09/08/2020 – Day 100 – Exodus 5 – 8 – Further to: Shaking off the spiritual toxicity of prosperity gospel.
Through the Christ imitator mentorship of Moses and Jeremiah, I am made all the more aware of my relative insensitivity to the plight of souls in suffering, in this case, my “own people” per se. We are saved by faith through God’s grace alone, He chose us, we didn’t choose Him. So, how can I look down on a future brother and sister simply because they haven’t received that grace yet from the Holy Spirit. Would it have been right for the disciples to look down on Paul prior to his conversion? This ties into Mat Walsh’s article that I posted under: “Thou shalt not judge!” We don’t judge souls that are not yet under the body of Christ. Note, this does not say we don’t hold them fully accountable for civil crimes! (taking note of our present crises of soul in this country) On the other hand, we most certainly are called bibilical to “judge” those within the church: Why?
Because we love them! We say we love our own children, but if we don’t discipline them, our actions do not match up with our words. Of course, we recognize it isn’t easy sometimes putting our “feelings” appropriately aside. But it is not about our feelings, particularly if they are driven from “avoiding the uncomfortable” as in: “I don’t want to make them ‘sad’ or ‘mad’.
Exodus 5: 22-23: “So Moses returned to the Lord and said, ‘Lord, why have Youu brought trouble on this people? Why is it You have sent me? For since I came to Pharaoh to speak in Your name, he has doesn’t evil to this people; neither have You delivered Your people at all.”
Moses is an exemplary Christian warrior but again, from Alistair Begg’s recent sermon in 1 Samuel on David: “The best of men, are men at best” God is sovereign; He is forever faithful! So , we must obey and have faith and resist all temptations to “put God in the dock” for not taking the shortest distance between two points from the prospective of our relatively total cluelessness.
Once again, we are called to face off against the toxicity of “prosperity gospel”:
“Few things do so much harm in religion as exaggerated expectations. People look for a degree of worldly comfort in Christ’s service which they have no right to expect, and not finding what they look for, are tempted to give up religion in disgust. Happy is he who thoroughly understands, that though Christianity holds out a crown in the end, it brings also a cross in the way.” J.C. Ryle