Virtual Sunday Message
11-1-09
By Rev Deb
God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. (1 Cor 1:9)
All Christians believe that salvation is the most important doctrine of the bible. It is just as important that we understand what the correct doctrinal teaching is, rather than placing preconceptions into the text.
Once a person comes to faith in Christ he/she is immediately brought into a permanent relationship with God as His child. This can NEVER be severed!!! At this moment of conversion, the believer also comes into a living organic union with Christ and becomes FOREVER united to Him as His bride; thus becoming "Bone of His bone and flesh of His flesh" (Eph. 5:30-32 K.J.V). Believers are then mystically united to each other as members into the ONE body of Christ's (1 Cor. 12:12-14)!!
Jesus articulated His Father's will, when He said, "And this is the will of Him (the Father) who sent Me, that of all that He has GIVEN me I lose NOT EVEN ONE (lit. translation), but raise them up on the last days" (Jn. 6:39). Consequently, if just one believer could walk away, then God would be a liar, because His will would not have been carried out! But we know that God CANNOT LIE (Heb. 6"18) !!! Our relationship to Christ is a permanent organic union...There are several verses that seem at first glance (seem!!) to indicate that a believer can lose his/her salvation relationship to Christ. These verses are often used to combat the security a believer has with Christ. But a closer investigation of these verses should put this misconception to rest.
Sample passages such as Joh. 15: 1-8, Gal 5:4, Phil, 2:12... seem to indicate that a believer could lose the salvation that cost God's Son His life! Intellectually, this seems absurd to me, but nonetheless, this is a real belief of some and therefore very important to address. Upon a closer look, we see that the apostle John and the apostle Paul are both speaking in reference to our FELLOWSHIP with Christ and NOT our salvation!
A falling out of fellowship is quite different then to fall from salvation... Scripture teaches that it is through this mystical union of our salvation, that we become the wife of Christ (Eph. 5:21-33, esp vs 25, 28-32 KJV). This union defines the believer(s) as being BONE OF HIS (Christ) BONE and FLESH OF HIS FLESH!!! The act of salvation establishes a permanent relationship with Christ.
Fellowship on the other hand, establishes a friendship. For example, when fellowship/friendship is interrupted by, let's say, an argument between a married couple, their fellowship/friendship is severed, but the RELATIONSHIP between the two remains the same. They are still married, but their fellowship to each other has suffered a set back.
Now in order for this severing of fellowship to be restored, the married couple must work out their differences through apologies and forgiveness. Once this is accomplished their relationship as a married couple can once again be enjoyed. But at NO TIME was the lawful marriage severed!
Our fellowship with Christ is the same, with the exception that the broken fellowship is ALWAYS on the part of the believer. When a believer sins in ANY way and does not repent, they will remain out of fellowship with their mate (Christ). This is what the apostle John was referring to in 1 Joh. 1:6,7 when he said,
"If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth; but if we walk in the Light as He Himself is in the Light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin."
Notice that ACKNOWLEDGING our sins is what brings us back into FELLOWSHIP with Christ. As I stated earlier, fellowship is very different from relationship. The huge difference in John's writing is that "confession of sin is NEVER connected with the acquisition of eternal life, which is always conditioned on faith!!!"
1 Joh 1:9, known as the Christian's bar of soap, explains how to reestablish our FELLOWSHIP with the Lord, not our RELATIONSHIP which can NEVER be broken!!! The Greek uses a continuous tense of the verb as follows:
"If we keep on confessing our sins, He is faithful and righteous having forgiven us our sins and having cleansed us from all unrighteousness."
These Greek tenses of the verbs are used to show that continual acknowledgment of our sins keeps us in a proper FELLOWSHIP with our loving husband, Christ. The word "confess" means "to agree with someone about something". In this context, it means to agree with God about a settled fact,- that He has already forgiven our sins!!!
The Psalmist David understood this all to well. He realized that the sins he committed were already forgiven, but as long as he refused to confess them, he remained out of FELLOWSHIP with God. It was the guilt of his sins that separated him from a melodic fellowship with the Lord, not the sin itself... Guilt is what keeps us from enjoying true fellowship with our loving Lord. But when we confess (ie. say we are sorry) our sins the GUILT of those sins dissipates and fellowship is once again restored.
Listen to the profound words of king David,-
"Oh, what joy for those whose disobedience is forgiven,whose sin is put out of sight!
2 Yes, what joy for those whose record the Lord has cleared of guilt, whose lives are lived in complete honesty!
3 When I refused to confess my sin, my body wasted away, and I groaned all day long.
4 Day and night your hand of discipline was heavy on me. My strength evaporated like water in the summer heat.
5 Finally, I confessed all my sins to you and stopped trying to hide my guilt. I said to myself, “I will confess my rebellion to the Lord.” And you forgave me! All my guilt is gone.!!!!"
Did you catch that in verses 1 and 2 ? king David clearly understood God's grace! He openly proclaimed that God's forgiveness of the ACT OF SIN is forgiven IMMEDIATELY !!
David truly understood GRACE like no other old testament believer... His immense understanding of it is brought out in Psalm 51; this is right after he had committed a long string of sins. Starting with his lust for Bathsheba, committing adultery and then murdering Uriah and many other soldiers unnecessarily. David knew that the natural man would not understand his repentance from these vile acts, and thus the confession and profound understanding of God's forgiveness found in Psalms 51.David was disciplined for his offenses, which he mentions in Psalms 32 "whose record the Lord has cleared of guilt"- As a matter of fact, David gave his own sentencing after Nathan the prophet rebuked him through a parable,- 2 Sam 12! David didn't realize that Nathan was referring to him in the parable and so when Nathan asked him what he thought should be done to such a person; David told Nathan that the person should receive a fourfold discipline. Nathan then revealed to king David that it was in fact him that the Lord was speaking about in the parable. This led to four of David's children to die, starting with the child Bathsheba was carrying as a result of the adultery they had committed.
When David was trying to hide his sins from God (although we could never hide anything from the eyes of Him who see all), His body began to waste away...Sin and Guilt are a sure fire stress maker, and we all know what stress does to the body...
Stress is the fastest way to shut the endocrine system down, causing a melody of illnesses, such as thyroid problems, adrenal fatigue, certain cancers, auto-immune diseases, chronic fatigue, depression...
The adrenals alone produce over 50 different hormones that are critical to health and well being. If just the adrenals are fatigued, it can cause symptoms ranging from hair loss, memory loss, low or no libido, muscle weakness, arthritis, lupus (and other auto immune disorders), asthma, electrolyte imbalances, varicose veins in the lower extremities,- This is just to name a few!!! Correcting the adrenals fortunately corrects the symptoms that were created by the adrenal insufficiency.
That is not to say, that sin and unconfessed sins is the only way that people get sick. But I will say this- Sin is what causes people to tamper with foods that our loving Lord created for us to enjoy by loading them with chemicals and unnatural products that foster debilitating illnesses!!! As an example, margarine is only one molecule away from being plastic!! Yes that is what I said !! Plastic! How in the world could that be healthy for us??? Processing salt by heating and refining it is what could cause high blood pressure. Unrefined and hand harvested salt, the way the Lord made it causes pleasure to the pallet and enhances taste. Jesus Himself said, "salt is good". Oh and by the way, there were no refineries in his day,- Only hand harvested ... The lack of salt (good salt) in a diet can cause problems as well!! So eat a little to maintain electrolyte balance...
Do the research, it could save your life! It did save my husbands life!! He was misdiagnosed and our research literally saved his life!!! He would not be here with me today, had we left it in the hands of others. Even doctors make mistakes.Just keep in mind what time we are living in, it is the time of illusions and delusions (2 Thess. 2:4-9,10,11; 1Tim. 4:1-6; 2Tim. 3:1-10, 12)!!
Sin and guilt is an ugly thing and God knew humanity could or would never be able to live up to His Holy standards. So He provided everything necessary for us to be able to live a godly life in Christ Jesus (2Pet. 1:3,4). The Lord also knew that we could do nothing to appease His wrath against us for our disobedience; so He sent His Son to appease it for us. This one time death and resurrection gave all who would believe eternal, forever, permanent life as a free, unearned gift!!
This was God's unmerited promise to us! God made this His responsibility to us! Fellowship is our responsibility to God! If we sin, we need to confess our sin in order to maintain a daily wholesome fellowship with our Father God and our husband Jesus. We have the power of the Holy Spirit, the same Holy Spirit that was brooding over creation, The Holy Spirit helps us in our daily walk and unites us in fellowship with the Father and His Christ!!!
The apostle John also knew the extreme importance of confessing all known sin. He knew that the GUILT that sin produces, separates the erring child of God from a peaceful fellowship with Him and with fellow believers... John also knew that guilt prevents the believer from being productive for God. So my point is this,- It is our GUILT, not our sin,that keeps us out of FELLOWSHIP with Christ.
If you have any unconfessed sin, don't hesitate- give it over to our loving and compassionate Lord and restore your fellowship today! Release the burdens that have been weighing heavily upon your shoulders and give it to Jesus who is waiting to bare them for you... Start a new burden free day with God, a renewed fellowship in the power of the Holy Spirit of God... You won't be disappointed!!!
To be continued...
Be Blessed
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