When someone looks at the world of Christianity, there are diverse beliefs about God and the scriptures. It is no different in regard to the range of beliefs about how God answers prayers. I could write a book about it, but my purpose here is to address only a concern about how prayers are answered.
It can be hard for a floundering member of this Church when he/she doubts the doctrines taught by the apostles and prophet, then go out, investigate and compare the doctrines and beliefs of other Christian denominations, especially in terms of how God answers prayers, leading themselves to think that another church or another Christian denomination or group knows more about prayers and God. This usually happens through accounts given by other Christians of how their prayers were answered.
I have heard and read personal accounts of prayers answered from a range of people, both in and out of this Church. I have heard accounts of the results from prayers that range from the mundane to the impressive. From all of that, I heard other Christians claim that God’s Spirit is therefore always within them, as they explain about their answered prayers, believing wholeheartedly that God is working in their life and guiding them. With all the differing accounts, especially from people outside the Church, how can a member discern if what was said is true and prevent getting pulled into the deluge of false claims about God and his Holy Spirit?
The scriptures say that we are to provide a sacrifice to heavenly Father and this can be done in many ways, such as what was said in Romans 12: 1 or Ephesians 5: 2.
The word of God speaks of self-sacrifice, one where we are to subjugate ourselves to the ways of God and to put aside the ways of the world. Some of these “self-sacrifices” refer to placing ourselves into a humbled state, a contrite spiritual state which subjects ourselves to his Spirit (Psalms 51:17), which is also seen in one of the most well known scriptural verses, “..he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it ( Matt. 10:39).”
It is clear that God is telling us to forsake mortal tendencies of life and embark onto a spiritual path and way, but how many really do this as they claim faith in God and his Spirit?
Indulgence or sacrifice?
The battle between being spiritual, the offering of oneself to God, or submitting ourselves to indulgences of the flesh and of the world. How easy it is for anyone of us to loose ourselves in indulgences, big and small and not even think of what we are really doing. Simple things, coffee, chocolate, junk food, cakes, or even drink (speaking generally), this is to name a few.
Think about it. When you fast for two meals, do you not desire to drink and eat? To have that treat, that potato chip, cup of hot chocolate or that slice of pizza? That is an example of the human nature, that of the natural man or woman, the carnal mind and heart, wanting things of the flesh and the world, but when you refuse those desires to continue the fast, then you are spiritual, submitting oneself as a sacrifice to heavenly Father.
Now let us seriously consider as to whether the everyday thing is an indulgence or sacrifice. What things are you doing in your life that would be counted as an indulgence? Having need to eat that chocolate every day, or have that tea every morning, or that need for something that is gained from the world or from the flesh, the pleasures.
It is so easy to get into ideas of “self-pampering”, or “I deserve this” or “treat myself”, etc. These philosophies are taught by many “self-help” gurus that claim this is increasing personal power. How easy the corruption of God’s principles and practices can occur so subtlety and quickly because they appeal to the very thing we all have, that is the “ego” which is where pride resides.
God knew that unless we act in “self-sacrifice” we would be caught up by the world and the flesh, locked into the carnal mind and end up with a heart of stone, spiritually speaking. Self-sacrifice assists us to humble ourselves and develop a contrite spirit, not to submit ourselves to indulgences, but to submit ourselves to the Spirit, which are spiritual things.
The important thing is to learn when things are not an indulgence and when they are. Making excuses to indulgence, even justify it as “free will or choice” is a selfish act because it serves no one but yourself. Athletes know the importance of self-sacrifice when it comes to performance. True they do it to perform better, it is for themselves, but the manner which it is done is the same. They do not indulgence in things that will hamper their “discipline”.
When God said that our bodies must be like a temple, that means we are to develop and maintain our physical nature unto God. Keep healthy, exercise and every so often, subjugate the body to a fast and to spiritual ways and things. Overcoming the things of the flesh is what opens us up to the Spirit, because by subjugating the flesh and the natural man or woman within, putting aside indulgences and excuses to indulge, shifts the body mind and soul into a spiritual focus and all good spiritual focuses are of God, which invites the Spirit. As athletes do this to perform, we can do the same, spiritually speaking for our faith unto God.
So what would it be for your faith, indulgence of sacrifice?
It is unfortunate that so many preachers and teachers of the scriptures exist today, where almost all of them are false, having none of God within them and none of God’s Spirit with them, teaching doctrines favoured by men. Test the spirits of those who speak is crucial to protecting faith. There is no justification to allow false teachings to take hold within your mind and heart, not for any reason, because false teachings are sinful. False teachings are contrived by the carnal mind and the carnal mind will always be an enmity to God. False teachings or false doctrines are not of faith, and this means that anything not of faith is sin. This is how serious false doctrines and teachings are to true faith.
When faced with the countless preachers and teachers out there that profess belief systems and doctrines, how can you ensure that your faith is protected and not infected by these falsehoods? The answer is to test the spirit of those words.
Testing the spirit is not solely by comparing word for word in the Bible, as so many other Christians profess to do. This is not the way Paul the Apostle taught. He made it clear that the letter of the word killeth, only the spirit gives life. This says that to compare the letter of the word for the letter of the word will get nothing in return but darkness and misunderstanding, but to compare the spirit of the word, which words are spirit and they are life, will get truth. This means to learn and exercise spiritual discernment, just as Paul the Apostle teaches. When a person learns the gospel by the revelation of Jesus Christ, he will learn the spiritual meaning and application. Then and only then can a person test the spirits because then it is comparing spiritual with spiritual.
When a person is able to compare rightly, then he/she is “rightly dividing the word“, which gives the power to test the spirits of others and their words, to spiritually discern if they speak God’s word or not. If not, what is said is rejected or treated as “of the world”.
Until that time that you learn to rightly divide the word and spiritually discern, keep one’s faith a distance from preachers, teachers or presenters (famous or not). Staying at a spiritual distance until you work out with God what is true. Never give any person’s words justification, such as “they are just giving provoking thought, or trying to progress, or they are just beginners in a beginner church, etc. Such justifications in your heart and mind weaken faith because sin is justified and God cannot accept sin in any degree. A good Christian, a good Saint speaks respectfully to false speakers, but at no time accepts falsehoods or false doctrines and stands strong in the faith, which can only occur when living the true doctrines of the gospel.
(Note, the words in italics are words matching scriptural passages in the King James Bible)
The new YouTube channel named “Mormon Messages” is online. It has quality videos, excellent messages and teachings. It is good to see the Church is taking advantage of media sources as YouTube. Here is a presentation of hope, to have hope, to endure with hope, to live with hope. When listening to this message, it shows me that unless we have hope, faith will falter.
Hope is not just having a manner of faith that all will be OK in the face of despair, but hope applies to every part of life and faith. Hope is to have the intent that things will be fulfilled and I can see in this, that hope to receive spiritual guidance from the Holy Ghost is that very thing, or hope that you will receive a true spiritual testimony, or to receive further spiritual testimony and understanding of the gospel.
To some these things are easy, to others they need to make the effort, but when there is a loss of hope, a different kind of despair occurs and I will call it the faith of despair, which is despair in faith. Without hope a person will fall from faith and loose their connection with God. Sort of makes one wonder if that is what happened to members who left the Church?
Here is the video on hope from the Lord’s apostle Dieter F. Uchtdorf.
The link is here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UbsU3b2srQA
I was alerted to this video by a friend who received it by e-mail. I located it on YouTube entitled, “How would you introduce Christ to a room full of people???“. As I watched it, I found the timing of this interesting since I posted a blog article about this very thing – “God’s Work, Always in Faith“. I spoke of how God does his work and anything he promotes will never be to appease or please the vanity of people, or even use such things to promote himself, his gospel, his salvation and be assured that any fanfare that appears in the name of Jesus Christ is not of him neither can it be for him.
This video portrayed the exact thing I was speaking about in the recent article about God’s work. I ask you to watch this video, it is a short one. The performance is by Steve Harvey, a actor and comedian who stood on stage to speak about Jesus Christ. Look at this video before you read on.
You really should to to their website. At the bottom of the web page is an audio player and their lyrics are really good, especially the “little old lady with a fractured femur”.
This easily happens in the world, where sinful behaviour and acts are justified. Acts as lying, sometimes called “white lies”, deceitfulness justified by the word “crafty”, manipulation justified in the idea of “it was just business, not personal”, or any other sin that man in the world commits and the millions of rationalizations the world attaches to it. These are the obvious justifications of sin, the evil of the world and of the flesh. Why then am I speaking about something that appears to be obvious to even the world? It is because I am using their bad example to lead into the practice of justifying sin in the name of Christian-hood.
Have I caught your interest?
I have seen this all too often, where justification of wickedness, sin or wrong is done in the name of “good will” toward others. Even using the examples of Jesus Christ to justify this idle philosophy. I use the word “idle” because it is a choice and act that forsakes righteousness and in the absence of righteousness, there is no Christianity as Jesus taught it and showed example by it.
There is no work that God does that is not by or for faith. Any work that is by popularity, or by fame or by popular acceptance is not the work of God but is the work of man. God requires faith and to have this faith, the gospel, its truths, faith must be present. Anything other than that is not of God and not of his gospel, which is the basis of calling something another gospel.
God does not gain faith through popularity, exciting things, fanfare, celebrities, neither does he entice anyone toward him through or by any of those things. For God to use those things means that God is a god of fanfare, or popularity, celebrity show or any of these kind of things.
The first commandment should have made that clear to people, but sad to say that people are still believing that all those things are part of God’s Church, gospel or his doctrines. I speak in a general application to the communities of Christians, not specifically to this Church.
There are some who believe and feel within the Christian communities that we are not to judge other beliefs or faith. When something is said about someone’s beliefs or faith, the retort given is “we cannot judge them”. This can be especially disconcerting when the matter at hand has to do with determining the value or truth of another person’s faith or beliefs. It seems by this, that nothing can be said or determined in order to avert false beliefs and false faiths, that we would then, by this restriction of not judging another, would likely have to accept false beliefs or faiths.
It is true, in the Bible, that we are to be careful about judging one another, as per Romans 2:1, but this passage does not prohibit judgement, it clarifies bad judgment. In Romans 2:1, Paul is speaking to the Romans and as anyone should see, the context which Paul is addressing are bad judgments from wicked people. In another part of the Bible, John 7:24, we are to make righteous judgment. So what of this concern by some that we are not to judge the faith or beliefs of another? In particular, if these faiths or beliefs are subject of condemnation?
The idea or philosophy that we are not to judge others because that belongs to God, goes against the Bible itself. The dilemma occurs when a person fails to understand the scriptures and what God has really done in what he has revealed to us. Poor interpretation, poor understanding, abiding in false doctrines or personal philosophies cannot and will not allow that person to properly understand the word of God, his gospel and what God has given as his will through revelation.
This shortcoming of many, both in and out of the Church, causes many to falter and fall from faith and even fail a good relationship with God. Failing in a good relationship with God occurs when a person falls to false beliefs, doctrines or personal philosophies that are of the world and because of these things, a relationship of God is affected and diminished (John 8:47), all because that person is not able to exercise God’s judgments against false beliefs, doctrines, philosophies and ideas!
We know of good intelligence and bad. We usually equate intelligence with science or some scholarly knowledge about some subject. Intelligence, people believe, is the ability to figure out problems or devise things that no one else cannot. Intelligence is even equated to those who are crafty, smarter than another to overcome obstacles or make intricate plans. Intelligence is even attributed to the ability to figure out the Rubrics Cube on the first try.
There is one intelligence that no one really pays any attention to and in fact would consider this one as foolish or useless. This is because, this particular intelligence does not seek to “gain” something as the other ones will. With the others, there is notoriety, fame, appeal, importance, even financial advantage. The intelligence that speak of here in this article gains none of those things, because the moment you do, it is no longer that intelligence.
I speak about Intelligence of Good. The ability to know true good and exercise it no matter the circumstance.
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