Spiritual Fornication - A Warning!

just-us-2 · Sep 30, 2015

2 Corinthians 11:2-3
2 For I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy; for I betrothed you to one husband, so that to Christ I might present you as a pure virgin.
3 But I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ.

James 4:4
4 You adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.

This is obviously the truth. It is in God’s Word for us to know. Everyone likes to cling to the fact that Jesus Christ died for the sins of all mankind – and rightly so. But what has been at best, minimized, and more often and worse yet, forgotten and neglected entirely, is that His death was to purchase mankind as a pure virgin for the Bride of Christ. Any departure from what God instructs is spiritual fornication.

It used to be much easier to tell a real Christian from a non-Christian (or a fake, or one who was deceived) – right was right and wrong was wrong. Now we are bombarded with “gray areas” that we must be “tolerant” of and “politically correct” so we don’t offend anyone…yes, even in churches. Now, people are “Jesus fans” which is really fans of Jesus (He’s such a nice guy!) without actually being His disciple, one who is separate from the world.

Now, before anyone decides it would be fun to jump in and start the usual arguments, let me remind you that JESUS HIMSELF called it the ‘depths of Satan’ (Revelation 2:24) Note that is in the book of Revelation, not some Old Testament book you can say with your watered down easy-to-live-with gospel no longer applies.

Go back to square one and think a minute – God sent His Son to DIE so that we could be reconciled to Him, a pure virgin for a bride – DIE is a serious word and if you have never experienced your own child dying, I’m happy for you…but God did this for us...I guarantee you He is not going to look at those who minimize (or worse) the importance of His Son’s life and say, 'spiritual fornication is okay because you meant well by being so kind to that person and not saying adultery – or fornication, or drunkenness, or drug use, or placing sports above Him in daily thoughts, or gluttony, or absorbing the subtle sinfulness of modern music into our thought processes and judgmental decisions of what is good and right…and you can come in and be His Bride.' This is something God imparted to me as I grieved over my son’s death when he was 30 years old – the same age Jesus was when He ministers on earth.

Yet · Sep 30, 2015

I'm with you. I'm sorry for your loss. We 'almost' lost our son last year. May God comfort you with His eternal peace.

pieman · Sep 30, 2015

just-us-2 said:

2 Corinthians 11:2-3
2 For I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy; for I betrothed you to one husband, so that to Christ I might present you as a pure virgin.
3 But I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ.

James 4:4
4 You adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.

This is obviously the truth. It is in God’s Word for us to know. Everyone likes to cling to the fact that Jesus Christ died for the sins of all mankind – and rightly so. But what has been at best, minimized, and more often and worse yet, forgotten and neglected entirely, is that His death was to purchase mankind as a pure virgin for the Bride of Christ. Any departure from what God instructs is spiritual fornication.

It used to be much easier to tell a real Christian from a non-Christian (or a fake, or one who was deceived) – right was right and wrong was wrong. Now we are bombarded with “gray areas” that we must be “tolerant” of and “politically correct” so we don’t offend anyone…yes, even in churches. Now, people are “Jesus fans” which is really fans of Jesus (He’s such a nice guy!) without actually being His disciple, one who is separate from the world.

Now, before anyone decides it would be fun to jump in and start the usual arguments, let me remind you that JESUS HIMSELF called it the ‘depths of Satan’ (Revelation 2:24) Note that is in the book of Revelation, not some Old Testament book you can say with your watered down easy-to-live-with gospel no longer applies.

Go back to square one and think a minute – God sent His Son to DIE so that we could be reconciled to Him, a pure virgin for a bride – DIE is a serious word and if you have never experienced your own child dying, I’m happy for you…but God did this for us...I guarantee you He is not going to look at those who minimize (or worse) the importance of His Son’s life and say, 'spiritual fornication is okay because you meant well by being so kind to that person and not saying adultery – or fornication, or drunkenness, or drug use, or placing sports above Him in daily thoughts, or gluttony, or absorbing the subtle sinfulness of modern music into our thought processes and judgmental decisions of what is good and right…and you can come in and be His Bride.' This is something God imparted to me as I grieved over my son’s death when he was 30 years old – the same age Jesus was when He ministers on earth.

Sorry can you go into what you mean a little more.

crossnote · Sep 30, 2015

It's true, it's hard to hear a sermon these days without hearing the about their latest trip to the Mall, the latest R movie, their latest cruise (ministry of course), sheesh, I'm starting to sound like Yet

just-us-2 · Sep 30, 2015

pieman said:

Sure! I will be back on here later this afternoon and do that.

just-us-2 · Sep 30, 2015

pieman said:

We all know that when a person is converted to Christianity he/she doesn’t instantly become perfect, but there will be something noticeable to others soon after, because if the ‘amazing grace’ didn’t change him/her, it wasn’t the truly amazing grace of God. God’s grace is a changing grace – it changes us!

As disciples of Jesus Christ we must eventually face those ‘gray areas’ and take a stand. Nowadays we often hear statements like, “He’s a Christian, but he’s really messed up,” or “she has a good heart but she lives with her boyfriend,” or “he/she believes in God but is gay.” It has gotten so bad that it isn’t even mentioned many times. It is just accepted. Those are gray areas not dealt with and made right, and they cause what is called “Christianity” to be no more than a mere shadow or ghost of what it was in those early days and what it is supposed to be still.

Looking back at the disciples who walked around the countryside with Jesus we see men who were accustomed to the law given by God to mankind. Eventually, He instructed Moses to write it all down and we can read today how when Yahweh crafted His law for the good of the people, He interwove into it elements that would remind them all day long how much He loved them, because He gave instruction for everything a person did in a day, a growing season for crops, and a year. As a person disposed of some sort of waste, for instance, he would be reminded how God loved them and gave them instruction for their good health. It is flagrantly untrue that the law is a bunch of don’ts and regulations and outdated rules. So they were well acquainted with the reality of God and were bold enough to stand up to the persecution they knew they would encounter. Today, ‘persecution’ is considered to be a sideways look or an eyebrow raised in question at stating an unpopular truth of God. Rather than be thought of as ‘weird’ or ’fanatical’ it is just easier to go with the flow.

Today, I could go online and order an ordination certificate saying I am an ordained minister and go about finding a church to hire me as pastor – it happens often. If it didn’t, there would be no market for the phony ordination certificates. Sadly, even those who are “ordained” by more conventional means teach much less than the whole truth of God’s Word, and this leads to teaching which is compromised with the world’s standards. That compromise is spiritual fornication. The pure bride is tainted by false teaching.

crossnote · Sep 30, 2015

I agree with your assessment of the messiness of Christiandom...but I don't believe more law is the answer...

Romans 4:15 KJV
[15] Because the law worketh wrath: for where no law is, there is no transgression.

eternally-gratefull · Sep 30, 2015

crossnote said:

we should have known it would not be long before law came into the picture. they just can't let it go.

Sadly, A thread which could have had some meaning, (the picture of the child) was just destroyed. Because we could not leave it at the child. we had to move on to wrath.

just-us-2 · Sep 30, 2015

crossnote said:

MORE law is not the answer. LESS law is not the answer. God, in His perfection, gave exactly what man needs - it just needs to be… looking for an accurate word here…um…abided by. That isn’t exactly what I mean though, so if you will allow me to use a parable of sorts to explain my belief—mankind is sick – the unsaved are dreadfully deathly sick – the professing Christians suffer from varying intensities of the malady I’ll call “compromise”, for the sake of keeping this brief. When we get sick physically, most people go to a doctor and the rest of us use the herbs God gave us to treat our ailments. Either way, some sort of medicine or treatment is used to restore health and I see the law as similar to that medicine or treatment. As medicine won’t do any good if one doesn’t take it, not properly using what God gave us as spiritual medicine – His Law - does no good either. This is why true revival is necessary for the church and how it is supposed to work.

HeRoseFromTheDead · Sep 30, 2015

eternally-gratefull said:

A little leaven leavens the whole batch...

BenFTW · Sep 30, 2015

Lets not get sidetracked, this thread has potential. I would say the reason people continue to struggle with such sins is for the very reason that Law is preached and has no power to change them. A congregation starts sinning and someone holds up the Law as to condemn them, showing them it is against God.

So what do they do? In their strength they try to be perfect, and not slip up, when in reality they need a revelation on God's grace that sets them free from sin's dominion. The remedy is not showing that it is against God, but that Christ has set them free, they have died to sin and are made alive unto God. They already know its wrong, their own conscience bears that truth. They need the solution and its grace, its Jesus.

BradC · Sep 30, 2015

BenFTW said:

Lets not get sidetracked, this thread has potential. I would say the reason people continue to struggle with such sins is for the very reason that Law is preached and has no power to change them. A congregation starts sinning and someone holds up the Law as to condemn them, showing them it is against God.

So what do they do? In their strength they try to be perfect, and not slip up, when in reality they need a revelation on God's grace that sets them free from sin's dominion. The remedy is not showing that it is against God, but that Christ has set them free, they have died to sin and are made alive unto God. They already know its wrong, their own conscience bears that truth. They need the solution and its grace, its Jesus.

This is the reality of the finished work in the life of the believer, something the law could never do.

eternally-gratefull · Sep 30, 2015

just-us-2 said:

MORE law is not the answer. LESS law is not the answer. God, in His perfection, gave exactly what man needs - it just needs to be… looking for an accurate word here…um…abided by. That isn’t exactly what I mean though, so if you will allow me to use a parable of sorts to explain my belief—mankind is sick – the unsaved are dreadfully deathly sick – the professing Christians suffer from varying intensities of the malady I’ll call “compromise”, for the sake of keeping this brief. When we get sick physically, most people go to a doctor and the rest of us use the herbs God gave us to treat our ailments. Either way, some sort of medicine or treatment is used to restore health and I see the law as similar to that medicine or treatment. As medicine won’t do any good if one doesn’t take it, not properly using what God gave us as spiritual medicine – His Law - does no good either. This is why true revival is necessary for the church and how it is supposed to work.

More LOVE and Grace is the answer.

The law can not make you righteous, It can not make you morally good. It can not make you chrstlike

All it can do is give you false security.

eternally-gratefull · Sep 30, 2015

BenFTW said:

Lets not get sidetracked, this thread has potential. I would say the reason people continue to struggle with such sins is for the very reason that Law is preached and has no power to change them. A congregation starts sinning and someone holds up the Law as to condemn them, showing them it is against God.

So what do they do? In their strength they try to be perfect, and not slip up, when in reality they need a revelation on God's grace that sets them free from sin's dominion. The remedy is not showing that it is against God, but that Christ has set them free, they have died to sin and are made alive unto God. They already know its wrong, their own conscience bears that truth. They need the solution and its grace, its Jesus.

Sadly I grew up in that church. It was a dead church, and will always be a dead church. A bunch of want to bes who have no idea how to love or walk in a Christlike manner.

just-us-2 · Sep 30, 2015

This thread is about spiritual fornication – not the law! I mentioned the law in reply to pieman’s request for more of an explanation and it was only to explain the disciples’ culture, how they lived.

Now there are a few individuals who apparently want to destroy and derail this thread like they have done to so many others that start out to try to edify and be a meaningful discussion. That is their prerogative and I can’t really stop them. I have been told that people are beginning to see what they do and how they perjure themselves by claiming to be a Christian but are devoid of the fruit of the Spirit and how they claim that others attack them when it is as plain as the nose on your face that they are the attackers. People aren’t as stupid as they would like to think they are. Even though they have been successful at running off serious people who come here to take part in Christian fellowship but I wouldn’t be too proud of that success if I were them.

So, I will not argue and allow what God has given me to share with others who have ears to hear to be derailed by anything the adversary throws in my way. Now you know that when I don’t reply to certain posts it is because I see no value in pursuing that conversation. Legitimate questions and conversation is a good thing. As God said in Hebrews 13:16, “But don't forget doing good and sharing with others, for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.”

BradC · Sep 30, 2015

Somehow the grace of God is looked at a source that God is committed and mandated to have to minister to others no matter how they might live. That is not true because it is not a source or attribute of God. Grace is given by God to man to give man something he does not deserve and to teach him in the way he must go. If God makes grace abound much more when sin abounds then it is given to overcome sin and not condone it. God is not mandated to do this but rather does so because it is needed in the situation and in the life of the sinner. Spiritual adultery is when a person rejects that grace and continues in sin spiritually, depriving himself of what is needed for him to overcome sin mentally, emotionally and within the framework of his soul, where he is experiencing self-consciousness to the gratification of the flesh. This person may not be living in any overt sin but his soul is contrary to God through pride and is an enemy of the cross and the life of the Spirit.

just-me · Sep 30, 2015

Just a side note. Born means to begin. "Born again" means a new beginning. Living the life means growing by the grace and knowledge of God via His word, and learning to walk, and start eating the meat. Being "born again" is the beginning of a life, not the finishing point. Temptations escalate with our maturity. Knowingly succumbing to those temptations that can lead us to an insincere devotion to Christ, is spiritual fornication.

Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man:But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed.Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death. James 1:13-15

But I am afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpent's cunning, your minds may somehow be led astray from your sincere and pure devotion to Christ. 2 Corinthians 11:3 (NIV)

eternally-gratefull · Sep 30, 2015

BradC said:

licentiousness is a form of spiritual adultry I would agree. But so is legalism, and trying to appease God by our works. by saying that if we live up to some standard (say like law) we make God happy.

which is so not the case. God is happy when we share his love, in which we fulfill the so called instructions or commands. Not when we of the flesh follow some religious set of standards, whether it be law, Sacraments, tradition, or whatever, that is all religion, and God does not like religion. God likes sincere humble hearts.

eternally-gratefull · Sep 30, 2015

just-me said:

being born again is being set free, It is bringing us back to a restoration with God. it is a returning to the garden of Eden, It is relying on God for 100 % of our needs, and every moment of our live is relying on him.

It is not returning to law. Returning to tradition, returning to religion. We are saved FROM THOSE THINGS, because those things will never make us righteous.

just-us-2 · Sep 30, 2015

BradC said:

I see what you are saying here. I used to not care much about other people and sometimes the human nature would like to return to that mindset, but Adonai changed that part of me and now I find myself worried about people who are like you described. Knowing only a pure, chaste bride is good enough for Yeshua, what can we surmise is the fate of those who are not spiritually of a pure heart? Scary thought but I think they are those spoken of in Matthew 7:19-23.
19 Any tree that does not produce good fruit is cut down and thrown in the fire!
20 So you will recognize them by their fruit.
21 "Not everyone who says to me, `Lord, Lord!' will enter the Kingdom of Heaven, only those who do what my Father in heaven wants.
22 On that Day, many will say to me, `Lord, Lord! Didn't we prophesy in your name? Didn't we expel demons in your name? Didn't we perform many miracles in your name?'
23 Then I will tell them to their faces, `I never knew you! Get away from me, you workers of lawlessness!'

Spiritual Fornication - A Warning!

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