I had intended for the previous posting to be my only message on why the prayers of church go unanswered.  However, as He is wont to do, the all-knowing Lord arranged for me to be in the right place at the right time, resulting in a change of plans. This has “happened” so many times I am no longer surprised.  Sometimes I say things I did not knew I knew.  When this happens I am the most shocked person in the room.  God, who lives within me in the form of His Holy Spirit, knows and, at the right time, proclaims what He knows through my unsuspecting vocal system.  Why He uses me remains a mystery.  However, those proclamations make me look good.  In my case, looks are definitely deceiving.  I just remind myself of what  Jesus said in Luke 18:19–only God is good.  Our goodness, holiness, righteousness exists only because we obey His Word through the power of the Holy Spirit.  He tells us what to do and empowers us to do it.  Goodness, holiness, etc. is ours for the obeying.  We must will to obey Him and follow through on that decision while depending totally on the Holy Spirit to tell us what to obey (God’s Word) and providing the power (Holy Spirit) to obey it.  Our part is to will to obey Him, then, by the power of the Holy Spirit, do it.  WE ARE NOT TO OBEY MAN.  This is the Truth that prompted this posting.

Upon finishing part one and thinking that I had finished my assignment, I soon found myself in one of those “right time, right place” situations, in fact two of them within a day or so.  I saw on YouTube a segment on a particular “Christian” church that is anything but Christian.  The speaker was a faith-and-grace-only enthusiest who was railing against the concept of “WORKS” relative to salvation.  Knowing the Lord’s Words on the subject, I listened to the false prophet as he made the God who supposedly saved him out to be the world’s most prolific liar.  I could only take so much of him and didn’t finish the segment.

Only a day or so earlier I inadvertently heard a former governmental official-turned-Bible-scholar say that God was not concerned about what we do in our daily lives, that man’s so-called sins were irrelevant to Him.  According to this reprobate, the Lord is only interested in man belief process.  According to this self-proclaimed Bible expert, what man does, says or thinks is not important.  The only relevant consideration was: DOES ONE RECOGNIZE JESUS AS ONE’S SAVIOR?  If one does so, how one conducts one’s life is irrelevant.  The theme is “Come as you are, stay as you are.”  Taking Jesus as one’s personal Savior guaranteed salvation.  Anything beyond faith is considered “WORKS” which God supposedly rejects.  According to both men I had heard, anything beyond faith in God was legalism, which is supposedly anathema to the Almighty.  This in spite of God telling us that “SIN IS THE TRANSGRESSION OF THE LAW,” that “IN HIM (GOD) IS NO SIN,” that “WHOSOEVER SINS HAS NEITHER SEEN GOD NOR KNOWS HIM” AND “WHOSOEVER SINS IS OF THE DEVIL” (1 Jn. 3:4-7).  That, these two Bible experts tell us, is nothing more than legalism.  The problem is that they are not alone.  They are, at present, joined by approximately 2.5 billion other “Christians” known globally as “the church.”

As I was questioning the Lord yesterday and this morning about what to do with what I had heard He prompted me to include another posting on the subject of unanswered prayer.  Just moments ago He confirmed His instructions when I read an article through which He spoke to me again on the subject.  With that foundation laid, let us hear what the Lord says in His Word concerning the source of the messages the two men had spoken.  Bear in mind that both of them claimed to be speaking “God’s Truth.”  However, the source of their messages was the source of most church “truths”–MAN.  Just as Jesus told Peter, unconverted man receives his supposed truths directly from Satan (Mat. 16:23).  Well-meaning though deceived man then proclaims those “truths” to people who accept them as God’s Truths due to self-induced ignorance of His Word.  Knowing only Biblical “headlines” and refusing to study the ultra-important “fineprint,” salvation seekers are low-hanging fruit for Satan who uses his false prophets to harvest a continuous crop.

It is a proven fact that every group within professing Christendom was started by a human being in search of a following.  What Catholic and Protestant people “know” as truth is what other men have told them is truth.  God has much to say about this death-producing generationally-spread error.  Let us examine some of His Truths concerning this subject.

First, let us establish one of God’s Truths: THERE IS NO HOPE IN MAN.  The foundational principles of “the church” are based on man’s (Satan’s) interpretations of God’s Word.  The Introduction to this website lists a number of lies put forth as God’s Truths by the “angel of light” (Satan) through his “ministers of righteousness” (false prophets)–2 Corinthians 11:13-15.  Jesus warned that this would happen in Matthew 24:4,5 if man did not “Take heed.”  Led by the devil, religious man has failed to do so.  It is so much easier to take the word of others.  The result is that CHURCH PEOPLE TRUST IN THEIR LEADERS TO TELL THEM GOD’S TRUTH.  THE SO-CALLED “TRUTH OF GOD” THEY HEAR COMES NOT FROM THE GOD OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURES, BUT FROM THE GOD OF THIS WORLD–SATAN.  Jesus warns us in Revelation 12:9 that Satan has deceived the whole world, including the church world.  This ministry exists to warn the Institutional Church of this fact which is proclaimed from Genesis to Revelation.

In Jeremiah 17:5 God warns those who seek Him that: “Cursed is the man who trusts in man …, whose heart has departed from the Lord.” Then in verse 7 He says: “…blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose hope is in Him.”  Jesus later speaks to this Truth in Matthew 25:41 where He warns that on the Day of Judgment He will say to those whose hearts had departed from Him: “Depart from Me, you cursed in to everlasting fire ….”  Notice that when man places his trust in man, his heart (mind) departs from God.  This is why I include Scriptural references when I speak or write.  I do not want anyone to trust in me.  Go to the Source of Truth–God and His Word.  Using that Truth, test me to see if what I say or write is Scriptural.  You are commanded to do this in 2 Timothy 2:15; 3:14-16/1 Jn. 4:1/ 1 Thessalonians 5:21.  L.J.