15 “Beware of the false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves. Matthew 7:15 (LSB)
With the ever-increasing move away from Orthodox Christianity into various forms of Experiential religion that we are witnesses of here and now, it seems that the bottom is falling out of Christianity. It’s bad enough that we have all of these “wolves in sheep’s clothing” drawing the unaware into false religions while pretending to be Christian, but there are seemingly endless numbers of our “Christian” leaders falling all over themselves embracing these heretics….
No one seems to mind either. It’s not that we have heretics among us, we always have them, but there are now many of our leaders either falling in bed with these people or revealing their fleshly side in some of the grossest sins imaginable. What is going on?
I do not believe that God has removed the restrainer…yet. However, it seems that there is a clarification going on. There are tests being presented to all professing believers in our time that reveals their genuineness. Those who fail these tests find themselves either in bondage to horrible sin or lining up theologically with complete heretics or completely falling away. Those who pass these tests find themselves cast off and away by the “mainstream” because they took a stand and refused to give in to the temptation as they fell on God’s mercy and grace in order to make those hard choices to not be popular or to fill up their heart’s desire from fleshly pursuits. Instead, they agreed with God and submitted to His will. It is always costly to do this, but Jesus’ disciples have counted the cost and know that possessing the treasure of eternal life in Christ is worth more than anything that can be had in this world.