Acts 5:29
"He who speaks on his own authority seeks his own glory; but he who
seeks the glory of him who sent him is true, and in him there is no falsehood."
John 7:18
Yikes! And this one:
"But there were false prophets also among the people,
even as there shall be among you lying teachers who shall bring in sects of perdition
and deny the Lord who bought them: bringing upon themselves swift destruction." (DRB)
2Peter 2:1
Sects?
If GOD did not found my church then is it considered to be a sect?
Well according to Holy Scripture 2Peter 2:1, and by using some GOD given common sense,
it is obvious to me that the Church which GOD founded could not be a sect,
but all of those founded by mere human persons must be.
I checked two other Bibles and look at the wording that each one used instead of using the word 'sects'?
"But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you,
who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction." (KJ)
2Peter 2:1
"False prophets appeared in the past among the people, and in the same way false teachers will appear among you. They will bring in destructive, untrue doctrines, and will deny the Master who redeemed them, and so they will bring upon themselves sudden destruction." (GNB)
2Peter 2:1
Damnable heresies? Destructive, untrue doctrines? False teachers? False prophets? Swift or sudden destruction?
Wow! This is all very scary.
Here is another:
"I am come in the name of my Father, and you receive me not: if
another shall come in his own name, him you will receive."
John 5:43
Remember, If you reject His Body (the Church, Col 1:24) , you reject Him, and those who do would rather accept the false prophet.
Here are another condemning two verses that I found:
"Amen, amen, I say to you, he who enters not by the door to the
sheepfold, but climbs up another way, is a thief and a robber.
But he who enters by the door is shepherd of the sheep."
John 10:1-2
How are you with parables? Jesus used them a lot. The sheepfold can only mean His Church which must be entered
by its door. He who does is shepherd of the sheep. He who does not is a thief and a robber. What do you think of that?
I seem to recall that Jesus appointed an earthly shepherd of His sheep. Oh yes, see John 21: 15-17 where Jesus gave
the primacy to Peter by telling him three times to feed His sheep.
Why would Jesus find the need to repeat Himself three times? Did He mean for Peter to feed them with food?
And here is still another condemning verse that I found. Goodness, how many more are there?
"He who is not with me is against me, and he who does not gather with me scatters."
Luke 11:23
Scatters? That sounds like this disturbing fact that I found:
There are now over 40,000 denominations in the world today that call themselves Christian, with new ones popping up every week.
See 'The World Christian Database' publication for this fact. It is a Protestant publication.
With 40,000+ denominations (sects, heresies, untrue doctrines, false teachers, false prophets) doesn't that sound like
a lot of people are guilty of scattering, when Jesus commanded that we be gathered.....as in one?
That shocking 40,000+ figure raises some troubling questiona in my mind.
1. With but one GOD and His one Word, the Bible, how can there not be but one Church?
2. Those 40,000+ sects must each have to be teaching something different from each other as well as from the true Church.
However, with only one Holy Scripture to interpret, how can that be?
The solution to that question must lie in the human interpreter of it and not in Holy Scripture itself.
After all, Holy Scripture teaches us that GOD is not the author of confusion,
(1Corinthians 14:33) and 40,000+ sects all teaching their own interpretation of the Bible are a great confusion, are they not?
So the author of confusion can only be man himself.
3. It would be a very strange thing indeed since GOD did give us an infallible book, and knowing the minds of men,
that He neglected to give them an infallible interpreter for it. Well, what do you think? Did He or didn't He?
Hey, if He did, then He must have told us that He did, and if He did tell us then in must be recorded in Holy Scripture.
Well let us see if we can find it? Where shall we start? How about starting with a keyword such as 'truth'?
Here is a good start:
John 14:6, "Jesus said to him: I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No man comes to
the Father, but by me." Now let us study the Word of GOD and see if He did give us of an
infallible interpreter for His Holy Scripture...
"The Way"
was the first term used to represent Christianity in those
days:
Mark 1:3, 12:14, Luke 3:4, 20:21, John 1:23,
14:4-6, Acts 9:2, 16:17,
Acts 18:25-26, 19:9,23, 22:4,
24:14,22.
Jesus said He was the truth. Since there is only one
Jesus, there can also be only one truth.....Right?
So logically, and by
using our GOD given common
sense, we must conclude that if all of those 40,000+ sects
taught the truth,
then there would be only one
Church.....Agreed?
After all, Jesus Christ founded
only one Church as Scripture plainly told us in Matthew
16:18.
He told us that there shall be one fold and one shepherd
in John 10:16. Does 40,000+ sects sound like one fold to you?
In John
17:11,21 and 22, Jesus prayed that we all be one. He said it not once but
three times in John 17.
Why does anyone, especially Jesus, repeat Himself
multiple times? I recall asking that question earlier in this writing
but for
a different set of verses. Why should anyone have to repeat his
or her message over and over again?
It is because so many of us simply do
not get the message the first time around.
It had to have been an
extremely important message from GOD since Jesus had to pray for it three
times.
Does 40,000+ splinters in Christianity sound like we are obedient to
GOD's word that was iterated
to us not once but three times from Holy
Scripture?
How could any person who calls himself a Bible
believer, simply ignore this plea from GOD Himself?
John 15:14,
"You are My friends if you do the things I
command you."
John 14:23-24,
"If anyone love me, he will keep my word,
and my Father will love him,
and we will come to him and make our abode with
him. He who does not love me does not keep my words.
And the word that you
have heard is not mine but the Father's who sent me."
Matthew 13:15-16, "For the heart of this people is grown gross, and with
their ears
they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut:
lest at any time they
should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears,
and understand with their
heart, and be converted, and I should heal them.
But blessed are your eyes,
because they see, and your ears, because they
hear."
Context for those two
verses: Jesus was speaking to the Apostles about those who simply do not get the
message.
What about the founders of those 40,000+ sects? Did they ever get
the message? Did they obey His commands?
Or did they simply act on their own
initiative as this next verse prophesied?
Matthew 15:9, "And in vain do they worship me, teaching doctrines and
commandments of men."
Matthew
15:13-14, "Every plant which my Heavenly
Father hath not planted shall be rooted up.
Let them alone: they are blind,
and leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both fall into the
pit."
Hey! Those last two verses
caused me to recall Psalms 127:1, similar meaning but with different
words.
If GOD did not build it or plant it, then those mere humans who
did are either laboring in vain or are rooted up.
John
5:39-40, "You search the Scriptures,
because in them you think that you have life everlasting.
And it is they
that bear witness to Me, yet you are not willing to come to Me that you may have
life."
Very important! Very scarry!
Do you remember the last part of the first part of John 14:6, that we have
been examining?
"I am the way, and
the truth, and the life."
What did Jesus mean by 'the life'?
I found
the answer to that question in Holy Scripture, troubling verses that I was
taught were merely symbolic:
John 6:53-58, "So Jesus said to them,
"Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat
the flesh of the Son of man
and drink his blood, you have no life in
you; he who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life,
and I
will raise him up at the last day. For my flesh is food indeed, and my
blood is drink indeed.
He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood abides
in me, and I in him. As the living Father sent me,
and I live because
of the Father, so he who eats me will live because of me. This is the bread
which came
down from heaven, not such as the fathers ate and died; he who
eats this bread will live for ever."
Now
I am in real trouble with several profound eternal salvation questions that have
suddenly come to mind.
How can I have eternal life simply by eating a symbol
of something else?
How can eating a cracker and drinking grape juice give me
eternal life?
I feel as if every word in those verses has come alive.
Jesus said in another verse that He was the truth, and the first two
words of those verses are "Truly, truly",
so how can the rest of those verses be anything
other than absolute truth? Let us read further in John 6.
Here is one that
agrees with how I feel, "This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?" (John
6:60).
That verse made me feel better but this one made me feel worse.
"After this many of his disciples drew back and no longer went about with
him" (John 6:66).
Obviously they did not believe what He had said and so
they left Him. Ouch!
Oh and did you see an ominous sign in that verse number,
the dreaded satanic 666?
Leaving Jesus as they did, no doubt made them
easy targets for Satan.
I want no part of Satan so I must believe
everything that Jesus said in those verses.
"unless you eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his
blood, you have no life in you;
he who eats my flesh and drinks my
blood has eternal life,"
Okay I must
believe it. I do believe it. Begone Satan! I desire that eternal life wih
Jesus.
But how do I eat His flesh and drink His blood? Holy Scripture
must give me the answer to that question.
Oh yes, the Last Supper, where
Jesus said to the Apostles, 'This is my body', and later, 'This is my blood'.
And He added 'Do this in
remembrance of me'. Also I noticed that He did not say
those words to the world
but only to the Apostles who were deemed to be the
earthbound leaders of His Church.
It seems that in every research that I have
done for the truth has ended up with the eternal Church that Jesus Christ
founded.
Have I gotten the message yet? Yes I finally got the message, but I
still have a few questions that beg for answers...
Let us explore the Book of
John. Make sure that you know the context of these
verses.
Look at all of the promises Jesus made to us of sending the Holy
Spirit to guide His Church...
John 14:16-17, "And I will ask the Father and He will give you another
Advocate to dwell with you forever, the Spirit of Truth WHOM THE
WORLD
CANNOT RECEIVE, BECAUSE IT NEITHER SEES HIM NOR KNOWS HIM."
John 14:24-26, "He who does not love me does not keep my words; and the
word which you hear is not mine
but the Father's who sent me. These things I
have spoken to you, while I am still with you. But the Counselor,
the Holy
Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things, and
bring to your
remembrance all that I have said to you."
John 15:26, "But when the
Counselor comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, even the Spirit of
truth,
who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness to me; and
you also are witnesses,
because you have been with me from the
beginning."
John 16:12-15, "I have yet many things to say to you, but you cannot bear
them now.
When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the
truth; for he will not speak on his own authority,
but whatever he hears he
will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come.
He will
glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you. All that the
Father has is mine;
therefore I said that he will take what is mine and
declare it to you."
Context: Again,
to whom was Jesus speaking in those verses?
He was speaking to the Apostles
alone.
Jesus said the Spirit of Truth will dwell with them forever. But wait
a minute! Will the Apostles live forever?
No they all died, so in context, the Spirit
must dwell in the Church which Jesus founded since it alone will live
forever.
Spend some time perusing the following verses, for they are
Biblical proof that His Church will indeed live forever:
2Samuel
7:12-13, Psalms 127:1, Isaiah 2:2, 9:6-7, 41:10-11, 54:11-17,
59:20-21, Daniel 2:44, 6:26, 7:14,
Matthew 16:18, 28:20,
Luke 1:33, John 14:16,18, Acts 5:38-39, Romans 8:31,
Ephesians 3:21, 5:23, Hebrews 12:28.
Have you ever noticed how
many Old Testament verses spoke of the eternal nature of the New Testament
Church?
It is because the Old and New Tesaments are one story of salvation
history. They are intertwined as a great Saint wrote:
"The New Testament lies
hidden in the Old. The Old Testament is revealed in the New."
Saint
Augustine
Ephesians 3:8-10, "To me, though I am the very least of all the
saints, this grace was given, to preach to the
Gentiles the unsearchable
riches of Christ, and to make all men see what is the plan of the mystery
hidden for
ages in God who created all things; THAT THROUGH THE CHURCH
THE MANIFOLD WISDOM OF GOD
MIGHT NOW BE MADE KNOWN to the principalities and
powers in the heavenly places."
Mt 18:15-17, "But if thy brother shall offend against thee, go, and
rebuke him between thee and him alone.
If he shall hear thee, thou shalt
gain thy brother. And if he will not hear thee, take with thee one or two more:
that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may stand. And if he
will not hear them: tell the church.
And if he will not hear the church,
let him be to thee as the heathen and publican."
Those verses could not have been written any
more clearly than they are.
Who has the final authority? Is it man or is it
the Church of GOD?
Recap of this session:
First we learned that
the Holy Spirit will dwell forever in the Church that Jesus Christ
founded.
Then we learned that the Church which Jesus Christ founded will last
for all eternity.
After that we learned that the wisdom of GOD will be
made manifold through that Church.
Finally we learned that it is the Church
which is the final authority.
And just look and remember what those verses
have to say about those who refuse to listen to His Church?
Again, the
question is which Church?
Well now I know that Holy Scripture has said that
there was only one in existence at that time.
It is an easy question to ask,
but now maybe not so hard to answer this time.
Interestingly, so many of
those 40,000+ sects teach that the Church which Jesus Christ founded fell into
apostasy
soon after the last Apostle died. Even of more interest is that not
one of them can provide an exact date or show genuine
historical
documentation to prove that false teaching. There is no Scripture verse that
says the Church would fall
into apostasy but it does say individual followers
will do so. Hmmm! Could that mean those 40,000+ sects are apostates?
Besides
that, they are all Sola Scriptura believers, so how can they possibly explain
away all of those Old and New
Testament verses regarding the guarantee
of the eternal nature of the Church without refuting Holy Scripture
itself?
John 20:22, "When He had said this, He breathed upon them and
said to them,
"Receive the Holy Spirit...""
GOD did indeed give His Church an
infallible interpreter for His infallible Word, the Bible.
And that
infallible interpreter is none other than the Holy Spirit, the third person of
the Holy Trinity.
A thought just came to mind:
Would I rather have a
human interpreter for Holy Scripture for each of those 40,000+ sects,
all of
which claim that the Holy Spirit told them?
OR:
The
Holy Spirit directly through GOD's
Church?
Now, from Holy Scripture I have come to these inescapable conclusions about the only Church that Jesus Christ founded.
1. His Church did not have a human person as its founder since He is GOD.
2. But what is the definition of the word 'person'?
3. I researched the founders of so many denominations, and did not find a single one that had other than a mere human person founder.
That means I must reject all of those that I researched.
Moreover, all of them are only a fraction of the age of the Church that Jesus Christ founded.
4. But after much searching I found this interesting page that shows how to find the Church that Jesus Christ founded
by using four different methods.
I also discovered that none of those sects that I tested could prove to be the true Church by even one of those four methods.
5. His Church existed then after He founded it and it must still exist today almost 2000 years later, as it was His promise.
Of which Church would you rather be a member?
One of those 40,000+ man made sects, the founders each of which had no GOD given authority whatsoever to do so.
OR...
The only Church with GOD given authority, the one which was founded by GOD Himself?
Some final notes...
Ephesians 5:25, "Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the Church, and delivered himself up for her."
Yet once again the text speaks of a singular Church, not churches. Did Christ deliver himself up for 40,000+ splinters
in his body, or as He said three times, 'that they may be one'?
What else did He say?
"He who is not with me is against me, and he who does not gather with me scatters."
Luke 11:23
John 10:16,
"And
other sheep I have that are not of this fold.
Them also I must bring, and
they shall hear My voice,
and there shall be one fold and one
shepherd."
Well, after reading this
Holy Scripture filled lesson, I certainly did get the message this
time.
DID YOU???
Written by Bob Stanley, April 23,
2011
Galations 4:16
