I got into an interesting conversation yesterday. I was called on something I said and though I believe I was misstated, the door for misstatement should have never been opened. My immediate response was to come to my own defense and that was sin added to sin. I had obviously offended the individual and damaged his good name which is blaspheming (I will exposit this later in the post). I wanted to clear my name by confronting the individual who has misquoted me, but in front of me was the individual who wanted his name clear. During the conversation I began to feel what he felt and then understood exactly where he was coming from.
It was very hard being called on this and confronted. What I did was SIN regardless of my original intentions and not only did I SIN I caused others who participated by either listening or commenting on what I said to SIN also. It was very very hard and my heart was and is broken. I knew better and for one who desires to lead God’s people I realized that this happens quite often in other areas of my life. Because I hate false teaching I am very quick to spread what I hear about those in the TBN or Daystar Camp. Even those who associate with these fellows/ladies. The problem is my spreading of this information is sin when I don’t hear come straight from their mouth or by even misstating something I have heard them say without giving them a chance to clear it up. So that leads to the few verses that were brought before me by the individual. I had no choice, once confronted with God’s word, to allow it to scrub me clean and repent of such actions.
Ephesians 4:29 (ESV)
29 Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear.
In a quick paraphrasing I think the Holy Spirit is saying. “When you talk, everything you say should build others up, never tear them down, and the listener should always be blessed by the convesation or it shouldn’t be said”. So let me say I had to run the conversations I had about others and with others through this statement and I realized that 90% of my conversations were not this way. Rather I was talking about a musician, a pro-athlete that I thought wasn’t good enough, actors who I thought couldn’t act, politicians that were doing things I didn’t like, preachers that I thought were teaching falsely or erroneously, and people that I disagreed with theologically. 9 out of 10 of my conversations didn’t even skirt along the side of the statement in bold above.
I believe that Ephesians 4:29 isn’t limited to just speech about Christians but ALL SPEECH and I have been found guilty on all charges. Not only that I have been found to violate this imperative habitually. I want to thank the individual how confronted me because it brought something up that I read in a book by Jerry Bridges called “Respectable Sins” in the book I ignored this section and now I see why. I would rather continue what I was doing because I enjoyed sinning and that is even scarier for me.
There are a few commands found in verse 29:
1. No corrupt (which is translated rottening or corrosive) speech should be spoken
2. When speech is spoken it’s only purpose is for it to EDIFY OR BUILD UP
3. It must fit the occasion which for me means that even if what you saying are true if it isn’t in the appropriate setting then it is not edifying or building up.
4. The speech should ALWAYS give grace or as the King James renders it should “minister” to the listener. This I belive is saying the speech should not hurt the listener (or the subject if you are speaking of someone else) or cause him/her to sin but it should be the very words of the Lord Jesus which speaks life into the listener.
There are three cases when this doesn’t happen in the epistles. Paul in 2 Timothy, Paul in Corinthians, and John in his third epistle. In two of these the men spoken about was in GRAVE doctrinal error and in one the man was in GRAVE sin and it was a letter to the church of Corinth to discipline the individual it wasn’t mere conversation about another’s sin.
So in closing. I repent if any of my posts on this blog or previous blogs have been a conduit of such error. I repent even more if I have spoken with you and my speech has been a conduit of such error and if I have offended anyone or caused others to sin by participating in such conversations I repent again. What I did was sin and it misrepresents my Lord Jesus in whom I want to testify to the world about. God bless and have a good week.
Good word brother. This si something I will have to delve into deeper myself. Today brother Dan preached at church today it was regarding being thankful in everything and I thought of this while reading. Great stuff, In Christ
You sound like a man in fear and in denial. How can one love a God that they in fact fear? How can one fear a God that they in fact love? You keep downing yourself for being who you are. Guess what… you can’t change, you won’t change. Until you learn and accept who you are, you will forever be confused. And yes… you are indeed confused, which is why you are always second guessing yourself. By all mean lionel… always debate. It would do you a world of good to study the real history of blacks before slavery. Currently you are a Christian slave. I’m not trying to spark a debate, trust me, this honestly is not my intention. But, you are so lost in that Book of allegories call the Bible. If you ever want to know the truth, you need to put that book down and study abroad. You are trying to be someone and something that you were never meant to be. Once again, I’m not try to spark a debate, but you need to realize that it’s always hard trying to be something other than yourself. There is a reason for that… and the cure is simple… be yourself. Be the real you that your creator intended you to be. To be anything other than who God intended you to be, is equivalent to second guessing the work of God… your creator. You will never find yourself in the Bible. That debating desire that you have is in you for a reason… but that desire is truly misguided. Search for the true history… it will be very liberating.
LOL!!!! Chuck you a fool dude!!! LOL!!!! Let me respond real quick. This may be an in house debate so sent you ain’t part of the family there may be so confusion. But since you are at the dinner table let me respond.
1. I do fear God, as son who fears his Father. So let me rephrase that I revere the Lord Jesus
2. The statement about “until you accept who you are” I think from my previous post I have made that clear. I am a redeemed sinner, saved by Gods grace through His only begotten the Lord Jesus Christ. I was once an enemy of God born into sin, but by blood of the Lamb I have been reconciled to God by faith. So I know who I am and that leads to this……
3. I am Christian Slave. I was a slave to sin, but Christ purchased me and I became His slave. So I have no arguments there bro.
4. Yeah those allegories always gets us dumb Christians. How stupid we are to believe that flood stuff, that red sea stuff, the conquest on Cannan, David killing a giant, the Tower of Babel, and especiall the virgin birth, death on a cross and ressurection of the dead. As a matter of fact it was once stated “the Gospel is foolishness” and let me tell you us dumb Christians really do believe all of those myths, amazing right?
5. The last statement leads me to believe that you have been reading a lot of eastern thought stuff but I don’t know. The “be yourself” “be what god created you to be” and so forth sounds like something from such authors. But maybe you conjured that up yourself.
6. Finally this was an area of the tongue that I found myself guilty of and since I want to be a good slave for “MASTA” I posted this just in case someone was offended here. If you were offended by any of my post I apologize to you also.
PS: I actually like being a slave, a fool, and believing in this stupid thing called the Gospel. Not only that I appreciate that God would show His mercy to me and call me to himself. I pray that you would relinquish your perceived right over your life and become a fool like me.
Amen Lionel!! Praise Him for his mercy endureth forever!!! LOL
Wow, what a wonderful post here. My comment to Chuck is, how do you know brother Lionel is confused, sounds fearful and in denial? What I am asking you is what do you know that has given you such great insight into what’s the truth? Since the Bible is a book of allegories, what stories do you have that can allow us to see where the truth is? One must study abroad in order to find truth? I have been oversees many times (not thru the military) and seen some great things, yet I would like to know how studying abroad may lead a person to find themselves?
The truth is in the Lord Jesus Christ, Christ alone. The Bible testifies of the Truth (The Lord Jesus Christ) and only in Him can man obtain salvation (Acts 4:12). I know this is starting to sound allegoric, but a slave to Christ I must be. In Jesus Christ, a man comes to realize who he really is before a Holy, Righteous, and Sovereign God. Man is depraved, evil in his thoughts and deeds, and that is the truth. There’s a flip side though! God sent His Son, Jesus Christ(God in the flesh, born of a virgin (another allegory), sinless, to die for the sins of those who may believe upon the name of Jesus Christ. God provided us atonement through the Blood of Jesus Christ shed on the cross, and through His Resurrection from the dead, He gave us life through Him. Now I know this is really sounding like that stuff in the Bible now, but this is the stuff that let’s us see who we really are before the Mighty Lord Jesus Christ. We are nothing, we are vain, and our hearts are deceitful (Jeremiah 17:9). But because of Jesus Christ, we become justified through His blood (Romans 5:6-11).
I mean to say all of this because that’s real love. I don’t want to tell you a lie, I desire you to know the truth. I have asked the same question,”How can one love a God that they in fact fear?” To be honest, the same way I loved my father even though I feared his wrath. My father was serious when it came to correcting me, yet I loved him for caring enough to raise me in the right way. O how this is true of my Father in Heaven (Revelation 3:19).
History itself proves that Jesus Christ is the truth. I have gotten the priveledge of visiting the land of Israel. It’s no fabricated story. These places and events in the Bible do hold true to history. There’s much more that could be said here, yet I will end with that. Check out this link: http://www.gotquestions.org/Bible-God-Word.html.
I was built up by your Words Lionel! Thanks for your blog, and for your great response to Chuck. We’re all slaves to something!
Hey Pastor Dave,
I pray things are well Sir. I see you guys are going to two services. I pray that goes well, I couldn’t preach once let alone twice. I don’t know how you guys do it. God bless.
Its a little hard to preach twice- but I’d love to preach more if people come!
We’re still looking forward to your visit! Thanks for your ministry!
Lionel,
I never called you or anyone a fool. For as long as you have known me, you have never known me to not say what I mean. I’m going to share some powerful knowledge that you won’t believe… but you can still research.
Do some reading on ancient egypt (kemet)…Osiris (3000 BCE)
…also Attis (1200 BCE)
and Krishna (900 BCE)
The story of Osiris, Aset and Heru (the original trinity) is written in hieroglyphs that pre-dates the existence of the Bible.
Krishna (Krsna) was a Hindu God. Was this a real God…I don’t know. But Hinduism is much much older than Christianity. Yet, before Mose somehow wrote the 1st 5 Chapters of the Bible (including his own death), this was the story of Krishna.
Jesus, was the one of the last miraculous conceptions.
Now As a christian, I know it’ll be your duty to find some type of facts to contradict the real facts. But, know this… The same Archeologists that authenticated the age of the dead sea scrolls, also authenticated the age of the ancient hieroglyphics.
Do you even understand the symbolism of the pyramids? As a Black Male… you need to investigate this, afterall your real ancestors built them. Read up on this.
No need Churck. I still have some of these books in my Library.
Here are a few links to help you out. I have read these authors and as a matter of fact I would have to throw in “Niggas to God’s”, “Before the Mayflower”, “The Miseducation of the Negro”, “The Education of the Negro”, “Message to the Blackman”, “The Willie Lynch Letter”, “There are only Two religions (Akil, author of Niggas to Gods). These are all books I read during my “enlightinging years” The years I spent freeing my mind from the oppression of religion especially the white man’s religion as they call it. So the links below are to authors I read and I read most of their works especially Browder and Akbar, but I also read the others. Let me know what you think and lets discuss them.
Dr. Welling
http://esowon.booksense.com/NASApp/store/IndexJsp;jsessionid=auwXrPHe1_g-bmY6Z0?s=localauthors&page=102878
Anthony Browder
http://ikg-info.com.hosting.domaindirect.com/id3.html
Cheikh Anta Diop
http://www.cwo.com/~lucumi/diop.html
Naim Akbar
http://www.africawithin.com/akbar/naim_akbar.htm
Yosef A.A. ben-Jochannan
http://www.nbufront.org/html/MastersMuseums/DocBen/DocBenVMuseum.html
Lionel,
I must keep my stance of this not being a debate. It’s cool that you have read the works of those authors (although none of them wrote about the real symbolism of the pyramids and how it relates to the Black race). All I am trying to say is, the story of Jesus Christ which is the cornerstone of Christianity, is a replicated version of older stories. Keep reading though. I just hope you read unbiased.
I know it sounds like I’m bashing… but I don’t mean to. I just believe you are selling yourself short of your own greatness. Keep reading up on lost history.
Peace
No Debate Chuck, but you must stand corrected as it relates to Both Akir and Browder they both write extensively on the subject you mentioned.
As it relates to greatness, that is the greatest mistake of mankind. It starts back in Genesis 3 “you will be like God”! And every since then all of mankind has “been searching for greatness. To no avail each has died and none have found this greatness.
Finally what makes a man great. Is it building pyramids, knowledge of self, is it wealth, prestige, your name written in history books, is it conquest of kingdoms, is it having buildings or pyramids named after you, is it finding the cure to AIDS, is greatness finding the cure to cancer, having Bill Gates money?
Let me tell you what I believe. It is laying down your life for man and raising it up thus conquering the thing that prevents all of mankind from being really great and that is DEATH!!!!! Until someone can come back from the dead and prove that they are God in Flesh I won’t be impressed. Why? Because I still have this huge issue in the backdrop which is I am going to die and I don’t know what is going to happen. Will I just go into obscurity, will I come back as a prince or an ant based off of my good works, will I just turn to dust or will I have to really suffer the penalty for my sin.
My friend Charles this is the trillion dollar question. If a man is so great and he dies, guess what he is just like every other man “from dust you were made to dust you will return”. But if someone can promise the resurrection from the dead and can back that promise by raising Himself from the dead and show Himself to over a hundred people. Then my friend that is greatness to the infinite power. Look bro everything else is going to rot away or become obselete thus the greatest accomplisments will be worthless sooner or later, but eternal life that is priceless my dear friend because it is valuable to every human that ever existed.
Finally where is Osiris, Krishna, and Attis? All three are dead and all three has left nothing back to prove they are alive. We know where Jesus is and His work is proven in the Body of Christ which is His Church. Keep the dialouge going. This is always interesting to me.
PS: I hope that I have defined why I am great. That greatness is becasue who I am found in, not based off of my own accomplisments.
Finally where is Osiris, Krishna, and Attis?
The story of Osiris was not for religious purposes… it was only a story (understand this). Yet his son Horus (heru) is worshipped just as much as Jesus is worshipped (internationally).
Attis was a Greek God. He was and is still worshiped by Greeks (I’m sure you know this).
Krishna was a Hindu God… The Hindu still pray and worship this God.
Finally, what did Jesus leave behind that is so factual. You say Body of Christ which is His Church. We both know that church is not a building, but a body of people with a collective belief.
Cont’ (I hit send too soon)
The three Gods that you mentioned all left the same thing… a body of belief with a collective belief… just like the story of Jesus. No Factual evidence. Not any evidence of any Arks. The Bible was nothing more than a Stolen story.
You are indeed a very bright and knowledgeable brother, I have something I want you and your buddies to look at.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjGkRFFBd0A&feature=related
Paste this to your browser and check out all three vidoes. I’m interested in your opinion. One more thing… Take note and research before you shot down the video.
Amen Lionel again bro!! We have to be faithful ministers of the Gospel. Meaning we are under obligation to give people the Gospel during every conversation if possible otherwise we find ourselves getting in unfruitful debates. For IT(The Gospel) is the power unto Salvation.
Thanks Charles for finally giving us some tangbile information, i think we have been asking for something to back up all of your seemingly weighless claims for a while now. Now finally something, greatly appreciated bro.
To all, continue to pray for Charles, that the Lord would open his eyes regarding this great mystery concerning salvation by grace through Faith.
God Bless
Hey Tyris,
My eyes have been open for quite some time now. I won’t reject your prayers because I know they are with good intention. However, I must tell you that they will not fulfill the intent. You are praying for something that will never happen. I was once a “Christian” puppet… but I was able to see the strings (chains). I wasn’t created to be controlled by a story that the Hebrews stole from the Ancient Egyptians and made it their own. Neither were you. Tyris, when I think of you and Lionel, I see men without a country. You are too good to serve with the Black Church (I guess it’s because they do it wrong), and you will never be good enough to serve with the ones you feel that does it right. Your eyes will be opened pretty soon. You are going to see the you are a token… or like Farrakhan said… you are like a Mannequin in a department store. When visitors come… they make sure that you are seen. But you have no power.
Charles you are one ignorant dude man. LOL I honestly don’t quite understand why you continue to contend for this truth that you yourself do not understand or can even intelligently articulate. What is this white church-black church thing you are talking about? I know quite a few black churches that “do it right”as you say. So I am not sure what you are on with that one? You were never a true Christian because if you were you would still be or Christ would be a lie. So let us not go there. If you held the title “Christian” it probably fell into the Hebrews chapter 6 or 10 category. No disrepect bro but Lionel and I having been asking for quite some time now for you to tell us about the god you serve in detail and you have not or cannot produce. I have enjoyed the dialogue at times and it has been to an extent appreciated and other times fruitless. So man I politely ask-don’t waste our time or any of your’s because I know it is precious. If you want to vent your frustrations with the Bible, just give us a call and we keep our little finger energy and have relationship building conversation. But I recall that is not your style. What can we do to help clear up your confusion or better yet what can be done on your part to clear up our’s. All ears bro. I am the student teach me bro. God bless bro, In Christ alone.
Tyris,
My stance is bigger than the both of us. You are still asking about this God (with the little ‘g’) that I serve, but it’s not really about that. It’s about freeing yourself and getting in touch with your spirituality. You are natrually spiritual. You don’t need some book to tell you how to act and who to be like. Because you want to follow this Jesus like prototype, you do not allow yourself to ask questions and challenge to very purpose of…your own religion. WAKE UP…YOU ARE BEING CONTROLLED. Sadly enough, you don’t even know what it is that is controlling you… it’s FEAR. You believe that God/Jesus, whom loves you so much, will cast your nerveless and fleshless spirit into some lake o’ fire…if you don’t follow a book and accept the unseen and unproven… yet, I’m the ignorant one.
Let’s take a look at what religion does:
It divides, creates indifferences, introduces prejudice, ignite wars, causes genocide, etc… I can go on and on.
Religion has not one good concrete purpose. Some people believe that it will get them closer to God. However… all of use are equally close to our creator.
You said: “What can we do to help clear up your confusion or better yet what can be done on your part to clear up our’s?”
Do this…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjGkRFFBd0A&feature=related
Paste this to your browser and check out all three vidoes.
The video that I supplied the link for… view it and the other two parts to it. Research it without prejudice. Don’t ignore any facts. NEXT: Study the art of spirituality, compare it to the purpose of religion and determine which one limits you and which one allows you to expand your real growth and development. While doing so… ignore your fear. Lastly… know that you are doing this for yourself and not for me. Free yourself… and meet me on the otherside or Stay and wait for the end of days.
Hey Chuck,
Lets make sure we define what we mean. So with no atagonizing or patronizing or condscending behavior at all answer some questions for me.
1. What is spirituality no links no nothing tell me from “your heart” and your spritual experience what exactly is spiritual.
2. Check out my church link and see where I serve http://www.lifelinebible.org and let me know if they are black enough.
3. Who or what do you serve. Can you explain in clear non evavisve language exactly what you believe. You keep pushing me to these other gods but in the next breath you tell me religion divides.