“Rest in the Lord and wait patiently for Him;
Do not fret because of him who prospers in his way,
Because of the man who carries out wicked schemes.
Cease from anger and forsake wrath;
Do not fret; it leads only to evildoing.
For evildoers will be cut off,
But those who wait for the Lord, they will inherit the land.
Yet a little while and the wicked man will be no more;
And you will look carefully for his place and he will not be there.” (Psalm 37:7-10 NASB1995)
In the day and time in which we live, and I live in the USA, wicked people who are plotting and carrying out wicked schemes seem to be massive in numbers. And they are in our governments, in our news media, in our educational systems, in the institutional market-driven “churches,” in the world of medicine, in pastorates, in businesses, in social media, in the music industry (including in some “Christian” music), in the entertainment industry, in advertising and marketing, and in lots of other places, too.
Sadly these wicked people and their wicked schemes have worked their way into many of the presentations of the gospel of Christ and of our salvation. And what they have done is to divide the gospel message, to cut it in half, basically, and to discard the half they don’t like while they retain the half that they do like. But a deliberate half-truth is a lie. Scriptures being removed from their biblical context are being made to say what they do not say if taught in the correct biblical context. And this is mostly deliberate.
And those who have created and carried out these divisions of truth are predatory people who inject venom (poison, lies, deceptions) into their prey for the full purpose to turn them away from the truth to follow after the lies. So, they pull Scriptures out of their correct biblical context, and they twist them to say what they do not teach, if taught in context, and sometimes they will use a succession of Scriptures, out of context, to teach a false gospel. And many naïve people are believing and are spreading the lies.
What many of these liars are teaching is that all we have to do is to make a verbal confession of faith in Jesus Christ, of him as Lord, and of faith in his bodily resurrection, and now we are saved from all sins, and heaven is now guaranteed us as our final resting place. But they do this through teaching the Scriptures out of context and by ignoring the half that they don’t want to accept. And many people are buying into the lies (half-truths) because then they can continue in their sinful practices without feeling guilty.
But Jesus Christ taught that to come to him we must deny self, take up our cross daily (die daily to sin), and follow (obey) him. For if we hold on to living in sin and for self, we will lose our lives for eternity. But if we deny self, die daily to sin, by the Spirit, and we walk in obedience to our Lord and to his commands, in his power, then we have eternal life with God. For not everyone who calls him “Lord” will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one DOING (obeying) the will of God (see Luke 9:23-26; Matthew 7:21-23).
For by God-gifted faith in Jesus Christ, which is not of our own doing, we are crucified with Christ in death to sin and raised with Christ to walk in newness of life in him, no longer to live as slaves to sin but as slaves to righteousness in walks of obedience to God’s commands. We are no longer to permit sin to reign in our mortal bodies to make us obey its desires. For if sin is what we obey, it results in death. But if obedience to God is what we obey, it results in sanctification, and its end is eternal life with God (see Romans 6:1-23).
And we learn in 1 John 1-3 that if we claim that we have fellowship with God, but yet we walk in darkness (sin), we are liars. If we claim that we know God, but we do not obey his commandments, in practice, we are liars. For it is not the one who claims he is “in Christ” who is “in Christ,” but it is the one who has denied self, died with Christ to sin, and who is now walking in obedience to our Lord and to his commands, in practice, and no longer in sin. We have the hope and the promise of eternal life with God in heaven.
[Matthew 7:13-14,21-23; Luke 9:23-26; John 10:27-30; Acts 26:18; Romans 1:18-32; Romans 2:5-10; Romans 3:23; Romans 6:1-23; Romans 8:1-14; 1 Corinthians 10:1-22; Galatians 5:16-24; Ephesians 2:8-10; Ephesians 4:17-32; Ephesians 5:3-6; Titus 2:11-14; Hebrews 3:1-19; Hebrews 4:1-13; Hebrews 10:19-39; Hebrews 12:1-2; 1 Peter 2:24; 1 John 1:1-10; 1 John 2:3-6; 1 John 3:4-10; Revelation 2:1-29; Revelation 3:1-22]
But these biblical truths are largely being ignored in favor of the half-truth “gospels” which are spreading so rapidly in our time. And even some people who claim to have rejected the lies and to have embraced the truth of the gospel are not now showing evidence of having had heart transformations and of having died with Christ to sin, and of now walking in obedience to his commands. They may put on a show of righteousness, but they are still living wicked and evil lives in addiction to sin; not in obedience to God.
But, although we should be speaking the truth of the gospel of Christ to the people, and we should be refuting the lies of the enemy, we should not fear what these evil people are doing or what they might do to us. We should be watchful and prayerful so that we do not get caught in their webs of deceit. But we have no power within ourselves to stop the evil from taking place. And so we wait on God, for him to act, and we trust the Lord with our lives, and we put our circumstances in his hands, and we trust in his sovereignty.
As the Deer
By Martin J. Nystrom
Based off Psalm 42:1
As the deer panteth for the water
So my soul longeth after You
You alone are my heart's desire
And I long to worship You
You alone are my strength, my shield
To You alone may my spirit yield
You alone are my heart's desire
And I long to worship You
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Rest in The Lord
An Original Work / October 19, 2025
Christ’s Free Servant, Sue J Love
