Keep Pressing On

 

The following is a testimony from David, a brother in Christ. He had originally written an encouraging note to me, titled "Keep pressing on." In that encouragement he observed, "It is most important that you continue to pursue the truth. It is vital that others come to know the truth as well. Speak about your knowledge of those who choose to subvert the "true" will of God,...they mislead and restrict others from pursuing knowledge and discernment about our Lord and what he truly desires for them to do. These men pervert liberty and mislead young impressionable lives to a slippery slope downward to a place of dissention..."

I wrote and asked David if he would share his testimony, as I felt many would be blessed by hearing of God's work in his life. The following is his response.

 

March 27, 2006

Greetings Vicky,

I have been a Believer in Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior since 1990. In the early years, I read books, went to conferences and listened to tapes of godly men. Everyone at the time seemed to be running in the same direction - towards God.

 

In the mid 1990's, things began to change for me. The church I was attending began to do things that are not in scripture, and were out of the realm of Christianity. I instantly knew that this was not of God. Men of God who I had heard before had abandoned the "truth" and began to run in a different direction. Men attribute things of satan to God and things of God to satan. They were speaking about things that were not leading men to God, they were doing things that were leading others astray - this was when I stopped doing everything. No more resource books, no more conferences or listening to tapes of these so called godly men.

 

I fervently prayed for God to show me the right way to go so that I would not fall to the wayside, like others were doing around me. I began to travel around the United States and Canada - visiting churches and small home groups to seek out the truth behind the deception. By 1997, I had a picture of what was taking place, and this was not just in these two countries - it was all over the world. In my heart I knew that deception had entered into the church and God's family too. I knew that these men who were teaching false doctrine and telling others that it was the will of God had fallen prey to the enemy. On the outside it may have looked good, but spiritually their lives were in chaos.

 

People I had known for years were in this deception and I could not allow myself to be around them anymore. I prayed that God would bring them out of this and I still do today. All throughout scripture, God tells us that he is to be found - in the Word. He tells us that we will only be able to stay on the straight and narrow if we grow in him. As we grow we leave childhood and mature. As we mature we gain the ability to hear him as he speaks to us. As we mature we begin to recognize "his voice" and as we hear his voice over and over again we learn to know him, as the one who is speaking to us.

In our maturity, we learn to recognize his ways from the ways of satan. In our growth we are sustained by his wisdom and knowledge, thus we are able to pursue the truth. As we progress in truth we are able to see and distinctly recognize the enemy.

God tells us to seek him and his ways - He does not tell us to seek out the ways of the enemy and find out how he works. God tells us to seek out the truth, not the lies of the enemy.

If we seek God, and we are mature - we will know what the lies are without looking for them.

If we pursue God and all his ways and we are mature - we will recognize the schemes of the evil one without looking for them. By knowing God and his ways the other is already known, and pursuance is not needed.

Satan wants those who seek and are weak to think that it is the right way to seek out the enemy and his strategy, thus in doing so - he leads them astray. Satan has infiltrated the church through the pursuit of knowledge and one who receives this "false" knowledge, then passes it along to another. And so forth down the line. Each one who runs to this and that place to receive the "blessing" is in fact receiving the disease, that is now flourishing throughout the world. Leaders & teachers go and receive the "blessing", then they return to their flocks, teaching them and the weak ones are infected and fall just as they have into the hands of the enemy. This in turn, keeps them running around in circles and never running in the right direction again - towards God.

 

The church and family of God is running in so many different directions today, that the enemy has got them in turmoil. Men want to know God, but in the "new" ways. Men want to teach others about His Will - yet they themselves do not have the maturity to discern what his will is and how to recognize the difference between the two.

 

My Lord and Savior died for me so that I could come to know him, to love him and to be with him for all eternity. My Father in heaven desires that I seek Him "alone" and no other. That I follow his ways and then utilize what he has given me to stay on the straight and narrow. He desires for me to be obedient to him. In order for me to do this , I must know which way I am to go. Which path I am to walk on, and be able to discern the pitfalls and deceptions of the evil one along the way.

This can "only" be done by leaving one's infancy in Christ, progressing through childhood and maturing into the person he wants us to be.

 

I fully believe and stand by what God expects of us today - to SEEK and LOVE Him, to be MATURE and OBEDIENT.

 

Scripture leads us on the right path -

 

TO BECOME "MATURE" IN WORD AND DEED -

 

TO READ, STUDY AND MEDITATE UPON THE WORD OF GOD -

All scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.

2 Timothy 3:16,17

 

TO STOP LIVING AND LOVING THE WORLDLY LIFE - Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For everything in the world - the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes and the boasting of what he does - comes not from the Father but from the world. 1 John 2:15,16

TO STOP SEEKING GOD AND LOOKING FOR KNOWLEDGE, WISDOM AND DISCERNMENT IN OUTSIDE BOOKS, CONFERENCES, MOVIES AND SO CALLED GODLY TEACHERS AND RELIGIOUS SPEAKERS -                                                     For the time will come when men 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 aside from truth and turn aside to myths. 2 Timothy 4:3,4

IN THESE DAYS OF "APOSTASY", THE SCRIPTURE IS THE "ONLY" RESOURCE FOR THE BELIEVER. ONE MUST BE FAITHFUL TO GOD IN ALL THINGS AND HE WILL REMAIN FAITHFUL TO US.

THOSE IN THE CHURCH AND FAMILY OF GOD WHO ARE MATURE AND REMAIN FAITHFUL, MUST GENTLY INSTRUCT THOSE WHO HAVE FALLEN PREY TO THE ENEMY, IN THE HOPE THAT GOD WILL ALLOW THEM TO SEE THE TRUTH - THAT THEY ARE CAPTIVE OF SATAN AND DOING HIS WILL, NOT THE WILL OF GOD.

 

In Christ,

 

David

A Messianic Jew