Christianity a Failure?
Our skeptic from Florida presented one more challenge: "And neither could Christianity" — I am quoting from his letter — "have been such a colossal and tragic failure if it had been founded by God. . .
This fellow probably assumes — as do most of you! — that Jesus founded today's organized Christianity with its Babylon of sects and denominations!
Jesus Christ did not found many denominations! Christ said, "I will build my Church." He did build it! ONE Church, commissioned to preach and to publish His Gospel — the very Message He brought from God — to all the world!
But what do we find today? Hundreds of different and disagreeing sects, all founded by MEN, each professing to teach the truth, yet contradicting and disagreeing with all the others — a modern religious Babylon!
What is a "sect"? According to Webster, it is "a group that has broken away from the established Church." Who established the Church? — Christ! Today's host of sects or denominations have BROKEN AWAY from that established parent Church — they teach different doctrines and observe different practices!
The religious sects of Jesus' day were the Pharisees, the Sadducees, the Essenes, the Samaritans." They had broken away from the true parent Old Testament Church established by God through Moses. Jesus joined none of them. On the contrary, He called His disciples out of them! The Greek word "ecclesia," translated "church" in English, has the meaning of "called-out ones."
The Church in History
Surprise number one, for our skeptic and for most people today, is this:
While most people today suppose that the true CHURCH was rapidly to grow BIG, to become a powerful organization, exerting powerful influence on the world, making this a better world, becoming the stabilizing influence of the world's civilization, actually Christ founded His Church for no such purpose!
Christ's instruction to His Church through the New Testament, was NOT to participate in this world's politics and affairs in an effort to make this world a better world. Instead, His command to His Church is, "Come out from among them, and be ye separate" (II Corinthians 6:17).
In His final prayer for His ONE Church, Jesus prayed: "I pray for them: I pray not for the world . . . Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be ONE, as we are. I have given them thy word, and the world hateth them, because they are not OF the world, even as I am not OF the world. I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil. They are not OF the world, even as I am not of the world" (John 17:9-16).
Jesus did command His BODY — the collective Body through which the Spirit of God does the WORK of God — to go into all the world and preach and publish His Gospel. But those of His Church are described as being strangers and foreigners in this world — as AMBASSADORS for Christ — representing His Kingdom which is foreign to the world — yet never being OF the world!
To Be Scattered
Now let's notice what was prophesied to happen to the Church.
This true Church of God was to be PERSECUTED — SCATTERED! "If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you," said Jesus to His disciples (John 15:20). "ALL that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution" (II Tim. 3:12).
On the night Jesus was seized to be crucified, He said: "It is written, 'I will smite the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered' " (Mark 14:27). After HE, the Shepherd, was crucified, the "sheep" — HIs CHURCH — were to become scattered! Previously, that same evening, Jesus had said to His disciples: "Ye shall be scattered" (John 16:32).
This persecution and scattering began early. Notice Acts 8:1: "And at that time there was a great persecution against the Church which was at Jerusalem; and they were all scattered abroad throughout the regions of Judaea and Samaria, except the apostles."
Read what Daniel says about the true Church: "And they that understand among the people shall instruct many: yet they shall fall by the sword, and by flame, by captivity, and by spoil, many days. Now when they shall fall, they shall be holpen with a little help: but many shall cleave to them with flatteries. And some of them of understanding shall fall, to try them, and to purge them, and to make them white, even to the time of the end" (Dan. 11:33-35).
The prophet Ezekiel foretold this scattering — chapter 34. Daniel again foretold it: "When he shall have accomplished to scatter the power of the holy people (Church), all these things shall be finished." That is, the end of the age! (Dan. 12:7).
Nowhere is there any prophecy that the one true Church should become great and powerful, exerting influence in this world. Rather, Jesus called it the "Little Flock" (Luke 12:32), despised, persecuted, scattered BY the world — separate FROM the world! Scattered, but NEVER DIVIDED! Always ONE Church, speaking the SAME thing — never many differing sects!
You have not read much of the history of THAT Church! Even the historians never knew where to look for the TRUE Church — for they did not even know WHAT the true Church is!
WORLD'S Churches Deceived
On the other hand, all the prophecies foretold that in the WORLD apostasy, deception, counterfeit "Christianity," and division would occur.
Jesus foretold the very first event to come on the world — GREAT DECEPTION — climaxing, in our day now just ahead, in GREAT TRIBULATION!
"Take heed," He said, "that no man deceive you. For MANY shall come in my name, saying I am Christ, and shall deceive MANY!" (Mat. 24:4, 5)
Notice carefully! It was not the few who were to be DECEIVED — but the MANY. It was the FEW who were to become true Christians!
Yes, the MANY would come in Jesus' name, proclaiming that Jesus is the Christ — yes, preaching Christ to the world — and yet DECEIVING the world.
Jesus had pictured this same condition, when He said: "Wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and MANY there be which go in thereat: because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto LIFE, and FEW there be that find it" (Mat. 7:13-14).
That is not what the world believes, is it? Probably that is not what you have always heard, and come to assume. But it is what CHRIST SAID! How deceived this world has become!
And no wonder! For Satan himself is pictured in the Bible as the "god of this world" (II Corinthians 4:4). He appears — not as a devil, but as a GOD — as an angel of LIGHT. And in Rev. 12:9, you read of "Satan, which deceiveth the WHOLE WORLD."
Clever Counterfeit
ASTOUNDING? Of course it is!
Hard to believe? Yes, but it's TRUE! How have the MANY been deceived? Simply by a preaching about the PERSON of Christ — extolling His virtues, worshipping Him, yet denying His MESSAGE — His GOSPEL — by substituting pagan beliefs while preaching ABOUT Christ!
What a clever counterfeit! And many — perhaps most—of those so preaching in Christ's name are sincere — themselves deceived! It is SATAN who has deceived even them! It is SATAN who has made himself the "GOD OF THIS WORLD" — and thus is worshipped AS God. This world doesn't know the true God, strange as that may seem! This world believes that if one "accepts Christ" — "makes his decision for Christ" — "WORSHIPS Christ" — he is saved!
That is what many preach today! But what did JESUS preach? Did He say it was possible to WORSHIP Him, and still be unsaved?
Listen! "In VAIN do they worship ME," said Christ. "teaching for doctrines the commandments of men . . . making the word of God of none effect through your tradition" (Mark 7:7, 13).
That is difficult to believe, isn't it? You have been so drugged, so poisoned, so deceived by this world's deceptions — Satan's COUNTERFEITS — that even the words of Jesus are difficult to believe!
May GOD HELP YOU TO BELIEVE CHRIST!
It is one thing to believe ON Christ — that is, in His Person — and something altogether different to BELIEVE CHRIST — to believe what He SAYS.
Shocking though it is, the overwhelming majority have been deceived by ministers who come in the name of Jesus Christ, proclaiming that Jesus is the Christ, but who teach a different Gospel and a different faith! They are those who, themselves being deceived from childhood, brought up in these deceptive beliefs, enter the ministry to earn a living, who choose it as their vocation or job, who decide to appoint themselves as Christ's representatives, yet who were not called by Christ to be His ministers!
They have hired themselves out to the people, and therefore must preach what the PEOPLE want to hear! They do not correct or reprove their congregations for rejecting the doctrines JESUS taught and for transgressing God's law, which the Bible defines as SIN!
Very few really know what the true Church is.
You will find the answer in our free booklet "A True History of the True Church." And to make it doubly plain, you should read a companion article: "Is this the Only Day of Salvation?" They will make the truth plain, understandable. Our skeptic from Florida will find in them the surprise of his life!