A loving heart leaves off
undue concerns regarding judging whether another may be right or wrong,
as it is concerned with showing love:.Romans
13:10.
Here they were catering to
the wealthy (let's go out for dinner and have a good time:.Luke
14:12-14) and avoiding works of love (mercy) toward the poorer brethren
– verse 13; and again, James 3:9-12.
The works James is talking
about in chapter 2 are the works of belief:.James
2:23,24,25. Some were acting as though the rich in the congregation
were their only brethren.
James
is saying that if you believe that all are God's people, you should be
acting not as you are, with respect of persons.
Many give gifts to those
they love and receive them in return. That's great! But remember to love
the poor and love your enemies.
When into law, we too have
much to judge and accuse others and ourselves of. Satan was the accuser:.Revelation
12:9,10. Religious and self imposed laws (necessary for hearts without
love) are the opening for Satan to bring into
minds that which we can accuse others of.
We leave God out of our
giving by imposing prerequisites
upon it. "What is he going to do with the money? I'm not giving it if....."
We have no trust that God goes with the gift in faith and instead require
proof of performance. We give
because we are of God and not because we require qualification of need.
Being into law (Old
Testament law) is wanting God to notice what is felt to be required
obedience and allows the seeing of when one is out of sync. Others can
now judge you. You can now judge you, and all according to this set of
standards. Where is love in all this? It's just all rules and regulations
for control. With love, rules and regulations are not necessary:.Romans
13:10. With rules and regulations, when we break them we no doubt feel
as Adam did – 'let's get away from God':.Genesis
3:8.
Being
in Christ is knowing that Christ's obedience is accepted by God on
your behalf. Figuring that you need to keep anything inferior to Christ
(such as the ten commandments, tithing, etc.) to be pleasing God, discounts
the obedience that Jesus achieved and gave to us as a gift:.Romans
5:17. He now appears in the presence of God for us:.Hebrews
9:24; 1Timothy 2:5.
Why then do some few still
feel that they have to present to God their own obedience? Are they self
righteous?
It takes right higher consciousness
to gain lasting rewards: Matthew 6:33.
But some prefer excuses which obviate
those rewards.
Even our own obedience,
our own righteousness, as is attempted to be achieved by ten commandment
keeping to be right with God, can be an idol. All this obedience for profit
comes from the ego level and
is not at all a part of
higher consciousness.
Idols
are things you bond with, or the things already bonded to you from childhood
and from later traumatic
experiences that may not in some ways still be motivating you toward your
best interests. We need to clear
the dark side of our presence here.
Idols in our lives are due
to.Self-Ish-Ness
and due to prior programming (the circumstances and concepts
that make up what it is that we think today); the things primarily to do
with the self; the aberrant
working by a mind 'off the mark' (original meaning for word translated
'sin') of the high calling to
brilliance of light in God.
Our lives, our getting this
or that, our future, our problems, etc.; the all consuming, to the exclusion
of concern for others, exercise of self, builds up to a big letdown:.Matthew
7:22,23.
No, we're not talking about
not improving the self, not getting good food
for yourself, wearing nice clothes, or having a decent car and home, but
like in the Old
Testament where they sacrificed (slaughtered, killed) a living animal
to ensure that they were always ok, we too, in this New Testament
age, sacrifice the welfare of others (1Thessalonians
4:6.{note
that the word 'defraud' here means in the original Greek 'eager to have
more than', 'to have a greater share than', 'to surpass', 'to excel', 'to
gain over', 'to possess the advantage over'}).dastardly.justifying.
overt
inaction, hardly the attitude of a servant that Jesus talked of in Luke
22:26,27 and Paul:.1Corinthians
10:11; Philippians 2:17;
Ephesians
6:6,7; Romans 12:1,2.
Idols are also the reason
many seem to be in a syndrome,
such as one woman, married three times to the same types of guys – alcoholic
abusers. Why did
she keep attracting these same types into her life?
Traumatic
experiences earlier in life make severe impressions upon the emotions.
Buried and long forgotten, this personal programming ensures new experiences
are responded to in a predetermined way. These held onto ways that have
so far got us to where we are in life can be hard to give up. We still
have anger. We still have hates, resentments, jealousies. We still may
feel that to get ahead, we must put down others. And so on. They are a
part of us. Idols can be the manipulative things we use that we believe
will allow us to progress, that enable us to appear better than another.
Breaking these confidences
is important. Keeping our mind on the principles
of God that enable us to be free.(free
of all the worldly things that
work hurts for us and others) is the way. Asking generally for blessings
for yourself, and/or others, may just amplify what a person deeply believes
he deserves, and that may be more negative experiences in his/her life.
Better to pray that God will guide them, give them wisdom to draw close
to Him, that God would encourage and protect and financially prosper them,
than just ask God to just "bless" them.
We are
now
dead in Christ and need to think "from the heavenlies" where He now
is:.Ephesians
2:6.
Notice in the following scripture,
that idols are a stumbling block to the freedom that comes with a relationship
with God.....continues
