03/31/2024 – “Helpfulness or Hypocrisy in Ourselves.” / “If anyone sees his brother, sinning a sin which does not lead to death, he will ask, and He will give him life for those who commit sin not leading to death.” (1 John 5:16)
“If we are not heedful and pay no attention to the way the Spirit of God works in us, we will become spiritual hypocrites. We see where other people are failing, and then we take our discernment and turn it into comments of ridicule and criticism, instead of turning it into intercession on their behalf. God reveals this truth about others to us not through the sharpness of our minds but through the direct penetration of His Spirit. If we are not attentive, we will be completely unaware of the source of the discernment God has given us, becoming critical of others and forgetting that God says,’… he will ask, and He will give him life for that you don’t become a hypocrite by spending all your time trying to get others right with God before you worship Him yourself.
One of the most subtle and illusive burdens God ever places on us as saints is this burden of discernment concerning others. He gives us discernment so that we may accept the responsibility for those souls before Him and form the mind of Christ about them. (see Philippians 2:5 – *Note (below) ). We should interceded in accordance with what God says He will give us, namely, ‘life for those who commit sin not leading to death.’ It is not that we are able to bring God into contact with our minds, but that we awaken ourselves to the point where God is able to convey His mind to us regarding the people for whom we intercede.
Can Jesus Christ seee the agony of His soul in us? He can’t unless we are so closely identified tied with Him that we have his view concerning the people for whom we pray. May we learn to intercede so wholeheartedly that Jesus Christ will be completely and overwhelmingly satisfied with us as intercessors.”
*Note: “Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who being in very nature, God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death — even death on a cross! Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”
Soli Deo Gloria!