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GOD MEANS BUSINESS
HALIFAX, Nova Scotia, December 2, 2015 – One thing that I’ve learned for sure over the years since my rebirth is that God means business.
The “everyone gets a gold star” mentality has no place in God’s kingdom on Earth. Not everyone is going to make it to Heaven. In fact, most people, as a result of their own free-will choices, will end up in the lake of fire.
This is the hard-core reality that should govern everything we do every day.
Jesus spent a lot of time haranguing his disciples for their lack of faith. He nagged them and goaded them solely to remind them that God means business. It’s not enough to be Jewish. It’s not enough to be born-again. It’s not enough just to “believe” or to do “good works”.
You must have faith, and you must also demonstrate that you have faith. You do this by submitting 100% to God in everything you do. Not just a little bit, not just in some things, and not just on Sundays, but in everything, every day, all day.
Faith is trusting only in God and doing God’s will even if it is contrary to the way of the world. Faith is submitting to God for no other reason than it is the right thing to do in God’s eyes. Faith is not only knowing that God knows best, but showing that God knows best. You do this by making God-inspired choices every day, all day. Faith is lived, not just spoken about.
We all have an expiry date on our bodies. Our souls will go on, but our bodies will die. The expiry date of our body is our own personal End Of The World. This could happen at any time, even today. Where we are at that time in our relationship with God (in other words, the extent of our faith) determines where we’ll spend eternity.
God means business. He loves us all the same and he wants us all to come home, but if we aren’t submitting to him 100% in everything we do for whatever time we have left on Earth, we can’t go home. There’s no place in Heaven for rebellion against any aspect of God. It’s God’s way or no way.
Jesus showed us what full submission to God looks like. He lived The Way and taught The Way, and our job, before our expiry date arrives, is to live it and teach it just as Jesus did.
God means business. I cannot stress enough how real and how permanent Heaven and Hell are. Heaven is the best we’ve experienced and can imagine; Hell is the worst we’ve experienced and feared. We can choose our way to Heaven, or we can choose our way to Hell.
This is the hard-core truth: Most of us will end up in Hell.
Jesus said that the path home is narrow, and those who find it are few.
Not everyone gets a gold star.
God means business.
Just a reminder.
ARF! ARF!
HALIFAX, Nova Scotia, December 2, 2015 – Did you know that all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags?
I remember feeling sucker-punched the first few times I read that scripture.
All our righteousnesses are as filthy rags.
All our righteousnesses are as filthy rags.
Let’s make it personal:
All my righteousnesses are as filthy rags. All YOUR righteousnesses are as filthy rags.
All your self-motivated accomplishments are as filthy rags.
All your self-motivated kindnesses are as filthy rags.
All your self-motivated sacrifices are as filthy rags.
All your works of the world are as filthy rags.
Jesus hammers this truth home when he states that none is good but God. Any good that we do is only because God is working through us. It’s God doing the good, not us. Any attempt we make to do good on our own, without God working through us, is like firing spiritual blanks. What Jesus is saying is that without God working through us, we are incapable of doing anything genuinely good or genuinely of any value, if what we do is self-motivated. Most people would balk at this (like being sucker-punched), but Jesus is absolutely bang-on. None is good but God, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags.
We born-agains are blessed to have God working through us all the time, if we choose for him to do that. He’s with us now, through his spirit, so there’s no excuse for not having him work through our fumbling fingers and tied tongues. We just have to remember to ask him. God won’t take the reins unless invited to do so, so invite him. Invite his input everywhere and always. Never do anything without his inspiration, and if he cautions against doing or saying something, heed him.
Heed him like a puppy in training. Sit. Heel. Roll over. Love your enemies. Choose to forgive. The more obedient you are to God’s directives, the faster your spiritual tail will be a-wagging. Hands down, the happiest creatures on any city sidewalk anywhere in the world are puppies out for a walk with their masters. Be God’s little puppy; be God’s good little happy puppy that heeds God alone.
All our righteousnesses are as filthy rags.
None is good but God.
ARF! ARF!
HEAVEN OR HELL
HALIFAX, Nova Scotia, November 29, 2015 – Our goal is to make it to Heaven, and our way to get there is to become as much like Jesus as possible. Jesus was fully human but also fully filled with God’s spirit. Jesus was not God, but God worked powerfully through him. This was possible because Jesus freely and willingly gave his free will over to God in everything he did. Everything. Not just some things – everything. That’s what we need to do to be like Jesus, and that’s what we must do to make it to Heaven.
In contrast, the “man of perdition” that Paul mentioned, who is the same one that Daniel described and that John wrote about in Revelation, will do the opposite of what Jesus did. That’s because instead of being filled with God’s spirit, he’ll be filled with Satan’s. In other words, a human will provide the body for the disembodied “Father of Lies” himself.
I was an atheist for the first 36 years of my life. During that time, various demon spirits moved in and out of me, most of them evil. I didn’t consciously invite them in; they just showed up as a consequence of my misguided thoughts and actions. I drew them to me, but unconsciously. Now, as a born-again follower of Jesus, evil spirits are still around me, but there’s no longer any room for them in me because God’s spirit has taken up residence. No human can have both God’s spirit and evil spirits at the same time. It’s either one or the other.
As Paul pointed out, everyone who doesn’t acknowledge that Jesus is Lord is antichrist (literally, “opposed to Jesus the Christ”), which means that most of the world’s population is antichrist. The man of perdition is also antichrist, but he’s not just your regular run-of-the-mill antichrist. He’s so antichrist that he’s considered The Antichrist. This is a man who has consciously chosen to host Satan’s spirit and to consciously work in opposition to Jesus (and therefore to God), so we’re talking one messed-up dude here. You don’t become The Antichrist by mistake: you become The Antichrist on purpose.
I mention this because the spiritual landscape is swiftly changing. The people of the world are being repositioned and softened up to accept a “global” leader who will be the man of perdition. God warned us about him through Jesus, Paul, Daniel, John and others, so he’s definitely coming. As born-agains, we’ll know him when we see him, and our job at that time will be to warn others about him, and to keep showing people the only way home to God.
Here’s what we should expect of The Antichrist. He’ll be very rich and well-positioned politically and religiously. He’ll perform “miracles” and will know everything about everyone. He’ll also be extremely handsome and charismatic; most of the world will be spell-bound by him and will without hesitation die or kill for him. His hold over people will be supernatural and powerful, and no-one will be able to escape his lure unless they’re born-again. Yet, sadly, even some born-agains will fall for him.
I’ve been under the thrall of demons, so I know how powerful their hold can be. I would still be under their control were it not for God rescuing me, but only after I cried out to him. God has given us all free will and he’ll never ask for it back. He respects our right to choose and won’t force his will on us, even if it means we choose our way to Hell. But the instant we break and cry out for help, God is there.
In contrast to what the world considers to be freedom (i.e., doing whatever you want to, whenever you want to do it), true freedom is putting your free will 100% into God’s hands and asking for his help and guidance in everything you do. As born-agains, we know this is true, because we live that reality every day. We know what it is to live without God’s help, and we know what it is to live with it, and there’s no comparison between the two. I’d rather live just one more day with my will completely in God’s hands than to live forever without his help.
The Antichrist has chosen the latter path, and that’s a horrible place to be. Even the pleasures of near-absolute power will in no way make up for what happens after that cold heart stops beating, and stop beating it will. Scripture tells us that The Antichrist’s days are numbered, and that Hell is his final reward.
Hell is the final reward of all antichrists.
We need to be reminded of that every so often.
__________
Heaven is our goal. Following Jesus as a born-again is the only way to get there. The Antichrist will try to persuade us otherwise, either through temptation or brute force. He knows all of our weaknesses, and he’ll try to exploit them. He’ll try to convince us that God’s Way is not only narrow but narrow-minded. He’ll brand us bigots. He’ll outlaw God’s Word. He’ll torture and kill those who won’t comply with his dictates. He’ll even torture and kill our family and friends. He’ll promote alternative belief systems that have elements of God’s Way but ultimately are antichrist.
Don’t fall for his lies. Don’t be deceived. Don’t be afraid.
Stay your course and endure to the end, no matter what that entails.
Jesus is Lord and God is our Father. We don’t bow down to anyone else.
Remember that when your time comes.
HEAVEN SIXTEEN
HALIFAX, Nova Scotia, November 14, 2015 – Acts of terror, regardless of who perpetrates them, all have the same final outcome: the reduction of freedom. This means less freedom of movement, less freedom of association, less freedom of speech, less freedom of the press, and so on. The initial gut-level response to terror is almost always fear and the desire for revenge, but the long-term fall-out is always – ALWAYS – less freedom. Think of how the Patriot Act has stripped Americans and their allies of freedom since 9/11. From this, we can assume that all acts of terror have as their ultimate aim the reduction and curtailment of freedom.
Likewise, from this, we can assume that whoever is ultimately behind all acts of terror is someone who wants to take away our freedom and thereby control us.
God gave every one of us free will and has never asked for it back. Paul said that all things are possible, but not all things are good. That’s why God engraved his laws on our hearts and set the Ten Commandments in stone, so that we would always be able to discern the good within the possible, regardless of how beguiling the temptation was to do bad. But God still permits us to do bad, if that’s what we choose to do. He does not intervene in our freedom either to do good or to do bad, but he does try his hardest to persuade us to choose the good.
That is free will.
Given this reality, it must therefore be someone who is opposed to God who is behind terrorist acts. Anyone who wants to forcefully remove or curtail the freedom of others is not mirroring God’s way and is not acting as God’s ally. In other words, they do not respect our God-given free will. We know, from Jesus, that the world is under Satan. So whoever is working behind the scenes to perpetrate terrorist acts with the ultimate aim of controlling the population is working for Satan, as are all those who willingly agree to have their freedoms curtailed in direct response to terrorism.
The New Testament mentions “the synagogue of Satan” a few times. This is in reference to “Jews who call themselves Jews but are in fact not”. Muslims call the United States “the great Satan”. These references to Satan point to power strongholds in the world at any given time. The truth is that all people, regardless of where they live or what religion they espouse, are under Satan unless they are born-again followers of Jesus. Born-agains are in God’s kingdom on Earth and have pledged their allegiance to God. Those who have not done so are defacto worshippers of Satan and thus automatically fall under Satan’s jurisdiction.
So what does this mean for acts of terrorism like the one unleashed on Paris on Friday the thirteenth of November, 2015? It means that Satan is behind these acts, regardless of who gets the finger pointed at them. It means more freedom will be forcefully removed and also willingly forfeited. It means that the world on Saturday the fourteenth of November, 2015, is less free than it was the day before. It also means Satan’s control of the world is expanding.
Satan goes by many names and wears many hats. His favourite disguise is The Invisible Man because he fancies himself to be like God. He and his minions slip in and out of people’s minds, beguiling them to act in ways that they know in their heart is wrong. Sadly, most people give into them.
The only way to win people back from Satan is to do as Jesus told us to do: love our enemies. We need to pray for the human perpetrators of terrorism as much as we pray for those who suffer from their acts. We need to pray, not curse them. If we find them, we need to imprison them, not torture or kill them. We need to give them time to repent of their acts, in the same way as God gives us time. We do not repay an eye for an eye, but nor do we just let them get away with their crime. Jesus says not to overcome evil with evil but to overcome evil with good. He also says that praying for our enemies is like pouring hot coals on their heads. So pour away, my friends. Pour away!
It may be, from all the prayers pouring out of us, that even one evil-doer may some day turn, just as I did and just as you did.
This is how we win people back from Satan and in so doing make the world safer and freer.
HEAVEN FIFTEEN
HALIFAX, Nova Scotia, November 11, 2015 – There’s an epidemic of well-meaning but misdirected help these days. We born-agains are often the worst offenders, imposing our “help” on people who either haven’t asked for it, don’t really want it, or never actually receive it.
In so doing, we make things worse for them and for us.
If people haven’t asked for help, don’t try to give it to them. It won’t work. Yes, you may see that they have a need, but if they don’t see that same need in themselves, keep your mouth shut about it. Better to go to God and pray for them than to nag them.
The only one you should be nagging is God.
Another help misfire is when people are insincere in their request for help. You’ll know the difference between a sincere request and an insincere one, and the best response to an insincere request is a simple “Sorry, no”. It may sound harsh, but ‘helping’ people who don’t really want to be helped in the way they need to be helped does not lead to a positive outcome for anyone.
Sending a check to a charity is another misdirected help effort that does no-one any good (except maybe the administrators and marketers of the charity). If you know (as most of us do now) that up to 100% of charitable donations are redirected down the black hole of admin and advertising costs, then you’re a sucker to sign the check. Charities are banking on your being a sucker. Close that sucker bank down.
If you feel the need to help someone financially, find a relative or an acquaintance who could use a few dollars. Give them the money (don’t lend it to them, give it to them) and do it anonymously, if possible. Expect nothing in return, not even a “thank you”. That’s true charity.
During his ministry years, Jesus helped all those who came to him in sincerity. God also helps all those who come to him in sincerity. These are our models – Jesus and God – not the Joneses next door who are involved in a dozen charities and sign up to do volunteer work every weekend.
If people sincerely need your help, God will send them to you and make it obvious that he sent them to you. Always be ready and willing to help whoever God sends your way. If God sends them, God will help you help them. That’s the only genuine help that’s genuinely needed and genuinely does any good.
HEAVEN FOURTEEN
HALIFAX, Nova Scotia, November 11, 2015 – It must have been a shock to Peter when Jesus called him Satan, especially since all Peter was trying to do was help Jesus. “Get thee behind me, Satan!” is a far cry from “Thanks, Peter. I knew I could count on you for back up”, which is likely what Peter expected Jesus to say in response to Peter’s offer to protect him.
I can imagine the awkward silence that followed Jesus’ outburst, and I can almost see Peter’s face, his eyes wide, staring at Jesus in hurt disbelief and confusion.
Peter was easily the most enthusiastic of all the disciples. That he wanted to please Jesus was beyond doubt, but during Jesus’ ministry years, Peter had a hard time figuring out what Jesus really wanted from him. Jesus nagged him about his lack of faith and about his tendency to “think as man thinks, not as God thinks”. But Peter always tried his hardest.
And that was his problem.
Peter approached kingdom life as if it were the world. But following Jesus and doing God’s will is not like living in the world. In the world, you decide how you want to proceed based on a combination of common sense, logic, desire, past experience, knee-jerk reaction, and other people’s expectations. In the kingdom, you have to wait for God’s go-ahead and proceed only if and when you get it. You also have to do what God wants you to do, not what your gut tells you to do, not what everyone else is doing, not what has always worked in the past, and not what religious tradition dictates you do.
Peter wanted to follow Jesus, but what he ended up doing instead was trying to get Jesus to follow him. It didn’t work.
It must also have been a shock for Peter when Jesus stared straight at him following his betrayal in the courtyard. That’s a wordless “I told you so” that I hope never to experience.
But amazingly, immediately after his resurrection, Jesus singles out Peter for a special mission: He wants him to feed his sheep and lambs. No, Jesus hasn’t left Peter his petting zoo to look after; he’s assigned Peter more or less the same position Jesus had during his earthly ministry.
Say what? Peter is to take the reigns from Jesus? How can that be?
Peter must have experienced yet another shock when he realized that Jesus had entrusted him with the leadership of the new church. Maybe the other disciples were shocked, too. Peter always seemed to get it wrong, and he had even denied knowing Jesus – how could Jesus overlook Peter’s numerous mistakes and make Peter the new leader?
God reads hearts. Peter clearly had a heart for Jesus and a heart for discipleship. What he was missing was the sense that he wasn’t up for the job. Peter’s enthusiasm was tinged with a headstrongness that was morphing into pride. The pride had to go, and pride can only go through repentance and a sense of one’s full dependence on God.
When Jesus appeared out of nowhere while the disciples were fishing, Peter didn’t even want to approach Jesus, he felt so unworthy. This is similar to the man who went to the temple to repent of his sins. He wouldn’t even lift up his head, he felt so bad about what he’d done. And what did Jesus say about this man? That he was the one who was forgiven his sins, not the man who proudly stood up and recited his laundry list of good deeds.
God reads hearts. Peter was ready to be everything he needed to be, but only after he let go of everything he wanted to be. As long as Peter thought as man thinks, he was going to go contrary to God’s will. God’s ways are not our ways. You can only think as God thinks when you stop trying to control the narrative and give yourself completely over to God.
HEAVEN THIRTEEN
BEDFORD, Nova Scotia, November 10, 2015 – Just before Jesus started his ministry, he thought he wasn’t ready to start. He’d been preparing for years, and had made one aborted attempt when he was 12, but he didn’t know he was ready when he actually was. His mother had to get his motor running, so to speak, by asking him to lend a hand at the wedding at Cana. God asked her to do that, and she did. Mary Mary was quite uncontrary when it came to doing God’s will.
Jesus didn’t know his time had come, and yet in God’s eyes Jesus was ready. God does that; it’s a little trick of his, like a test. The work we need to do in his name has to be done by him. Scripture says that. God works through people. All good things come from God. But in order for God to work through you, you can’t be relying on your own strength or your own understanding. What comes through you needs to come from God.
People who proudly assert that they’re ready are, in fact, not. Jesus thought he was ready to start working for God when he was 12 years old. Certainly, he already was spiritual light-years ahead of the Jewish elders in understanding of scripture, but he wasn’t ready to preach and teach. He had some living to do, some maturing that can only come with time. So his mother and father hauled him back to Nazareth.
But a few decades later, at Cana, when he thought he wasn’t ready, he actually was. He was as ready as he would ever be. He had prepared; he had learned; he had matured. And (and this is the kicker) he wasn’t confident in himself anymore. He hung back. He thought he needed to learn and mature more.
This hesitation and humility is precisely what God is looking for. Jesus not only needed to learn and mature, he needed to lose his confidence in his own abilities and rely solely on God.
It is, after all, God’s work that needs to be done, not ours.
This form of humility is not self-denigration but places all trust and confidence in God rather than in oneself. This has to be learned and then tested over time.
Jesus passed his final test at Cana, and off he went.
He was ready because he didn’t think he was ready.
Are you?
And Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people.
But when he saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion on them, because they fainted, and were scattered abroad, as sheep having no shepherd.
Then saith he unto his disciples, “The harvest truly is plenteous, but the labourers are few;
Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth labourers into his harvest.”
Matthew 9:35-38
HEAVEN TWELVE
BEDFORD, Nova Scotia, November 9, 2015 – As in every other type of job, working in God’s kingdom on Earth requires preparation. Very few people are ready to preach the Word immediately after rebirth. Most need intensive trial-and-error training, followed by a lengthy apprenticeship period. If the apprenticeship works out, God will hire you to work on a probationary basis. If you make it through the probationary period, then you’ll be hired full-time.
In contrast to the world’s system, the higher up the employment ladder you go in God’s kingdom, the fewer financial rewards you’ll reap. In fact, with each promotion, the less money you’ll earn. Nabbing a coveted full-time position means you’ll be earning a whopping nothing in terms of worldly wealth because you won’t need to earn anything. One way or another, God will provide for all your needs.
Look at Jesus during his ministry years, or Paul during his final travels. These are our examples of what full-time work in God’s kingdom on Earth looks like. Neither man had any income to speak of, yet their housing, food, transportation, clothing and miscellaneous needs were completely taken care of. They were also ferociously, even supernaturally, energetic. They didn’t just grudgingly put in their 40 hours a week and then kick back for a weekend of R&R with their buddies – no, they were always working. There’s no such thing as “overtime” when you accept a position in God’s kingdom on Earth. You work every day, from the time you get up in the morning until the time you close your eyes at night, and you keep on working until you either fall down dead or are killed. There is no retirement in God’s kingdom on Earth. The phrase “retired minister” is an abomination to God.
At any point, of course, your training or employment can be terminated, if you show yourself unworthy to the task. Being born-again isn’t a guaranteed ticket to Heaven, but it is a prerequisite to getting into Heaven. And being born-again necessarily means that you’re either working in God’s earthly kingdom or preparing to work in it.
All of you reading this blog should either be training, or apprenticing, or in your probationary period, or working full-time. If you don’t identify with one of those phases, you’re not born-again.
Jesus said that you cannot serve God and mammon. During your training, apprenticeship and probationary years, God will allow most of you to continue working in the world, but only enough to keep body and soul together. Your focus, during those years, should not be on increasing your income or on upgrading your skills to get a “better job” with “better benefits”; your focus should be on doing God’s work in preparation for full-time employment in the kingdom. Your goal is not to earn more money but to earn less, until you’re finally released from the need to earn money altogether.
What a blessed day that is, when God calls you to work full-time!
His spirit is with you powerfully from that point onwards, and you have the same focus and drive that Jesus and Paul had. Every incremental increase in God’s spirit (which comes with every incremental increase in your faith) brings you greater insight into God’s ways as well as enhanced pleasure in everyday life. The higher up the employment scale you advance, the closer you grow to God and Jesus, the more they entrust in you, and the more likely you are to get to Heaven.
The job does get tougher, however, and the physical comfort level decreases with each advancement. If you’re looking just to slide by as a lowly bench warmer in God’s earthly kingdom – forget it. There’s no such position available.
No genuine born-again wants to be bench warmer. That’s one way you can tell the real born-agains from the fake ones – the genuine ones can’t wait to get out there and start spreading the Word, whereas the fake ones either don’t want to do it or will only do it after attending theology school. These latter types see preaching as a career opportunity, and they’re in it mainly for the income security.
No genuine born-again preaches for a paycheck. No genuine born-again expects payment for sharing God’s Word.
Jesus filed professional preachers and Word-sellers under “hypocrites”.
Don’t get on that file.
Working for God can be exhausting and demanding and take everything you have to give, but even your worst day working for the kingdom will be infinitely better than your best day working for the world..
HEAVEN ELEVEN
BEDFORD, Nova Scotia, November 6, 2015 – One thing you can bet your bottom dollar on when you start seriously following Jesus is that you’ll be broke.
Flat broke.
No savings to speak of. Not even enough for an ice-cream on a hot day.
That’s because God’s weaning you off your wants and getting you used to having only enough for your needs. Burning off the excess. Refining the gold. Getting you to focus on what matters. Having money to buy things you don’t really need takes your focus off doing God’s work.
You prayed to have only your daily bread, so don’t be surprised if it doesn’t come with a steak and fries.
Or an ice-cream.
Most of us, however, don’t go gently into that economic good night. I speak from experience when I say it’s a shock to the system when God takes the money away, even if you think you’ve prepared yourself for it psychologically.
It’s at times like these that you have to remind yourself, over and over again (in between crying fits), that Jesus had no money, either. People would donate to him, but otherwise he was a freeloader during his ministry years. He never begged, but he graciously accepted what was offered him by way of meals and transportation and housing. Nothing wrong with that, if it’s what God wants for you. Even as a freeloader, Jesus always had enough for his needs and then some.
“Blessed are those who look after the needs of God’s freeloaders.” I’m sure that’s in the Bible somewhere, though perhaps worded slightly differently. Remember what Jesus said about how God rewards those who give even a cup of cold water to one of his children? That would be us, God’s children. His dear little thirsty freeloaders. His dear little thirsty and hungry freeloaders.
God bless us, and God bless those who look after us!
Huge blessings come the way of those who look after God’s children, especially when they’re in their seriously-following-Jesus freeloading years. But that’s always the way – those who help get more than those who are helped. It’s a wonderful law. Unfortunately, it’s been perverted by some “wolves” to insinuate that God will reward people MATERIALLY for helping others, but that’s not God’s way.
The best rewards are always spiritual.
What keeps me going as I stare into my empty wallet (and try not to cry) is thinking about Heaven. I can have all my wants here now, on Earth, if I choose to, or I can wait and get them in Heaven, where they’ll be infinitely better and last forever.
Most people, sadly, have chosen to get their wants now. It’s tempting, that’s for sure, but it’s best to do what Jesus did, and he waited to get his wants in Heaven. So did Paul, and so did all the prophets.
In this, as in everything else, we should choose as Jesus did. As long as we’re doing God’s work, we’ll have enough for our needs while we’re here on Earth. And then, if and when we get to Heaven – PARTY TIME!
As my grandmother used to say: “The good Lord provides.”
And that’s something else you can bet your bottom dollar on.
HEAVEN TEN
BEDFORD, Nova Scotia, November 5, 2015 – I am rabidly areligious. I hate all religions equally, and I hate them with a passion.
In my mind, ‘freedom of religion’ just means freedom to bow down to whichever demon you fancy, because all religions are demon worship, every single one. It’s better to live where religion is outlawed than to live where all religions are welcome.
Take Christianity, for instance. It’s loosely based on Jesus’ life and teachings, but it’s polar opposite to what Jesus intended. When he warned us: “Many will come in my name”, he was referring to the multiplicity of denominations that would spring up like weeds after a hard rain. None of these denominations reflect the true teachings of Jesus, and yet all claim to be “Christian”. Like the other demon-worshiping cults they mimic (Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, etc.), denominational Christianity is based on creeds and a rigid system of beliefs rather than raw live faith.
Jesus wanted us to experience faith raw and live, and he showed us how we can do that. Rather than institute a religious system that requires us to mouth “vain repetitions” (by reciting certain words over and over at certain times of the day) or perform deeds that were disconnected from our daily lives (like attending worship services), Jesus demonstrated how faith in God should not be something separate from what we do every day but instead should be life itself. He constantly referred to God as “the living God”, and invited us to live along with him. We don’t need to go into a building to worship God because our worship is the choices we make, every day, all day. We are our faith, we don’t just “practice” it.
If you follow Jesus as you should be following Jesus, your faith is indistinguishable from your life. In fact, if you follow Jesus as you should be following him, you could live in a Muslim country where Christianity is outlawed, and still openly live your faith 24/7. This is what is so astounding about what Jesus accomplished: he not only conquered death by paying our sin-debt on the cross, but he also conquered religion and the need for religious worship by turning everyday life into worship.
If you follow Jesus, you automatically are worshiping God.
If you follow Jesus, you live your faith real and raw by the choices you make, every day, all day.
Following Jesus is the highest calling a human being can aspire to; it’s also the most natural and the most rewarding. Jesus was a cool guy who lived a cool life. He was answerable to nothing and no-one but God, whose values he fully shared and fully espoused. He was areligious in the extreme.
So should you be.
A BORN-AGAIN BELIEVER 