Angelic Conflict 412: The CREATOR'S Will is that You Are Free From Mental Slavery

 

 

All twenty-one categories of doctrine begin with the letter C.  We’re learning about the character and nature of our CREATOR at the second of the twenty-one C’s.

 

We are rocking around the CREATOR CLOCK as our way of becoming familiar with the various parts of God’s essence.  Tick tock.  What time is it NOW on the CREATOR CLOCK?  It’s seven o’clock.

 

 

God is WILLING.

 

What is will?

 

WILL

A faculty of consciousness that expresses deliberate action…the ability to choose…the freedom to select your actions…the decision to assert a choice, either actively or passively…obedience to a choice you make…to elect…to determine…to decide…to bring about…to influence…to exercise discretion in a matter…

 

You have will.  God’s enemy has will.  The Creator has will.  It is the CREATOR’S will that you are free from mental slavery.

 

Turn in your bibles to Galatians, Chapter 5, Verse 1…

 

GAL 5:1

It was for freedom that (the Lord Jesus) Christ set us (believers in Christ) free; therefore keep (on) standing firm (permanently in the freedom) and do not be subject again (by going back) to a yoke of slavery.

 

The New Self Life, the Zoe Life, is a life of freedom and abundance.

 

JOH 10:10

“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I (the Lord Jesus Christ) came that they may have (the Zoe) life, and have it abundantly.”

 

What does it look like when you are living the Zoe Life…the eternal life…the resurrection life that the Lord Jesus Christ provided for us at the Cross?  It looks FREE.  It feels FREE.  It thinks supernaturally.  It acts supernaturally.  It is free of mental slavery.

 

Whether you choose to be free, or whether you choose to be a mental slave, it requires the expenditure of your will.  It requires a purchase.  Do you choose to be free?  Or do you entangle yourself in the yoke of slavery?  Do you live the life of abundance?  Or do you sell yourself short?  With what philosophy do you yoke yourself?

 

What is a yoke?

 

YOKE

A device for joining together a pair of draft animals

When you are in a yoke, someone is always in the yoke with you.  So if you choose to be a slave, someone has usually invited you to the slavery party.  You have gone willingly to the slavery party through the expenditure of your will.  One of the things that most amazes me is how easily we are willing to give up our precious freedoms.  It’s funny to me how we always want to point our fingers at Satan and the kingdom of darkness as the reason we are not free, when the truth is that most of the time we go willingly to the slavery we so wanted freedom from.  The Lord used Moses to free the Jews from the captivity and slavery of the Egyptians, but how did the Jews handle the freedom?

 

 

EXO 17:1

Then all the congregation of the sons of Israel journeyed by stages from the wilderness of Sin, according to the command of the Lord, and camped at Rephidim, and there was no water for the people to drink.

 

EXO 17:2

Therefore the people quarreled with Moses and said, “Give us water that we may drink.”And Moses said to them, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the Lord?”

 

Moses was really asking the Jews a penetrating question.  He was asking,

“Do you think the Lord who just parted the Red Sea for you is going to let you die of thirst in the dessert?”

 

EXO 17:3

But the people thirsted there for water; and they grumbled against Moses and said, “Why, now, have you brought us up from Egypt, to kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst?”

 

The Jews wanted to go back to the yoke of slavery in Egypt.  They wanted to trade their freedom for “three hots and a cot.”  What do you trade your freedom for? 

 

It amazes me how easily we are willing to give up our precious freedoms.

For example, because of the shooting incidents in Colorado and Connecticut at the end of last year, there is a move afoot to bully us into giving up our constitutional right to bear arms.  It won’t be too funny to see what happens if that farce is successful.  There aren’t enough police to go around, and a lot of us would die if we all had to wait for them to rescue us from a situation.  The criminals would have a field day if they didn’t worry about the possibility of us bearing arms to rise up against them.

 

The CREATOR’S Will is that You are Free From Mental Slavery.  Let’s take a look first at freedom from slavery.  What is slavery?

 

SLAVERY

Bondage to practices or institutions…drudgery…severe toil.

 

In the Christian Way of Life we often voluntarily subject ourselves to the bondage of religious practices just because they are familiar…to dead works…to meaningless rituals…things that we have believed in the past, for whatever reason, and then turned them into rigid religious practices that we rigidly defend.  Their familiarity gave us comfort.  And when the real truth exposes these untruths, as the real truth inevitably will, it causes a reaction in your soul. 

 

Last week I asked you to look into the spiritual closet of your soul, to see if you have any false doctrines hanging like coat hangers in there.  To many of you, I was challenging you.  To me, I was challenging myself.

 

I asked you to look into your spiritual closets to see if there are any false doctrines that you rigidly and willingly protect…that you leave to this day hanging in your souls…unchallenged.  The doctrine of rebound was the “sacred cow” that I challenged in your soul.  It’s funny how a challenge like this is received.  If I challenge you to inspect the doctrine of a man, and instead ask you to see what the bible says on the matter, then I’m the kook.  I’m not a kook by asking you to make God and His Word, and not the doctrines of men the coat hangers in your spiritual closet.  What did Paul say to the Corinthians?

 

1CO 2:4

…and my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power…

 

1CO 2:5

…so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God.

 

My job is to help you remove some of the false doctrine coat hangers and some of the oppressive religious vocabulary from your human spirit, as it may be stunting your spiritual growth.  I asked you to be ready for the demolition process.  I certainly am ready to tackle it.  You have that to look forward to in my next five years of being a Pastor.  I wonder how many of you will come along for the ride.  Because I am no longer going to pursue the “company line” of doctrines as taught, and as sometimes distorted by the Pastors in my doctrinal lineage…Darby…Schofield…Chafer…Thieme…

McLaughlin…all good men, but all decidedly human.  Yet they are not the issue.  I am.  I don’t believe God called me to the spiritual gift of Pastor Teacher to be a parrot of the doctrines of men.  I think he called me to speak with a unique voice in biblical Christianity, and it is just what I intend to do, no matter whom it offends or scares or shakes out of their spiritual complacency.

 

For me to suggest such a thing, of course is heresy, especially for those of you who want to “phone in” your spiritual life.  And let’s face it…a lot of Christians are “phoning in” their spiritual lives.  Their spiritual lives are no more important to them than a meal at McDonald’s.  They study the bible but it has no affect on their lives.  It doesn’t show up as fruit.  And instead of blaming themselves, they blame God for their choices.  They are engaged in ritualistic religious complacency, yet pointing the finger at others for their voluntary mental slavery.

 

BREAK

Better Than Life

When I Think About Home

 

Welcome back!

 

I like comfort.  I’m comfortable with the way I’ve been eating for nearly six decades.  But if the truth is to be known, that way of eating has me forty pounds overweight.  What makes you think that just because you have been doing something for several years that it’s good?  Doesn’t accurate self-assessment require more from you than time spent in a discipline, like the discipline of Christianity?  You can have twenty-five years in Christianity.  You can also have one year twenty-five times.  Which is it for you?  You can come to “church” every week, but what difference is it making in your lives and in your decisions?

 

Let me illustrate.  Here is the spiritual chain of command for Pastors.

 

The Lord Jesus Christ is at the center of a Pastor’s universe. 

 

The Word of God is next.  Psalm 138, Verse 2 says…

 

PSA 138:2

I will bow down toward Your holy temple And give thanks to Your name for Your loving kindness (grace) and (for) Your truth; For You have magnified Your word according to all Your name.

 

The Word of God has the same character as God Himself, and that is saying something, because God’s character is impeccable.  Therefore so is His Word.  Impeccable.  Pastors value a perfect God and His inerrant Word.

 

Then the human authors of Scripture come next in the spiritual chain of command for Pastors.  Second Peter, Chapter 1, Verses 20 and 21 say…

 

2PE 1:20-21

Know this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture is a matter of one’s own (private) interpretation, and no prophecy was ever made by an act of human will, but men carried along by God the Holy Spirit spoke directly from the exact thinking of THE God, the Lord Jesus Christ.

 

The human authors of Scripture are special because God the Holy Spirit breathed the exact thinking of the Lord Jesus Christ into their pens, and it was captured as the Canon of Scripture, the measuring stick for all of divine history.  My lessons may be God-breathed, but they are hardly canonical.

 

Next in the spiritual chain of command are Instructors for Pastors…the Pastors in my doctrinal lineage…John Darby…Cyrus Schofield…Lewis Ferry Chafer…Colonel Robert Thieme Jr. …Robert McLaughlin…and a host of other trusted authors, provide me with a doctrinal foundation from which to study.  They are like parents.  They exist to help me grow up as a Pastor. 

 

Then there’s me…the Pastor.  My job is to study and teach the Word of God, not to study and teach the thoughts of my teachers.  What does the bible say?  That is my mantra!

 

William R. Newell, one of the authors I respect, put it this way…

 

WILLIAM R. NEWELL

Those attached to, and entrenched in tradition, will always be found fighting for tradition.

 

In my thinking, whoever marries tradition is academically dishonest.  It would be the easiest thing in the world to keep reciting the “company line” of doctrines.  It requires no more work on my part to do so.  It requires much more work to go in a different direction.  My decision to be loyal to God and His Word has put me at the base of a research mountain that is a long steep climb…yet it has always been what I really signed up for when I became a Pastor, and it is the way I have sought to live my life…I seek God…I seek the truth. Proverbs, Chapter 8, verse 17 says…

 

PRO 8:17

“I (the Lord) love those who love me; and those who diligently seek me will find me.”

 

Ata point, this spiritual chain of command is no longer valid.  It must be adjusted to this…

 

The Pastor must take his place, and use his instructors as resources, just like a child when he becomes an adult, forms his own family…

 

GEN 2:24

For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to his wife; and they shall become one flesh.

 

I am a bride of Christ.  I am not a bride of my spiritual lineage.  The same is true for you.  You are a bride of Christ.  You are not a bride of Pastor Rory.  You have freedom.  And as you take in the biblical doctrines you learn here, you have the right to live them however you want to live them.  But mental slavery was clearly not God’s intent for us.

 

I want to know God, I want to know the absolute truth and I want to pass it along to you.  I want it to remove the coat hangers of false doctrine in your soul.  I want you to voluntarily come along with me.  But you have to do some spiritual housecleaning if you’re going to benefit from the work of this ministry.  AND…you’re going to have to be participants.  When I went into my own spiritual closet, here are some of the false doctrine coat hangers that got thrown out, coat hangers like these…

 

There will be a moment of shame at the Judgment Seat of Christ.  It was replaced with Scripture…Revelation, Chapter 21, Verse 4…

 

REV 21:4

“…and He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and there will no longer be any death; there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things have passed away.”

 

When you are out of fellowship with God for a long time you are a reversionist. You are a loser in the Christian Way of Life.  It was replaced with Romans, Chapter 8, Verse 1…

 

ROM 8:1

Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in (union with) Christ Jesus.

 

It’s not the man; it’s the message.  If it’s not the man, then why don’t I just stay in bed on Sundays?  You damn well better believe the man is important, especially if he does his job without a salary.  Check out First Timothy, Chapter 3 if you think it’s not the man as well…this is God speaking through the human writer of Scripture, Paul…

 

1TI 3:1

It is a trustworthy statement: if any man aspires to the office of overseer, it is a fine work he desires to do.

 

1TI 3:2

An overseer, then, must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, temperate, prudent, respectable, hospitable, able to teach…

 

1TI 3:3

…not addicted to wine or pugnacious, but gentle, peaceable, free from the love of money.

 

1TI 3:4

He must be one who manages his own household well, keeping his children under control with all dignity…

 

If you are out of fellowship when you pray, or if you don’t follow strict prayer mechanics, your prayers don’t get higher than the ceiling.

 

MAT 21:22

“And all things you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive.”

 

Oh yes Pastor…but what about First Peter, Chapter 3, Verse 7?  Okay.  What about it?

 

1PE 3:7

You husbands in the same way, live with your wives in an understanding way, as with someone weaker, since she is a woman; and show her honor as a fellow heir of the grace of life, so that your prayers will not be hindered.

 

Yes…praying with a carnal mindset to a perfect God is not a wise use of your time.  But God is faithful.  Do you honestly think there are times when He isn’t listening to you?  Do you REALLY think that an omniscient and omnipresent God, who is union with you, isn’t interested in every single detail of your existence?  Sorry…I don’t buy it.

 

There are other sacred cow coat hangers that are hanging or have hung in my soul…and yours…a right man for every right woman…a Right Pastor…when you sin you get scar tissue on your soul…God will punish you…Mary was born sinless, lived a sinless life and was bodily assumed into heaven…the Roman Catholic doctrine of the Immaculate Conception…Mary is the Mother of God…The Virgin Mary.

 

God wants you to be free of mental slavery.  Are you ready?  In this ministry…we’re going to be loyal to the Word of God.

 

CLOSING SONG

Calling You to Freedom

 

CLOSING VERSES

 

PHI 1:6

For I am confident of this very thing, that He (God the Father) who began a (divine) good work in (the creation of) you will (keep on) perfect(ing) it until the day of Christ Jesus.

 

PSA 37:7

Rest in the Lord and wait patiently for Him; do not fret because of him (the wicked one) who (seems to) prosper in his way, (do not fret) because of the man who carries out wicked schemes…

 

PHI 4:7

And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard (garrison) your hearts and your minds (for those of you) in (union with) Christ Jesus.

 

CLOSING PRAYER

Let us pray...

 

          THANKS

INTERCESSION

PETITION

 

And we pray that you continue to shape the messages from this pulpit that are an accurate reflection of your person, your thinking, your work, your reputation and your essence...we ask this through the power of God the Holy Spirit, in Christ’s name,Amen.

 

Thanks for coming!

Thanks for watching!

Thanks for listening!

 

www.barahministries.com