Things that cannot be moved
We live in a society that demands constant change. If you don’t change the way you think and embrace the new way than many times you will get left behind. For instance there is always a new software program to learn at work and if you are not willing to change then most likely you will not have a job for very long. In the business world things are always changing. For example stores used to rely upon people physically coming to their shop. However, in the last 5 years Business had to embrace the internet and start making their product available online or else they would lose a great deal of money. Another example is the text books that our children use to learn from in school. Many of these books have to be revised every year or so to keep up with the new discoveries that are made. The science field is another great example of the constant change that we go through because they are constantly learning new things that changes what we thought was right before. These are just a few modern day examples that show how much we are used to changing and adapting.
We can also see instability throughout history as we have seen new countries form and old ones fall. Not only do we have examples of this in our history books we can see these type of events happening in the Bible as well. For instance, when Daniel interpreted King Nebuchadnezzar dream he told him how his kingdom would be replaced by another and that kingdom would be replaced by another and so on. So, it very obvious that nothing in this world in regards to humans or the kingdom’s they may setup are sure things because all of them will at some point be shaken or moved.
Since we are always facing constant changes in our society and changing the way we think this has led many today in the religious world to start desiring to revamp the way that we worship God and so they come armed with their new ideas of how to make it better and they try to influence as many as they can to join in with them and embrace their new ways just like they embrace every thing else. Many are willing to do this, because they are tired of feeling limited on what they can do under traditional worship.
Why this may seem like a wonderful idea on the surface to enhance the worship service by using whatever means are necessary to appeal to the masses we must come to back to reality and realize that God is unchanging and when we come to worship him we don’t come to please our entertain ourselves. We come to worship our God and be pleasing him by obey his commands. Jesus makes this clear in,
John 4:24"God
is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and
truth."
Worshiping God in spirit
means worshiping him from our heart and worshiping him truth means worshiping
according to His word.
John 17:17
"Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth.
Both of these are necessary to make your worship pleasing to him. We also need to note what the writer of Hebrews says,
Hebrews 13:8 Jesus
Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.
You see God has not changed the way he wants things done. His pattern and his kingdom cannot be shaken or moved. In fact the writer of Hebrews tells us this very thing.
Hebrews 12:28 Therefore let us be grateful for
receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus let us offer to God
acceptable worship, with reverence and awe,
This whole phrase “cannot be shaken” comes from
the Greek word asaleutos which means - not subject to alteration of
essential nature or being, unshakable, enduring, unmovable.
This
plainly shows us that God’s kingdom or we could say his church cannot be shaken
or moved because it will continue forever. Even when Jesus comes back again and
destroys the earth, the kingdom will then be handed over to father where it
will remain in heaven for eternity. The kingdom/church will last forever and
the way that God has set it up will endure forever as well. So the
Another
thing that cannot be moved is truth itself. While it is true that the false way
will have its hour, but it will never endure. Things that are build upon lies
can never survive and those who live for falsehood will certainly pay the
price.
Proverbs 19:5 A false witness will not go unpunished, And
he who speaks lies will not escape.
Revelation 21:8 "But the cowardly, unbelieving,
abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars
shall have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is
the second death."
So a person should
never desire the false way because failure will always await them. Instead,
every person that is follower of God should have the same attitude as expressed
in,
Psalm 25:4 Show me Your ways, O LORD; Teach me
Your paths. 5 Lead me in Your
truth and teach me, For You are the God of my salvation; On You I wait all the
day.
God’ truth is what
we should seek because his truth will never die and it will not change. This is
why we see Jesus tells us that,
Matthew 24:35
"Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will by no means pass away.
No matter how many
times someone tries to destroy the truth it will not change because just as
Jesus has said, even if heaven and earth are gone his words will still remain.
The Bible makes is very clear that neither you nor I have the ability or the
authority to change God’s Word and so that makes God’s truth unmovable and we
should not try and comprise his truth for the sake of trying to please others.
In fact this message can clearly be seen from many passages. First of notice,
1 Corinthians 4: 6
Now these things, brethren, I have figuratively transferred to myself and
Apollos for your sakes, that you may learn in us not to think beyond what is
written, that none of you may be puffed up on behalf of one against the other.
Paul is letting us know
as Christians we are not go beyond what is written in the Scriptures because
they are our authority and pattern to follow and they have everything in them
that we need to know about living our life for God.
2 Timothy 3:16 All
Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for
doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, 17 that the man of God may be
complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.
Over and over again we
can see the N.T. writers expressing the importance of holding to the truth and
nothing but the truth. For example Paul tells Timothy,
2 Timothy 1:13 Hold fast the pattern of sound words which
you have heard from me, in faith and love which are in Christ Jesus.
The
reason why this was so important to the N.T. writers was because they knew that
there would be false teachers that would rise up and try to deceive people by
keeping them away from absolute truth. That exactly what Paul tells Timothy in,
2 Timothy 3:1 But
know this, that in the last days perilous times will come: 2 For men will be lovers of
themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to
parents, unthankful, unholy, 3
unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of
good, 4 traitors, headstrong,
haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, 5 having a form of godliness but
denying its power. And from such people turn away! 6 For of this sort are those who
creep into households and make captives of gullible women loaded down with
sins, led away by various lusts, 7
always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.
We have to realize that these kind of people exist today and they will
do whatever it takes to distort God’s truth. But we have been warned beforehand
and if we properly arm ourselves with God’s unmovable truth then their
deceitfulness will not have an effect on us. But, we cannot just sit by and
allow these false concepts to come to bloom; instead we must speak out and
allow God’s truth to overcome these falsehoods no matter how popular they may
be. In fact that’s exactly what Paul tells Timothy to do in,
2 Timothy 4:1 I
charge you therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who will
judge the living and the dead at His appearing and His kingdom: 2 Preach the word! Be ready in
season and out of season. Convince, rebuke, exhort, with all
longsuffering and teaching. 3
For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according
to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up
for themselves teachers; 4
and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside
to fables. 5 But you be
watchful in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist,
fulfill your ministry.
Friends, there is nothing
more powerful than God’s truth but you must be willing to use it as your
authority and guide by making it a part of your lives every day that you can.
If you never pick up your Bible and learn from it, then you will never become
the faithful Christian you should be and you will never be able to defend God’s
truth.
Some people say that
truth is relative and that I can have one truth from the Bible and someone else
can have another. If this concept is true then there really isn’t anyway that
we can find absolute truth from the Bible because this view makes every one
right no matter what conclusion they come to. However, Jesus makes it very clear that there is
absolute truth and that we can all know that truth.
John 8:31 Then Jesus
said to those Jews who believed Him, "If you abide in My word, you are My
disciples indeed. 32
"And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free."
If
truth is relative then a person cannot know the truth but Jesus says that we can
because there is only 1 truth. So, don’t allow yourself to ever get caught up in
this game that truth is relative.
Another
thing that shows that truth is not relative is the fact that there consequences
for not obeying God’s Word. For example, notice what happens in the OT example
in,
Leviticus 10:1 Then Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron,
each took his censer and put fire in it, put incense on it, and offered profane
fire before the LORD, which He had not commanded them. 2 So fire went out from the LORD and devoured
them, and they died before the LORD.
This a great OT
example of what happened to these 2 priests who decided to make their own fire
which was not the same fire as God had commanded. Now if truth was relative
they would not have lost their lives but since truth is absolute they did lose
their lives because they could know God truth on what fire was acceptable and
what fire was not. While God doesn’t
kill people today as he did with them we are still warned about disobeying his
commands under the NT. In fact the punishment for living an disobedient life is
far worse than physical death.
2 Thessalonians 1:7 when
the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with His mighty angels, 8 in flaming fire taking vengeance
on those who do not know God, and on those who do not obey the gospel of our
Lord Jesus Christ. 9 These
shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord
and from the glory of His power, 10
when He comes, in that Day, to be glorified in His saints and to be admired
among all those who believe, because our testimony among you was believed.
When a person decides to
live the false away outside of God’s commands by doing things their own way,
then they will face everlasting destruction. But, the bright side of this is
that those that are faithful to the Lord and are walking in his commandments
will spend eternity in heaven. So without a doubt God’s truth is unmovable.
Another thing that is
unmovable is God’s plan of salvation for all humans and how he wants everyone
to know the truth about being saved.
1 Timothy 2:3 For
this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, 4 who desires all men to be saved
and to come to the knowledge of the truth.
James 1:21 Therefore lay aside all filthiness and
overflow of wickedness, and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is
able to save your souls.
These two verses teach us
that we must go to God’s Word to find out how to be saved. Now I have already established that God’s word is
absolute truth so everyone should come to the same conclusion on what it takes
become saved. In fact, if you were here last week we took a very close look at
the great commission and we found out exactly what the Word of God said about
becoming a disciple of Christ and remaining a disciple of Christ.
The truth that I taught
in that lesson has not changed and therefore the message is the same today. The
word of God says the following things are necessary for salvation.
John 3:16 "For God so loved the world that He gave
His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish
but have everlasting life.
Luke 13:3 "I tell
you, no; but unless you repent you will all likewise perish.
Romans 10:9 f you confess with your mouth the Lord
Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will
be saved.
1 Peter 3:21 There is
also an antitype which now saves us -- baptism (not the removal of the
filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God), through
the resurrection of Jesus Christ,
Now most in religious
world would agree that a person needs to believe, repent and confess but when
it comes to baptism they say, “no it not necessary.” Now I will say this
baptism isn’t any more important than these other things that we must do to be
saved but it is just as important as those other things. All of these work
together to bring about salvation.
One thing that the Bible
does stress is that baptism is the point
where one is united with Christ in his death Rom 6 and it is the point that our
sins are removed according to Acts 2:38, and Col 2:12 ff. When we are raised up
out of the water we are considered a new creature that is now living its life
for Jesus Rom 6. At the point of baptism we are added to the church by God 1
Cor. 12:13; Acts 2: 47. Finally according to Gal. 3:27 and Rom 6:3 baptism is
how we get into Christ where all the spiritual blessing are found
The only reason I am
stressing baptism more than I am these other things is because this command is
being ignored by many in the religious world and it makes the difference of
being lost or being saved. If a person never obeys God’s simply of plan of
salvation which includes baptism, they will always be outside of Christ and no
matter how great that person may be or how many great works they do it doesn’t
change the fact that they are lost because they are outside of Christ. I know
that is a hard saying but that is what the word of God teaches us. So, God plan
of salvation cannot be moved.
We have examined several
things that cannot be moved or shaken in this lesson. We learned that God
cannot be moved, his kingdom cannot be moved, his truth cannot be moved and
finally his plan of salvation cannot be moved.