Truth or Pretense
“Behold, you trust in deceptive words to no avail. Will you steal, murder, commit adultery, swear falsely, make offerings to Baal, and go after other gods that you have not known, and then come and stand before me in this house, which is called by my name, and say, ‘We are delivered!’—only to go on doing all these abominations?”
Jeremiah 7:8-10
There is a striking similarity to the “gospel” of Jeremiah’s day as to ours. The common lot of man has not changed. The truths of God invariably fall into corruption by the infusion of men’s ideas, their concepts, and their innate desire to explain away the Word of His Truth. Throughout the ages, as Solomon noted, “there is nothing new under the sun”. The names, the phrases, the nomenclature may sound new and may be followed with great enthusiasm but the haunting emptiness of these things can never bring the wonder of His Presence in the human heart.
The darkest times in Israel’s history came when “every man did what was right in their own eyes”. The disconnection and the lack of community and oneness is the revelation of a people who live outside of God. The Holy Spirit within a heart produces the growing sense of our being “members one of another”. A living faith that fuses hearts by the very fire of God within each is God’s answer to a fallen and divided world. When carnal things, issues of the world, whether it be politics, medical protocols, or the latest headline, divide His people, we must begin to comprehend how far we have fallen from His Life within.
God hates mixture and any “gospel” which proclaims an amnesty from God’s Judgments as Israel was saying in Jeremiahs’s day… “we are delivered so that we can do these things” is heresy. The truth will always convict of sin, it will never compromise nor become comfortable with sins defiling scourge. Truth is given to set us free and only actual truth, powerful truth can actually set an individual free in the freedom of Christ.
The litmus test for us to know our current growth in His Truth will be evident in the freedom we have from sin and the corresponding freedom to make Him who is the truth known. Our lives are to be a statement of faith. How we live, how we conduct ourselves, and how deeply we feel the desire to fellowship in the light of Christ with all who walk in the light of Christ.
To rely on confessions without a corresponding walk is the definition of hypocrisy.
“For if we would judge ourselves,
we should not be judged”
1 Corinthians 11:31
If we would but let His Word bring conviction and judgment we will avail ourselves of His Grace. Our journey into truth must begin with our being truthful to our own condition. God never turned away from a penitent heart. He does and ever will turn from those who lean upon something other than the power of His life within to live righteously.
It is a day to let His word have its way in our hearts. To open ourselves to the Sword of the Spirit to cut away our entanglements, our numbness in order to bring us to pure and holy repentance. I have seen many turn themselves away from His truth by their religious confessions. Using His Word to justify themselves from the truth of His Word. There is no remedy for such.
“They that observe lying vanities
forsake their own mercy”
Jonah 2:8
Mercy is not a doctrine, it is a power that enables us to offer our very lives to Him as living sacrifices (Rom. 12:1). To live within its sphere of power and to feel the beauty of a broken heart is a joy to those who have tasted of its wonder. Mercy, true and pure will break a heart more completely than any harsh judgment can.
Seek Mercy
Seek mercy, choose mercy, and let mercy’s power infiltrate our hearts afresh. For purity is bound within her garments, meekness shines with the gentle strength of Christ and His peace reigns where mercy has wrought her good work.
“Seek the LORD, all you humble of the land, who do his just commands; seek righteousness; seek humility; perhaps you may be hidden on the day of the anger of the LORD”
Zephaniah 2:3
BT
