Under Subjection

“But I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection: lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway.” (1 Cor. 9:27)

My body means our thought processes, we are to be able, by the power and strength of the Holy Spirit, to control our emotional state and the way that we think. A tall order, for not only are we to have the ability to be happy, and all of its relative states, but to mourn, (Romans 12:15) to force ourselves, as it were, to release that which by any other means would be a normal, natural part of any human being. Because someone else is expressing a particular emotion, we are to be able to control our emotions enough to be able to summon them at will.

But we are not to be able to perform these tasks, these feats of emotion, as an action on a stage, or on the movie screen, we are able to love our neighbor, (Mark 12:31) and this means that the emotion must be genuine, it must not be fabricated for either their benefit or for a pretense of the love and compassion that we are commanded to show by keeping our bodies under subjection.

As you more than likely already know, this is an impossible task, and will not be possible unless you ask the Lord to give you that heart of compassion, of love. With everything that the world is throwing at us today, it would seem impossible, there are after all nearly eight billion of us, with every possible scenario playing out enough in each of those individual lives many times over in just a single moment. The thing is, you do not need to be concerned with each and every one of them, just the one in front of you.

When the world, at least in the past, comes upon the times of tribulation, it turned to the Lord, famines, wars, catastrophic events, there were more churches built during the depression of the 1930’s than at any other time in history, but not any longer. Church doors have been locked, willingly, by those who are to fling them open and lead people to Christ, no matter the consequences, governments have all but shunned the Almighty from their so-called hallowed halls, the name of Jesus in banned from almost all media sites, and the Word of God is no longer the foundation of neither nations nor most homes. There is a new moral construct, and it has nothing to do with love.

It is never offending, always being polite, allowing each other to live their own lives as they see fit, rarely with the consequences in mind for others around them. Debate is no longer tolerated, but is seen as defiance, as grounded in racism and intolerance, these are the advents of sin, but to even speak the word can place one in a position of not only personal loss, but personal danger. It is the way mankind has always been without the visible and present possible retribution upon them by the hand of God. “And the LORD said unto Moses, Go, get thee down; for thy people, which thou broughtest out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves.” (Exodus 32:7)

Why on such a large scale now? Why is evil so prevalent, so widespread, so unchecked in nearly every corner of the world? Cannot God contain the sins and rebellion of man after a certain number of us have become present, is it because there are so many of us now that sins grows exponentially as the number of human beings increases? Of course not, that is a foolish notion to say the least, and so a conclusion can be drawn, those who profess Christ are not all saved, and they have no more ability to keep their bodies under subjection than a dalmatian can lose or modify his spots, and those who truly are crucified with Christ are many less than one might like to think.

It is the Holy Spirit of God that works through us, He does not control us, and if we are not willing in all ways to submit to His leading, then sin will rule, there is no third alternative.

Very few “Christians,” and some are indeed saved, have a desire to stand against sin anymore, instead they would rather expound upon the love that Christ offers, but only on that love, they fear to offend by reproving, they will not rebuke for fear of seeming uncaring, they tolerate sin in hopes that perhaps one day that individual will come to the light, but never show them the darkness they are in. They have locked their church doors, and will do so again if they are told to by the secular authorities, they will wear a mask, if it is required, some even going so far as to place the logo of their church upon it, a cross, or a Scripture verse that, in some strange, convoluted way, is meant to show their own personal faith in Christ.

They will take the vaccine, because it is the right thing to do, they have become as the world, the benefits of becoming like the world outweigh the negative effects of humbly serving the Lord, no matter the consequences.

We are in the apostacy because those who claim to know Christ as Savior have decided to attempt to live in both worlds, they have determined that keeping their bodies under subjection is not necessary unless they are in line with what the world around them says is correct. “Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin.” (James 4:17) If you are not going to stand against sin, you cannot stand for the love of Christ.