Friday, February 9, 2018

True or False with A.W. Tozer

TRUE OR FALSE. The heart is adept at emotional tricks and is entirely capable of falling in love with imaginary objects or romantic religious ideas.

TRUE OR FALSE. Christ has become a project to be promoted or a cause to be served instead of a Lord to be obeyed. Thousands of mistaken persons seek to do for Christ whatever their fancy suggests should be done, and in whatever way they think best. The result is an army of men who run without being sent and speak without being commanded.

TRUE OR FALSE. Millions go through life unaffected by the presence of God in His world.

TRUE OR FALSE. It takes a work of God in a man to sour him on the world and to turn him against himself; yet until this has happened to him he is psychologically unable to repent and believe.

TRUE OR FALSE. Jesus was not in the business of offering human advice that people could take or leave as they wished. Instead, He always spoke with absolute, final authority.

TRUE OR FALSE. I do not believe it for one minute, for there are not a dozen “rights.” There is only one “right.” There is but one Jesus and one God and one Bible. He said what He meant. He meant what He said. He is the Eternal Word, and we must listen to Him if our discipleship is to be genuine and consistent.

TRUE OR FALSE. As Christian disciples, we should be whatever we are wherever we are. Like diamonds. A diamond does not adjust; it is always a diamond. Just so, Christians ought always to be Christians. We are not Christians if we have to wait for the right atmosphere to practice our religion.

TRUE OR FALSE. The person who wants to die a Christian must live a Christian. The person who wants the Advocate above to be a shelter for him or her in that hour must allow Him to be a shelter right now!

TRUE OR FALSE. Some teachers have tried to enshroud Jesus in a pink fog of sentimentality. But there is really no excuse for misunderstanding Him. He drew the line as taut as a violin string. He said, “He that is not with me is against me; and he that gathereth not with me scattereth abroad” (Matthew 12:30). “But he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God” (John 3:18).

TRUE OR FALSE. Truth is not a text. Truth is in the text, but it takes the text plus the Holy Spirit to bring truth to a human soul. A person can memorize a text, but the truth must come from the Holy Spirit through the text.

TRUE OR FALSE. The only solution that will loose us from our sins is the blood of Jesus Christ. He loved us and freed us—washed us—from our sins in His own blood.

TRUE OR FALSE.  Receiving Christ savingly is an act of the total personality. It is an act of the mind and of the will and of the affections. It is thus not only an act of the total personality, it is an aggressive act of the total personality.

TRUE OR FALSE. Our thoughts are the decorations inside the sanctuary where we live. If our thoughts are purified by the blood of Christ, we are living in a clean room, no matter if we are wearing overalls covered with grease. Our thoughts largely decide the mood and weather and climate within our beings, and God considers our thoughts as part of us. They should be thoughts of peace, thoughts of pity and mercy and kindness, thoughts of charity, thoughts of God and the Son of God—these are pure things, good things and high things. Therefore, if we would cultivate the Spirit’s acquaintance, we must have the control of our thoughts. Our mind ought not to be a wilderness in which every kind of unclean thought makes its own way

TRUE OR FALSE. God’s highest purpose in the redemption of sinful humanity was based in His hope that we would allow Him to reproduce the likeness of Jesus Christ in our once-sinful lives!

TRUE OR FALSE. How many Christians are there who pray every Sunday in church, “Thy kingdom come! Thy will be done!” without ever realizing the spiritual implications of such intercession? What are we praying for? Should we edit that prayer so that it becomes a confrontation: “My kingdom go, Lord; let Thy kingdom come!”

TRUE OR FALSE. A strange thing under the sun is crossless Christianity. The cross of Christendom is a no-cross, an ecclesiastical symbol. The cross of Christ is a place of death. Let each one be careful which cross he carries.

TRUE OR FALSE. We cannot love honesty without hating dishonesty. We cannot love purity without hating impurity. We cannot love truth without hating lying and deceitfulness. If we belong to Jesus Christ, we must hate evil even as He hated evil in every form. The ability of Jesus Christ to hate that which was against God and to love that which was full of God was the force that made Him able to receive the anointing—the oil of gladness—in complete measure.

TRUE OR FALSE. Who has ever given us the right or the privilege to look into the Bible and say, “I am willing to consider this matter and if I like it, I will buy it”—using the language of the day. There is something basically wrong with our Christianity and our spirituality if we can carelessly presume that if we do not like a biblical doctrine and choose not to “buy” it, there is no harm done.

TRUE OR FALSE. We settle for words in religion because deeds are too costly. It is easier to pray, “Lord, help me to carry my cross daily” than to pick up the cross and carry it; but since the mere request for help to do something we do not actually intend to do has a certain degree of religious comfort, we are content with repetition of the words.

TRUE OR FALSE. It has become popular to preach a painless Christianity and automatic saintliness. It has become a part of our “instant” culture. “Just pour a little water on it, stir mildly, pick up a gospel tract, and you are on your Christian way.” Lo, we are told, this is Bible Christianity. It is nothing of the sort!

TRUE OR FALSE. The things that are closest to our hearts are the things we talk about, and if God is close to your heart, you will talk about Him!

© Becky Laney of Operation Actually Read Bible

No comments: