As I mentioned yesterday, today’s post is going to be a challenging one for many of you to read and process, let alone receive. But it needs to be shared and I’m totally comfortable with doing so here. All I ask is that you approach this with an open heart and mind, and even more importantly...an open Bible. Take notes. Search the scriptures to see if what I am sharing lines up with the word or not. (Acts 17:11 ). I have nothing to prove to anyone nor do I have any other agenda but pleasing the One who first loved me. (1 John 4:19)

I mentioned in closing yesterday how the early days of my ‘coming to Jesus’ was marked by such a strong presence of Him teaching me to learn His voice, and then follow. You can call this ‘abiding in Him’. (John 10:27; 15:1-8). And was I ever seeing God move in my life in incredible ways as I have shared recently with you all. Jesus kind of has this ‘thing’ when it comes to working with, in, and through His new ‘babes’. (Luke 10:17-21; Mark 16:20)

But it did not take long for the enemy, who ‘comes immediately’ (Mark 4:15) to steer me just enough off course to make a difference. It doesn’t take much, does it, to influence a change in direction...just a few degrees, actually. Satan can be so subtle and crafty; given he’s been at this for a long time.

So I admitted this ‘abiding’ that I was learning about early on, slowly changed; and the presumed question wanting to be asked was ‘what happened’? And I said...’church happened’. I also promised to follow up today...and explain. So let’s do that now...

Prior to the first coming of Jesus some 2000+ years ago, we know that God’s people, the Jews, were looking for and anticipating His arrival as the promised Messiah. They were anxious for God to deliver them and set them free from their Roman oppressors.

Today, we have multitudes of people who also believe they are God’s children, who are looking for and anticipating His second coming and that He will set them free and deliver them from the oppression of this world. Anyone heard the word ‘rapture’ before?

We also read in John 1 that when Jesus came the first time, He came to His own (people) and yet...they did not receive Him. (John 1:11). Have you ever wondered why? In that same passage, we also read that ‘in the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God, and the Word was God...and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” (1:1,14). Jesus is/was...the ‘Word’. 

So He came to His own...and His own did not receive Him - the Word who was made flesh. 

Later, in chapter 8 of the same gospel, we read an interesting exchange Jesus had with a group of very well educated religious scholars who were absolutely convinced...they were God’s children given they were descendants of Abraham. (8:39) And yet...Jesus tells them outright that they are not able to hear, listen to, nor understand His word. (43). Would you care to read on as to why...they were not able to receive ‘the Word’? Because, in the words of Jesus who shared this so diplomatically, ...their “father was the devil and the desires of their father they wanted to do...and he is a liar and the father of all lies’. (44)

Please note here...Jesus was not talking to a bunch of ‘crack heads’ in some dark alley trying to shame a group of souls held captive by Satan. He was talking to an established group of ‘respectable religious folks’ who were unable to see their true condition.

So let me ask you this in a moment of personal reflection: If this happened the first time when Jesus came to ‘deliver His people’, how can we be so certain that this could not happen again...to us? And please don’t be too quick to try and answer that. I know, I know...you go to a church where the ‘truth is preached’. Why else would you be going there, right? Please know, I am not here to sow discord and division. I am simply wanting for ‘whoever has ears to hear’... to look again to this book we profess to love, believe and follow...and take a look at these passages again, maybe for the first time.

I know I refer to this passage often, but Jesus made it a point to stress that ‘not everyone who says, “Lord, Lord”, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but those who do the will of His Father in heaven.” (Matt. 7:21). He goes on to point out that a day is coming when those ‘many’ will come before Him and make mention of all the wonderful works they did...in His name. (7:22). And then He will tell them plainly: “I never knew you- depart from Me, you who continue to sin.” (7:23)

As I like to say here often, those are His words, not mine. And they are in there for a reason! Those folks...who had to be convinced they were children of God, will be told otherwise and are denied entrance into His eternal kingdom. Those folks do not appear to be ‘saved’, despite what they had been told by their preachers. And I will just leave it at that, for now.

At the close of yesterday’s message, I encouraged you to examine a few passages in preparation for today’s message, one of them being Matt. 23:15. In what had to be probably one of the most blistering messages Jesus ever preached, it should be noted that it was not directed to all those ‘wandering sheep’ that He had such great compassion for. (Matt. 9:35-38)

It was directed at the religious leaders of that day who Jesus points the finger of blame at for misleading His people. And if you want to do some digging in OT passages, you will see quickly this seemed to be an ongoing problem over the centuries. You might check out Jeremiah 23 and Ezek. 13 and 22. Oh, one other passage you might go underline and give thought to is found in Lamentations. This is the book Jeremiah writes after the fall of Jerusalem, the ‘city of God’ and where His temple was. God brought Babylon in to destroy it, and the aftermath was not pretty at all. But look where God, through Jeremiah, points the finger of blame at in 2:9,14. And what did Jesus also warn would happen again, prior to His return in Matt. 24:4-5,11? Please go read Lamentations 2:9,14 now.

So now, back to that heated sermon Jesus preached to this crowd in Matt. 23. One of the more interesting ‘zingers’ He lays down at them is found in vs. 15. It reads: “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel land and sea to win one proselyte, (convert) and when he is won, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves.”

Ouch! Have you ever seen that one before? It can leave you scratching your head in puzzlement for sure. But when the Holy Spirit opens up the eyes of our understanding to it, trust me...it will have you sitting up and 'concerned'. But it might help to read another passage for context here first, then we can come back to this.

Peter tells us in his first letter that we are ‘born again...through the word of God’ and our ‘souls are purified in obeying the truth (word) through the Spirit’. (1:22-23). Paul uses a similar picture here in describing how the ‘bride of Christ’ is made ‘clean, spotless, and pure’ by the ‘washing of the water of the word’. (Eph. 5:26-27). He would later write how this ‘word of God works effectively in those who believe it’. (1 Thess. 2:13) That might explain why the ‘devil comes immediately to snatch this word from our hearts, lest we believe it and are saved’. (Luke 8:12)

We need to be careful with what we read and take in, and then regurgitate to share with others. I know it can make us sound ‘smart and well read’ when we toss out quotes from ‘intellectuals’, but Jesus hides His truths from ‘intellectuals and reveals them to babes’. (Luke 10:21). Let me just tell you how thankful I am that I don’t have to be really ‘smart’ to understand God’s word...I just have to come to Him with my whole heart, and then He makes it clear to me by ‘revealing’ it. (Matt. 13:11; Luke 24:45)

So let’s go read from Mark 7 to help us better understand Matt. 23:15.

Once again, Jesus is mixing it up with some religious leaders. They wanted to know why His disciples did not ‘follow the traditions of the elders’.(7:5). Jesus wanted to know why they didn’t follow the commandments of God. (Matt. 15:3). He then launches off in to a pretty insightful explanation to what ‘religious’ folks can become notorious for doing: “honoring God with their lips, but their hearts are far from Him’. (Mark 7:6; Tit. 1:16). You can read through vs. 16 there on your own but basically, He’s accusing them for replacing God’s word with their traditions and man-made doctrines, and the result...if you can believe it (or not)...is they “make the word of God of no effect”. (13). Let that one sink in for a moment.

We have over 400 ‘Christian denominations’ today and everyone seems to offer up their own take on how to ‘get to heaven’. No wonder the world shakes their head in bewilderment and skepticism. You might be surprised to discover how easy it is for God’s word to be replaced by men’s words. Which is probably what Jesus is making a case for in Matt. 23:15.

God begins to do something in the heart of a new convert/believer when they come to Him, like He was doing in me 44 years ago. But then, is it possible that we end up in a place where something else is being taught, in place of God’s pure word? So then if we are taught to believe a ‘doctrine’ that does not totally line up with God’s word, and that doctrine ‘captures our heart’, like a ‘stronghold’, then when we actually ‘hear the word of God’, if... it does not fit with that doctrine we now love, we then will reject God’s word. As in, not ‘receive it’. And it can only get worse from there. Hence...making a new convert a ‘two-fold child of hell’, as Jesus put it.

I told you this would not be easy to get through, nor will this next and final point be. – I think we can agree that every group out there that calls itself a ‘church’ is not a part of God’s kingdom. (2 Cor. 11:3-4) Yet, they can do many ‘wonderful things in His name’, yes? (Matt. 7:22). You know, things like Marching at Pro-Life rallies to protect the unborn. Yet, if they are teaching new converts to follow their doctrines instead of Jesus, what are they doing...keeping Matt. 23:15 in mind?

Which is why the case could be made that many ‘so called churches’ have actually become ‘spiritual abortion clinics’.  Oh...the irony of it all.

And let me assure you now...God has a huge problem with that!