True or False

Sunday, July 31st, 2022

by Ken Pullen

No one who practices deceit shall dwell in my house; no one who utters lies shall continue before my eyes.

Psalm 101:7 — English Standard Version

There are six things that the LORD hates,
seven that are an abomination to him:
haughty eyes, a lying tongue,
and hands that shed innocent blood,
a heart that devises wicked plans,
feet that make haste to run to evil,
a false witness who breathes out lies,
and one who sows discord among brothers.

Proverbs 6:16-19 — English Standard Version

Lying lips are an abomination to the LORD, but those who act faithfully are his delight.

Proverbs 12:22 — English Standard Version

While awaiting my wife to get ready for church this morning I read an account of a man who wrote;

“For many years, I struggled with drug and alcohol addiction. It started before I was a teenager and continued until my last semester of seminary. Since I was a straight-A student and a Christian who attended church faithfully, no one suspected that I was also regularly using narcotics…”

This is just one of a growing number of people writing, or saying publically how they were or are alcoholics, drug addicts, sexually immoral — committing adultery, having sex outside of marriage, having sexual homosexual relations, being a thief, embezzling, and on and on the litany of lies while saying “I’m a Christian…” as folks tell the world of the sin, the lies, the deceit, the immorality — doing that which God hates, doing that which God clearly states anyone who partakes of will not enter His House. See heaven. Have eternal life.

You Must Be Born Again

Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.” Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.” Nicodemus said to him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”

John 3:1-8 — English Standard Version

For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God. You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. 

Romans 8:3-9 — English Standard Version

A Living Sacrifice

I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

Romans 12:1-2 — English Standard Version

It doesn’t matter if you go to a church every Sunday. And have for years or decades. If you are not regenerated within your heart and mind — truly changed by the power of the Spirit of God to work in you. It doesn’t matter what we may say, or how nice the symbol of ultimate shame glistens around our necks — if we have not truly repented of our sin, not truly been transformed and made into a new creature, born anew by the Spirit — we are not truly disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ or children of God.

No matter what I might say or think. No matter what you may say or think. It’s what the Word of God says. And there is no variance, no changing in the Word of God. No exceptions.

A person cannot be an alcoholic, a drug user, a sex addict, sexually immoral, an adulterer, a liar, and everything plainly, clearly written in the Word of God and find themselves in the kingdom of God. Not unless genuine repentance occurred and within that turning from self and the world to God, Jesus, and the Word of God the Holy Spirit indwells an individual, and that individual experiences a radical, definite, change within them.

To not continue drinking to excess, being a drug user, sexually perverted and sexually immoral, a liar, and such one cannot then also be a Christian.

Not a true one.

But a false one in word only which is not a Christian no matter how many words or church appearances or conducting one’s behaviour in front of folks.

Being keen to deceive but not keen on submitting, committing, believing to Jesus, in Jesus. Not truly.

When I was around 15 years old and at one of my parent’s churches, the sect my parents became members of were very fundamentalist, legalistic and had around 10,000 members in America and Canada at the time [it has since greatly diminished and many splits and divisions occurred] I was out in the parking lot with about 4 other lads around my age at a rural church in the network of smaller churches my parents were members of. I still recall one of the boys saying, “I’m a Christian.” And another one immediately said, “No you’re not!” And the latter boy’s words were true. The first boy’s parents may have been Christians but he certainly was not. It doesn’t happen by osmosis or genetics. It only happens with a true change of heart and mind. True conversion of the thinking, living, believing, and being.

That brief experience in the parking lot remains in my memory all these years later.

Just because someone grows up in a family that thinks or claims they are Christian, in a certain denomination, they go to church regularly, and happen to perhaps even have born again parents? That does not mean their offspring are Christians or going to see God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit, and all the heavenly hosts in heaven eternally.

Later in the article written by the man who said;

“For many years, I struggled with drug and alcohol addiction. It started before I was a teenager and continued until my last semester of seminary. Since I was a straight-A student and a Christian who attended church faithfully, no one suspected that I was also regularly using narcotics…”

He wrote that after a decade and a half of living that way, hiding his alcohol abuse and being a narcotics addict, even while in seminary, after a bit over 15 years of deception one night the Holy Spirit came into his heart and mind and from that night on he was changed. And never again drank alcohol to excess or took narcotic drugs. How did this occur?

He wrote that — HE CONFESSED HIS SIN AND REPENTED TO THE LORD.

And a Supernatural change took place in him.

There is only one Christian. A TRUE one. In God’s eyes. According to His Word.

Anything else is a pretender, a lie. And will not see the kingdom of God but will receive God’s just justice.

Alive in Christ

Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving. See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to Christ. For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, and you have been filled in him, who is the head of all rule and authority.

Colossians 2:6-10 — English Standard Version

A Tree and Its Fruit

“Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? So, every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit. A healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus you will recognize them by their fruits.

I Never Knew You

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’

Build Your House on the Rock

“Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it.”

Matthew 7:15-27 — English Standard Version

I once imagined, said, thought I was a Christian. I wasn’t. I hadn’t been truly born anew, transformed, and changed into a truly new creature by the Supernatural power of the Holy Spirit as a result of my confession of sin, any true repentance, or anything I said or did.

I was a pretender. Appearing real to those around me but I was a liar in the eyes of God who knew my real heart. It wasn’t until many years later one winter’s night, in the middle of the night, a true regeneration, transformation, and change occurred within me. I was born anew. And my life has never been the same since.

There is true. There is false. And no matter how well we might make it appear true? If it isn’t truly true God knows. Oh, God knows. And we are a liar before the Lord even if we have many or all the people we may know cowed and convinced we’re a true disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ, or as the world only knows, a “Chrisitan,” not truly knowing what it means to be a true Christian, as most professing to be do not know either. Tragically. Eternally tragic unless they submit, commit, believe, and obey allowing the Spirit of God to work in their hearts.

Thus, they would show the change within them and no longer consume alcohol in excess, be addicted to narcotics or drugs, commit sexually perverted and immoral acts, be unethical in business, commit adultery, and so on.

A person is either true.

Or they are false.

And it doesn’t matter what people think or if you’re a talented actor or actress, good at keeping up appearances — because God your Creator knows our every thought, knows our hearts even better than we know them ourselves. And there is no lying or acting in front of God.