In today’s Part II of our devotion on the state of Christianity today in America, we are going to explore some of the implications of (Proverbs 18:21): “Death and life are in the power of the tongue…”
Today in America civil war exists within the body of Christ. Many Christians sadly, are dumping on one another instead of building one another up. Many Christians are falling back to lovers of themselves and not the brethren. Even some Bible schools are turning out students who have a knowledge of God, but in theory only.
Denominations are breaking up the body of Christ. The body of Christ is now a mangled, strife ridden, and disunited body of believers. Instead, we need to be the shining examples of Christian love in order to make a difference in people’s lives. The Bible says that the word of God is our sword and that it is mighty to the breaking down of strongholds. Instead, many Christians are using their tongues as swords, mighty to the breaking down of the body of Christ.
We should be heaping coals on our enemies to the point that our love will break down even the hardest of hearts. Instead, many of us are heaping coals into Satan’s furnace allowing him more and more fuel to destroy the unity of the body of Christ.
I, in the past, as a Christian, have spoken the word of God as if I was an authority, only to be shown later by God and others that my interpretation was completely wrong. I have come down on both Christians and non-Christians very hard; not with a heart of compassion but one of judgmentalism and “lording” the truth. I have spoken behind people’s backs, and even mocked other believers.
Did any of this behavior build up the body of Christ? No – it tore it down. The Lord has spoken to my heart that we must change all of this forever. My tongue in the past, not only was used as a cutting edge against my brothers and sisters in Christ, but as a chopping axe against non-believers.
We as Christians are subject to many emotional swings and in those times we need compassionate hearts surrounding us, to help us when we fail, fall, and stumble. Lord, please help us to pick up one another when we fall instead of stepping on them.
My friends so often the words we speak are crucifying the body of Christ. Our tongues must be tamed or else this fragmentation will only continue.
But on a far more serious note, when we bicker over non-essential doctrine, complain about minor things, and use a judgmental spirit against others, we are drawing people away from Christ; and not to Him. Our tongues are becoming Satan’s allies. And as a result, our Christian witness may be turning souls away from the kingdom of God. Love draws and strife divides.
The words we speak can have eternal implications to our non-Christian contacts. We must learn to harness our tongues or else face the inevitable conclusion that we will become stumbling blocks to Christ.
My friends what is your attitude? How often to you criticize your pastor instead of praying for him? How often do you look at a cigarette in your brother’s mouth and criticize him for smoking, forgetting that he may have just licked an alcohol and drug habit and has only this bad habit left to work on? How often do you complain how tough your steak is and forget that millions of people don’t even have a bowl of soup or bread to eat? Finally, how often do you pray for people to treat you with love but refuse to do the same for them?
We need to fall on our faces and ask God to forgive us for the sinful attitudes we often are guilty of having. We must come clean before God and admit how often we have been stumbling blocks because of the lethal venom that has come from our tongues.
It’s time to take spiritual inventory and realize that the deeper walk we want to travel on requires a deeper talk! We must present our bodies to God as a living sacrifice and ask Him to totally fill us with His Spirit. Only when we are fully walking in the Spirit can we break the stronghold of the flesh we so often walk and talk in. (Romans 8:13) says it so well: “For if you live according to the flesh you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.”
Let’s follow the advice of the Apostle Paul: “Set your mind on things above not on the things that are on the earth.” (Colossians 3:2).
“Only when we are fully walking in the Spirit can we break the stronghold of the flesh we so often walk and talk in. (Romans 8:13) says it so well: “For if you live according to the flesh you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.”
It’s ironic that I would breathe a word of caution in response to a devotional committed to Christian unity but I’m driven to comment on this contextual matter. My prayer is that this interpretation will be taken as support of what was said by making sure there is no confusion in the Apostle’s description of the difference between believer and unbeliever.
The quote above puts two thoughts together that I feel could cause this confusion. They are “fully walking in the Spirit” and you will die “if you live according to the flesh.”
These are not two opposite choices that can be made by Christians. No Christian “Brother” “lives according to the flesh” vs.12. The sons of God are led by the Spirit of God vs.14. “Flesh” and “Spirit” are essentially and unchangeably opposed and there is no third category of “fully walking in the Spirit.” Christ broke the “stronghold of the flesh” and when He calls us to Himself, we are those who “have been set free from sin.” Romans 6:22.
The death and life of vs.13 are eternal and are claimed by one of two conditions, “according to flesh” or “according to Spirit” and not “fully walking” to “break the stronghold.”
If this interpretation is what the context conveys then the message of today’s devotional is all the more relevant. As Spirit led people, we operate as members of the body of Christ and citizens of Heaven. Where we see so much dissension and infighting, it should make us wonder if those engaged in creating division are truly being “led by the Spirit” at all and therefore Brothers and Sisters in Christ.
Only God knows their heart but we see the fruit and the “fruit you get leads to sanctification and its end, eternal life” or “ what fruit were you getting at that time from the things of which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death” Romans 6:21-22. Two conditions, one a believer and one an unbeliever.
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