<a href="http://getrealchristianity.wordpress.com/" title="Real Christianity" rel="home">Real Christianity

Tags: Come Out From Among Them and Be Separate, Community of the Called-Out Ones, Final Judgment, First Century, Is America a Christian Nation?, Jesus, Real Christianity, The Great Awakening, The Lamb's Book of Life, Unreal Christianity

Come Out From Among Them and Be Separate (Part 1)

Apr 15

Posted by RJ Dawson

At the great judgment there will be a steady stream of non-penitents going before the Lord. They will be the ones who justified themselves in life despite their sin. The most guilty will be unreal Christians.

Over the last 2000 years, unreal Christians have rewritten the pure teachings of Messiah Jesus. And for this, like the hypocritical Pharisees of old, they will receive the greater judgment.

As the world wonders what has happened to Western society, especially in America, everyone has someone or some group to blame. The progressives are blamed for introducing an anti-Christian purely secular blueprint for society that rewrites the culture, for example. But long before the emergence of the all-encompassing agenda that faces us at present, filled with anti-Christian rhetoric and the establishment of new laws to form a new culture, another group had done the same.

And the former group was much more successful. Rather than the in-your-face tactics of the present purveyors of the current gathering storm, the former group used a low-key approach. It took full advantage of willingly ignorant Christians who refused to follow the Lord but were conditioned to follow religious leaders and whatever they may teach. These Christians never checked to see if their leaders were standing on the Word of God, or cared to. They never checked to see if their leaders even followed the Lord. It was a mass assumption that their favorite clergyites were acting at the behest of God and relaying His pure Word.

Boy Howdy, were they ever wrong. Whether these so-called Christian leaders were Protestant or Catholic or Charismatic or whatever, America in general took their words and actions as true and correct. American Christians did not bother to see whether any deception was involved. In fact, the very idea that they were being lied to and led astray was verboten. The religious higher-ups had such a powerful hold on the minds of American Christians that said Christians would flatten anyone for even thinking their brand of Christian religion was incorrect.

They made the fatal mistake of not separating themselves from the false world of Christian counterfeits. They chose to have their names, lives, and reputations recorded in a different registry other than the one commanded by the Lord:

And if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire. [Revelation 20:15]

America was brawnier then. There was more animosity and open hostility between denominations and religious groupings. Biblically illiterate “Christians” were prone to fight physically to protect their turf. They had no idea they were brainwashed by pretenders. Unreal Christianity ruled through threat and pure hatred against any and all reformers.

Speaking of which, if America has always been a Christian nation, why was there ever any need of reform? Why was there a Great Awakening in the 1730’s and 40’s? Why did other great revival and reform efforts come forth since then? And why were the greatest resisters in these powerful and undeniable moves of God other Christians?

It has always been this way. Rather than actually obey the Lord Jesus and follow Him, unreal Christians create their own brand of Christianity that is much easier than the full curriculum of the Lord. And rather than crucifying the flesh as Jesus commanded, unreal Christians crucify real Christians.

So, back to the judgment. Jesus will judge the fakers, be they deceived or not, based on their adherence to a different gospel and the leaders thereof. He will say things like:

“I never knew you; ‘DEPART FROM ME, YOU WHO PRACTICE LAWLESSNESS.’” [Matthew 7:23]

A lot of Christians may realize right then and there for the first time that they got it wrong. They will see that their insistence on following someone or something other than the Lord Jesus for the sake of social or religious standing doomed their souls.

And, of course, it will be too late. An untold number of unreal Christians who have already passed on are awaiting their inevitable fate. Though they will try to plead their case it will not matter.

While time remains on our side, those of us on this side of eternity might want to make sure we’re getting it right.

Nevertheless, with most of them God was not well-pleased; for they were laid low in the wilderness.

Now these things happened as examples for us, so that we would not crave evil things as they also craved.

Do not be idolaters, as some of them were; as it is written, “THE PEOPLE SAT DOWN TO EAT AND DRINK, AND STOOD UP TO PLAY.”

Nor let us act immorally, as some of them did, and twenty-three thousand fell in one day.

Nor let us try the Lord, as some of them did, and were destroyed by the serpents.

Nor grumble, as some of them did, and were destroyed by the destroyer.

Now these things happened to them as an example, and they were written for our instruction, upon whom the ends of the ages have come.

Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed that he does not fall. [1 Corinthians 10:5-12]

No one of us is above the teachings of the Lord. Every one of us needs a Savior, and by God’s grace a Savior has been provided. But that doesn’t mean we can simply pick and choose our own Christian beliefs. The Word of God is an all-or-nothing document. Following the Lord and obeying His teachings and commandments is an all-or-nothing proposition. And though we may do some great things on this planet and help many people selflessly and sacrificially, we are not saved by our works. Human virtue is not a ticket to heaven. No matter how righteous we are we will still be proven to be unrighteous by God’s holy standard unless His standard is applied.

Be encouraged by this opening section of Peter’s second letter. It is an excellent discourse regarding God’s standard of righteousness, separation from the world of sin and deception, and true discipleship unto the Lord:

Simon Peter, a bond-servant and apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours, by the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ: Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord; seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence. For by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust.

Now for this very reason also, applying all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge, and in your knowledge, self-control, and in your self-control, perseverance, and in your perseverance, godliness, and in your godliness, brotherly kindness, and in your brotherly kindness, love.

For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For he who lacks these qualities is blind or short-sighted, having forgotten his purification from his former sins.

Therefore, brethren, be all the more diligent to make certain about His calling and choosing you; for as long as you practice these things, you will never stumble; for in this way the entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will be abundantly supplied to you. [2 Peter 1:1-11] [1]

Posted in Real Christianity

Tags: Come Out From Among Them and Be Separate, Community of the Called-Out Ones, Final Judgment, First Century, Is America a Christian Nation?, Lord Jesus, Real Christianity, The Great Awakening, The Lamb's Book of Life, Unreal Christianity

Strange Days Have Found Us

Apr 10

Posted by RJ Dawson

The 1960s ushered in the full-flowering of a new age, a weird age, with strange days, and pills that make you larger, and pills that make you small. And today’s pills are consumed in mass quantities by young and old alike, but regarding truth and finding the path of God, don’t do anything at all.

So turning on, tuning in, and dropping out apparently didn’t achieve the desired result. Instead, it was a generation’s call to self-deception and the beginning of a mass exodus to the devil’s strange little wonderland.

Since then the weirdness quotient has been gaining steady ground, through a process of fits and starts, as America decides it will do the wrong thing, then the right thing, then the wrong thing…

The “sane” generation of the sixties supported without question a government that slipped off track, while the up-and-coming insaners kept warning of gross evil and injustice to the nth degree. The sane rejected said argument and continued to blindly follow the lemmings trail. In time both groups merged by believing the big lie and the big liar.

It was only those who got close to the Lord Jesus, stayed close, and obeyed His Word who had a real handle on things, but these were rejected and are still, as the deceived majority always castigates the seeing minority.

And nowadays it has reached such crisis proportions that the majority seems to sit back and be led around by anyone and anything other than the Lord. Like one of those giant schools of fish in the nature vids all packed together like a single organism, moving in mass, darting here and there, told what to think, how to live, and what to believe. Media manipulation has since sailed way off the charts, as good old Americans do the strangest things. It’s become an upside down world where evil has suddenly been vaulted to the top and worshipped as good. And anyone trying to right the course is seen as a complete idiot and moral degenerate while the real moral degenerates parade around in all their filthy glory with a zero shame index and a conscience long since destroyed:

But the Spirit explicitly says that in later times some will fall away from the faith, paying attention to deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons, by means of the hypocrisy of liars seared in their own conscience as with a branding iron… [1Timothy 4:1-2]

Some will fall away from the faith. This reveals the exodus of turncoats and destroys one of the greatest and most deceiving false doctrines, meaning many will quit on God and doom their souls for love of themselves and this fallen world.

Paying attention to deceitful spirits. HELLO? Sinners have always accessed the devil’s media, read his books, attended his lectures, and followed his lying advice, but unreal Christians? Uh, YEAH. When the devil speaks, people listen, as to a stockbroker with a hot tip. Better stay in the Word. Otherwise, newspaper taxis will appear on the shore, waiting to take you away.

Doctrines of demons—the teachings of invisible fallen angels—powerful entities that warp men’s minds with convoluted logic and outright deceptions, bringing mass confusion and a complete lack of understanding of the real spiritual world the Lord taught us about. Or tries to. It’s bad enough that people religiously believe the most idiotic things, but “Christians?” Unreal Christianity has possibly done more harm than all other false religions put together.

The hypocrisy of liars. The Lord Jesus warned us about the leaven of the Pharisees, mixing pure grade A extra virgin first cold press hypocrisy into all their teachings, and baking a bulbous loaf of dead bread guaranteed to confuse, obliterate critical thinking, make the partakers thereof spiritually deaf and blind, and leave their sanity on the docks as they sail away into a faux spiritual la la land.

Seared in their own conscience as with a branding iron.Yep. Rejected the Lord. Burnt to the core of their little cerebellums. Up is down and black is white and good is evil, and magnetic polarity reverses course, and they spend their days opening up one giant Pandora’s box after another, beckoning the contents to flee like released rats into the world of the unsuspecting neutered and brainless to passively accept the Last Days Big Fake-Out.

Strange days have found us indeed. The weird quotient is rising exponentially. Hold on to your walk with God, folks, because it’s starting to get really wacky out there. In fact, staying as close as possible to the Lord will be the only thing that will save us from the great deception coming our way.

And this is just the start! Wait ‘til you see what’s coming next. If you think it’s weird now, and it is, you will be shocked and awed as the future unfolds. The cat is out of the bag. And more cats and bigger cats will follow. It’s going to look like Alice in Wonderland in plain sight. A nationwide epidemic of slappy face will break out as people keep trying to wake themselves up from the real time nightmare emerging.

These are the strange days of deep deception, the times of night descending into day. The deceiving power of the enemy is so strong we have largely not understood that a vast bizarro world has been surreptitiously built up all around us. 1984 is no longer knocking on your door—it’s in your living room.

LIFE HAS BECOME AN ILLUSION.

“…For false Christs and false prophets will arise, and will show signs and wonders, in order to lead astray, if possible, the elect. But take heed; behold, I have told you everything in advance.” [Mark 13:22-23]

Fake Christians could get a clue if they obeyed God and honored His Word, but the great deception never stopped at the church doors. In fact, such places can easily hold their own against any New Age freak on the planet, both in weirdness quotient and outright rebellion. Instead of openly welcoming those dark wispy spectres traipsing down the aisles humming the theme from Star Trek and blowing their otherworldly breaths into passive minds, perhaps checking their credentials first would have been a good idea:

Who is the liar but the one who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, the one who denies the Father and the Son. Whoever denies the Son does not have the Father; the one who confesses the Son has the Father also. [1John 2:22-23]

Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God; and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God; this is the spirit of the antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming, and now it is already in the world. [1John 4:1-3] [1]

And it is still in the world. And it took the pill that makes it larger.

Go ask Alice.

Posted in Current Events

10 Comments

Tags: Alice in Wonderland, antichrist, Doctrines of Demons, False Prophets, Jesus is the Messiah, Leaven of the Pharisees, Lord Jesus, Media Manipulation, Real Christianity, The 1960's

Pressing On. Toward Resurrection. (Part 3)

Apr 4

Posted by RJ Dawson

The conclusion of this 3-part article contains the answer many have been seeking. Times are rough for a lot of Christians the world over, and have been getting more difficult in places where things used to be better.

Be encouraged.

…That I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.

Not that I have already obtained it or have already become perfect, but I press on so that I may lay hold of that for which also I was laid hold of by Christ Jesus.

Brethren, I do not regard myself as having laid hold of it yet; but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. [Philippians 3:10-14] [1]

I have been watching videos about underground Chinese Christians. One of the prevailing themes among their lives is the ongoing dedication they must pursue with so little apparent reward or accomplishment. They keep pressing on through each day, year after year, though things rarely get any easier or more comfortable. They often wonder why they have to suffer so much. The Lord keeps telling them the same thing He told the apostle Paul:

“My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” [2 Corinthians 12:9 NKJV]

The NASV says: “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.”

What is this power, this strength, this dunamis? And why does it only kick in when we are weak? Is it not the very same power the Lord Himself used to live a perfect life?

And what is this grace, this charis? It must be something tangible, like a spiritual IV packed with nutrients, and not simply God’s favor alone.

A real Christian must be able to live off this power and grace when all else is unavailable. Did not the Lord of all Creation live a life of apparent outward weakness in order to be very powerful in the spirit? And did He not continually demonstrate this power? It is obvious then, that a person who is to be a real Christian must have this grace and power, this charis and dunamis. And he or she must be able to receive it by making themselves weak in the flesh and in the ways of this world.

It is simply a fact that spiritual giants will appear as the opposite to non-spiritual people.

This “weakness” and the requisite strength that comes because of it is what we lack. And we lack it due to simple laziness and a bowing to human nature. Most “Christians” are as fleshly as the day is long and therefore weak in the spirit. They learn to be weak in the spirit and that it is perfectly okay to be weak in the spirit often because their fake leaders are weak in the spirit.

After a while an entire culture starts calving off like a massive landslide because the ones charged with being salt and light and holding things together became derelict in their duty.

Like a great baseball player who stays out night after night drinking and fornicating and bringing much less than his “A” game to the field for his team and fans until the team suffers and he breaks down in a heap and retires early.

Meanwhile, there was another baseball player of the same era who kept doing his duty every year and every game. He was somewhat off the radar, and no one realized how great his accomplishments were to the same degree. He was Mr. Consistent. Not a lot of flash, but he brought it every day. Rarely stopping due to injury, he continued bringing the best for his team and racked up the stats until he eventually broke an impossible record the other guy was supposed to break and should have but never came close.

People who know baseball know who these players are, and many more just like them. The dedicated player also had a very rough row to hoe during his playing days and suffered many slights and insults but continued to soldier on. He was somewhat invisible for many years. The other guy was the darling of the media, characterized as a great hero, and got away with everything. Though he was a carousing drunk all the dads wanted their sons to be like him, but not so much the other guy.

The Lord was like this. He would bring it regardless. It didn’t matter if anyone noticed, if it appeared as though He was accomplishing nothing, or if the whole blasted filthy rotten world and everyone in it hated Him without a cause. He was going to do His duty come hell or high water. He would complete His mission. You could not stop Him. He was a million percent dedicated. Regardless of whatever the circumstances may be, He would do and did do everything that was required. He pressed on like no one had ever pressed on and taught His disciples how to do likewise.

And He strengthens us to do likewise. Therefore we are without excuse.

Go spend twenty years in a Chinese prison for doing nothing wrong but everything right and then tell me how challenging your life is, especially when all God ever says is “My grace is sufficient, My grace is sufficient…” Will they get out of jail tomorrow? Or next year? Or ever? They had and have no idea. They are tortured and forced to endure the worst insults to body and mind but somehow maintain the ability to go on. And they do it with a big bright smile and tears of joy streaming down their face!

What IS this grace anyway? And how does it fuel a person to do the impossible?

One of the hardest things about being a real Christian is being continually dedicated against the tide with no sign of any kind of change for the better. You’re out on the ocean every day with nothing but a water and sky horizon and nothing ever changes, it seems. You feel completely alone though you know the Lord is somehow there with you. You feel like you’ve been cast aside and the only One that can help won’t help.

In China, a few thousand dedicated believers felt exactly that way but pressed on anyway. One day they looked up from their spiritual drudgery and noticed their numbers had increased a little—to many tens of thousands. The tens of thousands continued to press on against the wind with no change to their very difficult lives or apparent change to the culture around them. Then one day they looked up and the tens of thousands had become millions. In a Communist country! Where real Christianity is outlawed! Where the worst forms of abuse were thrown their way!

Still, they continue pressing on, pushing against evil in the way the Lord taught us. They press hard against a very powerful force the way one pushes a car down the road with the tires almost flat. This evil force is like a giant unseen mass of pressure suspended from the heavens to the ground that continually resists the Light and those in which the Light dwells. Yet, these unrelenting Chinese believers continue with marathon worship, unceasing prayer, forty day fasts, and incessant witnessing and evangelizing. They meet in secret house churches or wherever they can knowing they could be killed and tortured for it.

And while the real Christians in China were growing from a few thousand to what is estimated at the moment to be close to one hundred million, most American Christians have become the opposite—a bunch of spiritually weak, lazy prima donnas and ultra-fleshly fakers watching their entire country go screwy and ultra-sinful without much concern about it or any plans to change it.

China will become a Christian nation in a few years while America is going in full reverse and the majority of Christians here remain willfully clueless.

Until now.

It started a few decades ago with a few thousand…

Posted in Real Christianity

2013 UPDATE: 19% of Americans Now Reject the Resurrection, Up From Only 7% in 2012

Tags: Discipleship, Evangelization and Witnessing, Grace of God, Lord Jesus, persecution, Prayer and Fasting, Pressing On, Real Christianity, Resurrection, Strength Made Perfect In Weakness

Pressing On. Toward Resurrection. (Part 2)

Apr 2

Posted by RJ Dawson

Now if Christ is preached, that He has been raised from the dead, how do some among you say that there is no resurrection of the dead?

But if there is no resurrection of the dead, not even Christ has been raised; and if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is vain, your faith also is vain. Moreover we are even found to be false witnesses of God, because we testified against God that He raised Christ, whom He did not raise, if in fact the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised; and if Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins. [1 Corinthians 15:12-17]

Unreal Christians make a mockery of real Christianity. They bring shame on real Christians everywhere. They refuse to acknowledge what is required. Their offshoot brands of Christianity are not for major leaguers, not by a long shot. Their “churches” are instead the haunts of adult T-ballers. Grown people acting like a bunch of five year-olds.

They can’t catch, they can’t throw, they can’t hit, and they can’t field. They can’t do squat. They won’t do squat.

They refuse. Put ‘em out there on the spiritual frontier in some foreign country where Christianity is banned and spat upon and see what happens. See how they stand the test where real Christians know they must stay in top condition and pray, fast, worship, study, and witness all the time as if their life and the lives of so many others depend on it, and such fake Christians will last about a second before they either get wiped out or become just another diabolical Judas.

I don’t know how things are now, but when I was a mere lad of six in the first grade I had a big test the next day and forgot to study. I attended one of those schools where we all wore uniforms and the teachers wore black. And they meant business. I suddenly remembered as I was walking to school that I was going to get grilled that morning and quickly came down with the worst stomach ache ever known to any kid anywhere. I doubled over holding my gut. Of course, I was in no physical pain. My thespian skills were all for effect. I knew my mother was watching. I turned around acting all sick though I was perfectly fine and chugged back home, all the while doubled over and groaning as if I was gut shot. I knew the teacher and the whole class would humiliate me because I was not prepared. I thought it better to take a chance on my mother’s hoped-for compassion. She didn’t really believe me but did not force the issue, thankfully.

Why is it that most Christians no longer have the proper attitude? Why do they not obey the clear teachings of the Lord? Why are they not dedicated? Don’t they know their soul is on the line? Do they know there will be a Judgment? Why do they think they can be disobedient or halfhearted and get by? Don’t they know they cannot be effective for God and be a good servant for others if they fail to do what is required?

Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect. For through the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think more highly of himself than he ought to think; but to think so as to have sound judgment, as God has allotted to each a measure of faith. [Romans 12:1-3]

Enough of this country club garbage. Enough of this elitist, narcissistic, arrogant, clannish, and high-minded Christianity. Enough of this ridiculous man-made clergy-laity divide. The way up is down. The Lord Jesus clearly taught and demonstrated servanthood and humility, and that one must either follow His example or take a hike.

And He was saying to them all, “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake, he is the one who will save it. For what is a man profited if he gains the whole world, and loses or forfeits himself? For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words, the Son of Man will be ashamed of him when He comes in His glory, and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels.” [Luke 9:23-26] [1]

Which brings me to the point of this article. This is the season in which we celebrate the resurrection of our Lord. He was physically dead. He rose from the dead. He lived a perfect life. He never committed a single sin. He honored the Torah to the nth degree. He lived the most dedicated and disciplined life of any human being for all time. No one else has come within a universe of His perfection.

But it was not easy. It was very difficult. It was difficult even on a daily and hourly basis. No single man has ever pressed on and walked out a life beset with so much pain and personal denial, with so much fortitude, ardor, and spiritual backbone. He was always focused, always strong, always on His game, and always working extremely hard doing everything that was required. He often walked alone among humans with little or no help from others. He was as dedicated as dedicated can be, and He set the perfect example for all of us.

So we can sit around and be lazy and unproductive and a sorry example to the world? I don’t think so. Christians who realize they are called to the same dedication as the Lord are those who get with His program. They leave all other wimpified programs. They stop messing around with programs that don’t work and never will. They are forever seeking out the high ground, and higher ground. By getting down on their face, serving God and others, and putting forth the proper discipline, they’re climbing the Rockies, desiring that rarefied spiritual air attained only by the mighty few. They don’t want to be an adult playing around like a little kid, something most Christians have become proficient at.

They want to be in the major leagues. They want to do what is required.

They pursue the prize of the upward call.

“Pressing On.” Melbourne Mass Gospel Choir:

Posted in Real Christianity

Tags: Bob Dylan, Discipleship, Evangelization and Witnessing, Lord Jesus, Melbourne Mass Gospel Choir, persecution, Prayer and Fasting, Pressing On, Real Christianity, Resurrection

Pressing On. Toward Resurrection. (Part 1)

Mar 30

Posted by RJ Dawson

There is a spiritual reality among Christians not often talked about or understood that is just as vital and all-important as any other.

It is not popular.

As in the case of physical persecution, this reality is often placed on a very high shelf, kept in a rarely used cabinet, or even locked away out of sight.

Christians would rather not acknowledge its existence. And since most Christians have never seen much of a need for it and have gotten by without it, they would much rather keep it as far away from themselves as possible.

The majority of those who refer to themselves as Christians are not even aware of it. Those that are aware often treat it is a non-entity or something to be shunned, and feel very uncomfortable whenever it may come up in a conversation or teaching session.

Of course, there are many realities regarding real Christianity that nominal “believers” want no part of, and will argue against their necessity no matter how many Scriptures reveal their presence, point directly to them, and speak of their absolute need toward a successful and fruitful walk with the Lord.

For example, fasting is no fun, but it works. Nothing can replace it. The Lord taught it, practiced it, and proved its effectiveness. But most Christians never fast. And most Christians will fight anyone who says they have to.

I used to be part of a large congregation that taught and practiced fasting and prayer to a relatively high degree. We had to fast at least one day a week. We went on two-day fasts every quarter or so. Everyone was expected to participate and most did. We were taught to pray at least an hour every day. We had corporate prayer meetings that all were expected to attend. It was part of the culture. If you didn’t participate you were not doing your duty as a believer and member. We had all night prayer meetings. The church building and grounds were a center of spiritual activity and there was always something going on almost every day of the week. It was a hang out. A great place. Most members accepted and adopted this kind of prayer and fasting with no reservations, because: (1) It was clearly Scriptural, (2) It was very effective, (3) It was part of the culture, and (4) It was taught and mandated by the pastor.

After a while, though, it became apparent that fewer members were complying. Some stopped because they had never disciplined themselves for such or made it part of their lives and spiritual lifestyles for the long haul. They were doing it because the group did it and they feared the pastor or being a deviant from the norm.

It is the same reason so many people go to church or honor their leadership, denomination, or denominational beliefs and dictates. They are not so much into it as much as they are being put upon to do it. It is not really in their hearts to serve God necessarily, but more of a cultural thing. They feel good going to church. It gives them a lift of some kind. Their life throughout the rest of the week does not really reflect anything spiritual, however. They are certainly not fulltime, dedicated followers of the Lord, but feel they are doing enough to get by and that is all they really want.

Once any form of persecution comes they quit. They get very angry when convicted. They don’t like it when their casual “walk” is exposed or their Biblical ignorance is revealed. When this happens, though, such people should be thankful for the apparent warnings. Because if real persecution ever broke out they would get destroyed.

I like sports. I’ve played a lot of different sports. I know what it’s like to play alright and am also fully aware of the embarrassment of playing lousy. Sports will humble a person, regardless of how good one may be. You have good games and not so good games.

The major leagues in any sport contain the cream of the crop, the best of the best, and virtual all-star teams of the greatest talent in the world. Yet there are times when these great talents look like idiots on the field or court and one wonders how they can be so boneheaded. The reality is that the action is so fast and the players so good and so much is at stake that the player who fails to bring his “A” game can look like an idiot pretty quick. A man should never step out on a football field during live action, for example, without being 100% focused and ready or he will get creamed and end up looking like a fool. It is hard enough as it is for the fully dedicated. Get just the least bit lax and someone out there will very quickly reveal your weakness and send you into next week.

It always amazes me that out of millions of baseball players in this country, many of them very talented and dedicated, less than 800 are on a major league team at any given time. Some very, very good players have never made it to the show. How is this possible? How can someone so good be not good enough? Because there are others who are even better.

It is said the hardest thing to do in all of sports is consistently and successfully hit a baseball. Most people can’t even see a baseball going 95 miles an hour from only 60 and a half feet away. Anyone who has ever stood in a batter’s box to face live pitching at that speed will confirm this. It takes an adjustment. Those that do it all the time do a very amazing thing. If they don’t work very, very hard and stay on their game they’re gone.

But Christians? Well, most are taught that heaven is automatic. That God requires very little. That you can get away with anything. That such super dedication and discipleship shown by world-class athletes is completely unnecessary and even ridiculous. “No one can live like that!,” the false Christians exclaim.

Hence, most of these so-called “Christians” and their dead, dull, boring, wimpy churches have set their own standard, a stupid standard, a rebellious standard, a very weak standard, and a standard in which sin and spiritual laziness is quite welcome. There is no salt in these places and very little light. They are composed of all those who would never make the cut on a good team or probably any team. They are no different than anyone else in any particular society and are a mere reflection of the world and not the kingdom of God. The devil is not the least bit afraid or respectful of them. And while they may look good now, there’s a hot place waiting.

Meanwhile, real followers of the Lord the world over, in places like China and many Muslim countries, are currently lining up as those characterized in the following:

Women received back their dead by resurrection; and others were tortured, not accepting their release, so that they might obtain a better resurrection; and others experienced mockings and scourgings, yes, also chains and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn in two, they were tempted, they were put to death with the sword; they went about in sheepskins, in goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, ill-treated (men of whom the world was not worthy), wandering in deserts and mountains and caves and holes in the ground. [Hebrews 11:35-38] [1]

Posted in Real Christianity

Amazon
First Kindle Edition

Tags: China, Discipleship, Evangelization and Witnessing, Lord Jesus, persecution, Prayer and Fasting, Pressing On, Real Christianity, Resurrection, Spiritual Reality

The E-Book Has Landed!

Mar 24

Posted by RJ Dawson

**The Real Christianity E-Book is LIVE!**

And it is now available to pretty much any e-book supported device known to mankind, anywhere on the planet, and is only a few clicks away. Thank you, readers, for the koinonia over the last two years of this blog.

It was one of you who asked me last year if Real Christianity was available in e-book format. I had written an article last June entitled The Great Pretenders. In the comments following the article, my friend Mike said the following:

“Great piece, RJ, that simply describes that thing that none of us want to admit… The body is supposed to be guided and controlled by its Head. A body running around without a mind looks pretty silly doesn’t it? Thanks for bringing truths we need desperately!

“By the way, is “Real Christianity” available in electronic format? Just curious… Blessings.”

Of course, I had thought about doing an e-book for a long time but circumstances and time were clearly not cooperating. The simple question above put the thought back in my mind that I needed to act on what I had long desired, and I purposed in my heart it was time to act. I answered Mike with the following:

“Thank you very much, Mike. Chickens running around with their heads cut off do look pretty silly until all the chickens are doing it. Then it just looks NORMAL.

“Regarding the book, in the not too distant future I will be moving out of the acoustic folk scene and going electric. Kindle Reader here I come… Until then I have good old fashioned books available! Thanks.”

For something seemingly so simple and easy, going digital ended up being a tad more difficult than first visualized. A lifestyle change had to be made to bring the dream to pass. It took a lot of effort and money, and especially the help of a good friend who just happened to show up at the right time.

Some of you may have noticed that I have not been posting as many articles as in the past. I have grown concerned that with so little time and so few postings, I may have lost readers. I hope that is not the case. I thank all of you for your patience and I ask that you would spread the word. The book is priced very affordably, and is available universally.

Get a copy and tell your friends and family! Help spread the very necessary word of the coming reform and revolution in American Christianity and the Great Awakening of the 21st century!

For your convenience, simply click on the embedded link of your choice to locate and purchase the Real Christianity E-Book:

Apple iTunes
First iBook Edition

Barnes & Noble
First Nook Edition

Smashwords
First Smashwords Edition

Of course, the print book is still available also as before, through most local and internet book stores, including Amazon and Barnes & Noble online. Search by full title and author name.

Check out the new book!

Posted in Current Events

Never Say Die

Feb 19

Posted by RJ Dawson

Sometimes life is hard.

But we learn fairly young in life that we must press on and overcome whatever difficulty we are facing because the alternative is much worse.

In fact, there is really no comparison.

Even if we never achieve the goal or actually fully overcome and get past major obstacles and setbacks, there is at least a good feeling that we tried, that we made the attempt, and that we gave it everything we had.

In sports, losing is not as bad if we give everything we have and “leave it all on the field.” Of course, losing is bad. Losing is really bad. I hate losing. Being very competitive by nature and by choice, I know that making peace with the idea of losing is a terrible thing to do. But if one has done everything one can possibly do (and that always involves doing things we never thought we were capable of doing), we can eventually get past the loss and get on down the road.

But it depends on how we lost. If we know we gave it our all and that there was nothing more that could have been done, we have a victory of sorts in our hearts. And it is the kind of victory that allows us to feel okay about ourselves, and not get down on ourselves, and keep the fires stoked for the next opportunity to win.

I am not afraid of the devil. Yes, he is a very powerful spiritual entity that can wreak the very worst forms of destruction and wickedness. And yes, he sometimes gets us. He sometimes inflicts serious damage. I mean, as wicked as humanity can be, there is no way humanity can reach such incredible forms of wickedness and evil without some serious help. We know as Christians that there is a devil and that he can do some damage. The devil working in concert with unregenerate humanity has proven to be a lethal combo throughout history, and there is plenty of evidence to support this.

Yet, if one is not a real Christian one will not perceive any devil. The devil, through his great powers of deception, can easily keep sinful human beings in the dark and remain invisible. In fact, non-Christians often scoff at the idea of a devil and of wicked unseen entities existing upon this planet.

But the Lord Jesus knew such entities existed. In fact, He could see them. He addressed them. And they talked back. He was not afraid of the devil and He taught us the same. To respect one’s enemy is a good thing. To fear one’s enemy is to not have faith against one’s enemy. And if that happens, one will find oneself up a creek without a paddle. One will have no return volley or return fire or a bigger punch. Instead of fighting even harder to overcome the enemy and the obstacle, fear causes one to give in. One will surrender. That’s what fear without faith does. It causes eventual surrender.

Real fighters, however, never surrender. Real Christians have no fear of their enemies. If one respects his enemy and knows he is in for a tough fight, he will have a much better chance of victory. But to fear one’s enemy is to lose before the battle is ever engaged.

But even if you should suffer for the sake of righteousness, you are blessed. AND DO NOT FEAR THEIR INTIMIDATION, AND DO NOT BE TROUBLED, but sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you, yet with gentleness and reverence; and keep a good conscience so that in the thing in which you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ will be put to shame. For it is better, if God should will it so, that you suffer for doing what is right rather than for doing what is wrong. [1 Peter 3:14-17]

Though we face formidable foes, the Lord empowers us to kick their rear ends all over creation. That’s what He did. Dying on the cross was not what unbelievers would call much of a victory, but for real Christians, He is our great King because He defeated hell, He defeated death, and He defeated the grave. He fought with everything He had to resist all temptation and live a life completely devoid of any sin. Most of the rest of us already commit our first sins as little kids, right out of the chute. But not the Lord. And as a result, when He died, HE COULD NOT STAY DEAD. Sin had no hold on Him. He defeated sin. He defeated the world. And He mopped up the parking lot with the devil.

So even though the devil is still a bad dude, he’s got asphalt stuck in his face and elbows and knees, and regarding the Lord, is a thoroughly defeated foe.

But the Lord, from His good heart and wonderful grace, has blessed each of His sons and daughters with their own opportunity to whip the devil. He allows for spiritual fights to take place. He trains us for battle and sends us into war having full confidence that we can also get our licks in and overcome any obstacle any enemy might put before us.

So remember, living some sort of “perfect” Christian life in some sort of faux American dream or “hippiefied flowers in your hair peace love dove nothing bad ever happens to me” is a bean dream, even though many fake Christian ministers tell us we can, and that it should be one’s primary goal. However, if one does manage to live such a life on this planet, it exposes the fact he is not fighting the devil. It illustrates such a one has made peace with the devil. And it reveals a person in league with the devil.

“If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, because of this the world hates you. Remember the word that I said to you, ‘A slave is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you; if they kept My word, they will keep yours also.

“But all these things they will do to you for My name’s sake, because they do not know the One who sent Me. If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin, but now they have no excuse for their sin. He who hates Me hates My Father also. If I had not done among them the works which no one else did, they would not have sin; but now they have both seen and hated Me and My Father as well. But they have done this to fulfill the word that is written in their Law, ‘THEY HATED ME WITHOUT A CAUSE.’” [John 15:18-25]

The bottom line, ladies and gentlemen, is that real Christians are in a real fight, and as in any war, there will be casualties. But the victor who suffers on the field of battle continually gets back up to fight another day, and this absolutely infuriates the devil and this fallen world. The evil one hates the fact that he can throw everything at us and still not defeat us. He considers himself and his hordes far superior and it causes him untold grief every time a son or daughter of the Lord Jesus gets back up and fights on though horrifically battered and bruised.

Through such valiant and stalwart action, warriors for the Lord look directly into the enemy’s eyes and fearlessly express something to the effect, “Is that all you got?”

…Greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world. [1 John 4:4] [1]

Posted in Real Christianity

Tags: Faith, Fear, Greater is He, Lord Jesus, Real Christianity, Spiritual Warfare, They Hated Me Without a Cause

Cults of Christianity (Part 3)

Feb 12

Posted by RJ Dawson

In reality, a probable majority of real Christian ministers in the world are broke and taking it on the chin every day. They are beat up and thrown in jail and tortured and murdered. THIS IS HAPPENING RIGHT NOW.

And most are having a very hard time staying alive to minister because next to no one gives them a dime.

TV ministry and traditional Christian churches can be a good thing, but these entities would go a whole lot farther if they portrayed the real Lord Jesus instead of the false caricatures we have of Him. And it would be much better if the world saw real ministers instead of the false caricatures thereof: Perfect pulpiteers, denominational cultists, and fancy pants blowhards who pass themselves off not only as the real thing but the only ones worthy of respect.

It would be good to see real Christians and hear their stories instead of the same old Christian celebrities droning on and on. Many of these guys are nothing but a false made-up image of something real and are masters at deception. They know what works to keep the money flowing and never deviate from it. Money makes them what they are, not the Spirit of God, and this makes many of them glorified well-to-do cult leaders leading millions around by the nose.

They are the antithesis of the rejected and broken tragic figures like the Lord Jesus and His men who valiantly rose above all the hate thrown their way to get the Gospel to the relative few who wanted it. These men were the most courageous men who ever lived because they were willing to take whatever evil threw at them without retaliating in kind and did take it, and took it repeatedly, and kept pressing on into the wicked wind in their faces to get the job done.

Does this look anything like a well-to-do preacher filled with worldly credentials and high standing above men with servants at his beck and call? Or a glowing smile meister motivational speaker more interested in the accoutrements of this world than the vagaries and insults of real spiritual battle?

I don’t think so.

And if you want the final proof, what they do simply does not work according to the Acts model. America is still going down the drain regardless of millions of churches and ministries and billions of dollars. Many of these entities are having little impact whatsoever on their communities, cities, states, and the country itself. Instead, they have joined the world and are as worldly as the day is long.

But they will insist on their status and they will insist that they be paid, while 99% of real Christians have to struggle on their own and support their individual God-called ministries by their own labor and sweat, fighting on the front lines, suffering abuse and extreme prejudice, much of it coming from “Christians!”

So if one’s big guy head honcho ain’t having to man up the way the Lord Jesus and His men did, one has every right to wonder why. On the other hand, when the Lord Jesus is in charge through real Christians,

GOOD STUFF HAPPENS!

THINGS GET DONE!

THE DEVIL GETS RUN OUT OF TOWN!

MILLIONS GET SAVED!

THE ROMAN EMPIRE GETS TURNED ON ITS LEFT EAR!

The real problem in America is that we have met the enemy and it is US. Fake preachers and fake Christians have taken over, just like the money-grubbing traitors in DC, and as a result the country is ever closer to slip-sliding away.

But millions of real Christians as dedicated as the apostle Paul are on the rise! They are led by the Lord Jesus and WILL NOT BACK DOWN. They are willing to suffer any insult and have, and continue to fight on to get the job done.

And the job is getting done. Though in the early stages, the real Great Awakening is coming forth. As for unreal “Christian” cults, the Lord has their number, and He’s coming after the Christian Pharisees and Great Pretenders the same way He came after the original Pharisees, with the Word of Truth.

The fast and spurious are being exposed.

Their masquerading veil of deception is coming down.

Posted in Real Christianity

Tags: Apostle Paul, Christian Persecution, Christian Pharisees, Cults, Lord Jesus, Personality Cults, Real Christianity, The Great Awakening, Voice of the Martyrs

Cults of Christianity (Part 2)

Feb 8

Posted by RJ Dawson

I’ve been reading an otherwise very good Christian study book recently. It has its merits. But it is like so many other Christian books in that it contains a thread of man’s tradition overwritten upon the truths of God’s Word.

In particular, the author portrays modern ministry formats as synonymous with that of the early Church. He also suffers under the delusion that only a particular kind of minister/ministry is worthy of receiving funding. Of course, he counts his ministry worthy—he accepts huge sums for his ministry work—millions and millions of dollars.

This is not necessarily a bad thing at all, but after a while, many people in his position no longer see straight and begin to see only themselves and people like themselves worthy of the hard-earned money that Christians give in support. And because of this they see most other Christians as completely unworthy of receiving a dime.

And they even compare themselves to the apostle Paul.

Well, this is interesting. When was the last time you saw one of these big shots taken out and stoned? Most professional Christian “ministers” look nothing like Paul or the original apostles. Many TV preachers and their TV wives look great on TV, all happy and smiling and made up and looking good. Some of them even sport the silly putty effects of halfway decent plastic surgery (others not so much).

But if we saw Paul on TV it would scare the hell out of us. We would see this greatly disfigured man with facial injuries and a broken, stooped-over body limping around the studio set like Quasimodo, likely bandaged up and probably bleeding from new wounds or old ones that won’t heal. Then, however, we would see the brightness of the Spirit of God shining forth from his smiling face, a face filled with the peace that passes all understanding. And we would gaze upon a man of great character regardless of his bleak outer appearance.

Are they servants of Christ?—I speak as if insane—I more so;

in far more labors,

in far more imprisonments,

beaten times without number,

often in danger of death.

Five times I received from the Jews thirty-nine lashes.

Three times I was beaten with rods,

once I was stoned,

three times I was shipwrecked,

a night and a day I have spent in the deep.

I have been on frequent journeys,

in dangers from rivers,

dangers from robbers,

dangers from my countrymen,

dangers from the Gentiles,

dangers in the city,

dangers in the wilderness,

dangers on the sea,

dangers among false brethren;

I have been in labor and hardship,

through many sleepless nights,

in hunger and thirst,

often without food,

in cold and exposure.

Apart from such external things, there is the daily pressure on me of concern for all the churches. [2 Corinthians 11:23-28]

Now, I’m not saying all TV preachers and church pastors don’t have a place and I’m not saying they’re all fakers, but many must be mere children by comparison—a bunch of little boys playing with new toys shoving their weight around and demanding that everyone serve them.

And Christians have learned to serve them without a word because they have been conditioned to do so (or God will get them post haste or wreck their lives or send them to hell). So they serve them without question due to an entrenched traditional intimidation factor. This makes it easy for the little boy ministers who insist on having their way even though they possess no scars anywhere to show forth the true marks of their supposed callings.

ALL OF THE ORIGINAL APOSTLES SUFFERED GREATLY DURING THEIR LIVES AND EVERY ONE EXCEPT JOHN DIED A GRUESOME, HORRIBLE MARTYR’S DEATH, JUST LIKE THEIR FATHER BEFORE THEM.

But the majority of modern ministers in America does not know and will never know this kind of suffering. Many live in nice homes with nice marriages and have plenty of money. Just like Paul, right? Just like the Lord, right? And they think themselves the only worthy ones to receive donations!

Now, of course, the Lord blesses us with nice things and that’s great, but I do believe He shows no partiality with whom He blesses.

So why are only a handful of professionals worthy of respect and financial support to the detriment of everyone else? Is it because they’re “official ministers?” Can anything be a bigger cult red flag? One dude or a small group of controllers at the top of a pyramid with all the authority and money?

ALL REAL CHRISTIANS ARE MINISTERS. THE LORD JESUS DID NOT CREATE A CLERGY AND A LAITY. SUCH IS MAN’S INVENTION. THE LORD CREATED A BODY OF WHICH EVERY REAL BELIEVER IS A MEMBER. HE CREATED A COMMUNITY ENGAGED IN MUTUAL MINISTERIAL SHARING, OR KOINONIA, IN WHICH EACH AND EVERY MEMBER PARTICIPATES. HE DID NOT CREATE A CULT. [See 1 Corinthians 12!]

For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. [Galatians 3:26-28] [1]

Posted in Real Christianity

Tags: Apostle Paul, Christian Persecution, Christian Pharisees, Cults, Lord Jesus, Personality Cults, Real Christianity, The Great Awakening, Voice of the Martyrs

Cults of Christianity (Part 1)

Feb 5

Posted by RJ Dawson

Christians in general have a generally incorrect concept regarding cults:

They’re looking in the wrong place.

In the consensus view, a cult is composed of a small band of nitwits spouting crazy weird stuff led by a powerful pinhead leader so far off base he’s in the center field bleachers. This extremist view of culthood is quite convenient since it equates “mainstream” Christianity as the model of sensible people doing sensible things.

Kind of like paying lip service to the Lord Jesus in church while preaching about all His great exploits but never, ever doing likewise.

“Why do you call Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do what I say?” [Luke 6:46]

That means no 100% commitments to the Lord and His work, and all it entails. No 180′s. No far-reaching lifestyle changes as the product of extreme heart changes. And no getting the heck out of Egypt and the Sinai, but feeling all warm and fuzzy fully ensconced within the dead cultures of a fallen world.

It means no raising the dead. No spiritual resurrections. No divine healing. No miracles. No casting out demons. No Book of Acts experiences. No infilling of the Spirit of God. No prophetic utterances. No speaking in other languages never learned. No joy unspeakable.

It means no real discipleship or fellowship or spiritual authority over evil forces. No real love or compassion for one another. Little mercy or understanding or the willingness or ability to do anything whatsoever for another and each other in order to build a strong spiritual community.

“These signs will accompany those who have believed: in My name they will cast out demons, they will speak with new tongues; they will pick up serpents, and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover.” [Mark 16:17-18] [1]

Many churches and ministers are filled to the gills with error and false doctrine and don’t even know it. They act like real Christians but have no power or love to perform like real Christians. And because they are satisfied with such a wimpy and unbiblical status quo and refuse to actually obey the Lord’s commands they are not Christian at all, but something else…

So, what was that about cults again?

Do churches and ministries usually have one head honcho who sits atop the entire operation “lovingly” dictating church/ministry functions? And is everyone in the congregation expected to go along with the pastor’s “vision” or be seen as a rebellious deviant from the norm?

Hmmm…

Instead of a strong community composed of strong spiritual disciples one and all, as in the Acts model per the Lord’s teachings, are not most churches composed of a relatively few young good-hearted Christians (regardless of physical age) who simply don’t know any better (yet) and a majority of pew-sitting traditionalist clergy lovers still stuck in spiritual elementary school after umpteen years? People who wouldn’t scare in the least the least level demon on the planet? People who by their choice are destined to be the nicest people in hell?

Well?

Single “pastors” ruling churches is simply not the Biblical model. Many “Christians” regardless of denomination conditionally obey their voodoo masters in the pulpit instead of the Lord Jesus, and as a result their places of worship are in no way communities of believers but something else entirely.

They are cults. The real deal. That’s how thick the deception is within institutional Christianity. Many churches, large or small, are cults. Many big time preachers have formed personality cults built around themselves. But to call it that breaks all the rules and they attribute such truth-telling to the devil. Yet, these so-called pastors are the ones making mindless robots of their members and almost never strong disciples of the Lord, something we have clearly been commanded to do.

As a perfect case in point, the Lord Jesus, in order to keep the apostle Paul from being transformed into a celebrity with a false cult built upon and around him, allowed Paul to suffer great, great things.

He could not allow Paul to become a religious figurehead like some duded up TV preacher, or mega church pastor, or gilded pope. So he must allow Paul to appear as a mere mortal man often with no one to rescue him from great suffering and attack.

For his part, Paul in turn had to show his stature in the Lord by accepting this place and position in the spirit, weather the violent storm, and be the brunt of vile attacks upon his character and body.

And when people saw that they could “get” Paul, they lost the respect they would otherwise have for him and perceived him as a mere unprotected everyman, not as some great “man of God” high and lifted up with a big fat wallet in a big fat pulpit on a big fat platform with a big fat “godly” reputation, way above what all other mortals must suffer and far above their congregations and the zombie minions within them.

Posted in Real Christianity

Tags: Apostle Paul, Christian Persecution, Christian Pharisees, Cults, Lord Jesus, Personality Cults, Real Christianity, The Great Awakening, Voice of the Martyrs

BLOWOUT! (Part 3)

Jan 20

Posted by RJ Dawson

The primary reason many people have a problem with the Word of God is the fact that God simply tells it the way it is. He defines that which is good. He defines that which is evil. He speaks of light and darkness, and very little about any gray areas.

Indeed, there is that time in the morning and evening when night gives way to day and day gives way to night. But these times are relatively brief. Morning and evening are but beginnings and endings. Daytime is not night time. Light is not darkness. And good is not evil.

Jesus does not compromise truth. He IS the Truth. He stands firm on a solid rock. He IS the Rock. And He expects His followers to do likewise.

But standing firm for the truth will get one in trouble. Compromisers want no part of trouble. They want everyone to play nice. Well, evil is not nice. Evil is evil.

Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness; who substitute bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter! Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes and clever in their own sight!

Woe to those who are heroes in drinking wine and valiant men in mixing strong drink, who justify the wicked for a bribe, and take away the rights of the ones who are in the right!

Therefore, as a tongue of fire consumes stubble and dry grass collapses into the flame, so their root will become like rot and their blossom blow away as dust; for they have rejected the law of the LORD of hosts and despised the word of the Holy One of Israel.

On this account the anger of the LORD has burned against His people, and He has stretched out His hand against them and struck them down. And the mountains quaked, and their corpses lay like refuse in the middle of the streets. For all this His anger is not spent, but His hand is still stretched out. [Isaiah 5:20-25]

WOW…

How many people heard THAT in church last Sunday?

Things have gotten so fouled-up and twisted around that much of “Christianity” would never allow the words of Isaiah anywhere near their cute little gatherings where never a strong word is heard or such bold apparent pejoratives as “repentance” dare be muttered.

Repent from what, anyway?

Haven’t you heard? We’re all going to heaven. Every last one of us. It doesn’t matter what we do, what we say, what we believe, or what we think. The old idea that all roads lead to Rome remains ever strong but with a different terminology.

The reality is, except for one road, the road the Lord talked about, all roads lead to hell.

This is simply Biblical fact, which takes us back to why so many people hate real Christians and real Christianity.

Remember when you were young and you were allowed to do anything you desired? Remember how your parents or guardians explained to you that good and evil were mere concepts and there really is no difference between right and wrong or that there is any such thing? Remember how you were taught that variety makes the world go ’round and that everyone is different, has different lifestyles, and that sin is a primitive idea created by Neanderthals too dull and stupid to understand alternative lifestyles and choices?

Many people think the Lord Jesus is some cool dude pretty much okay with anything and everything. Does their ignorance make Him so?

The reality is that He loves us all regardless of our sin and evil and pleads with us to repent and get right. He knows the destiny of the unregenerate and repeatedly warns of the results of our wrong choices and embrace of evil. He tries desperately to break us free from deception and our self-imposed entrancements, but most people laugh and walk away.

Even among Christians, those who take strong stands are most often shot down and treated with contempt. And no one was treated worse for this than God Himself. By His own people.

All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being. In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men. The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. [John 1:3-5]

Boy Howdy. Did John get that right or what?

We live on a polarized planet. Literally. It contains opposing forces. However, God has structured things in such a way that there exists perfect harmony and balance among such forces. Yet, there are still such things as hurricanes and naturally-occurring vast forest fires and massive earthquakes and spewing volcanoes and floods and tornadoes and deafening thunder and blinding lightning and a few other events to help maintain the proper planetary balance.

And God looked at all of it and said it was good.

So if you ever wonder about your place in standing up for the Lord, His Word, and Truth, remember that to not act would be a tragedy.

Do not back down. Let the sparks fly. Put your whole heart into the work of God. We’re in the early stages of a spiritual blowout. But we all must do our part, regardless of the price to pay. And the price of the greatest love is the greatest life.

Be of the same mind toward one another; do not be haughty in mind, but associate with the lowly. Do not be wise in your own estimation. Never pay back evil for evil to anyone. Respect what is right in the sight of all men. If possible, so far as it depends on you, be at peace with all men. Never take your own revenge, beloved, but leave room for the wrath of God, for it is written, “VENGEANCE IS MINE, I WILL REPAY,” says the Lord.

BUT IF YOUR ENEMY IS HUNGRY, FEED HIM, AND IF HE IS THIRSTY, GIVE HIM A DRINK; FOR IN SO DOING YOU WILL HEAP BURNING COALS ON HIS HEAD.”

Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. [Romans 12:16-21] [1]

Posted in Current Events

5 Comments

Tags: Day and Night, Evening and Morning, Good and Evil, Isaiah the Prophet, John the Apostle, Light and Darkness, Lord Jesus, Overcome Evil with Good, Real Christianity, Repentance

BLOWOUT! (Part 2)

Jan 16

Posted by RJ Dawson

We are presently living in a time when societal pressure is rapidly increasing the world over. The pressure must be allowed to vent, but the venting must be done in such a way that society remains generally intact. As the pressure continues increasing, however, the venting must also be increased. Otherwise, a massive blowout could take place.

There is currently a relatively minor blowout happening in the Middle East. The so-called Arab Spring that dashed onto the scene in the spring of 2011 actually began in December of 2010 in Tunisia. It quickly spread to Egypt and Libya. The leaders of these countries have been deposed or murdered. And there is more to come.

But this is not the big blowout many are expecting. It is merely a way to vent the growing pressure while keeping the area intact. New governments are forming.

In America, the pressure is being very well contained through several means. Politicians and unethical economists are lying about the vast extent of our national problems. The major media continues to dumb-down millions of Americans by giving them a place to vent and keep them satisfied that all is well. People watch much television and burn up talk radio phone lines with an endless succession of gripes. We all complain to one another.

But nothing actually changes. It is only venting. The pressure is being slowly bled-off.

Americans are also being drugged into submission. The use of legal drugs, such as several different forms of anti-depressants, far exceed the use of illegal drugs, which makes the “war on drugs” entirely disingenuous. There are many people who are properly diagnosed. Many others are drugged for the wrong reasons. An entire generation of school-aged boys, for example, were administered such drugs as Ritalin just to keep them from being boys so they would fit better into an artificial school system.

But societal pressure continues to rise and expand rapidly. People know there is something terribly wrong.

Something bad this way comes…

Biblical prophecy clearly speaks of a time at the end when the entire construct of mankind’s sinful society or kosmos will explode. It will be the great end time blowout. There is nothing to be done about this. It is a massive volcano in the making.

Societal masters have therefore learned how to contain and control societal pressure through inauspicious though temporarily “safe” venting: Create a fantasy world and drug ‘em. Create a fantasy world and drug ‘em. Create a fantasy world and drug ‘em. The best and most far-reaching drug is alcohol.

America has therefore become in many respects, it seems, a fake and shiny amusement-shopping park with ubiquitous television screens and communication gadgets, which also serve as forms of addictive drugs.

Many of our older citizens in nursing homes live out their remaining days tucked neatly in bed. They are often drugged because it is totally unnatural to imprison a human spirit in that way, and the inhabitants would otherwise fight against the restraints.

As population densities increase, more laws against behavior must be created to keep the machine running smoothly, but pressure is all the while increasing to an inevitable breaking point. This is why measures have long since been taken to contain American society when it blows. So far, the venting process has been a huge success.

There is only one problem for the devil and his minions, however: The Spirit of God cannot be contained, controlled, dumbed-down, or drugged.

“But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth.” [Acts 1:8]

“The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but do not know where it comes from and where it is going; so is everyone who is born of the Spirit.” [John 3:8] [1]

Posted in Current Events

Tags: America, Arab Spring, Biblical Prophecy, End Times, Lord Jesus, Middle East, Power To Be Anointed Witnesses, Real Christianity, Societal Pressure, Spirit of God

BLOWOUT! (Part 1)

Jan 11

Posted by RJ Dawson

The Lucas Gusher, Spindletop Hill, Texas. Jan 10, 1901

Oil and natural gas are under pressure far inside the earth. It is trapped in geologic formations thousands of feet below ground. When drilling rigs drill down to release the flow of these hydrocarbons to the surface for later production, the drill string punctures these formation zones and releases the trapped gas and/or oil into the borehole.

As the gas/oil flows into the hole created by the drill string, the pressure increases because the hydrocarbons are seeking escape through a relatively miniscule egress created by the drilling pipe.

In the early days, drilling rigs had no method of controlling highly pressurized oil or gas as it shot toward the surface.

When the oil or gas travels upward through the borehole, it gains in speed and increases in pressure. If the formation pressure within the earth is relatively minor, it will be easier to control when it reaches the surface.

But sometimes the drill string (composed of drilling pipe and the bottom hole assembly) punctures a downhole formation under very high natural pressure. The oil or gas within the formation zone thousands of feet below ground then begins flooding into the borehole at a high rate of speed and shoots rapidly toward the surface gaining speed exponentially as it blasts upward. Since oil and gas wells often exceed two or three miles in depth, and some are even deeper, there is time to contain what is known as the kick before it reaches the earth’s surface and the drilling rig.

This is done through the use of BOPs, or Blow-out Preventers. These are a series of large valves below the drilling rig that can be closed off quickly to prevent a blowout in cases of large amounts of rapidly rising oil and/or natural gas. Also, there is much on-site instrumentation designed to detect such hydrocarbons within the wellbore. If everyone is on their game, blowouts can be prevented and contained. The oil/gas can then be slowly and safely bled off and burned off over time and the rig can remain under control. But drilling rigs can squat on a veritable giant powder keg for days and weeks until the well pressure and danger is vented and reduced to a manageable level.

On occassion, though, the pressurized hydrocarbons arrive so quickly at the surface of the wellhead that the entire drilling rig is destroyed and melted to the ground. It is sometimes the case that thousands of feet of drilling pipe flies out of the well hole like spaghetti as if shot from an underground cannon.

And any small spark can ignite the natural gas upon reaching the surface.

[To Be Continued]

Posted in Current Events

Tags: Blowout Preventers, Drilling Rigs, Geologic Formations, Oil and Natural Gas Wells, Pressurized Hydrocarbons, The Lucas Gusher 1901

Happy Thanksgiving 2012

Nov 22

Posted by RJ Dawson

“The First Thanksgiving at Plymouth” (1914) By Jennie A. Brownscombe

In light of so many distressing events taking place in the world at present, it is good to pause on such a day as this and take stock of our many blessings. Sinister forces always at work continually attempt to steal our joy and strength, limit or destroy our faith, and drag us down to a place of apathy and even despair.

But the devil can stick it all in his left ear.

I went to get my truck inspected yesterday at a little shop. I walked into the waiting area and a customer looked up at me from whatever magazine he was reading.

“How’s it going?” I said.

“Good.”

I continued, “Isn’t it great to live in America even though things are so messed up? This is still a great country and a great place to live.”

“Yep,” he said. “I gotta agree with you on that.”

“And we’re gonna get through all this,” I replied. “We’re taking our country back and somehow or another things will be good again.”

And he agreed.

I have discovered that many people agree with this. I also know many Americans are not at all happy with the status quo. Many are angry and getting angrier with each passing day. And watch what happens as taxes on our hard-earned wealth continue to rise exponentially to support an agenda that the vast majority of Americans do not agree with.

Meanwhile, our beloved lying, censoring media continue to push this un-American agenda with fake happy faces glued on their mugs. At some point people start to understand that the more television they watch the dumber they get. Coincidence?

In the first century A.D. an obscure Man arrived on the scene with His own agenda. It was an agenda of truth and love. The powers that be eventually hated this Man in part because He threatened their false agenda, much of it based on a false religious paradigm. What we face in this country is similar. Shine a light and watch the cockroaches run for their lives.

The showdown is coming. It always does. You can’t keep taking freedom away from a freedom-loving people and expect them to go along with it forever.

The devil tries to convince real Christians that God doesn’t care and that all is lost.

Well, the devil can go butt a stump.

Real Christians have God on their side. They are on God’s side. And they don’t have to be perfect. Fake Christians think they must convince everyone they have sterling reputations and ultra-holy lives, but the fact of the matter is that without the sacrifice the Lord Jesus made on our behalf every single one of us winds up in hell, and that includes all the lame brained Christian Pharisees.

AND IF IT IS WITH DIFFICULTY THAT THE RIGHTEOUS IS SAVED, WHAT WILL BECOME OF THE GODLESS MAN AND THE SINNER? [1 Peter 4:18]

Self-righteous people have always been the bane of any society, whether they are religious or not. Prideful human beings only care about themselves and their reputations and could not care less about everyone else or their country. Christian Pharisees take control of churches and denominations and put themselves in high authority the same way a miniscule class of elites runs the political and financial sectors of this country. Unless they get their act together with God they can all go jump in the lake. It will give them good practice.

And if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire. [Revelation 20:15 - 21:1]

236 years ago some folks in this part of the world got together and said enough. They threw off their oppressors and gained both religious and political freedom. It’s what free people do, and those who are the most free are also those who really have but one ultimate thing to be thankful for on this national day of Thanksgiving:

Our King died in our place.

And because of that greatest of all selfless acts, whosoever will can have true spiritual freedom that will last from now throughout all eternity.

Love your neighbor. Help your neighbor. Bless your neighbor. Give to your neighbor. But more so, bless the Lord Jesus in all you do. Love Him with all your heart. Help Him in His work. Give Him your heart. Thank Him for the life He has bestowed and His many blessings in your life. He is worthy of all.

Now He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness; you will be enriched in everything for all liberality, which through us is producing thanksgiving to God. For the ministry of this service is not only fully supplying the needs of the saints, but is also overflowing through many thanksgivings to God. Because of the proof given by this ministry, they will glorify God for your obedience to your confession of the gospel of Christ and for the liberality of your contribution to them and to all, while they also, by prayer on your behalf, yearn for you because of the surpassing grace of God in you.

Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift! [2 Corinthians 9:10-15] [1]

Posted in Current Events

Tags: America, Freedom, Give Thanks, Lord Jesus, Plymouth, Real Christianity, Salvation, Thanks Be To God, Thanksgiving

Election Rejection: What Goes Around Comes Around

Nov 8

Posted by RJ Dawson

And because the Republican Party establishment will continue to savage Ron Paul and refuse to give him anything at all, the Republican Party will go into the election without him and it will end up costing them in November. Keep in mind that Ron Paul is a Republican and has been for many years. But it won’t matter. He refuses to be bought, refuses to obey the corrupt Republican Party line, and will be smeared and cut out (unless by some miracle they see the light). At this writing, the Republican Party establishment would rather lose than accept Ron Paul. [You're Being Scammed (January 7, 2012)]

And lose they did. After all the effort, all the money, all the sacrifice, all the hope, all the dreams, and all the work, the Republicans still lost. What exactly was accomplished?

Regarding the Presidential Election itself, pretty much nothing.

The current occupant of the White House, to the great dismay of almost exactly half the country, is still the current occupant of the White House and will be for quite a while.

It was said from the get go that Ron Paul was not electable. But tell me, would you really rather have the current occupant than Ron Paul? Because Congressman Paul was “not electable,” but Mitt Romney was electable, and according to conventional wisdom much more so, Ron Paul was cast aside and Mr. Romney was bear hugged and smothered with kisses.

But he still lost. As it turned out, Mitt Romney was the one who was not electable. In an election that should have been a cakewalk, Romney lost to the worst President in American history.

It is easy for me to see where it all went haywire because I already knew what would happen after the best candidate was rejected. Rules were changed. Behind the scenes cheating and skullduggery took place. And the arrogant attitude and Nazi-like control of Republican bigwigs blazed forth into one of the biggest losses in Republican history.

The man in the White House was mortally wounded but the Republicans still managed to snatch a humiliating defeat from the jaws of victory. This is like blowing a three touchdown lead in the last quarter. (Wait. Didn’t I see the Dallas Cowboys do this a few million times over the last several years?)

The defeat of the incumbent should have been a sure thing, but two primary and significant scenarios were playing out that made this one of the most unprecedented presidential elections in history:

(1) The first has to do with the complete rejection of Ron Paul and millions of his passionate supporters, both young and old, all over the country. This was the stupidest thing the Republican Party could have done. It alienated millions of great Americans, the early majority of those in the military, and a gigantic block of young, aware, and intelligent voters.

What were they thinking? Hard to say. Insanity has no rhyme or reason.

But it was mostly about the money. And control. Mitt Romney had by far the greatest treasure chest and the greatest financial backers of any other Republican candidate, matched only by those of the current occupant.

But Ron Paul had the grassroots. He had the passionate backers who had already done their research and were not swayed by political talking heads and brain dead, bubble-headed TV commentators. The LSM was undoubtedly in the pocket of the main guy, but money does some serious talking, and the corporate media played their role flawlessly, supporting the money.

But money is no equal to real Americans passionate for their country who see right through the LSM gobbledygook and the insanity that is DC. Even so, many more Americans who began running the race well allowed themselves to be compromised by fake candidates who were largely doing nothing but running interference for the elite-chosen Republican big boy.

I tried to warn people, but it just proves how many millions of voters in this country are swayed by the media, and that the media has an agenda that opposes real American life and progress.

Nevertheless, this election will turn out to be a great victory for the country, which brings me to the second primary and significant scenario:

(2) Judgment. Earlier in the year, I had agreed with another writer that reelecting the current occupant would later prove to be a much better thing than a Romney victory. Why? Because if Romney was elected president in 2012, most Republican and conservative independent voters would go back to sleep thinking a great victory was won in cleansing the nation of the current occupant. This is exactly what would have happened. And the new guy would continue the same sorry policies as the old guy and most people would pay no attention, and the country would continue going down the drain.

I happened to mention this in a comment on a conservative blog earlier this year and got lambasted for it, due only to the great passion involved in not wanting to necessarily fix the country, but simply get rid of the current occupant (even though this always plays into the opposition’s hand).

But now that the current occupant has been reelected, the real fighters for American liberty will continue to be goaded on by an obvious non-Constitutional interloper. The intent, however, will not be to remove him but fix the country. The election of the new guy would have sapped this strength.

I keep trying to express the fact that the big boys are highly, highly intelligent, rich, and are expert extrapolators. They always know what nearly every sequence of events will be and have almost every base covered. They are world-class manipulators.

But the one base they do not have covered is the passion of the electorate. The elite in control (both major parties) are very, very few in number. Though they have ripped off America and have many, many puppets in power, they will never be able to contain the revolutionary fervor that is coming, even though they are planning for it the best they can. Before it’s over, Americans will take their country back. In the meantime, as I expressed in my last post, judgment will continue:

And regarding predictions, whichever of these men gets elected on Tuesday, I will guarantee you this:

There will be judgment on his administration.

And judgment in general will continue upon the country and will accelerate. Just as is the case when a lawbreaker goes too far and ends up in prison and must be incarcerated to protect society, so will there be judgment against the ungodly for the preservation of the country. Discipline never looks or feels good at the time, but if the corrective is accepted and applied, good things result. Judgment is simply a much louder alarm clock.

The coming years will continue to be tough but God always takes care of His own. Real Christians will continue in faith and will be used of the Lord Jesus to continue bringing in probably the greatest Great Awakening this country has ever seen. What we are beginning to see is a much higher level of spiritual kingdoms at war.

Speaking of which, the way to win the war is according to the following:

“Blessed are you when men hate you, and ostracize you, and insult you, and scorn your name as evil, for the sake of the Son of Man. Be glad in that day and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven. For in the same way their fathers used to treat the prophets.

“But woe to you who are rich, for you are receiving your comfort in full.

“Woe to you who are well-fed now, for you shall be hungry.

“Woe to you who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep.

“Woe to you when all men speak well of you, for their fathers used to treat the false prophets in the same way.

“But I say to you who hear, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. Whoever hits you on the cheek, offer him the other also; and whoever takes away your coat, do not withhold your shirt from him either. Give to everyone who asks of you, and whoever takes away what is yours, do not demand it back.

“Treat others the same way you want them to treat you.

“If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. If you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners do the same. If you lend to those from whom you expect to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners in order to receive back the same amount. But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return; and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High; for He Himself is kind to ungrateful and evil men.

“Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.

“Do not judge, and you will not be judged; and do not condemn, and you will not be condemned; pardon, and you will be pardoned.

“Give, and it will be given to you. They will pour into your lap a good measure—pressed down, shaken together, and running over. For by your standard of measure it will be measured to you in return.” [Luke 6:22-38] [1]

THANK YOU FOR READING. PLEASE HELP ME GET THE WORD OUT. BE BLESSED.

Posted in Current Events

[See my post: Ron Paul, Follower of our Lord Jesus—For Such A Time As This]

Tags: 2012 Presidential Election, Judgment, Lord Jesus, Love Your Enemies, Real Christianity, Republican Party, Ron Paul, Spiritual Warfare, The Golden Rule, The Great Awakening

Election Day 2012: Heads They Win, Tails You Lose

Nov 5

Posted by RJ Dawson

November 6^th will be a sad day for America. Once again we have two less than ideal candidates from which to choose.

Actually, we have two lousy candidates. Really lousy. And the American voter put both of them in position to win. One guy has already messed up the country pretty bad. The other guy claims he will fix everything the first one messed up.

And America has been fooled yet again.

It happens every four years. And the ongoing result is that the Democrats and Republicans remain in power to continue taking this country to the very edge of destruction. Well, the edge has really already been crossed (quite a while ago) and America is stuck in mid-air off the top of a cliff like Wile E. Coyote, who about this time is looking at the viewer thinking, “Oh crud…”

UPDATE: I wrote the above before the election on the morning of November 5. After the election, Ron Paul said the following: “We’re so far gone. We’re over the cliff.”

The American voter will soon see this. The honeymoon period keeps getting shorter and after this election it will be about a nano-second because Americans are fed up and want real change for the better NOW.

Regarding that I will ask, “Then why did you vote for either one of these guys? What did you think would happen?”

Four years ago the country apparently thought good things would happen when it elected the new bright shining star. The previous guy in office before the bright shining star fouled things up so bad he paved the way for the current occupant. The current occupant has now done the same for the guy who hopes to become the new occupant.

I’m not making any predictions regarding the election because it doesn’t matter which of these guys gets elected. Very little will change for the better. Once you get past the outer veneer, these two guys are actually the same guy (What? Are you crazy? These guys are polar opposites!).

Right.

Just watch and see. If the new guy is elected, all the current haters of the first guy will dance in the streets, thinking happy days are here again and all will be well.

Yeah sure.

Before the current election process ever began, God had blessed America with an excellent choice, the way He always blesses with excellent choices, yet most voters rejected him. But guess what? The Freedom Movement has already gained great ground and though Ron Paul was trashed and most Americans believed the lies, what is more astonishing is that most Christians believed the lies, rejected a real Christian, and accepted a Mormon! Nevertheless, there are now many more Ron Pauls out there coming to the forefront. Just because the LSM is hiding the facts doesn’t mean it isn’t happening.

And regarding predictions, whichever of these men gets elected on Tuesday, I will guarantee you this:

There will be judgment on his administration.

Some of the reasons are as follows:

(1) Neither one of them is a real Christian. It’s one thing to make no claims to being a real follower of the Lord Jesus. It’s another altogether to lie about it. The current guy claimed to be a Christian four years ago but has largely supported completely unChristian things since. You know them by their fruits. The new guy is not a real Christian either and anyone who studies the New Testament and the fantasy of Mormonism knows the two are not at all compatible. Remember, image and numbers mean nothing to God. He’s sees right through every façade though most people will always be fooled, and by His own words, the majority of humanity (by their own choice) will never make it to heaven anyway (Matthew 7:14).

(2) Neither one of these men fully honors the Constitution of the United States. Both have track records proving against it. Don’t get mad at me, just study their respective records. Candidates know the voters have very short memories and very short attention spans, and usually vote not their conscience but their emotions. How many are voting for the new guy because they hate the old guy? What’s that going to accomplish?

(3) Neither one of these guys has a pure record against baby killing. The new guy is a world class gymnastic flip-flopper when it comes to abortion, and merely says whatever may be convenient. Why have so many pro-lifers been fooled once again by mere rhetoric? If Ronald Reagan couldn’t/wouldn’t do anything about ending abortion, how in the world will the new guy?

(4) Neither one of these candidates is outspokenly against what the Bible refers to as the exceedingly grave and wicked sin of the original inhabitants of Sodom. If supporters of such sin are interested, they might want to study the Word of God to see what God thinks about it, but here’s a refresher:

Now the men of Sodom were wicked exceedingly and sinners against the LORD. [Genesis 13:13]

And the LORD said, “The outcry of Sodom and Gomorrah is indeed great, and their sin is exceedingly grave.” [Genesis 18:20]

Now the two angels came to Sodom in the evening as Lot was sitting in the gate of Sodom. When Lot saw them, he rose to meet them and bowed down with his face to the ground. And he said, “Now behold, my lords, please turn aside into your servant’s house, and spend the night, and wash your feet; then you may rise early and go on your way.” They said however, “No, but we shall spend the night in the square.” Yet he urged them strongly, so they turned aside to him and entered his house; and he prepared a feast for them, and baked unleavened bread, and they ate.

Before they lay down, the men of the city, the men of Sodom, surrounded the house, both young and old, all the people from every quarter; and they called to Lot and said to him, “Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us that we may have relations with them.” But Lot went out to them at the doorway, and shut the door behind him, and said, “Please, my brothers, do not act wickedly. Now behold, I have two daughters who have not had relations with man; please let me bring them out to you, and do to them whatever you like; only do nothing to these men, inasmuch as they have come under the shelter of my roof.”

But they said, “Stand aside.” Furthermore, they said, “This one came in as an alien, and already he is acting like a judge; now we will treat you worse than them.” So they pressed hard against Lot and came near to break the door. But the men reached out their hands and brought Lot into the house with them, and shut the door. They struck the men who were at the doorway of the house with blindness, both small and great, so that they wearied themselves trying to find the doorway… [Genesis 19:1-11]

If you think I’m wrong on the new guy’s real views on this subject, then I suggest you wise up and at least check out the following link: Romney’s Flip Flopping on Homosexuality

Whoever is NOT AGAINST abortion is AGAINST the Lord Jesus.

Whoever is NOT AGAINST the sin of Sodom is AGAINST the Lord Jesus.

Whoever claims to be a follower of the Lord Jesus but refuses to obey His teachings and commandments is a liar:

The one who says, “I have come to know Him,” and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him… [1 John 2:4] [1]

And regarding the election of President, whoever claims to fully support the Constitution but does not is not only a liar but also a traitor.

Article 2, Clause 8 of the United States Constitution states:

Before he enter on the Execution of his Office, he shall take the following Oath or Affirmation:—“I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

Few Presidents have actually obeyed their oath over the last several decades. Instead, they have sought ways to get around the dictates and restrictions of the Constitution, having no real honor for it, or love of their country, or respect for the people who put them in power. But most voters are simply not aware of this, apparently do not want to be aware, and do not care to be aware.

“I hate Jones! So I’m voting for Smith!”

“Well, I hate Smith and I’m voting for Jones!”

Track records simply do not matter to most voters, and as a result they always get something they did not think they were voting for. It will be no different this time.

So enjoy all the fake pageantry and false drama on election night. Both of these guys were already groomed to obey their voodoo masters. They were paid to play a role and are both excellent political actors. One plays the good Democrat standing up for “Democrat values,” and the other plays the role of the good Republican standing up for “Republican values.” But it’s all for show. The fix has been in for about a century now. The bad guys behind the scenes own both of them and if you want to believe otherwise it is your right as an American to do so.

But believe me; you will be most upset in the not too distant future. And you might start to see that these guys merely talk a good game but rarely follow through. And you might start to get a clue that beyond the mere outer shell, as fake and duplicitous as it is, there is no real difference between the two major political parties or effective distinction between the two candidates.

But they do have a hidden agenda. And it’s not godly, and it’s not Constitutional.

Therefore, Caveat emptor—Let the Buyer Beware.

RELATED POSTS:

January 07, 2012: You’re Being Scammed

January 26, 2012: Duping the Majority: A Foolproof Method of Success (Part 1)

January 27, 2012: Duping the Majority: A Foolproof Method of Success (Part 2)

January 29, 2012: Duping the Majority: A Foolproof Method of Success (Part 3)

January 30, 2012: The 2012 Freedom Movement (Part 1)

January 31, 2012: The 2012 Freedom Movement (Part 2)

Posted in Current Events

Especially in New York City.

Tags: 2012 Presidential Election, Democratic Party, Lord Jesus, Mormonism, Real Christianity, Republican Party, Ron Paul Revolution, The Freedom Movement, United States Constitution

New York City is the Undisputed Abortion Capital of America

Nov 2

Posted by RJ Dawson

Please continue to pray for those who are suffering as a result of Hurricane Sandy. There are incredible reports coming forth of great love and support all over the region. Neighbors are helping neighbors. Friends are helping each other. Sacrificial giving is taking place. It is very encouraging to see what is largely a purely American response to help one another—one stemming directly from our Christian heritage—that is relatively rare in other parts of this world.

While we are all greatly concerned about the extensive devastation and suffering currently taking place, we must stay on point in remembering possible reasons for such devastation.

Some are saying this is simply a cyclical change, and that the planet is merely going through the same cycles it has been going through over millions of years. The difference now, it is said, is that a lot of our stuff happens to be built in danger zones. It certainly appears that some kind of climate change is taking place, but the northeast has experienced massive storms like this before, just not this massive.

And the destruction from Hurricane Sandy has been off the scale. There is really no precedent for a storm this large and destructive. It would take years to repair the damage and rebuild, if indeed all will be rebuilt. No one wants to use the “K” word but is has already been floated by those on the scene when the monster storm blew in. Comparisons to New Orleans are obvious.

For those who insist on keeping this event on a mere natural plane and claim it is just nature being nature, you probably do not need to read any farther. The truth of the matter is that actions have consequences. Great civilizations have arisen in the ancient past and vast empires have been constructed. But they are all gone now. Nothing remains but ruins and historical accounts, some quite brief. They did not just come and go with no rhyme or reason. There were in fact perfect reasons for their demise.

And the number one reason was sin and rebellion against the Creator.

Speaking of sin, the most vile, disgusting, wicked, and perverse choice ever perpetrated by humanity is the act of violently reaching inside a mother’s womb and ripping an innocent growing baby out piece by piece (or using some other horrendous method, such as vacuuming the little one out, or even allowing the innocent baby to be partially born and then knifing it in the neck and splitting its skull and…)

People actually do this.

Every day.

In America.

And it’s all perfectly legal.

And not enough people care to do anything about it. For the most part we waste all our steam on political rhetoric and false promises. We are actually satisfied that some bigwig says he is against the practice and let it go at that. Or we continue playing the fool’s game of electing false pro-life presidents so they will appoint the right Supreme Court justices to change the law. It didn’t work with Reagan thirty years ago and it won’t work now.

The only thing that will work is repentance. And repentance requires a humble, contrite heart. And until enough people in America put forth some real repentance with the fruits of repentance to match nothing will change. Innocent babies will continue to be butchered.

There is such a huge disconnect in this area. If parents think of their own newborns they are horrified at the prospect. Grandparents think it the worst of all scenarios. But when it comes to all those other babies who have no advocate to save them from the worst form of child abuse ever invented, almost everyone goes silent.

Why so many abortions are performed there might have many reasons but the facts are clear: If you are a baby in the womb the last place in America you want to be is in New York.

Of course, there are many wonderful, loving parents in New York and births take place there every day all day long, and the little ones are perfectly cared for. But it’s like those men sitting in a briefing room about to go on a bombing mission during a war. The instructor tells them to take a good look at the men on either side of them. He then tells them there is a fifty-fifty or better chance you will never see them again, because many will not be returning home.

If you’re a baby waiting to be born in New York it is exactly the same: “Hey little buddy, you might make it, you might not. You have about the same chance of being tortured and cut up in pieces as you do being born healthy and whole.”

And that is simply the fact. Abortions in New York City almost equal live births. The metropolis has the most liberal laws in the entire country for killing your unborn baby (or terminating your pregnancy if you prefer).

Since science tells us that every action demands a reaction, and we all should know that our choices have consequences, what does one think the reaction or consequence might be for the worst sin ever committed by a human? Especially when the sin is multiplied a million times? Or about 54,000,000 times? That’s the number of babies legally killed in this country over the last forty years.

It was about this time of the year in 1972 that the Supreme Court was officially deliberating the verdict, but the decision had already been made. It was part of the world population reduction agenda by the globalist traitors in power. January of 2013 will mark forty years since the verdict was rendered. And when Roe v. Wade was decided on January 22, 1973, babies within the womb across the entire country were instantly denied every single one of their rights legally granted to them by the Constitution of the United States, most significantly their right to life. They no longer had a single viable advocate. Each of them was rendered a non-person, a gob of tissue, a nothing. And America has been awaiting the worst form of judgment ever since.

As they say in financial circles, follow the money. In this case, follow the judgment. Unless America repents as a nation it will one day be judged as a nation. Until that time, keep your eye on certain states and cities. Those who reject God and consequently embrace the devil the most are first in line to receive their just fruits.

Forty is a very significant Biblical number. It can be defined as a generation or significant time period. Most of all, it is termed a period of probation. Just as it is that there is no longer any chance to repent once a person dies, it is often the same with this time period:

“So the LORD’S anger burned against Israel, and He made them wander in the wilderness forty years, until the entire generation of those who had done evil in the sight of the LORD was destroyed. Now behold, you have risen up in your fathers’ place, a brood of sinful men, to add still more to the burning anger of the LORD against Israel.” [Numbers 32:13-14]

“You shall remember all the way which the LORD your God has led you in the wilderness these forty years, that He might humble you, testing you, to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not. He humbled you and let you be hungry, and fed you with manna which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that He might make you understand that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by everything that proceeds out of the mouth of the LORD. Your clothing did not wear out on you, nor did your foot swell these forty years. Thus you are to know in your heart that the LORD your God was disciplining you just as a man disciplines his son.” [Deuteronomy 8:1-5]

“Beware that you do not forget the LORD your God by not keeping His commandments and His ordinances and His statutes which I am commanding you today; otherwise, when you have eaten and are satisfied, and have built good houses and lived in them, and when your herds and your flocks multiply, and your silver and gold multiply, and all that you have multiplies, then your heart will become proud and you will forget the LORD your God who brought you out from the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.” [Deuteronomy 8:11-14]

“Moreover, you took your sons and daughters whom you had borne to Me and sacrificed them to idols to be devoured. Were your harlotries so small a matter? You slaughtered My children and offered them up to idols by causing them to pass through the fire. Besides all your abominations and harlotries you did not remember the days of your youth, when you were naked and bare and squirming in your blood.” [Ezekiel 16:20-22] [1]

The most defenseless and innocent among us are the little ones. Only the heartless do them harm. Only pure evil is responsible for their deaths.

There will be hell to pay.

Posted in Current Events

Tags: Abortion, Climate change, Hurricane Sandy, Lord Jesus, National Judgment, New York City, Partial Birth Abortion, Rebellion Against God, Roe v. Wade

Hurricane Sandy: A Super Perfect Wicked Storm

Oct 29

Posted by RJ Dawson

I just heard the above description tonight while listening to a live radio broadcast from New York City. Hurricane Sandy had been projected to be “The Perfect Storm,” but the above description is that much more accurate.

In August of 2011, Hurricane Irene was also projected to be a really bad storm but according to many people in the region, it failed to materialize into the monster tempest many weather experts had predicted it to be. This is very curious in light of the fact that Irene did billions of dollars in damage and cost many lives.

I wrote a series of articles last year regarding Irene and the eerie Virginia earthquake of August 23, 2011 that not only did damage to the Washington Monument but also the Washington National Cathedral. Both structures continue to undergo repairs to this day. I wrote of the strange numbers involved with this earthquake and its predecessor over a century earlier. You can access my first article, Twin Earthquakes in Virginia: An Interesting Coincidence here. In this article I wrote the following:

Another possible coincidence is in the works. The first major Atlantic hurricane is presently rebuilding strength in the Caribbean. It is projected to grow to a Category 4 storm and lessen to a 3 as it strikes the Carolinas, then move directly over Washington D.C. late Saturday night, August 27. On Sunday night it is currently projected to strike New York City as a Category 1. The last time that happened was in 1821. The Norfolk and Long Island hurricane was only the second hurricane to have ever passed directly over New York City. The 1821 storm happened exactly 38 years since the Treaty of Paris, slamming into Long Island on September 3 of that year. 38 is a multiple of 19. The hurricane just happened to have a 13 foot storm surge. Coincidence?

Though predicted otherwise, Hurricane Irene did not achieve such a high storm surge last year, but guess what? Hurricane Sandy has officially brought a thirteen foot storm surge. What Irene did not do Sandy has done. Regarding judgment then, it is now very clear that Irene, as bad as it was, was a mere warning of what would come later.

In the second article, YOU CALL THIS A STORM?! , I wrote the following:

In light of the fact that pretty much every American paying attention knows we have major problems in both our national government and religious life, the minor damage done in the quake to these two structures must at least be considered as beyond mere coincidence, and a possible wake-up call.

In the meantime, the latest track estimates have Hurricane Irene heading directly for New York City, though the storm is expected to veer a tad to the east. America in general may continue disregarding and rejecting God, but God’s people are pleading for His involvement and mercy. A few fissures in our national monument and several fallen doodads off the national cathedral might seem minor at first glance. Do they represent national schism and crumbling traditional Christianity?

Whatever the case, such coincidences sure seem to be piling up. And now Irene is here. Time for a showdown, Lieutenant Dan?

As of this writing on Monday night, October 29, 2012, millions of people are without power in the overall region affected by Sandy, which is currently being labeled a “Post Tropical Storm.” Dire warnings had already gone forth from New Jersey, New York, and Connecticut governors. Connecticut was hit very hard by Irene and looks to be hit even harder this time.

Almost all transportation is currently cut off in New York City. Bridges and transportation tunnels are closed. Major flooding is taking place. The Battery Tunnel took on fifteen feet of water. All subways are currently flooded with at least five feet of water. New York utilities run underground and much power was already turned off before the surge arrived for security purposes. Such flooding was predicted last year with Irene but never materialized. It is materializing now. As of this writing, we will not know how bad this will be, but it will obviously be the worst storm in recorded history in the area. No storm with this much energy has ever ventured this far north. Sandy is an even greater storm than the precedent-setting storm of 1938. And as I mentioned before, the last time there was a thirteen feet storm surge in New York City was 1821. The Sandy storm surge reached an incredible 13.88 feet!

After Irene hit last year I wrote a third article, A Lesser Hurricane Irene: The Evidence of Prayer? In this article I said:

Though many people were killed, almost five million lost power, huge regions were flooded and flooding is ongoing, and billions of dollars in damage took place, some curiously bitter people continue to insist that Hurricane Irene was a hyped event. Some are very thankful that the huge storm was not as bad as originally predicted. Some are arrogantly putting forth their opinion that the storm was nothing that couldn’t be handled, and that they handled it quite well.

Again, it is now apparent that Irene was a warning.

As a result, many people had become complacent and prideful and have not taken Hurricane Sandy seriously. A million people in the New York area are without power, the city that never sleeps is in darkness, and the Big Apple is underwater. Are people in the area taking Sandy seriously now? There has been a flooding “incident” at a nuclear power plant in New Jersey. Cell phones are not working. All of this is taking place in darkness and the full extent will not be known until the daylight hours of Tuesday morning.

I closed my third article last year with the following:

Lieutenant Dan eventually made his peace with God. For all those who did not during the opportunity that was Hurricane Irene, there will be another showdown in the not too distant future…

This was a clear prediction that something worse was on the way. That “something worse” is happening right now.

Again, Hurricane Sandy is the biggest, baddest, greatest storm to ever hit New York City. They are calling this a “Katrina-like disaster.” The normal high tides are also being affected by a full moon. Some will still insist that all of this is mere coincidence.

THIS IS NOT COINCIDENCE. THIS IS JUDGMENT.

For all those who do not believe in this kind of judgment, you have greater judgment to look forward to in the future. Yet even in the midst of this, real Christians continue to pray for this country and the good news is that the Lord Jesus is hearing our prayers and responding.

We are in the early stages of the greatest national Great Awakening this country has ever seen and nothing will stop it from coming to pass. Non-Christians and unreal Christians will hate this event and fight against it just as they hate the Lord and fight against Him. But for the sake of His people, God is doing everything He can to save and restore what can be saved and restored of this country.

Judgment is a greater degree of warning. It is designed as a last step effort to wake people up. Many are being awakened, but many others continue to insist on the opposite. This explains why Irene was a “Lesser Hurricane,” and why Sandy is the most “Super Perfect Wicked Storm” in the New York area in American history.

Over the next few days we will all see just how wicked. Perhaps it may even approach the wickedness of many people in America who continue to sin to their heart’s content with no remorse and no cure, except that of national repentance and a return to the Savior of mankind.

THANK YOU FOR READING. PLEASE HELP ME GET THE WORD OUT. BE BLESSED.

Posted in Current Events

Tags: Connecticut, Hurricane Irene, Hurricane Sandy, Judgment, Lord Jesus, New Jersey, New York City, Real Christianity, The Great Awakening

A Lesser Hurricane Irene: The Evidence of Prayer?

Oct 28

Posted by RJ Dawson

Embracing Suffering

Oct 22

Posted by RJ Dawson

Though the Lord has always provided a place for me to stay, I have been essentially homeless for seven years. I put my house on the market seven years ago this month and began living out of a suitcase.

I’m still living out of a suitcase.

My house sold three and a half months later. I only got two legitimate offers. The Lord told me what the final selling price would be at least a month before.

About that time, things were looking so bleak my realtor called to advise me it would probably be best to take it off the market. This was devastating news, especially since he was such an upbeat and optimistic guy. It was really bad news among an entire shipload of bad news. My life had by that time come completely apart but I kept manning the helm and being responsible. My heart was destroyed. I really don’t know how in the world I ever got through it all.

When I received that phone call from my realtor I was out of town, pretty far away, and was making inquiries into a new job and a whole new life. It just so happened I was in the office of the friend of a friend at the end of the day, just visiting. There were four of us. After exiting to take the call I went back into the room and told the others. This was a crisis point. It was one of those things where you either got it right and won a spiritual victory or lost it all. Everything was on the line.

The good news is these were godly men who knew how to pray. One of them had been on his deathbed in the hospital several years before with a very bad heart condition. He should have died but through the powerful prayers and faith of saints God healed his heart and raised him up. This man was always smiling. He wanted me to feel his grip and it was very strong. He was without doubt a living testimony to God’s greatness and love.

I asked him to lead a prayer. Four men stood in a circle in that office holding hands. Eyes were closed. We began to pray. In the midst of the prayer a miracle happened. I suddenly had 100% faith. My whole former life was quickly coming undone but I suddenly had the faith that my house would sell. I had been very positive about the process before but this was different.

God told me in no uncertain terms that the house would sell.

I must reiterate the fact that the house had to sell, and sell quickly, or nothing else would have worked. Bad news was stacked up against me like backed-up cars on a freeway.

After the prayer I quickly called my realtor and told him we were going full speed ahead and to keep working the deal. Exactly one month later on the exact day of the month I closed on the house at the exact price the Lord had told me about before. The selling price was not my asking price and there were counter offers, but everything got done just the way the Lord told me it would. Not only that, but it went right down to the wire. The closer we got to what would be the closing date the more it appeared that the house would never sell. The pressure increased dramatically. Everything hinged on the sale. But I had complete and total peace in my heart regardless of the negative circumstances because I knew what God had said. I kept telling others that it would be okay, that the house would sell, and that it would all work out.

This was not blind faith. It was pure faith. After that prayer with three godly men the Lord told me what would happen and I was merely acting on what He said. I had to keep the faith, of course. And I had to maintain the course. And I did.

It was an extremely difficult time. Everything was hitting me at once. Suffering seemed to be far too light of a word.

This brings me to the point of this article. There are times we have to embrace suffering no matter how counter-intuitive it may appear to be. On a related front, psychologists talk of “going back into the wound” (as painful and apparently stupid that sounds), or healing can never take place. It’s like going through powerful white water rapids in a wimpy canoe with no surface guarantee of coming out alive on the other side.

It is like going into the belly of the beast.

The counter-intuitive nature of spiritual suffering most often causes us to reject it and stay clear of its embrace. But the Word of God clearly states:

For just as the sufferings of Christ are ours in abundance, so also our comfort is abundant through Christ. But if we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation; or if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which is effective in the patient enduring of the same sufferings which we also suffer; and our hope for you is firmly grounded, knowing that as you are sharers of our sufferings, so also you are sharers of our comfort.

For we do not want you to be unaware, brethren, of our affliction which came to us in Asia, that we were burdened excessively, beyond our strength, so that we despaired even of life; indeed, we had the sentence of death within ourselves so that we would not trust in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead; who delivered us from so great a peril of death, and will deliver us, He on whom we have set our hope. And He will yet deliver us, you also joining in helping us through your prayers, so that thanks may be given by many persons on our behalf for the favor bestowed on us through the prayers of many. [2 Corinthians 1:5-11] [1]

Sometimes the pain is so great it does indeed appear unbearable. Sometimes we reach a point, like the apostle Paul, in which we despair of life itself. Sometimes the suffering is such that we consider life no longer worth living. But just as the sun goes down and brings on many hours of darkness, the sun will rise again. The long dark night will be over. The Comforter will come.

The Lord rose again.

We will rise again.

Posted in Real Christianity

10 Comments

Tags: Dallas Holm, Embracing Suffering, Lord Jesus, Pure Faith, Real Christianity, Resurrection, Rise Again, Spiritual Suffering, The Comforter Will Come, The Sufferings of Christ

Love is the Fulfillment of the Law

Oct 12

Posted by RJ Dawson

We are taught while growing up that there are certain borders we must never cross. There are boundaries established by the authority figures in our lives that are designed to protect us, but often do much more.

They stifle us. They destroy our dreams. They force us to conform to a very low common denominator in which everyone looks the same, acts the same, and lives in fear of the inevitable consequences of breaking the code.

It’s called culture. And the worst cultures are religious cultures.

There was a time in the American culture when almost everyone bowed to the dictates of a so-called religious moral code that superseded much of what our hearts were designed to experience.

Rather than being loved-based, it was fear-based. And the sad thing about it all was that it played right into the devil’s hands. Though there was undoubtedly limited success against sin in the code, there was also success against life. Proverbial babies were constantly being thrown out with the bathwater.

Have you ever wondered why the God of all creation made it so easy to sin? It did not matter how oppressive a culture might be, or how strict the mores of that culture might bind a person up into a little shell of being becoming too fearful to take a chance on venturing forth. If a person wanted to sin, a person could always find a way.

But while all the authority figures were displaying their very heavy hand at stopping any potential moral failure or embarrassing cultural code-breaking by the young deviants among us, where was God? Why didn’t God surround everyone with angels with big sticks ready to whack us all into kingdom come when we stepped out of line? Where was God when and if we decided to test the boundaries of our cultural arrangement?

Why does God seem to take the attitude that we can do whatever we want but He will get us in the end? Why does it seem as though God doesn’t seem to care all that much about our little lives but is taking big notes that He will use against us at our final trial?

And how in the world have Christians in general bought into this picture of God even though God’s great act of love blares out at us day after day and hour after hour through any one of thousands of reminders, most notably a simple cross?

God became one of us!

We must throw our false religious garbage and idiotic moral codes right out the window if they do not address this simple fact.

God became one of us, and He lived among us, and He knows how hard it is, and He knows how lonely people are, and He cries inside all the day long about how broken people have become and how our hearts are often destroyed by the very nature of this fallen world and the evil among us.

And He wonders how His wonderful perfect creation could all go so wrong…

But there was no other way.

There was no other way to create people just like Him unless He also blessed them with the freedom to choose their own path.

And that’s what this world is all about. It’s the simple answer to the philosophical problem from evil. Human choice creates bad stuff and sometimes some really, really bad stuff. And free will is why God does not stop us from making bad choices. Oh, He will try to convince us otherwise. He will try to reason with us. He attempts to tell us about the eventual fallout when what appears to be a good decision will turn into a complete disaster later on. He really does try to guide us and stop us from doing stupid things. That’s essentially what the Law of Moses is all about.

But at the end of the day He will not deny our free will. He will allow us to choose incorrectly. He will let us have the final say.

What I am saying is this: the Law, which came four hundred and thirty years later, does not invalidate a covenant previously ratified by God, so as to nullify the promise. For if the inheritance is based on law, it is no longer based on a promise; but God has granted it to Abraham by means of a promise. Why the Law then? It was added because of transgressions, having been ordained through angels by the agency of a mediator, until the seed would come to whom the promise had been made. Now a mediator is not for one party only; whereas God is only one. Is the Law then contrary to the promises of God? May it never be!

For if a law had been given which was able to impart life, then righteousness would indeed have been based on law. [Galatians 3:17-21]

But righteousness is not based on law. Tell this to all the moral cultural crusaders throughout history, especially in America, who tried to force compliance toward morality. Tell this to all the dimwitted quasi-Christians who refuse the fullness of a walk with God because it violates their religion and false Christian doctrines and stupid lame-brained attitude that continually attempts to force God to be like them, instead of surrendering their lives completely to be like Him.

Many people think America took a nose dive in the 1960’s but refuse to consider the actions of the previous generations that were the real cause of the cultural breakdown. The 1960’s in America was actually the time of a great Spirit outpouring and spiritual awakening in that Christians in all denominations and people everywhere were being filled with the Holy Spirit and speaking in tongues and engaging in miraculous works. But most churches were against it all, and fought it, and opposed the Lord Jesus because He didn’t do it their way! And many fake Christians continue to oppose God and insist on their lifeless religion, negative attitudes, and dead churches to this very day.

How much of this is based not on the unconditional love of God, his unmerited grace, and one’s total dependence on Him, but on a giant misapplication of Scripture? Sound familiar? Though the Law of Moses seems to be filled primarily with Thou Shalt Not’s and that the heavenly author is a negative NO! God always preoccupied with stifling the free wills of His creation, the truth is actually the opposite.

A parent tries to tell a child, “Please don’t do this because if you do it will hurt you,” but then must watch as the child does it anyway and feels just as much pain as the child does if not more when the bad results come forth. Yet parents know the child will eventually have the final say.

Is it any different with God? He knows we will mess up. He knows we will mess up repeatedly. But He has the ability, the strength, and the means to clean up our messes. And this ability, strength, and means stems from His great and powerful love for us. He is able to cleanse our hearts with His precious blood spilled on our behalf, no matter how much we may be stained with sin. And He has the power to raise us to new life!

So why does God seem to be aloof and uncaring even though the direct opposite is true?

Because living right is not about force or religious compliance.

It is about love.

And no one can make a law that forces a person to love someone.

And God will never attempt to force anyone to love Him.

It is not about living a perfect life but finding a perfect love.

God loves us just the way we are. He does not condemn us for the sins we have committed. His great desire is to guide us as the Good Shepherd He is into the green pastures of abundant life where His grace and perfect sacrifice cleanses us and allows us to be free. Things are the way they are on this planet because it is the only possible means of allowing free-willed beings to love God as much as He loves them.

God is love, and—

Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfillment of the law. [Romans 13:10][1]

Posted in Real Christianity

13 Comments

Tags: False Moral Codes, God is Love, Holy Spirit Outpouring, Jesus is God, Lord Jesus, Love is the Fulfillment of the Law, Real Christianity, Religious Culture, The Law of Moses, Unconditional Love

The Day of Atonement

Sep 26

Posted by RJ Dawson

He came to His own, and those who were His own did not receive Him. [John 1:11][1]

Many Christians have some semblance of an idea that Jesus was rejected by His people. But what most do not know is just how wicked and pervasive the rejection was.

And He is still being rejected today.

He is rejected by the majority of those who confess to be adherents of Christianity. He is rejected by most churches. He is rejected by most preachers. He is most often never welcomed in our so-called places of worship. Christians in general don’t want Him, don’t like Him, and most will never allow Him to be in control and be the Leader we all need.

I have written about this extensively but for the most part it always seems to fall on deaf ears. I have never been officially disfellowshipped from a church but I have been silenced and slandered and libeled and gossiped about. Many wished I would leave before the Lord released me. Though I have met thousands of wonderful believers with big smiles and great attitudes, I have also seen many dirty looks from so many so-called loving Christians and preachers I have halfway come to expect it. Some can think what they want, but others will identify with this. I have years of personal experience in this area and can relate, though on a smaller scale of course, to what the Lord went through.

The worst persecution comes from those you thought were friends.

But official churches do not care. The people within most churches have accepted a watered-down version of the original and have retained the right to hate and reject, and there is no doubt they would hate and reject the Lord if He ever showed up. We have glorified preachers and Christian personalities. We have allowed them the high place, the television studio chair, the radio broadcaster’s booth, and have lifted them up over and beyond the Lord. They claim His Lordship but don’t really know Him. If they did they would spend most of the time on their faces instead of soaking up the control, authority, and glory. These are pretenders who have not only accepted a weak version of the original but teach it as gospel. The time will come when the Lord will clean house but that time is not yet.

There are so many false doctrines being taught within official Christian circles it is laughable. There are many, though, who feel more and want more, and get inspired to act, but quickly withdraw once it becomes evident it will cause a problem in the local body. You can bet there will be scads of preachers and church officials getting creamed at the judgment for being so control-oriented and hateful toward God’s apostles and prophets and teachers, and all those who were earnestly doing the will of God but suffering for it.

Even this paper will go over the heads of some who read it. They cannot imagine that their lovely church could be guilty of rejecting the Lord Jesus, though the very clear evidence is all around them.

On this annual Day of Atonement or Yom Kippur, how many churches and preachers and denominational leaders and church-going Christians even consider honoring that which is clearly put forth in the Word of God? Most have never even heard of it. Most would never bring it up, maybe because it is “too Jewish,” and “We’re not under the Law,” or some other garbage. Yet having dead services is fine. Rejecting the infilling of the Holy Spirit is perfectly okay. Wanting nothing to do with anything resembling the Book of Acts is perfectly acceptable.

Such have rejected the Lord. Such are embarrassed by “speaking in tongues.” Such refuse to take on the Name Above Every Name in water baptism. Such will not really love his brother unless he looks like them, acts like them, and believes like them. These people talk about love but violate every commandment concerning love. If they really did love it would show. If they really loved the Lord it would show, instead of insisting on dead, boring, lifeless churches where a miracle could not find its way in edgewise, even though there might be a great eloquent preacher or wonderful “worship” music.

Whover takes the time to study real revivals and spiritual awakenings knows the usual order of things is wholly unlike the way the Lord wants it to be. But what can He do?

Most have kicked Him out.

Most don’t want Him.

Most have instead invented a worldly, religious substitute.

But the Lord will not be stopped. Just as He has always done, He will use the nobodies and those the official Christians think are idiots. Since He is not welcome in most church buildings, He will use living rooms and garages and shacks and barns and open fields and anywhere else He might find before the official Christians find out about it and shut them down or run them out of town.

I could quote Scripture forever but it won’t do any good. But, speaking of which, here’s a good one:

For consider your calling, brethren, that there were not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble; but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong, and the base things of the world and the despised God has chosen, the things that are not, so that He may nullify the things that are, so that no man may boast before God. [1 Corinthians 1:26-29]

We are in the early stages of a national Great Awakening. But it will bypass most churches. Most preachers don’t get it and won’t get it. As He did in the beginning, the Lord will use the humble and the nobodies. There are many who have been in the process of being prepared for what is coming forth, and will come forth suddenly. These are the ones who had formerly been rejected, just as the Lord Jesus was rejected. And like Him, they do not fit within official church circles. And because of this, the Lord will generally work outside official church circles and most so-called Christians will end up missing out on the greatest spiritual movement this nation has ever seen.

And you know what else? They will even fight it, like rabid wolves, just as they have been doing all along. But this time there will be far too many real Christians, and they will be connected in fellowship, and they will not be so easy to pick on and pick off as before. And the Lord will be with them and among them because they have never rejected Him like so many others have, but have embraced Him, and suffered with Him.

Since real repentance always accompanies great spiritual movements, there is always the hope that opposing churches and preachers repent as well, overcome their spiritual pride, and get right with God.

On this Day of Atonement, consider the price that was paid to buy your salvation. Consider the One who was rejected but completed His mission anyway. And think about where you want to stand in the coming Great Awakening—within it or against it.

And start doing something about it now.

Posted in Current Events

Tags: Baptism in the Name of Jesus, Book of Acts, Dead Churches, Lord Jesus, Real Christianity, Speaking in Tongues, The Day of Atonement, The Great Awakening, Yom Kippur

Happy Rosh Hashanah

Sep 16

Posted by RJ Dawson

This is a great time of year. The Jewish New Year starts tonight at sunset. This is known as Rosh Hashanah, the “Head of the Year.” It is a traditional time for a new beginning, and those who take it seriously know that God still uses His calendar.

For example, biblical scholars know that the spring feasts have already been fulfilled. The Lord Jesus was the spotless Passover Lamb and then rose again from death on First fruits. He was the first perfect offering ever made, in that He had no sin, but became sin on our behalf:

He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. [2 Corinthians 5:21]

The Feast of Pentecost was also fulfilled fifty days later. It marked the day the Torah was given through Moses on Mount Sinai, but instead of Law, Pentecost established a day of Love and reconciliation for the simple fact that a long list of do’s and do not’s without faith merely reveal the perfect standard by which we must live. The infilling of the Spirit of God grants us the power and the ability to live:

You are our letter, written in our hearts, known and read by all men; being manifested that you are a letter of Christ, cared for by us, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts. Such confidence we have through Christ toward God. Not that we are adequate in ourselves to consider anything as coming from ourselves, but our adequacy is from God, who also made us adequate as servants of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life. But if the ministry of death, in letters engraved on stones, came with glory, so that the sons of Israel could not look intently at the face of Moses because of the glory of his face, fading as it was, how will the ministry of the Spirit fail to be even more with glory? [2 Corinthians 3:2-8]

Many Jewish rabbis teach that the Old Testament actually speaks of two Messiahs. One Messiah was known as the “Son of Joseph” and would come to earth in the person of a suffering servant. The second Messiah was known as the “Son of David” and would burst onto the scene as a powerful conquering king. They did not perceive that these two were actually the same Messiah, and many Jews in the first century misidentified the Lord as an imposter because He was not the conquering king they were looking for. Yet, the Scriptures are filled with the idea of going downward to go upward. Humility must precede exaltation. If one cannot handle the former, there will be no latter. The Lord Jesus fulfilled this perfectly. He arrived as the Sacrifice Lamb to pay for sin 2,000 years ago as a suffering servant and will soon return again.

And it will be in the autumn of the year.

Pay attention to Rosh Hashanah, which runs from sunset on Sunday night, September 16 to sunset on Monday night, September 17. Ten days later is the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur). It begins at sunset on September 25. These are the ten “Days of Awe” when we all should take our walk with God very seriously, engage in spiritual introspection, repent of sin, and do our best to present a pure sacrifice on Yom Kippur. What follows in the Feast of Tabernacles (Booths), or Sukkot. It is a seven-day feast commemorating the time the Hebrews lived in temporary shelters in the Sinai desert.

This time in autumn was in all likelihood the actual time of our Lord’s birth and will also mark the season of His return! Sukkot has not yet been fulfilled. We get a tantalizing clue regarding the Lord’s physical birth in the following:

And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth. [John 1:14]

The usage of the word “dwelt” in the above passage indicates the fact that the Lord tabernacled among us, in a temporary shelter, spreading His tent, so to speak. He spent forty days here after His resurrection in His glorified state, and ascended to heaven bodily ten days before Pentecost.

He will return during a future Feast of Tabernacles, and will then set up a permanent dwelling for all:

“In My Father’s house are many dwelling places; if it were not so, I would have told you; for I go to prepare a place for you. If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself, that where I am, there you may be also.” [John 14:2-3] [1]

Posted in Current Events

5 Comments

Tags: Day of Atonement, Feast of Tabernacles, Hebrew Calendar, Jewish New Year, Lord Jesus, Real Christianity, Rosh Hashanah, Sukkot, The Second Coming, Yom Kippur

The Name of God: The Name Above Every Name (Part 10)

Sep 8

Posted by RJ Dawson

The Lord Jesus consistently displayed the heart of a Father. As we studied in the last post, He said He would not leave His disciples as orphans. Yet, many believers, whether they admit it or not, effectively feel like orphans. They do not feel connected to God. Could this be because they are not connected to God? As in the idea of the new birth experience which the Lord said all real believers are required to undergo , many Christians cannot point to any such experience.

The Name of God: The Name Above Every Name (Part 9)

Sep 5

Posted by RJ Dawson

“But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you.”

According to the above passage, the Father… will send the Holy Spirit… in the Name of the Son. In classic Christian jargon, the “First Person” will send the “Third Person” in the name of the “Second Person.” This reminds me of the Olympics, when the three medal winners stand on small joined platforms of three different levels to receive their medals.

The Name of God: The Name Above Every Name (Part 8)

Sep 2

Posted by RJ Dawson

God was performing extraordinary miracles by the hands of Paul, so that handkerchiefs or aprons were even carried from his body to the sick, and the diseases left them and the evil spirits went out. But also some of the Jewish exorcists, who went from place to place, attempted to name over those who had the evil spirits the name of the Lord Jesus, saying, “I adjure you by Jesus whom Paul preaches.”

The Name of God: The Name Above Every Name (Part 7)

Aug 28

Posted by RJ Dawson

Pessimism is a sin. If a person claims to be a real Christian and is not optimistic regarding areas under God’s control, then one is sinning against Him.

It’s called a lack of faith.

…And whatever is not from faith is sin.

The Lord was often exasperated with faithlessness, especially among His own disciples. Remembering the simple fact that those guys were His students learning His craft excuses them since they were in the process of moving from darkness to light.

The Name of God: The Name Above Every Name (Part 6)

Aug 25

Posted by RJ Dawson

Unreal Christianity is infused with sacred cows. After two thousand years of extra-Biblical heretical teachings and “Christian” denominational offshoots, Unreal Christianity contains a veritable zoo of protected cattle wandering down city streets masquerading as truth. As possible reincarnated ancestors, none dare touch such cows without stirring up a hornet’s nest of retribution and murder.

And He said, “Truly I say to you, no prophet is welcome in his hometown.

Hope Island

Aug 20

Posted by RJ Dawson

About a decade ago, there was an award-winning television show I really liked on the old PAX TV channel. It was called Hope Island and ran from 1999-2000.

The critically-acclaimed series was about a young minister who was sent to the Pacific Northwest to fix up an old church and restore a ministry that had been neglected for 30 years. It featured a cast of distinct and unique characters who somehow came together under the young man’s leadership and how a wonderful sense of community was restored under the guidance of the Lord.

I believe this is a dream that many believers have—to live within a loving and accepting community that allows each person to walk in the fullness of what God created them to be without any religious pretext or close-minded attitudes.

We must continually remind ourselves, as if we needed reminding, that our churches are not very close at all to the original model created by the Lord, and also remind ourselves that we keep perpetuating a false model that does little compared to the prototype.

In fact, we have become quite comfortable with much less than the best and resist any real change with a passion.

But God still knows our hearts. And He knows we are really not so happy but possibly merely satisfied with an essentially dead routine that never changes. Christians are some of the worst people on the planet regarding change for the better, and are ever fearful of some such calamity or losing control.

But the young minister discovered that the paradigm he was taught in ministry school simply did not work among the people of his new flock and that he must do things differently if he would reach them and allow the Lord to bless their lives.

This is something that has always been on my heart, that we might do as the people of the show did in this regard, and begin doing things the Lord’s way.

We forget that the Lord’s way is off the map. We read the Gospels but refuse to see that His way flew in the face of established, traditional religion. It is because His way is the right way as opposed to our structured and their structured dead religious ways.

His way is the way of the heart.

He was and remains all about reaching us on a heart level and setting us free from whatever bondage we happen to find ourselves within, especially religious bondage. He shows us that there is a way to have our hearts set free and fulfilled while also walking in holiness with Him. He wants us to be filled with His joy to overflowing and His faith to the nth degree.

And it is not at all that difficult to achieve.

The reason so many people liked that show and were saddened to see it cancelled was because it spoke to their hearts about what Christian community could and should be.

Last night I happened to see if I could find it posted anywhere and actually discovered part of one show. And it blessed me. The young man had been given a great opportunity to leave Hope Island and secure a “better” ministry position at a big church with much greater perks and position. He had decided to take it since it was obviously “better” for his career.

But then at the last minute he changed his mind. One particular individual was devastated by the news, telling him in so many words, “You come here and enter our lives and we all fall in love with you and then you leave us?” The people in the small locale needed someone to help bring them closer to God and one another, and he had done that, but did not realize how much of an impact he had made.

He decided to stay.

I must confess, after all these years, I maintain an idyllic dream of actually doing what this fictional young man had done. I long to be part of an eclectic ensemble of real people trying to be real Christians free of all the trappings of the usual Christian dead order and decorum, where people are often bored to tears and don’t know it, and whose hearts are rarely touched or fulfilled.

How long must we persist in, “Just do what you’re told. That’s the way we do things here and we ain’t changin,’” and how long must we wait to decide on taking a chance at having real life with the Lord?

Hope Island is a mere fictional account of what some people did to love one another under the Lord’s guidance. Yet it is closer to spiritual reality than that of most churches. Why do we long for such but rarely do anything about creating such a place?

The Lord Jesus wants to touch your heart today and every day. And I want to be a part of that. Are there any others out there who feel the same?

And, as long as I’m dreaming and take literally the words of the Lord about all things being possible, is there any potential Christian community in the Pacific Northwest that might appreciate someone to help bring it to pass?

Must Hope Island remain a mere myth?

Posted in Current Events

Tags: All Things Are Possible, Book of Acts, Christian Community, Hope Island, Lord Jesus, Real Christianity, The Way of the Heart

The Name of God: The Name Above Every Name (Part 5)

Aug 18

Posted by RJ Dawson

But when they had ordered them to leave the Council, they began to confer with one another, saying, “What shall we do with these men? For the fact that a noteworthy miracle has taken place through them is apparent to all who live in Jerusalem, and we cannot deny it. But so that it will not spread any further among the people, let us warn them to speak no longer to any man in this name.” And when they had summoned them, they commanded them not to speak or teach at all in the name of Jesus.

The Name of God: The Name Above Every Name (Part 4)

Aug 14

Posted by RJ Dawson

Christians have been unknowingly conditioned to perceive God and the Lord Jesus as two completely different people. How did this happen? Why is it that despite a veritable plethora of pure scriptural references to the absolute deity of Jesus He remains relegated to second-class status? Why do the majority of Christians refuse to give the Lord Jesus His due and honor Him as God?

The Name of God: The Name Above Every Name (Part 3)

Aug 8

Posted by RJ Dawson

Therefore, since we have this ministry, as we received mercy, we do not lose heart, but we have renounced the things hidden because of shame, not walking in craftiness or adulterating the word of God, but by the manifestation of truth commending ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God. And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, in whose case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.

The Name of God: The Name Above Every Name (Part 2)

Aug 4

Posted by RJ Dawson

Who is the Father? Who is the Holy Spirit? Why don’t they have names? Prior to its translation into English, the Greek New Testament renders the words Theos (God), Kurios (Lord), Pater (Father), Huios (Son), and Hagios Pneuma (Holy Spirit) as descriptive terms and titles of God. Though the argument has been explained exhaustively, it must be stated yet again for purposes of this study that the same individual may be a grandfather, a father, a son, a brother, a husband, an uncle, a cousin, and a nephew.

The Name of God: The Name Above Every Name (Part 1)

Jul 30

Posted by RJ Dawson

I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened, so that you will know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the surpassing greatness of His power toward us who believe. These are in accordance with the working of the strength of His might which He brought about in Christ, when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly…

I’ll Be Busy For a While…

Jul 18

Posted by RJ Dawson

Hey everyone,

I appreciate all of you for helping make this blog what it is. Thanks to those of you who recently subscribed and for all the comments and “Likes.”

I’m going to be really busy for a while starting a new job and I won’t be able to correspond as much as I have been. I have already set my comments to “on hold” because I would like to reply properly. So when you see that your comments are not yet posted it is the same for everyone. Please feel free to comment as before. Your input is much appreciated.

Also, please continue to check out my past articles if you like. I will try to get back as soon as I can at intervals. I would appreciate your prayers.

Keep up all the great work. We are winning this battle. The Great Awakening is coming forth and real Christianity is breaking out all over.

Later,

Posted in Current Events

11 Comments

YOU CANNOT SERVE GOD AND WEALTH

Jul 15

Posted by RJ Dawson

Oklahoma State Representative Rebecca Hamilton has recently posted an eye-opening series of articles on her blog, Public Catholic. I encourage all to take a look at it and see what is really going on behind the scenes of our political process regarding issues of great consequence for real Christians, especially the way money and influence corrupts our elected representatives and why nothing ever changes regarding legalized abortion.

I warn you in advance that these articles are brimming with truth and will give you a front row center view of American political corruption in action. For those of you who know all this has been going on but never saw it from the inside, this is your opportunity to advance your education. I have personally been writing about the religious side of such corruption for years, and my book Real Christianity is saturated with this theme and exposes the compromising dirty deeds of Unreal Christianity. So pay special attention to the love fest between political and religious leaders captured in these posts. If you have any heart for God at all you will see what a bunch of spineless sell-outs many of these people are, and that you could be very close to such sell-outs on a local level.

You can find Part 1 here, Part 2 here, and Part 3 here.

Thank you, Rebecca, for an inside look at our corrupt money-first political process that confirms everything so many others have been saying for decades regarding the puppets America continues to elect to positions of power. You have proven from the inside that there is no difference whatsoever between the two major parties when it comes to righting the course of this country and standing up for the principles of our Constitution. Most people simply do not see or do not want to see what is really going on behind the scenes.

When the Lord Jesus used the term mammon/mamonas (wealth), He was referring not simply to money, but to the god of riches. He stated that a person will hate one and love the other, and that it is impossible to serve both. Ask a three-year-old to count the elected reps serving the Lord Jesus. Before they get to elebenty-twelve they’ll have the number about right.

I had a long exchange once with a very strong Pro-Life advocate who believed the key to overturning Roe v. Wade was electing Republican presidents. I told him we have already done that, starting with Ronald Reagan almost 32 years ago and nothing ever changes. We keep electing “Pro-Life” Republicans who nominate Supreme Court justices and nothing ever changes. It seems the electorate can only remember what happened a few months back at best and is continually brainwashed by the media.

Is “brainwashed” too strong a term? Then how is it that the majority of supposedly Pro-Life Catholic voters in this country supported and voted for Barack Obama in the 2008 election? And now they’re upset because he’s pro-abortion? And has anyone noticed we have six Roman Catholics on the U.S. Supreme Court?

During the 2012 Republican nomination campaign we had a very clear choice in a candidate that had a very long record proving he was not bought by anyone and never would be, had always been 100% Pro-Life, and is on record as being a real Christian who attempts to honor the Lord Jesus and His teachings in all he does.

But he was soundly rejected by Pro-Life Christian Republicans who helped nominate a guy who is the king of flip-flopping puppets.

I believe everything Rebecca said in her post. I’ve been trying to say it to whoever will listen (very few) for years. Watch what happens if the Republican candidate is elected—nothing.

But I am encouraged for this country because a few real Christians figured out a long time ago (and the numbers are greatly increasing at present), that current elected reps will do nothing to right our course, but the Lord Jesus will do everything if we only get on our faces before Him, humble ourselves and pray, and dedicate ourselves to do His will.

And He has heard and is hearing our prayers! We are currently in the early stages of a national Great Awakening. The political process no longer works because almost everyone is bought off. But the Lord honors His people by granting their petitions. When people realize that putting their faith and trust in the Lord Jesus instead of political puppets actually changes things for the better, they quit wasting time and effort on a losing game.

The game simply cannot be won if He is not involved. When He is involved good things happen. I am therefore resolutely optimistic about the future because God is being granted more and more control through our free will submission to His leading and authority.

It will be costly. Christian persecution in America continues coming forth and will rise exponentially. But such persecution always goes hand in hand with Great Awakenings. We cannot have one without the other. Persecution is merely a sign (a big giant sign all lit up like a Christmas tree) that individual believers and Christian communities are strong, effective, and doing the job the Lord commanded them to do.

Unreal Christianity, on the other hand, avoids persecution at all costs, has made friends with the world, serves the devil without even knowing it, and is content with just enough “Christianity” to be satisfied but never so much that demands a real personal cost or invites attack. Such unreal Christians know they would get creamed anyway, so they are only acting in their best interests.

But real Christians simply can’t help themselves. They are anointed and trained by God to attack the enemy. They rise to the occasion. They speak up. They engage in spiritual warfare. It is part of their DNA. They are persevering fighters one and all, just like their Father.

“The LORD is a warrior; The LORD is His name.” [Exodus 15:3] [1]

Posted in Current Events

Tags: Christian Persecution, Lord Jesus, Political Corruption, Real Christianity, Rebecca Hamilton, The Great Awakening, The LORD is a Warrior, United States of America, Unreal Christianity

Reject God’s Prophets At Your Own Peril

Jul 12

Posted by RJ Dawson

The Watchman On The Wall

The preceding link will direct you to an incredibly timely post from the blog, Manoah’s Wife, and for me, one with clear and current prophetic overtones. Many voices have been going forth from the Lord over the last several years warning this country of what is coming. Without repentance there is no way to hold back the tide. Our national and personal sins have demanded judgment. This passage is a perfect word to each of us, to our “churches” and spiritual communities, and to the nation of America itself.

The good news is that many are not only hearing the prophetic word but are acting upon it. Our former righteousness will not save us in the day we sin, yet the wicked that turn from sin will be saved. This is happening right now. Many sinners are turning to God but many “righteous” are falling away and do not even know it. These “believers” have closed their hearts and minds to prophetic warnings and the full truth of the Lord’s message. They have substituted false doctrines that appear perfectly Biblical and subsist on dry formalism, dead religion, and watered-down “Christianity light” instead of embracing the Lord Jesus in all His power and glory.

It is an exact rendering of the Lord’s words from so long ago directed to His own people:

“But what do you think? A man had two sons, and he came to the first and said, ‘Son, go work today in the vineyard.’ And he answered, ‘I will not;’ but afterward he regretted it and went. The man came to the second and said the same thing; and he answered, ‘I will, sir’; but he did not go. Which of the two did the will of his father?” They said, “The first.” Jesus said to them, “Truly I say to you that the tax collectors and prostitutes will get into the kingdom of God before you. For John came to you in the way of righteousness and you did not believe him; but the tax collectors and prostitutes did believe him; and you, seeing this, did not even feel remorse afterward so as to believe him.” [Matthew 21:28-32]

Many Christians have fallen asleep and insist on playing games and engaging in mere dutiful routine because they have rejected the prophetic word and disfellowshipped every prophet whom the Lord ever sent their way. The passage in Ezekiel reveals exactly the heart of God but many “Christians” insist that such is mere “Old Covenant” drivel and that God is no longer like that, in that the New Covenant has transformed God into an uncaring and worldly pansy who would rather we all act like a bunch of Sunday School kids and go through mere motions every Sunday morning. Those who have adopted this false view of God have no chance, because they refuse to listen to prophetic warnings and strong teaching, and instead substitute a fleshy, worldly, and wimpy “Christian” outlook devoid of spiritual strength and power.

What a sad state of affairs it is when most “Christians” would rather reject God for their own “Bible-based” religion or simply live in sin with no conviction or desire to honor the Lord Jesus properly.

“If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.” [John 14:15]

Based on this, most “Christians” do not love the Lord and therefore do not show His real love to others. They are dealing with a substitute. They “say” but do not “do.” They cannot possibly send forth the seed of the Gospel simply because they do not possess it, nor want to possess it.

“But as for you, son of man, your fellow citizens who talk about you by the walls and in the doorways of the houses, speak to one another, each to his brother, saying, ‘Come now and hear what the message is which comes forth from the LORD.’ They come to you as people come, and sit before you as My people and hear your words, but they do not do them, for they do the lustful desires expressed by their mouth, and their heart goes after their gain. Behold, you are to them like a sensual song by one who has a beautiful voice and plays well on an instrument; for they hear your words but they do not practice them. So when it comes to pass—as surely it will—then they will know that a prophet has been in their midst.” [Ezekiel 33:30-33] [1]

Posted in Current Events

Tags: America In The Balance, Ezekiel, Judgment, Lord Jesus, Real Christianity, Rejecting God's Prophets, The Great Awakening, The Prophetic Word, The Watchman On The Wall

The Declaration of Independence 2012

Jul 4

Posted by RJ Dawson

On June 7, 1776, Richard Henry Lee of the Virginia House of Burgesses introduced a resolution that essentially became the actual Declaration of Independence. The short document stated thus:

Resolved, that these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States, that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved.

That it is expedient forthwith to take the most effectual measures for forming foreign Alliances.

That a plan of confederation be prepared and transmitted to the respective Colonies for their consideration and approbation.

The resolution was debated the next day and then tabled until July 1. In the meantime, a committee was formed to consider the question of independence. It was composed of five members: John Adams, Ben Franklin, Robert Livingston, Roger Sherman, and Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson was enlisted to write the document. After editing, the Declaration was voted upon for acceptance by Congress on July 2, and formally accepted on July 4, 1776. It is interesting to note, however, that it was not actually a declaration of independence. That honor belonged to the resolution of Richard Henry Lee. The original title of the formal document written by Thomas Jefferson was the following:

A Declaration by the Representatives of the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA in General Congress assembled

The final draft adopted on July 4, 1776 contained the more familiar title of:

The Unanimous Declaration of the Thirteen United States of America

When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security.

Such has been the patient sufferance of these colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former systems of government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his assent to laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his governors to pass laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of representation in the legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved representative houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the legislative powers, incapable of annihilation, have returned to the people at large for their exercise; the state remaining in the meantime exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavored to prevent the population of these states; for that purpose obstructing the laws for naturalization of foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migration hither, and raising the conditions of new appropriations of lands.

He has obstructed the administration of justice, by refusing his assent to laws for establishing judiciary powers.

He has made judges dependent on his will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, standing armies without the consent of our legislature.

He has affected to render the military independent of and superior to civil power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his assent to their acts of pretended legislation:

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by mock trial, from punishment for any murders which they should commit on the inhabitants of these states:

For cutting off our trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing taxes on us without our consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of trial by jury:

For transporting us beyond seas to be tried for pretended offenses:

For abolishing the free system of English laws in a neighboring province, establishing therein an arbitrary government, and enlarging its boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule in these colonies:

For taking away our charters, abolishing our most valuable laws, and altering fundamentally the forms of our governments:

For suspending our own legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated government here, by declaring us out of his protection and waging war against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burned our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to complete the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of cruelty and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow citizens taken captive on the high seas to bear arms against their country, to become the executioners of their friends and brethren, or to fall themselves by their hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavored to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian savages, whose known rule of warfare, is undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these oppressions we have petitioned for redress in the most humble terms: our repeated petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have we been wanting in attention to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace friends.

We, therefore, the representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress, assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the name, and by the authority of the good people of these colonies, solemnly publish and declare, that these united colonies are, and of right ought to be free and independent states; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the state of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as free and independent states, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent states may of right do. And for the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor.

New Hampshire: Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple, Matthew Thornton

Massachusetts: John Hancock, Samuel Adams, John Adams, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry

Rhode Island: Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery

Connecticut: Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott

New York: William Floyd, Philip Livingston, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris

New Jersey: Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon, Francis Hopkinson, John Hart, Abraham Clark

Pennsylvania: Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John Morton, George Clymer, James Smith, George Taylor, James Wilson, George Ross

Delaware: Caesar Rodney, George Read, Thomas McKean

Maryland: Samuel Chase, William Paca, Thomas Stone, Charles Carroll of Carrollton

Virginia: George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Nelson, Jr., Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton

North Carolina: William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn

South Carolina: Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, Jr., Thomas Lynch, Jr., Arthur Middleton

Georgia: Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton

Posted in Current Events

Tags: A Nation Blessed by God, American Revolution, July 4 1776, Richard Henry Lee, The Declaration of Independence, The United States of America, Thomas Jefferson

Choose For Yourselves This Day Whom You Will Serve

Jun 30

Posted by RJ Dawson

The invisible war rages. There are two competing kingdoms. Real Christians know the real fight is between the Lord Jesus and Satan. These two are the only leaders of the only two kingdoms that exist on the planet.

Thus, the fight is not between this country and that. It is not a fight between Christians and Muslims. It is not a fight between Republicans and Democrats. And it is not a fight between Catholics and Protestants.

The devil has authority over the entire world of unregenerate sinful mankind:

And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, in whose case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. [2 Corinthians 4:3-4]

The Lord Jesus is the King of His kingdom:

I charge you in the presence of God, who gives life to all things, and of Christ Jesus, who testified the good confession before Pontius Pilate, that you keep the commandment without stain or reproach until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ, which He will bring about at the proper time—He who is the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords, who alone possesses immortality and dwells in unapproachable light, whom no man has seen or can see. To Him be honor and eternal dominion! Amen. [1 Timothy 6:13-16]

The devil offered the Lord all the kingdoms of the world as his second in command, which means the devil controls all the kingdoms, nations, and countries of the world, or he could not have made the offer. This means he even controlled and sat atop the powerful Roman Empire.

If one purports to honor and believe the Word of God, one must believe this. Therefore, if a person wants life and real freedom, he must at some point leave the devil’s kingdom and join the Lord’s. Otherwise, do nothing. The Lord Jesus is only in authority over those who have confessed His Name and bowed before Him. He is the Father of those who have accepted His sacrifice on their behalf and have been released from their bondage to sin.

According to His teachings, everyone else is under the authority of Satan.

Thus, the devil creates sub-battles within his kingdom to deceive the lost and even Christian believers about the real battle. He divides us through political parties, culture, race, denominations, and a myriad of other subsets in order to take our focus off of him.

This is why the only real change takes place when the Lord Jesus is able to rule in an area where the devil had previously ruled.

In the present battle, Jesus gains authority through the submission of a human being to Him. It is the only way He gains authority. And it must be through a person’s free will and love for Him, and not by coercion. He has only ONE kingdom. He has only ONE community of believers. And He is the ONE leader of His community. Everyone else within it is on equal footing with one another. He created no hierarchies or clergy-laity divisions. He created no men ruling other men within His kingdom. He is the only Ruler.

It is the same in Satan’s kingdom. Though it appears on the surface to be ruled by many different and disconnected leaders, rulers, presidents, dictators, financial kingpins, and religious quacks around the world, all of these are under his command whether they know it or not. If one has not submitted to the Lord Jesus, then one does not belong to Him and one does not have salvation. Such a one remains in His sins regardless of his station in life and receives his or her motivational feed from the original Beastie Boy.

If sin rules a person’s life (and it will unless the Lord is allowed to remove it and its power), then one is prone to powerful deception. Sin is blinding, and those who live in sin are subject to it, controlled by it, and are easily deceived by the devil into believing any number of lies.

And the devil is a master liar.

When one submits to the authority of the Lord Jesus and accepts His only payment for sin, then one is released from the power of sin and the blinders come off. This is a very, very powerful event, and one becomes an entirely new creation. Old desires pass away and new desires come forth to serve God and live a holy life. This is why the Lord referred to a true conversion experience as being “born again.”

This does not happen by merely converting to some branch of “Christianity.” It does not happen by merely joining a church or submitting to it and its particular doctrines. It happens only by submitting oneself to the Lord Jesus with one’s whole heart. He is the only One who can set a person free from the disease of sin, and give a person power over sin.

In fact, His Name means that very thing: YHWH-Salvation, or YeHoshua. The real meaning of salvation is being set free. It is the granting of freedom. Everyone wants to be free, but sin is the one thing endemic to mankind that one will never be set free of without the Lord. He lived a perfect sinless life and thus gained power over sin, and shares that power with whoever will join Him. There is no salvation without Jesus. He is the only One who can bestow spiritual life.

Yet, the devil has a field day dividing up Christians. It was not the Lord who created a million different Christian denominations. It is not the Lord who advocates hating one president and loving another, or siding with one political party and hating the other, or fighting for one Christian denomination and hating all others. The Lord’s community is in perfect unity, and is composed of all those who have bowed the knee to Him and no other.

If the Lord Jesus could be president, then real Christians would vote for Him. Otherwise we should vote for a real Christian. If neither candidate is a real Christian then it doesn’t matter which one is elected, since both belong to the kingdom of the other guy and nothing significant will change.

When the Lord Jesus is in charge there is liberty and blessing. When He is not in charge there is very little liberty and blessing. It should be obvious to Christians, since they supposedly know God’s written Word, that when the Lord is honored, the land of the people who honor Him is blessed. When the land is otherwise cursed, then…

Ask yourself if America is presently in good shape. Does it look like the Lord Jesus has been given governing control of Washington D.C.? Does it appear that He has been given governing control of the fifty states?

Some states are certainly in better shape than others, but most have very serious problems. People have been warning for decades that America is going in the tank, that the nation is filled with sin and murder, and that things are regressing ever faster. Yet, what do we do? We think a particular non-real Christian candidate is better than another? We think sinful human beings will somehow make the necessary gargantuan changes that are required?

We need to look at the big picture. Look back at the last 100 years and one will see a steady downhill slide that keeps accelerating. Yet we do nothing to actually change it. We engage in a bunch of cosmetic garbage that has no effect. The Word of God even predicts that things will continue to grow darker:

Indeed, all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. But evil men and impostors will proceed from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. [2 Timothy 3:12-13]

But there is a reason for this. It is not set in stone. It is because most people refuse to give themselves wholeheartedly to the Lord. We as a nation refuse to repent and submit to His authority so He can fix things.

And why is this surprising? The majority of churches don’t want Jesus in charge!

Unless the LORD builds the house, they labor in vain who build it; unless the LORD guards the city, the watchman keeps awake in vain. [Psalm 127:1] [1]

So, with all the constant drivel on the airwaves and the ongoing political process, Americans are fools if they think anything other than our submission to the Lord Jesus will change things substantially for the better.

Until then, the devil is in control of all those who refuse to bow the knee to the Lord, and if such people are in high office, the devil has that much more control.

At the end of the day, whether we like it or not or understand it or not, each of us will either serve the devil or serve the Lord Jesus. There is no in-between. There is no third party.

It may be the devil

Or it may be the Lord

But you’re gonna have to serve somebody [2]

WATCH VIDEO: Gotta Serve Somebody [Won Grammy Award in 1980]

[2] Bob Dylan, Gotta Serve Somebody, from the album Slow Train Coming 1979.

Posted in Real Christianity

Tags: Bob Dylan, Choose For Yourselves This Day Whom You Will Serve, Gotta Serve Somebody, King of kings and Lord of lords, Kingdom of Satan, Kingdom of the Lord Jesus, Lord Jesus, Real Christianity, Spiritual Battle

The Great Pretenders

Jun 27

Posted by RJ Dawson

At the hands of the apostles many signs and wonders were taking place among the people; and they were all with one accord in Solomon’s portico. But none of the rest dared to associate with them; however, the people held them in high esteem.

And all the more believers in the Lord, multitudes of men and women, were constantly added to their number, to such an extent that they even carried the sick out into the streets and laid them on cots and pallets, so that when Peter came by at least his shadow might fall on any one of them. Also the people from the cities in the vicinity of Jerusalem were coming together, bringing people who were sick or afflicted with unclean spirits, and they were all being healed.

But the high priest rose up, along with all his associates (that is the sect of the Sadducees), and they were filled with jealousy. They laid hands on the apostles and put them in a public jail. [Acts 5:12-18]

And this is how it always happens. The clergyites in control will always fight against the Spirit of God until they get off their high horses and get on their faces before Him.

Why have we not seen revival? Why are most church services so dead they might as well be funerals? Most churches are so cold you could ice skate down the main aisle.

The Sudducees in the above verses had their own version of “The First Church of the Refrigerator” and were so incensed on losing control to the Spirit of God they threw His guys in jail. Modern religionists in America don’t do this anymore. They just treat believers with supreme indifference, keep them out of their “private clubs,” and never allow them to come close to expressing their hearts and revealing truth. These are religious control freaks one and all, and the majority of churches in America remain under the control of such fleshly fruitcakes who fight revival and the manifestation of God’s Spirit.

And that’s the main reason we as believers find ourselves in such a predicament. There always has to be certain people who are so in love with themselves and their power they will always stifle any possible move of God.

When there are no Book of Acts manifestations you can be sure humanity is in control.

I mentioned in a previous post that if a poll was conducted among church leaders to sign a pledge allowing the Lord Jesus to have absolute total control in their churches that very, very few would ever sign it.

And the reason why is simple—they would lose control. Life would become a challenge. They would likely lose their perks, and most of all, they would lose their high horse reputations. God would fix it so no one would henceforth want to kiss their “hand” and bow down to them anymore. As it is, most believers worship their preachers and reverends and priests and church buildings and non-Biblical doctrines and all the other stuff the Pharisees and Sadducees were guilty of, instead of worshipping the Lord Jesus in Spirit and truth.

Prayer is the answer—long, hard times of prayer—intense prayer, intercessory prayer, and prayer of no pretense that rightfully moves the heart of God.

Repentance is the answer—solid, heart-rending, sobbing, snot-dripping repentance that proves one is seeing straight, knows one is nothing without God, and desires to do anything to have all of God and His direction.

The Lord, however, is truly a Gentleman and will never force His way upon us. That’s why He waits for us to get down to spiritual business. There are so many saints of God with pure hearts who remain under the control of some fleshly, proud, I’m-better-than-you-and-deserve-my-place-in-the-spotlight pinhead who will fight the Lord all day long in the guise of serving Him. Until someone challenges these people they will always remain in control.

This is what the Lord said about these future Christian pretenders:

“But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you shut off the kingdom of heaven from people; for you do not enter in yourselves, nor do you allow those who are entering to go in.” [Matthew 23:13]

“Woe to you lawyers![1] For you have taken away the key of knowledge; you yourselves did not enter, and you hindered those who were entering.” [Luke 11:52]

In other words, if your fearless leader refuses the full Spirit-filled kingdom of heaven and key of knowledge attained by the apostles and first century believers, then so too will you, who have bowed the knee not to God but to a fellow human being in the form of God. The apostles were very humble men and suffered greatly for their faith. But they were also great stalwarts in that they learned to live in hardship and carry the banner of the Lord courageously despite their loss of social standing, monetary gain, and religious position.

Unlike the highly vaunted religious leaders they suffered the loss of all things but WALKED WITH GOD AND POSSESSED THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN. They shook the devil’s kingdom to the core instead of joining it like so many unreal Christians and Christian leaders do so today.

Instead of living as the apostles did, however, we treat them like disconnected museum pieces to admire from afar but never think or desire to have what they had.

There are actually millions of such real Christians on the planet today who have learned to live for God and will always live for God regardless of powerful persecution and indifference toward them. They will fight any God-directed battle for the spiritual freedom of humanity regardless of dire circumstances, and reject anything that compromises their walk.

You will know the Lord Jesus is in charge when you see everyone in the vicinity taking a backseat and hitting the deck, especially the high and holy ones who previously thought it would all fall apart if they did not keep their grip on control. Anything not of God will be burned up, of course, and good riddance. But real leaders understand fully that they are nothing and that the Lord Jesus is everything, and every part of the spotlight belongs to Him and Him only.

Let the Spirit of the Lord be in charge!

Let Him do what He wants!

Get the heck out of the way!

Therefore, I exhort the elders among you, as your fellow elder and witness of the sufferings of Christ, and a partaker also of the glory that is to be revealed,

Shepherd the flock of God among you, exercising oversight not under compulsion, but voluntarily, according to the will of God;

And not for sordid gain, but with eagerness;

Nor yet as lording it over those allotted to your charge, but proving to be examples to the flock.

And when the Chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the unfading crown of glory.

You younger men, likewise, be subject to your elders; and all of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, for GOD IS OPPOSED TO THE PROUD, BUT GIVES GRACE TO THE HUMBLE. Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you at the proper time, casting all your anxiety on Him, because He cares for you.

Be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. But resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same experiences of suffering are being accomplished by your brethren who are in the world. After you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ, will Himself perfect, confirm, strengthen and establish you.

To Him be dominion forever and ever. Amen. [1 Peter 5:1-11] [2]

[1] Greek—Nomikos: Relating to law, learned in the law, experts in the Mosaic Law. Torah teachers. Those consumed with the letter of the Law but completely missing and neglecting the Spirit of the Law.

Posted in Real Christianity

Tags: Apostles, Book of Acts, Dead Churches, Healing and Miracles, Kingdom of Heaven, Lord Jesus, Prayer and Repentance, Prideful Church Leaders, Real Christianity, Revival

He Steadfastly Set His Face To Go To Jerusalem

Jun 16

Posted by RJ Dawson

Mount Everest (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

There are times in our lives when we have to make tough decisions.

We must decide to obey God.

I remember hearing a relatively well known preacher several years ago make a statement regarding such tough decisions. In all honesty he said, “I’ve rebuked the Holy Ghost so many times…”

What he meant, of course, is that there was no way what he was hearing was from God. It was too hard. Too difficult. Impossible, even. No way could it be God. He would never ask (command) me to do such a thing.

But, of course, it actually WAS the voice of God…

Not only does the Lord have “hard sayings,” He also has very hard things for us to do at times. And this portends the theme of this article, that God, in all His grace and love, commands us to do impossible things that put our lives in peril and sometimes destroy our comfort zones.

A lazy, lolling river suddenly becomes fast and filled with white water and giant boulders. But instead of simply getting over to the bank ASAP, the Lord directs us to enter headlong into the churning, violent rapids and commands us to ride the wave of the future.

Right.

These are some of the stepping off points in one’s walk with God. How many Christians are there in this world who are no longer real Christians because they refused such commands? How many are merely playing games, fooling themselves and almost everyone else in an attempt to live for God in disobedience?

It can’t happen, you know. Would that you were hot or cold…

You get the picture. Refusing God’s commands while claiming to be right makes one a veritable dab of spit at best and pool of vomit at worst.

Yes, the Word of God actually says that. As Yogi Berra would say, “You could look it up.”

The title of this post illustrates such tough obedient choices. The Lord knew all along He would make that fateful trip to Jerusalem one day and enter into the mouth of the dragon. He would drop His defenses, lose all protection, and become the object of not only the wrath of mankind, but the wrath of God.

But how is that possible? Jesus IS God.

And again, that’s the point. The strong must support the weak. The strong must do very difficult things on behalf of the weak. The strong must carry the day.

Now, in English, the phrase Set His Face To Go makes no sense. We think it makes sense but only because we have discovered what it means. This phrase is an obvious example of a Hebrew idiom that found its way into the literal translation. It comes to us from the KJV translators and is over 400 years old. However, it is based on the earlier English translation of William Tyndale which is going on 500 years old. I do not think those people had any clear understanding of Hebrew idioms. Later translations give a clearer understanding in English. The following is from the NASV:

He was determined to go to Jerusalem… [1]

Young’s Literal Translation states, that he fixed his face to go on to Jerusalem.

The Hebrew idiom, from an original Hebrew Gospel, means that the Lord Jesus could not possibly be swayed from facing His fate. He was resolutely determined to complete His mission. He set His face like a flinty rock to enter the belly of the beast. This was not only sheer determination and willpower to do the job He was called to do; it was also the determination to face the greatest physical, emotional, and mental torture ever suffered by anyone in taking on the massive burden of our sins, and actually become sin on our behalf.

He had every reason, in the natural, to reject such a trip. How could it be God’s will for me to face such a horrible fate? Anyone else would have found a way out, and would have justified his disobedient behavior.

But not the Lord Jesus.

He wasn’t thinking of Himself.

He was thinking of you.

So, we must set our minds at ease in that whatever difficult circumstances He is commanding us to undertake, He will never ask us to go to the cross the way He went to the cross.

But we must go to the cross. We must be crucified. We must destroy our sinful and selfish human nature through real repentance and allow His life to course through our born again veins and arteries, and allow our hearts of stone to be transformed into living hearts of spiritual love and mercy.

He made it relatively easy for us, you know. There is a place in each of us reserved for His Holy Living Spirit. The key to being like Christ, therefore, is not to engage in some ascetic attempt to be “holy” and Christlike through our own power and religious methods, but to unlock the door of our hearts, open the door wide, greet the Lord who waits patiently on our doorstep with a gracious smile and a loving hug, invite Him in, and give Him the best room in the house.

Whatever price we must pay to get us to the point of accepting such a visitation is worth it, don’t you think? And so is anything else He asks us to do, no matter how scary or difficult.

We must all Set Our Face to do the will of God. We must go to our own version of Jerusalem. We must swim across the ocean and ford every stream and climb every mountain (including Everest) and dream the impossible dream.

We must sacrifice our lives in the greatest act of giving for the sake of His abundant life.

It’s what people do when they’re in love.

Posted in Real Christianity

13 Comments

Tags: Determination To Do The Will Of God, Hebrew Idioms, Holy Spirit, Lord Jesus, Original Hebrew Gospel, Real Christianity, Real Repentance, Set His Face To Go, The Blood Covenant, The Sacrifice Lamb

Baby’s Room

May 30

Posted by RJ Dawson

I don’t normally write about what I am about to write about.

I usually write about the proper application of Scripture and what the New Testament actually says as opposed to two millennia of man-made additions.

But you can’t read that kind of thing all the time. One needs some lighter fare to lighten the load.

I have noticed that many of you write about your own personal stories. In fact, this is probably what blogging was originally intended to be—keeping a daily web log on the events of one’s life.

In that light, I have decided to tell a personal story to bring glory to God. It happened almost a quarter century ago:

We were attending a local fellowship in a town I once lived in. One day, a good friend and spiritual brother in our church approached me with a need. This young man was somewhat new to the church and was a member of my church-based home group, a collection of about ten or twelve people, mostly couples. My family usually held weekly meetings in the small house we were renting, though we sometimes met in the homes of others. It was a good group, and we all got along great and had fun. I did a little teaching, we shared a meal, and we took prayer requests. It was mainly about being with like-minded believers and enjoying each other’s support. You might say most of us were not made of money, though we worked hard. I did carpentry work. Steve was a roofer. Another Steve and his wife did whatever they could including taking care of a large paper route.

Ricky and his wife were young professionals and an older man in the group sold hospital equipment and did quite well. I remember his wife didn’t want to have meetings in her home because she didn’t feel like her home was good enough, even though it was better that what the rest of us had. In particular, she didn’t think her furniture was up to par. Yet, the couches we all sat on at my house had been given to us. We had recently moved to town and were in the process of starting over. A kind couple in the church had wondered if we wanted a little bit better furniture and we were thankful to trade in our older set.

It was Ricky who had called me one day with his request. Knowing he was a member of the group and that we were all trying to live for God the right way, I listened intently and took to heart the story he told.

It seems a young unmarried woman had just had a baby. The baby was born with a terrible skin condition that had no cure. He was covered with sores. The young lady lived with her mother and at least another older relative in a mobile home. The baby would need a special bed usually reserved for burn patients. The good news is that the very expensive bed had already been donated. The problem was the mobile home floor would never support it.

Would I be willing to build a room addition for the little guy?

Lots of thoughts ran through my head. I’m struggling for money. We were both working hard. I only had one vehicle. And yet, I felt like I had no choice but to meet Ricky at the baby’s house and at least take a look.

The material would be donated. All they needed was my labor. Someone else would build a cinder block perimeter wall about two feet high to build the floor on and meet the floor of the trailer. I would take it from there.

I decided to do it.

Over the next few weeks I concentrated on building a room addition for a little baby boy who came into this world in really bad shape in an effort to relieve a portion of his suffering. He was really a cute little guy, quick to smile, and despite his painful condition seemed very willing to live. He was much loved and cared for by his young mother who had a very sweet disposition.

To solve the car problem, we arranged to borrow the grandmother’s little car so my wife at the time could use it for work, while the grandmother carpooled.

After the cinder block wall/footings were constructed, I began building the floor. It was very important that the floor be strong enough for the bed and was the main reason for the new room. Though I can’t remember, I probably went a little overboard and used 2x12s at least 16 inches on center. I decked it, built the walls, and completed the roof. I installed two or three windows to make it bright and cheery, included a sizeable exterior door, and trimmed it all out.

At completion, the floor was level with the mobile home floor and provided a seamless transition to the new room. The big new bed was delivered and installed on one end of the addition. I will never forget that room, all painted with light flooding in from spacious windows (as opposed to the rest of the house which was quite dark). It was a big room.

When the little guy was put in his new bed I knew it had all been worth it, though it caused quite a strain on our lives and finances. I received no pay other than the joy of seeing that little baby with all his open sores smiling broadly as he lay in his new bed, giving him whatever relief it could muster.

I quickly lost touch with them. They lived pretty far away. I have even forgotten the baby’s name, but will never forget him or that time. I don’t remember sharing too much about what the Lord had accomplished for the little one with our home group, but no one else in the church knew what we were doing. It was a big sacrifice, but I knew the Lord was in it and would take care of us. It is interesting that some people in that church looked down on us regarding our financial condition at the time, and seemed to think we were not working hard enough to rectify it.

But Ricky was very happy. God worked through that young man to bring a miracle to pass and it was a privilege to be part of it.

We continued struggling financially in a down market for over another year or two. But then the Lord blessed us with an opportunity to gain our own miracle house, a pretty big house on acreage that just kind of dropped out of the sky.

I have always believed these two events were connected.

God is faithful.

Posted in Real Christianity

Tags: Baby's Room, Lord Jesus, Real Christianity

Sivan 7: The Day Of Pentecost

May 28

Posted by RJ Dawson

The View of Jerusalem from Mount Zion 1849

The following is an excerpt from Real Christianity, The Nature of the Church:

THE UPPER ROOM

Why did Jesus create His community of called-out ones in the humble upper room? For starters, He had to have a place off the beaten path, so to speak. It would have to be owned by a disciple or a disciple’s family who was sympathetic to the cause. It could not be a public place, such as the temple complex, but private, to allow for complete unity of spirit and purpose. It had to be a place big enough for 120 people to pray and seek God for about ten days without interruption. In short, it had to be a house. In reality, it was a house.

Though we cannot yet be positively certain, particular statements in Scripture lead one to the strong conclusion that it was located on Mount Zion, Jerusalem’s highest southwestern hill, and that it was probably the house of Mary, the mother of John Mark.[1] If placed on Mount Zion, this house would be located roughly a half mile due southwest of the Temple Mount, approximately five hundred feet south of the present Zion gate. At the time of the Qahal’s creation, however, this house was within Jerusalem proper since the southern wall of the city was located further to the south. Therefore, though Jesus was betrayed, died, was entombed, and rose again outside the city walls, He created the Church inside the city. Not only that, He created the Church in a house.

Why did He create the Church in the city that condemned Him to death? If it had to be within Jerusalem, why didn’t He create the Qahal in a place of high honor, such as the temple? Was it because He was rejected by the ruling hierarchy? Was it because there was no place of high honor for the Lord of all Creation? Or was it because Jesus simply created His community in the most appropriate of all dwelling places, a place which had been foretold in Scripture?

You will bring them and plant them

in the mountain of Your inheritance,

The place, O LORD,

which You have made for Your dwelling,

The sanctuary, O LORD,

which Your hands have established.

The LORD shall reign

forever and ever. [2]

THE HOUSE OF GOD

From the untold millions which had descended from Abraham by the first century A.D., only the upper-roomers were present when this scripture was fulfilled. Each and every one of these original 120 were Jews. On the birthday of the Lord’s Qahal, Jesus established a sanctuary, a dwelling place on His own mountain—Mount Zion. On this mountain, the 120 were planted, both in the Lord and by the Lord, and functioned as the ovum fertilized by the Holy Spirit which would eventually develop into a body—the body of Christ. Before the sun went down that first day, the original 120 grew by twenty-five times to three thousand—all Jews, all descendants of Abraham, all devout and God-fearing, from every country under heaven to which they had been dispersed. Even though Luke, the author of the book of Acts, doesn’t say so specifically, can there be any doubt that each tribe of Israel was represented in the initial outpouring?

This was the mysterious destiny of the house of Israel—to one day become the actual dwelling place of YHWH!

When Abraham was first called forth and told he would be the progenitor of many people, God had His own future residence in mind. Later, He revealed this truth to Moses, who led God’s people to the land of promise. The house of God would only be a home for the obedient, however, since they would be sharing quarters with God Himself. The structure of the tabernacle of Moses reveals to us The Nature of the Church. The tabernacle was a tent, mobile, following after the Lord as He moved onward into the future. It was filled with His presence. It was where the ark of the covenant was kept. The priests would minister in its midst. Sacrifice was called for. Repentance, baptism, and the infilling of His Spirit were all typed into its construction. It was pliable and moveable, built for eternal purposes.

The tabernacle and all the rites associated with it continued to the time of David. It was then that God revealed to yet another generation the purpose of the tent, and the great revelation of its underlying meaning. After building his own house, David desired to build a house for God. But the Lord would not. God’s plans had not changed, nor would they ever. His eternal purpose was wrapped up in the illustration of the mobile tent. In the future, His dwelling place would be similar—it would be within humanity. [3]

[1] Acts 12:12

[2] Exodus 15:17–18

Posted in Real Christianity

Tags: Israel, Jerusalem, Lord Jesus, Mount Zion, Real Christianity, The Church, The Day of Pentecost, The House of God, The Infilling of the Holy Spirit, The Qahal, The Upper Room

The War On Truth (HIS NAME IS JESUS)

May 25

Posted by RJ Dawson

Robert Powell as Jesus of Nazareth (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The War on Truth is the War on the Lord Jesus.

It is the ongoing attempt to relegate Him to a far lower stature than that which He actually possesses, and than that which He has rightfully won. It is a slanderous attempt to deceive the world about His true identity, to conceal and not reveal His exalted status as Supreme Being, the Alpha and Omega, the King of kings and Lord of lords, and the very God of the Universe.

Not content to merely fool the world of unrepentant sinners, the War on Truth is an ongoing and sinister effort to hoodwink believers into believing a lie.

For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work; only he who now restrains will do so until he is taken out of the way. Then that lawless one will be revealed whom the Lord will slay with the breath of His mouth and bring to an end by the appearance of His coming; that is, the one whose coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and signs and false wonders, and with all the deception of wickedness for those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved. For this reason God will send upon them a deluding influence so that they will believe what is false, in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth, but took pleasure in wickedness. [2 Thessalonians 2:7-12]

Most Christians believe God and Jesus are two different people.

How does one suppose this came about? Are Christians somehow above Satan’s deception?

But much more, are Christians somehow above God’s deluding influence upon them?

Selah. . .

The outer identity of the Lord Jesus has been reformed and refashioned. His perceived persona has been transformed into a graven image by the devil as a way to lead people off the trail, and onto a deluded road to nowhere. This has been done through a partnership with Pharisaical pretenders and theological eggheads—those who can only see with their heads and never their hearts, and who insist on rationalizing spiritual truth and relegating it to formulas and philosophical nonsense. It is the taking of knowledge about God and attempting to cram it into tiny brains and make revealed truth scientific and formulaic.

“I am the LORD, that is My name; I will not give My glory to another, nor My praise to graven images.” [Isaiah 42:8]

The word LORD in the above verse is actually YHWH.

And the final and highest compound Name of God is YHWH-Salvation, or the Name Above Every Name, or Yehoshua, or JESUS.

It is nothing more than the specious casuistry of the Pharisees in the guise of theological higher learning to take the Lord’s Name in vain and make it secondary, which can only be pure slander.

“You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain, for the LORD will not leave him unpunished who takes His name in vain.” [Exodus 20:7]

This slandering of the name of God is taught by those who wouldn’t know God if He was standing right next to them, and by those who never allow themselves a Book of Acts Spirit-filled experience if their lives depended on it.

These are religious intellectuals in love with themselves, their religious authority, and their contrary spiritual views which do not lift up the Lord Jesus (THE TRUTH), but exalt instead their heady and rationalistic perspective at the expense of the glory, majesty, and honor of the One who came to set the captives free.

And as I mentioned in my preceding article, these teachers would never allow the exaltation of the Name Above Every Name in water baptism in a million years.

And they call themselves followers of Jesus?

And He said to them, “Rightly did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘THIS PEOPLE HONORS ME WITH THEIR LIPS, BUT THEIR HEART IS FAR AWAY FROM ME. BUT IN VAIN DO THEY WORSHIP ME, TEACHING AS DOCTRINES THE PRECEPTS OF MEN.’ Neglecting the commandment of God, you hold to the tradition of men.” He was also saying to them, “You are experts at setting aside the commandment of God in order to keep your tradition.” [Mark 7:6-9]

What always drove the scribes and Pharisees crazy? What was the one thing that always caused them to become enraged? It was nothing more than being proven wrong by the Man Himself, and consequently losing their exalted religious status and control. Has anyone wondered why the Lord was always acting the servant? Why He is so humble? And why the Pharisees never were? Does any of this look familiar?

“Until now you have asked for nothing in My name; ask and you will receive, so that your joy may be made full. These things I have spoken to you in figurative language; an hour is coming when I will no longer speak to you in figurative language, but will tell you plainly of the Father.

In that day you will ask in My name, and I do not say to you that I will request of the Father on your behalf…” [John 16:24-26]

These disciples of the Lord had not yet perceived who Jesus really was, and could not comprehend the concept of YHWH becoming a Man, and thus, the Lord was relegated to speaking in “figurative language.” But such language was merely a method He had to use until the full truth of His identity could be absorbed. This would not happen in its entirety until the infilling of His Holy Spirit at Pentecost.

Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me. If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; from now on you know Him, and have seen Him.”

Philip said to Him, “Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us.”

Jesus said to him, “Have I been so long with you, and yet you have not come to know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; how can you say, ‘Show us the Father?’” [John 14:6-9]

How more evident can the tactic of hell be? The pinhead in pinstripes knows he must deceive people concerning the Lord because it is the only chance he has. He must lie. He must fool. He must dupe. He must cheat.

Humanity must fight back.

Christians must especially fight back.

Real Christians are fighting back.

“Therefore everyone who confesses Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father who is in heaven. But whoever denies Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father who is in heaven.

Do not think that I came to bring peace on the earth; I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. . . [Matthew 10:32-34] [1]

Posted in Real Christianity

Tags: God With Us, Lord Jesus, Real Christianity, The Everlasting Father, The Lord Almighty, The Mighty God, The Name Above Every name, The War On Truth, YeHoshua, YHWH-Salvation

Water Baptism in the Name of Jesus (Not!)

May 19

Posted by RJ Dawson

There’s power in the Name of Jesus.

But apparently not in baptism.

The vast majority of Christians worldwide for the last two-thousand years have absolutely refused to invoke the Name Above Every Name [1] in water baptism.

By this, at the very onset of their Christian walk, they have failed to honor the Lord Jesus though simultaneously claiming a very close walk with Him.

Most are simply unaware. Many have been taught an alternative method and have accepted it, though it violates Scripture. Some simply do not care.

What we’ve got here is failure to communicate.

“Baptism doesn’t matter. So back off.”

“Baptism is very important, of course, but the first Christians obviously got it wrong.”

“Baptism in the Name of Jesus is heresy.”

“Oh that. Yeah, there’s some weird people out there doing some weird stuff, especially those guys. The verse at the end of Matthew is very clear on the right way to baptize.”

Despite the fact that every single reputable Biblical encyclopedia, dictionary, ancient source, and denominational historical record states flatly and clearly that the original water immersion method taught and administered by the apostles included invoking the pure and holy Name of Jesus, about 95% of all Christians continue to refuse to use the Lord’s Name in baptism. And most conduct baptism in a man-made non-Scriptural manner.

This disses the Lord.

If a Christian believes in and honors the Holy Trinity, (a non-Biblical term), his or her water baptism will certainly reflect it. He or she will honor these three distinct Persons by invoking their Biblical titles. He or she will honor the first Person of the heavenly Godhead—the Father. He or she will honor the second Person of the heavenly Godhead—the Son. And he or she will honor the third Person of the heavenly Godhead—the Holy Spirit.

There’s only one little problem.

This is something the first followers of Jesus never did.

And the reason why is simple: They recognized Jesus the Messiah as YHWH Himself. And they honored the one God of the Hebrews and showed their allegiance to Him by invoking His Name, the Name Above Every Name, in water baptism. They were taught by the apostles themselves, who set the precedent, and who were themselves taught directly by the Lord Jesus.

The record in the Book of Acts and throughout the epistles is clear—there is absolutely no Scriptural historical evidence whatsoever for title baptism. It never occurred. It was a much later development.

Now, why does one suppose this happened? Why was it officially changed, though the Word of God continues to loudly declare it openly and exclusively? Who could possibly be responsible for removing the powerful and holy Name of the Lord Jesus from baptism?

Regarding the Word of God, which Christians claim to honor, here is the overwhelming evidence that demands a verdict:

And He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. He who has believed and has been baptized shall be saved; but he who has disbelieved shall be condemned. These signs will accompany those who have believed: in My name they will cast out demons, they will speak with new tongues; they will pick up serpents, and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover.” [Mark 16:15-18]

Peter said to them, “Repent, and each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off, as many as the Lord our God will call to Himself.” And with many other words he solemnly testified and kept on exhorting them, saying, “Be saved from this perverse generation!” So then, those who had received his word were baptized; and that day there were added about three thousand souls. [Acts 2:38-41]

But when they believed Philip preaching the good news about the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, they were being baptized, men and women alike. Even Simon himself believed; and after being baptized, he continued on with Philip, and as he observed signs and great miracles taking place, he was constantly amazed. Now when the apostles in Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent them Peter and John, who came down and prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit. For He had not yet fallen upon any of them; they had simply been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. Then they began laying their hands on them, and they were receiving the Holy Spirit. [Acts 8:12-17]

So Ananias departed and entered the house, and after laying his hands on him said, “Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus, who appeared to you on the road by which you were coming, has sent me so that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.” And immediately there fell from his eyes something like scales, and he regained his sight, and he got up and was baptized; [Acts 9:17-18]

“A certain Ananias, a man who was devout by the standard of the Law, and well spoken of by all the Jews who lived there, came to me, and standing near said to me, ‘Brother Saul, receive your sight!’ And at that very time I looked up at him. And he said, ‘The God of our fathers has appointed you to know His will and to see the Righteous One and to hear an utterance from His mouth. For you will be a witness for Him to all men of what you have seen and heard. Now why do you delay? Get up and be baptized, and wash away your sins, calling on His name.’” [Acts 22:12-16]

While Peter was still speaking these words, the Holy Spirit fell upon all those who were listening to the message. All the circumcised believers who came with Peter were amazed, because the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out on the Gentiles also. For they were hearing them speaking with tongues and exalting God. Then Peter answered, “Surely no one can refuse the water for these to be baptized who have received the Holy Spirit just as we did, can he?” And he ordered them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. Then they asked him to stay on for a few days. [Acts 10:44-48]

It happened that while Apollos was at Corinth, Paul passed through the upper country and came to Ephesus, and found some disciples. He said to them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” And they said to him, “No, we have not even heard whether there is a Holy Spirit.” And he said, “Into what then were you baptized?” And they said, “Into John’s baptism.” Paul said, “John baptized with the baptism of repentance, telling the people to believe in Him who was coming after him, that is, in Jesus.” When they heard this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. And when Paul had laid his hands upon them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they began speaking with tongues and prophesying. There were in all about twelve men. [Acts 19:1-7]

Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death? Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. [Romans 6:3-4]

Such were some of you; but you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God. [1 Corinthians 6:11]

There is a reason such verses of Scripture bring strong reactions. If one studies the Book of Acts, one discovers that the enemies of the Lord hated His Name, and they hated His followers’ use of His Name. They knew there was great power in the Name of Jesus, and they knew it greatly superseded their power.

Demons were cast out by the Name of Jesus, not mere titles.

Miraculous healings took place by the Name of Jesus, not mere titles.

People were being made free from the wicked power of sin by the Name of Jesus, not mere titles.

Concerning the command of the Lord regarding water baptism, why have most Christians agreed with the enemy?

“There is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name under heaven that has been given among men by which we must be saved.” [Acts 4:12]

This is why Peter said what he did at the conclusion of the first prototypical message of the Church Age. Immersion in water in the name of Jesus signified the giving of oneself to Jesus as one’s Lord and Savior. It signified an extremely undignified and all-embracing act—dying completely to self—performed in the open and recorded in public for all to see. It signified the burial of the repentant (dead) person and total surrender to the Lord Jesus.

Instead of dissing the Lord in baptism, it was the highest possible form of praise.

Real Christians are constantly on the move toward greater spiritual growth and maturity, the gaining of more revelatory knowledge, and a closer walk with the Lord. We learn new things all the time. Life with the Lord Jesus is a spiritual adventure. It is productive and fruit-bearing, though there are times of severe struggle and trial.

However, resistance against new revelation is often on the surface, ready to emerge. In light of that:

Be diligent to present yourself approved to God as a workman who does not need to be ashamed, accurately handling the word of truth. [2 Timothy 2:15]

Now these were more noble-minded than those in Thessalonica, for they received the word with great eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see whether these things were so. [Acts 17:10-11]

Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through Him to God the Father. [Colossians 3:17] [2]

[1] Philippians 2:9

Posted in Real Christianity

Tags: Baptism in the Name of Jesus, In the Name of Jesus, In the name of the Father the Son and the Holy Spirit, Lord Jesus, New Testament Baptism, Real Christianity, The Name Above Every name, The Trinity, There is Power in the Name of Jesus, Title Baptism

The Image of Deception—Legacy of the Unreal

May 15

Posted by RJ Dawson

The following is an excerpt from Real Christianity, The Nature of the Church:

There is one body and one Spirit, just as also you were called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all who is over all and through all and in all. [Ephesians 4:4-6] [1]

Each of the principle foundation elements of the first Qahal were counterfeited by the Church of the Reversed. Specifically, Jesus became characterized as someone much less than God. He lost His place of total, absolute dominion. He was no longer honored as King of Kings, except possibly in name only, and there was no spiritual kingdom. Repentance became ritualized, and was replaced by the paying of homage to the new Christian Pharisees and the institution they controlled. Unreal Christian adherents no longer repented to the Lord, did a 180 degree turn toward righteousness, or changed their way of thinking to reflect their new spiritual nature (since no real change had taken place).

The correct water baptism method employed by the first church was corrupted entirely. Candidates were no longer even required to be immersed, for example. Like counterfeit repentance, water baptism evolved into a ritual practice which had much more to do with honoring one’s particular “Christian” culture and traditions rather than honoring the Lord.

In fact, to illustrate the true nature of the woolly wolves, the “name which is above every name”[2] was no longer invoked in baptism, but banned from the process entirely, and the doctrinal truth of the Spirit of Jesus living within believers continued only in a religious, conceptual sense, and was otherwise thoroughly denounced and disestablished. All four doctrinal points taught by the apostles on the first day of the Church morphed into ritualized practices with no spiritual meaning, and the truths from which they morphed were eventually declared heretical. The new Christian melting pot also contained the adulterated forms of fellowship, bread-breaking, and prayer which were presented as legitimate, though hidden behind each was the salivating, snarling visage of a wolf in sheep’s clothing.

In the final analysis, we discover that the unreal church possessed little more than the fossilized remains of the practices which turned the world upside down in the first century. As a result, the Lord had little authority over its powerless and non-relational members, and church life became a routine practice with little or no life-changing purpose or ability to minister beyond mere human capabilities. But as in many locations in the world today, the Lord’s persecuted church continued to function just as it had in the beginning. Like the remnant of Israel spoken of by Paul in the book of Romans,[3] Jesus has always maintained a remnant of true believers within the earth. His Qahal has never ceased to exist.

Though only a small minority compared to the vast collection of Christian adherents in the world, its members continue to honor their Messiah as did the upper-roomers. However, since the Lord’s community has never been concerned with geopolitics, the forced subjugation of people groups, or the writing of very subjective chronicles, it has faded from historical view. Even if this knowledge cannot be satisfactorily documented for the skeptics among us, the fact of the matter is that the characteristics of the first Christian community, the prototype, remain extremely different from most of the churches and church organizations throughout history and modern times, both in practice and doctrine. Christians continue to be tied to structures promoting dual class division and institutional formats which have little to do with real Christianity. Christians have largely rejected the work of their most distant ancestors, and have lost due respect for the truths they taught, and the One who taught them.

Will we continue to be so blind and arrogant that we place the blame for this fact on them, rather than ourselves? They are the ones who built the foundation. They are the ones who paid in blood to set the example which all successive generations were to follow. If their very immature spiritual juniors of the present continue in this vein of quiet mockery and religious complacency, the Unreal Church of the Conformed will grow even larger with greater determination against truth. In fact, the bloody persecution of real Christians will expand from the present hell-holes of this world and will soon go international. Every nation will take part. The greatest enemy of the present day community of called-out ones, however, are not modern Herods and Neros, but modern religionists intent on protecting their turf.

And who are these chief persecutors? Who are the new Christian Pharisees? In what form do they exist today? Who are the ones influenced by the same spirit that gave Saul of Tarsus his commission to fight the Church? Such deceived ones are much closer to all of us than we think. Through their resolute and unwavering stand for their chosen form of Christianity, they have allowed themselves to become the very image of the unreal.

Our greatest enemy wears virgin wool.

[2] Philippians 2:9

[3] Romans 9:27

Posted in Real Christianity

1 Comment

Tags: Christian Pharisees, Correct Water Baptism, Counterfeit Religious Traditions, Deception, False Prophets, Lord Jesus, Qahal, Real Christianity The Nature of the Church, Saul of Tarsus, Wolves in Sheep's Clothing

You Can Trust Your Heart With God

May 12

Posted by RJ Dawson

If God is anything at all, He is faithful. He won’t let us down. He’ll always be there. Betrayal is the farthest thing from His mind. And though we might not be able to figure out why, He really does love us all, and it hurts Him to have those He has created reject Him.

And we think, how in the world can God be all-powerful and strong and yet so easily hurt by mere human beings? Maybe it’s because He’s not the big bad unfeeling ogre some people think He is. He really can be touched by our pain and feelings of helplessness.

But He also knows that freedom comes with a price and He can’t be there every five seconds to protect us from every little happenstance. There is no growth in that. God puts a very high price on maturity and maturity demands pain. There is simply no other way.

Now, He does watch over us, and He often protects us, but His goal for us is to grow and be like Him. He is not in the business of having perpetual children who never grow up. Why in the world would He want that? WE don’t want that. So the way things are make life tough.

But He wants us to be up to the challenge. He has chosen that we enter this world in a completely helpless state. He has chosen the way of growth. Any intelligent person would eventually discover that if he or she was in God’s shoes it would be done in the same way.

But whatever happens, because God is loving and kind, it never means that anything lousy is permanent, or else He would not have made a way for miracles. He would not allow the possibility of a sunrise chasing away the darkness of night. And he has made His Holy Spirit available to help and comfort us.

Christianity 101 is this: Our Lord Jesus is God, and God is Love, and Love is good.

There is no doubt that the circumstances of this life can be bad, but God is not bad. And when God is summoned in faith He shows up, and He chases away darkness and a lack of hope. He blesses us with strength and will often help us open a door, so we might go in where the life is.

I have found that when we are serious about God, God will be serious about us. There is a clear connection between giving ourselves completely to God and God giving Himself completely to us. He is a lover, and He believes in love. And He knows love is a 100% commitment and never anything less. Therefore, if someone wants to mess around on God and give Him anything less than what He has already given to us, that someone better not expect anything from God.

If you have never been hurt in love you have never lived, so why would we expect to treat God in such a way? If it isn’t fun for us, why would it be fun for Him?

We are truly made in the image of God, and if anyone loses track of this, our Lord Jesus is the perfect image of God in human form to always remind us. Jesus is God. Did He not provide the greatest expression of love in paying our way out of sin?

“Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends.” [John 15:13] [1]

If that’s not love, there is no love. The greatest love is giving oneself for another. One will find that when he does for God what God has done for him, he will know God.

Such giving creates a pure heart. Selfishness, however, creates a cold and evil heart. This pretty much explains everything, doesn’t it?

Our Lord is 100% Love, 100% faithful, and a 100% giver, and these are the kind of people He relates to.

One will never go wrong in giving his or her entire heart to the Lord Jesus.

In fact, one could never do anything more right.

Posted in Real Christianity