Can I admit to you I'm distressed, a bit? Social media has a way of revealing more than we intend, and I see people who call themselves believers sharing so many unChrist-like thoughts (even cleverly wrapped and disguised by misquoted Bible verses and Christian values). I see Christians talking about karma, advocating sexual impurity (anything outside of God's design, and He began with marriage from the first), talking nasty about one another, elevating political parties and figures to the place of the cross (or higher), advocating for murder of babies and political opponents, and so many other things beside these.
We are willingly repeating what Israel and Judah of the Old Testament did! We are trying to pretend to be godly, but in reality, chasing after our own hardened hearts. Do we really know Jesus at all? If we were in His word, we'd know that these are the very things that offend Him! And what do they lead to? They lead to selfish pursuits, to the point that even our "good deeds" are done in selfish intent (if I do good, it will save me from a bad end!) instead of doing them because our love of God and all people inspire us. They lead to murder, adultery, and idolatry, where Jesus defines such things as done in the heart as opposed to merely the physical act.
When we come to Christ, we are supposed to be born again. If we try to have it both ways, we're not really born again at all, are we? Born again means the old self is dead, and we are reborn in Christ. We are dead to the flesh, dead to the world, dead to the old. This does not mean we won't make mistakes, we will. The Old man, the flesh, needs to die daily (Picking up our cross is a daily thing, and I have to repent of my thoughts and/or actions daily!), and so we need to drop to our knees and come to Christ daily, hourly, every second! There is no room for idolatry in the Church or in our hearts; put on Christ, and get in to His Word, and do things His way! John 3:1-21 Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.” Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.” Nicodemus said to him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”
Nicodemus said to him, “How can these things be?” Jesus answered him, “Are you the teacher of Israel and yet you do not understand these things? Truly, truly, I say to you, we speak of what we know, and bear witness to what we have seen, but you do not receive our testimony. If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you heavenly things? No one has ascended into heaven except he who descended from heaven, the Son of Man. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed. But whoever does what is true comes to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that his works have been carried out in God.”
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