THE MAKING OF THE REMNANT
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Our last study
contains a review and an invitation.
A review of the gospel is necessary
because the gospel propels us to a
decision. In due time, we either
accept or reject the gospel because
of the basic internal needs to
resolve conflicts. Some people try to
avoid difficult decisions by putting
them far into the background of
consciousness. They say,
“I’ll think about this
tomorrow.” Postponement, though,
is really a decision, too. It is a
mild rejection. Suppose you asked
someone to marry you. Any answer
other than “yes” is
actually rejection, isn’t it?
The danger with postponement is that
it easily leads to greater rejection
until we are firmly decided. In the
case of the gospel, we must listen to
the Holy Spirit. The more we reject
His promptings, the more difficult to
respond.
This lesson also
contains an invitation to read these
studies again. If the Holy Spirit has
impressed you that this message is
important, you need to read it again
for two reasons. First, your
understanding of the gospel will
increase 100% the second time you
study it. Details will become much
clearer and more meaningful.
Secondly, knowing what revelation is
about, you need to find an interested
friend and share the message with
him. “The Spirit and the bride
say, ‘Come! And let him who
hears say, ‘Come!’ Whoever
is thirsty, let him come; and whoever
wishes, let him take the free gift of
the water of life.” (Revelation
22:17)
The proclamation of
the gospel
The full gospel must
reach every person before Jesus
comes. John said, “Then I saw
another angel flying in midair, and
he had the eternal gospel to proclaim
to those who live on earth – to
every nation, tribe, language and
people.” (Revelation 14:6) Jesus
said, “And this gospel of the
kingdom will be preached in the whole
world as a testimony to all nations,
and then the end will come.”
(Matthew 24:14) The question is,
“Who will help spread the
gospel?” We know that the
144,000 will lead the way during the
shaking and the trumpets, but they
cannot do the work alone. They need
the help and support of the remnant!
What is the gospel?
Would a counterfeiter
print a $9 bill? No. People would
immediately recognize the folly. A $9
bill could not be counterfeit since
real $9 bills do not exist. Thus, a
counterfeit has to be an imitation of
something that exists.
The devil has
counterfeited the gospel and his
imitations are in every land. In
America, the devil’s counterfeit
of the gospel is almost
indistinguishable from the real
thing.
Many people honestly
believe Satan’s counterfeit
gospel. Jesus understands. He looks
down upon the earth with love at
those living up to all they believe
to be true. In His great mercy, He
accepts those who do not know the
truths about the gospel. Jesus does
not hold a person responsible for
truth he does not know. On the
contrary, James tells us that sin is
held against us when we know better
and then refuse to do it!
“Anyone, then, who knows the
good he ought to do and doesn’t
do it, sins.” (James 4:17)
The Lord loves the
people of earth with a love beyond
human understanding. Those living up
to all they know to be right glorify
God, and He is pleased. Peter says,
“For the eyes of the Lord are on
the righteous and his ears are
attentive to their prayer, but the
face of the Lord is against those who
do evil.” (1 Peter 3:12) Because
truth has been obscured from most
people by Satan’s devices, Jesus
is going to enlighten the entire
world with the gospel in the near
future. Those who are sincere in
heart will receive the full gospel
and the remnant will be made up.
Those who recognize the confirmation
of the Holy Spirit will move forward
and receive the gospel truth as it
reaches every nation, kindred, tongue
and people! Thus, the remnant will be
gathered into one body. Jesus said,
“I have other sheep that are not
of this sheep pen. I must bring them
also. They too will listen to my
voice, and there shall be one flock
and one shepherd.” (John 10:16)
The net effect of the
gospel will be to unify those who
hear the voice of Jesus into one
large group called the remnant. This
will be finally accomplished during
the trumpets. People will receive the
gospel by faith, obey the
commandments of Jesus as the first
angel’s message commands or they
will reject the gospel or receive the
mark of the beast. There will be no
middle ground. The rapid sequence of
events coupled with rigorous laws
requiring Sunday observance in
America will push everyone to a rapid
decision.
What are the gospel
and its counterfeit?
In a sentence, the
gospel is the complete story of
salvation. The gospel explains the
role of our Creator, the nature of
man, the sinless life of Jesus on
behalf of man, the work of Jesus in
the heavenly sanctuary as our
mediator and the second coming. If
you look closely at the previous
sentence, you will observe God’s
great love expressed through five
fundamental teachings of the gospel.
They are easy to remember when you
begin them with the letter
“S”:
- Salvation by
faith
- Sanctuary in
heaven
- State of the
dead
- Second Coming
of Jesus
- Sabbath
worship
The devil has
distorted and ruined each of these
elements as far as possible. We will
briefly survey each of the
counterfeit elements of the gospel
within the Christian world:
Counterfeit 1
One of Satan’s
most powerful counterfeits is that
salvation either comes by obedience
to God or by intellectual assent to
what is true. Satan’s trickery
on this subject is very subtle. He
can actually deceive an evil person
into thinking he is righteous! For
example, Satan led the Pharisees to
think they were righteous even though
they were far away from the kingdom.
Jesus said, “…on the
outside you appear to the people as
righteous but on the inside you are
full of hypocrisy and
wickedness.” (Matthew 23:28)
Asking a person what
he believes is not enough. The
Pharisees thought they were
righteous. Therefore, to see what a
person actually believes, we have to
do some fruit inspection. Jesus said,
“… every good tree bears
good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad
fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear
good fruit.” (Matthew 7:17) The
problem is that what people say and
what people do may not be consistent.
Notice the two extremes. The first
example describes a religious type we
will call “workers.”
A worker can say,
“I’m saved by faith,”
while at the same time, be working
his way to heaven. People having this
problem are usually identified by
zealous and/or rigorous obedience to
the teachings or ideals of their
denomination. Workers tend to see sin
as acts of commission, i.e., sins or
wrongful deeds acted out. Living by
the rules is very important to these
people. In their hearts, they have
confidence that they are saved
because they are obedient to the
rules. They look at themselves and
see very little wrong. Workers, in
day to day living, regard obedience
as the primary process through which
salvation occurs even though they
say, “Salvation comes by
faith!”
The Jewish religion at
the time of Christ typifies this
great deception. The sin that blinds
these people is pride. They cannot
see why they do not have salvation!
After all, they do not see anything
wrong with themselves! These people
tend to criticize those breaking the
rules but rarely speak about the
greater sins of omission. Here is a
paradox. Workers tend to see the
violation of rules as great sins
while disregarding the spiritual or
physical needs of those around them.
Jesus said to the Pharisees,
“…Woe to you Pharisees,
because you give God a tenth of your
mint, rue and other kinds of garden
herbs, but you neglect justice and
the love of God. You should have
practiced the latter without leaving
the former undone. …And you
experts in the law, woe to you,
because you load people down with
burdens they can hardly carry, and
you yourselves will not lift a finger
to help them.” (Luke 11:42,46)
The coming exam will
overtake these people. Workers will
not be able to obey God; for civil
laws will become so strict that
obedience will be impossible!
(Remember how Hitler strengthened the
Germans if they should help an enemy
of the Reich?) To avoid suffering and
death, the workers will have no
option but to worship the beast! When
the great religious organizations of
the world merge as a result of the
destruction of the trumpets, whose
rules will the workers, follow?
The tragic point with
this deception of Satan is that he
makes obedience of greater importance
than the purpose of obedience! Jesus
said of the Jews, “They worship
me in vain; their teachings are but
rules taught by men. You have to let
go of the commands of God and are
holding on to the traditions of
men.” (Mark 7:7,8)
On the other end of
the scale, Satan has another
counterfeit about salvation that is
equally dangerous and perhaps more
widely received in America than the
worker concept. In brief, this
counterfeit holds that if you believe
you’re saved-you’re saved!
In general terms, this doctrine
teaches that obedience to the Ten
Commandments is unnecessary, even
more, an insult to God’s
salvation. The Christian is under
grace, not under the law, and his
primary duty is to love his neighbor
as himself. By simply assenting to
the fact that Jesus died on Calvary,
one may have salvation, full and
free!
We call these people
“thinkers.” Thinkers tend
to enjoy their religion more than
workers do because their religion is
people-orientated. Whereas, workers
are quite critical in nature,
thinkers are generous and causal
about behavior. The thinker’s
gospel has very few limitations.
Righteousness that comes with
intellectual assent is simply a gift
from God, so take it, and join the
church. The heart of the
thinker’s gospel is the golden
rule, “Do unto your neighbor as
you would have him do to you.”
The thinker’s
gospel sounds good. This is why it is
so popular in America. The
thinker’s gospel has transcended
mainline denominations and has become
the dominant theme of the 20th
century Protestantism. This point is
proven by asking, “What
theological differences exist in day
to day living between Methodists,
Lutherans, Baptists, Presbyterians
and all others in America?”
Certain
characteristics of thinkers and
workers have to be presented in the
extreme to demonstrate the kind of
people such theological processes
produce. What we do reflects what we
believe! Old Testament history
clearly tells us that Israel
vacillated between two poles. The
reason Israel was so unsteady is that
they forgot that salvation comes
through a love – faith
relationship with God. Loving Jesus
for all that He has done comes first.
Having faith in Jesus means doing,
going and being all that He directs.
The faith relationship requires
prayer and study each day to know His
will, and Satan offers a million
diversions to prevent us from
spending time in either.
Satan has cleverly
counterfeited the gospel of workers
and thinkers by using partial truth
in each case! Do not be fooled.
Either doctrine is deadly. The simple
truth about salvation is this:
Salvation by faith means a complete
surrender of the will to Jesus. It
means to be, to do, and to go as
Jesus directs your life. True
salvation produces a life of action.
Obedience comes as a result of
salvation-not salvation as a result
of obedience! Look closely at Hebrews
11 and you will observe that each of
the great men and women in this Hall
of Faith was obedient to God’s
commands! Paul says of Abraham,
“By faith Abraham, when God
tested him, offered Isaac as a
sacrifice. He who had received the
promises was about to sacrifice his
one and only son, even though God
said to him, ‘It is through
Isaac that your offspring will be
reckoned.’ Abraham reasoned that
God could raise the dead, and
figuratively speaking, he did receive
Isaac back from death.” (Hebrews
11:17-19)
The old gospel
favorite by James Sammis and Daniel
Towner, “Trust and Obey,”
sums up the gospel very well:
“When
we walk with the Lord
In
the light of His Word,
What a
glory He sheds on our
way!
While we
do His good will,
He abides
with us still,
And with
all who will trust and
obey.
Trust and
obey,
For
there’s no other way
To be
happy in Jesus,
But to
trust and obey.”
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