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
“If you love Me, keep My commandments. – John 14:15
We must not talk about our fellowship with Christ, or our being separated from the world unto Him, unless we make Him our Master and Lord in everything. Some public teachers are not true at all points to their convictions, and how can they look for a blessing? A Christian man, anxious to be useful, ought to be very particular as to every point of obedience to his Master. I have no doubt whatever that God blesses our churches even when they are very faulty, for His mercy endureth for ever. When there is a measure of error in the teaching, and a measure of mistake in the practice, He may still vouchsafe to use the ministry, for He is very gracious. But a large measure of blessing must necessarily be withheld from all teaching which is knowingly or glaringly faulty. God can set His seal upon the truth that is in it, but He cannot set His seal upon the error that is in it.
The Lord is very gracious and pitiful; but yet He is a jealous God. He is sometimes sternly jealous towards His people who are living in neglects of known duty, or in associations which are not clean in His sight. He will wither their work, weaken their strength, and humble them until at last they say, “My Lord, I will take Thy way after all. I will do what Thou biddest me to do, for else Thou wilt not accept me.” The Lord said to His disciples, “Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature: he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved;” and He promised them that signs should follow, and so they did follow them, and so they will. But we must get back to apostolic practice and to apostolic teaching: we must lay aside the commandments of men and the whimseys of our own brains, and we must do what Christ tells us, as Christ tells us, and because Christ tells us. Definitely and distinctly, we must take the place of servants; and if we will not do that, we cannot expect our Lord to work with us and by us. Let us be determined that, as true as the needle is to the pole, so true will we be, as far as our light goes, to the command of our Lord and Master. ~ C.H. Spurgeon
https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1906.cfm
Warn the brethren about the practice of paganism in their worship of God but use wisdom in when to stop trying to reason with them. They have been told and that is all we are to do and after, when there is no repentance nor desire to search the matter out, leave it in God’s hands.
1. Christians will not boast in their religion because they exchanged it for an eternal relationship with Christ (Heb. 13:5).
2. Christians will not receive the Eucharistic Christ because we received the true Christ at conversion and now live in permanent union with Him (Rom. 6:5).
3. Christians will not confess to an earthly priest because we have a perfect High Priest in heaven (Heb. 4:14-15).
4. Christians will not submit to the pope as head of the church, because Jesus is our Head (Eph. 5:23).
5. Christians will not follow unbiblical traditions of men because we have a more sure word (2 Tim. 3:16-17; 2 Pet. 1:19).
6. Christians will not earn indulgences for the remission of sin because Jesus paid the eternal sin debt with His perfect and sufficient sacrifice (Heb. 7:27; 9:12).
7. Christians will not participate in the ongoing sin-offering of the Eucharistic Christ on an altar because Jesus finished the work of our redemption (John 19:30).
8. Christians will not pray to Mary and the Saints because Jesus is the one mediator to God and He has given us access to Him (1 Tim. 2:5; Heb. 4:16).
9. Christians will not have unity with Roman Catholics because we have been sanctified by the truth and will not be unequally yoked with unbelievers (2 Cor. 6:14-18; John 17:3).
10. Christians will not bow down to Catholic statues, icons and the Eucharist because it is the sin of idolatry (1 Cor. 10:14).
hattip: Dan Allnut
You know—it’s not what it means to me. I live in a fallen world, and I am of the sinful nature so why, oh why, would I take my own word or belief and think it to be truth or fact? Simple question, isn’t it? GOD has given us something to know exactly what needs to be done-it guides us because we cannot be trusted to think right for ourselves–because of our sin nature. The WORD condemns any and all pagan rituals. Whether you believe it or not. GOD by HIS very nature cannot, and will not, accept your worship of HIM in those pagan ways–won’t happen no matter how much you believe you are honoring or worshiping HIM. Eggs and bunnies have NOTHING to do with the Resurrection of JESUS. In fact, they are VERY dangerous for any believer to even consider touching. Rev. 3:10 tells us that since we were faithful, we will be kept from THAT time (the most horrible time on earth). We are not faithful when we use pagan rituals or things in our attempt to worship GOD. In fact, that is called Unfaithful. As for me and my house we will refrain from ALL pagan rituals at any time of the year and give thanks that HE died on the cross for our sins because there was no way we could. HIS resurrection proves who HE really was and is and is to come– Read 2 Kings 17:14-15–you will see that gentile Christians (or so called) are just as stiff necked as the Jews— ~ Dan Allnut
Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ. -Colossians 2:8
For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.” -Second Peter 2:1-3:
And He said to them, “You are those who justify yourselves before men, but God knows your hearts. For what is highly esteemed among men is an abomination in the sight of God. ~Luke 16:15 NKJV
“On that day of judgment,” says the Lord,“I will punish the leaders and princes of Judah and all those following pagan customs. ~ Zephaniah 1:8
Paganism is unredeemable. God required the Israelites to completely annihilate all that belonged to pagan idolatry so that there would be no amount of influence to worship Him in like manner. In Acts 19:19 we see the new converts obeying God in this:
A number who had practiced sorcery brought their scrolls together and burned them publicly. When they calculated the value of the scrolls, the total came to fifty thousand drachmas.
(if we could incorporate paganism into our worship of God, or, if we could christianize paganism, wouldn’t this be the time to mention it to the new converts?)
There are two types of worship by mankind-to the enemy of our souls, Satan, or to the lover of our souls, our Redeemer, the Lord Jesus Christ, the only true God.
As Matthew Henry said, “If Satan gets but half of you, he gets all of you. If God gets but half of you, He will have none of you.” It’s time to destroy all of the pagan/papist traditions and rituals from our worship to God.
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