Navigation systems are important, especially in vehicles, ships, and aircrafts. For example, if an aircraft departs from Boston in route to LA, and the navigation system is off by 5 degrees; if not corrected it could end up arriving in Alaska. It’s the same with life and ministry. I’ve witnessed it so many times. And we’ve come close to veering and diverging off the main path ourselves. It’s easy to do unless you really know God and begin walking immediately in the light of the knowledge of the Word of God you have. But the Lord is very patient and gives us many opportunities to make things right. I could give you many examples, but here’s just one that unfortunately, did not end well.
For the sake of privacy, I’ll call this person Solomon (not their real name). Solomon married young, and many questioned his choice of spouse. They were both Christians and eventually got into the ministry. Gradually over time their marriage went sour and he got into an adulterous affair. He even sent a gift to our little son for his birthday, but we sent it back and told him that since he was living in sin we could not accept his gift. I know that sounds harsh but it was right. Some things can be tight but right. Scripture is clear on this.
"I wrote to you in my epistle not to keep company with sexually immoral people. 10 Yet I certainly did not mean with the sexually immoral people of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of the world. But now I have written to you not to keep company with anyone named a brother, who is sexually immoral, or covetous, or an idolater, or a reviler, or a drunkard, or an extortioner—not even to eat with such a person." (1 Cor. 5:9-11).
Many believers who glory in what they think is love is not glory at all (v 6). The truth in love is the balance and what we need.
After we returned his gift we lost touch with Solomon. Sadly and shockingly, years later he hung himself in a freakish act of suicide (sorry but the details are too gory and surreal to share here).
THE DREAM
Anyway, my wife precious Carolyn received a dream from the Lord about Solomon’s situation. She saw a burning candle up on a high shelf in a barn. This candle represented Solomon’s life at one time, but it was now on a high shelf, which signified the light that used to burn brightly in Solomon’s life was now kept hidden. That candle then fell off the shelf and burned the barn down.
Solomon made a wrong turn in his life and never corrected it. Forgiveness and mercy waited years for repentance. God was patient and long suffering with Solomon and gave him ample space and place to repent and turn to the Lord again. But somehow he never did. We are hoping that in a final desperate cry in the hour of his death that Solomon called on the God of his youth and was saved “so as by fire” (1 Cor. 3:15). Adultery is not the unpardonable sin.
Ad I said, I could share many more examples of how believers were easily deterred off the main path of righteousness in their lives. But often it started with something small.
ONE BAD INGREDIENT
For example, I’ve seen where one bad ingredient in their spiritual diet messed them up, and carried them away into deception and sometimes even destruction. Their lives were never the same.
“Be not carried away by divers and strange teachings… “ (Heb. 13:9)
It matters what and how you believe, my friend. This is one of the marks of our writings and many books — to keep people from drifting into strange doctrines, belief systems, and lifestyles that are contrary to the faith.
“Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things that were heard, lest haply we drift away from them.” ( Heb. 2:1)
You really should get some, or all of our books for your library, especially if you are younger and just starting your race. They will have a sanctifying effect on your spirit and nurture the fear of the Lord in your life. These books will help build and furnish your life in God (Amazon).
This word from the Lord is one of the key building blocks of our own personal lives and purpose in the Lord, with writing being a main component.
“… your vision is to build a city not made with hands, to take a people to a place where I am, sojourners in a land, a vision not of man. Yours is a vision in the Spirit to redeem man; a vision to furnish the inside of man, for they are the true temple of God. My plan for which you’ve been created is to build man.”
Are you walking in the light of the knowledge of God you possess? What has the Lord told you about your life? And how are you cooperating with Him in the building of it?
Bert Farias' books are forerunners to personal holiness, the move of God and the return of the Lord. They also combat the departure from the faith and the turning away from the truth we are seeing in our day. His recent five-book bundle, written under a fresh anointing, is a forerunner of what the Lord is doing in His church today. His newest release, Turning Your Trials Into Gold, is a powerful testimony of how God raised up Bert and his wife Carolyn from a sick bed and near death.
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