Is it Possible to Serve Both God and Theology?

I completely agree with Marshall Segal in this piece he wrote about making sure you do not serve both God and Theology. "It’s possible to love what we’re learning about God more than we love God himself", He said. "We will never be truly satisfied by knowing about God. We need to know him. If that dichotomy doesn’t make sense to you, beware. Facts about God without feelings for him and fellowship with him—without a sense that you are God’s chosen, redeemed and known son or daughter—will give you a false sense of God’s love and security".

Christian leadership can be exciting and can equally be a snare. Exciting because you are a servant of the Most High God with a whole lot of divine resources available to you. God uses you you to manifest His awesome power, bringing glory to His name. On the other hand, it can be a snare because our hearts can be so lifted up that we forget that we are still children of God and are not essentially different from other sons and daughters of God who are serving Him in some other areas. Our relationships with other people are affected as we expect to be served instead of serving. We expect others to pour out their lives for us instead of pouring out our lives for them as leaders. We expect others to always think about our comfort and good without thinking about their comfort. We teach them what to do without doing those things ourselves. We separate ourselves into a lonely position where people that knew us before can no longer reach us. We are not bothered anymore even when we know that we need God's touch. We refuse to cry out and ask for help because of our position. We die in secret because we do not want anything to destabilize the picture people have about us. It can be a snare because we may become conceited, thinking that we have become very familiar with God, thinking that we have known a lot about God, we lose all fear of Him. We can do anything with impunity thinking that as long as we sanction it, God sanctions it also. In fact we think that we know God more than everybody else who do not have the same exposure we have.

Marshall Segal said "Their education and pride—their knowledge and confidence in their own system—had blinded them to the very image and voice of God. They knew so much about God, and yet knew him so little...So we should fear money when it leads our hearts and allegiances away from God. And we should fear our system of theology when it more subtly does the same". Read and be blessed.

You Cannot Serve Both God and Theology.

Are you committed to raising the younger generation?

Recently, the Vice President of the United States of America conducted a homosexual marriage between two White House staff members and twitted on how happy he was doing so. The Rev. Franklin  Graham, the son of Billy Graham, chided the Vice President and said, 'There Will Be A Price To Pay For Our Nation'. I agree with him because through the Scriptures, we have seen God bring down great nations because of wickedness. However, the focus of our discussion today is from what I read in one of the Comment boxes:

“I am so glad that the vast majority of the population having the same mindset as Mr. Graham is old and on the way out. The younger generations are far less likely to fall victim to such demented hatred and homophobia. This world is becoming BETTER in that sense, not worse. Heaven was made for people who love people, not the bitter, vicious "Christians" such as Graham and some of these others”. Kittius Cattias.

This comment got me thinking. For some days now, the questions I have been asking myself include: Am I doing enough to pass to the next generation what I believe about God? Yes we are on our way out and have fought this battle throughout our lives, have I done enough to prepare the next generation to continue this battle or will they fall ‘victims’ to what the commenter called ‘demented hatred and homophobia’?  Remember these are words they have been using to silence the voices of those who hold a different opinion to theirs and except you have a strong moral balance, you may not be able to understand this scheme of the enemy. Through the years, we have insisted that homosexuality is just like every other sexual sin and perversion in the world. As God commanded us, we love homosexuals as individuals, and every other sinner for that matter, but we disapprove their sin. That is why we preach. God loves sinners but disapproves of their sins. But these apologists will want to push it down our throat that we are bigots that spread hatred among men. They say that we hate homosexuals and we bear the responsibility for the death of any of them that commits suicide for whatever reason. But this is far from the truth. Genuine Christians do not hate people and yet are bold to say what the Bible says no matter whose ox is gored, even at the detriment of our lives. The bible condemns every sexual sin and perversion but lovely calls every person caught in any of the sins to repentance because God has appointed a day He will judge the sins of men. Heb.9:27.

It is a moral battle and has become more difficult now that you have some so called Christians who are twisting some passages of the bible to prove that it is normal to practice homosexuality, hence they do not need to repent because that is who they are. But we know that this is a lie of the devil to keep these ones in this bondage till they die. It is common knowledge that when a people become very obstinate toward God, instead of responding to God in repentance and obedience, they rebel and fight every prophet that God uses to call them to repentance. This is because they want to remain in their sins. Many preachers in the western world have been silenced already. They carefully avoid mentioning the issue of homosexuality because of fear of backlash to their ‘ministry’. I thank God for Rev Franklin who is still speaking with boldness in that hostile clime.

But the question remains, have we prepared the next generation for the battle? Are we doing all that we need to do? Am I teaching my family? Do they know the difference? Have they been brought to the point where they can stand their ground even when some people will want to push guilt to their conscience to agree to a sin they did not commit? It is good to leave wealth, money and properties behind for my children. However, in the theatre of ideas, especially in the morality spheres, these things cannot sustain my children. I know this very clearly. If they are won in that sphere, they will even begin to commit the resources I would leave behind to fighting the values I stood for. This is because it is in the theatre of ideas that values are formed. That is where convictions are shaped. The ideas you have will either strengthen your conscience or weaken it. Am I preparing my children to win in this battle? It is good to send them to the best of schools, but if they succeed academically only to come back as subdued people who cannot stand for the values I was ready to die for, then I must have failed as a destiny moulder.

O Lord, I commit my life to raising the younger generation. Help me!

Western Culture is at the Edge of Dying - Ravi Zacharias

“Secularity has no staying power… you cannot live with a neutral view towards values… the Herods are still with us they don’t want the Christ child; the Pilates are still with us they ask, “what is truth?” but don’t wait for the answer; the Caesars are still with us they want to be worshiped, times have changed, human nature has not. So the west better awaken to learn from history. I hope it’s not too late but that’s the reality.” Dr. Ravi Zacharias (Apologist, Evangelist, & Author).

Listen to what he said on the importance of recovery of fatherhood today. After listening to part 1, I made a phone call to talk to my son. 

Remain blessed.

Part 1

 

 Part 2