ARE YOU WITH JESUS?

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In Christ, Mark

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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

"Or again, how can anyone enter a strong man's house and carry off his possessions unless he first ties up the strong man? Then he can rob his house.”
"He who is not with Me is against Me, and he who does not gather with Me scatters. And so I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come.”
Matthew 12:29-32

Truly I tell you, people can be forgiven all their sins and every slander they utter, but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven; they are guilty of an eternal sin.”

He said this because they were saying, “He has an impure spirit.”

Mark 3:28-30

“Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters.”

Luke 11:23

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.
If you look at our world today and the people in it, I think you could break the populace into three categories pertaining to their relationship with Jesus and a connection to Christianity.
First, we have those who choose to have no relationship with Jesus and thus choose to have no connection to Christianity. The reasons may vary but the end result is the same, no hope beyond death, only the destiny of eternal damnation. Within this group there exists those who even choose to see Jesus and anyone connected to Him, those in the second group, as worthy of persecution and extermination.
Speaking of the second group, this segment consists of people in the world who have chosen to fully believe and trust in Jesus as their Lord of Lords and King of Kings, the Author of their creation and salvation. Those in this group see themselves lost and hopeless in life without Christ and they are willing to surrender what the world offers in exchange for what Jesus brings them. Further, they would be willing to die for Him while carrying out His call to share His gospel with others, just as He self sacrificially died for all mankind to pay the price for their sins.
So there are those who choose to not believe and those who choose to believe.

So who is in the third category?

That would be those people who choose to straddle the line between unbelief and belief.
For there is another section of the world’s population who will only believe in Jesus when it’s convenient or when it suits them. They are unwilling to fully give up what the world offers because their desires so often become a greater priority than the desires of Jesus. If followed, His calling would mean leaving behind worldly pleasures in exchange for service, a laboring for the Lord to carry out His assignment to make disciples of all nations, a commitment many people are just not willing to make.
So what category do you find yourself in? Where do you fall in your relationship with Jesus?

As we look at today’s scripture passage, we find Jesus setting our views straight because as we see, there really aren’t three categories. You are either with Jesus or you aren’t, period. Look again at His words here:

"Or again, how can anyone enter a strong man's house and carry off his possessions unless he first ties up the strong man? Then he can rob his house.”

"He who is not with Me is against Me, and he who does not gather with Me scatters. And so I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come.”  Matthew 12:29-32

You may remember that Jesus had just got finished addressing the Pharisees who tried to make the claim that Jesus had been driving out demons through the power of Beelzebul, the prince of demons. Obviously, the Jewish religious leaders were not on Jesus’ side and were trying their best to discredit Him, seeing Him as a challenge to their authority and following. And so to them and anyone else who chose to oppose Him, Jesus had an important message to share:

"He who is not with Me is against Me, and he who does not gather with Me scatters.”

Did you get that what Jesus was saying?
He was saying, “You are either with Me or you aren’t.”
In other words, there is no middle ground, no standing astride of the line between belief and unbelief.  
The bottom line in what Jesus is saying us that if you are with Him, then you are a sheep who is member  of His flock, kept together and protected by the Good Shepherd (John 10:1-16).
Conversely, if you choose to not be with Jesus, then you are against Him, choosing to be with the world and Satan who has his way with those in it. Anyone who opts to not join the flock of Jesus ends up scattered according to Luke’s Gospel, vulnerable to attack like a sheep without a shepherd. And without protection, a person not in Christ is unprotected and easy pickings for anyone or anything evil.
Notice that Jesus doesn’t say a word about being with Him sometimes and not with Him others. You can’t be a part time believer. It doesn’t work that way. Jesus tells us there are two clear choices.

You are either with Him or against Him.

So again I ask, “Are you with Jesus?”
Back to the scriptures. Let’s revisit the matter of those who choose to try and discredit Jesus, even after all the good He has done, even after witnessing His miraculous works, those who decide to paint Him as being partnered with evil like the Pharisees had done while trying to connect Jesus to Beelzebub. What about those people?

Jesus gives us the answer to the question through His words:

And so I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come.”

Wow! Jesus tells us that those who choose to adopt an attitude of the Pharisees, trying to connect His good work to evil sources, would be committing a sin that is unforgivable, a sin of blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, the very Holy Spirit that Jesus was using to do all His powerful, wondrous deeds.
Now you may say, “What? You mean, there is a sin that can’t be forgiven?”
The Bible and the following words of Jesus say so and every word from the scriptures (and especially from the mouth of Jesus) is truth.

You see, the Pharisees were so spiritually lost and adamantly opposed to Jesus that they were willing to egregiously reject His holy works of goodness and love as He healed maladies, exorcised demons, and restored others to full health. Instead of praising God for all the powerful acts He was performing by way of His Son and the power of the Holy Spirit, the Pharisees instead tried to wickedly connect what God had initiated to evil to the works of demons.
Simply incredible and despicable, right?

Here were people who were to lead in the name of God, discrediting Him with their very accusations against His Son.

Today, we still have modern day Pharisees in our midst, people who still refuse to give credit to the Lord despite the obvious miracles He performs by way of the Holy Spirit each and every day. These people have chosen to fully reject Jesus as well as His will and way for their lives and in doing so, they cut themselves off from the Father in heaven and sever their opportunity to live with Him and His Son Jesus forever.
For Jesus clearly said, “I am the Way and the Truth and the Life. No one comes unto the Father except through Me” John 14:6 and there is no gray area in His words. No place in between where someone can stand. We are either with Jesus and God or we’re not. Jesus expects that we are all in, that we are with Him and with Him fully.
So again, where do you stand? Are you with Jesus or against Him?
Amen.
In Christ,
Mark
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