Can Wedding Garments of Salvation Be Lost?

Who Are Invited To The Wedding Feast? The Church or The Old Testament Saints

By Abraham Israel

Hear the Parable:

"And Jesus answered and spoke to them again by parables and said: 2 “The kingdom of heaven is like a certain king who arranged a marriage for his son, 3 and sent out his servants to call those who were invited to the wedding; and they were not willing to come. 4 Again, he sent out other servants, saying, ‘Tell those who are invited, “See, I have prepared my dinner; my oxen and fatted cattle are killed, and all things are ready. Come to the wedding.”’ 5 But they made light of it and went their ways, one to his own farm, another to his business. 6 And the rest seized his servants, treated them spitefully, and killed them. 7 But when the king heard about it, he was furious. And he sent out his armies, destroyed those murderers, and burned up their city. 8 Then he said to his servants, ‘The wedding is ready, but those who were invited were not worthy. 9 Therefore go into the highways, and as many as you find, invite to the wedding.’ 10 So those servants went out into the highways and gathered together all whom they found, both bad and good. And the wedding hall was filled with guests. 11 “But when the king came in to see the guests, he saw a man there who did not have on a wedding garment. 12 So he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you come in here without a wedding garment?’ And he was speechless. 13 Then the king said to the servants, ‘Bind him hand and foot, take him away, and cast him into outer darkness; there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ 14 “For many are called, but few are chosen.”" (Matt 22:1-14).

This parable has been a bone of contention for many people to say that a believer who is saved can again lose his wedding garment of salvation and go straight to the outer darkness or be kept for hell fire in waiting. Still others try to argue that the outer darkness means just a lack of revelation and not eternal lostness of soul. But when ever we want to understand a parable of Jesus, the most important thing to consider in understanding it is to look in to the context, people or situation Jesus was speaking in to. Was He speaking to the Church or the Jews in general or the all the Old Testament saints in general who lived before the death and resurrection of Jesus.

The reason why we should see the context in which all the parables of Jesus are given has been beautifully explained by Mike Scott in the following quote.

Mike Scott says, "The present New Testament verses were introduced by Robert Stephens first in his Greco-Latin Testament published in 1551 A.D., and then later Stephens published the Latin Vulgate of 1555, the first whole Bible divided into the present verses. Legend has it that Robert Stephens numbered the verses of the Bible while on horseback on a trip. His son testifies that his father did indeed number the verses of the Bible while on a trip from Paris to Lyons, but that the work was done while resting at the inns along the road.

Since this division of the Scriptures was done by man unaided by inspiration there are notable instances in which the context caused by a division into verses and chapters is destroyed. The careful Bible student will always read verses and even paragraphs before and after a statement to insure that the complete thought of a context is considered." ^[1] 

Getting the Context Right

Here Apostle Matthew the writer was giving a answer of three parables in succession which was ignited by the question which the chief priests and elders of the people asked Jesus. Here is the verse which starts the whole context, "Now when He came into the temple, the chief priests and the elders of the people confronted Him as He was teaching, and said, “By what authority are You doing these things? And who gave You this authority?”" (Matt 21:23). In other words, the very authority of Jesus was questioned by religious chief priests and elders of the Jewish people. So the next three parables the writer uses to explain how Jesus defended the divine authority with which he was demanding a verdict from people to believe Him.

So the three parable was not directed towards the Church but first to the unbelieving Jews mainly, then the Jews of that first century to believe and accept Jesus as their Messiah and then finally to all believers to understand the gospel of Jesus and believe Him. Always the parable of Jesus are heavenly realities explained in earthly language of stories and metaphors, so that those who are spiritual can understand the meaning of it through the help of the Holy Spirit (1 Cor 2:12-14).

The Kingdom of Heaven

Jesus answered these chief priests and the elders of the Jewish people and explained with what divine authority and purpose He was approaching the Jewish people with the message, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." (Matt 4:17; Matt 21:23). The authority of Jesus did not start with any humans but with God Himself who has sent Jesus as His servant and representative to call the Jewish people for the Wedding Feast (John 8:18).

If the Church is as Apostle Paul call it implicitly, the Bride who is betrothed to one husband Christ as a chaste virgin, the Church was not present at all at that time (2 Cor 11:2). Paul also spoke of the Jesus Christ and Church, comparing them using the imagery and symbolism of marriage only later after Christ died and rose again (Eph 5:23-27, 29-30, 32).

We ought to see that Jesus did not say in the gospels, 'Now I am building my Church' but only promised that He will in the future build His Church (Matt 16:18). Also He promised that in the future where ever two or three will gather together in His Name, immediately the corporate Presence of Jesus will show up to identify the place as His legal authorized Church on earth (Matt 18:15-20). And the Church was brought in to existence as a corporate entity only on the day of Pentecost when the Holy Spirit came mightily upon the 120 disciples of Jesus in the upper room and as a result of it three thousand souls were added in to the Church on that very day (Acts 1:13-14; 2:1-4, 40-41).

So the whole parable is about heavenly wedding feast that the God the king is arranging for His Son. In Matt 3:17 God declared from heaven who his Son was and how much He was pleased with Jesus. When Jesus starts the parable saying, "The kingdom of heaven is like a certain king who arranged a marriage for his son", he was clearly pointing that the marriage for His Son [i.e. pointing to Himself] was not his own idea or imagination of fantasy, but it was God's idea to unite Jesus with the Church.

Marriage of the Lamb

All those whom God the king invited to the wedding were only invited to enjoy the wedding as spectators and participants, and thus were not part of the Bride the Church. So afterwards when Jesus continues with the parable saying, "3 and [the king] sent out his servants to call those who were invited to the wedding; and they were not willing to come. 4 Again, he sent out other servants, saying, ‘Tell those who are invited, “See, I have prepared my dinner; my oxen and fatted cattle are killed, and all things are ready. Come to the wedding.”’", he was saying that God sent all the prophets of Old Testament to invite people to get saved and become a partaker of the friend company of Israel in the wedding of the Son. Jesus said John was the the final Old Testament prophet and many prophesied until John, from that day of John the Baptist the kingdom of heaven suffered violence because many believed the message of the coming Messiah and entered the kingdom of God except the religious crowd of people who rejected the king's invitation (Matt 11:12-13; Luke 7:29-30). Many prophets message in the past was rejected and still some other prophets were stoned and killed by the forefather's of Israel. The same was happening when the apostles who were sent by Jesus with the invitation for wedding feast to the kingdom of Israel on the last ditch attempt to save them from God's wrath (Matt 23:34-38; 10:1,7, 16-28).

The marriage of the Lamb is clearly described in Rev 19:7-8 which says, "7 Let us be glad and rejoice and give Him glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and His wife has made herself ready.” 8 And to her it was granted to be arrayed in fine linen, clean and bright, for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints." So these previous verses implies that just before the time of the Rapture of the Church this following verse will be pronounced in heaven after which the marriage of the Lamb will take place. But only the Church will be the bride of Christ in the marriage. The ceremony will be a very private affair in which Christ will reward his bride with ornaments of glory and be granted to be arrayed in fine linen of the righteous acts which the saints did it with the help of God. In this ceremony the Old Testament saints will not be able to partake as they were already invited to the wedding supper of the Lamb.

The Lamb represents Jesus Christ who died and redeemed all the saints of God with His blood (Rev 5:6, 9-10). We know from John the Baptist that He called himself and the Jewish people who followed His teaching as the "friend of the bridegroom" (John 3:29), hence we can call all those Jewish people who awaited for the Messiah and died until Jesus died and got resurrected with Him as God's friends in Friend's Resurrection (Matt 27:52-53). All the friends of the Bridegroom Jesus will stand, hear and rejoice greatly in hearing his voice, their joy will be fulfilled in it (John 3:29). The time before Jesus death was friend's time, even though the apostles of the Church were allowed to participate in it, they later understood after Christ's resurrection that they were not just friends but the bride of Christ (John 15:14-15). He who had the Bride with Him was Jesus who prepared a separated people for the Bride's Resurrection (John 3:29).

The marriage supper of the Lamb is clearly described in Rev 19:9 where it says, "9 Then he said to me, “Write: ‘Blessed are those who are called to the marriage supper of the Lamb!’” And he said to me, “These are the true sayings of God.”" The people called to the marriage supper of the Lamb are blessed because this opportunity to get invited in to it was closed at the time of Friend's Resurrection. So the marriage supper of the Lamb will take place in which all the Old Testament saints who partook in the Friend's Resurrection at the time of Jesus will without fail partake in it (Matt 27:52-53). But the Rapture of the saints that will happen very soon will be the Bride's resurrection in which the resurrected Church of all time will be then taken to marriage of the Lamb (1 Thess 4:14-18). Both are two different things.

Those Who Rejected The Invitation Were Destroyed

The wedding supper of the Lamb was in the eyes of God happening at the time the invitation went out. Those who heard the good news of the opportunity to be a part of the heavenly kingdom were ushered in spiritually as though they were in the wedding hall which was ready to start the program any time. In other words, those who accepted the salvation message of Jesus were immediately considered as the part of the guests sitting in the wedding hall. And these people who rejected the message of salvation and forgiveness of sins through believing in Jesus were the people who rejected to be a part of the wedding supper of the Lamb, they were seen in the eyes of God the king as those who were sitting in the marriage hall of the believing community of Israel without the wedding garment of salvation (Isa 61:10).

God did destroy those who rejected the message of salvation to enter in to the wedding supper of the Lamb (Matt 22:7). The last ditch effort of God to rescue these friends of God was finally closed on the day Jesus pronounced that the kingdom of God has been taken from them and given to a new Church Era of the whole world (Matt 21:43; 23:34-39). Only after this he looked over Jerusalem and cried for it because already the invitation to the marriage supper of the Lamb has been closed and the God's wrathful woe's had been announced which took over the whole nation of Israel under His curse (Matt 23:34-39; 27:25). After the resurrection of Jesus the time for the first fruit of gathering the Bride's Resurrection company from the Jews started to take place until 70 A.D.

Darrell G. Young says, "In 70 A.D., after a 143-day siege which began at Passover, a Roman military force consisting of about 30,000 troops under the command of Titus battered the walls and entered the city. They destroyed everything, including Herod's Temple, exactly as spoken by Jesus Christ 40 years earlier (Matt 24:1-2)....By 70 A.D., Jerusalem and Judea were left desolate, most of the people either killed or being held in captivity, or had become refugees fleeing to remote lands." ^[2]

Those who were considered as friends of the bridegroom Jesus was no more considered as one by God after the Friend's Resurrection (Matt 27:52-53). God Himself now looks toward the Bride of Christ in favor unconditionally because of their faith, and broken off the friendship with his covenant friends because of their unbelief till the Millennial Kingdom of Christ in which He will mercifully quicken them and bless them to be a blessing to the whole world for thousand years (Rom 11:20-23, 25-26). God is not partial to any one people group (Rom 2:11). From the time of Adam to Abraham God looked on the whole world to find any one who will seek Him with faith (Psa 53:2), many who sought God by faith were blessed, preserved and used as His servants during that time (Rom 5:13-14; Heb 11:4-7). God has been merciful to His Jewish friends who were the descendant of Abraham His friend for nearly two thousand years from 2000 B.C. to the time of the death of Christ (Isaiah 51:2; 41:8; James 2:23). Now he has looked to the whole world for another two thousand years to take a chosen royal priests for Himself out of it from the death of Christ to the Rapture of the Church who is the Bride of Christ (John 3:16; Eph 5:23-24, 26-27; 1 Thess 4:14-18; 1 Peter 2:9-10). After this God will again quicken the people of Israel with His Spirit and will make them a blessing to the whole world for a thousand years through Jesus Christ (Gal 3:8; Rom 11:26-29; Isa 2:3; Psa 9:8).

The King Gives a Wedding Suit

We know that the people who seek God with faith are given a salvation garment which He requires from all the person who will finally attend the Wedding Feast of the Lamb (Matt 22:11; Isa 61:10). That means when the wedding hall is full and God comes to see them all, is it in heaven that he sees these people who have peeped through and have come in to the wedding hall in heaven without Him noticing it? By no means. God is omnipresent and knows even the thoughts of all humans (Psa 139:7-10; 94:11).

Then the question that arises out of it is, 'Can a person who is given the garment of salvation by the kingdom of heaven, can he lose it?' The answer is no, because according to the word of God the salvation we receive is a eternal one (Heb 5:9). But in the context of Jesus speaking to the unbelieving Jewish chief priests and elders of the people, the robe of salvation that is given to them is the gospel of forgiveness that has come to them through Jesus. But we see that they questioned his authority to provide salvation (Matt 21:23-27; 9:1-8; Mark 2:6-7; Luke 5:21), and therefore they were the guests of the wedding hall which was the nation Israel in the eyes of God. But because of rejecting the message of salvation, God finds these religious people as odd men in the midst of many believing people who accepted Jesus as their Messiah and Lord thus receiving forgiveness even at that time.

Unworthy Rejecters Were Rejected

First the learned religious Jews who did not want to partake of the Wedding Feast of the Lamb were rejected by God as unworthy of attending his royal feast when all of them gave reason for not attending the feast (Matt 22:5-8). When Jesus proceeded with the parable and said, "11 “But when the king came in to see the guests, he saw a man there who did not have on a wedding garment. 12 So he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you come in here without a wedding garment?’ And he was speechless." (Matt 22:11-12). God will not demand a wedding garment from a poor man who have been invited from highway rag clothed community of people to whom He has not supplied it previously (Matt 22:9-10). Therefore because He has already supplied the opportunity to get saved to all people in Israel through Jesus, he was again demanding the garment of salvation when he came to see the friends in the wedding hall of the nation of Israel who were ready and waiting for the wedding and got an opportunity to attend through the resurrection of God's friends which happened when Jesus was resurrected (Matt 22:10, 11; 27:52-53). God has clearly spoken through Jesus that Jesus in the only way to attend the Wedding Feast as the friends of God (John 14:6). Many Jews who religiously heard the good teaching of Jesus and received with Joy, but did not surrender their lives to be born again in their spirit-man were found without the salvation garments in that generation along with all the religious gospel rejecting Jews who questioned Jesus authority (Matt 13:18-21; 7:24-29).

Those who are born again are those people whom God undertakes them for eternity ahead to keep their garments of salvation always white through the blood of Jesus and sealing them with a guarantee of the oil of the Holy Spirit which their head will never lack (Eph 1:13-14; 2:10; Heb 9:14; Eccl 9:7-8; John 10:28; 1 Thess 5:23-24). God always sees the glorious end of all believers lives even from the beginning of their salvation, and so when God clothes all believers in His appointed time and gives reward, they all shall be clothed in white garments during the Rapture of the Church and the succeeding judgment for reward (Isa 46:10; Rev 19:7-8; Acts 15:18; Heb 9:28; 2 Cor 5:10). From the beginning to the end of the earthly lives of all believers who are already accepted in the beloved, are therefore seen as complete as Jesus is by the Father in heaven (Eph 1:6; Col 2:10). The beauty of the Bride who is the Church is greatly desired by the Bridegroom Jesus the King who is in love with her and has given himself unconditionally to make her glorious, holy and without blemish (Psa 45:11; Eph 5:25-27).

Finally Found the Culprit

Therefore the man found without the wedding garment was neither the Church believer nor the Jewish believer who lost their salvation, but he is the one who has rejected the authority of Jesus to receive salvation through Him (Matt 22:11). When God the king asked that man, "Friend, how did you come in here without a wedding garment?’, he was speechless" because he knew already that God demands salvation through the Messiah Jesus to enter in to heaven as His Jewish friend company (Matt 22:12). But he must have remembered the word of Jesus who had clearly spoken that those who enter by Him will be saved and find pasture (John 10:9). Alas, it is too late when one has ruthlessly lived in unbelief by rejecting the gospel message of salvation throughout their earthly lives.

God demands a verdict from people who have not accepted His verdict which made Him to sacrifice His own Son for the sins of all humanity (Isa 53:4-6, 10-11). So the culprit are those who have rejected the gospel and have been found by God as men without the wedding garment who were also trying to claim the covenantal benefits just because they were born and present physically within the religious nation of Israel which claimed Jehovah God as its leader and King. But according to God only those who are of faith are the real friend company that He accepted through the line of Abraham (Gal 3:7). He did not just accept all the physical descendants of Abraham as his friends who did not have an iota of real faith (John 8:39). But God called all those people as friends who believed in Jesus (Gal 3:29; John 15:14-15).

So the final result for those who rejected the faith of Jesus was no other place other than the outer darkness of prison of Hades where all the dead spirits will be in torment and be kept in that prison for the White Throne Judgment at the end of the Millennial rule of Jesus on this earth (Luke 16:23-31; Rev 20:11-15). Here is what happened, "13 Then the king said to the servants, ‘Bind him hand and foot, take him away, and cast him into outer darkness; there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ 14 “For many are called, but few are chosen.”" (Matt 22:13-14). Here in the outer darkness there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth which is nothing other than the torment of Hades prison which is present in the lower parts of the earth (Eph 4:9; Matt 8:12; 22:13; 25:30). The outer darkness is referred implicitly one time when the unfaithful servant is appointed his portion with the hypocrites (Matthew 24:51). Two times when the wicked will be gathered from God's kingdom and cast into a "furnace of fire" (Matthew 13:42, 50). Evidently, outer darkness can also be called a furnace of fire. The outer darkness is again referred implicitly outside of the book of Matthew in Luke 13:28. This passage in Luke 13:28-29 is a parallel passage to the outer darkness reference in Matthew 8:11-12. As a whole the "outer" in "outer darkness" probably refers to being outside of the earth, the kingdom of God and the Presence of God (2 Thess 1:9). Even the angels who sinned before the flood of Noah's time by possessing people and filling their mind with evil thoughts of violence and sex were arrested and kept by God in the same place of darkness till the time of judgment take place before the White Throne Judgment (2 Peter 2:4, 17; Jude 1:6, 13). It is called as outer because this place is outside of the earth (Eph 4:9). It is called as darkness because the revelation of God's presence and His life will not be available over there (2 Thess 1:9; John 1:4-5). It is also called as "furnace of fire" because of the spiritually tormenting atmosphere that will make them weep and gnash their teeth (Matt 8:12; Luke 16:23-24).

The bottom line is that people with out faith will only wait for the eternal hell fire and the White Throne judgment in Hades and there is no respite for them. Here is the contrast of a overcoming faith believer's wonderful future with the gloomy future of unbelievers as revealed by God, "7 He who overcomes shall inherit all things, and I will be his God and he shall be My son. 8 But the cowardly, unbelieving, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.”" (Rev 21:7-8). Believers in Jesus as God's sons will inherit all the riches of God forever and ever and live to enjoy life with Him in the future, while the unbeliever's will be tormented without God's presence because of rejecting Jesus as their Lord and Savior. All humans are called to partake in the wonderful future life with God, but only those who choose to accept His invitation becomes chosen (Matt 22:14). Maranatha! Come Lord Jesus!



Footnotes:

1. http://www.scripturessay.com/article.php?cat=&id=383

2. http://focusonjerusalem.com/thefallofjerusalem.html

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Is the Father, Son and the Holy Spirit are all the same?

Are The Three Persons In Trinity The Same?

Q: The Father, Son and the Holy Spirit are all the same, has this been mentioned anywhere in Bible. Please answer this Question ????

A : No they are not the same person, but the same in the essence of their Character. Jesus said, "I and the Father are one" to tell that they are same in purpose, work and character (John 10:30; 14:9-10). "The Father, Son and the Holy Spirit are all the same" phraseology is not found in the Scripture but 1 John 5:7 comes very close and says, "For there are three that bear witness in heaven: the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one." In what way these three persons are one is that it is not in person but in witness of their Character display in heaven.

The Word described by John the Apostle is nobody other than the Lord Jesus who became a man in the flesh to reveal the Character of God in the flesh (1 John 1:1-2; 4:2). Even though he became a perfect human being on earth, he was still part of the Godhood or else He would not have been able to say, "before Abraham was, I AM" (John 8:58, c). The pact that Jesus made with the Father before coming to the earth to save humans was that He agreed to be a bond slave of God and obey His word hundred percentage at all times as a perfect human without using His Divine attributes independently (Phil 2:6-7; Heb 10:5-7). The devil in the wilderness tried this one thing, it wanted Jesus to act independently apart from will of the Father God, but Jesus won over all the temptation of Satan by the power of the Holy Spirit (Matt 4:1-11). If Jesus had given in to the temptation of Satan even for a moment, all humanity would have been lost for ever in its sinfulness.

Jesus is not the same person as the Father and also vice-versa it applies. We see from the Bible that Jesus had a separate will as a person apart from the Father. Luke 22:42 says, "Father, if it is Your will, take this cup away from Me; nevertheless not My will, but Yours, be done." But Jesus submitted His will voluntarily to God the Father according to the pact previously made before the foundation of the world in order to save our sinful humanity from getting separated from God forever because of our rebellious nature to God and His ways which only deserves death. Death is separation from God and his goodness (Heb 4:3; 1 Peter 1:18-20; Rom 6:23). We know that at that time when Jesus walked on earth, God the Father was present in heaven which was clearly revealed when the voice of the Father God came out of heaven to testify Jesus was His beloved Son who has lived life fully pleasing to Him from the day he was born as a baby (Matt 3:17).

The Holy Spirit who is considered as the third person of the Trinity is a unique individual personality who has a will of His own which is clearly expressed in Acts 15:28 which says, "For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit, and to us, to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things." The apostles walked hand in hand with the Holy Spirit that they understood him as a individual person, with a will to express if we are willing to walk in it. So the Holy Spirit is not the same person as Jesus and the Father. He is omnipresent both in heaven and on earth at the same time by choice and executive assignment (1 John 5:7-8). We can say that they are one God because when the Holy Spirit says a thing and expresses it, it will be in agreement with both the Father and the Son. The same applies to the others persons of the Trinity. As God they all have one will of God between them which will always be in agreement and that which can never be broken (John 5:30; 16:13-14; 15:15; Psa 2:12; Eccl 4:12). No person in the Trinity will ever do a things independently of each other, this is the reason there is perfect love in between them always (John 17:23). In fact, "God is Love" because they are three in person (1 John 4:8). If God is just one person, he cannot be love because love can only be expressed between at least a minimum of two persons only.

So the bottom line is, the Bible implicitly says that the Father, Son and the Holy Spirit are all the same God but have individual personality which looks the same in Character.

Much Blessings......

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Can a Indian Christian Claim To Be a Dalit and Still Stay True To The Bible?

Can a Indian Christian Claim To Be a Dalit and Still Stay True To The Bible?

Q: Can a Indian Christian claim to be a Dalit and still stay true to the Bible?

A : The word "Dalit" comes from the Sanskrit, and means "ground", "suppressed", "crushed", or "broken to pieces". In other words all those people who have been poor economically were called as low caste [i.e. dalits] by Brahmin's who consider and call themselves as high caste. Wikipedia informs, "It was first used by Jyotirao Phule in the nineteenth century, in the context of the oppression faced by the erstwhile "untouchable" castes of the twice-born Hindus. According to Victor Premasagar, the term expresses their "weakness, poverty and humiliation at the hands of the upper castes in the Indian society." In the context of traditional Hindu society, Dalit status has often been historically associated with occupations regarded as ritually impure, such as any involving leatherwork, butchering, or removal of rubbish, animal carcasses, and waste. Dalits work as manual labourers cleaning streets, latrines, and sewers." So economically poor people are segregated by the Brahmin's who try to control the religious life of the country in an undemocratic and casteists way of calling these people as 'Dalits' or low caste.

All men are born free and therefore each one has the right to work hard and be rich, or stay lazy to be poor. But no one has the rights to call anybody as low caste just because they are economically poor. This is discriminisation against humanity. God created all men as equals with the same opputunity to excel and it is the responibility of the goverment of this country to keep this divine oppurtunity available to every citizen of this demoncratic country and not be misled by a wrong policy of a casteist discriminatory agenda to influnce it.

First of all the Indian government should become enlightened enough in the 21st century to give people equal opportunity based on merit and help the one category of people who are really poor. The poor people should be called economically poor and not be described using a sanskrit word. The schemes to help people based on caste is a mindless, anti-social, undemocratic, illogical and illiterate thinking on the part of our government. If India really wants to prosper as a whole, new democratic and casteless society should be encouraged. The imbalance in the empowerment to create oppurtunity to become wealthy to all our Indian citizen without partiality has not been available because of lack of right policies in the Indian goverment which still hides itself behind a casteist agenda which is tainted by injustice. Looking forward to a great change in our 21st Century!!!

The problem with those people who call themselves Dalit Christian is that they need to change their mindset and realize that they are a new creation in Christ Jesus. A person cannot be a Dalit and still call themselves a Christian, even the government recognizes it. There is only one true caste Christian, they are Christians who follow Jesus with their whole heart. In Him there can be no Jew or Gentile or Dalit category, but one Body of the Great God. When the mind becomes renewed with the identity of Christ, then God will start to bless them. Dalit is the identity of Pagans and so all Christians must discard such identity as beggars which comes from the pagan casteist society and look to themselves as Priests and Kings of the most high God (Rev 5:9-10). It is only a discrimination to those people who think like the world and it will be a discrimination also to a person who is not truly born again. Christians should not allow themselves to be influenced by the world system of thinking, but be renewed by the kingdom way of thinking.

Christians should move by merit and look to the Lord to prosper them rather than look to our local government to make them prosperous (Psa 75:6-7). Remember the heavenly Government rules over all earthly ones. I think God has allowed such thing in our country to purify Christians and remove the Chaff from it. When all benefits are given, it is easy to follow Christ. But when we realize that a price has to be paid, only the true followers of Christ will pay the price, carry their own cross and follow Him (Luke 9:23). GLORY!!! Praise the Lord! The word “Dalit Christian’ is not Biblical and never can be.

Much Blessings......

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What Sin Did the Poor Old Man Commit to be Poor?

What Sin Did the Poor Old Man Commit to be Poor?

Q: One of my Hindu friend to whom I started telling about Jesus asked me a question and I am not sure on what exactly I should answer for that. He is a lawyer. Please see the question here...

"Yesterday after finishig my work,I was on my to house with my (client) for whom I got bail in 302 IPC a murder case and I very well know that he had commited that offence on the way. I saw through the car window an old man driving his bullockcart with few cement bags in an hot sun, I was thinking why this partiality between (god) his own creatures. Here, who is the sinner, my client who caused a murder sitting in an a/c car (or) the deceased person (died) or me knowingly got bail for an accused (client) and what is the sin commited by the old man sitting in the bullockort in hot sun?"

Can you please help me to answer as I feel he is more like an atheist now.

A : These are the favourite atheistic thinking that comes through the direct influence from the spiritual realm that wants to pull God in to a conversation and make Him seem bad. The devil doesn't want the God who is good all the time to be seen by humans that way, but whether some one thinks He is good or not doesn't change the goodness of God. The Bible says that God is good all the time and His tender mercies are over all His works (Psa 145:9) As a sign of showing his goodness to all humans alike, "... He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust." (Matt 5:45). Sun keeps our health and environment intact and so it is a physical blessing that God gives to all humans. Rain gives all human especially farmers an oppurtunity to make financial gains and therefore keep the economy of a country rolling with out trouble and so it is a financial blessing that God gives to all humans alike to shows that He is still good. Inspite of God sending all these blessings, curse of God can occur automatically upon a land when they do not seek God, because when earth was designed it was not made to exist for its own survival but that every human in it would be able to find the true God who created it (Acts 17:26-28; Zech 14:17; 1 Kings 16:30-33; 17:1; 18:18-19). The very survival and sustence of man by the good God is for him to find the purpose of His existence before His appointed time on earth will end, which is seventy years and by extreme strength eighty years (Psa 90:10).

God wanted man to live forever but man chose to sin and invite death upon himself. Adam our forefather chose to hear the voice of rebellion and therefore lost his relationship with God forever on behalf of all humans (Rom 5:12). Sin is a rebellious state in which all humans are born since that time and therefore have lost the perfection of God and greatness for which we were originally created by God (Rom 3:23; 1 John 3:4). All humans born to Adam and Eve have been born sinners (Psa 51:5), therefore God in His love wanted to bring them all back from that lost relationship to again experience His goodness which has been a alien thing in the mind of man inspite of enjoying the blessings of God daily (Psa 10:4). God doesn't make one person poor and another one rich, but it is the influence of the world goverment and the sinful mind of man that has caused inequality among men (Psa 10:3). Infact our God is the only one who says that He is a God of both rich and poor people (Pro 22:2). And also the Bible clearly reveals that a person who helps the poor is helping the Lord directly and also He will reward those do such kind act on behalf of him (Prov 19:17). God also delivers the poor people who cry out to him when they are afflicted and have no one to help them, God intervenes in to the affairs of men supernaturally to help the poor people many a times (Psa 72:12; Prov 22:22-23).

But Satan has done a wonderful work of making people believe the opposite of who God is in His character because no one wants to seek God through His written word which is a personal letter from him to all humans alike (Psa 119:9-10). According to the word of God, the rich client, the lawyer who justified the sinner by perverting justice, the man who died by murder and the poor old man who was pulling the cart for his survival are all sinners unless someone among them had received or will receive Jesus Christ as their Lord and Saviour which will make God to substitute the righteousness of Christ for them and make them perfectly righteous before Him (2 Cor 5:21). All humans are sinners not just because we have sinned, we sin because we are sinners born that way (Eccl 7:20). But God justifies the ungodly sinners who believe in the Lord Jesus and starts to see them 'just as if they have never sinned at all' in their life after they believed Jesus (Rom 4:5-8; 5:1).

It is not wrong to be born poor but it is wrong to stay poor because God gives a lifetime of oppurtunity to work hard diligently and become rich. These are some of the reasons for a man to stay poor all His life 1) If a man works hard without diligence He will stay poor (Prov 12:24; 22:29), 2) A lazy man will always stay poor (Prov 10:4; 12:27), 3) He who oppresses the poor to increase his wealth and he who gives gifts to the rich--both come to poverty (Proverbs 22:16). 4) A person may wear out his good health in order to get rich and stay poor because of bad health (Prov 23:4-5). 5) When a person loves money and does not love the work that he does with passion, he will never have enough and will stay in poverty of mind (Eccl 5:10). 5) Strong and violent men retain riches, others will stay poor because of lack of interest to succeed (Prov 11:16).

And finally riches gained through righteous means will increase little by little and stay forever but those riches gained through fradulent means will suddenly diminish and disappear (Prov 13:11). So riches usually has nothing to do with God's design but rather it is a product of a man's diligent work. Nobody should blame God for a person being poor because God Himself desires all men to be prosperous and succeed in their lives through righteous means and methods (Prov 10:22; Psa 35:27).

By the way the good news is, (1) All sinners will one day be judged for what for they have done in their lives and they have to give account to God the righteous Judge, who has appointed Jesus who is the Perfect Man as the only Mediator between God and Man forever (Acts 17:31; Rev 20:11-14; 1 Tim 2:5). After judgment they will be thrown in to Hell Fire forever which is a just punishment for all sinners (Rev 20:13-15). (2) The current corrupt world goverment under the direct influence of Satan will be wound up and Christ will come and take over the whole world to rule it in righteousness for a thousand years (1 John 5:19; Psa 9:8; 98:9; Rev 19:13-16). (3) Satan will be bound up for the whole thousand years of Christ's rule and then will be let loose for a while at the end of thousand years and then will be thrown in to eternal Hell Fire forever (Rev 20:3, 7-10). Praise the Lord! (4) Those who will now believe in Jesus will be forever justified as righteous and they will live with God and reign forever and ever (Psa 37:29, 37; Rev 5:9-10; 21:24, 26).

God is allowing all the evil in the world to continue until now because he loves all sinners and wants all sinners to repent, believe in Jesus and be saved from sin (John 3:16; 1 Tim 2:4). When God's appointed time of mercy gets over, he will take vengeance on the whole world who do not know God and those who do not obey the gospel (2 Thess 1:6-8). These shall be discarded from the Presence of God forever (2 Thess 1:9).

We cannot talk people in to salvation. We can only share the love of God towards them in action and then in sharing our Testimony, then expect the Lord to work in their lives. If they resist our loving message of salvation, all we can do for them is to pray to God to touch and draw them towards Himself so that they might be saved (John 3:17; 12:32; 1 Tim 2:1, 3-4). The Holy Spirit will surely convict them at some time and will make sure that we are rewarded for our faithful prayer for these people's salvation (John 16:8-11).

May the Lord show mercy upon this person and let him be saved. May you be empowered to speak for God and be bold to say things with love.

Much Blessings......

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