Bad Form

Chris Bilauca

Monday, May 27, 2013

I crave the real power of God. I crave seeing Him in action among His people, and the absence of it makes me question whether we truly have a relationship with Him! It’s not the miracles I want to see, it’s the reflection of the Acts church. I’ve been reading a book called “The History of Christianity”, and specifically regarding the “religion” of Christianity that had begun to occur, not even 200 years after Jesus! 150 AD, Christians were already starting to lay down rules regarding baptism, length of time in catechism training, etc. The perception was that since your sins are forgiven when you’re baptized but seriously frowned upon after baptism, one should wait until the latter part of their lives to receive it, just to be sure that they’re going to heaven. What bologna! Human beings are suckers for systems and institutionalization, any measuring methodology by which to feel good about ourselves, and consequently judge those who fail by its standards. It’s evil, proud, and demonic; it attempts to substitute the power of God’s Spirit with human effort. The truth of God is a relationship with Him, and “religion” circumvents that, making people think they can be okay with God apart from a true relationship with Him. Look at John Wesley, a powerful man of God who had a true relationship with His Father. After his death, his followers didn’t fail to break the 2nd commandment as is our human nature, and made a religion out of his teachings: Yet another standard by which to judge and the Methodism denomination was birthed. Without fail, men without a relationship with God will forever try to emulate the truth: False fire, a form of godliness, an idol. So the question now remains: What do we do? Or more specifically, because we’re only truly domain holders of our own souls, what do I do? Seeing all this fallacy, having my eyes open to all this heresy, I must first realize that this is nothing new. Mankind has been doing it… since the fall of man in the garden, and will continue doing it. But if I, if have had my eyes spiritually opened by God, what will I now do? For a long time, the magnitude of the truth terrified me into doing nothing… what can one person do anyway? Then it dawned on me, it’s not my responsibility anyway! This is God’s world, He controls it. He knows it. He’s the One who revealed it to me. And if He did, it’s for His purpose. He’s in charge, not me! All that I must do, is listen to Him and follow where His Spirit leads. The Spirit revealed it to me, and He must lead on. You see, if He’s reveals something to me and at that point I choose to take the revelation and run with it myself, I’m no different than the Galatians. They started with the Spirit, but tried to continue in their flesh. So again it comes down to relationship, this time, my own. Am I being faithful to God? Do I hear Him, or do I still insist on hearing my own reasoning? In 100 years, we’ll all most likely be dead. What am I going to do with the time that God’s given me? I’m so sick of this ho-hum, nominal Christianity. We’re bearing no fruit, and we have very shallow, or non-existent, relationship with our Father. Worst, most aren’t truly interested in one, they just want the blessings from Him to complement their self-absorbed, narcissistic life styles. Let’s get serious with God, and serious about believing Him. It will cost much; actually, everything. If you have a better avenue of life to pursue, go for it. As for me, though it’s hard and I don’t always get it, I can only repeat what Peter said after Jesus asked His disciples if they wanted to pursue life elsewhere:

Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.
John 6.68