Chapter eleven
There are three, only three, requirements to assure a successful christianity.
First, I want to say what is not required. Are you ready for this, my brother?….
We don’t need seminaries or christian universities. We don’t need congregational membership. We don’t need a diploma. We don’t need recognition. We don’t need to ‘go to church’. We don’t need to bunch with the bunch. We don’t need Pastor Whoever. We don’t need wednesday night bible study. We don’t need to be active in ministry. We don’t need connections. We don’t need man’s permission or approval or assistance. We don’t need a salary. We don’t need charm. We don’t need money.
So what do we need?
First, we need to abide in Christ. Second, we need to submit to the governance of the Holy Spirit. Third, we need to give allegiance to God’s bible.
That’s it!?
That’s it.
Generally speaking (Warning: I do a lot of ‘generally speaking’), there are three vital subjects pulpit-people ignore: First, one’s need to abide in Christ, and second, one’s need to be governed by the Holy Spirit and third, commitment to the bible.
In the next chapter I explain why, in my opinion, this is so.
Now, before going further, I will unfold my understanding of ‘successful’ christianity….
Favourable christianity is…. knowing you have fought “the good fight”…. laying up an abundance of “treasures in heaven”…. not being “ashamed of the gospel of Christ”…. being a competent “fishers of men”…. giving a good account at “the judgement seat of Christ”…. finishing one’s unique “course” or calling…. bearing “much fruit” to the glory of the Father…. being crowned with “the crown of righteousness”…. being an overcomer…. plundering the devil’s kingdom.
Again, to accomplish all this is simple: abide in Christ, obey the Holy Spirit, be devoted to God’s bible.
Simple, yes. Easy, no way.
It’s an ongoing challenge to abide in Christ, to be guided exclusively by the Holy Spirit, to have the tenacity to choose bible over religion. I have been a christian for almost fifty years and I still have ongoing struggles. I must be content with continuous increase. So very much I want to hear Lord Jesus say, preferably in King James language, “Well done, thou good and faithful servant.”
First, abide in Christ….
Let’s look at John 15:5: “I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit.”
Bill, if you agree that “much fruit” is successful christianity would you acknowledge that the way to attain successful christianity is to simply abide in Jesus Christ (who in turn abides in us)? We know this is so because Jesus said so.
Can you see how John 15:5 is a rebuke to all the spiritual stuff denominational officers have introduced to evangelicals? John 15:5 is utmost simplicity. Evangelicalism is utmost complexity.
What is so difficult to understand about Christ’s promise, “He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit”? Does the young born-again have to go to seminary to learn that devotion to Christ results in “much fruit”?
The vine and the branch speak relationship. There is a beautiful concord between branches and vines (christians and Christ); the branch cannot bear fruit unless attached to the vine and the vine cannot produce fruit without abiding branches.
The remainder of John 15:5 says: “for without Me you can do nothing.” A good definition of nothing is…. nothing!
Without being relationally attached to Lord Jesus we “can do nothing”.
I conclude that…. if relationally attached to Lord Jesus, we can do all He calls us to do. (“I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”)
…. we cannot do christianity successfully without being strongly attached to Jesus.
…. we don’t need religious paraphernalia to bear “much fruit”.
…. we don’t need Pastor Whoever. Only the one not abiding in Christ needs someone (a Pastor Whoever, an elder, a friend) to point him/her to “the true vine”. Sadly, those ‘someones’ are quite rare.
…. the fruit we bear is relative to the quality of abiding relationship we have with Jesus Christ.
…. our time on earth should be spent improving the quality of relationship with Jesus Christ. This is priority.
…. to bear more fruit we simply need to abide in Lord Jesus more fully.
This is the problem: Evangelicals (etcetera) seem to think that abiding in religion is the same thing as abiding in Christ. Bill, please give this “hard saying” serious consideration because your Bethel is fraught with religion (as I define religion).
Religion is not needed and not helpful. And not only not helpful, but detrimental. And not only detrimental, but devastating. Religion hinders the life-flow from vine to branch, from Christ to christian. Infatuation with Christ is diverted to infatuation with christians. I know; been there, done that.
Jesus was successful because of an abiding relationship with His Father. (“The Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He sees the Father do…. I do not seek My own will but the will of the Father who sent Me…. The Father who dwells in Me does the works…. You, Father, are in Me, and I in You”.)
The second requirement needed to assure a productive christianity is plainly stated by Lord Jesus: “When He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth.”
I conclude that…. “He will guide [me] into all truth.”
…. “He will guide [whoever] into all truth.”
…. He only guides those looking to Him for guidance.
…. He dispenses “all truth” directly or indirectly though others.
…. only the Holy Spirit is able to lead anyone into “all truth”.
…. only the Holy Spirit knows what truth we need at every moment.
…. only the Holy Spirit is purely motivated.
To be guided by the Holy Spirit alone is swimming upstream against the flow of religionists who constantly and zealously propagate the presiding Jesus-and-us narrative.
Warning: JESUS-and-us will in time become US-and-Jesus. Religion does that.
Religion is a false vine competing against the true vine. (Jesus: “I am the true vine.”)
Successful christianity requires that religion must go – be disallowed, refuted, renounced, cast out.
The third requirement is allegiance to the bible.
Jesus taught us, Matthew chapter 7, that the wise man is he who hears His sayings and builds his life on those sayings. That house will not fall. Evangelicals build partly on rock and partly on sinking sand.
Why is it so difficult to recognize traditions of men? Is it because we don’t see what we don’t want to see? Traditions of men are simply practices and doctrine that are not the sayings of Christ. (The sayings of Christ are not only the red letters but the entire bible. “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God.”)
Ask yourself: are New Testament teachings and examples the formula for successful christianity? Or not? Would the evangelical say to Jesus?…. “Lord Jesus, Your bible is precious but insufficient. That’s why I add this and that to my christianity.”
Years ago I heard a sermon warning that mixing the bible with traditions of men always results in confusion. That moved me. I often recommit my life to Jesus Christ but that message moved me to also commit myself to the bible. I signed the last page of the bible in the presence of the Father, His Son, and the Holy Spirit as a solemn declaration of obedience to the bible.
Though everyone can make such a declaration, very few will.
Allegiance to the bible means that every time traditions/teachings clash with the bible the christian will choose obedience to the bible. Obedience to the bible is obedience to Jesus Christ. Obedience to “tradition[s] of men” is obedience to religion.
The Pastor Whoever who makes such a decision to obey the bible will soon be unemployed.
The pew-person making such a declaration will be lonely.