Buy truth, and do not sell it. Get wisdom and instruction and understanding. Proverbs 23:23
My wife Kathy and I recently met a woman and her fifteen year-old son at a conference we attended. We had the privilege of praying with and for them both. One of the things this woman shared with us was the deteriorating vision of her son who was wearing glasses. She stated that until recently her son had 20/20 vision.
I recall that meeting now within the context of the ability to see clearly as it relates to spiritual things. The Bible has much to say about seeing things accurately, as well as having spiritual insight and vision.
Consider these examples:
- "Where there is no vision the people perish." Proverbs 29:18
- "So give Your servant an understanding heart to judge Your people to discern between good and evil." 1 Kings 3:9
- "Give me understanding, that I may observe Your law and keep it with all my heart." Psalm 119:34
- "For if you cry for discernment, lift your voice for understanding." Proverbs 2:3
- "Those who have insight will shine brightly like the brightness of the expanse of heaven, and those who lead the many to righteousness, like the stars forever and ever." Daniel 12:3
One simple truth found throughout the Bible is that God requires His people to gain understanding of who He is, what He is doing in their lives and in the world around them, and act upon that acquired knowledge. Proverbs 23:23 supports this and says: "Buy truth, and do not sell it. Get wisdom and instruction and understanding."
We are instructed to seek truth and hold on to it steadfastly. We are encouraged to acquire wisdom through understanding that comes from instruction. God desires His people to become educated in spiritual matters as they pertain to Him and living for Him in righteousness and holiness day by day.
The Apostle Peter captures the essence of what it means to be a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ when he wrote these words in his second epistle:
Simon Peter, a bond-servant and apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours, by the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ: 2 Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord; 3 seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence. 4For by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust. 5 Now for this very reason also, applying all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge, 6 and in your knowledge, self-control, and in your self-control, perseverance, and in your perseverance, godliness, 7 and in your godliness, brotherly kindness, and in your brotherly kindness, love. 8 For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9 For he who lacks these qualities is blind or short-sighted, having forgotten his purification from his former sins. 10 Therefore, brethren, be all the more diligent to make certain about His calling and choosing you; for as long as you practice these things, you will never stumble; 11 for in this way the entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will be abundantly supplied to you. (2 Peter 1:1-11).
We can say that our understanding, insight, discernment, learning, knowledge, and the application of all those things wisely must come through the filter of the Bible and the leading, prompting, guiding, and correcting of God the Holy Spirit. This is so because it is through the Bible that we learn who God is and what He has said to us. It is the Holy Spirit who reveals God to us and who gives us understanding of the things of God, even insight into the Bible. 1 Corinthians 2:6, 10-13 gives us these truths:
Yet we do speak wisdom among those who are mature; a wisdom, however, not of this age nor of the rulers of this age, who are passing away. For to us God revealed them through the Spirit; for the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God. For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so the thoughts of God no one knows except the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may know the things freely given to us by God, which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words.
So, what we must keep in mind is that being a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ is much more than apprehending knowledge, even more than believing certain data. Believers are to put into action what they say they believe. James famously said that faith without works is useless and dead (James 2:20, 26), and we know that the enemy of our souls and his cohorts have the knowledge of the Father and the redemption He offers through faith in the Son and tremble (James 2:19).
This is why it is of utmost importance that believers "see" what it is they are to make actionable. A life lived for the glory of God is a life that is guided by the truth of God as revealed in the Bible and administered by the Holy Spirit.
The question thus becomes, who made your glasses? In other words, where did your understanding of the world and how it operates come from? What informed you of a proper response to the world system? Do you think and act subjectively or objectively? Is your view of the world as it exists today informed by your own ideas, attitudes, and understanding or is your view of the world and your responses to it shaped by something outside of yourself?
Do you submit yourself, bend your knee, and adhere to the precepts, statutes, commands, and principles that God has revealed to us through His revelation to us that is the Holy Scriptures? Do you apply with all diligence the things the Holy Spirit impresses upon you and shows you? Do you practice those things? Are these things consistent with what the Bible says?
If your beliefs lead you away from faith that grows deeper and more mature over time, if your doctrine does not help you develop a richer appreciation for Christ and what the Bible teaches then you must reconsider what you believe. You must submit yourself to the authority of the Bible, not make the Bible subservient to you. This is a huge issue today among people who profess faith in Jesus Christ.
Friends, it is not nearly enough to believe you have proper doctrine and theology. People with opposing viewpoints, different glasses to carry the metaphor forward, believe they see things crystal clear. But this cannot be stated any clearer than I am about to now: if your theology, your doctrine, and living out the things you say you believe do not result in your own sanctification then something is amiss. If your doctrine and theology do not result in action then you are deceived. If your doctrine does not result in preaching the Gospel to the lost then what good is it?
Today we have Christians who believe that God approves of transgenderism, transsexuality, homosexuality, lesbianism, and now even pedophilia. Those same people, who believe they are showing God's love, march under the rainbow banner of sexual debauchery. Some people who believe their glasses provide 20/20 vision support the advocacy of the slaughter of unborn human beings. These same people support drag queens, Islamic indoctrination, homosexual normalization, and the destruction of our Western Civilization being advocated in the government schools. The very foundations of America are being systematically destroyed and many professing Christians are yielding the sledge hammers by blind ignorance and a Disneyland version of Christianity that renders them spiritually impotent to raise a single objection to the wholesale carnage being inflicted upon America.
It is time for true Christians as differentiated from Christians In Name Only (CINO's), to rise and push back hard against this darkness that has gripped America. If the way you see the world – your glasses – does not show you that America is dying at the hands of liberal progressive Marxists, neoconservatives, anarchists, atheists, wiccans, new agers, socialists, politicians of every party or no party, nihilists, narcissists, and apostate fake Christians operating in what has become the beast religious system of the last days one world religion, then it is time for you to get a new prescription! Throw those glasses away because your spiritual eyesight and therefore your soul is in peril. You are very close to becoming completely blind to what God is shouting at His people today.
Unless God makes your glasses you will ultimately become completely blind and worthless and will be tossed out and trampled underfoot by the stampede of God-haters that are on the march in America today. Will you take action? A visit to the eye doctor is as simple and easy as crying out to the One who gave you spiritual sight in the first place. May God have mercy on us and grant us the courage and determination to take our place in the widening breach the enemy of our souls has created in America.
Dr. Mike Spaulding
Pastor, Calvary Chapel of Lima
Host, Soaring Eagle Radio and DrMikeLive
Follow Mike on Twitter @ccpastormike and @soaringeaglerad
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