Growing Beyond Apostasy & Other Meditations

© 2006 R.A. Feller. All Rights Reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

First published by AuthorHouse 01/16/06

ISBN: 1-4208-0202-X (sc)

ISBN: 9781463458430 (ebk)

Printed in the United States of America

Bloomington, Indiana

Contents

Apostasy

About the Author

What has happened to me due to my ignorance in spiritual matters has cost me a great deal, but I have gained alot of understanding in sorting out where the roots in which I was drawing originated. When we go to the Bible to get a need met and are unfamiliar with where to look, we might find it reader unfriendly and put it away on a shelf with no redeeming value. However; by having a desire to meet God, the person of this book, you will meet him a little at a time and discover that His words speak for you to learn of whom you are following.

If you search for me with all your heart you will find me. I’ve found God to be patient, kind, gentle and just within His love. I’ve learned to relate to Him within His pattern to where He has made me glad. Christ, who now permeates my mind in this matter, is my portion to you. I’ve learned that the majority’s rule, which can seem to be so right, does not overrule the Spirit of Jesus Christ. We can always be wrong when we’ve not been trained to know how to recognize the true voice of Christ which alone is right. Now, Study to show thyself approved.

This book is a series of select meditations, shared for you to examine and reflect upon. You will find substance here; the kind which will help you by strengthening through encouragement and establish further your ongoing relationship with Jesus Christ.

Apostasy

After an exhilarating praise and worship service and progress report of missionary work, came a short sermon on the goodness and blessing of the Lord. Sin was mentioned, being separated from God was mentioned, getting right with God was mentioned, and then an altar call was given. I watched as five people, three of them crying with a genuine touch of God upon them, were led in prayer into an apostate religion. Jesus said, ‘Let no one mislead you, for many will come in my name saying I am He. Satan comes as an angel of darkness disguised as an angel of light and would deceive, if possible, even the very elect." In sharing through insight and my own experiences; I intend, with God’s guidance, to expose this dark false apostate light.

Let me explain: Christ is the reason for our rejoicing; He’s the one who takes us from where we’ve been to where we can trust Him to take us to next. A creature cannot refashion its own body, only the Creator can do this; the creature must rely on God, know that He is and is able to bring about change to that which He created. When someone introduces to you a ‘Jesus’ where self effort brings about change beyond grace, which is ‘God’s free gift to us ‘His Son’ (see John 3:16), we go astray. We are creatures of habit, who have been grown into many types of dark structures. One such structure we are used to is self effort which has ties with honoring God’s laws of conscience. Here a free gift from God does not easily register, so we stay in a two party covenant and are unable to receive His grace. It is beyond our comprehension until God, by His law of grace, reveals it to us as we search Him out, to the point of seeing the context of what the Bible is saying over all the other messages being conveyed to us. This includes some verses that were just picked out to prove someone else’s point. I believe that if we lose our peace with God while defending a position of truth, something is going to rise up on the inside of us and Jesus will not govern or reign over this kind of kingdom. If we extend ourselves off of our base, who is Christ, we take authority with our own best self efforts. Even if it is to speak the truth, truth without love for your relationship between God and yourself equates to a lie. Love + truth must bring you to the kind of light that draws you nearer to God and not further away. Oh look what I did, I’ve proved my point! The ‘self’ gets inflated here and God is not exalted. It is in humility where God is recognized; people see his love and want to know Him for it. It is by grace when the false structure of self effort crumbles which unveils before us to see God’s way and build with Him. With a clearer understanding of the spectrum of grace realized, it sets the stage for the perpetual revelation of that to which we’re joined. Everything stems from grace. God’s restoration, love, truth, light, salvation, forgiveness, all of creation, His word, His very being, our feelings, the heavens and the earth could not be contained for all that could be said about God’s amazing grace towards us.

Without grace it is left up to you to honor God’s word to keep your conscience clear as a way for salvation. The newness of the Spirit of God within us becomes quenched when we do not allow God to work His law in us by grace. It is the goodness of God which leads to repentance. Making confused decisions occurs with the roots of lies like weeds sticking in our heads. The mirror is dim when we cannot see what the end of the root is connected to in the dark. Clear the mind, pray for light to pull the weeds, and Christ shall bring all into focus with his love, and then we will grow beyond apostasy. He’s the type of merciful God you’d want to know intimately and be married to forever. There’s so much of God’s Being through grace to share, yet so many focus on the cork of the bottle and never pull it out to have a full drink of the knowledge of His grace to receive His incomprehensible blessings. Thrill seekers usually never get beyond the hype of excitement because they’re looking to feed their flesh and miss Christ’s Spirit. In churches, where the focus is on sin all the time, there is a ‘Repent and get right with God or else attitude’. Great damage is done because fear keeps people away from receiving God’s love, mercy, and grace which would bond us together with the Father through the power of Christ in us; our hope of glory and healing throughout the process. With fear as my role model, I raised up my own standard which was to obey the law with a cart blanche grace. I would apply it towards repentance to be right with God and continue on with my own self effort every time; I broke away from my self imposed standard, which in my confused state, is what I thought was the intention of grace. I was blind to God’s gift of eternal life. I could say the words and go through the motions, but was at a loss to be able to bond together with Christ. I became elevated above other people in my own eyes which only made me self righteous, I’m keeping the law so you had better listen to me, was my inner voice and in this frame of mind I would give other people the ‘Spanish Inquisition’. Self effort with an ‘earn your way to heaven attitude’ does not honor God in relating with Him. This is why we need a savior to bring us together in meditation as we seek Him. Here we will find He is able to deliver us, it is here we learn of God’s loving grace. Rather than wait on God’s timing and be woven into the fabric of His body with Christ at the head in the bond of unity in His love, we end up following the traditions of men where we’d just sign a contract to team up with God. Thank-You God, for I know that it is by grace that I have gotten off of this roller coaster, now truly as a part of Your body Lord Jesus, I know your peace from my relationship with You in place of holding a ticket while waiting on line to get into heaven.

It may be you’ve been misled into pleading the blood of Jesus over you to sanctify your efforts to God that you’d serve Him with your own strength, but the cost of going all the way with Jesus is not up to what you can do. Nor is it to change your behavior on your own power by coming up with a formula to use the power of God to obey Him. Again, the weight being shifted to honor what you can do in the flesh, while leaving the roots that are grounded through grace in a love relationship with God out. Statements like, Now you’ll have the devil on the run, supports servitude of God in a self centered manner. We should not do things out of trying to be righteous. We only reinforce darkness and get in the way of the light of Christ who wants to reveal His truth and love to us. Trying to save yourself by applying God’s word with your strength goes against God’s Spirit of grace and is of an antichrist spirit. (NOW THAT YOU HAVE CHRIST YOU CAN TAKE ON THE WORLD). Christ will do the work in you and is faithful to complete it. Christ‘s centeredness is left out of the picture. Through salvation, Christ is in us, His righteousness already paves the way. If we take the time to be in touch with Him, we’ll find in our being and in His care He is the one who motivates us, as His love is what raises us. It’s not only about searching the scriptures, it’s about holding onto what God has shown us and drawing from the root which introduced us into a relationship with a living breathing being person in which we remain joined to in the first place. His name is Jesus Christ; seek to know Him first and He will guide you. Take a long honeymoon in scriptures until you fully understand the new covenant, or your enthusiasm may take you anywhere the wind should blow, even outside the structure of the Holy Spirit who would keep you focused on Christ. As you keep studying, you will grow to know Christ better then any false doctrines that you’d encounter. By continually searching out the Bible as a whole book, you’ll be able to see when someone tries to put a few scriptures together that are out of context, making false claims that would ordinarily put you, and all who follow this lead, on a false path. You’ll have an established relationship and know to trust Christ’s love to hold you in place. Unless the Lord builds the house, they that labor, labor in vain. How else are we going to learn of Christ but by the Spirit of His word. We’re to be at peace and wait on God to reveal Himself by being kept in remembrance of His goodness and only then are we truly found to be thankful. In this way all may know Him better and be brought together in one mind, in one Spirit, in one body and in one accord as we’ve surrendered our self control; where we humbly submit ourselves to God’s power to build us into His image.

Where would we be without going to Christ to meet us everyday? He shows us the path where God increases His life in us everyday. God further meets us as He renews and transforms us through the power of Jesus Christ, by resisting the proud, yet giving grace to the humble. Once rooted and grounded in the love of God we’re able to grow with Christ in us who has now become our hope of glory. Jesus uproots all the darkness from the power of sin, revealing to us it’s presence in our lives, that we may humbly ask Him to remove it along with the bad effects it has on our lives; leaving us free so we can grow deeper in the riches of Christ all the more.

Believers (another name for priests) say they have faith in Jesus and then go on about other things leaving Jesus out of the picture. Or they walk obeying God without a love relationship with Him. This ought not to be as they are neglectful and their obedience is to law over sin and death, which as a reminder deals with self effort, and is off the path of the Law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus. The law of sin and death triumphed over God’s law that is why we need a savior. Also, never get so focused on what God has already made apart of you that it becomes an idol and a stumbling block that may keep you from reflecting fresh revelation of Christ towards further growth, which would reveal what God would want to bless you with next; more of Him, His love, and less of your strife. God by His Spirit has the power to quicken what He has done for you as a testimony within the peace of His own timing, but do drink in the full reality of the grace which He has bestowed upon you and treasure it in your heart by the flame, which is His light, which causes it to glisten. A word of caution, you’re to grow from glory to glory not run ahead and lose sight of God in the process. You don’t have to be fearful of letting go to move on to deeper growth. God has brought you thus far and in spite of the goats that may be holding you back, He will see you through. If you get outside of God’s pattern by wandering away from His path, and come to know that you’re out of touch with Him and life has become unbearable again, know this answer in the midst of your carrying your own load - God’s call is to follow His LOVE ‘JESUS’ only, or reaching a deeper spiritual purpose might be prolonged. The Israelites had to spend an extra forty years in the desert before their children would inherit the promise land because of their disbelief. Although Caleb and Joshua held the promise alive in their hearts, as they inherited, this faith kept them till they finally entered the land. When a besetting fear, like letting go of your control to take hold of grace, lands you on a downward spiral as anxiety bangs at the door; remember fear has torment and will keep you locked on a spiritually abusive path. At this point an individual will feel it is up to them to carry the load, and may become blind to the renewal through Christ. But through God’s patience, as grace keeps the heart searching, one can find the new exceeding beauty of the next grace embrace as it moves deeper into His kingdom.

Luke 38:42: As Jesus and His disciples were on their way, He came to a village where a woman named Martha opened her home to Him. She had a sister named Mary who sat at the Lord’s feet listening to what He said. But Martha was distracted with all the preparations that had to be made. She came to Him and asked, Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her to help me!

Martha, Martha, the Lord answered, You are worried and upset about many things, but only one thing is needed. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.

Although Martha wanted everything to look alright for her guest of honor, as she invited Jesus into her home, she kept busy to justify being locked in the ways of her own world. Maybe in her busyness she was trying to get His attention. I wonder what would have happened if she asked Jesus for help instead of pointing the finger at somebody else when she saw her plans were not working out? Whereas I picture Mary as a true believer, for not only was she aware that Jesus was in the home, but in her heart to receive His love as well. I believe that self effort gives way to trust as one proves themselves to be faithful in searching Christ out; then when we grow, only love will remain to keep us committed in any true relationship.

Whenever there’s a lack of trust we need direction. God’s word needs to be studied for clarity in love for love to take place. Otherwise, through deception, we take our eyes from Christ and follow the rituals of men who have become wise in their own eyes. The blessing of salvation becomes bondage as we wear ourselves out running from one experience to the next, in which we try to feel good. We’re looking for God’s Spirit, through Jesus Christ, to satisfy our soul, but we’ve been trained in counterfeit spirituality which feeds the flesh and frustrates our efforts