As pointed out in a previous article, Young People, Satan sends forth the wind of false doctrines to keep us from seeking the Kingdom of Heaven and its righteousness. Doing that, he strives to make us drift off the path that brings us to the channel through which we enter that kingdom.
But there is another side which we must also consider. By false doctrine Satan strives to keep us from what Paul says in Philippians 3:14, namely, “I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.” By a sinful walk, by the breaking of God’s law, we can also deliberately and eagerly go away from the Kingdom of Heaven. That breaking of God’s law is due to Satan’s desire and temptation brought to us so that we walk in hatred against God. Do not forget that every sin, no matter in what form it comes, is an act of hatred against God. As Satan got Adam and Eve to hate God, and reveal this by eating what God said that they might not eat, Satan is today working feverishly and constantly with us, striving to get the whole human race to walk in hatred against God, and reveal this by going against His law.
To act as though there is no God Whom we must serve is one thing, and is performed by all men, as they are by nature. But to go against God is also the desire of man’s sinful flesh. And Satan got the whole human race to hate God by getting Adam and Eve to die spiritually, so that losing their love of God. they had no love of God left in them to hand down to the human race. Apart from doctrines and teachings, Satan is constantly striving to get us to break God’s law, and in that way, cause us to walk in hatred against God.
Therefore, today there is, in what calls itself God’s church, so much sin and approval of breaking God’s law, that the way is being prepared for the Antichrist to come. Anti means against, and antichrist means against Christ. And Satan is not simply using the world, and those who desecrate the Sabbath, for the coming of that antichrist. He is working very, very hard in the church world. In the church world today there are so many sins not only to be allowed without rebuke and punishment, but also advocated and encouraged. In fact, because God’s law reveals what are acts of love to God, the breaking of His law is boldly walking in hatred towards Him. And many churches today advocate living with and like the world in its breaking of God’s law. Young People, consider how much sin there is committed in the church world on the Sabbath day! Church members are in what is called and scheduled as a worship service. BUT being busy with things spiritual is at best only two services, and about one and a half hours of “worship” twice a Sabbath day. In fact, in many churches that is only once a day. And members of those churches can spend MORE hours on the Sabbath day watching some sports played for hours on TV, or hear it over the radio. Far more busy and active are they with worldly sports than church worship! You do not do that, do you? If you do, you are drifting with the wind that Satan is blowing, and are not seeking the city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God. Hebrews 11:10
Let us go back to what we considered in a previous article in this department. Satan got Adam and Eve to hate God. No matter how necessary and sinless it may look to us, simply to eat a piece of fruit that is forbidden, and every breaking of God’s law, is an act of hatred against Him. Take note also of the fact that Satan approached Jesus, Who surely needed bread after forty days and forty nights of fasting, and Satan came with such an appealing suggestion, namely, doing what Jesus could but would not do: Command stones to become bread! Did He not change water into wine as His first miracle? And Jesus answered him with the awesome and wonderful truth that “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.” Matthew 4:4. And when our God says that on the Sabbath we must do no work, and that the Sabbath day is to be hallowed for our God, may we make one minute of it unholy, carnal and for the joy of our sinful flesh, rather than for the worship of our God? When we desecrate the Sabbath with sports, entertainment, worldly gossip and amusement, we drift away from the way of God’s law, and thus away from the entrance into the Kingdom of Heaven. By seeking what our flesh enjoys, and opposes our God in His law, we reveal no interest in seeking that kingdom and of walking in love for our God.
In the church world Satan is presenting so many, many things today that are not serving God, but are tempting us to eat forbidden fruit, as Adam and Eve did. The world has done this from the beginning. In fact, the very first child to be born became a murderer! Cain killed his brother Abel. Cruelty and murder came into this world by the very first family that was created and born on this earth. Satan got Cain, the seed of the serpent, to kill Abel the seed of the woman. Cain did not simply reveal hatred against Abel. He manifested his hatred against God, Who taught us how to serve and worship Him. Cain undoubtedly had been told by his parents that God revealed how he must worship God. In fact, God said to him, “Why art thou wroth? and why is thy countenance fallen? If thou doest well shalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door.” Genesis 4:6, 7.
Mind you, even though that awesome truth was presented to Cain, he still wanted to go in the wind that Satan blows, and whereby he gets us to seek that which our flesh craves, and is opposed to what God promises us in Christ. What is more, today Satan is working very feverishly in his hatred against God, and against His covenant people. Satan hates constantly and deeply the church of God and he is using so many of the things man now can make and use, so that he can strive with all his power to get us to drift by his wind of false doctrine not only, but
also by wicked works which he wants us to perform. Satan here, in the murder of Abel, reveals already what he will do with Christ, when He comes into our flesh. And you may be sure that when Jesus refused to do the three things Satan suggested in that temptation, after Jesus had, according to Matthew 4:1-11, refused in love of God, Satan revealed very clearly that he hates God and His kingdom which is ruled by Christ.
There was a time when churches correctly, and in love to God, would not allow their members to go to theaters, and have them enjoy the works of Satan. But today, and by means of television, one does not even need to go away from home to be with the world in its devilishness. Parents in ages gone by would warn their children not to enjoy Satan’s influence in the places of the world’s carnal entertainment by movies in theaters. And, sad to say now parents by television let the world come into their home, and let Satan blow his winds upon the family, so that its members are drifted away from spiritual matters, and tempted to live as the world lives. And also sad to say, some churches will approve of this, even though in I John 2:15 we read, “Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.” GOD says that, Young People. Here is written what He says to His church.
It is Satan who tells us not to be so serious. It is Satan who uses television, radios and cameras to spread sin left and right, and to tempt members of Christ’s church to go along with those he, Satan, has led to enjoyment of wickedness. It is what GOD says, not merely this article and what Paul says in II Corinthians 6:17, where He declares to us: “Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing: and I will receive you.” It is so easy, and enjoyable for our flesh, to turn on the switch so that Satan is in our home, and tempting us and our children. And the sad truth is that even when we are only listening to the news – that is, turn on that television set or radio to get the news – in between Satan comes with advertisements of the world, and its works of hatred against God, and love of sins which the world delights in and boldly commits. Killing, stealing, acts of adultery even, and dishonor against parents as well as coveting what the neighbor has, are presented to entertain, not to warn against and declare to be acts of hatred against God. And against this are Jesus’ words which we find in Matthew 5:6 and 48. Jesus tells us to hunger and thirst after righteousness. And the world cannot do one thing that is righteous. And we read in Romans 3:12. “They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable: there is none that doeth good, no not one.”
Hold on to that truth, Young People. Our God gives our churches the grace to maintain that truth. Insist on the awesome truth which our God presents here. Hold on to it with the truth given us in Psalm 7:11. There we read, “God judgeth the righteous, and God is angry with the wicked every day.” THAT is why we maintain the truth that there is no “common grace” of God on the unbelievers for whom Christ did not die.
Thanks be to God, our churches have not drifted into the doctrine of God being gracious with some for whom Christ did not die. Listen! If God is gracious to those for whom Christ did not die, He is not Jehovah, the I AM Who NEVER CHANGES! If He changes, giving a grace to some in this life, and than stops it and puts them into hell’s torment. He is not the I AM, but the I Was. DARE WE maintain that sinners can realize a change in God, the I AM? He is gracious to them in this life; but will not be when they die? Why does He cause them to die then and go to hell?
Do not believe or defend the teaching that Jehovah, the I AM, becomes a God Who was changed because of what men do. May our God grant you the grace to maintain the truth of His word, and not drift with the wind that Satan blows upon the churches, because of his hatred toward the Holy, Unchangeable God.
Stand fast and hold on tightly to the truth in Malachi 3:6, “For I am the Lord, I change not: therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed.” If He does not change in His grace, then those that receive a “common grace” must have some blessing after they die, and get part of heaven’s blessing.
Do not drift away from our God, and His truth that He is the unchangeable I AM. Call Satan a liar; and do not let him cause you to drift from the truth that our God is a God Who hates ALL sin, and all sinners for whom He did not send Christ to blot out their guilt.
Watch out for all the winds of false doctrine, and of breaking God’s law. Fight them; and do not accept them and defend them.