Month 2:21, Week 3:6 (Sheshi/Kippur), Year 5935:048 AM
Gregorian Calendar: Tuesday 24 May 2011
Worldliness
The Drum-Beat of Lucifer
"Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world -- the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life -- is not of the Father but is of the world. And the world is passing away, and the lust of it; but he who does the will of Elohim (God) abides forever" (1 John 2:15-17, NKJV).
I confess I feel a bit sad as I write this today and the reason I feel sad is because I see so many implicitly trust in man more than they do in Elohim (God). The blind always have a choice between two guides - one that can see and another blind man.
"We grope for the wall like the blind, and we grope as if we had no eyes; we stumble at noonday as at twilight; we are as dead men in desolate places" (Isa.59:10, NKJV).
I have followed many blind men for short periods of time both during my walk through academia as well as religion. In many respects I am glad I began as a scientist because the world claims to be 'scientific' when it isn't. 'Science' is just a useful term to hide behind, much as many religious people hide behind being 'religious'. Frankly I find little difference between the two - most scientists are, in my view, highly religious, whether of the atheistic sort or not.
It's particularly sad when Yahweh shows you in advance the path someone is going to go and where they will end. That is a kind of knowledge I would wish on no man. I can only imagine what Yahweh feels knowing where the vast majority of His children are headed.
According to our passage of scripture today, worldliness is being anti-Christian. It is a lethal combination of materialism, egotism, ambition and lust - all mingled together in a deadly potion. James does not mince words when he says that "friendship with the world is enmity with Elohim (God). Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of Elohim (God)" (James 4:4, NKJV). Put simply, we cannot be 'other-worldly' and 'this-worldly' at the same time. We are to be in the world but never of it (Jn.17:14-16).
So what is worldliness apart from being anti-Christian?
"Whatever promotes self, cheapens life, starves the soul, hopes without Bible grounds for hope, adopts current moral standards, indulges in pleasures of the flesh to make bearable the secret thoughts of death and judgment - that is the world" (A.W.Tozer).
To the beat of what drum are you marching? The believer will seem out-of-step and eccentric in the world because he is marching to a heavenly rhythm. All those who serve Yahweh are in the same marching order and those who belong to the prince of this world belong to another.
Do you know to what beat you are marching? If you are not sure, then I invite you to read my sermon, Might You Be a Satanist Without Knowing It? Many have been shocked into repentance and others have just marched on into oblivion. Please be careful.
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