Encouragement

A Perspective of the Bible for the Lost

by Lawrence Walkup 
04/19/15
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A PERSPECTIVE OF THE BIBLE FOR THE LOST

By

Lawrence Walkup

"Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth" (John 4:23-24). In these two verses, Jesus is saying so much. Jesus says true worshipers because there are false worshipers. They are those who worship what they do not know (vs. 22). The difference is the true worshipers worship in spirit and in truth. There are all kinds of religions in the world and they have their particular style of worship; but the only kind the Father seeks out are those that worship in spirit and in truth.

What Jesus is doing here is narrowing down how things must be if you want to truly connect with God (vs. 24). Those that don't do it this way are excluded (John 18:37). That really has to be offensive to other religious systems. You bet it is, and furthermore, I submit to you that the absolute meanest people in the world are the religious. When Pilate found no fault in Jesus who was it that insisted that Jesus be put to death (John 19:7)? Do you really think God was behind the Crusades or was that just man evoking the name of God and exercising his own will? What does a Muslim extremist do before he blows himself up along with forty other people...he yells out 'God is great.' The religious are never about God; they are only about how they are seen in front of man (Matt. 6:1,2,5,16; 23:5). The name of God is evoked only for effect. A religious system is nothing more than another entitiy of the world system...not God's kingdom

A time is coming and has now come. Jesus' coming has changed things from the way they were before. So then how were things before? Well, there was no worshipping in spirit and truth because the spirit was not yet given personally, and grace and truth would be realized through Jesus Christ (John 1:17). The Israelites relationship with God before Jesus was based on the Old Covenant found in the Old Testament. It was based on keeping a set of laws. At the death of Jesus a New Covenant went into effect based on grace. Just like it is in all societies, a will only goes into effect at the death of the person (Heb. 9:16-17). The New Covenant that went into effect was the new will that went into effect when Jesus died. And currently, until Jesus comes back the second time, we are still living in this time period of grace in which God is seeking those to worship him in spirit and in truth. The invitation is still open.

Jesus gives a definition of God the Father: God is spirit. What is spirit? Nobody knows what that is. Science has nothing to do with the spiritual. It can only deal with the physical. It only deals with matter. And as far as that goes, we who are born again of God's Spirit ourselves do not even have a clue as to what spirit is exactly. As of now it is a world that is entered into by the dynamic of faith. Every human in the world has faith. We have faith in a chair supporting us. We have faith in our car starting up every morning. The issue of faith is the object of our faith...that which we put faith in. It's not whether one has faith or not, because everyone has it. What is it that you have come to learn through trial and error that can be trusted?

God designed human beings as dependent creatures. Obviously we can all see about ourselves that we are not self-sustaining. This is why apart from God, man is naturally a slave to fear (Rom. 8:15). Apart from God man can only make his best attempt at covering up his fear from his fellow man. He does this by being successful in the world. God designed us to be dependent upon him. This is what faith is when it is talked about in the Bible. We were designed to make God the object of our faith. To put faith in God is not forced upon us. It is something that you exercise through choice. Choosing to exercise faith in God is our love for God, and it is our worship to God (1 John 5:3; 3:23). 'And without faith it is impossible to please God' (Heb. 11:6).

Worship is defined for us in Romans 12:1. Worship is offering our body as a living sacrifice. This simply means losing your life for his sake in order to find your life...choosing to let him live through you by sacrificing the self that wants to live through you. This is put into action by faith. This is truly the one and only thing that God wants from us. Remember, these are the ones that the Father is seeking. The very defnition of sin is that which is not of faith in God (Rom. 14:23). Think of all the things we do in our lives in which we are not exercising faith in God. We think of sins as the big stuff like stealing, lying, murder, adultery, hatred. Those things are the fruit of sin. Those are the things that end up being manisfested in our lives as a result of not putting faith in God...of not trusting God (John 16:9). Unbelief is the root that produces the fruit.

Have you noticed that Science does not give a satisfactory answer when trying to explain the beginning of existence? A logical brain which most people have says: 'Where did the very first piece of matter come from?' Science in their explanation always starts off with something already existing. They want you to buy into something that your brain is raising a red flag to. It seems that Science requires more faith, than that which God requires.

Adam and Eve were the first humans on the earth. They did not come from apes, but from God who created them. At creation they were indwelt with the very life of God. The definition of the word death is the absence of life. God had told Adam and Eve in the day that they ate of the tree they would surely die (Gen 2:17). They did not die physically, but spiritually. They became absent of the spiritual life of God. And this is what has been passed down to every human being born after them...a life void of the life of God (Rom. 5:12). When Jesus came many years into the future; this is what he came to restore back to man (John 10:10). The very essence of Salvation is the restoring of the life of God back to man. Man is given a second chance at starting over again with God...thanks to Jesus!

Until lost man discovers the truth, the only way he can perceive God at all is from what the religious world tells him. To the lost God and religion are one in the same. Any talk of God is just talk about religious stuff. He is turned off by all the religiosity. This is the correct reaction that all of us should have. The truth is...we are better off being lost than we are being religious. All of this points to the significance of Jesus the person. He did not come proclaiming a religious system. This is what man has turned it into and gave it a name called Christianity. Do you realize that the word Christianity is not even in the Bible? The connotation of what that word has come to mean today is because of man thinking that God needs his help. Typical of man rudely imposing himself so he can matter.

Jesus came proclaiming himself. He made radical statements about himself that can only leave one to conclude that he was crazy or he was who he claimed to be. Only he can save. A religious system cannot. In fact it does the opposite; it can only drive you into worse bondage than which you are already in. Again, it was the religious leaders of Jesus' time that insisted that he be put to death. That is very significant. The lost need to stop looking at Jesus through the prism of religion and discover the person behind the prism. The religious community insisted that Jesus die and it was the establisment that carried out the execution. Jesus was the true revolutionary of the time.

If you take any Bible and look at it physically you will see that most of it is made up of the Old Testament. Three quarters of the entire Bible is Old Testament. The Old Testament is where God begins with man. He chose a particular race of people to reveal himself to the world. These people were called Israelites. And it was these people and only these people that he made the covenant with. The Gentiles do not come into the picture until the New Covenant comes into effect (Rom. 2:14; Eph. 2:11-22; 3:1-6). Born again Christians of today want to believe that the Old Testament which is the Old Covenant is also addressing them, but it isn't. If the Jews could not keep the Old Covenant, what makes us think we Gentiles can? Again, man imposing himself where he doesn't belong because his pride can't resist the challenge of the law. 'Just sit back and watch and see how I perform.'

If one were to choose one word that would sum up the entirety of the Old Testamen it would be the word...failure. Of couse there are prophesies in the Old Testament that have been fulfilled and some still waiting to be fulfilled; but as far as in regards to man...failure is the word that sums it up. It is the failure of the Israelites over and over again to do what God says to do. It is the failure of them to keep the law that God demanded. But here is the dirty little secret that nobody ever got until the Apostle comes along later and explains. People today, and even Christians, are still not getting it: God always knew that the Israelites couldn't keep the law. It wasn't given to them for the purpose of keeping it, but for the purpose of driving them to put faith in him (Gal. 3:23-25).

God is not interested in us keeping a list of rules and regulations. Think about it. If that was the case, where would the focus of our minds always be? It would always be on how well we are performing. It would never be on God which is what he wants. God desires relationship. He doesn't want performing robots. That is what permeates in the religious world. He wanted the Israelites to cry out to him in recognition of their failure to keep the law. He wanted them to see that keeping the law was not what they needed, but what they needed was God himself. Remember, at the very beginning of human history, this is what was lost. And the consequence of that is seen over and over again in the Old Testament. If you take your finger and point to the place where you want your dog to go to...what does the dog do? The dog looks at your finger instead. Like the dog, the Israelites were more focused on the pointing finger (the Law) instead of using it as a tool from God to get them to where he wanted them to go. And the place he wanted them to go was that place of seeing their need for him. If a person does not see his need for God, there is no way he is going to put faith in God.

Here is the pattern of the Old Testament: And again the people did evil in the sight of the Lord. And from that they suffered the consequences. After enough suffering they again started trusting him and he again delivered them. He does this over and over again with them because he is patient and longsuffering. As the Apostle teaches...that law was given to us to reveal our problem of sin (Rom.7:7). We possess a sinful nature which is an absolute selfish nature. The fulfillment of the Law is love (Rom. 13:8-10). Jesus is the only person that has ever fulfilled the law (Matt. 5:17). We cannot fufill the law therefore we cannot love. The opposite of love is not hate...but pride. If we cannot love then we are left with only our pride. What is most important to us is the self. And the self is never never satisfied. It complains relentlessly to be satisfied (Gal. 5:17). God wants us to be like him...a lover. And the only way we can be like him is to get him inside of us. To be able to love unconditionally like God is the most fulfilling life that one could ever live. God who made us, knows what will fulfill us, and that is why he is always trying to get us there...to love like he loves.

At this point, the question may come to mind: If God gave the Israelites the law for the purpose of revealing what their problem was; and if the law was only addressed to them; then how are the Gentiles going to discover their problem? The book of Hebrews was written to address three groups of people: unbelieving Jews, Jewish Christians that couldn't let go of the law, and Christians who want to act like Jews by putting themselves under the law. The Gentile Church has always believed that the law was addressed to them . It is still the prevailing belief. So in effect the law is going to do its work in them as was intended for the Jews...lead them to Christ because of an inability to keep the law. And for the most part that hasn't happened because the church is still religious. And of course God knew the Gentiles would be this way so he never needed to address them directly.

In the Old Testament, unlike it is today, God was on the Israelites constantly. It was never an issue if God was real or not, or that he existed. The issue with them was to see how far they could go satisfying their flesh before God intervened. They could not get free of being a slave to their sinful nature. God would let this go so far before he miraculously physically delivered them again. You would think as a human seeing this over and over again you would never stop trusting in a God who only wants the best for you. Evidently from the practical perspective of being human, the greatness of sin overides the greatness of God. What a condition to be in!

To the lost, God does not exist because we don't see him working today like he did in the Old Testament times. That has to mean that all those miraculous events were nothing more than mere stories...they did not really happen. People who believe those events really happened are mocked and ridiculed for believing such nonsense. If God is real, then why isn't he operating today like he did back then? Why aren't there any miracles? God is not operating like he did back then because it is a different situation now. God did not indwell believers back then like he does today. The situation is different now because of what Jesus has accomplished.

Jesus who came from God came to offer his life so that we could receive his resurrected life in the form of the Holy Spirit. When we receive his life, the life of God has been restored back to man. Man is back to where he originally started. This is called being 'born again.' The term 'born again' is so mistakenly over used by the world because of the fact that they aren't born again themselves. It's not a mere change in a person's attitude. It does not mean taking on a new leaf...turning the page in one's life. It's an actual invasion of God himself and making our bodies his temple (1 Cor. 6:19). If you want a miracle; this is the greatest of them all. And Jesus is qualified to invade because Jesus is God (John 1:1). He was fully man that could die, and he was also fully God that could save. If Jesus Christ is not God then Christianity is meaningless. As far as that goes, if Jesus is not God...life is meaningless. Everything in all creation hinges on this one central figure.

God indwelling us by his Spirit means he is constantly with us. God was also constantly with the Israelites, but it wasn't because he was indwelling them; it was because he was constantly on their case by demanding that they keep a law that was impossible to keep...resulting in them crying out to him for mercy. This act of crying out to him was their feeble attempt at faith. It wasn't much, but it was enough to get them back in right standing with God again. The Israelites' sins were dealt with through the system of the law. The law required animal sacrifices to be made to atone for their sins. These sacrifices were a foreshadowing of the one and final sacrifice that would be coming in the future that would take away all sins for all time (John 1:29); (Heb. 10). Get that and understand that...all sins...for all of mankind...encompassing all of time...taken away!

Faith is what saves us. In the Old Testament it was not a term that was understood as it is today (John 1:17; Gal. 3:23-26). If you look in a Strong's Concordance notice the very few times the word faith is mentioned in the Old Tetament in comparison to the New Testament. Before Jesus the Israelites were constantly reminded of their sins, through the law, in order to get them to exercise faith that would save them. They would be saved by their faith in an event unbeknownst to them that would be coming in the future. For us today we are also saved by faith in that same event that has happened in our past. Jesus who takes away the sin of the world reaches back in time as well as forward in time to finish dealing with sin once and for all (Heb. 10:12). Unlike the Israelites, we do not need to be reminded of our sins because they have been taken away for good. Instead of dealing with us on the issue of sin , God now deals with us on the issue of life.

Because the wages of sin is death, and because all men have sinned, we are all born into this world spiritually dead (Rom 6:23). Adam and Eve and Jesus are the only humans that came into this world spiritually alive...the rest of us...not so. A dead man can do all sorts of things to improve his life, but until he takes on the spiritual life that is being offered...he will always remain dead. And the only life that is being offered, comes from God the Father. He is offering the life of his resurrected Son (John 3:16). There is a big long list of the founders of all the other religions of the world. What separates Jesus from them is that not one of them rose from the dead. And because he did, that means we can also rise from the dead at the moment of being born again.

Besides redeeming us, Jesus' purpose for coming was also to give us more revelation of the otherwise invisible God. In John he told us what God is and how he must be worshipped. He told one of his disciples, 'if you have seen me, you have seen the Father' (John 14:9). Jesus' presence on the earth for three years was a demonstration in the flesh of the nature of God the Father. It says in Hebrews 1:3: 'The Son is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of his being...' Him physically being like the rest of us humans is something we can relate to; even to the lowest class of human he was nonthreatening because he was of no reputation. Imagine that. God coming to earth wanted to be perceived by man as one being of no reputation (Philipp. 2:7). God's ways are so much not like our ways. This should be a lesson to us in how we should absolutely not be fearful of man.

After Jesus ascended to the Father, his Apostles would now carry on where he left off. In their books that they wrote, which became known as the New Testament, they would do as Jesus did. As Jesus elaborated on the nature of the Father, the Apostles would elaborate on the nature of Jesus and on the words that he said. In particular one Apostle would stand out above the rest because he would write most of the New Testament. If God could only leave us with one book out of the entire sixty six books of the Bible...it would probably be the book of Romans written by the Apostle Paul. If you want to know the Gospel in detail...read the book of Romans. Read it a few times.

The very last book of the Bible is confusing and very hard to understand. It's even confusing to spirit filled Christians, so what chance do the lost have of understanding it? There are tons of books written with good intentions trying to explain the book of Revelation. It's like the science of Psychology...a lot of opinions being expressed and none of them agree amongst themselves. The secret to understanding the book of Revelation can be found in Daniel 12:9-10: 'He replied, "Go your way Daniel, because the words are closed up and sealed until the time of the end. Many will be purified, made spotless and refined, but the wicked will continue to be wicked. None of the wicked will understand, but those who are wise will understand."' Revelation like Daniel's end time prophecy will be closed up and sealed until we get closer to the end.

Because God started with the Jews in the beginning of the Bible, I think he is going to end with the Jews at the end of the Bible. I think God is going to unvail the meaning of Revelation and make it clear to the 144,000 Jews left here during the Tribulation. This will happen after the rapture. And since the rapture has not happened yet, we will continue to argue about Revelation. God is now dealing with the world through the church...his body. God reaches the world in the beginning through the Jews, and then after Jesus, he does it through the church. When the church has been raptured off the earth then God will go back again to the Jews to attempt to reach those who have been left behind. More specifically it will be 144,000 Jews acting as evangelists because the blinders of unbelief have been removed. Look at Romans 11:25. The Apostle is talking about when the full number of Gentiles have come into the kingdom, then Israel will be saved. The church leaves the earth and the Jews left here will act as the church did.

When Daniel talks about the purified, spotless and the refined; he could be talking about the church that has been raptured or about those who have been left here and have become saved, and therefore have been made purified, spotless and refined. But notice the wicked will continue to be wicked. Who is the worst of the worst at being blind to the truth...the worst at understanding. Remember when I said, it is better to be lost than to be religious. The wicked that continue to be wicked will most likely be the stubborn religious. True, included in this group will be the anti God governments of Communism and Socialism, but I don't think it will be the people of those countries as much as it will be the leadership of those countries. God is moving tremendously in those countries to save the people and many are being saved. No, those who will mainly make up the wicked that continue to be wicked will be the stubborn religious who refuse to believe. And what group in particular hates Christians as much as Jews that goes to such extremes to prove their commitment?

Any person in any group can be saved because God saves individuals. You can't be saved because you simply belong to a particular family or a particular group. You have to have your own faith. Salvation is that personal because God is that personal. What could be more personal than another person living inside of you where you live. Being born again of God's spirit is the beginning of salvation. Maturing from that beginning means more of Him and less of you. And you do this by your choosing. It is not forced. The Apostle summed up the Christian life in one statement: 'The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love' (Gal 5:6). The more we mature in our faith, the more it results in the love of God. And this is what God is ultimately after in our lives...to be like he is. Hopefully the lost will some day come to their senses and discover the truth. Truth is not found in a religious system, or a philosophy, or a theory. It is found only in a person. And it is only in that person that you are set free (John 14:6; 8:32).