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Subject 13 : The Gospel According to MATTHEW
[Chapter 21-7] Philosophical Ministers Oppose the Gospel of Jesus (Matthew 21:44)
(Matthew 21:44)
“And whoever falls on this stone will be broken; but on whomever it falls, it will grind him to powder.”
In today’s Scripture passage, the Lord says, “And whoever falls on this stone will be broken.” This passage means that God will judge those who challenge Him. Today, I would like to speak about those who oppose God with their own thinking, especially with their philosophical thoughts. As in the past, and in this day and age, there are many people who oppose God, and the reality of what opposes God is none other than human thinking.
How do people oppose God? It is philosophical human thinking that makes people oppose God the most. Human thinking itself opposes God. Does this mean that Christians can also oppose God? Yes, it does. Christians also oppose God when their thoughts have prevailed over the Word of God.
Current Christian Ministers Who Oppose the True Gospel with Their Own Thinking
Matthew 21:23 says, “Now when He came into the temple, the chief priests and the elders of the people confronted Him as He was teaching, and said, ‘By what authority are You doing these things? And who gave You this authority?’” These leaders of Judaism who were handed down the Old Testament, and had faith in God with reverence, tried to find petty faults with Jesus’ words and said, “By what authority are You preaching these things?” Jesus answered, “I will ask you also. Was the baptism of John from heaven or from men? If you tell me this, I likewise will tell you by what authority I do these things.”
Jesus Christ explained to them with a parable: “A father told his first son and the second, “Go, work today in my vineyard.” The second son said he will not do it, but the first son answered saying, ‘yes.’ However, the first son did not go to work while the second son regretted it and went afterward. If so which of the two sons is more right?” After having told this story example, Jesus said to them, “Assuredly, I say to you that tax collectors and harlots enter the kingdom of God before you. For John came to you in the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him; but tax collectors and harlots believed him; and when you saw it, you did not afterward relent and believe him” (Matthew 21:31-32).
Jesus gave the gospel of His baptism and the Spirit first to those who believed in the Word of the Old Testament. However, the chief priests the elders of the people did not believe in the gospel of the water and the Spirit. Instead, they challenged Jesus. They did not believe in the baptism of John the Baptist. Even though John the Baptist had come in the way of righteousness, that is, the way that would make people righteous, they did not change to the end and did not believe him after all.
Jesus Christ told them of the Word of the Truth once more with the parable of a vineyard: “A certain man planted a vineyard, set a hedge around it, and finished making everything such as winepress and so on. Then, he leased it to vinedressers and left. When he sent his servants and his son in turn to the vinedressers to receive its fruit as rent, the vinedressers beat and killed the servants and even the son of the owner. Then, when the owner of the vineyard really comes, what will he do to those vinedressers? Will he not lease his vineyard to other vinedressers who will render to him the fruits in their seasons?”
It means that the Lord wanted people who would genuinely believe in and follow the Word of God. God bestowed His Word on the face of the earth, and asked those who would believe in that Word of God to become the fruits of salvation by that faith. God didn’t want us to bring certain fruits of our actions. The Lord said, “Have you never read in the Scriptures: ‘The stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. This was the LORD’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes’? Therefore I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken from you and given to a nation bearing the fruits of it” (Matthew 21:42-43).
A person who opposes the gospel with his or her own philosophical thinking is an opponent of Jesus. But strangely enough, people who claim to believe in and follow Jesus Christ are the ones who challenge and oppose Jesus the most. How do they stand against the Lord Jesus? They oppose Him saying, “Jesus took away our original sin, but not all. Nevertheless, sins still remain in this world. That being the case, we get to receive remission for our personal sins only if we offer prayers of repentance everyday.” If we look at the many Christians opposing God, we see that they are all opposing Jesus with their own fleshly thinking. They say, “How can you say you are without sin? There are sins in one’s heart even after having faith in Jesus.”
However, the Truth tells the opposite. The fact that Jesus has blotted out all the sins of mankind by His baptism and bloodshed on the Cross is the Truth. If that is the case, we must recognize that the philosophical thinking of each and every one of us human beings is a sin. It opposes the gospel of the Truth by which one gets to be born again by the water and the Spirit realized by Jesus, and we must turn back from it at once. Even during the days of Jesus, the chief priest of Judaism and the elders who were said to have believed in God opposed Jesus. That’s no unlike those Christian leaders who have religious fervor and philosophical faith in this current day and age. They had tried to live devoutly and holy. But they were the very ones who had opposed Jesus.
On many occasions, people tend to oppose Jesus with their own philosophical thinking. The Bible speaks the Truth, but each and every human being tries hard to understand the Bible according to their own thinking and in line with their own standards. That is why people who have try to use philosophical thoughts say, “People commit sins everyday because they lack in their deeds, so how can people say they are righteous just because they have faith in Jesus?” They advocate their thinking as being right. Philosophical human thinking is precisely what prevents them from believing in Jesus. The fact is that it becomes a sin directly opposing the Lord-given gospel of the water and the Spirit.
Now, surely you must have come to realize just a little how one can actually oppose Jesus unconsciously. First of all, you might know by now that human thinking itself is what opposes the gospel. We must know well how evil people’s thoughts are and how different their thoughts are from the Truth of God. Human thinking follows one’s own desires of the flesh, and it can never follow God’s Word of the Truth. Do you know why people aren’t able to believe in the Word of the Truth of the redemption spoken by Jesus Christ? Not only that, do you know why they are sinners even if they do believe in Jesus? It is precisely because of people’s own thinking. It was human thinking that prevented them from believing in the salvation of the redemption which is the Truth of God.
If we listen to sinners who haven’t been born again, they say that God calls them as the righteous because they believe in Jesus. But they say that they still are sinners with sins currently in their hearts. Because they are immersed in their own thinking, when they reflect on their own thinking, they see that human beings are lacking, weak, and full of transgressions. They have committed sins so very often, and they argue how they can say they are righteous before God and before people. From a human perspective, it may sound right, but actually, it is the total opposite of the Truth. Yet, if one does not know the gospel of the Truth, he or she cannot but naturally say that. Likewise, we are able to see people who are said to believe in Jesus opposing God constantly with their philosophical thoughts. While caught up in humanistic philosophy, they say, “Even if I believe in Jesus, it is correct that I am a sinner, so how can I be a righteous person?” Many people confess, “I cannot but be a sinner who is insufficient until I die.”
However, is it correct that a person is still a sinner despite having faith in the salvation of the baptism and the blood of Jesus and the Holy Spirit? Even now, they are strongly objecting to the fact that Jesus Christ has become the Savior and that human sins have vanished due to John the Baptist giving Jesus the baptism to pass on sins. This is precisely what opposing God with the philosophical human thinking is. But clearly, the Law of God is that “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Those who are said to have sins go to hell. This is the Law of the Truth laid down by God.
False Ministers Will Receive Judgment
People who had fervently believed in God with their own philosophical thoughts instead of the written Word at the time of Jesus were the chief priests and the scribes. They were the ones opposing Jesus with their own thinking. Then what happens to a philosophical person who opposes God with human thinking? Referring to such people, God said, “Their heads will be broken.” When Jesus sees these kinds of people challenging Him, He says, “It is utterly intolerable. I will surely pass the judgment on them.” Dear fellow believers, if we were to regard Jesus as a rock, then what is the human head? It is no more than a rotten pumpkin. If a rock and a pumpkin were to collide, which do you think will win? So, if people were to oppose the gospel of the water and the Spirit with philosophical human thinking, they will be the only ones getting hurt; and what benefit would that be to them? Please, just think about it. Human stubbornness will only lead people to hell. Do you understand this?
You must understand what this means. It isn’t that we are irrelevant just because we have received salvation. It has been said that you have to know yourself as well as your enemy to win a battle. The reason so many people do not accept it and do not get to receive salvation is that the Truth of the salvation cannot enter the hearts of people because they are held in captive by their own philosophical thinking which obstructs the Word.
Rejecting the gospel is purely due to people trying to understand the gospel Word at the level of their own human thoughts. The reason they oppose God is that they trying to understand the salvation of God with their meager hundred and tens worth of IQ. After just a little thought, they say it is simply wrong if it does not fit their way of thinking and right if it does fit their thinking. But, that is completely different from the thinking of Jesus as spoken in the Scripture passages.
A human being cannot possibly become a righteous person with philosophical human thinking. However, if God has made us righteous, the person can become righteous by faith. However, many people oppose God with the philosophical thinking coming out from a brain no bigger that the size of both of their fists. We, who are righteous, must educate such people. If a person is opposing God the Omnipotent with his or her tiny thinking, that person is very foolish. The salvation of Jesus comes not from the ground, but from God who is above. You must also realize just how much people’s philosophical thoughts challenge the gospel. Then, you must let your family members and friends know that one’s own philosophical thinking opposes the gospel of the salvation of Jesus.
The chief priests said cynically to Jesus, “How can You be the Son of God, and if so, are You the Savior?” They did not believe in Jesus being the Son of God and the Savior for the sinners. But, Jesus said to them, “John came to you in the way of righteousness.” John the Baptist had witnessed that Jesus came in the way of righteousness to make sinners righteous, but they did not believe him.
People who oppose Jesus’ Word of the Truth will surely be broken. It is because they cannot reach the Truth through human thinking. No matter how well a person might believe in, and follow Jesus, the person can never become righteous by a faith based on his or her philosophical thinking. By way of accepting the gospel of the water and the Spirit by which Jesus has turned us into the righteous, the faithful can become the righteous.
But by offering prayers of repentance ardently, and struggling to live a sanctimonious life according to philosophical human thinking, a human being will never be able to reach the salvation of becoming a son of God, meaning a righteous person. We must realize that such a route of faith opposes God even more. Your spirits must be awakened. If a person is caught up in one’s own thinking even after having been born again, the person can reckon whether or not he should continue the life of faith. But I hope you realize the Truth, knowing that you will never be able to arrive at the Truth with your own thinking.
If Jesus has turned us into the righteous with His Truth of salvation, we become the righteous only by faith. If He has made it so we the righteous can enter the Heaven He created, we enter Heaven only by faith. And if He has made us the children of God, we get to become children of God only by faith. If the Lord tells us that a human being has nothing to do with receiving the salvation when he believes in God according to the logic of his own philosophical thinking, we must believe it.
There are many philosophies in your thoughts also. Not only are we weak, if we were to look at people, it’s hard to realize just how many people there are whose thoughts are held tightly together by human thinking. Instead of understanding what the Truth of God is, there are many people who oppose the Word of Jesus or the gospel itself with human thinking. People like this are those who oppose God. But, what does the Bible say about what would happen if one were to oppose God? The person goes to hell. Faith is the same. People have to be free from their philosophical thoughts in order for the faith to be upright. If people get caught up in their own thinking, the faith cannot stand upright. Philosophical human thinking only shows the righteousness of human beings, and it prevents people from chasing after the Lord.
What did the Lord say? He said, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself” (Matthew 16:24). Denying oneself stated here means that one has to discard his or her own logical thinking. If a person has his or her own philosophical thinking, the person is opposing the gospel. Doing so, it would just bring that person’s own loss. All who lead a life of faith, whether they are born-again people or not, must throw away their own philosophical thinking and follow the Lord.
Jesus says that if one prays, He will provide answer to the prayers. He also says that if one believes in Jesus, He will make that person one of the righteous by cleansing away all sins, no matter what sort of a sin it may be, even those sins that are red as scarlet. Nevertheless, we must throw away our own philosophical thinking before all else in order to receive salvation.
Throw Away Your Thoughts and Believe in the Truth
What does the philosophical human logic do to the gospel? It stands against the genuine gospel of the water and the Spirit. Scarlet sins do not become as white as snow with philosophical human thinking. Instead, it makes us believe that we have to cleanse everyday those sins that we commit after having started believing in Jesus, even though the past sins were cleansed when we first started believing in Jesus. The Lord has cleansed all the sins completely in a single stroke by the water and the blood. But philosophical thinking has us oppose God by claiming that human sins can never be gone.
The Lord says, “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; let him return to the LORD” (Isaiah 55:7). We must throw away our thoughts. Following our own thoughts leads to destruction. See the Scripture passage in which the people of Israel were destroyed trying to serve God with their philosophical thinking, having fallen into their own thoughts when the Word was not with them. That applies not only to people of the Old Testament, but to you and me as well. So you and I must throw away our philosophical thoughts. That is why our Lord said, in the Gospel of John chapter 3, “Unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.”
It means regardless of who, no person can enter the Kingdom of God if that person was not baptized into Jesus and does not believe in Jesus who has come by the water and the blood (Romans 6:3, Gal 3:27, 1 John 5:4-8). Anyone who wants to receive the remission of sins must first throw away his or her thoughts. With a philosophical human faith, a person can never become righteous for all eternity. Philosophical faith makes the faithful righteous and turns them into the sinful. However, a person who has become righteous by believing in the gospel of the Truth, never again becomes a sinner. We must realize that we cannot become righteous with our own efforts. If we believe in the Word of Truth, we become righteous. It is true. If we know the Truth, we become righteous and if we do not know the Truth, we belong to the multitude of false ministers and heretics.
How dangerous philosophical human thinking is. When I meet and speak with people, I can see that they are filled with self-centered thoughts from beginning to the end. I once preached the gospel to a certain ministry worker. “Jesus took away all our sins by the water and the blood. By Jesus receiving the baptism of redemption through John the Baptist, all our sins were passed onto Jesus, and Jesus died on the Cross in order to receive the judgment, and three days later, He was resurrected. Because Jesus blotted out all our sins, we are righteous. We have become righteous by believing in it.”
Just then, that ministry worker who was caught in his own philosophical thinking said, “If that is the case, then I guess it is all right to commit sins recklessly. If that is the case, then I guess it is all right to commit murder!” I had preached to him that Jesus has taken way all the sins of the world by the water and the blood. Who had preached that it is not a sin to commit murder? Yet, such people oppose the Truth because they have a self-centered philosophy inside them. He said, “I guess it is all right to commit sins recklessly” because he does not believe, and is unable to believe because of his own thinking. To sin or not to sin is one’s own choice. Is it true that people do commit sins recklessly just because they have received the remission of all their sins?
The Greek word for “gospel” is “euaggelion,” or the good news. And it was said to have the “dunamis” of God (Romans 1:16). This Greek word “dunamis” means strength, power or ability, from which we get the word “dynamite.” Jesus has perfected all the righteousness of God by taking on our sins completely at the time He received the baptism at the Jordan River, and suffered judgment for our sins by dying on the Cross. Resurrecting three days later, He now sits at the right hand of the throne of God.
This is the gospel of the water and the Spirit, and if we believe this, all sins will be blotted out, just as an explosion of dynamite would blow away a building without any trace. This is the power of the gospel. If one were to believe in Jesus Christ’s baptism of redemption and blood of the Cross, sins inside the heart of the believer will be no more. Yet, some people, caught up in their own philosophical thinking, oppose the salvation of God, saying, “If the gospel of the water and the Spirit is right, I guess even committing murder wouldn’t be a sin. Then, I guess it is all right for people to commit murder.” This is precisely what human thinking is.
Here in the Scripture passage, it is written, “Whoever falls on this stone will have their head broken.” What is meant by being broken is that philosophical human thinking will be broken. Jesus has blotted out all the sins in this world by the baptism He had received and by His shed blood on the cross. But people become opponents of Jesus with their own philosophical human thoughts, saying, “If all my sins have been remitted already, I guess I can commit sins freely.” When did God say that committing murder after having received the remission of sins does not constitute a sin? Even though God did not say so, people, having fallen into their own thinking, are objecting just for the sake of objecting so that they don’t believe the Truth. People think, “If that gospel is true, then it means that even if people do commit sins, they do not constitute sins.” They are afraid to believe that Jesus has taken away all their sins. For them, the gospel of the water and the Spirit itself is fearsome.
Because what Jesus gives us isn’t something bad, we must accept the gospel of the water and the Spirit that the Lord Jesus has given by faith. Everything good comes down from above. However, if we come to rely on selfish human thinking, we cannot accept the true gospel by faith, and we start to worry. We say, “Sins shouldn’t be taken away all at once because if that is the case, I’ll be committing sins haphazardly. What should I do? If that, indeed, is the case, I think something really bad will happen. Furthermore, if that is the case, there will no longer be the need to worship, and offer prayers of repentance.” That is why there are still so many Christians who aren’t able to accept the gospel for having fallen into their own philosophical thinking.
Man’s Philosophical Thinking Itself Is Evil before God
If people do not free themselves from human thinking, they will develop a relationship at war against God. People are prone to reject the gospel of Truth because they think they will be leading a completely prodigal life, instead of having faith in Jesus. There would be nothing to repent of after having received the remission of sins once and for all. That is why most Christians don’t accept the gospel of the water and the Spirit. That is why people oppose God with their philosophical thinking. People aren’t able to accept the work of the gospel because human philosophy puts people’s own thoughts ahead of God’s and distances people from the Word of the Truth of God. They think that their virtue and kindness are far better than those of God.
In the Book of Romans chapter 8 verse 7, it is said, “Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be.” Human thinking makes people become enemies of God. Right now, many people say, “You say Jesus has taken away all sins? Oh, how could He have taken away all! He took away only the original sin. As for the personal sins, people have to repent every day.” This is what human thinking is. People and their human thinking tend to believe that life would become a mess if they go on living without offering prayers of repentance. They say such things because they are think that their ethical life would be ruined. That is a seriously mistaken thought? Did God send Jesus to have people’s ethical life be ruined? Does it mean that human beings are more virtuous than God?
As you well know, human thinking cannot save people from sins. Why don’t people who have received salvation by having faith in Jesus repent? There is no one in this world who turns back from deeds on their own other than the born-again. How can the righteous be compared to any sort of a sinner? The righteous cannot live with sin. Repentance is truly knowing in one’s heart what or who has been wronged and then turning back from it instead of just saying, “Oh Lord, I believe. Please, forgive me. Amen.” This is only lip service and nothing else. Real repentance is something that only the righteous, not the sinful, can do.
Yet there are many people who have become enemies of God because of their own way of thinking. When Jesus was on this earth, all the chief priests and the elders became enemies of God. They had abandoned Jesus and held to their own faith. As a result, many people who believe in Jesus are mocking Him, even today. Although Jesus has taken away all the sins of this world, they say that one becomes more and more holy by offering prayers of repentance everyday. This is a total disregard for the way of salvation, and it makes Jesus into nobody. The gospel of the water and the Spirit says that Jesus came to this earth and blotted out the sins of this world once and for all. Throwing away this Truth is a shortcut to destruction.
On this earth, there are two types of churches. First, there is the visible church that is approved by the world, and most of Christianity falls into this type. The other type of church is the invisible church, that is, the born-again church of God which suffers persecution in this world. Both types of church are the same in the formality of believing in God. But, the former is a church that tries to cleanse sins on its own by repenting every day with its own human thinking, because it does not believe in Jesus, who has taken away all the sins of the world.
The other one is a church that has received salvation by having accepted the gospel of the salvation of the water and the Spirit that says Jesus has blotted out the sins completely, giving up cleansing sins on its own, just like the tax collectors and harlots. Those who dwell in the latter type of church are people who have broken their philosophical thoughts before Jesus.
People who believe in Jesus philosophically, that is, who repent and cleanse their sins on their own every day are acting in enmity before God and opposing Him. I am saying that those who taught this were the chief priest and the elders who rejected Jesus. And the leaders of large churches that the world recognizes today are of the same sort. Are the church members of a philosophical Christianity in this current world the born-again people? No, they are not. They go on living with a clear philosophy of their own. They are the ones whose subjectivity and values are clear. They say they believe in God, but in actuality, they are the opponents of God. Strictly speaking, they cannot be called Christians. They don’t believe in Jesus’ gospel of the water and the Spirit as it is written in the Scriptures. They choose to make idols out of God with their philosophical Christian doctrines.
Tenacious Self-righteousness of the Liars
In the Bible, Jesus already blotted out human sins. This is written in the past perfect tense. So the problem of sin has already come to an end. In essence, it has already been resolved. Because Jesus has saved us by the gospel of the water and the Spirit, our sins have been resolved (Hebrews 10:17-18). But what about the large churches these days? They are currently in the process of making up a philosophical salvation, showing no regard for the Word of God. When asked, who are the ones opposing God, I say boldly that they are the Christian sinners who say one can arrive at sanctification by repenting every day and the ones who believe in Jesus philosophically. Arriving at sanctification by repenting everyday is a philosophical faith.
Didn’t Jesus truly become the chief cornerstone that links us with God? By taking on our sins by the baptism, didn’t He turn us, the believers, into the righteous? A cornerstone is a stone at the corner of a building uniting two intersecting walls. It usually is laid at a ceremony marking the start of a building. Jesus Christ has become the cornerstone to make us reconcile with God and form His Church with His gospel. But is it possible for us to call out the name of Jesus and profess proper faith without relating us to Him? If you try to do this, you have a philosophical faith, and Jesus does not approve of it.
When we became enemies of God due to sins, God gave us the gospel of the water and the Spirit by sending Jesus down to this earth and had Him take on all the sins of humankind through His baptism. He had saved from all sins all those who believe. In doing this, Jesus became the Savior for us, who are the faithful. In turn, He made us the children of God. For that, we are able to call God our Father, and God has allowed us to be called His children.
But those who believe in Jesus philosophically do not believe in the same Jesus. As seen from today’s Scripture passage, the Lord will judge them. People who try to receive salvation by their own human thinking, through their kind deeds, many tears, and much praying are the ones who oppose God. People receive salvation only when they truly believe in the Jesus-given gospel of the water and the Spirit. The faith in which they believe arbitrarily by neglecting Jesus’ gospel is a complete failure, and they could never be able to receive salvation.
People mine for gold in the mountains. When a gold mine expert finds a vein of gold, he digs up the mountain just a bit more, and they know at once whether the vein of gold is a dead-end vein or a vein full of gold. Believing in Jesus is like that. You believed in Jesus, saying that you want to receive salvation by believing in Him. But if sins are still there, doesn’t that mean something is wrong? Do you want to know the end result? With a faith such as that, you believed in Jesus to the very end, but if the sins are still there, what would you do then? It’s not true that one would become a virtuous person and be sanctified simply by having faith. People who believe philosophically have the understanding that people arrive at sanctification and become the righteous by offering prayers of repentance every day. But they died in the end as sinners. To such people, the Lord says, “I never knew you; depart from Me” (Matthew 7:20-23).
They might say, “How is it that You never knew me? Have I not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons, and done many wonders in Your name?” Jesus will reprimand them, saying, “I never knew you. Depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness. You saw Me as the One who wasn’t able to blot out all your sins. Did you not believe philosophically, and did you not corner Me by claiming that I blot out your future sins and personal sins whenever you offer your prayers of repentance? You coming to the foot of the Cross and begging me to blot out you sin is what has made Me a liar. You who believed in Me with your own philosophical faith, depart from Me.” The fact is that all the heretics in this world became heretics because they have had a philosophical faith. Heretics must throw away their own thoughts and come back into the Scriptures.
The Baptism Carried out by John the Baptist and Jesus
Numerous people go to hell having believed in Jesus’ salvation with their philosophical thinking. People have the thought tendency to believe in accordance with their own philosophical level. They tend to believe what fits their standards, and they resist accepting what doesn’t fit their standards. In order to receive salvation, we must jump over our framework of thinking by believing in the Word.
First of all, we must understand that John the Baptist was born on this earth to do the work of passing on the sins of humankind to Jesus (Malachi 4:5-6, Matthew 3:15). There is a purpose for everyone who is born. John the Baptist was born to pass on all the sins of the world to Jesus. I pray that you know and believe that John the Baptist was the very man who had passed on all the sins of humankind to Jesus.
Thus, the Bible says, “This man [John the Baptist] came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all through him might believe” (John 1:7), and also says, “And from the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffers violence” (Matthew 11:12). These passages mean that John the Baptist had passed on the sins of the world to Jesus, and he had participated in the work to fulfill all righteousness. The Words of Lord in which He gave witness, “For John came to you in the way of righteousness,” also means that the way of salvation that saves people, was perfected by the baptism that John the Baptist had given to Jesus.
All we have to do is to just purely accept the written Word as it is. Human thinking isn’t necessary for the salvation of people. All that we have to do is just have faith in the Word of God. However, many Christians reject the Word of God as it is. The work carried out by John the Baptist doesn’t suit their level. People are not pleased with it, and that is why people say that they cannot believe some parts of the Word. Not only that, but there are those who oppose God with the human thoughts, saying, “Why does God pass on sins by Jesus’ baptism, of all things?” They are asking why wasn’t a method more suitable to the human level used. They say that they cannot believe because that method doesn’t fit in with their philosophical standard. This is seriously opposing God.
So many people in this world try to believe in the Truth in that John the Baptist had passed on all the sins to Jesus once and for all by thinking in their own way. But they aren’t able to believe it. Their philosophical faith tells them that when they believe in Jesus, they receive the remission of their original sin. But as far as personal sins, they get to receive the remission by offering prayers of repentance every day. In doing so, they dream of a philosophical faith in which they will receive salvation when they become righteous by becoming more and more sanctified.
In short, they believe that they will gradually be sanctified by offering prayers of repentance after believing in Jesus. How can this not be a mistaken belief? Jesus has taken on all the sins of mankind by receiving the baptism from John the Baptist. But since people want sins to go away gradually, and try to add their own righteousness to the righteousness of the salvation of God, how can this not be a mistaken belief?
The words, “For John came to you in the way of righteousness,” means that “For God had sent John the Baptist to make people righteous.” Not by human means such as prayers of repentance and sanctification. Jesus had made people holy by having taken on the sins of humankind once and for all, by receiving the baptism from John the Baptist. John the Baptist spoke of the baptism, and Jesus Himself many times spoke of the baptism He received from John the Baptist. But people aren’t accepting it. They hold on to their philosophy. People are ceaselessly opposing God.
Now, you have a choice to make: Will you come forth before God and believe in the gospel of the water and the Spirit according to the Word of God, or will you believe according to your own philosophical pattern of thought? I have spoken to you about man’s philosophical faith preventing people from attaining salvation, but how about you? Are you immersed in a philosophical faith also? Take it to your heart that in the end, if you do not believe in the gospel of the water and the Spirit, without adding your own righteousness and your own thoughts, all that awaits you is only hell.
The chief priests and the elders went to hell after having opposed Jesus to the very end, by uniting themselves under a philosophical faith. Now is the time for you to choose one of the two: Will it be philosophy, or will it be faith? People, who believe in Jesus as it is written in the Word, get to receive the remission of sins by faith, by accepting the work God has done, and by just accepting the pure Word of the Truth.
All those famous people in today’s Christian communities are modern versions of the chief priests and elders. They oppose Jesus with their philosophy even now. When I think about how we have come to be righteous by believing this, I am truly thankful. I don’t know how we have received the remission of sins by coming to God’s Church and in the ranks of the born-again, instead of being in the ranks of people of philosophical faith who oppose God.
I cannot thank God enough for this. But by the Grace of God, we almost came offering prayers of repentance every day by saying, “Jesus wasn’t able to blot out all my sins” throughout our lives, and being tied up in a denomination that is full of experts on philosophical doctrine. Deceived by the words in a single passage which says, “There is none righteous, no, not one” (Romans 3:10), we could have fallen into the fire of hell after opposing Jesus until the very end. But, by His unconditional love of the Truth, we have received true salvation. Now, even though salvation has been perfected, people are falling into the fire of hell is because they had believed in Jesus with their own philosophy.
Jesus wants you to believe in the gospel which tells you that He has paid for all your sins by the water of His baptism and His blood, and receive salvation. To those who reject the gospel of the water and the Spirit by blindly insisting that their faith is of orthodox Christianity, without having been born again by the water and the Spirit, God says, “I never knew you.” If you do not believe in the salvation of Truth, the baptism, and the blood of the Cross, your self-righteousness will be broken and all that will be left is for you to suffer the wrath of God.
If you have been a person such as this, you have to turn around from your evil ways. Do not oppose the Word of God, the salvation of Jesus, in your own philosophical way. By repenting and turning back now, believe in Jesus’ gospel of the water and the Spirit through which you will be born again. By doing this, you receive salvation from the sins of this world.
Those who do not accept Jesus Christ who has come by the water, the blood, and the Holy Spirit as their Savior are all heretics. Those who believe in Jesus philosophically cannot receive the salvation. Let us throw away our own philosophical faith. By doing this, let us receive salvation. Let us not become heretics. One’s own philosophy makes you a heretic. So, please throw away your thoughts and come to the Word of God.
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