The Way Is Very Narrow and the Gate Is Very Strait (Constricted)

How can we know anything about anything

To try to explain truth to him who loves it not is but to give him more plentiful material for misinterpretation. George Macdonald

Do we have to make a choice between science and the Bible?

NO!

That is NOT where the problem is, but that is what everyone seems to want to talk about.

Take science as an example. How can we know anything about the created material world around us?

How can we know anything from what we can see using natural sciences?

We all see the same things in the material world, but we don't come to the same answers.

Why is that?

How can we know anything about the Bible and what it teaches? Every person believes different things about the Bible and how it should be read.

Why is that?

Same scientific facts. Different answers.

Same Bible. Different answers.

Why is that?

The true question is this: How do we come to our answers that we get from what we can see through science or what we can read in the Bible?

How do we think about what we see using science or what we read in the Bible?

How do we analyze what we have seen and read?

How do we interpret what we have seen and read?

We use logic, but logic always has a foundation. Jesus talked about building on the Rock. That Rock is Jesus Christ. He is the true foundation. There are also the false foundations of the ungodly.

An example might help.

Question: Why do believe in evolution?

Answer: Because my science teacher told me that evolution is scientific fact.

Question: Why do you believe your science teacher?

Answer: because he agrees with the textbook he assigned us to read.

Now, we have asked, "Why?" twice.

If we continued to ask, "Why?" we would come down to the foundation of this person's thoughts.

When we get down to the foundations, there are no more questions that can be answered. So where to the foundations come from?

There are three possibilities.

things that we make up, pulled from the air
demonic lies
divine revelation

Question: Why do believe in creation?

Answer: Because God revealed this to me. He spoke to me through the Bible and gave me His faith so that I could believe Him.

See how quickly we got to the foundation. This is a belief that has a foundation that is solid and that cannot be moved.

In reality, the things that we make up, that are pulled from the air, are actually from demons and all the lies of demons spring from the prince of demons, Satan. So these are one and the same.

Divine revelation comes from the Almighty, Creator, God, Jesus Christ. So there are only two choices, but how do we know there are only two choices? Because God has revealed this truth to us.

The question then is how do we tell the difference between the revelation that comes from God and the lies of Satan?

The answer is that everyone who sincerely wants to do the will of God will know.

Jesus said, "If you really want to obey God, you will know if what I teach comes from God or from me"

The rejection of the revelation that comes from God is not an intellectual problem. It is a moral problem.

Jesus said, "Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened to you: For everyone who asks receives; and he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks it shall be opened. *

Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to those who ask him? Matthew 7:7-11 *

You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink. You can set the truth before someone, but you can't make anyone believe those things that they don't want to submit to. They have to want to obey God.

How frequently it is brought to our attention that nothing good can be done if the will is wrong! Reason alone fails to justify itself. Richard M. Weaver

Jesus said, "You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free" (John 8:32)

"If we are not prepared to buy the truth at the cost of our own humbling we shall not receive it"

Lies appear to have no price upon them. They seem cheap and they abound everywhere. But for the truth there is always an obvious price to pay.

[God] has set a day when He will judge all the world's people with fairness. And He has chosen the man Jesus to do the judging for Him. God has given proof of this to all of us by raising Jesus from death" (Acts 17:31).

"There is a judge for the one who rejects Me [Jesus] and does not accept My words; that very word which I spoke will condemn him at the last day" (John 12:48)

That also stands for every person who speaks the utterances of Jesus. When we hear them, we hear Jesus Christ, and we either accept or reject. Every person who follows Jesus Christ is commanded to only speak His utterances and not their own.

"When we love others, we know that we belong to the truth, and we feel at ease in the presence of God" (1 John 3:19)

Ravi Zacharias did two open forums in a university. On the second night, one man told him that he had brought two Atheists in the night before who said that the arguments presented were so strong that they could not contend with them, but they were going to remain Atheists because that is what they prefer to be true.

In listening to an unbeliever and drawing out his reasoning, the unbeliever finally came to his foundations.

They turned out to be assumptions that were pulled from the air. When asked why he believed his basic assumption, the unbeliever looked startled and blurted out, “I guess I’m making the whole thing up.” It was quite a revelation to him since he hadn't even known that he had any assumptions. However, he decided to remain an Atheist because he didn’t want God to rule over him.

The human mind was never created to function outside of the anointing of God. God created the human mind to literally flow with the holy anointing oil of the Holy Spirit. The book of Proverbs tells us that all knowledge, wisdom, and understanding come from God. Given that reality, who would want to be unplugged?

The Scripture is clear that we are three part beings. We have a spirit, soul, and body. The word for soul is also translated as mind, heart, and life. It appears that when we are born again our spirits are joined to the Holy Spirit in an amazing way. From that moment on, it is a battle for the mind. If we yield to the Holy Spirit, that puts our spirit in control of the mind. Be not conformed to this world, but be transformed-literally transfigured-by the renewing of your mind. That's all in passive voice, so it means that someone else is doing the renewing and the transfiguring-the Holy Spirit.

We believe that this transformation will include a changed life and much more. The word that God uses here, He does not use lightly. It is only used in three Scriptures. The Greek word is metamorphoo. It refers to a metamorphosis. It is used when Paul says that we are to present our bodies as living sacrifices and prove what is the good, acceptable and complete will of God is and to be transformed (metamorphoo) by the renewing of our minds. It is used to tell us that as we all take the veil away from our faces and see the glory of the Lord in those who are reflecting His glory, those who are being made into the image of God, that we will be transformed (metamorphoo) into the same image from glory to ever increasing glory and this will be done by the Spirit of the Lord. The real meaning, though is seen in the transfiguration of Jesus. Jesus was transfigured (metamorphoo) before them. If you can receive it, this is what is meant my this word. Salvation is much greater than we think. And four references of Scripture point to this transfiguration as the coming of our Lord, Jesus Christ in His Kingdom and in His power. I don't say that I fully understand this. Perhaps no one does. At the same time, I don't want to tell God what His limits are. I want to walk into everything that He has for me. How about you?

Some time ago, God showed me that grace is not forgiveness. The Greek word, charis, means free gift or unmerited favor. Paul says that, when he does good works, it is not he, Paul, who does the works but grace that lives in Paul. There are other verses that equate charis with the Holy Spirit and that equate charis with power. I don't claim to understand this one hundred percent, but I have touched the edges of that power.

Faith is the other word. The Greek word, pistis, literally means stability. The Bible gives us some clues as to what it is. First, it is a substance-the substance of things hoped for. It is also evidence-the evidence of things not seen. And faith without works is dead. Also, Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. Literally, that is: faith comes by hearing and hearing comes by A" word from God. We know from a multitude of other scriptures that God does speak. Anyone who will explore finds out by experience that God can be found. We also know that we can learn to discern His voice from other spriits and from our own minds and that it is a sin to speak a vision out of our own minds,

God showed me a vision of a leaf and it was being carried by the wind. The shape of the leaf is faith. The wind is the Holy Spirit. The Spirit can take the leaf wherever it wants because of the shape of the leaf. The Holy Spirit can take us wherever He wants if we just have faith. If the leaf were a rock, the wind would have little effect on the leaf/rock. When we hear God's voice, and He tells us something, we can either obey or not. When we obey, our senses are exercised by reason of use and we can hear better the next time. When we disobey, our consciences are seared by a hot iron and we have a bit of spiritual hearing loss.

Now, here is the amazing thing that I just realized about the strait and narrow way. We just never realized how strait and how narrow this way is. Of course, we know that strait is not straight. Strait is the gate. So it is a constricted gate. Jesus is the Way. Jesus is the door.

Take what the Bible says about faith and add one more point from Scripture: whatever is not of faith is sin. That means that if God didn't tell me to do it,then it is sin for me. If God tells me to do something and I don't do it, then it is sin to me. It is disobedience. It is falling short. The reality is that God directs our lives. When He does, we either obey or we don't. There are no gray areas. There are no shades or shadows. When God directs us to take one of two very good and Scriptural choices, only one of them is the direction of God. Not only that, but God never contradicts Himself-that is, His direction is always in line with Scripture. And the Scripture cannot be broken.

The Way Is Very Narrow and the Gate Is Very Strait (Constricted)

How can we know anything about anything

The Strait and Narrow Way

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