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:
As I was in prayer early Sunday morning, February 13, 2000, the Lord put it in my heart to write about the seven lies His people believe. I had no idea when I began to write what even the second lie would be, much less the third or fourth. I just knew they would come to me as I went along if it was indeed the Spirit of God that prompted me to begin writing. And they did. Here is the first of the seven principal lies that Christian ministers have persuaded God's children to believe.
Because God's children have believed Satan's Lie #1, that Christianity is God's family, and because Christianity can be joined, the children of God have come to think of God's family as something that can be joined. But listen to what the Spirit said through me a couple of years ago as I was talking with some Christians: "NO CHURCH THAT CAN BE JOINED IS HIS." Please consider carefully those stunning, revealing words. They are the Word of God for you! The church is not of God because all churches can be joined. No church is God's family; we must be born into God's family. This is the "new birth" of spirit Jesus mentioned, and this is why Jesus said, "Ye must be born again."
The giving of the holy Spirit is the work of God, and for this reason the Apostle John could say that those who are born of the Spirit are born "not of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God" (Jn. 1:13). In Romans 9:16, Paul taught that membership in God's family is not a question of who desires it, nor even of who strives to obtain it, but it is solely of God who shows mercy. "So," Paul then continued, "to whom God will, He shows mercy, and whom He will, He hardens" (9:18).
Does this sound hard? It is more than hard. "With men," Jesus declared, "it is impossible, but with God, all things are possible" (Mt. 19:25-26). Again, "You have not chosen me, but I have chosen you" (Jn. 15:16). If you feel a tug from God in your heart, respond! It is God's mercy reaching out to you. It is not you! It is Jesus knocking at your door with an offer of eternal life!
There is absolutely nothing about God that the nature of man loves; we who now love God, love Him only because He first loved us (1Jn. 4:10, 19). We who now walk in the light, walk in the light only because God has mercifully called us out of darkness into His light. Becoming a member of God's family is the work of God in the human heart; it is in no respect the decision or work of man, for "the carnal mind is not subject to the Law of God, neither indeed can be" (Rom. 8:7).
Have you joined a church? If so, you are in the wrong place, no matter which church it is. Repent, and come out of that church, for no church is His! "Join the church" is a commonly heard phrase, but from whom did that phrase come? Not from Jesus. He suffered and died to create a family of born-again people, not a religious club that can be joined. Joining a Christian church is the principal way that God's children come to partake of the religion of Christianity. Although by joining a church, God's children think they are doing good, they are only being puffed up by Christianity to think that they have the wisdom and the power to choose to become members of God's holy family. None of us is that wise or good.
Jesus taught me that, unlike Christianity, the spirit of harlotry has nothing to do with his Father's household; God will not take in just anybody who brings his money and decides that he will be a part of God's family. Citizenship in God's family is a high honor, a sacred calling to which wise men humbly and gladly respond. God's children have too often followed Satan's lead and partaken of his religious clubs. Satan's religious clubs are Christian denominations with their own "ordained" leaders, their own teachings, and their own ceremonies and regulations. Men call them churches, and then pretend that to join them is to become a part of God's people. How deluded by Satan's cunning we have been! But Jesus is opening our eyes!
My dear brother! my sister! Can you not feel the love of God in this for you? Can you not hear the tender voice of Jesus crying out in your heart, "Come out of her, my people!"? Jesus wants us to be one in heart and mind with him, and with each other. That can never happen inside Christianity. It is too divided.
That God's family can be joined is the second of the Seven Lies that God's children believe.
For more information, check our web site for tract #14, "The Church?".