Jay Forrest - Jay Forrest's Blog

Power is Poison

“Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men.” – Lord Acton

When Christians take power into their own hands, terrible things are done in the name of God. Shameful deeds of persecution, torture and killing. History has demonstrated that nothing is as dangerous as the joining of church and state.

The Evangelicals rail against the Catholic Church for the abuses of the Middle Ages. They would never do what they did. And yet, what do you think Christian Nationalism is?

Dangers of Christian Nationalism

Jesus said:

“My kingdom does not belong to this world. If my kingdom belonged to this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not from here” (John 18:36).

When Church and State join forces, you know that bad things are about to happen. This is not theory, this is history. When the Roman Empire made Catholic Christianity the religion of the state, soon after the persecutions followed.

Power is Poison

When Jesus was offered by the devil “all the Kingdoms of the world,” he refused (Matt 4:8-9). Now the Church in the United States is being made the same offer. Unfortunately, it is bowing the knee to glory and power to a kingdom that belongs to this world.

Jesus said, “My kingdom does not belong to this world.” Then why do some Christian want to create a kingdom on earth? This is against the wishes of Christ. And so we now have Christians who are willing to “fight” and kill for God.

The Ruler of this World

The sad part is that as they pursue Christian Nationalism, they fail to realize that they are joining up with the “ruler of this world.” And do you know who that is? The devil (John 16:11; 12:31; 14:30; 2 Cor 4:4). That is why 1 John 5:19 says that “the whole world lies under the power of the evil one.”

The most dangerous people in Jesus’ day were the religious leaders. Not much has changed in 2,000 years. What starts out as a good intention ends up becoming s a hideous catastrophe. Only pride blinds us to this temptation.

What is Conversion?

Jesus said, “Assuredly, I say to you, unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matt 18:3 NKJV).

The basic meaning of convert is the idea of turning. There is a “turning from” and a “turning to.”

Turning From

The first part of conversion is the turning from sin. E. Stanley Jones rightly defines conversion as “conversion from a self-centered person to a God-centered person.”

This turning from sin is called repentance, which is a change of heart. The word heart in the Bible is used for the will, the control center of your moral life. Repentance is a change from a will aiming to please self, to a will aiming to please God.

Turning To

The second part of conversion is turning to God and trusting Him to forgive and save you. Faith is not believing certain claims about God, rather it is about trusting a Person. Faith is “an inherent trust and enduring confidence in the power, wisdom and goodness of God” (Heb 11:3 AMP).

Turning to God involves a separation from the world, the flesh, and the devil, and a dedication to the Church, the Holy Spirit, and the Lord Jesus Christ. The sim of our life is now to love God first and foremost, and to love our neighbors as ourselves.

Selfishness is Sin

He said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets” (Matt. 22:37-40).

Agape Love

The kind of love spoken of here is not a feeling, it’s an act of the will. It is the willing of the highest good of God first and foremost, and the willing of the highest good of others equally with our own highest good.

Selfishness

Selfishness is putting our interests above God’s and others. It is putting ourselves first and foremost. It is dethroning God as King of our lives and placing ourselves on the throne of our heart.

If “love is the fulfilling of the law” (Rom. 13:10), and “sin is lawlessness” (1 John 3:4), then selfishness is the essence of sin. Sin is not missing the mark, sin is a wrong aim. It is aiming to please self rather than God. It is the root of evil.

Flesh, Sin, and Sins

The flesh is the tendencies toward selfishness, sin is the aim to serve self, and sins are the selfish actions that result from this wrong aim. They are selfish thoughts, words, and deeds.

Testimony of the Church

“Sin is due to the abuse, not use, of free will. The abuse of free will occurs when we put our egocentric interests above the common interests.” – Thomas C. Oden
“The root of all sin is selfishness, separating first from God and then from man.” – Andrew Murray
“We hold the essential principle of sin to be selfishness.” – A. H. Strong
“We have also seen, that all sin is selfishness.” – Charles Finney

Prayer Before Eating

“For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected, provided it is received with thanksgiving, for it is sanctified by God’s word and by prayer” (1 Tim. 4:4-5).

We should pray before we eat a meal. God is our Provider, therefore everything we receive is a gift. We should therefore receive the gifts of God “with thanksgiving.”

Even Pigs Grunt

I heard a preacher once say that even pigs grunt before they eat. It is true, they do. How much more should we thank our Creator for His providence?

I will share my little prayer that I use before meals. But there are many other examples you can find online. Use whatever one stirs you to thanksgiving.

My Meal Prayer

Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for this food, blessed it and nourish it to my body, through Christ my Lord. Amen.

False Expectations About the Bible

John Chrysostom (around 387 CE) appears to be the first writer to use the word Bible to refer to the Old and New Testaments together. It later became a favorite destination for the collection of writings.

Since then a lot of false expectations have arisen about the Bible. Many have become stumbling blocks to people.

One of those false expectations is in treating the Bible as a history book, or a science book. The Bible is not a history book, it’s not a science book, it’s a book about the relationship between God and humankind.

Science and History

Now it is true, that the Bible does contain history and science. But that’s beside the point. The Bible is not a history book, and it is not a science book,. Therefore, the accuracy of its science and history is not that important.

A lot of ink has been spilled trying to defend the non-essential parts of the Bible. The Bible is filled with myth, metaphor and parables. This is how you use language to hint at what can’t be defined in literal language.

Essentials and Non-essentials

It takes a little bit of wisdom to understand the difference between what’s essential and what is non-essential when it deals with God. And unfortunately, in the modern age, people have mistakenly thought the non-essential was the important part.

In essentials, the Bible is true. In non-essentials, the Bible is fallible. The Bible is both human and divine. It is divine and true regarding God and our relationship to him. It is human and fallible regarding the world and our understanding of it.

A Relationship Book

The Bible is not written to tell us about the world, the Bible was written to tell us about people’s relationship with God. It documents how God dealt with humankind throughout the ages.

A lot of doubt has been created in the world, because of false expectations of the Bible. The Bible is a book that God inspired men to write down, not about science and history, but about their relationship with Him. That’s what the Bible is. It’s a relationship book.