“Whoever has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. The one who loves me will be loved by my Father.” (John 14:21)

Before you continue reading, please go back and reread that scripture about three or four hundred times.  Okay, maybe at least two or three times!  My point is, do you get it?  Do you understand what it is that God reveals to demonstrate a genuine love for Him?  Time and again throughout scripture, God tells us that it is those who accept His Word and keep His commands that truly love Him.  Obeying God’s Word IS to accept His Name, and disobedience to His Word is to reject His Name! (Rev. 3:8-10)  Boy do Christians have a different standard today regarding what is required for them to be accepted by God!  Arrogance is believing that you can deliberately reject God’s commands yet maintain that He will welcome you into His kingdom anyway simply because you claim yourself to be a Christian!  Entitlement is creating a belief system that supports that false teaching!  

So, how about you; how do you show your love for God?  Is it by attending church service?  Is it by praising His Name and giving thanks for all your blessings?  Do you show your love for Him by giving out of your wealth, or by serving out of your abundance of time?  Or is it perhaps the way that you worship that demonstrates your love for Him?  The question is not so much about what we do to show our love for God as much as it is about understanding what God clearly defines love to be: “And this is love: that we walk in obedience to His commands.” (2 John 6) 

Christians: your religion is getting in the way of God and preventing believers from coming to know the Lord!  Just because you name a golden calf, Jesus, does not mean that that idol then somehow magically becomes the Word of God (Truth)!  When you mistake your religion for “God,” then your religion becomes your idol and you’re then guilty of idol worship whether that idol has Jesus’ name on it or not. 

Do you believe God?  Do you believe that the Holy Bible is the Word of God?  Do you believe what you read in His Word, believe what God says?  Do you accept His Word?  Do you agree that “love” is obedience to God’s commands, and anything contrary to the Truth in God’s Word is evil?  Are you washed in the Word; do you know the entirety of God’s Word? (Deut 8:3)  Do you know that God says that it is His Word that is full of the Spirit and life? (John 6:63b)  Do you believe that?  Do you believe that God’s Spirit is very near you?  Do you believe that through His Word, His Spirit is “in your mouth and in your heart so that you may obey it?” (Deut. 30:14)  God’s greatest commandment is that we love Him with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength. (Mark 12:29-30)  God’s Word tells us that His TRUE worshippers must worship Him in Spirit and in Truth. (John 4:23-24)  So, the question that I have for ALL Christians is, do you love the Lord with all your heart, and do you worship Him in Spirit and in Truth?  Because according to His Word, your salvation depends completely upon whether or not you do! (John 6:63)

Why do you go to church?  Is that where you think God is?  Do you think that you might find Him there?  For sure that is what your church wants you to believe, indeed that perception is good for business!  So, do you bring God with you to church, or do you go to church to “be in the presence of God?” (Job 27:3)  “Church” is not where God is!  God is Spirit, and His Spirit can only be found in your heart, and it is from there that He desires that we earnestly seek Him in His Word and through prayer! (Luke 17:20-21)  Please don’t get me wrong, it is absolutely biblical that believers gather together to worship the Lord in community with one another.  This type of fellowship is essential, it is how we strengthen each other’s faith and grow together as one in the body of Christ.  That is what discipleship is all about!  But make no mistake, you cannot reject His Truth and claim to be a part of the body of Christ!  And it is not all those sitting in the buildings that we call “church” that make up God’s church, but only those who accept His Truth and keep His Word!  And the church cannot accomplish effective discipleship if it removes the Truth regarding what God reveals a love for Him to be!  

If “you are included in Christ when you hear the message of Truth (Eph. 1:13),” then it must also be true that you are not included in Christ when you hear and accept a distortion of His Truth (aka, Satan’s deception)?  According to God’s Word, it is all about obeying His commands, keeping His Word — that is “believing in Him,” that is love!  And that defines a people who God will continue to bless.  But according to the church today, it is all about simply letting God know that you have allowed Him to forgive you (accepting Christ as your Savior), “praising His name,” and being grateful for the perversion of God’s grace which they believe to be “truth.”  Yep, that’s all it takes, just simply say His name and follow your particular church’s form of worship and you are golden!  Hmmm, how’s that belief working out for us, America? (Deut. 8:20)  If your church claims that “love” is anything other than following the commands of God, then your church is leading you down a path that may appear to be right but in the end will lead to your spiritual death and the destruction of our nation! (Prov. 16:25)  Moreover, if your church has stopped demanding obedience to the commands of God to be welcomed into the family of God, then your church isn’t preaching The Word of God!

Christianity as a religion has become a stumbling block to believers!  Christians today are those who are praising Jesus’ name, and stumbling over His Word!  “They stumble because they disobey the message — which is what they were destined for.” (1 Peter 2:8b)  His Word is the stone that Christians are stumbling over (falling on), and His Word will crush those on whom it falls! (Matt. 21:40-44)  Christians — a people lovin’ ‘em some Jesus, all while the vast majority of them are rejecting His Word. (John 12:48)  Due to Satan’s deception consuming the church, Christians are loving their religion to death (to their own spiritual death), meanwhile, the vast majority of their hearts are far from the Lord, living with no fear of God before their eyes! 

So, do you love God, or do you just love your religion?  The church I recently left pridefully sells shirts that read, “I love my church!”  If ever there was a clearer answer to my question than the one that its congregation literally wears on their sleeve!  Yes, they do indeed love their church.  Little do they know, their church is not doing them any spiritual favors!  You must understand the difference between providing community support and providing the Truth in God’s Word!  To be honest, the church is doing plenty from a standpoint of the concerns of man, just not the concerns of God.  Today you can find emotional support (counseling), fellowship, and encouragement to overcome many of our various addictions within the church.  And that is great, a community of believers should provide that support.  But you can also find this type of support at Weight Watchers, addiction clinics, in group therapy, or any one of the many other secular support programs available today.  Let me be clear, community support IS essential to our mental health!  But are things of this life all that the church is supposed to be about?  

People go to church seeking the peace and freedom that they do not believe they can find anywhere else.  And this type of freedom is only found through God’s Spirit, and His Spirit is only given to those who accept His Truth and follow His teaching. (John 14:15-17, John 8:31-37)  And what are those who buy into the false teaching within the church today NOT finding?  True freedom!  Why?  Because they are not hearing the true cost in order to receive Him!  The church is not delivering the truth about the cost required for subjects to decide whether they will agree to meet that condition before they can then actually receive His promised Spirit.  Yes, there most certainly is freedom in His Spirit!  But you cannot receive Him at a discounted cost!  Everyone loves a deal…  Not with His Spirit!  Without knowing the true cost, how can you begin to build upon that which you desire?  Without knowing the cost, all you are doing is running aimlessly.  Please read this passage regarding that cost… (Luke 14:28-35)  

If God’s Word is Jesus, then Jesus can set you free!  If your religion is Jesus, then Satan’s deception will keep you bound in sin and darkness.  God’s Word (Truth) is the only way that you come to know the Lord.  Anything other than His Truth, is an idol, a barrier, a stunt to your spiritual growth that will ultimately prevent you from giving your life to Christ.  Where is your heart?  Do you have in mind the concern of man, or of God?  Do you love God?  Because, according to His Word, how you feel about sin reveals the truth.  Are you going to take responsibility and turn from sin (repent), or trust deception in that your religious beliefs have taken care of sin for you?  Have you offered your body to the Lord? (Rom. 12:1-2)  Is your life His to do with as He pleases?  Is your life, Jesus?  Do you hate the sin in your heart (envy, pride, selfish ambition)?  Because you must, if you are ever going to choose to die with Christ to it! (Gal. 5:24)

Do you long to be with Jesus?  Does His Spirit within you long to be permanently clothed with Him in His kingdom? (2 Cor. 5:1-4)  Do you really believe in Christ’s return?  Do you long for that return?  Or does your heart reveal that you are not really patiently waiting for Him?  Christians who do not long for their heavenly dwelling, are Christians whose hearts are as far from the Lord as the Jewish people who God described as a stiff-necked people — having hearts full of pride, lust, envy, selfish ambition, and the things of this world.  My question is this: Where does the confidence in your salvation lie?  Is your confidence founded by what your pastor or priest tells you?  Or is the confidence in your salvation founded in the fact that your heart is at rest before God because you know that you belong to the Truth?  Because our hearts will either condemn us or bring us confidence before God — love for your religion, and loving the way you worship, do not apply! (1 John 3:19-24)  Are you pursuing God, or simply pursuing your salvation?  Because the sincerity of your love for Him, and the genuineness of your profession, is found in only one of these two.  Fear the Lord!  

Share this post on social media