Turnround (Part 4)

Turnaround (Part 4)

1 John 5:1-5 "Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God: and every one that loveth him that begat loveth him also that is begotten of him.   By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God, and keep his commandments.  For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous.  For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world: and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.  Who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God? "

We are engaged in an ongoing struggle against our enemies, namely,  the World, the Flesh and the Devil. These three have arrayed themselves against the believer, as rivals to the Holy Trinity; The flesh lusts against the Spirit, Satan sets himself against the Son of God, and there is no room in the heart for both the love of the world and the love of the God.

The citizens of heaven were all over-comers. There are no idle spectators among them. They all had to fight and win, and through their faith , they overcome lukewarmness, idolatry, temptation, the worship of the Beast, the fear of man, and a host of other obstacles laid. They were great examples of turnarounds who found a better place at the end of their earthly journey.

John writes that the victory that overcomes the world, is our faith. So I ask the question of every believer-how is it that our faith overcomes the world and begins a turnaround within us?

The world, literally interpreted is the “cosmos”, which means ‘the order’ or ‘the adornment’, referring to the way that humanity instinctively organizes itself independently of God.

The world is a spiritual entity:

- It resists Christ.

-It is engaged in battle with God and cannot receive the Holy Spirit. 

-The entire world lies in the (power of) the wicked One. 

Therefore the world will hate Christians because it hates Christ itself.

The World has a central doctrine, which was first taught in the garden of Eden, by the serpent. That doctrine is “…you shall be as gods, knowing good and evil...”. It is the exaltation of man to the place of God and even to the replacement of God, it is humanism and  the deification of man it is seeking! This is why the world hates, rejects and persecutes Jesus.

Worldliness is an outlook, which preempts God, rejects His authority, and which would allow all of us to decide what good and evil are. Self is the supreme authority in worldliness and the highest ideals of this world are human autonomy. Concepts such as to follow one’s own heart, and to be true to self at all costs, permeates our modern culture bound by traditions an fear.

Paul warned us that “In the last days, perilous times would come for men would be lovers of self…”, and as a consequence , they would be,  “…covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy,  Without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good,  Traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God;  Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away" in 2 Timothy 3:1-5.

It is not “faith” in general that overcomes the world, it is the specific core of the Christian faith,  the incarnation of God in Christ. The man who turns to Christ with all of his heart, embraces a doctrine which is a direct refutation of the core doctrine of Satan and the world.

The Christian conversion involves giving up on being as a god. We want instead to be mere men again, redeemed by Christ, and  under God as worshippers of God. In fact our new core doctrine is the incarnation, which is the opposite of the core spirituality of worldliness. Turnaround literally begins we put Christ first and seek to please Him and not ourselves regardless.

John 3:3 "And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven."

What a man worships, he conforms to. Worldly man worships man, self, and exalts self above all that is called God or that is worshipped. He has cast off reverence to the God of the Bible and placed self as supreme. This is the source of the corruption of the soul, for man was created to know and worship God and as a consequence, grow into godliness.

When a worldly man repents of his self worship, and turns to the God revealed through Jesus Christ who humbled himself in the flesh to provide change for us, this doctrine has an incredible capacity to humble us! We worship  a God who “emptied himself and took upon him the nature of a servant”, which is the absolute opposite of worldliness.

The deep inner acceptance of the doctrine of  the incarnation automatically delivers us from the Spirit of the world, we can never be the same again, nor can we ever have the same values again, after worshipping the God who condescended to us in our need