Greetings Victor:
Thank you for your kind words (not really) and insight, though I may not be as knowledgeable as others think they are in the things of God, if I can correctly remember I am a work in progress, Phil 1:6 ” Being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in “me” will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ, and yes many will perish but 2 Peter 2:9 ” The Lord is not slack concerning His promises, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, NOT WILLING THAT ANY should perish, but that all should come to repentance. My opinion is that yes granted much of what you’ve shared here is true, we should and cannot sugar coat the truth, but hey they are people who’s heart is seeking truth and all they’ve known is abuse and mistreatment, and we’re going to try and convince THEM of the love of God, being completely truthful, there must be a balance to how we witness to people. We are to not forget where we ourselves came from before we were introduced to the Lord, hey maybe you learned the hard way I don’t know, but beating people up is not the answer to ministering to broken people who are just looking for a way out of their misery, because if they don’t have Jesus when they die, they are going straight to the chamber of torment and eternal death.
I just think and this is just my opinion, the Lord says that we are TO put away idle talk and arguments with one another to have one mind and spirit because we are the Body of Christ, he does not want us striving and pointing fingers at each others, we are not called to do that, we are called to be an extension of the Love of God to a perishing and lost generation, AND TO ONE ANOTHER that’s our call, just to love them and that’s it, I feel beat up by you with your harsh words they may not mean to be harsh but they come out that way, God uses us if we are available to him, because the foolishness of God, is wiser than the man, 1 Cor 1:25. I know where I was before I came to the Lord and my heart is geared towards those who are perishing, I can pray for the them, plant seeds, fast for them and all, but in the end its God who gets the increase and honors our cry to Him on behalf of the unrepentant, and unprepared. There’s a book I think you should read hey you don’t have to but I think it may help, unless you DONT have a teachable spirit that is think you know every thing and are not open. Its by Mary K. Baxter, ” A Divine Revelation of Hell”, hey once you’ve read this book, you see things totally and powerfully different when it comes to the lost, God’s heart is that none will perish, and we are His instruments He has choosen to let that happen to as many people as He leads to us, let us not make the mistake and let one of them slip out, on that note, Woe to US, scribes and pharises, and teachers of the law.
God bless you Victor!
Marisa, you are gravely mistaken on several points, that being because you are worshipping at the altar of Ashtoreth and Baal. Do not take that as an insult or a nasty remark as some will do. Take it as counsel and warning from God for your sake. I will speak very plainly to you for all our sakes, the Lord’s included.
You do not thank me for my “kind words,” because you perceive them to be unrighteous. They are true words, in the true love of God, and kinder words could not possibly be spoken to you at this juncture. Your darkness needs addressing, if you are to be delivered. It takes truth and love to do that. It is not being nice, kind and friendly that is going to win you to freedom, but the truth in Christ. You resist the truth and pontificate as though you know something, when truly you know nothing. Throw away, if you will, all that I have and will say to you, but I will say it anyway. While it is not my responsibility to make you believe, it is my responsibility to speak, and speak I will, by the grace of God.
You have not understood what I have written you. It is true, as recorded, that God is not willing that any should perish, and ultimately, they will not perish. Read The Good News, The Purpose of Evil, The Reconciliation of All Things, and Who Then Can Be Saved?!
You write: “…but hey they are people who’s heart is seeking truth…”
You have set yourself up as judge of hearts and do defy and contradict the Word of God. Are there hearts seeking after truth? Which hearts are those? Is it not written, “None seek after God, no not one” (Romans 3)? I wrote you quoting the things Jesus spoke. You seemed to take the Bible record of His Words, and those of others I quoted, as a personal insult. You disregarded the fact that to certain persons, He spoke harsh words. Were they seeking the truth? Did He then blow it because He did not use your self-righteous approach? Who are you to judge who is seeking and who is not? In my letter to you, I asked you, “How do you know I was not speaking to a Pharisee or a scribe (which I was) when I spoke as I did?” I was very kind and patient with you, Marisa. The least I could have done was speak to you in like manner as the Lord to His disciple, Peter, and demonstrate yet more in the Lord and in Scripture that which you, by your spirit, counter in your stance:
“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 16:23 ).
You do indeed savor the things of men. The Scriptures and examples of faithful and true saints I gave you were ignored entirely, and you continued to “love” with the love of devils. “Let’s be buddies; forget the truth and responsibility toward God!” you declare, along with millions of religious. I gave you the examples of Peter, John the Baptist, Paul, Jude, James and Stephen, along with the Lord Himself. You ignored them all.
When God sent the prophets of old to preach repentance for their sins, up until John the Baptist, did He not have this great and necessary understanding and love you now presume to have on how to reach souls? Or do you have another source for your love? Surely, you do! Was He not interested in winning them to Himself? Could He not have sent better prophets than the likes of Moses, who slew 3000 of his own people, or Joshua, who had Achan and his whole family, including “innocent” children, stoned and burned, or Samuel, who chopped Agag up into pieces with a sword, or David, who slew two hundred Philistines instead of the required one hundred, to please Saul, King of Israel, or Elisha, who cursed some wicked children, whereupon two she-bears destroyed forty-two of them, or Elijah who slew four hundred and fifty royalty-honored citizens of Israel? Isaiah claimed to be told:
“Cry aloud, do not spare, lift up your voice like a ram’s horn, and show My people their rebellion, and the house of Jacob their sins” (Isaiah 58:1).
Do you think he was as sweet about it as you seem to think and judge? Truly, you are deceived by the queen of heaven, spoken of by Jeremiah the prophet, none other than Ashtoreth, the sex goddess of fertility, prosperity and love. Your love is her love and her love is your love. You are worshipping her instead of, and in the Name of, the Lord Jesus Christ, attributing her character traits to Him. He is not as you suppose.
Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today and forever, Marisa. Do you not know that? No, you do not. While you are aware of the letter (if you are) you are entirely ignorant of the spirit and substance of the declaration of Holy Scripture.
Apparently, the record I submitted to you of His Words to such as yourself was not acceptable to you. Perhaps you think He would only speak to those “nasty” Pharisees and Sadducees and scribes the way He did, and that He would not speak to His own that way. Think again:
“But I have against you that you left your first love. Therefore remember from where you have fallen, and repent, and do the first works, or else I will come to you quickly and will remove your lampstand out of its place unless you repent” (Revelation 2:4-5).
“Repent! But if not I will come to you quickly, and will fight with them by the sword of My mouth” (Revelation 2:16).
“But I have a few things against you because you allow that woman Jezebel to teach, she saying herself to be a prophetess, and to cause My servants to go astray, and to commit fornication, and to eat idol-sacrifices. And I gave her time that she might repent of her fornication, and she did not repent. Behold, I am throwing her into a bed, and those who commit adultery with her into great affliction, unless they repent of their deeds. And I will kill her children with death. And all the churches will know that I am He Who searches the reins and hearts, and I will give to every one of you according to your works” (Revelation 2:20-23).
(By the way, Marisa, you are in bed with Jezebel. I now address the very thing He was addressing there, spiritual fornication, a false, carnal love that perverts and distorts all truth and reality. You need to repent.)
More of the Lord speaking to His own:
“Remember then how you have received and heard, and hold fast, and repent. Therefore if you will not watch, I will come upon you as a thief, and you will not know what hour I will come upon you” (Revelation 3:3).
“I know your works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I would that you were cold or hot. So because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will vomit you out of My mouth. Because you say, I am rich and increased with goods and have need of nothing, and do not know that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked, I counsel you to buy from Me gold purified by fire, so that you may be rich; and white clothing, so that you may be clothed, and so that the shame of your nakedness does not appear. And anoint your eyes with eye salve, so that you may see. As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten; therefore be zealous and repent” (Revelation 3:15-19).
“As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten,” the Lord says. Then He says, “Therefore be zealous and repent.” Marisa, those words are for you. He does not speak in vain and has not spoken in vain by us to you, and He has spoken, like it or not. Your love is counterfeit, you stand with Satan, savoring the things that are of men, and unless you repent, you will suffer the judgment on Jezebel and her spiritual fornicators who were causing others to stumble.
You accuse me of speaking in a way as to cause stumbling? I am not here, as a faithful and true servant of the Lord, to win flesh into the Kingdom. Flesh and blood cannot, shall not, enter in. One must die to enter. You seek to bring souls into the Kingdom, flesh intact. It is you, with your counterfeit love, who is stumbling souls, pretending and presuming that they can come into the Kingdom apart from the applied cross to their lives. That is because you are serving another kingdom, another Jesus, and preaching another gospel. Repent, Marisa, repent. I speak by the love of God, not as you think it to be, taught by false prophets and teachers, but as it is, and as He is. Again, I say, repent.
You write: “…and all they’ve known is abuse and mistreatment, and we’re going to try and convince THEM of the love of God, being completely truthful, there must be a balance to how we witness to people.”
Abuse and mistreatment? Where? With whom? That is crap, Marisa. Where have you been? While there are evident instances of such, for the most part I have seen pampering, coddling, kissing, hugging, sympathy, empathy, affection, handshakes, slaps on the back, candy, dinners, smiles, flatteries, and anything but “abuse and mistreatment,” and all in the Name of fellowship in Jesus Christ. People love the churches and the social benefits they offer. However, you are right, ironically, in what you say, because your kind of approach and love are the very abuse and mistreatment they are getting in the form of what, to man and the world, is known as love. People are dying because of your philosophy born in heathendom and pagan worship.
As it is written:
“Faithful are the wounds of a friend; but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful” (Proverbs 27:6).
We all want to be loved, hugged, affectioned, kissed, sympathized with, with sins and faults covered over (not as God would have it, and as Scripture declares it) and ignored. However, true friends, who can only be true friends if in the Reality of the crucified and resurrected Christ, are faithful to Christ Jesus, and do inflict wounds for righteousness’ sake. I, being His friend and yours, “wound” you, while you, as my enemy and His, try to deceive me with your “kisses.” It will not work, Satan. I am not ignorant of your devices. Get behind me. You are an offence to me.
Accuser of the brethren, fulfil your role then, and tell me that I am “beating up on you,” poor victim, defender of the flesh and of the carnal man, who refuses to take up the cross, being at enmity with God. Read Victims and Perpetrators and So You Want to Walk with Jesus.
You write: “…because if they don’t have Jesus when they die, they are going straight to the chamber of torment and eternal death.”
Foolish and ignorant woman! How you contradict the Word of God, which says:
“And the sea gave up the dead in it. And death and hell delivered up the dead in them. And each one of them was judged according to their works. And death and hell were cast into the Lake of Fire. This is the second death” (Revelation 20:13-14).
And: “For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all will be made alive” (1 Corinthians 15:22).
And: “The last enemy made to cease is death” (1 Corinthians 15:26).
How then can one remain in “eternal death” when death will be destroyed? “Chamber of torment”? Yes, there is torment for sinners, but not forever, and not in a literal “chamber” made for that purpose as you suppose! You serve Baal and Ashtoreth, two vindictive demons, and not the Lord Jesus Christ! As it is written:
“For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all will be made alive” (1 Corinthians 15:22).
THAT is the love of God encapsulated in few words, of which there are many, many more. Indeed, the whole of Scripture testifies to the love of God, in spite of the therein recorded wars, famines, pestilences, wild beasts, betrayals, assassinations, adulteries, and the incessant rebellion of mankind, in spite of the constant outpouring of the blood of countless “innocent” animals, the burning flesh and fat, which, Scripture records, is a “sweet smelling savor unto the Lord.”
Read Who Then Can Be Saved?!, The Reconciliation of All Things, and The Good News. Learn the truth, Marisa, and quit believing and spreading lies in His Name!
Heed your own counsel and ruthlessly “put away idle talk and arguments,” speaking the truth, striving for the true gospel, contending for the true faith, instead of declaring and defending the dung you call love, which you are spewing everywhere in the Name of the Lord.
You write: “I can pray for the them, plant seeds, fast for them and all, but in the end its God who gets the increase and honors our cry to Him on behalf of the unrepentant, and unprepared.”
Indeed! Again you contradict the Word of God with your counsel of Nimrod, the mighty hunter of souls, and infatuation with Ashtoreth and Baal, who reek of self-righteousness. Tell me this: If Christ laid down His life for every one of us and prayed for all to be saved, then according to your words, that God “gets the increase and honors our cry to Him on behalf of the unrepentant and unprepared,” it is a done deal, is it not? If His prayer is not as good as answered, backed up with His blood, what makes you think your comparatively vain prayers, without blood, will do anything to move God? If His Son’s sacrifice and prayer is not enough, what makes you think yours will be? How foolish! How diabolically self-righteous are these notions of yours! How antiChrist! Hear yourself woman! I speak that you may, for your sake.
Harsh, am I? You better believe it. If you have the right to spew such ungodly dung out of your heart and mouth, lies inspired by devils, in the Name of God, how much more do I have the right, yea, the responsibility, even with harsh words, to stop the mouths of the wicked who publicly blaspheme the Name and Character of God all day long! As Enoch, the seventh from Adam, also prophesied to these, saying:
“Behold, the Lord came with myriads of His saints, to do judgment against all, and to rebuke all the ungodly of them concerning all their ungodly works which they ungodly did, and concerning all the hard things ungodly sinners spoke against Him. These are murmurers, complainers, leading lives according to their lusts. And their mouth speaks proud things, admiring faces for the sake of gain” (Jude 1:14-16).
You are among those to be rebuked, guilty of said deeds and words, Marisa. Get yourself “a teachable spirit,” and learn, instead of spouting words of gross darkness and ignorance.
Only learn from men of God, which we are, and not from fear and demon-possessed people like Mary Baxter. I am amazed at the claptrap people like you believe, thinking it to be of God. Her revelation was not of God but of the flesh and/or of demons. God had nothing whatsoever to do with it. What a despicable character assassination of the Lord Jesus Christ! And you believe it! Jesus Christ is not some impotent, wimpy, soppy, pitiful, helpless loser! He is LORD, GLORIFIED, VICTORIOUS, THE ONE WHO HAS PREVAILED, WORTHY OF ALL HONOR, PRAISE, GLORY, AND WORSHIP BECAUSE HE OVERCAME THE WORLD, THE FLESH, THE DEVIL, HELL, AND DEATH ITSELF! Truly, you believe Satan and his power and not the Lord Jesus Christ and His.
Marisa, now am I harsh with you, and I hope, for your sake, that you will humble yourself, allow yourself to be rebuked as you so richly need and deserve, and receive the truth you have till now hated. If you should happen to be offended, then go your way, suffer that which you must, and when you are fed up to the full with lies and their consequences, God will be there to meet you and deliver you from your delusions of grandeur and counterfeit love, which are in opposition to Him.
You blessed me, Marisa, and I receive that blessing, in spite of where you are at. I take it you mean well or think you do, but you are in great and deadly error. In turn, I ask that God will open your heart to the truth, that you will repent and believe, God granting you the grace to take up the cross and worship Him in spirit and in truth.
Earnestly and with sure knowledge (there is no other way), contending for the faith once delivered to the saints,
Victor Hafichuk