(This is an archived correspondence at The Path of Truth. We have sent notification to the correspondent.)
Your critique of gotquestions.org is at least misguided. biblehub.com has for your viewing 20 maybe more commentaries on the whole Bible none are in 100%' agreement. Are they all from Satan? If you hear a sermon do you take it at face value or do you check it out. When a person has a vision to take up the ministry or is called to the mision field are their visions from Satan.
In HIS Service, Donald
Just as I am, without one plea,
but that your blood was shed for me,
and that you bid me to come to Thee,
O Lamb of God, I Come, I come.
The story behind the poem.
<http://www.cyberhymnal.org/htm/j/u/justasam.htm>
Your critique of gotquestions.org is at least misguided.
-
Victor Hafichuk
- Posts: 749
- Joined: Thu Mar 06, 2014 12:07 am
Re: Your critique of gotquestions.org is at least misguided.
Donald, those are all valid questions and we welcome them. Will you welcome at least our effort at answering, if not our answers? Let's see.
Many men comment. Every man comments. Our contention is not against commentary but against the presumption that men think they know what they're talking about when they don't, commenting in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ. They presume they can speak as they think and please while attaching His Holy Name to their opinions. That will never do with God, even as with Job's three friends with whom He was angry with their words, as doctrinally correct as the words in themselves might be.
But let me draw a line between Job's friends and most of the people we're dealing with, like Gotquestions.org. Job's friends did have true knowledge of the Lord and did speak many true things, at least doctrinally in the letter, unlike those you're concerned about. The problem with Job's friends was that they were misapplying the truth, presuming Job's lot was a consequence of sins.
After the three and Job had finished speaking, Elihu addressed Job satisfactorily in the Lord's sight. Finally, God spoke the conclusion.
The problem with those we address is often both doctrine and application - not always, but often.
One bullet of an entire chamber aimed at the target doesn't excuse the other bullets being fired randomly. Besides, the target must be defined by God and not man.
Yes, Donald, men's notions and carnal speech ARE from Satan:
“And Jesus said to them, Take heed, and beware the leaven of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees.” (Matthew 16:6 MKJV)
The Lord did say the unbelieving religious were children of their father the Devil, didn't He? Even His own disciple's speech needed to be rebuked as that of Satan:
“Then Peter took Him and began to rebuke Him, saying, God be gracious to You, Lord! This shall never be to You. But He turned and said to Peter, Go, Satan! You are an offense to Me, for you do not savor the things that are of God, but those that are of men.” (Matthew 16:22-23 MKJV)
Obviously, you don't know these things, do you, Donald? Consider, then.
As children of God we make a difference between what is true and what is false, what is of the one who savors the things of men and what is of God. This is something you try to judge by your carnal abilities because you've never received the Spirit of God and entered His Kingdom to be able to discern by His Spirit:
Malachi 3:16-18 MKJV
(16) Then those fearing the LORD spoke together, each man to his neighbor. And the LORD listened and heard. And a book of remembrance was written before Him for those who feared the LORD, and for those esteeming His Name.
(17) And they shall be Mine, says the LORD of Hosts, for the day that I will make up My treasure. And I will pity them as a man has pity on his son who serves him.
(18) Then you shall again see the difference between the righteous and the wicked, between him who serves God, and him who does not serve Him.
1 Corinthians 2:13-16 MKJV
(13) These things we [saints] also speak, not in words which man's wisdom teaches, but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
(14) But the natural man [Donald] does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.
(15) But he [the saint] who is spiritual judges all things, yet he himself is judged by no one [not even Donald].
(16) For who has known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct Him? But we [the born again/baptized in the Holy Spirit saints] have the mind of Christ.
You ask: “When a person has a vision to take up the ministry or is called to the mision field are their visions from Satan.”
If that person receives a vision from God, and waits on God for its fulfillment, for only He can perform it, then that one does well. If those visions are from Satan - and likely it's news to you that visions of the kind you speak certainly are, then the man takes upon himself the Lord's Name in vain and troubles himself and others with him in his preferred pleasures.
Donald, I believe you're speaking not of picture visions from the Spirit of the Lord (the kind Joel and Peter spoke of) but of imaginations originating in men's hearts, which are...things men savor, which are of Satan. Nominal Christendom is filled with the works of men:
“Concerning the works of men, by the word of thy lips I have kept me from the paths of the destroyer.” (Psalms 17:4 KJV)
Phrases like “take up the ministry” and “called to mission field” are usually a dead giveaway as to what kind of vision and the source - not always, but often. These “visions” come of a state of heroism and flesh-induced sacrifice and not of obedience to God as men often assume.
Much better to repent of pride and self-aggrandizement, rent garments, don sackcloth, put ashes on one's head and say, “Lord, YOUR will, not mine be done.”
Contending for the faith once delivered to the saints,
Victor
Many men comment. Every man comments. Our contention is not against commentary but against the presumption that men think they know what they're talking about when they don't, commenting in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ. They presume they can speak as they think and please while attaching His Holy Name to their opinions. That will never do with God, even as with Job's three friends with whom He was angry with their words, as doctrinally correct as the words in themselves might be.
But let me draw a line between Job's friends and most of the people we're dealing with, like Gotquestions.org. Job's friends did have true knowledge of the Lord and did speak many true things, at least doctrinally in the letter, unlike those you're concerned about. The problem with Job's friends was that they were misapplying the truth, presuming Job's lot was a consequence of sins.
After the three and Job had finished speaking, Elihu addressed Job satisfactorily in the Lord's sight. Finally, God spoke the conclusion.
The problem with those we address is often both doctrine and application - not always, but often.
One bullet of an entire chamber aimed at the target doesn't excuse the other bullets being fired randomly. Besides, the target must be defined by God and not man.
Yes, Donald, men's notions and carnal speech ARE from Satan:
“And Jesus said to them, Take heed, and beware the leaven of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees.” (Matthew 16:6 MKJV)
The Lord did say the unbelieving religious were children of their father the Devil, didn't He? Even His own disciple's speech needed to be rebuked as that of Satan:
“Then Peter took Him and began to rebuke Him, saying, God be gracious to You, Lord! This shall never be to You. But He turned and said to Peter, Go, Satan! You are an offense to Me, for you do not savor the things that are of God, but those that are of men.” (Matthew 16:22-23 MKJV)
Obviously, you don't know these things, do you, Donald? Consider, then.
As children of God we make a difference between what is true and what is false, what is of the one who savors the things of men and what is of God. This is something you try to judge by your carnal abilities because you've never received the Spirit of God and entered His Kingdom to be able to discern by His Spirit:
Malachi 3:16-18 MKJV
(16) Then those fearing the LORD spoke together, each man to his neighbor. And the LORD listened and heard. And a book of remembrance was written before Him for those who feared the LORD, and for those esteeming His Name.
(17) And they shall be Mine, says the LORD of Hosts, for the day that I will make up My treasure. And I will pity them as a man has pity on his son who serves him.
(18) Then you shall again see the difference between the righteous and the wicked, between him who serves God, and him who does not serve Him.
1 Corinthians 2:13-16 MKJV
(13) These things we [saints] also speak, not in words which man's wisdom teaches, but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
(14) But the natural man [Donald] does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.
(15) But he [the saint] who is spiritual judges all things, yet he himself is judged by no one [not even Donald].
(16) For who has known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct Him? But we [the born again/baptized in the Holy Spirit saints] have the mind of Christ.
You ask: “When a person has a vision to take up the ministry or is called to the mision field are their visions from Satan.”
If that person receives a vision from God, and waits on God for its fulfillment, for only He can perform it, then that one does well. If those visions are from Satan - and likely it's news to you that visions of the kind you speak certainly are, then the man takes upon himself the Lord's Name in vain and troubles himself and others with him in his preferred pleasures.
Donald, I believe you're speaking not of picture visions from the Spirit of the Lord (the kind Joel and Peter spoke of) but of imaginations originating in men's hearts, which are...things men savor, which are of Satan. Nominal Christendom is filled with the works of men:
“Concerning the works of men, by the word of thy lips I have kept me from the paths of the destroyer.” (Psalms 17:4 KJV)
Phrases like “take up the ministry” and “called to mission field” are usually a dead giveaway as to what kind of vision and the source - not always, but often. These “visions” come of a state of heroism and flesh-induced sacrifice and not of obedience to God as men often assume.
Much better to repent of pride and self-aggrandizement, rent garments, don sackcloth, put ashes on one's head and say, “Lord, YOUR will, not mine be done.”
Contending for the faith once delivered to the saints,
Victor