Do you do what Jesus said?

I’m stunned and speechless at how many Witnesses i talk to, who think they ARE doing God’s will, they ARE following in the footsteps of Jesus, they ARE doing what Jesus said to do, etc.

I ask – have you ever read the Sermon on the Mount?   They say – oh yes, of course, we read all the Bible, etc.

How are you doing with that?  Are you following it?

Oh yes, i am doing what Jesus said!

Uh…wow. When i read the Sermon on the Mount, i don’t feel like i’m successfully executing it at all.  Loving God with all my heart soul and mind…loving others as much as i love myself…forgiving everyone! Wow, i’m not obeying that by a long shot.

I love C S Lewis’ comment on it:

“As to ‘caring for’ the Sermon on the Mount, if ‘caring for’ here means ‘liking’ or enjoying, I suppose no one ‘cares for’ it. Who can like being knocked flat on his face by a sledgehammer?

I can hardly imagine a more deadly spiritual condition than that of a man who can read that passage with tranquil pleasure.”

“Obviously, the law applies to those to whom it was given, for its purpose is to keep people from having excuses, and to show that the entire world is guilty before God.” – Romans 3:19

 

Truth Doesn’t Change

But God, that the error of so great deception might not be concealed, and that He Himself might not seem to be a cause of error in permitting them so great licence to deceive men by divinations, and cures, and dreams, has of His mercy furnished men with a remedy, and has made the distinction of falsehood and truth patent to those who desire to know.

This, therefore, is that distinction: what is spoken by the true God, whether by prophets or by diverse visions, is always true; but what is foretold by demons is not always true. It is therefore an evident sign that those things are not spoken by the true God, in which at any time there is falsehood; for in truth there is never falsehood.

But in the case of those who speak falsehoods, there may occasionally be a slight mixture of truth, to give as it were seasoning to the falsehoods.

(Clementine Literature, 4th century)