Yesterday we heard a news report about parents who were shocked to learn that their children were medically classified as obese and that, as a result, they were at risk for many serious health issues. The parents had previously been oblivious to their children’s true condition because they were comparing the size of their children to the majority of other children around them, rather than comparing their size to the standard for healthy weight identified by the AMA. They discovered that true “normal” was not what seemed normal to them.
When we heard this report, I knew the Lord was confirming through this natural analogy that we were to share the spiritual issue I’d been praying about. He’s been showing us that many remain in dangerous deception regarding their true spiritual condition due to the age-old issue of people measuring themselves by (and comparing themselves to) others, instead of by (and to) the standard of His Word. Therefore, like the parents gauging their children’s condition by the condition of other children around them, many are unaware that their distorted standard is putting them at risk for serious consequences.
We must remember that the Lord warned of the great number who would fall away in the last days due to lawlessness, and of the many who will stand before Him in the end, believing they’re saved, but who will tragically be turned away because they lived lifestyles of lawlessness (sin) rather than truly following Jesus as Lord (II Thess 2, Mt 7:13-27, Mt 24). If a GREAT NUMBER around us are deceived by these errors, living in compromise with the world (yet wearing the name of Christ), for those who measure and compare their condition by the standard of others rather than the standard of God, lukewarm or lawless Christianity will appear as “the norm,” while those truly seeking to live by God’s standard will appear to be “fanatics,” or “extremists.” One of the defining, and most concerning, characteristics of the lukewarm church that Jesus rebuked in Revelation was that they too were oblivious to their true condition. They were under the impression that their spiritual condition was good and, like the parents in the story, were probably shocked to learn that by the real standard (Jesus’ standard), they were “at risk.”
The Lord is calling all to measure and compare our spiritual condition by the standard of His Word rather than by the standard we may see in the majority around us. Though we cry out for all to be saved, we should never forget that Jesus told us the majority would choose the broad path to destruction, and only a few would choose the narrow path that leads to eternal life. So we dare not conform to the standard of the world (the broad path) thinking it will have the same end as conforming to the standard of the Word (the narrow path). We pray all will come in to God’s hospital for a spiritual health assessment with the standard of His Word to ensure that the standard we’ve been using to determine what’s normal is not causing us to be deceived about our true condition and at serious spiritual risk.
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When “normal” is really not normal ~
But understand this, that in the last days will come (set in) perilous times of great stress and trouble [hard to deal with and hard to bear]. For people will be lovers of self and [utterly] self-centered, lovers of money and aroused by an inordinate [greedy] desire for wealth, proud and arrogant and contemptuous boasters. They will be abusive (blasphemous, scoffing), disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy and profane. [They will be] without natural [human] affection (callous and inhuman), relentless {unforgiving} (admitting of no truce or appeasement); [they will be] slanderers (false accusers, troublemakers), intemperate and loose in morals and conduct, uncontrolled and fierce, haters of good. [They will be] treacherous [betrayers], rash, [and] inflated with self-conceit. [They will be] lovers of sensual pleasures and vain amusements more than and rather than lovers of God. For [although] they hold a form of piety {godliness} (true religion), they deny and reject and are strangers to the power of it [their conduct belies the genuineness of their profession]. Avoid [all] such people [turn away from them]. II Timothy 3:1-5
Blessings and Prayers!
© Laura Jewell Tyree