirit-filled” churches. WHERE IS GOD IN ALL OF OUR ACTIVITY? Surely this is not the way it is supposed to be?
New fads and programs come and go, but the mediocrity and LACK OF GOD just seem to go on forever. And so quietly, sometimes without anyone even noticing, they slowly slip out the doors – never to return. Some have even told me that they felt God “calling them out”. Others simply felt they couldn’t stay there anymore. The state of the church weighed upon them more than words could say.
Very often they did the rounds of other churches, hoping against hope that they would find a place that felt “right” in any way. (-Though most of them are not “church-hoppers” by nature). But the places they visited never seemed any more “right” than the place they had left. And after a while it just seemed easier to stay at home with God.
As I said earlier, most of these people have not given up on Christianity at all. It is today’s church system that they have given up on. And we are talking about large numbers here. Thousands are already opting out. And many feel like they are “waiting” for something.
Some of these people have started up home-fellowships. Or they meet with other couples on a casual basis. But many meet with nobody at all, and they consider themselves in a ‘Wilderness’ place – alone with God. (-Very common).
I was asked several weeks ago by a pastor whether I agreed that what is happening could be a ‘move of God’. That is a pretty radical thought. Many leaders would think the opposite. Because anything that leads people out of “their church” can’t be of God, can it?
Hmmmm. All I know is this: The concept of going through a ‘Wilderness’ just before entering the ‘Promised Land’ is totally Scriptural. In fact, it is right through the Bible. Even Jesus went through such a wilderness time.
But it is not possible to stay “alone” forever. Some day, if these people are going to be part of a new move of God’s Spirit, they are going to have to come out of their wilderness and become part of the “BODY” that Jesus brings together – the ‘new wineskin’ that will come with this new move of God. Otherwise they could miss out. That is the great danger.
I’m sure there are many on this List with comments or testimonies relating to this topic. I would love to hear from you. It really is becoming a significant issue in the church.
God bless you, my friends.
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For weeks after I published the above article, I was inundated with emails. It seemed to be going round and round on the Internet because many responses were from people that were not even part of our own List. Such a huge number of heart-felt stories from people who still loved Jesus but had left the churches (-forever, in many cases). What an eye-opener! It confirmed to me that this issue is so much larger than many of us have realized. I don’t think a lot of Christian leaders have any clue how many believers are simply opting out of “organized religion” today. Andrew Strom
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Pastors, there are many of us “Out-of-Church” Christians who want to belong to a Bible practicing church that has nothing to do with the pagan/papist/traditions of men “holy” days like X Mass and Easter, which is just blasphemously slapping Christ’s holy name on an unholy pagan feast to Tammuz and the Queen of Heaven. Get rid of those unlawful days as practices and see if your numbers improve. Even if they don’t, you can know you are obedient to God’s Word.
The X Mass Blog 