John 10:7 Then Jesus said to them again, “Most assuredly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep.

Many churches, even well known ones, have attempted to replace Jesus as the door of the sheep. They’ll come across as religious, pious, complete with smoke, incense, prayer, altars, etc. to hide this fact.

Here in John 10, Jesus confronted a world religion mainly the Pharisees who did attempt for decades and decades to replace the person and work of the Messiah by which they implemented their own system of justice and salvation. Mind you, they didn’t eliminate God’s laws, but they went much further and invented new traditions and laws. They did so in my view because knowing that keeping the law, albeit to a subjective level, was never going to be enough, they would replace the Messiah with a new law and delusionally thought God would accept this.

So when the Messiah came and looked them straight in the eyes and said “I am the door of the sheep, not you or your religious system”, that was what sent them into a frenzy as they then sought to kill Jesus. They did NOT like this one bit, as if they were not this door for God’s sheep, they’d be out of business. Their control over sinners would be squashed.

The Pharisees understood that only God could forgive sins, and here was Jesus claiming He was this God. “How DARE He”, they thought, because the god they invented had they as his executioner and door for the sheep. So they needed to get rid of this guy, or the sheep would hear and believe Him and directly be forgiven, there would be no further need for their temple tax system either. The unreachable salvation carrots they put in front of the sinner’s nose would be gone if Jesus had His way.

Many modern religions also have attempted to replace Jesus. Look no further than the Catholic Church, the Mormon church, the Jehovah Witnesses, and others who say they are modern day replacements in their theology. They claim to be the door of the sheep, and tell the sinner “we are Jesus’ live in person representative”, knowing mankind naturally needs to see in order to believe, knowing that sinners are lost and need hope.

So hooking the sinner into their cult like systems is easy by just stating “in order to be forgiven of your sins, we MUST do this for you”. The sinner being duped just like the Pharisees did to their flock, becomes then dependent on their system for a perceived salvation. They really don’t want to go to hell, so they’ll buy anything without discerning who the door is for their forgiveness really is. And His name is Jesus Christ, the ONLY door, the ONLY way to salvation, He is the DOOR, not a church!

Are you locked into a system which holds your forgiveness hostage?? Answer this question honestly. Because there’s just one path to forgiveness, and it is directly going by faith alone to Jesus Christ!! He turns NO sheep away nor does He lose any granted to Him! Stop wasting time, and start believing!

If you open a Bible and it seems like a convoluted complicated mess, there is a reason. While God’s word is readily available to every living soul, it isn’t going to make sense to everyone. God is behind this, as He is the only One who will allow enlightenment.

So who does God enlighten? That is of His counsel alone, to His will, to His purpose. When does God do this? Again it would be to His timing alone, but it happens when He regenerates a fallen sinner’s heart. I can say in my case, before that point, I really understood NOTHING. Based on pride, I was reading INTO the Bible everything I wanted it to say.

Upon my regeneration, God said “STOP, and learn”. And it was then, while I thought I knew everything, I realized I knew nothing at all. But then the Bible starting making sense. The words were literally jumping off the page as I asked myself “why didn’t I see this before!”.

But the learning never stops, God will keep teaching and applying His word so that while one day it might mean an application for one thing, and the next year He’ll add more to this application. Again, all to His purpose and will.

Some will have a fast track, some will need to proceed slower. Again, if you are trusting that it is God teaching you, that trust means He will only let you learn what He wants you to learn. So try and not get frustrated as in this lifetime we’ll NEVER know everything.

ONE HUGE TIP!

What I learned from God is that you MUST, I repeat MUST view God as sovereign when you read and study His word. This means He is the Authority, you are the servant. There is no “co-teachers” or “cooperation” or “collaboration” when it comes to His word. So this means every teaching you hear or learn from others is BELOW God’s word in authority. If you place it above? Well, vast areas of Scripture will NOT MAKE SENSE.

And lastly NEVER, I repeat NEVER interject what your heart personally wants Scripture to say. Born in sin, our hearts are “deceitful above all things, and desperately sick” (Jer. 17:9). So this means a complete surrender to what God has said, NOT what you want Him to say. By doing surrendering this way, be prepared for a JOYFUL enlightenment! You will most likely say as I did “why didn’t I see that before!”. You will grow to really love God’s word and see a systematic string all throughout, and that is the person and work of Jesus Christ, God’s redemptive plan, God’s purposes, and a revelation of who He is.

The common theme throughout the years is that America is predominantly a Christian nation. But let’s analyze a few things in today’s society to discern this theme.

While it is true, that the nation was founded on Christian principles “in God we trust”, and whose founders implemented those the moral and virtuous theme of Christianity into the constitution and founding principles, America is hardly a Christian nation.

Look no further than the murder of the unborn. A nation whose zeal, whose desire was to call abortion good and pro-life principles evil cannot be “Christian” no matter the rationalization. Look at the zeal for immoral lifestyles, where the highly degenerate Kardashian family gets much more press and attention than any actual Christian family. Look at the zeal for living for self, and how sports teams squash any following of Jesus Christ. Look at how actual Christians are treated.

Look! If hypothetically Jesus Christ Himself ran for political office in the United States, He wouldn’t make it out of the primaries. Jesus would summarily dismissed as an “extremist” or “domestic terrorist” and most likely labeled a “racist”. You think the Pharisees and scribes persecuted Him, well there would be NO comparison on how He’d be tortured, threatened, and persecuted by a modern day America.

And don’t me get wrong, several churches would join in on the persecution, they’d call Jesus an “intolerant bigot”. They’d call His doctrines “unloving” and “hateful”, and like the Pharisees of old would most likely be the ones calling on the secular authorities to arrest Him and put Him to death!

So is America a Christian nation? Hardly!

Psalm 14:1 “The fool has said in his heart, “There is no God.” They are corrupt, They have done abominable works, There is none who does good.”

Believe it or not, but every human being born after Adam less Jesus Christ, was born a real fool. We naturally lie to our hearts and say “there is no God” and would live out the rest of our lives this way unless God intervenes.

And unless that intervention comes, we delusionally continue to lie and then attempt to become our own god. We make the rules for right and wrong, we decide what is ethical, moral, and good. We decided what is sin as well. This is why the Psalmist says “there is none who does good”, because “goodness” compared to a holy God is an unachievable endeavor.

The real fools are those who will continue to say “there is no God” until their dying breath. Only then to discover that absolutely EVERYTHING they ever accomplished in this life including the very breath they too was all given by God. They never realized that God sent them their spouse and children, their jobs, their provision, the many good things, as their deluded fallen hearts told them they created this through their own will and exertion.

What a regret that day will be! To finally realize the TRUTH, that the Almighty God is sovereign. And as mentioned, we ALL have been fools. Just because God intervened doesn’t dismiss the fact that if saved, you were a deadly fool as well. Some forget this fact, or try to portray themselves as never having been real fools as anyone else.

And let’s be clear as well, if you are trying to save yourself by your “goodness”, it doesn’t matter how much lip service you give to God, you are actually saying IN YOUR HEART, “there is no God”. You invented a god to suit yourself most likely through a world religion such as Roman Catholicism or other religions who use the humanistic “goodness scale” to determine who goes to heaven and who goes to hell. Whereas God is using His own scale, which is His holiness compared to everyone else.

Jesus Christ is the only who has met the “goodness” standard, and there is just one way to eternal life, it is through His person and work alone! Place your faith alone in Him!

Colossians 1:5 because of the hope which is laid up for you in heaven, of which you heard before in the word of the truth of the gospel

Sometimes it is rather easy to get caught up in the fallen world’s troubles. Finances, relationships, politics, etc can be a temptation to make one believe that this is all there is. It is the devil’s joy when we give up hope on heaven.

Heaven isn’t a temporary place, it is eternal. There is no disease, there are no deadly storms, there is no 401K which is failing, no car accidents, no hospitals, there is no murder, rape, theft, adultery, lying, cheating, slandering, maligning, depression, anxiety, nor is there anger. Heaven is a total peace and joy one will never experience here on earth.

There are times I believe God gives us a mere glimpse of heaven, when we realize a total peace and rest for a small time, by which many have said “this is heaven on earth”. But we really won’t know the enormity of that peace and rest until we reach heaven, and those days where we said this will not even come close.

If you do believe in God and His promises, He said He will “wipe every tear away”, meaning you will never feel sad about anything again nor will you regret. How He does this? Well that is His counsel, not ours. But be prepared to be completely blown away! This is the hope for heaven, every Christian has, as we will see our Savior Jesus Christ face to face. And how JOYFUL that day will be! To see the One who died for us in person! It will be overwhelming!

If you do not have a hope for heaven, you are lost and blind. You are stuck in this fallen place and hell is your end. And like heaven, hell on earth will not even come close to the actual hell. All those things I mentioned, storms and sins will never cease and will be amplified to a never ending agony. There is no hope, no joy, no peace, and certainly NO rest as you are tormented day and night.

God doesn’t given second chances, once we perish it is either heaven or hell. And since we all have SINNED against Him, there is just one destination we are born with, that is hell. But because He is merciful, He provided a Savior Jesus Christ who can save you from His wrath. By placing your faith alone in Him for the forgiveness of your sins, the only hope you are granted with is eternal life with Him! An awesome HOPE!

Acts 17:24 God, who made the world and everything in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands.

Every person no matter their position, belief, religion, age, gender, race, has a god in their life. The question is who is that god. Is it the Almighty God, or an invented god which is often times that person who looks themselves in the mirror.

The vast majority of the fallen world has a god unto themselves. This god is subjective, has an unstable moral compass, and whether you believe he exists or not is guided by none other than Satan himself. This fictional god’s doctrines are “you be you”, “be your own truth”, “you only live once”, “be your best you”, “believe in yourself” as each doctrine will focus on self. You see this with famous people, politicians, common people, and even those who call themselves “Christian”.

Go to any bookstore, if they still exist, and in the self-help section you will see book after book, teaching this secular self god doctrine. What are the fruits of this religion? Narcissism, selfishness, deadly pride, bitterness, loneliness, depression, anxiety, stress, anger, and vast ignorance. With each of its doctrines producing another deathly fruit.

The fact is, if you are a god unto yourself, you have no real moral compass, you are unstable in every way. Now you might be able to give the impression by worldly success that this fallen religion is making you happy, but internally you know it is fleeting. Some really do stupidly believe they beat the Almighty God at His own sovereignty. That they cured their own cancer, they achieved their success by their self driven motivation, they have a great family because they worked harder than most. Only then to realize in the end, darkness and torment in a place called hell.

Some who do believe in a higher power, the actual God, believe He can be harnessed and controlled. We see this in world religions where they attempt to say God ONLY dwells in temples made by humans. So outside that “church”, they believe they are free of Him never realizing that God is everywhere all at once. No one is outside of His sovereignty. Yes, even in evil circumstances, God is in control in that He is restraining a even worse evil which could take place. Some have this notion that evil in effect controls God? That is not the God of Scripture!

And once you get to this understanding, a real healthy fear of God should be realized. That in every aspect of human life, God is in control, completely sovereign. Now I am not saying He is responsible or that He causes evil which is the ignorant strawman used against His sovereignty. The premise is that humans born after Adam are totally rotten in sin, and evil/lust is their natural desire. God doesn’t have to make one do evil, you desire is evil. NOW see it as God restraining what you are actually capable of, and you might just understand His mercy and grace.

So who is your God? Again, everyone has a god, the question is who that god is. Because the truth is, there is an Almighty God, sovereign, omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent who will never be defeated. His ways are not human ways. His justice is perfect, His mercy and grace are never-ending, He never breaks a promise, never changes a promise, never will be defeated by evil, the God who can snuff you out in second if it was His will to do so. Lastly He is a God of pure LOVE, not human type of love, but His love is perfect, it never changes, it holds no grudge, it is always unconditional. A love SO GREAT that He sent His only Son Jesus Christ to die for YOU if you so believe in Him, so that you could live eternally with Him. A pure sacrifice for you! He created the whole universe with just one spoken word.

Or will you continue to believe you are the god of your life? Compare what I said about the actual Almighty God to yourself, what do you see?

The Apostle Paul writes in 1 Cor 15:14 that if Christ didn’t rise from the dead, faith in Him would be all for not, that any preaching about Him and faith in Him would be “empty”. Christianity worships the RISEN Christ!

But Jesus did rise from the dead! And there is clear undeniable evidence of this that even the most hardened atheist has a hard time disputing from a logic level. You see, up until Jesus incarnation, death, and His resurrection, many false Messiahs said they were the “Promised One”. The perished, they didn’t fulfill a thing, so people then looked for the next one. Now Scripture doesn’t name them specifically, but based on man’s depraved nature we can presume there were many.

All we need to do is see the televangelists today to realize that if Jesus didn’t rise from the dead, and we were still waiting a Messiah, one can just imagine all the “tele-Jesus” that would be out there through the centuries claiming to be Messiah. They would do this mainly for the money, the popularity, etc. And like the false Messiahs which came before Jesus, they would perish and leave their flock disappointed.

And from another logic standpoint, imagine if Jesus didn’t rise from the dead. Ask yourself why those disciples would not have just left Christianity in the dust instead of marching towards their own death and constant persecution. They had nothing to gain but an ignorant suicide mission if that was the case. But they saw Jesus with their own eyes, walking with them, talking to them, eating with them.

And let’s say from a further logic standpoint, that the disciples were just delusional, they believed a lie and this Jesus was a farce, why didn’t Christianity die out then in the first or even second century? Because logic says it would have. But rather we see the Gospel stronger than ever in 2023! So again, while an atheist might externally protest the notion of Jesus, and other world religions such as Islam and Judaism denying Him as the Messiah, internally they can’t get past the fact that the Gospel is still progressing.

So the logical fact is that if Christianity was a lie, and the faith in Jesus was empty, it surely would have died out almost immediately. And consider this? Think of all those religions which OPPOSE Jesus in every respect, after 2,000 years they would have discovered a tomb with His bones, but no such discovery has ever been made, nor is there even an attempt to do so because He DID rise! My Dad used to say “if two or more people know about a crime, that eventually it will come to light”. So in the case of Jesus, if the disciples were lying, at least one would have broken and told the truth, that the story of Jesus rising was all made up.

The Resurrection by which the world celebrates “EASTER”, has never been disproven. Let that sink in! The advancements with science and technology, the fact that writings during the time all could have disproved this event all have come up empty.

Jesus sacrifice on the Cross to propitiate the sins of His children did happen and the confirmation of this was the Resurrection! Without this Resurrection, no one could be saved because Jesus would have not been who He said He was, the promised Messiah. This confirmation is the epitome of the Christian faith! This is why the Resurrection matters! Jesus rose from the dead just as He promised, He will come again but this time not to atone for sin, but to do away with it for an eternity! Those not in Him, those who fail to place their faith alone in Him with suffer an eternal torment. Those placed in Him will live with Him for an eternity in glory!

“let God be true but every man a liar” (Reference Romans 3:4)

A case for Sola Scriptura, a hard contested doctrine by Roman Catholics and all world religions whereby man is the truth by their inventions and doctrines and God is the liar. It literally flips what the Apostle Paul said on its head!

My repeated challenge for those who do not believe by the Bible alone it is the authority for faith and practice in Jesus Christ, is where else can one find the truth from God and know without any doubt that this truth is from God? Because if we use the premise that man is a natural liar, we cannot then naturally trust it as truth no matter WHO is preaching the doctrine.

Thus the only way one can determine the Gospel being preached by man is true has to come from an ultimate standard of truth which is God Himself. And where is this truth contained? Scripture! Paul reiterates this in Galatians 1:1-9 that if anyone preaches a different Gospel than what God has stated, including even from the Apostles, angels, etc. that it MUST be discarded. Very important to remember!

This is why discernment is so very important from the word of God. Anyone can preach anything, and anyone can claim to be a “Christian”. Externally they will exude a religion, piousness, gentle words, but if they are preaching against the truth found in Scripture, they must be called out as false.

The premise is “every man is a liar” and “God is true”, so if you always use this as your standard, discernment then comes easy. You will not take at face value what man has told you, you will TEST this teaching by the truth, and again that truth was revealed from ONE JUST SOURCE, Scripture!

If you are not trusting in God, or you really don’t believe He exists or that His word is much too convicting, you will be then trusting man, habitual and natural liars. I mentioned this long ago about my own posts, don’t trust me, rather TEST me by the word of God to know what I am saying is the truth. Trust God instead! He will lead you into all truth and supplies vasts amount of wisdom to do so to the WILLING.

You will be always led astray if you are not discerning by the ultimate truth contained in the very word of God. So whenever one is fighting against His word as the only truth revealed, ask yourself why they would be doing this. Most likely because they would rather trust man as that truth!

3 years ago, my beloved dog Leo was in the midst of his last month on this earth. Time would stop for him. On this day, he was given a report of a full remission from his cancer, but it also marked the last 10 days of his life. I had no idea as to when his time would stop as my own time clock, but I knew it was imminent. All I could is pray for another day with him.

Looking back, God really taught me that tomorrow is never promised. We shouldn’t think we have this unlimited time because that is our desire and want. The death clock is set, and we can’t add a minute to it.

Which leads me to saying that MANY believe they have an unlimited future to get their life in order. One day they say they’ll sit down with their Christian friends and study these things they have been saying, but not today. One day day in the future they’ll make time for it, but not today or this week or this month or this year. Not realizing their death clock cannot be changed.

And when time stops, that is it! If you die in your sins unforgiven, it is off to hell. God won’t care how nice you thought you were, or entertain all those excuses you made. Leo was given less than 8 years, but he is just a dog you’ll say and dogs have a short life. But now compare your life to an ETERNITY, it never ends. And if in hell, it will be torture, sadness, pain, suffering, darkness, despair on and on and on. It will be an incurable cancer so to speak which never lets you die.

All for what? Because you thought you were smart and all those religious do-gooders were just hypocrites? Those bible bangers you made fun of, chastised, ridiculed for their faith will all be a regret for an eternity. And when time stops, there will be no chance to turn back, no chance to repent, no chance to make amends with God. You made your choice, and JUSTICE is what you will receive.

You followed the beat of your own drum, and those Christians you will discover were right all along. You thought by going to church and being a good person would be enough. And now what? There is just darkness, suffering, and despair. There will be no one to hear your excuses, complaining, and mocking. There will be no one to hear why you procrastinated and why God got His justice wrong on your sins.

So if you haven’t done so, TODAY place your faith alone in the person and work of Jesus Christ alone! There are many who will have their funerals prepared tomorrow who didn’t have a tomorrow to repent. So why put it off? Why fight against this truth which has not changed since the beginning of time? There is just ONE way to salvation, and it is through Jesus Christ. If placed in Him, you have been (past tense) forgiven by His death and by His rising from the dead, you too will rise.

Don’t believe in Jesus because I say so or other Christians say you should. If you believe in Him, you will see just how rotten of a sinner you are in God’s sight and how desperately you needed Him! It will be only then your internal and external mocking, your doubts, your silly pride will leave! Only then you will realize just how very stupid you were to put this off! Time can then stop at any moment with a full realization that you are secured for an eternity in Jesus Christ!

Romans 5:8 “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us”

YOU WILL NEVER BE GOOD ENOUGH OUTSIDE THE PERSON AND WORK OF JESUS CHRIST!

Many unbelievers have been spurned by a world religion which basically teaches that BEFORE God could save the sinner, that sinner must reform themselves, to be “good enough” in effect for God to save them. Scripture teaches the opposite!

The sad fact is many unbelievers give up all hope by these false world religions. As they then say, “look, I am such a nasty sinner, I have done so many BAD things, so according to what I have heard, I am beyond saving”. I am here to tell the one who thinks this way, that you were LIED to!

Thousands of years before you were even a blip on the radar so to speak, Jesus died on the Cross. He waited for no one to reform themselves, He went and died on your behalf if you so believe in Him. As Paul stated above “while we were still sinners”. So the world religion who says “you need to” do anything BEFORE Jesus will save you, are deceiving you!

Jesus died (past tense), at that moment He paid your sin debt knowing each and every sin you would commit in your entire lifetime. He paid for them ALL including the ones you are ignorant of. This is the Good News! The bad news is that if you died not believing He did this, you were not saved. Which means an eternal torment in hell, no matter how “good” you thought you were, and many in those world religions are heading to that eternal hell.

You see, God demands ABSOLUTE perfection. There is no lee-way here. Adam and Eve committed simple disobedience, and they were cast out of the Garden with no second chances. God didn’t take into affect their good deeds before that point, they sinned and that is all it took! They were no longer going to be able to dwell with God eternally.

God knowing that you can NEVER be “good enough”, sent His Son Jesus Christ to die on the Cross to ATONE for your wicked rotten self. Jesus did this willingly! Again, He didn’t wait until you got your act together, He paid the price on your behalf knowing full well you’d never get your act together nor would you have the perfection needed to dwell with God. This is the heart of the Gospel, the Good News! By Jesus rising from the dead, by which the secular world celebrates “Easter”, you too are promised to rise again IF you have placed your faith alone in Him!

What is the evidence of being saved? First and foremost is an innate and genuine desire to REPENT, to turn away from a life of sin and to turn to God’s holiness, a striving for it. Again, Jesus didn’t wait until you repented, He already PAID your sin debt, you rather repent out of thanksgiving for what He DID on your behalf! This repentance is natural, not forced, and if a burden, you most likely were never saved but deceived. The call to REPENT should be a head nod, not a fight, you don’t seek ways to get away with sin, but are now seeking ways not to commit sin. If an adulterer in your former life, you naturally seek to stop being an adulterer for example, know what Jesus did for YOU!

Romans 4:5 But to him who does not work but believes on Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is accounted for righteousness

You see? God justifies the UNGODLY, not the godly who think they reformed themselves by goodness or morality to make themselves somehow self righteously worthy for God to save. Jesus DIED on the Cross, He rose again!