“I have finished the work which Thou gavest Me to do.” (John 17:4)

Loving Leaven In The Lump

A while back I wrote an article called Drifting From the Authority of Scripture. In it I point out that the Christian Church here in America has created a “thing” they call evangelicalism, but its not the Christianity of the New Testament. And right now there is so much talk about the apostasy which appears as if it has been recently ignited within our Lord’s Church.

We do have to agree that it does seem to have almost instantly exploded onto the scene. It’s as if the Devil has suddenly tossed a spiritual match onto the trail of gasoline that is the Contemplative Spirituality he has been saturating within the desert-like dry forest of intellectual evangelical churchianity so easily passing for Christianity these days in alleged postmodern America.

But I offer however that this apostasy has actually been slowly burning for years and only now is the Holy Spirit simply blowing it throughout the Body of Christ. And so it is spreading throughout the American Christian Church as quickly an Oklahoma wildfire in order to burn out the deleterious driftwood now wasting our Father’s precious resources.

And the leaven contained within the idol of evangelicalism infecting the Body of Christ right now is every bit as real as Asherah poles and altars to Baal. This leaven is the wrong understanding of the love of God. What people have done through the years is exactly what Oswald Chambers warns about in the following devotion: Through focusing solely on God’s love these fools have actually been worshipping His love instead of Him Who loves…

The Death of Jesus Christ is the performance in history of the very Mind of God. There is no room for looking on Jesus Christ as a martyr; His death was not something that happened to Him which might have been prevented: His death was the very reason why He came.

Never build your preaching of forgiveness on the fact that God is our Father and He will forgive us because He loves us. It is untrue to Jesus Christ’s revelation of God; it makes the Cross unnecessary, and the Redemption “much ado about nothing.” If God does forgive sin, it is because of the Death of Christ. God could forgive men in no other way than by the death of His Son, and Jesus is exalted to be Saviour because of His death.

“We see Jesus because of the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour.” The greatest note of triumph that ever sounded in the ears of a startled universe was that sounded on the Cross of Christ – “It is finished.” That is the last word in the Redemption of man.

Anything that belittles or obliterates the holiness of God by a false view of the love of God, is untrue to the revelation of God given by Jesus Christ. Never allow the thought that Jesus Christ stands with us against God out of pity and compassion; that He became a curse for us out of sympathy with us.

Jesus Christ became a curse for us by the Divine decree. Our portion of realizing the terrific meaning of the curse is conviction of sin, the gift of shame and penitence is given us – this is the great mercy of God. Jesus Christ hates the wrong in man, and Calvary is the estimate of His hatred. (My Utmost for His Highest, 242)