12/24/2018
When I wrote this letter, I had two friends for whom I most was prayerfully optimistic the Holy Spirit could liberate using its truths. They each returned their copies unopened. satan has his talons so tightly wrapped around their hearts that light cannot pe*****te. I pray that none of you find it as difficult to peer into the Light. For those who received a hard copy, your prayers have been answered: you now have the letter in a format that makes it easier to forward! Merry Chrismas!!
Dearest family and friends:
Much of what we “know” about God has been transmitted through what some call “love lines”, connections with parents, pastors, priests, teachers, family or friends. I cannot replace those persons in your heart, nor is it likely, that I can remove misinformation from the place it has been rooted in your mind. Ultimately, the Holy Spirit will need to do that work. What I am asking is that you make His work a little easier by granting the possibility that, to the extent that your beliefs disagree with the truths I’m presenting, the person(s) on the other end of your love line, was/were themselves misled and, totally without malice, have led you to misunderstand God. Jesus said, “I Am the Good Shepherd. I know My own [sheep] and My own know Me” and they harken to My voice. For those who belong to Jesus, you will recognize His voice in the Truth I’m sharing with you and He will lead you out of the darkness of bo***ge to those lies into His marvelous light of freedom.
I am in my 24th year of working the Kairos Prison Ministry and just had the joy of participating in the K-45 weekend. Each team is comprised of members of many faiths including Roman Catholics. I’ve taken to reading the obits lately (Peg thinks it’s morbid; I consider it preparation, since one of these days, my turn to have my life reflected there will come). I’m moved near the point of tears when the storyline indicates the deceased is a “good Catholic”. It would have been far better had the person been a “faith-filled Christian”. Catholics have been lied to all their lives and, if they have bought the lie and lived the lie, chances are they have died on the wide road and, that’s a shame! It is more shameful that the proponents of their faith virtually forbid its members to read books, literature, sermons, etc., written by non-Catholics. Everyone that RC members are exposed to have drunk the Kool-aid! There is no chance that someone will expose them to the truth and allow escape from the wide to the narrow road.
Martin Luther did not seek to break from the Roman Church but to return the Church to its roots, to the truth of the Gospel: man is saved by grace alone, through faith alone in Christ alone. Also, Scripture alone forms the only unshakable foundation for our faith. By elevating Papal Decrees and Church tradition to equal with Scripture, the Roman Church elevates the Pope to equal with God. No man, however pious, is God’s equal. We creatures are fallible, prone to mistakes, even Popes. That was one of the problems Luther identified in the Church of his day.
Let’s get the meat of the matter. Since Luther was right, we are saved by God’s grace, not by any merit of our own (i.e., no congruent merit). The only “good works” we can rely upon are those of Christ. His sacrificial, atoning death fully satisfied God’s righteousness removing the stain of sin from us, and its power over us, freeing us to walk in the good works God prepared beforehand for us to do [Eph. 2:10]. We are saved by faith alone but not by faith that is alone. Our works are the fruit, and not the root, of our salvation. To attempt to “add to” God’s formula for salvation is the write your own. You lose Christ’s redemptive work and replace it with your own “filthy rags”.
Some (most?) of you believe that God wants everyone saved. There is no Scripture, properly read and understood in the context of the entirety of the Bible, that supports such a proposition. God is Almighty: He gets what He wants. Had He wanted everyone saved, He would have devise a plan to save everyone. He did not and so He does not. [Note, God does NOT owe everyone a chance at salvation; “The wages of sin is death”.] The same ‘some’ as above most likely read John 3:16 to mean “God so loved [everyone in] the world, that He gave His one and only Son, that whosoever [wants to] believe(s) shall have eternal life”. You will acknowledge that the bracketed terms are not there but simply inferred by the reader who would like for them to be true. However, Jesus contradicts those wished-for terms: “No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws Him. (Jn. 6:44)”Basically, no one has the “want to’s” unless Abba first gives them to her/him. Salvation is God’s idea/plan; Jesus initiated the plan with His sacrificial death and resurrection (indeed, Jesus said “It [the Plan] is finished”); Abba executes the plan by dispatching the Holy Spirit to quicken to life those He has elected (whose names He wrote in the Book of Life before the foundation of the world Rev. 13:8, 17:8). God deserves and receives all the glory for our salvation. To God ALONE be the Glory for the great things He has done!
Here’s the problem: the God that most of you SWAPT (serve, worship and pray to), the one that wants everyone saved but is powerless to make it happen because he bows the knee to the free will of man, does not exist. Hence, you are guilty of idolatry (worshiping a false god). If you have read any of the Old Testament, you will remember how much trouble the Hebrew nation got into for worshiping gods that were not THE God. Please, I beg of you, make sure this Christmas that you are not numbered among those who are pursuing a non-existent “feel-good” God. Swear allegiance (give your HEART) to the Holy, Eternal, Almighty, Righteous, Triune God, Who Alone, is Worthy to receive Glory, Honor, and Praise, Now and Forevermore! Alleluia!!!
Merry CHRISTMAS!
