Turning To The Truth

If you turn away your foot from the Sabbath,

from doing your pleasure on my holy day,

and call the Sabbath a delight,

the holy day of the LORD honorable,

and shall honor Him not doing,

your own ways, nor finding your own pleasure,

nor speaking your own words,

then you shall delight yourself in the LORD;

and I will cause you to ride on high hills

of the earth and feed you with the heritage

of Jacob your father, the mouth of the LORD

has spoken.

Isaiah 58:13–14

            When there is an emulsification of heathen philosophy and Christianity the end result is not a better product as each belief systems, while having some similarity are so different that cannot be homogenized and as with this form of emulsification there is fall out, a separation one element from another. Milk is a homogenized product, once done it remains emulsified. Oil and vinegar dressing with all the herbs must be shaken up to blend them once again as there will be at the bottom of the bottle a sludge of herbs and other unblended products. Now, if you mix vinegar with baking soda and attempt to emulsify these products you are going to get an exothermic reaction. This is because when these two are mixed, the mixture rapidly expands to its original volume. This simple knowledge is well explained in High School Chemistry. There is in this combination an attempt to blend products with the hope of establishing a good thing and all that has been done is to have an explosion of sort, or in the least a tremendous overflow of bubbles. Then end result will not produce a good product. This is what occurs when heathen philosophies are attempted to be syncretized with Christianity; the end result is in a bad product. Heathen philosophies, no matter how good some things said or believed are, they are still from the root of heathenism. Vinegar is a good thing, baking soda is a good thing; yet together they are not good. The good sounding of heathen philosophies often lead people to believe in what is not Scriptural, to practice things that are not Scripture, to build organizations that are not Scriptural; the sound good, but their base is in heathenism. One diversion that has occurred due to the influence of heathen philosophies can be seen often on Sundays which for Christians the Sabbath Day. The Seventh Day Adventist use the old Jewish Sabbath Day as being the proper day for worship of God. By doing so, promoting this day as the Sabbath they have ignored history and the reason why Christians claim Sunday as the Sabbath Day. We may argue about this day, but do you have a Sabbath? If so is it aligned with Sunday which was the day set aside as the Sabbath from early Christianity. Today there is a blending of the world with Christianity. How? For many this is a day of boating, skiing, shopping, going out to lunch making cause for someone to serve them when they should be associating with other brothers and sisters, to play football, or other sports on this day, etc.. Yes, many use this day for their pleasure and not taking time to delight themselves in the Lord. God has promised to feed you to care for you, and this is according to your devotion to Him, and in the above Scripture it is by keeping the Sabbath. How does this demonstration of impiety align with the above analogies? It is an emulsification of the world with Christianity and many give reasons for doing so all sounding good, but are not Scriptural. This emulsification of heathen philosophy and Christianity and made cause for many developments leading to many forms of religion, Christian religion and many to ignore the facts, the facts of history, the facts of Scripture.

            What has this emulsification caused? One such result of this blending of philosophies is reason, it is an exalting of reason to be Reason. It is by this Reason one can come to God and know God and that this Reason was given to man as a guest in our consciousness. It is from this Reason that we have, “God within us.” These ideologies of such as Neoplatonism teach that Reason is the necessary mediator between God and man. This may sound good, that it has the ring of truth to it for every man is said to be enlightened by this Reason, and of God being universally in man. This philosophy of religion is to be found in Plato, Pythagoras and in Neoplatonism, that Reason was necessary as the mediator between God and man, the teacher for man, the interpreter of God, and is Divine and human at the same time. This syncretized religion, a blending of heathen philosophy with Christianity has not taught the truth about God and His dealing with man. What has been done is to reduce the knowledge of God to be individual, a personal manifestation of God that each man can have which may or may not be different from another man’s manifestation of God. We find this in the world today where it is taught and believe that every man has his/her own truth. God is not then the absolute God of the universe, rather it is a god that is manifested in spirit and truth. We find this thinking of individuality of belief in Churches that teach special revelation from God. No one is to suspect, or oppose such demonstrations that may seem so absurd, and against the norm, rather we are to accept them as God’s manifestation. This Realism leads to a belief system that refers all our religious knowledge to be subjective. It is this subjective reasoning that leads to a mysticism that is unscriptural. While there may points of agreement, a blending by stirring up the fallen particles and making them once again to be Christian all that is been done is to assign to one’s belief is speculation and the result is to syllogize heathen philosophy into a form of mysticism. This emulsification can be found in such teaching of George Fox  (1624 – 13 1691) who was a founder of the Religious Society of Friends, commonly known as the Quakers or Friends. In this religious group there will be found mysticism practiced and emulsified with Scripture. They, as many do, attempt to find God where God does not reside.

            I will illuminate more on this subject as it pertains to all of us and our faith. As a reminder I am reproducing the definition of Neoplatonism:

1. A philosophical system developed at Alexandria in the third century a.d. by Plotinus and his successors. It is based on Platonism with elements of mysticism and some Judaic and Christian concepts and posits a single source from which all existence emanates and with which an individual soul can be mystically united.

2. A revival of Neo-Platonism or a system derived from it, as in the Middle Ages.

A philosophical system originated in Alexandria in the 3rd century A.D., founded on Platonic doctrine, Aristotelianism, and Oriental mysticism, with later influences from Christianity.[1]

When you cry out,

            Let your idols deliver you.

But the wind will carry them

            All away.

A breath will take them.

            But he who puts his

Trust in Me shall possess the land,

            And shall inherit My holy mountain.

                                    Isaiah 57:13

Revive Your Soul;  Read His Word

Richard L. Crumb

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[1] Retrieved from: http://www.answers.com/topic/neoplatonism January 21, 2013

Persevere Until He Comes

Then He said to Thomas,

“Reach your finger here, and look

at My hands; and reach your hand here,

and put it into My side. Do not

be unbelieving, but believing.”

And Thomas answered and said to Him,

“My Lord and my God!”

John 20:27–28

            How many of us are like Thomas, unless we see, touch, we just don’t really believe. There is a notion that it is true, that Jesus is God, but we want more, need more, as did Thomas. When Thomas was confronted with Jesus, saw Him alive, there was no longer any need to see Him, to touch Him for he recognized Him as the One with whom he walked and talked with for some three years: Jesus was the promised Messiah. Did Thomas actually touch the wounds of Jesus? There is no indication that he did but he did cry our: “My Lord and My God!” The Greek is explicitly clear although there are those who say that Thomas gave his cry to both Jesus and to God, separately, but the Greek: Ὁ κύριός μου καὶ ὁ θεός μου” literally says: The Lord of Me and the God of me. Thomas saw the risen Jesus and knowing that it was his friend, the One who had been crucified, dead and buried, was now alive in front of him and cried out to him those words indicating for us under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit that Jesus was the Lord and the God. Jesus said this to him and to us: “Jesus said to Him, “Thomas, because you have seen Me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed” (John 20:29). Jesus rose and took with Him His body that forever was the payment for sin and will not return until the last day: sorry for those who believe in more that one return, that is the rapture, Scripture is clear that Jesus returns on the last day and then those in Him will rise to meet Him in the air, and not until He comes. Now, we who are left until His return cannot see Him bodily, but we have a special blessing if we believe on Him. How can we see Him? He left the Holy Spirit to guide His Church by means of the inspired word of God. Those inspired words were written by men who walked with Him, John, Matthew, Peter, and by those associated with the disciples, Luke, Mark, Jude, and all done within a short time after the death of Jesus Christ. Jesus was crucified in and around the year 33 A.D. and the first writings by the Apostles were around the year 55-60 A.D. There are no other writings that are that close in time to the one who is being written about; therefore we have the assurance from that alone that there would be those alive who knew, saw, and spoke about still alive and would have refuted any claims about Jesus that they knew would be untrue. We have the inspired word of God for His Church and we can have His blessing when we have been enabled by God to receive His word whereby He is revealed to us, and the salvation that He, by His mercy, gave to those He chose. How do I know I am one of the chosen ones? You will know by your desire to know Him, to live according to His word, His commands, no matter what may occur due to your belief in Him. You may stumble, your may commit a sin, but you fall on your knees and repent to a Holy God who has sent His Son to save you, not because your are caught in sin, rather because God is Holy and Just, and you had blasphemed Him.

            This new covenant God gave His Church did not come without those dissenters, or philosophies that had already penetrated into parts of the world. They need refutation and God rose up men to do so as to protect His Church until He comes. Neoplatonism was one such attempt to introduce into Christianity religious ideas that were not of God, rather they were religious, different in many ways to Plato from which they were founded. Because Neoplatonism was religious and a counter Platonic philosophy of reality and thought, or ideal and form, Neoplatonism sought to find the One, or God, and had many tenets that were similar to Christianity that some were affected in their theology and included those tenets in their writings and teachings. We need to continue to know about them, to find if they are acceptable or not, and if not to refute them and remove them from our religion, or theology. One such belief system of Neoplatonism is the mystical aspect of religion which has had such an impact on Christianity, and that belief is one of mysticism. What is mysticism? It is a conviction that the soul has special ability, an immediate sense about the forms, thought in regard to a deity that deals with us in this life, to have a special interaction with this deity, and immediate knowledge of God whereby one derives happiness. Can Christianity be said to be mystical? Yes! Why? Because Christianity admits that there is a supernatural influence of God upon a person, the soul, and recognizes that there is a higher form of knowledge, a holiness that can be attained, and a person can have fellowship with God. In that manner Christians can be said to have a mystical religion. There may be some agreement among those who believe in mysticism, yet, there are many differences that separate one from the other. It is these differences that were derived from such philosophies as of the Neoplatonic philosophy, and theology, that must be explored. This will be what will be continued in the next blogs.

And He said to me,

            “My grace

is sufficient for you

            for My strength

is made perfect in weakness.”

                                    2Corinthians 12:9

Persevere in your walk with Him

Richard L. Crumb

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Antichrists Are Present: Watch, Pray, And Believe In Jesus Christ

Blessed is the Lord God of Israel,

for he has visited and redeemed His people…..

To grant us that we being delivered

From the hand of our enemies,

might serve Him without fear,

in holiness and righteousness

Before Him all the days of our life….

To give light to those who sit in

darkness and the shadow of death,

to guide our feet into the way of peace.

Luke 1:68,74–75,79

            This prophesy of Zacharias who was filled with the Holy Spirit (vs. 67) and recorded by Luke should be a wellspring of hope in our hearts driving us to follow Him who will guide us in this life and the life to come. The one to come was not a demiurge, a mystical union of Jesus Christ as brother to Satan as the Gnostics believed and taught and the need for some enlightenment or special knowledge that this knowledge would allow a person to partake of the spiritual realm and its power while on earth, and that same knowledge would allow you to enter the pleroma (Greek for fullness) after you die.[1] This similarity between Gnosticism which had become infused with Neoplatonism that knowledge is the most important thing for salvation and it is by this knowledge that a person enters heaven has caused some to syncretize Christian belief of salvation and heaven. Knowledge is important as this how we come to know the will of God and what God has done by sending His Son to die on the cross for our salvation. It was the death of Jesus Christ that paid the debt of sin and not our knowledge of this act that saves us. John writes: “My little children, these things I write to you, so that you may not sin. and if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for our only but also for the whole world” (1John 2:1–2). For some of the Gnostics, and there were many forms of Gnosticism, the world was wicked and the body doesn’t matter therefore sin doesn’t matter. Scripture teaches us otherwise, that sin does matter: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and he truth is not in us” (1John 1:8). We must come to know, to have the knowledge, that we sin, and that we are fallen in our nature and have no method within ourselves to correct this sinfulness. God has provided, through the death of His Son justification and sanctification for His children: “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1John 1:9). Unlike the Neoplatonism of the Gnostics who believed in some secret knowledge to save them, and their belief in the wickedness of this world which included them as one of the wicked for all matter was wicked Christians believe in the knowledge of sin and their nature and know hat we must obey the commandments of God. It is this knowledge that develops our religion and our religion develops our character and our character develops our actions. We must live a righteous life if we are to please God and to have His blessing. If we do not deny that Jesus is the Christ, for if we do, then we are liars: “Who is a liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ? He is antichrist who denies the Father and the Son” (1John 2:22). Remember this: Christ is the word in English that means Messiah who was promised in ancient times by God’s prophets. When Zacharias was asked what name should his baby, who was later to be called John the Baptist, he began to speak, which beforehand he had not spoken (Luke 1:20) for he knew that God had visited the earth and was now ready to introduce to the world the promised Messiah. John would be the forerunner who would proclaim the coming of the Messiah, Jesus Christ. It is not some special knowledge for Jesus was alive, walked this earth, did miracles to give evidence of who He was, and why He came, the promised One, the Savior. It was not some visible representative, a form as Plato would have Him, and even though Neoplatonism did not follow exactly Plato’s philosophy, they did not know or believe that God would send a Savior. Gnostics as a whole did not believe in Jesus either only some special knowledge but Scripture give us what is required for salvation: “Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God, and everyone who loves him who begot also loves him who is begotten of Him. By this we know that love the children of God when we keep His commandments” (1John 5:1–2).

            Saying 22 from the Gospel of Thomas (This is not inspired from God but has much meaning into the world of Gnoticism): When you make the two one, and you make the inside like the outside and the outside like the inside, and the above like the below, and when you make the male and female one and the same, so that the male not be male nor the female female; and when you fashion eyes in the place of an eye, and a hand in the place of a hand, and a foot in the place of a foot, and a likeness in the place of a likeness; then you will enter [the kingdom of heaven]. (Saying 22, Italics mine).[2] Yes, from their teachings there are those that have accepted homosexuality, that all are the same only in different forms and there is no sin so they can do whatever pleases them, but this is not what the Bible states as shown above. You may say: “we are not Platonists, or Neoplatonists;” but if you think as they do, and do as they have taught, then you are what you say you are not. Mysticism from such thinking as invaded the Church and can be seen in Pentecostalism, in such religions centers as Bethel Church in Redding, CA., and in the Charismatic movement. These religions systems believe in some special knowledge, some special revelation from God, so that they would be regarded a pious, worthy of God’s salvation, but this is not the case for salvation comes from God through His Son and in no other way.

            Knowledge is important and it is not just any knowledge, it by and through whom this knowledge comes and Jesus Christ is the truth, the life (John 14:6). It is by Jesus who came and gave us the truth: “And we know that the Son of god has come and has given us an understanding, that we may know Him who is true; and we are in Him who is true, in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life” (1John 5:20). Once again, Scripture as affirmed: Jesus is God, God come in the flesh and it is Jesus who gives us understanding as to salvation: not some special knowledge that some have and others may not have, rather He came and showed us the way to eternal life, Him, and this He did by dying on the cross paying the debt of sin, satisfying the justice of God. Now, we have a responsibility: to live according to His commandments, and not some teaching by men who are antichrist.

For many deceivers have gone

            Out into the world who

Do not confess Jesus Christ as

            Coming in the flesh.

This is a deceiver and an antichrist.

                                    2John 2:7

Whatever You Do, Do It For Christ

Richard L. Crumb

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[1] Retrieved from: http://www.christian-history.org/gnostic-beliefs.html#sthash.owDc7Usy.dpuf

[2] Ibid.