On Bible Unity We Stand in Church of God Nigeria

We stand upon the sea of glass,
That's mingled with Jehovah's fire;
Our rope's are white, our feet as brass,
We stand upon the foe's empire.

We bow no more to gods of men,
We shout the victory o'er the beast;
Yea, o'er his mark, and o'er his name
We overcome thro' Jesus Christ.

Upon this bright and glowing plane
Of heaven's truth and burning love;
Our souls in glory ever reign,
With all the ransomed host above.

In sweet and pure unbroken peace,
Upon this sea we glide along;
Our hearts so filled with holy bliss,
Flow out in everlasting song.

Chorus:
We stand redeemed upon the sea,
And sound aloud the harp of God;
All glory praise dear lamb, to Thee,
For Thou hast saved us by Thy blood.

When we do not have a clear understanding of unity and its elements, we would be at a loss to come to terms with division and its constituents. The unity of the church of God is that which is founded on the Word and the Spirit of God. Anything short of this is ecumenism. Since the unity is pivoted on truth, any deviation from truth which is the pivot will create a division. On Bible unity we stand! Whoever preaches unity should preach truth. The truth unites all its lovers and divides them from liars and the deceitful. It is a sword of division. For there must be such division among you, that they which are approved may be made manifest among you. Anyone who is not on the Lord's side is against true unity. We stand in the truth of God's Word. We reach out our hands in fellowship to all the blood-washed ones. The brain-washed ones need our compassion, too. They are deceived and deceiving others. May the Lord deliver them from the captivity of satan. Amen.

Sadly, some men do also stand opposed to the truth as Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses. God's Word is Truth, to oppose it is but strife. Many religious organizations of men are founded in opposition to the Word and Spirit of Truth. When the light of God shines upon a dear soul and shows him the errors of men's ways to oppose them, the heretics are quick to label such a one as a cause of strife and division. Saints are told to study to shew themselves approved unto God, workmen that need not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth, not striving about words to no profit, which do subvert or corrupt the hearers. We are to shun profane and vain babblings: for they will increase unto more ungodliness.Men, such as Hymenaeus and Philetus, who indulge in vain and profane speeches in opposition to the truth, are full of words that do eat as does a canker. They have erred concerning the truth and overthrow the faith of some with their false doctrines. People, such as these, are the real enemies of unity! So, let every Christian examine their doctrine to be sure that the word of truth is being rightly divided, without strife. Strife is in the opposing of truth. Strife is when we drift away or err from the truth. Strife is taking up arms against Christ. Strife is division. Strife is heresy. Nevertheless the foundation of God's church stands sure, having this seal, The Lord knows them that are his, and are truly members of the one and only church of God. And, Let every one that names the name of Christ depart from iniquity. It is not enough to be a professor of name of Christ and His church. We need to stand with the truth and not against it. Who is on the Lord's side?

UNITY in the church of God, Nigeria is a must. Keep the banner flying. ENDEAVOR to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. It is worth every sacrifice. CHRIST gave the BEST sacrifice for this purpose. No sacrifice is too much. Mark them who cause division among us and avoid them. Those who resist the Truth and divide God's dear children will not be innocent. The bones of Christ Jesus was not broken at the cross. Anyone who attempts to, or supports those who, work at breaking the bones of our blessed union in the Lord will not be guiltless. WHO IS ON THE LORD'S SIDE?

Let read the words of our brother, Warner, who has gone to the yonder shore: 'The salvation of the Lord, which qualifies us for heaven, makes us one on earth. A religion of divisions will deceive the soul. The chief object of God’s ministers is to “perfect the saints.” The blood of Christ not only purifies from “all sin” and “all unrighteousness,” but also sweeps away all erroneous doctrines. The Comforter guides into all truth, which involves the removal of all error. It is true that cleansing from error is not as instantaneous as from sin. But the pure in heart have perfect fellowship, even though all previously educated errors have not yet disappeared. There is therefore no real cause of division but sin. Therefore to cry against sects and divisions without first being wholly sanctified, and then leading people into this precious paradise of holy love, is nothing but confusion mocking confusion, or satan buffeting satan, as the devil flogged the sons of Sceva. All efforts of union but that of God’s holiness is like pounding cold, crooked pieces of iron against each other to make them fit together. The more blows, the more crooks and differences. Put them into a furnace of white heat, and they will lose their cold, stiff, crooked individuality, and flow into one mass. That is God’s way of uniting His people, in the fire of the Holy Spirit. All tinkering up platforms of union is wasted time. Each effort has only molded another sect calf for the people to worship and wrangle over. Freedom from sin knits together in love. But all merely strapped-up unions are bundles bound together to be burned. Bible salvation is all that is needed. This obtained, both union of heart and soul, and harmony in outward worship and life, will follow as a result or fruit of the Spirit. When “baptized by one Spirit into the one body,” and made to drink in the one divine Spirit in His fulness, there will be no trouble to “worship God in Spirit and in truth.” For all such “know the truth, and the truth makes them free.” 

'On the plane of Bible holiness, no outward observances are made a test, in fact nothing is made a test of fellowship. For holy men “judge not from appearance, but judge righteous judgment.” “If we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin” I John 1:7. Fellowship is of the Spirit (Phil. 2:1), and exists where heart-purity exists. It is the conscious blending of hearts filled with the same Holy Spirit. 

'One may have been led into all truth, the other not. This does not interrupt fellowship. Nevertheless it is the duty of such as “know the truth,” in meekness to instruct others who do not. Ignorance of some truth does not destroy fellowship, but resisting the truth does, because it forfeits salvation. We must not sanction people’s errors, but if saved, show our love and fellowship to them, so long as they do not get the evidence that their wrong doctrines have become wilful, or they have in some way lost salvation. The fellowship ends, but love and kindness still continue in faithful efforts for their salvation. To ignore fellowship simply because of some doctrinal error is bigotry. To agree to disagree, or to put on an equality truth and error, is babel confusion. To know the truth is our privilege; to teach the truth our duty; but to have fellowship with the pure and upright of heart is an involuntary and spontaneous fact. Sects are the result of carnality. Nothing but perfect holiness destroys carnality, and thus removes both sectism and its cause. The fire of God’s love saves the soul, harmonizes all hearts that receive it, leads them into perfect and uniform obedience to all truth, and drives afar all who refuse to pass through its purging fire, and gain the plane of holy fellowship.'

God is Doing A New Thing

Praise God for salvation.

I feel liberated from falsehood and vexation of spirit. I look forward with joy to the work the Lord is doing to bring truth to bear in the city of my residence. Saints have been praying for this. A meeting will held in Port Harcourt, Nigeria, for this purpose. God will bring smiles to the hearts of all who love truth and hate oppression and deceit.

We pray for the disappointment of devil who has worked so much to enthrone arbitrariness in the place of  wholesome words, even the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to the doctrine which is according to godliness, so that all the children of God might be set free from the fear and bondage of mortal men. One point is clear, I did not report them to the brethren, but they have reported me to the elders outside our city. The elders have called for us, but the ones who made the report are unwilling to answer the call. They have suddenly realized that they have reported themselves. We serve a God who taketh the wise in their own craftiness. Where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the disputer of this world? hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? We shall be there by the grace of God on the 5th of December. Our God will go before us and bring victory to His holy name. Let all flesh be silent before Him who presides in the holy assembly.  All things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do. Every hidden thing shall be made manifest. Amen.

The 83rd Psalms speaks of men, who said, 'Let us take to ourselves the houses of God in possession'. Such as are they who love to have preeminence among the little flock of Christ. This is one reason the church of God in Benin City has suffered so much set back since the sixties. Men take the houses of God in possession. The church does not belong to man but to God. We join the psalmist to beg the Lord that 'as the fire burneth a wood, and as the flame setteth the mountains on fire; so persecute them with Thy tempest, and make them afraid with Thy storm. Fill their faces with shame; that they may seek Thy name, O LORD. Let them be confounded and troubled ... yea, let them be put to shame... That men may know that Thou, whose name alone is JEHOVAH, art the most high over all the earth.'

In a look into the church of God, we find that 'the apostasy of the church came by "ecclesiastical ambition and degeneracy." The human element got in the way where there should have been only the divine. There is necessarily the human element in the work of God, for Christian work is God and man working together; but in the true relation man is God's instrumentality and is altogether in subjection to the divine Head, who rules over all. When the human element supplants, gets in the way of, or acts in the place of, the divine, we have a fundamental error that always results in apostasy. This human ecclesiasticism, always more or less intolerant, reached its autocratic perfection in the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church and constituted the "man of sin" who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshiped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God" (2 Thessalonians 2:3-4). 

'The spirit of human government in church affairs has shown itself in, or has followed in the wake of, every reform movement of the past. The Spirit of God worked in the movement to accomplish good, but was always checked by this baleful element. Luther meant well but was himself dogmatic and intolerant. He held to many doctrines of Catholicism whose wrongs he could not see. He did not make proper allowance that others besides himself might be right, or at least have some truth. Neither did he or his associates or followers leave the way open for God to lead into more truth, much less the whole truth. Thus the reformation of the Sixteenth Century, while it recovered from the debris of apostasy the doctrine of justification by faith, became the occasion for Protestant sects, human-ruled institutions, and these were succeeded by other sects. Some of these have been as intolerant, inflexible, and as unlike primitive Christianity as the Roman Catholic Church itself. 

'Church government, as humanized in the sects, has taken forms other than the hierarchic. We have the episcopal, or rule by bishops; the presbyterian, or rule by presbyters; the congregational, or rule by the local brotherhood. Our object here is, not to discuss which of these forms most nearly resembles or is most different from the Scriptural, but merely to show that man rule has manifested itself in various ways.'

We pray that these things will be sorted out. So that all the children of God, being delivered out of the hand of our enemies, might serve him without fear, in holiness and righteousness before him, all the days of our life in this city. We shall indeed stand free and be aloof from the great city, where the fire of the Word and the Spirit are put out from men's heart, the city which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified. Oh, how many good ones have been killed there!

Making the visible church identical with the invisible church

i

Jul 1

Greetings in God's holy name. 

My mind has been dwelling on the propriety of calling some religious gathering "Babylon", etc, because of the unholy practices among. Of a truth, any gathering that is not founded on the pure revelation of Christ Jesus which makes holy living visible among the members can rightly be described as a house of confusion. However, if the hypocrisy and ungodliness that characterise such a system is also witnessed among so called "true churches", would it be proper to differentiate them from the ones we disparage? Would we be right to call others "Babylon" and see ourselves as "Zion" when we are more or less like them? If the insincere are found in Babylon, should they be found acceptable in Zion also? How then would Zion retain her purity? 

When I thought about these things, I was confronted with the words of Christ, "Let both grow together until the harvest..." Mt 13:30. Another thought that developed in my mind was the saying that "many are called but few are chosen" Mt 22:14. So, I, kind of, looked upon the visible church as a bit different from the invisible church, where only God "knoweth them that are His" 2Ti 2:19. But that was where I had the problem of sincerity. How I can make excuse for the "unsaved" and "hypocrites" in Zion, and condemn Babylon for having such characters? 

I thank God for answering that question today through the tract by CE Orr: "Having a Spiritual Congregation by Bro Charles E Orr"

	Having a Spiritual Congregation > Having a Spiritual Congregation | Charles E. Orr A free online library of books, music, magazines, and more.
	View on library.timelesstruths.org	Preview by Yahoo

  I've now known that the difference lies in the overseer placed over the congregation by the Holy Ghost. His job is to look out for the spiritual well being of the souls committed to his care. He's endowed with the graces of Christ, most especially the Spirit of discernment so that he will never let a soul up from the altar until he knows that soul has been forgiven of God. According to the tract: 

"...a pastor must have such spiritual discernment that none can profess in the congregation that he is overseeing who are not saved without his knowing it. What is he to do with those who he knows not to be saved? He is to deal with them just as Jesus would deal with them. Christ will give him wisdom to know how to deal with them. We cannot tell you, for no two perhaps should be dealt with alike. But one thing is certain, they must at no great distant day be brought to an experience of salvation or take their place among the non-professors. The old leaven must be purged out or it will leaven the entire lump. Certainly we believe in showing mercy, longsuffering, and gentleness, but God will lead each pastor in this matter who lives under the direct leading of the Holy Spirit. There are pastors right among us who to a great extent have left off judgment. It is all mercy and toleration and no judgment. Worldliness is getting in, division, strife, contention—and no man to lift a voice against it. Pastors have become so easy that they allow those to profess in the congregation who are proud, covetous, worldly, and are living for the dollar more than living for God. The preacher must be true to his nearest and dearest friend, even to those of his own household. Some are so indifferent that they allow young women who are dressed like the world, and who bear no fruit of the Spirit in their life, to teach a class of children in the Sunday School. All they do is profess to be a Christian, but there is no evidence of spiritual life. All is cold and dead, and their teaching is merely mental theory. We all wonder why there is not more of the power of God among His people. We have given some of the reasons. The judgments of God in the power of the Holy Spirit are not being rendered. Too many pastors are suffering that woman Jezebel to profess among them in her pride and worldliness (Revelation 2:20). God is love, certainly, but love is severe. Tolerating worldliness, formalism, pride, covetousness, and unholiness is not love. Love will keep the Church pure."

The question now is, do the servants of God in Zion live up to this responsibility of making the visible church identical with the invisible one. The real difference between the church and Babylon is the disinction between their visible temple and the holy one in Heaven.

Grace be to you and peace from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
Eric Winters