Is God Pleased With The Congregation?
Approximately 1,500 years after God created this earth, mankind
had so perverted itself with lust, greed, and hatred, that the Creator
determined that it was in the best interest of all creation for Him to
destroy life on earth. "And God saw that the wickedness of man was
great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of His
heart was only evil continually. And it repented the Lord that He had
made man on the earth, and it grieved Him at His heart. And the Lord
said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the
earth; both man, and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls of
the air; for it repenteth me that I have made them. But Noah found
grace in the eyes of the Lord." (Gen.6:5-8).
It escapes the notice of the casual reader of the scriptures,
that the flood was very much more than a flood. It was a catastrophic
re-creation of both heaven and earth. So terrible was the destuction, it is a
marvel that even the ark survived, and had God not cared for it, it
certainly could not have withstood the power of the Creator's wrath.
The waters of the flood originated from many places. It was not
simply a hard, steady rain for forty days and nights. Not only were
the "windows of heaven opened", but "all the fountains of the great
deep were broken up." The geography of the earth was violently and
completely rearranged, with colossal convulsions. The one, gigantic
continent suggested in Genesis 1:9 was ripped apart, thus forming in a
year the continents as we know them today. (It doesn't take God a
billion years to do anything). The physics of heaven and earth were
re-created, so that rainfall became a common occurence. Before the
flood, it isn't mentioned, "for the Lord God had not caused it to rain
upon the earth....But there went up a mist from the earth, and it
watered the whole face of the ground" (Gen.2:5-6).
There are many, many differences in the order of the cosmos which
were effected by the event called "the flood", but time will not allow
us to pursue them further just now. Suffice it to say that when Noah
and his family stepped out of the ark, it was very much as though they
had stepped onto an entirely different planet, with new ground rules
for survival, and new laws of the universe with which to cope.
Of all this, I would invite your attention to the biblical phrase
"it repented the Lord that He had made man on the earth, and it
grieved Him at His heart." Think on that for just a moment. In the
beginning, everything God created pleased Him. "And God saw every
thing that He had made, and, behold, it was very good." He had good
feelings when He beheld His creation. He put forth an effort to do a
good thing, and He did it, but in only a little more than 1500 years,
the crown jewel of His work - man - so disgusted and outraged Him that He could not bear the thought of allowing him any longer to exist. He
dearly loved man, and freely gave him dominion over a paridise-like
planet, and, in righteous indignation, destroyed them both. Adam's
race was cursed with death, and even though Noah escaped, he and his
fellow survivors still bore that curse, and passed it on to succeeding generations. It is
still "appointed unto man once to die" (Heb. 9:27).
Jesus did not undo that curse. He did not come to undo that
curse. Faith in Jesus will not exempt one from having to die a
natural death. But faith in Jesus will give one the hope of escaping
what the Bible calls "the second death", which is the lake of fire,
where souls who will not submit to the lordship of Jesus will be
tormented day and night forever (Rev.20:10-15), in a darkness so thick
that words fail to describe it. It is worse than hell. Hell itself
will be cast into the lake of fire. It is a place of absolute
hopelessness and pain. "There shall be weeping and gnashing of
teeth." The screams of the damned will be the only sound. Only by
faith can we understand that such a fearful place even exists. Please
do not go there. Please seek the Lord while He may be found. The
great joy of life on earth is the hope that we may have in Christ.
But my point in this article is, as God was at first pleased with His creation of man,
yet later regretted ever doing so, He is now at the point of regretting that He
ever created His holy congregation, though in the beginning it was the joy of His
heart. It is a terrifying thought to contemplate, that our Lord
should be so disgusted and angry with us that He would even regret
that He made the excruciating sacrifice that He did, but I believe the
congregation has provoked Him that much.
"But the Lord is patient" you say? Don't mistake God's patience with His people as His
approval. The denominations of Christianity have divided the holy Ghost-filled saints of
God. The doctrines of men have lied about the Father and His Son. Christianity is the
"cage of every unclean bird, and every foul spirit" - and that is why God is calling every
child of God out of it - to save us. I believe the situation is grave. If you don't sense a
mounting terror in your spirit for the things coming upon the elect, much less this
wicked world, I wonder if you, too, have been deluded by the empty promises of
doctrines of men. God is demanding unconditional surrender to His will.
Yes, it seemed hard to think that God would regret creating in
Christ a new race of men (cp. 1Cor.15:45), but His heart is broken.
His wrath is kindled. He will forgive, but only if we repent. Otherwise the curse which
Paul warned would befall the congregation will become a living reality: "...because
they received not the love of the truth...God shall send them stong delusion, that
they should believe a lie, that they all might be damned who believed not the truth,
but had pleasure in unrighteousness" (II Thes. 2:10-11).
May God help us to see the seriousness of this hour in human history. The destruction
of Adam's race, except for Noah, "happened unto them for
examples", Paul wrote, "and are written for our
admonition." The destruction of the congregation, except for those who obey God,
is certain, though we who say so are ridiculed and ignored, as was Noah in
his day. The congregation is not the bride of Christ, my dear reader. The
bride is that part of the congregation which obeys the will of the Father.
Please don't mistake God's patience to be approval. Please don't
mistake His mercy and blessings on your life to mean that He accepts
your lifestyle. He detests every way of living except His. He
loathes every teaching that doesn't come from heaven. He is irritated
by every saint who does not stay filled with the holy Ghost. His
toleration of our ways by no means is an indication that they are acceptable to him.
But, because God still blesses mankind, men continue contentedly in error, as if God will
not judge us for such things!
"What hast thou to do to declare my statutes, or that thou shouldest
take my covenant in thy mouth? Seeing thou hastest instruction, and
castest my words behind thee. These things hast thou done, and I kept
silence; thou thoughtest that I was altogether such a one as thyself;
but I will reprove thee....Now consider this, ye that forget God, lest
I tear you in pieces, and there be none to deliver. He that offereth
praise glorifieth me: and to him that ordereth his conversation aright
will I show the salvation of God." (from Psalms 50)
God is not pleased with the congregation, as long as its members remain in Christianity. You
must come out to where Jesus IS! And Jesus is still "outside the camp", waiting for those
who want to please Him, and WILL please him, no matter what the cost. May we
suggest that you order our free cassette/gospel tract series "Coming Out" - where you will
be encouraged to follow the voice you are hearing. The Spirit is calling you OUT, and
that is why you can never be satisfied at the vain denominational meetings you attend
each weekend... they can never satisfy your soul.
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