Living by laws of life or death.

In Romans 8:2 Paul the Apostle tells the Christians at Rome, “For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death. We see here two laws and we will use this verse to define the inner struggles we have in searching for true love and acceptance for ourselves by having a desire to follow the Lord’s leadings. Laws are instructions that govern our behavior and regulate our decision making which brings order in our lives. Where we have no awareness of us breaking laws in our thinking processes, there is no condemnation or blame that we have broken any laws and that there is a price to pay when we break them. These laws of life and death work together to bring God’s purposes to completion and we need to identify the thinking process and emotions that go along with our seeking of total contentment with in our selves. The greatest travesty that can happen to mankind is to be born into this world and be living in a God ordained system of following rules and never having the empowerment to live and be protected by them. This only happens because mankind is ignorant and never understands God’s intentions for putting him on the earth in the first place.

God who is the Author and Creator of the universe has the answers to all of life experiences and our wholeness depends on us following His laws and directions which are to be empowered by His grace which is His strength. Experiencing God’s grace brings us security as we seek our personal destiny and particular purpose that God intended for our lives. Only He can teach, give us the desire and empower us to follow His laws because, He created this system of life in the first place. If you owned a product that broke down, common sense tells us to bring it back to the original maker for repairs. If you are God conscience or a born again believer, then I would suggest that you read this entire article. I make a difference here between having a God consciousness verses being a born again believer because, only a born again believer can have a living relationship with a living God.

Our spiritual life begins when we ask Christ Jesus to come into our life and we have a miracle encounter with the Holy Ghost who comes into our being and becomes our teacher that shows us how to participate in the kingdom of God. We receive the kingdom of God and all of His characteristics the day we make Jesus our Savior. If we are going to accept Jesus Christ as our Savior we must obey Romans 10:9-10 when it tells us, if you believe with your heart and make a public confession with your mouth that Jesus was raised from the dead and accept His finished work at the cross, you will be born again. Jesus the Christ was the first born again God man who is God the Father’s son. It is only as we become born again that we become a member of God’s family and God becomes our father as He is Jesus father. We are not talking about belonging to a certain denomination and attending church services. This should be our next destination but without this supernatural miracle taking place in our life, church going has no meaning in having an intimate relationship with God.

In Genesis it tells us that by God’s spoken word He created the sea, the animals and made mankind into His likeness. By creating mankind after His likeness it was His intention for man to be a co-partner with Him in their physical life now and live in heaven with Him for eternity. Being a born again believer means, you will have an inward witness by the Holy Ghost of the Spirit World and you will be able to define and identify the difference between His voice speaking to you in the inner man verses all the other voices that are crying out for recognition in the world today, trying to bring us under control to do their bidding. As I said laws were only intended to keep order, but have no life giving power and inseparable association with the living God of the universe.

God gave the Ten Commandment through Moses because He wanted mankind to know that they were breaking them. Breaking God’s commandments was not only keeping them from having the loving relationship He wanted with them but, it brought with it shame, guilt and a lack of appreciation for them selves. A person with out having the Holy Ghost living in them is incapable of obeying God’s laws because; his will power is weak and he is a slave to the crippled fallen nature he was born with. This is what happened to Adam and Eve when Satan made them believe that when God made them, He made them incomplete. Satan tempted them to eat from the Tree of Good and Evil and made them believe that if they did, it would make them like God. They didn’t realize that they were already God’s children and had a complete relationship with Him. They were deceived and became ashamed of themselves and hid in the trees and made fig leaf aprons to cover their nakedness which brought with it shame. This is the nature we inherited from our greattttttt grandfather Adam. God knew that man was incapable of being faithful in following Him and put a fail safe mechanism in man when He made him perfect in the beginning before Adam disobeyed God. That being, that if anything happened by man missing God’s intentions for him by failing to appropriate God’s best, there would be consequences that man would reap in his soul which represents mans ( mind, will and emotions. )

It is these consequences which would lead him back to his Creator who is the meaning of all life. By man missing God’s best, he would reap upon himself a feeling of incompleteness, a spirit of shame and self loathing that causes him to search for love in all the wrong places to find the longings for purpose that God planted in him. Unless he comes to understand God’s way of how to stay close to Him and let Him be a loving Father, this searching with out true direction causes pain, disappointment, addicted behavior and an evil conscience that ends up with a mediocre life on earth. These consequences depend on the spiritual condition that man finds himself to be in. Scripture tells us that mankind is made up of body, soul and spirit. It is our Spirit Man which can not be seen with our physical eye that has to be empowered because; this is what controls our soul and physical behavior.

Over the last forty some years of my seeking of God and looking for my identity as a person, I have come to realize that I am a unique being and when God made me He broke the mold. If you want to be a whole person as God intended, this is the same conclusion you have to come to for yourself. When our awareness or self esteem of one self begins to grow it brings with it a feeling of how important you are to God and you learn how to love the one your with which is yourself. God is not a respecter of persons and He wants all of mankind to know that He is a jealous lover who wants a personal and vibrant relationship with each one of use on a private intimate bases. Scripture tells us if we want to worship God it must be with our spirit connected to His Spirit. This is what reveals the truth of God’s ways to our mind and heart. God’s truths were intended to be passed down through the generations as an inheritance from family too family. When you begin to build any structure, you must have a firm foundation if you expect the structure to grow strong and straight. If the structure is being built with inferior material it is only a matter of time before the whole structure collapses. If we apply this principle to how God structured our lives and how we are to be raised up as a holy edifice as His body to do His works in the earth, our basic foundation can not be built on lies and doctrines of devils and us be expected to be become a God quality product of power and wholeness.

A child who is being raised in a healthy home environment should be taught principles by their parents of God’s plan of wholeness. We start with laws of does and don’ts. When a child breaks a law they receive discipline like going to their room or being grounded etc. This should start to instill in a child that there are rules that have to be followed and it feeds a seed that God implanted into them at their conception of submitting to the authority of God. These rules put roots in kid’s lives and as they are matured and nurtured in the admonition of the Lord being taught to them by their parents, they become the generation that God’s uses to bring God’s purposes into the earth.

This word for admonition in the Greek is noutheteo: which means to caution, reprove gently or to remind one of something. A child should always want to seek the advice of their parents whether they’re living at home or living out of the house. However, the first admonition that must be laid in their life is them coming to know the Lord Christ Jesus as early as possible in the home setting. This is the power the child needs to walk in obedience to parents who represent the authority of God’s laws. A child needs to become grounded while he is living at home under the careful eye of his parents and be nurtured to have a hunger with in himself to walk in obedience to their leadings without always being told what to do. He can not have the Holy Ghost in him if he has not been born again. It is the Holy Ghost who creates this hunger with in them. We start out teaching our children laws of do’s and don’ts however, a child can only experience the inward satisfaction and self worth that is produced in him if he is walking in obedience as a born again believer.

Unless we as parents make our children our top priority in our lives, not our ministries, our job, or our hobby etc., we have failed the foundational purpose of Christian maturity. A child is a slave in having a lack of good judgment because he was born that way. We have to compel them through unpleasant conditions and take on a responsibility because of the authority we were invested with by God to look after them and start them off in the right direction. Coming out of our mother’s womb, our human nature has a an attitude of “I will not obey”. Since scripture tells us that we were born alienated with a wall between our maker and His creation, we need to be loved back into wholeness by discipline with great passion and perseverance.

We start out building character in a child habit by habit and this brings order but not relationship. If the child has a messy room, the problem is how to get him to keep it clean, not a problem of grounding the child in him learning how to exercise a pattern of healthy thinking. This makes them feel they have a duty to perform like a ritual of obedience but we must take the next step and instill in them how to become independent and how to decide for them self if they want to obedient just for the satisfaction it creates with in themselves and not stay in a pattern of having a fear of the consequences if they do not obey.

They need to learn the difference before they leave their parent’s house or their actions when they become adults are founded on a weak foundation of countless unrelated habits and desires, which waver and conflict with one another. This produces no apparent direction in their lives and they have no resolve within themselves against the turmoil and fears that beat against their minds daily. Our whole being has to be disciplined and focused on seeking a clear and direct course of action with a vision given by the Holy Ghost. What we are explaining here are two sets of laws.

The law of death says I have to obey or I am going to get punished. The second law says I have a hunger in me to walk in obedience because of the pure pleasure of feeling so loved and secure with in myself.

Scripture tells us that the Devil is the father of all lies. He is a very real living entity on the earth and the prince of the power of the air in lofty places going about in a rage trying to influence mankind to miss their appointed destiny with God their creator. It is the born again children in their battle uniform knowing their call and trained in spiritual warfare with their God given weapons and gifts who are to take back what the devil has stolen and maimed upon mankind.It is an awesome responsibility to be called on by God to raise a generation of children as a fighting force and equip them to birth God’s kingdom into the earth.

This is why the devil is absolutely terrified of the Joshua generation that God is raising up for this final battle against evil and this is what will usher the Lord Jesus Christ back into this earth. The word for Joshua in the Hebrew is yeh-ho-shoo-ah: meaning, one who saves. It represents a generation of those who have the breathe of God‘s Spirit alive and flowing in their mind and heart proclaiming freedom and offering assistance to those who are under demonic attack, and to deliver those who oppose themselves by rescuing and avenging what the enemy has stolen and looted from God’s people. If we are growing up in our parents care and are being taught principles where their originality comes from the Ten Commandments, we go through an inner struggle of realizing that we are having a terrible time deciding that we want to obey let alone having the strength to obey them. This causes a fear and insecurity with in us that is a very real living entity that we have to learn to deal with.

When there is no parental supervision and children are not being brought up in the admonition of the Lord, we end up with kids having no discipline and vision of the life God planned for them. If you consider your self as a born again believer who says they love God and wants to fulfill their purpose on the earth, it has to be very disconcerting to see what’s going on in this country and the spirit of anti-christ at work driving the presence of God out of the consciousness’ of society. This whole country is in an uproar trying to correct every ill with different fixes and have no clue as to God being the only one who has the answers of life and its purposes. I can understand the scandals and perverse behavior among the unsaved community. However the scandals and perverse behavior going on with in the born again community in leadership and the congregations of America is a disgrace and unless God’s people who are called by God’s name will humble themselves and repent of their sinful ways, this country will implode from with in.

I sense that because the days that we are living in are dangerous and coming to an end, the born again church who are God’s salt and light to this generation must awake from a spiritual sleep and begin to present the gospel in each of their own arenas of life with passion and power as Jesus did when He walked the earth. Jesus is the perfect example of a man born of a woman into this earth and scripture tells us that there is no other name given among men as a foundation for mankind to understand how to operate in the kingdom of God. Therefore, we must understand His walk and the way He found His place with His heavenly Father who created the universe.

He was born into a normal family as any other person in the earth. His earthly father who physically nurtured Him was a man called Joseph whose occupation was that of a carpenter. The Hebrew word for Joseph represents one who supports and adds to a child’s education and raises him in the ways of God. Jesus was raised as a carpenter’s son and this became his earthly occupation however, his father was mightily used by God to give Jesus wisdom and encouragement so he could fulfill His calling in the earth. The only difference between Jesus birth and the rest of mankind’s birth is that, His physical birth and conception was from the sperm and D.N.A. of the God of the universe and it did not come from an earthly human being’s sperm.

Jesus was conceived through God’s seed. He came into this world as a born again believer. Jesus the earthly physical human being had Christ the anointed King who was with God when He created the universe, now living on the inside of Him with all of His heavenly Fathers characteristics and was physically born coming out of His mother’s womb a Righteous person. God His Father looked at Him as being blameless, free from evil contamination and set apart to do His heavenly Father’s purposes in the earth. Now the only way mankind can make God their heavenly Father as He is Jesus Father, is by having a second birth from above. We have our natural birth and then we have to have a second birth that is a Spiritual birth from above by receiving God’s Spirit into our being. This takes place as I have said when we make a commitment and ask Jesus to come into our hearts and have a supernatural experience through the Holy Ghost. When this happens a person has a witness from with in him self of this taking place. As a born again believer, it’s very difficult at times to realize that God looks at us as blameless, free from any evil contamination and set apart to do His heavenly Father’s purposes in the earth which is the same way He looks at Jesus. That’s because, we have to deal with being tempted to look at our faults and failures as we endeavor to find peace and purpose for our life.

As we begin to over flow and understand our righteous position in Christ by having a hunger and thirsting for God, the Holy Ghost reinforces our doubts of our permanent connection and total acceptance that God wants to lavish on us because of us being His children. As we come to know what it is to be righteous in His sight, it causes us to understand how to make Godly decisions. By staying in a constant awareness of how highly He esteems us, it allows Him to search our heart and give us a vision and a purpose for the calling He put in us. This is what makes us become like Him in our characteristics and temperament. Our experiencing righteousness, acts as seasoning or a spice to our daily walk, just as spices in our food enhance and create flavor to our palates. We experience peace and joy in our walk with the Holy Ghost and it is acceptable and pleasing to God. We can also communicate with people a lot better, because of the higher esteem we have for ourselves.

Jesus was betrayed and put to death because of our misdeeds (or sin) and was raised from the dead to secure our justification or (be put in right standing and us know that God sees us as sinless.) This act by Him absolved us from all guilt and the feeling of being punished as far as God is concerned. It’s absolutely critical we understand that, we do not become more righteous by doing more things in God’s service or that we lose our righteousness by missing God’s will from time to time. Jesus did not save us because of any works of our own that we had done or can do. God knew that man could not be trusted to help save himself. It was the pity and mercy God had on us and it was His premeditated plan of uniting Himself to man without us doing anything to earn or deserve it. It was by our new birth experience in Christ and being regenerated by the Holy Ghost that we became part of the eternal family of God.

It is by His grace (unmerited favor) that we have His living power working within us. In turn, this enables us to conform to His will in purpose, thought and actions, and become heirs of eternal life. This becomes a greater reality in us as we experience His unconditional love. Jesus said, “Greater love has no man then this that he lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends, if you do what I command you.” Jesus laid down his life for us. Jesus himself is our righteousness and the continuing revelation of this fact secures our hope in God who wants to be a Father to us. If we do not have a true understanding of how God’s righteous Spirit works in our life, we could have a real zeal and hunger for God to move in our lives and if what we were seeking was not His righteousness, our endeavors would be doomed to failure from the start. I have found as I walk and talk to the Lord everyday, it clears my mind of the (negative influences) bombarding my mind. Righteousness is experienced through the mind of Christ which we received the day we had our born again experience.

There are many examples in the Bible how born again Christians got misled and lost their awareness of how to operate in the righteous Spirit of Christ and went back into a mind set conciseness of obedience to law regulations. Unfortunately, human nature is still the same today. Some of our church assemblies have lost or never had a true vision of what righteousness represents. Jesus tells us “Unless our righteousness goes beyond the righteous positions of the scribes and Pharisees we will not be able to enter or participate with God in His kingdom.” The Pharisees were the people who taught the laws of the Torah which embodied the Jewish teachings and explained God’s laws to the people. The scribes were letter writers who put the laws down on paper so the law of God would be documented. Jesus said if we did not go beyond the concept of the Pharisees standard of having a righteous position with God by us trying to obey God’s laws, we could not enter His kingdom or participate in it.

This word enter is an action word of participation. Common sense tells me, if I have a desire to love the Lord and follow His leadings, and Jesus in scripture warns me of a condition that can take hold in my life that can hurt me in my relationship to getting to know God better, I‘d better stand up and take notice and understand how to live in His Righteous Spirit at all times. The Pharisees were living by trying to obey the Ten Commandments. Now that seems like a good thing to do and the majority of born again and none born again assemblies are teaching this today. It doesn’t make sense in our own understanding of anything being wrong with teaching this concept. However, Jesus said we must go beyond that if we want to participate in His Kingdom.

Man does not go to hell for his sins nor does he go to heaven for his good works. It only depends on him making Jesus the Savior of his life and he becoming born again.

God set in motion His way with His word from the beginning of when ever, and we need to seek His face and stop living in ignorance by following man made concepts of what they think kingdom living is all about. If Jesus is going to become our Lord and Master, we are going to have to do it his way. God is a King ruling His kingdom, not a democracy and all these denominations coming up with their own rule of law. Now I have been asked at times “aren’t we supposed to be living by the Ten Commandments”? Let me answer that and define from scripture how Jesus wants us to go beyond this concept of Law. Jesus was always talking about the heart. The religious leaders always dealt with the physical seen acts of men (the outward). Their judgment was based upon what they saw by a person’s do or don’t and they executed judgment if a person violated the Levitical Law of Moses or the Ten Commandments.

God’s law was created to cause us to recognize our spirit of shame and the loathing disappointment we had for ourselves by breaking them.

The law was never designed or intended to give peace to the offender. God gave the law to cause confusion and unrest in His creation. When God gave Moses the Ten Commandments it never gave us the power to try and keep them in the first place. The law was given to minister death to those who were kept under it, until Christ would come to give us a spiritual revelation of God’s true heart which sets us free from a weak will struggling to keep His laws. God the Father sent His first son Christ Jesus who was the first God man and by us accepting His sacrifice on the cross it brings us peace and joy in our lives and lifts this burden of shame and self loathing with its guilt. God knew we would be having a hard time trying to obey His commandments and this was His intention in the first place. Jesus endured the cross for the joy that was set before Him. That’s why it pleased God the Father that in Jesus Christ all the fullness of the Godhead would dwell in Him in bodily form. The law of God can only be kept by us experiencing God’s love through His Righteous Spirit.

We were made to explore and search for the meaning of life and to recognize our weaknesses with out judgment and a need for a power greater than our own.

A hireling or a person with a legalistic attitude cares nothing about the person as a unique individual. Did you ever notice how, cowboys or cowpunchers as they’re called in Texas drive and herd cattle together as if there is no distinction from animal to animal. A shepherd on the other hand, leads and calls his sheep and even names them. They know the sound of His voice and follow Him. A hireling or hired hand is incapable of relating to another’s weaknesses because, his pride of being right prevents the transparency needed to create the bond of peace needed to create healthy relationships.

Everybody is the same to him without any distinction. All they care about is being right and getting the cattle to obey because, all they seek is what they want. God on the other hand is the exact opposite. Everything He does is for the benefit of another. His holiness demanded justice because of sin. So, on our behalf He offered up Himself in the form of His own Son to satisfy the demands of the schoolmaster we were under subjection to. Jesus fully satisfied the demands and legal requirements once and for all and as we walk in the understanding of this concept being empowered by God’s Righteous spirit, we can stop working so hard at trying to be good doers and feeling guilty when we miss God at times.

Our judgment was executed and satisfied when Christ was resurrected. He was now free to love us unconditionally because there was no longer anything in front of him that legally had rights of judgment against us. The court was satisfied and adjourned. Christ’s work was complete and He was so intent on making sure of our security that His office as a High priest is one that’s always open, never in recess and always steadfast and sure. He always identifies himself with us and imputes his righteousness to us without measure. All who have put their trust in Him for righteousness sake have never been disappointed. Christ is the end of us living by the Law. We live by the righteousness of Christ, which was imputed to us the day we came into the kingdom. We have now become the workmanship of God in Christ as God created in us, a new species of man with a spirit created in True Righteousness and Holiness.

There is a difference of day and night between living in the faith of Jesus verses living and functioning with the faith of Jesus. When we live in the faith of Jesus verses a faith in Jesus there is a difference between life and death. Of, represents being empowered by an inner awareness of a living person working with in you. In, represents a belief in principles of scripture with a non living entity of doctrines of do’s and don’ts that man manipulates to fit into their own goals of what life represents and has no reality that ministers to the child with in us

In John 8:31 Jesus said, “if we would continue in HIS WORD (by His Righteous Spirit) than you will be my disciples indeed (visibly evident for all to recognize, even the lost) and are (Guaranteed) to know the Truth and the Truth shall make you free!” We will be Jesus disciple, when we stop having our behavior being controlled by us trying to obey God’s laws, not because of its intended purpose, but because of the fear of the consequences if we don’t.

No one can capture the favor of God by trying to keep his Commandments.

Jesus said in John 14:23, “If a person really loves me, he will keep my commandments.” Blind obedience without love will maintain order, but does nothing to enhance a loving relationship. Blind obedience without recognizing its value is destined for failure. Love gives the reason to obey and gives us value and worth. The hungering heart seeks with passion the kingdom of God. The complacent heart grows restless in pursuing God.

By us understanding our eternal security in Him, it becomes the central core issue to walking in a healthy relationship with God. Unless we have a revelation of it in our spirit that goes beyond our intellect, we will walk as crippled and defeated believers who doubt the faithfulness of our King concerning His love and goodwill of heart towards us. We have become performance oriented in our relationship towards Him because; we have been seeking to earn His graces. All this while, we have been ignorant of His free gift of grace which empowers us in our weakness by living on the faith of Christ Himself because, He was willingly to pay with His death the penalty for the consequences of our sinful nature. God has credited His righteousness to all of us and it is already a done deal as far as He is concerned.

The word of God tells us that we do not fight against physical opponents, but we fight against spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly (supernatural sphere.)

Scripture tells us, “God’s scepter or measuring stick in his kingdom is righteousness.” A scepter is something that endows a person with authority. Because we received all of God’s characteristics the day we become born again as I have stated, we need to know how to think and function in God’s characteristics or Righteous Spirit or the consequence is, we will live in a self-righteous life style contrary to God’s will. Scripture tells us; our own righteousness is like dirty filthy rags in God’s sight. In our ignorance of not having a true knowledge of God, we in our own efforts end up substituting and mimicking God’s Spirit in our own emotions and fleshly thinking. Those who are ignorant of God’s word are committing spiritual suicide.

Scripture states, “The entrance of God’s word into our hearts brings light and understanding to the straightforward and ordinary man.” If this is going to happen, we must be willing to let the Holy Ghost reveal any hidden agendas with in us that does not line up with the way God sees things. Paul the Apostle when writing to the Corinthian church felt it necessary to remind and encourage them when he said, “awake from your stupor and return to sober sense in your right mind and sin no more. For some of you have not the right knowledge of God. You are willfully and disgracefully ignorant and continue to be so. You lack the good sense of God’s presence and the true knowledge of Him.” This stupor that he was talking about is demonic in nature and a ploy of the Devil to keep our spiritual ears blocked up so we can not rightly interpret the word of God. There is no other way for a person to fulfill the longing with in himself of him being delivered from feelings of incompleteness and find the love of God he so desperately needs if, he is unlearned and ignorant of the scriptures.

Beside all that, we must learn to recognize the difference between our own thinking telling us what scripture means verses the Holy Ghost who is the teacher of God’s word. Scripture tells us that a man should not lean towards his own understanding because the results of that is death. Since we received the mind of Christ the day we were born again, we can now be instructed by the Holy Ghost. When we lean to our own understand, we frustrate the grace of God and burden ourselves down with unanswered prayer and what we put our hands to can not prosper as God intended. When this happens, it causes us to not appropriate God’s favor. This tells me that man is his own worst enemy. I will use an experience in my own life to define what I have just said and scripture to back it up.

I was brought up in a God fearing Catholic home. My father was a very authoritative proudly driven man who had a love for God according to Catholic tradition. I inherited that spirit at birth and was raised with strict rules and regulations and an extreme awareness of the Ten Commandments. My one aunt was a nun and my cousin was a priest. I was an alter boy for three years and attended a parochial school. Before turning thirteen I had thoughts of becoming a priest because I was very God conscience and began to feel at age six that I had a calling on my life. I didn’t realize then that it was God and He was trying to get my attention.

I know now that I was searching for my own identity but because there was no one who knew God personally and His ways, there was no one to admonish me and instruct me as to the feelings that were taking place with in me. Mankind was born with a fallen nature to say no to authority as I have stated and there comes a time when his innocents which is temporary comes to an end and he becomes aware in his growing pains that he has become a law breaker in some form. Our awareness of this brings uneasiness and unrest and the atmosphere of insecurity. This is the principle of the law of God that brings death as I have stated and what God intended to happen from the beginning.

The Catholic religion did a fine job in my entire family of making us aware that we were sinners and law breakers who were going to hell if we did not follow the Ten Commandments and their particular denominational rules and observances. All though all of my family had a conscience ness of a God that we prayed to, none of us were born again people. My father, who worked at the steel mill, would stop off at a Catholic church to pray before he went into work. My innocents and the awareness of breaking the Ten Commandments went by the way side at about the age of eleven. This is when I became aware that I was breaking them on a regular basis and beginning to act with sinful behavior and all though I went to confession weekly asking for forgiveness and confessing my sins to a priest as I was told to do, I was back Monday and the rest of the week becoming a slave to sins that I was told would send me to hell.

This guilt and inward struggle and knowing I was breaking God’s laws and not having the power to walk in obedience became a stronghold in my life and continued until the age of twenty five. This stronghold was a spirit of shame and a self loathing of my self. Some where over those fourteen years some one or some how God planted a scripture in my mind that said that I could never be tempted beyond that which I could bear, but with the temptation God would show me a way out. I could never seem to live by this promise. There wasn’t a night when going to bed that I didn’t ask God to forgive me because I knew if I died in my sleep I was going to hell for eternity. These sins that I was committing I was told were mortal sins not venial sins. They said those who commit venial sins only had to suffer or burn in purgatory for a while to pay some penance for them. However, mortal sins sent you to hell and if you committed a sacrilege, there was no forgiveness for that sin and you automatically went to hell.

This principle of sin is so contrary to scripture that it sickens me to talk about the bondage that some one could inflict on a person who had a desire to live holy but lived with a relentless guilt and bondage that had no mercy. I was never told I needed to be born again and to read the bible to find what God’s will was for my life but only to just follow the Catholic religion. The nuns told us that we were not intelligent enough to study the word of God on our own and to just do what the priests and the Catholic Church told us to do. After fourteen years of guilt and condemnation in my life at age twenty five I was married with one child and one on the way. I was in the bar and restaurant business with my father and one afternoon during the lunch hour a man came in and ordered lunch and said to me, “have you ever accepted Jesus Christ into your heart.” I thought here’s another one of those bible preaching Protestants with their philosophy of life. I was told to not listen to people like this because if I ever left the Catholic Church I was going to hell. Even though I lived with an inner fear and a hunger for something I could not define, something made me listen to this man. My initial response was “I am a Catholic.”

He then said, “I don’t care what denomination you belong to, have you ever accepted Jesus Christ into your heart.” My answer was, “I believe what my grandfather and father believe and what the priest and nuns told me all these many years.” His response was, “Do you at the end of the week give your pay check to some one else and count on them to pay your bills and give you spending money.” I said, “Are you nuts.” The next statement coming out of his mouth planted a principle in me which has grounded my focus for seeking God these past forty years. He said, “Isn’t it more important to you that you know what the truth really is so that you don’t spend your whole life seeking what other people tell you what God’s will is for your life and loosing God’s favor and end up going to hell.”

He then started quoting scripture that said, there is only one mediator between God and mankind and that is the Lord Jesus Christ. I told him that he believed in a different bible then Catholics do. Well this encounter continued every afternoon for an hour or two after the lunch hour over a nine month time period. What he was telling me was ministering to the inner man with in me. I finally said to myself, I am going to buy a Catholic bible which I was told was the Dua Remes bible and when he comes in I am going to set him straight. I never seemed to have the time to go buy the bible and low and behold one afternoon two nuns came into the bar selling Catholic bibles. I thought wow what a coincidence. However, I now know that God was behind the scene orchestrating this scenario for my benefit to deliver me from a life style of guilt and shame. God wanted to introduce me to himself and deliver me from the laws of death and introduce me to the love laws of life.

Over the next nine months our conversation was the two of us with two different bibles sitting there after the lunch hour studying scripture and I finding out that the same word was in both bibles. I found myself getting hope that I could be set free from the insecurity, guilt and unsure ness of where I was going to spend eternity. He never once invited me to his church in all of this time. Now you need to understand that the doctrines of the Catholic Church were very deeply implanted in my heart and soul because of my commitment to follow God’s leadings all of my life and I was being tossed between two different teachings, the true word of God verses the Catholic religion interpretation of scripture. However for the first time I was getting a vision of a God I was told existed all my life but never realized that He was alive and was trying to communicate with me.

Well this whole scenario came to a head one afternoon when I thought, when he comes in the restaurant for lunch today I am going to tell him to hit the road because, I could no longer stand these last nine mouths of turmoil that was going on with in me. It was getting to the point that the unrest was showing up in my behavior to the point my wife was beginning to wonder if I had killed somebody in my past life or I had some dark secrets. My father being a devout Catholic told me to stop listening to this man because he was a Protestant and if I changed religions I was going to hell.

He came in this particular afternoon and as he left the restaurant I said to him. “The only way I will believe what you have told me all these months is if Jesus Himself tells me, what the right thing is for me to do.” Well as a Catholic we were taught that the only way we could have our sins forgiven, we had to go to confession and confess our sins to the Priest, who was our mediator between God and myself and he would give me my penance and absolution which in turn made me pure to receive communion at mass on Sunday morning. Another Catholic doctrine was that if you went to communion with out confessing your sins to a priest, you would commit a sacrilege and there was no forgiveness for that sin and you automatically went to hell when you died. This fellow that God let come into my life, continually told me that I could confess my sins to Jesus Christ because He was alive and He would forgive me and was sitting at the right hand of God to make intersession to for me.

Being a very logical and carnal individual I didn’t see any Jesus Christ standing around, I only had years of indoctrination with law type teachings of death from the Catholic religion. When you’re told the Pope is infallible when it comes to teaching and making decrees from the word of God, this makes a person become sold into slavery and he is controlled by fear laws but there is no love based power to live the Christian life. I had no clue or understanding at this time of the bondage I was brought up with, but only a groaning and hunger all those years to be set free from the inward prison that had control of my life.

With in the next few days after informing him that I wasn’t going to believe him unless Jesus Himself told me the truth, I was driving my wife to see the doctor as she was pregnant with our second son. My mother was with us sitting in the back seat. As I said it was my teaching that I had to go to confession to a priest to have my sins forgiven so I could receive Christ in a wafer form at mass Sunday morning. This fellow that had witnessed to me said if I confessed my sins to Jesus He would forgive me all my sins. I was trying to believe him and was in torment and in the valley of decision the last two days because I had been told all those years that I had to confess my sins to a priest who had the power to forgive my sins. I had told my wife the dilemma I was in and she knew that confessions were over at four in the afternoon and it was almost four already and if I didn’t get to confession, I could not receive the body of Christ at mass Sunday morning. I had no awareness at this time that God was on the scene and was still trying to introduce him self to me.

I also didn’t know the scripture that I stated earlier in Romans 10:9-10 “ For with the heart a person believes ( adheres to, trusts in and relies on Christ) and so is justified ( declared righteous and acceptable to God) and with the mouth he confesses and declares openly and speaks out freely his faith and confirms his salvation.” When some thing is confirmed, there is a personal witness from within one self.

As I was driving my thoughts were on me wanting to believe what this fellow had been telling me all these months. My wife said to me, “it’s nearly four o’clock and you’re not going to make it to confession to receive communion at mass tomorrow.” The next thing out of my mouth was, “I asked Jesus to forgive me for my sins and He did.” When that statement came out of my mouth, I sensed a great wind enter the car and filled my entire being with its presence. It was as if some one I could not see gave me a loving hug and the first impression was for me to stop the car and worship or thank this witness with in me. Tears began rolling down my face and my wife and mother knew something had happened. My mothers sensing that I may have become suddenly ill said to my wife, “what’s going on up there.” Her response was, “don’t worry he is having a supernatural experience.” Over the coming months the first thing I noticed was, I found that the will power that I didn’t possess to stop sinning was gone and all those sinful habits fell away and I became aware of a spiritual world I had never experienced before.

As I began searching the scriptures and meditate on the word of God day and night it was as if a still small voice with in me was explaining and telling me that all my years of searching for a God who I did not really know had been watching and leading me with a plan for my life and all that time He knew the every longings of my heart and the guilt I struggled with. He began to show me through scripture His plan and purposes for my life. The word of God began to be like wet ink on a page and personally written just for me as it continues to be till this day. It is this same living word these last forty some years that has empowered and secured me to understand an invisible world of faith that has become more real everyday. Over the next six years my whole family had born again experiences. My mother was the first to ask Christ into her life and then my three brothers with my dad being last. I got him to come to an Easter service at my church and at the alter call he came down and accept Christ and we were all there with him. The drastic change in his life was something to behold as he became a living witness at his work and in the market place where ever he roamed. Over the next five years many of my aunts and uncles also received Christ. As I read the bible I became aware that Paul the Apostle had a similar inner struggle that I had for years. In the book of Romans chapter seven he talks about an inner struggle he was having in trying to walk in obedience to God’s leadings. Let’s look at what he said in Romans 7:1-25. Continued in part two.