Spiritual Poison Control

Psalms 27:11-14 ESV

 

“Teach me your way, O Lord,

    and lead me on a level path

    because of my enemies.

Give me not up to the will of my adversaries;

    for false witnesses have risen against me,

    and they breathe out violence.

 

“I believe that I shall look upon the goodness of the Lord

    in the land of the living!

Wait for the Lord;

    be strong, and let your heart take courage;

    wait for the Lord!”

 

What is the way of the Lord? It is the way of righteousness and holiness, of moral purity, of honesty, and of integrity. It is the way of submission to Christ as Lord, and of leaving our lives of sin behind us to follow our Lord Jesus in obedience to his ways and to his commands. And it is the way of surrender of our lives and what we feel are our rights to Jesus, and of letting him be Lord (owner-master) over our lives (Rom 6:1-23; Eph 4:17-24).

 

But that is not the way of the Lord that most people are teaching today, at least here in America. The gospel of Jesus Christ is under attack by the enemies of the cross of Christ. And the enemies of the gospel are those who are teaching that we can believe in Jesus, have our sins forgiven, and go to heaven when we die, even though we dishonor Christ as Lord, refuse to bow to him in obedience, and refuse to forsake our sins to live in holiness.

 

They are those who give the appearance that what they are teaching is righteous and holy, but it is a lie. For what they are teaching is that we can hold on to our sin and continue in sinful rebellion against God, but that Jesus is supposed to still forgive us and promise us his heaven. For, they teach that Jesus does it all and that nothing is required of us in return. He does it all and we do nothing, and we keep on doing whatever we want.

 

This “another gospel” and this “different Jesus” that they are teaching exhumes from the mouths of people whose hearts are hardened toward God and his righteous requirements. Their idea of salvation is totally based on utter selfishness and evil desires. So, they demand that they be able to hold on to their sinful lifestyles and that God still forgive them and give them his heaven. And they falsely refer to this as God’s grace.

 

No Fear of God

 

So, there is no fear of God in their lives. They do not honor or respect or revere God for who he is. And they take him and his plan of salvation for granted, thinking it is somehow owed to them because they made a profession of faith in Jesus, or because they confessed him as Lord, or because they “invited him into their hearts.” But they dishonor God, and they insult the Spirit of Grace. So, they are his enemies.

 

They promise people forgiveness of sins and eternal life with God based on a lie, so they are keeping people still bound in their sins and on their way to hell while promising them eternal life with God. So, they give a false image that what they are speaking is truth and that what they are saying are the words of life, and words of healing, and of mercy. But they are death traps, instead, disguised as true remedies for our sins.

 

For, they don’t teach death to sin and living to righteousness. They coddle people in their sins, and they teach or they imply that we can believe in Jesus and still live in sinful rebellion against our Lord. So, their “prescription” for life is literally a “prescription” for death, just disguised as a “prescription” for life and spiritual health and wholeness. So, they promise them life, but instead what they hand them is death (destruction, decay).

 

Feeding Them Poison

 

What they are feeding the people is actually poison which will kill them. So, this is an emergency situation which calls for “poison control.” And poison control works to help people who have ingested poison to rid their bodies of that poison, to vomit it up, or whatever else they do to get the poison out of people’s systems so that they can live. So, we need spiritual “poison control” intervention to help people vomit up this poisonous false gospel, too.

 

And the spiritual “poison control” comes from God and from his Word. His word teaches (instructs) us in what we need to do to rid ourselves of sin and of lies and of beliefs in false gospels. For, God/Jesus has the only true antidote for sin which is poisoning our lives. And his antidote is God-given faith which submits to Christ as Lord, which surrenders all to him, which forsakes our lives of sin, and which follows Jesus in obedience.

 

And we who are followers of Jesus need to see this as an emergency situation which requires spiritual “poison control,” and we need to be making an outcry against this cheap grace gospel which is poisoning people’s hearts and lives with lies. And we need to be giving biblical counsel to people in how, not only to get rid of the poison, but how to live spiritually healthy lives in submission to God’s biblical “prescription” for our lives.

 

The Way of the Cross

 

So, we need to be those who are teaching others the way of the Lord, and we need to be leading people on a level (straight, righteous, and holy) path. And we need to be telling them that God’s gift of salvation from sin is deliverance from our addiction to sin, and it is empowerment to live in slavery to God and to his righteousness. For the way of the cross is the only way to salvation from sin and to eternal life with God.

 

And he (Jesus Christ) said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it. For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses or forfeits himself?” Luke 9:23-25 ESV

 

So, please know that the Scriptures do not support this notion that we can remain living in sin, doing whatever we want to do, but have our sins forgiven and have heaven guaranteed us when we depart this earth for eternity. For Jesus died that we might die with him to sin and live to him and to his righteousness. He died that we might no longer live for ourselves, but for him who gave his life up for us (1 Pet 2:24; 2 Co 5:15; 1 Co 6:19-20).

 

All I Ask of You

 

by Andrew Lloyd Webber

 

No more talk of darkness,

Forget these wide-eyed fears;

I'm here, nothing can harm you,

My words will warm and calm you.

Let me be your freedom,

Let daylight dry your tears;

I'm here, with you, beside you,

To guard you and to guide you.

 

Let me be your shelter,

Let me be your light…

 

Love me, that's all I ask of you

 

The above lyrics are taken from a secular song, “All I Ask of You,” but these quoted lyrics express God’s words to us, that we would let him be our freedom, that we would let him shelter us and be our light, and that we would find our hope, and our peace and safety in him and not in the things of this dark world. All he asks of us is that we love him, which means we submit to him as Lord, and we obey his commands.

 

[Lu 9:23-26; Jn 6:35-58; Jn 15:1-11; Rom 6:1-23; Rom 8:1-17; Eph 4:17-24; 1 Pet 2:24; 1 Co 6:9-10, 19-20; 2 Co 5:10, 15; Tit 2:11-14; Jas 1:22-25; Gal 5:16-21; Eph 5:3-6; Gal 6:7-8; Rom 2:6-8; Matt 7:21-23; Heb 10:26-27; 1 Jn 1:5-9; 1 Jn 2:3-6; 1 Jn 3:4-10; Rom 12:1-2; Matt 5:13-16; Rev 21:8, 27; Rev 22:14-15; Eph 2:8-10; Heb 12:1-2; Jn 6:44]