My Dear Brothers and Sisters of the Faith,
I have come to a point in my life where I can no longer find refuge within the confines of the Church. If you know NOT what I am speaking of, than allow me to explain myself. The Elders have been given a responsibility to watch over the Lord’s Flock. And yet, for some reason, this responsibility has been neglected and, in some cases, shunned. WHAT is it that they are supposed to be looking for whilst watching over the Sheep? The answer may be found in the Scripture:
“So guard yourselves and God’s people. Feed and shepherd God’s flock-His church, purchased with His own blood-over which the Holy Spirit has appointed you as elders. I know that false teachers, like vicious wolves, will come in among you after I leave, not sparing the flock.”
I stand by what I say next… the generations before us have failed. It is easy to see how they allowed this to happen. The rise of Evolution, Feminism, Homosexuality, and the World Peace Movement. They wanted to spread the Gospel to a fallen world, so they allowed it to be compromised. For the Evolutionist, they threw away Creation. For the Feminist, they discarded Paul’s preaching. For the Homosexual, they distorted every passage concerning a pure lifestyle, and for those who want World Peace, they watered down the divisive words of our Savior.
And now, it is my generation’s turn to fix that which is broken. It is our Christian duty to confront the wolves who are “from [our] own group….and distort the truth” (2) to fit what they want to believe rather than abide by what God actually says.
The Apostles tried to warn us! “…There will be false teachers among you. They will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the sovereign Lord who bought them…” (3)
When Paul wrote to Timothy, he explained how we must “preach the Word, when it is convenient and inconvenient; correct, rebuke, and encourage-with great patience and careful instruction” but that we must watch out, “for there will come a time when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths." (4)
Not only did the Apostles try to warn us, but also in the past one hundred years, numerous Theologians have tried to educate us on what to look out for and what dangers we will actually be facing. One such Theologian was J. Machen Gresham who lived during the 1920’s. In his book, Christianity and Liberalism, he explains what happens as man increases in knowledge and begins to criticize and reject the convictions within:
“The industrial world of today has been produced not by blind forces of nature but by the conscious activity of the human spirit; it has been produced by the achievements of science. The outstanding feature of recent history is an enormous widening of human knowledge… In such an age, it is obvious that every inheritance from the past must be subject to searching criticism…so many convictions have had to abandoned that men have sometimes come to believe that all convictions must go. If such an attitude be justifiable, then no institution is faced by a stronger hostile presumption than the institution of the Christian religion, for no institution has based itself more squarely upon the authority of a by gone age.” (5)
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who was another great theologian and martyr, spoke concerning the Church in America. Just before the dawn of WWII he came to America. Upon arriving, he was both torn and distressed. “He seemed cut off from a part of himself, divided from himself by an ocean, wandering the streets of New York like a ghost.” He felt as though he was running away to a safe haven while his German comrades were being attacked.
One Sunday morning, while looking out is window, he could see a statue of Gabriel sitting atop Riverside Church. “He knew that the tepid liberal preaching at Riverside was extremely unlikely to meet with his approval, [but] he could not live one hundred yards away and not visit. Sooner or later, he must at least taste the lukewarm waters there.”
"The head pastor was Harry Emerson Fosdick, and in 1939 he was the most famous liberal preacher in America; Riverside was America’s premier pulpit for liberalism. Bonhoeffer’s ears were burning to hear something from God, but what he found, he was not ready for.
"The sermon’s text was from James, but not the James of the New Testament; it was from the American philosopher William James, whose works Bonhoeffer had studied nine years earlier. Upon hearing it, the usually gracious and tolerant Bonhoeffer was set off by this empty preaching, and in his diary he poured out his disgust:
‘I have no doubt at all that one day the storm will blow with full force on this religious hand out, if God Himself is still anywhere on the scene… The tasks for a real theologian over here are immeasurable. But only an American himself can shift all this rubbish and up till now there do not seem to be any about.’”(6)
When I had first read this from Bonhoeffer, I was brought to tears. I look upon this country and the Church that should be ever so vibrant, and I am met with a God given anger, disappointment, and conviction. What Bonhoeffer said was true. And yet, we, the Church, must go a step further. First we must admit that we have succumbed to the cares of this world and the enemy lies within.
"The great menace to the Christian church today comes not from the enemies outside, but from the enemies within; it comes from the presence within the church of a type of faith and practice that is anti-Christian to the core."(5)
Secondly, we must not be afraid to give evil a name. It is easy to define evil, but to actually label something as evil takes authority, and that authority comes from Jesus Christ. One of the greatest apologists who has ever lived was not scared to give evil a name. He tried to warn us by telling us what to look out for:
“The one thing I have learned: I know the Liberals…I know them well. I was one of them. And they are the most dangerous, insidious, and all pervading cult that’s loose in the United States right at this moment. They make the Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Mormons, and all the Mind Sciences, and the Occults look like Sunday school teachers. Do you know why? Because those other people are outside the church and these Devils are in it! And they are doing it in Jesus name. They do not believe in the Trinity. They do not believe in the deity of Christ. They do not believe in the Virgin Birth. They do not believe in the Vicarious Atonement. They do not believe the Bodily Resurrection. And they have grave doubts about whether Jesus will ever come back again and that the Bible itself is the Word of God. Yet I could give you a list of them that infest, and that’s the proper word, infest our Theological Seminaries, and our Church related schools, and our denominations. And this Theological flea infestation is ruining the life blood of the Church which is Evangelism!” (1)
I know that there are those of you who would rather have me praising the Church and all that she has accomplished. I apologize, but I cannot ignore her tainted and corrupt actions. Quite frankly, I love Christ more than I love His church. I want this to be divisive. I want the church to separate and divide itself from the Wolves.
“It is often said that the divided condition of Christendom is an evil, and so it is. But the evil consists in the existence of the errors which cause the divisions and not at all in the recognition of those errors when once they exist.” (5)
I have compiled a list that will aid you in distinguishing a WOLF from a SHEEP. The things on this list are Biblical and I will defend each and every point. For the Wolf who knows and is fully aware of what he believes, we must THROW HIM OUT. (7) And yet, keep in mind that some may unknowingly agree with some of these points and be ignorant towards what it entails. We must “correct, rebuke, and encourage [them]-with great patience and careful instruction.” (4)
For those of you who trust me, I charge you to spread the word. Tell the Wolves that their time has come to an end. Tell them that God is our first love and we shall stand by His Word and defend it. And yet, I must warn you. If you agree with this Note and you so desire to “share” it… be forewarned. You will be attacked. It is inevitable. A wolf does not run when it is cornered. Are you ready to defend what you believe? They are trying to take away from the authority of the Scripture. We must hold the line! Once the wolves have broken through the Scripture....the battle is lost. "This is where we hold them! This is where we fight! This is where they die!" (8) Christians! Pick up your swords and your shields and meet me on the battlefield…meet me at Thermopylae.
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Work Cited
1. Dr. Walter Martin 1970’s-80’s
2. Acts 20
3. 2 Peter 2
4. 2 Timothy 4
5. J. Machen Gresham, Christianity and Liberalism, 1920
6. Brian Metaxes, Bonhoeffer
7. John 2: 13-17
8. King Leonidas
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