To Whom Much is Given, Much is Required

Elders' Conference—2014

Fred R. Coulter—May 24, 2014

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Let's just do a quick survey of the Epistle of 1-John. There's an awful lot in 1-John. If you don't have the whole series on The Epistles of John, we'll send it to you. These general epistles are very important, because these are written by the original apostles of Jesus Christ; that's two apostles, Peter and John, and two brothers, James and Jude. You can't have anyone closer to Jesus than those four.

So, he's affirming what it was that they experienced. The Church didn't begin until 300A.D. What did they do? They discounted all the work of the apostles, and discounted all the fact that there were Churches of God and began with the first pope! You know who the first pope was? Emperor Constantine, who took the office of Pontific Maximus.

This was building. There were those trying to come into the Church. I'll bring that out when I bring out what does the Bible have to say about the Trinity. I'll just give you a little sidebar preview:

• Who is the 'god of this world'?
• Who is the 'prince of the power of the air'?
• Who brings another Jesus?
• Who is another father?

Satan!

What do you have? Satan: his spirit and his false Jesus! Take note of this with the Protestants. You need to write for that CD that I gave out to everyone here: To Be Free! The victory boasting of the Grace Communion International[transcriber's correction], the successor to WCG (Worldwide Church of God). That will give you a little understanding of the setting for us today, which compares to this.

One key: all you need is Jesus. That's not true! If all you need is Jesus, you have another Jesus, because the true Jesus came to reveal the Father. Our relationship is with the Father! We will see that John brings out here: You must have both the Father and the Son! They give a little lip service to the Father, but they speak an awful lot about the Spirit and Jesus. But Paul said, 'Why is it that you listen to those who come and bring another Jesus and you receive another spirit, which you didn't receive?' Now then, we are ready for 1-John.

He wants to establish his credibility, 1-John 1:1: "That which was from the beginning, that which we have heard, that which we have seen with our own eyes, that which we observed for ourselves and our own hands handled, concerning the Word of life." Can you get any more authentic witness than that? No!

Verse 2: "(And the life was manifested, and we have seen, and are bearing witness, and are reporting to you the eternal life, which was with the Father, and was manifested to us); that which we have seen and have heard we are reporting to you in order that you also may have fellowship with us; for the fellowship—indeed, our fellowship… [that's our relationship with God] …—is with the Father…"(vs 2-3). Notice that the Father is first.

• What did Jesus say on that Passover night concerning the Father? 'If you pray anything in My name, asking the Father, He will give it to you; for the Father Himself loves you.'
• What did He say of the apostles? 'Those whom You have given Me.'
• What do we see in John 6? The Father draws us!
• What happens with these counterfeit Christianities?
• They bring the Father way down!
• They magnify a false Jesus!

Our true fellowship begins with the Father! That's what sets aside the Churches of God from the Christianity of this world. You observe that. "…is with the Father and with His own Son, Jesus Christ" (v 3).

This tells us how we have our sins forgiven. Here is how you keep your bearings when there is a lot of turmoil. Let's take what we saw that happened there with the pope and Kenneth Copeland and add some miracles. Think about this: The whole society has been taught to react and think with feelings rather than facts, rather than truth. 'Oh, we won't discuss doctrine, but let us have love.'

Here John is giving the guidelines, which is prophetic for us today; 1-John 2:3: "And by this standard we know that we know Him: if we keep His commandments." Remember what Tony Palmer said: He read the concordant agreement between the Lutherans ad the Catholics that salvation comes by grace alone unto good works. What do you suppose is in the mind of the Catholics in the phrase: unto good works? The seven sacraments of the church!

But all you Protestants out there that don't follow it because diversity is divine, and we have unity in diversity. Another word for it would be: diversity is diabolical. What is the Spanish name for the devil? Diablo! Doesn't Satan want to get all people together under him?

What does it say in Rev. 13 about the world worshiping Satan? You know the truth is, the world does in one form or another, but they've never had an opportunity to be swept together in emotion to agree like we saw on this video.

I can tell you this. Those two videos, the one about the pope and Kenneth Copeland—Pope Francis' Video Fulfills Prophecy by Doug Batchelor—and To Be Free, have made an impression upon me. I hope it does on you; brethren, we've got a lot of work to do.

• we need to think clearly
• we need to think with the Word of God
• we need to know the Word of God

Remember, we are to love God with all our heart—yes, there's emotion—but with all our minds.

Notice the ifs in v 4. Please understand this. All of the ifs pertaining to God and His people are to His people, so 'if we keep His commandments.'

• that's the standard
• that's the measuring stick
• that's what you look at

All the feel-good stuff, all the huggy-huggy, kissy-kissy, nicey-nicey… We saw it there, all the arm raising, all the hand clapping, all the wooing. I wonder how many demons were in there whipping it up. Does Satan want you to be happy in his fold? Yes, couldn't have anything better!

This is the separation, v 4: "The one who says, 'I know Him,' and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the Truth is not in him." That's how you measure it.

So, if you think in terms of feelings and how tender and nice, and how a mother and other people would take this from the pope, 'it's so good, what a lovely man.' Do they keep any of the commandments of God? There is the measuring.

Verse 4: "The one who says, 'I know Him,' and does not keep His commandments… [Is well intentioned and I understand him. No!] …is a liar, and the Truth is not in him." Jesus said, 'I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life, and no one comes to the Father except through Me.' Did He not say the gate was narrow and the way was straight? That means difficult! 'And few there would be to find it.'

Even if you are all alone and God the Father and Jesus Christ, with Their Spirit, are in you, you're not alone! You have more than great groups who think they have God, but have a counterfeit.

Here's the challenge for us, v 5: "On the other hand, if anyone is keeping His Word, truly in this one the love of God is being perfected…." That's what God wants to happen in our lives: being perfected!

"…By this means we know that we are in Him" (v 5). The way we're perfected is:

• through prayer
• through study
• through repentance
• through obedience
• through loving each other
• through learning from all of our experiences and trials and difficulties that we go through

—and remembering that 'everything works together for good to those who love God and are called according to His purpose.'

Verse 6: "Anyone who claims to dwell in Him is obligating himself also to walk even as He Himself walked."

The world is enticing. Never, never, never before in the history of the world have there been so many temptations readily at your fingertips. That's why we have the series, Obsessed with Sex (churchathome.org)

How many have followed the report that Sean Hannity did concerning the spring break down in Florida? I looked at part of it, but most of it was soft-porn or nearly hard-porn. But what do those young people know? What have they been taught? They've been socialized; they've been emotionalized; they have been taught to go have fun; to have sports. A lot of them are becoming atheists. They take drugs. They have sex. All these wild girls down there and they even have a program called, Bad Girls, to brag how bad they are. And isn't it a wonderful thing that we have our wonderful President to give us free contraception and abortion! Look at the society; look at the adults.

Colorado is going to 'pot.' It's not just the young ones. They interviewed a 64-year-old woman who was always after her daughter for smoking pot. She didn't want to smoke pot, but she had a marijuana cookie and she said it made you feel so relaxed. I'm going to do some Church at Home on 'pot.' Think of this world.

Notice what John tells us in v 15: "Do not love the world, nor the things that are in the world…." We have more things than any other generation. The ones in America that are at the lowest level of poverty would be considered middle class in other countries of the world. Some they would be upper class.

"…If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him" (v 15). You have to push God away: 'What? Keep the Sabbath? Saturday? You mean I can't go out Friday night? I've gotta be with my friends. Do you realize what they would do me if I texted them and said, 'I can't go out Friday night, because I keep the Sabbath of God.' They would leave me alone. You'd really be better off, because you have to ask: Are they really your friends?

Love of the Father is not in them. Notice that it didn't say the love of Jesus. The connection is with the Father first! That's what Jesus said.

Verse 16: "Because everything that is in the world…" Magnify that with what we have today compared with what John had when he wrote this and this is prophetic. I imagine if Chris could use his imagination and take this verse and give us a lot of flashes of here, there, everywhere, and take us in a trip around the world and show different people, different places, how many have their minds on God? God knows! God will deal with them. But they are very few.

Verse 16: "Because everything that is in the world—the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pretentious pride of physical life..." I say to you, that describes every commercial on television. Have you ever seen the commercial for medications where they come on and say, 'I'm so sick; I took this, but you really need to take this.' They are happy. Everything is great and marvelous. I guess these drug companies make so much money that they have all of these enhancing sex ads all the time.

"…is not from the Father… [focus on the Father] …but is from the world. And the world and its lust is passing away, but the one who does the will of God abides forever" (vs 16-17). This is what we need to convey to the young people:

• you need to think about your life
• you need to think about what you have learned with God
• you need to understand that your emotions are going to pull you in one way, but that's not necessarily the way of God

You are going to have friends whom you will find are not friends. You've got to resist taking drugs, having pre-marital sex, having abortions. In this world, for the young people, that's almost asking too much; but that's what God requires!

Notice this prophetic statement here, v 17: "And the world and its lust is passing away, but the one who does the will of God abides forever."

Think of this. Here's a young impressionable 17-year-old and he or she has a friend and says, 'I've got a little cocaine here.' Oh, no, I don't want that. 'I try it, do I look like an addict? I use it. Here, if you take this, you will have an organism from head to toe, ten times the magnitude of normal.' Really? So, they take it. Bang! They don't think they are hooked, but it is so good, and 'I'm not hooked; I think I'll try it again.'

Then one day they are going to come down as an addict with needle marks in their arms and their legs and they are going to be walking around like a walking skeleton, eyes sunk into their head, depressed, addicted.

Like I saw on one report. This one prostitute, about 42-years-old, was interviewed: 'What do you think about getting off this and getting your life squared around?' She said, I can't! I won't do it! 'Well, how long do you supposed you may live?' I don't know, but I'm on my way to go buy some more!' That's the ultimate in the way of the world.

Verse 18: "Little children, it is the last time… [it was for the apostolic age coming to a close] …and just as you have heard that the antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have risen up, by which we know that it is the last time."

An antichrist is someone who does not keep the commandments of God. When they get into an official religion, they end up with the head of the church who says he's the vicar of Christ, which means the replacement. Many antichrists, yes indeed! Atheists, agnostics, Catholics, Orthodox, Protestant, Buddhists, Hindu, Shinto, animas religions—they are all antichrist. We have literally millions and millions—billions—of those.

Verse 19: "They went out from among us…" They came from the true Church of God. They accuse us of 'leaving' the church. No, we stayed with God and they left God.

"…by which we know it's the last time…. [that's a prophecy for us today] …but they were not of us because if they were of us, they would have remained with us; nevertheless, they left that they might be exposed to show that they all were not of us" (vs 18-19). Here we find, at that time, Christ taking the tares out of the Church.

• Do you suppose that may happen in every generation?
• How does Christ keep the Church clean?

Verse 20: "But you have the anointing from the Holy One, and you have knowledge of all things pertaining to salvation. I did not write to you because you do not know the truth, but because you know it, and you understand that not one lie comes from the Truth" (vs 20-21).

They can take the Truth and wrongly apply it and create a lie, because they use some of the Truth, but not all of the Truth.

Verse 22: "Who is the liar if it is not the one who denies that Jesus is the Christ?.…"

• If you have another Jesus, are you denying the true One?
• If you have another Father, are you denying the true One?
• If you believe in Satan's trinity of this world, you don't believe in God, are you an antichrist?

"…He is the antichrist—the one who denies the Father and the Son. Anyone who denies the Son does not have the Father either" (vs 22-23). The Jews claim that, but they don't have the Father.

Verse 24: "Therefore, let what you have heard from the beginning dwell in you; if what you have heard from the beginning is dwelling in you, then you will be dwelling in the Son and in the Father." Remember the sermon I gave, Where Does God Dwell? The Father and the Son will abide in us.

Verse 25: "And this is the promise that He had promised us: eternal life. These things I have written to you concerning those who are leading you astray" (vs 25-26). That's why it's so important to always know the Word of God.

1-John 4:1: "Beloved, do not believe every spirit…" As all the elders discussed, there are more and more demonic attacks that are coming to people, even in the Church. The reason is that more and more people in general are sinning, so there are more and more demons that God allows to come out of the abyss and be here.

Zechariah 13:1—this is where I was able to understand this: "'In that day there shall be a fountain opened to the house of David, and to the people of Jerusalem, to cleanse them from sin and for uncleanness. And it shall be in that day,' says the LORD of hosts, 'I will cut off the names of the idols out of the land…'" (vs 1-2). Aren't there a lot of them there? Just think what's going to happen to St. Peter's Basilica.

"…and they shall be remembered no more. And also I will cause the lying prophets and the unclean spirits to pass out of the land" (v 2). What does this tell us? When there's a lot of sin, there are a lot of unclean spirits.

1-John 4:1: "Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits, whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world." They were in the Church.

I'm going to read an interview from J. Michael Feazell, who was one of those in the Grace Communion International. Once they believe in the trinity, that is not fait accompli. That's the first step to other things! I will read to you that they will end up believing pantheism—God is in everything. God is in every person. All we have to do is go out and see Christ working, even in those who are down and out taking drugs. False prophets! Boy! We have that today.

Verse 2: "By this test you can know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God." What does that mean? That He just had a human body? Think on this for a minute! What is the Catholic doctrine concerning Mary? She was immaculately conceived and did not have the stain of sin on her soul, which is the Catholic version of the Bible, the law of sin and death.

It says distinctly in Rom. 8 that in Jesus sin was condemned. If Mary was immaculately conceived, that means that Jesus did not receive the law of sin and death from her as a human being. So, Jesus did not come in the flesh, according to that principle. If you talk about coming in the flesh, and you are talking about being human and having the law of sin and death within you. So, they deny the true Jesus!

Verse 3: "And every spirit that does not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is not from God. And this is the spirit of antichrist, which you heard was to come, and even now it is already in the world." What you might do on a Bible study is go back and look at all of their Scriptures:

• beware, don't let anyone deceive you by any means
• be on guard,. many will come in My name saying I am the Christ
• in the end there will be many false prophets and many false christs and they will do signs and wonders, so that even the elect may be deceived, if it's possible

Hang on! We're going to be like in a rocket going to the moon. You better strap yourself down to the Word of God and God, because it's going to come. How are you going to deny that what we saw in this video was not a good thing? I think Albert Jones made a very good perceptive analysis of the whole operation: The pope let the Protestants think that they have won. I thought that was a profound insight into the operation of what was there.

Verse 4: "You are of God, little children, and have overcome them because greater is He Who is in you than the one who is in the world. They are of the world; because of this, they speak of the world, and the world listens to them. We are of God; the one who knows God listens to us; the one who is not of God does not listen to us. By this means we know the Spirit of the Truth and the spirit of the deception" (vs 4-6). We are to have that discernment and understanding because of the Spirit of God.

These things are coming upon us, brethren. I think we are going to see things sweep even more. More churches are going to become in that. I wonder what Grace Communion International will do. I wonder what's going to happen to all of the lukewarm Christians who have had their attention diverted from God the Father and Jesus Christ to when they gather on the Sabbath, it is a social interaction with each other and they are loving the brethren more than they are loving God.

They hear sermons that are smooth. I wonder what's going to happen? Remember Matt 25, the parable of the ten virgins. Those parables have meaning. The way we keep the oil in our vessel, which is symbolic of God's Spirit, so that our candle will keep burning, because it wasn't a candle, it was a little clay shell with a wick on the end. You had to keep pouring oil into it. It wouldn't burn very long unless you kept putting oil in it. The way you grow in God's Spirit and grow in grace and knowledge is through prayer and study.

Always remember this: Don't say, 'Oh, that's all I ever hear.' What are we being prepared for? We're being prepared to inherit the Divine nature, the nature of God, the sons and daughters of God, born of the resurrection! That's something!

Remember this, if they don't want to talk about doctrine, what does that mean? They don't want to define any sin. Another little clue: you hear the word celebrate. When that word starts coming out, that's a sign the deception is coming. We keep the Sabbath. That means there's a law that says, Remember the Sabbath Day to keep it Holy. 'We celebrate the Sabbath—no law. We do it because we are good. You are now a candidate to celebrate the first day, because after all, all those old things you learned in the Old Testament are obsolete.'

1-John 5:17: "All unrighteousness is sin, and there is a sin not unto death. We know that anyone who is begotten by God does not practice sin… [living in sin] …for the one who has been begotten by God keeps himself by the power of God, and the wicked one does not touch him. We know that we are of God, and that the whole world lies in the power of the wicked one" (vs 17-19). What does Rev. 12:9 say? Deceives the whole world. Yes, indeed!

Verse 20: "And we know that the Son of God has come, and has given us an understanding, so that we may know Him Who is true; and we are in Him Who is true… [the Father] …and in His Son, Jesus Christ. He is the true God, and the eternal life…. [then a final warning]: …Little children, keep yourself from idols" (vs 20-21). Quite prophetic! I'll let you read 2nd & 3rd John; it continues that way.

At first they left, later they kicked the ones who knew the truth out of the Church and even refused to accept the Apostle John. 'Oh, he's so old and decrepit; we're new; we're a younger generation. You know that Christ is not going to return when he dies.' You had a lot of brethren then believed it. So what happened? They were left open for the deception to come and envelop them! After John died, it swept like fury. We've seen it in our age. We haven't seen the final result of it, yet, but these things tell us what we need to do, what we need to watch for, how we need to do it.

If there's anything that has just impressed upon me, as I brought out to everyone in the meetings, that 'to whom much is given, much is required.' So we need to produce as much as we can. There will be those who produce 30-fold, 60-fold, 100-fold. We don't know how much we will produce, but we need to really press forward in our lives and in what we do to preach the Gospel, all combined together!

God has called each one of us. All of us have a part. We are all needed. God loves us. God has called you. He's given you His Spirit, the greatest gift you can receive in this physical life! Then the promise of eternal life forever. So we really need to be on guard!

Scriptural References:

• 1-John 1:1-3
• 1-John 2:3-6, 15-26
• 1-John 4:1
• Zechariah 13:1-2
• 1-John 4:1-6
• 1-John 5:17-21

Scriptures referenced, not quoted:

• John 6
• Revelation 13
• Matthew 25
• Romans 8
• Revelation 12:9

Also referenced:
Sermon Series:

• Epistles of John
• Obsessed With Sex (churchathome.org)

Sermon:

• Where Does God Dwell?
• Brief Summary of Pope's Speech by Roy Assanti

DVDs:

• To Be Free (produced by Grace Communion International)
• Pope Francis' Video Fulfills Prophecy by Doug Batchelor

FRC:lp
Transcribed: 6-15-14
Formatted: bo—6-19-14

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