Many ask why I feel the way I do about the church's condition. Hopefully this will begin to explain why my mindset is such.


The writer of Hebrews exhorted us in Hebrews 2:1-3:



"Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard, lest at any time we should let them slip. For if the word spoken by angels was stedfast, and every transgression and disobedience received a just recompence of reward; How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation."



It is simply not enough to bow the knee at an alter, confess that Jesus is Lord, attend church on Sunday and then go live a normal life like others in the world. The kingdom of God in us requires diligence and earnest pressing in. Souls are at stake, ours included, but sadly, how very few see that. If conviction comes upon us, we comfort ourselves with our salvation experience and drown out the words the HolySpirit is whispering to us.



How many there are nowadays who are comfortable occupying a pew on Sunday or serving on the church board but know nothing of presenting their "bodies a living sacrifice, holy, and acceptableunto Him, which is our reasonable service."



Oh, if honesty could only overtake us and we could admit to ourselves of the great lack of personal holiness in our lives, the lack of zeal, the great amount of time we spend expanding our own kingdom in this life, and yet neglect God's kingdom and its glory. God is simply not our number one priority, in time, money, effort or concern. We need to recall the prayer exhorting us to love the Lord our God with our whole heart....all of it.



Soon, as this age winds down, billions of souls will face eternity without Christ to cover their sins. Yet look at the church as we know it. We have bushel basket Christianity, telling the world to come under and see how we praise, but God forbid that we go out as we were commanded and to compel them to come in. We muster enough zeal to worship for an hour on Sunday, but come Monday, or even Sunday afternoon, we are expended and we drift back to our first love, our life in this world.



Do we not realize that God has asked that we lose our life for his sake, for that is the secret to finding it in Him? This does not come with a blaise, haven't-a-care attitude towards God, or towards sin. We are told that we have an enemy who does not sleep and whose sole goal is to distract us so that we become ineffective for God at best and lose our own sole at worst. Yet, we act like there is no warfare at all going on, and with our own very souls, or those of our children or friends at stake as the prize!



Many will say, "But I am forgiven!" Indeed! You are! Is this the way we repay our precious Lord for that gift? Lest we forget, just because the seed sprouts, and indeed is good seed, there are no guarantees that sprouted seed will endure to the end. The cares of THIS life can easily enter in and choke it out. The evil fowls of the air can pluck the word out of are hearts and we die prematurely, and unfruitful. We neglect watering our good seed and it withers when the heat is turned up (and brothers, it is fixing to get turned up!)



Back to Hebrews, the writer in chapter three spends the entire chapter warning and exhorting the saints to PRESS and never sit down in contentment that is not godly contentment in God's kingdom.



In verses 12-15, hear his plea:



"Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God. But exhort one another daily, while it is called To day; lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. For we are made partakers of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence stedfast unto the end; While it is said, Today if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts, as in the provocation."



Do we fear sin anymore? Really FEAR it, or is it more of an aggravation at best, and at worst a bed partner we refuse to truly give up? We have forgotten that "Without holiness, no man shall see the Lord." We have forgotten that God's people all left Egypt but not all of them entered the rest of God. Most died in the wilderness of unbelief and di not enter the rest of God.


So how about us? If "Without faith, it is impossible to please God", how exactly is our own faith growing exceedingly? The sad truth is, we have nothing to believe in but that the tomb is empty and Jesus is risen, but that is just the beginning of our walk, and the depth of our faith and trust in every word out of God's mouth, not our end point. Do we not realize it is possible to build again that which He destroyed and our end will be worse than if we never followed after Christ at all? If the Apostle Paul himself continued to press in that He might win Christ, shall not we even moreso?



We are told to:

 "Lay aside every weight and the sin that doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race set before us."


We are told to run the race of our Christian walk as we would if we were running a race and there was but ONE prize. Have we truly convinced ourselves that we are so running? Really?

Great faith reveals a trust relationship with Jesus that is born of intimacy, and without that...if our walk is simply religious activities, but we are actually quite content where we are, with sin still in us and our prayer closets devoid of emotionaL depth that God so desires, like it or not, we are lukewarm.



Some say my posts are judgemental. They do not see the exhortation of love that is the motivation. My sole purpose is to encourage sainst everywhere deeper into the salvation God has prepared for each of us. We are limiting God today by our unbelief as surely as Jesus's neighbors did when He came preaching, and dear brothers and sisters, unbelief is not a weakness, it is "an evil heart of unbelief".



God is waiting to pour out His spirit again on each individual life and on the collective body. But before He can do so, he requires we break before Him in humility and repentance, turn from trying to save our own lives in the here and now, for we have a heavenly kingdom that is approaching us at the speed of light that will simpy boggle our minds.

Thank you Lord for what you are doing and about to do in your body.