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Others May: You Cannot

Discussion in 'Other Christian Denominations' started by Claudia_T, Jan 7, 2007.

  1. Claudia_T

    Claudia_T New Member

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    I kept going around and around trying to do something that was wrong and God just wouldnt allow me to do it, and I finally remembered reading this a long time ago... I hope that it might help someone else here to understand God's dealings with us... it also reminds me of what we are studying at Church and how God kept making His people go around and around in the wilderness in the Old Testament until they learned some things.



    OTHERS MAY: YOU CANNOT
    -by G. D. Watson (1845-1924).
    --------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    If God has called you to be really like Jesus He will draw you into a life
    of crucifixion and humility, and put upon you such demands of obedience,
    that you will not be able to follow other people, or measure yourself by
    other Christians, and in many ways He will seem to let other people do
    things which He will not let you do.

    Other Christians and ministers who seem very religious and useful, may
    push themselves, pull wires, and work schemes to carry out their plans,
    but you cannot do it, and if you attempt it, you will meet with such
    failure and rebuke from the Lord as to make you sorely penitent.
    Others may boast of themselves, of their work, of their successes, of
    their writings, but the Holy Spirit will not allow you to do any such
    thing, and if you begin it, He will lead you into some deep mortification
    that will make you despise yourself and all your good works.

    Others may be allowed to succeed in making money, or may have a legacy
    left to them, but it is likely God will keep you poor, because He wants
    you to have something far better than gold, namely, a helpless dependence
    upon Him, that He may have the privilege of supplying your needs day by
    day out of an unseen treasury.

    The Lord may let others be honored and put forward, and keep you hidden
    in obscurity, because He wants to produce some choice fragrant fruit for
    His coming glory, which can only be produced in the shade. He may let
    others be great, but keep you small. He may let others do a work for Him
    and get the credit for it, but He will make you work and toil on without
    knowing how much you are doing; and then to make your work still more
    precious He may let others get credit for the work which you have done,
    and thus make YOUR REWARD TEN TIMES GREATER WHEN JESUS COMES.

    The Holy Spirit will put a strict watch over you, with a jealous love, and
    will rebuke you for little words and feelings or for wasting your time,
    which other Christians never feel distressed over. So make up your mind
    that God is an Infinitely Sovereign Being, and has a right to do as He
    pleases with His own. He may not explain to you a thousand things which
    puzzle your reason in His dealings with you, but if you absolutely sell
    yourself to be His love slave, He will wrap you up in Jealous Love, and
    bestow upon you many blessings which come only to those who are in the
    inner circle.

    Settle it forever, then that you are to DEAL DIRECTLY WITH THE HOLY
    SPIRIT, and that He is to have the privilege of tying your tongue, or
    chaining your hand, or closing your eyes, in ways that He does not seem
    to use with others. Now, when you are so possessed with the living God
    that you are, in your secret heart, pleased and delighted over this
    PECULIAR, PERSONAL, PRIVATE, JEALOUS GUARDIANSHIP AND MANAGEMENT
    OF THE HOLY SPIRIT OVER YOUR LIFE, then you will have found the vestibule
    of Heaven.
     
    #1 Claudia_T, Jan 7, 2007
    Last edited by a moderator: Jan 7, 2007
  2. Eric B

    Eric B Active Member
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    I tried to actually consolidate my response to this with my response in the suicide thread, because these issues are truly related, but that point only got lost in that discussion.

    I too read that tract years ago, and where it at one point gave me some sort of comfort when I was going through some heavy opposition from unsaved family when I first became Christian, and then people quoted the scriptures on how "all who live godly shall suffer", but then I noticed all the Christian leaders who live as richly as any king. (And that tract touches directly on that point, which is why it stuck out to me). But when I read it again years later, I saw that it was assuming that every bad thing that happens to us, or does not go the way we want is God "doing" it for some unknown reason. But all that is not what those passages say. For one thing, it was being used to justify an assumption that God chooses only some now for persecution or "humility", in contrast to a passage that appeared to say that ALL would receive persecution. Something is not being understood properly, obviously.
    Yet, this is the basis of people's harsh judgments on sufferers of just any mundane problems when they do not have a good enough attitude or complain too much (even if they don't threaten suicide). Based on this notion, they accuse them of rejecting Christ, or saying He is not "in control", and thus not "having faith" or "trusting God" that this pain or other disappointment is "what's best" for Him. (So naturally, we can conclude from that, he may not even be saved, with a reaction like suicide the "proof" or "fruit" of that! Thus the entire basis of that whole argument). And when he goes to many "Christians" for counsel, he often gets all of these platitudes and judgments, with prooftexts coldly thrown at him, and even his salvation questioned, if he is too "bitter".

    On the other hand, during the time I was being comforted by it, it actually helped tempt me to pride and judging, because if all of those other Christians were doing so well, God "must not have been dealing with them", (one person even quoted Ps.81:11,12 to me once), and maybe they were not even true Christians (but meanwhile, that did not really help me deal with my problems or give me any "joy"!)

    But all of this is stepping way beyond scriptural boundaries. This then has God as the cause of all sin and problems in the world (like someone injuring you, birth defects etc), and even among so-called "Arminians", it becomes almost like an extension of Calvinism beyond the issue of salvation, to daily life. Like in that issue, we appeal to "sovereignty" and speculate on why God is doing something "unpleasant to our fallen minds", and tell people "it is above our comprehension", when we have already gone beyond scripture into the unknown. That is not how we are told to comfort one another!

    (As I say on my page dealing with our cold, trite formulaic responses to suffering: http://members.aol.com/etb700/abundant.html: But here, "faith", which was the vehicle through which we trust God for salvation, is taken and applied to something it never was directly intended for. —"Trusting God" now becomes a philosophy of positive attitudes in life with some unknown "good" being what we trust Him for)

    So yes, this tract may be a nice sentiment and something people can keep in mind, but it can also be used wrongly to pacify people, and when things have to be read into scripture and assumed like that, it deserves caution!
     
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