Jesus also, that he might sanctify the people with his own blood, suffered outside the gate. Therefore, let us go forth to him outside the camp, bearing his reproach. For we have no continuing city here, but we seek one to come.
Select a thought to read by choosing a collection, the month, and then the day:
“Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.”
Paul, in Romans 8:9
From a Broadcaster newsletter by John David Clark, Sr., August, 1988
My friends, avoid at all costs any religion without the holy Ghost power. Religion without the holy Ghost is false religion, regardless of the impressive labels men give to it. Men calling their religion “Christianity” does not mean that it has anything to do with Christ.
In the Old Testament Law, two witnesses were required in order for a matter to be legally confirmed. Even Jesus said, “If I bear witness of myself, my witness is nothing” (Jn. 5:31). He knew that the Father’s witness was the one that confirmed the truth of a matter. “Every way of a man is right in his own eyes,” Solomon wisely observed, “but the Lord pondereth the hearts”(Pro. 21:2). “If we receive the witness of men,” said John, “the witness of God is greater” (1Jn. 5:9). To whose witness are we trusting our souls? Man’s or God’s?
Jesus described the way of the gospel that was to be preached as a working together of the human and the divine witnesses (Jn. 15:26-27): “When the comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceeds from the Father, He shall testify of me. And ye also shall bear witness.”
Now, let me ask you . . . “The Question”. How do you know that you are right with God? Has God set his seal of approval upon your faith by giving you the holy Ghost? Or is what you believe about yourself, what a minister told you to believe, the only witness that you have? There are plenty of ministers who take it upon themselves to tell others that they are right with God. But what has God said? Where is His infallible witness? Many souls have been persuaded to believe that they are right with God. But may I ask, “Persuaded by whom”, or “by what”? A minister? Not good enough. How do you know the minister knows what he is talking about? The Scriptures? Not good enough. Jesus condemned those who trust in the Scriptures for their hope of eternal life. “In them you think ye have eternal life, he said, but they are they which testify of me.”
You’ll find plenty of pastors who will tell you that your faith is pleasing to God, even if God has not yet baptized you with His holy Spirit. Indeed, many will tell you that the witness of God, the holy Ghost baptism, was for another time and another place. If you are satisfied with the witness of men, you’ll listen to them, and you will die with them.
How do you know they are right when they tell you that you are? By the Bible? But what is the proof that they understand it rightly? Let me exhort you to seek the Lord’s favor instead of the opinions of men, and seek not the Bible, precious as it is, but seek rather its Author.
“The Question” that Minerva asked, which so irritated those who didn’t know the answer, should be asked a thousand times more frequently than it is. She found the answer, as Jesus promised that she would, even though some ostracized her for asking, and seeking, and knocking on the door of heaven. A few weeks after our class ended, she visited me with the news. She had done what the Bible says to do. She had gone to Jesus rather than to men and had found the confirmation of her faith, the confirmation that honest faith desires.
“The Question” is, “How do I know the way of Jesus is the only right way?” And God’s answer is that Jesus baptizes with the holy Ghost those who truly believe in him, the true Messiah. That is God’s answer, and it is so perfect and fulfilling that we don’t need another one.