"The Rapid Spread Of Error In The One True Church Of God" By: Dr. Shuffel P. Hepburn

The rapid spread of error in the one true Church of God. That's our message. The text is taken from Matthew 23.

No Bible reader should be surprised by the fact that error and hypocrisy has been so pervasive in the Christian Church century after century since the time of Jesus Christ. The Bible constantly warns us about this. Error and hypocrisy among God's children existed even before His arrival. The God of Heaven warned about those who prophesy lies in the book of Jeremiah, telling His people do not listen to the words of the prophets who prophesy to you. They make you worthless. They speak a vision of their own heart not from the mouth of the Lord, chapter 23: 16. The wicked Kings surrounded themselves with these false prophets who told them what they wanted to hear. And do not the presidents, world leaders and even religious leaders of today do the same. They gather around them, those so-called prophets and spiritual leaders that would tell them what they want to hear.

And Jesus Christ Himself was daily challenged by the works of the wicked Pharisees and Sadducees who worked with Satan to try to make a mockery of God's plan, to use Christ to save man from The Bondage of sin, by grace through faith. These who were responsible for interpreting the law were living contrary to the same laws that they were forcing upon men. Perhaps Satan knew what was coming. Perhaps he knew that when The Father sent His Son He meant business. But Satan wanted to keep the Jewish people and all who followed Judaism under the law, because he knew that the law was dead works that could never change man's hopeless state.

Father we thank You for Your Word, bless it as it goes forth. Anoint it that those that listen to it will be transformed in their thinking about this Word Father in the name of Jesus Christ we pray. Amen. Bring forth truth in the Church of the Most High God in Jesus name we pray.

Satan was also fully aware that Abraham believed God and was counted unto him as righteousness. Therefore Abraham was justified and made righteous by faith. Galatians 2:16 had not yet been written, but the Apostle Paul would confirm, that man is not justified by the works of the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. I am sure that Satan knew that Christ had come to fulfill the law by ushering in justification by faith.

Jesus Christ railed against the Servants of Satan who were the Pharisees and the scribes saying the following, "They outwardly appear righteous to men but inside they were full of hypocrisy and lawlessness," according to Matthew 23 and 28. He accused those responsible for teaching the law to the Jewish people of only being interested in doing works in order to be seen by men. He accused them of loving the places of honor at feasts, and of loving to have the chief seats in the synagogue. He accused them of shutting up the Kingdom of Heaven against men, neither going in themselves nor allowing anyone to go in. He accused them of devouring widow's houses and of pretending to be holy by offering long prayers. And He accused them of many many more transgressions.

So it should not be surprising that by the time Martin Luther the father of the Protestant Reformation came along 1500 years after Christ, there had already been major divisions in the church established by Christ. The biggest split leading up to Luther's time was when the Orthodox Eastern Church separated from the Catholic Church in 1054. Tension had been brewing between Western and Eastern leaders of Christianity for years, and most especially now between Pope Leo the 9th and patriarch Michael Cerularius, who excommunicated each other in 1054. Cerularius was head of the Eastern Christian Churches. The Eastern Christian Church did not recognize the pope as the head of their churches, because they rejected the Roman Catholic doctrine of papal supremacy. And they established their own patriarch over the eastern churches along with their own governing body, and this was one point of contention.

Yet another major difference in beliefs or doctrines between the east and the west was an insertion in the creed which describes the way the Holy Spirit came forth to the earth. The Roman Catholic version of the Nicene Creed says, "We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the Giver of Life who proceeds from The Father and The Son. This insertion is referred to as the Filioque clause, which means and from The Son. This phrase and from The Son was added to the Nicene Creed by the Roman Catholic Church, saying that the Holy Spirit proceeded from both The Father and from The Son. While on the other hand the Orthodox Church only says the Holy Spirit proceeds from The Father. The Orthodox Church believes that this insertion by the Catholic leaders was an innovation that was unnecessary, and was perhaps heresy.

But let us look directly into God's Word to see what His Word says to us about this. We'll refer to John 14 and 26, where the Word of God says, but The Comforter which is The Holy Ghost whom The Father will send in My name, He shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you. Clearly this text is saying that The Father sent The Holy Spirit in Jesus Christ's name. Well what does it mean when it says in Christ's name. We'll take a look at John 15 and 26 to see if we can get more clarity on this. In this text the Word of God says the following, "But when The Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from The Father, even the Spirit of Truth, which proceeded from The Father, He shall testify of me."

And so this is saying that The Father sent the Holy Spirit, in the name of His Son Jesus to testify of all that Christ said and all that He did and everything that was done to Him. And since The Father and Son are one we can make a case that they both sent The Holy Spirit. But I think it is better to go with the precise wording of the scriptures, agreeing that The Holy Spirit proceeded from The Father. This doctrinal disagreement is not so egregious that the difference of their interpretation should have been the cause of such a massive church split. Except that Satan, who's the author of confusion, made a big to-do about this. These two major sections of the Christian Church could find no common ground on this point and so they parted company. One became the Roman Catholic Church and the other became the Orthodox Catholic Church.

And yet they both claimed to be the one true church established by Jesus Christ and founded by St Peter, which he then passed on to St Ignatius. They both agreed on the importance of scripture, on the importance of tradition, and on the views of the Eucharist. However there were other differences between the two main pillars of the Christian Church. The Orthodox used Greek in their services, while the Romans used Latin. Unlike the Roman Catholic Church, the Orthodox Catholic Church permitted married men to be ordained, however traditionally they did not permit clergy to marry after ordination. Also the Orthodox Church believe that marriage is able to be dissolved, while the Roman Catholic Church believed that marriage is only dissolved at death.

And then there was a huge error that crept into the Roman Catholic Church, which was the selling of indulgences. Now indulgences were certificates that were supposed to absolve sins and reduce the time that people spent in purgatory after death. They did this to raise money for the church apparently. But after Martin Luther posted His famous 95 thesis which challenged the church's authority to do this and other things, it was outlawed in 1567 but kept on the books.

Perhaps when Martin Luther posted his 95 thesis, he thought that he would bring the Roman Catholic Church from the era that had crept into it once and for all. And I suppose he wanted to bring forth a season in which there would be no error in the church at all. In this regard he was destined to fail. For Jesus Christ said in Matthew 24, false christs and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders to deceive if possible even the elect. Meaning even God's chosen. In fact Luther himself made errors when he was translating the Holy Bible into German. For instance, he was confused about which books contained God's true Word. For instance, the books of Hebrew and Revelation were included in books that he had considered removing, but after prayer decided to place them at the very end of the Bible. Then there are some like Sirach, Maccabees, Judith and Baruch, that he did remove because they were not written in Hebrew. These however are in the Catholic Bible today, but not in the Holy Bible that we have.

It is very safe to say that there continues to be error in Christian denominations today. And the errors will continue. This is why the Father sent us the Comforter through Jesus Christ however, to lead us into all truth, to bypass these pieces of error in the Christian Church wherever we may find them. In other words the Comforters task is to point out erroneous doctrines and keep believers on track. As long as Satan is loose however, there will continue to be error in the church, as long as he's on the earth there will be error. There will be false teachers, and there will be false prophets. As long as we live in the kingdom of this world, there will be fake news, there will be deception as Satan continues his onslaught against the Church of The Most High God.

But God is calling His people back to simplicity in worship. He's calling them back to unity. He's calling them back to the undiluted Word of God. And He's calling us back to His one true church in which we are all of one accord. He's calling us back to the way that the apostles and disciples were on the day of Pentecost. For we have wandered so far away and this is why His power perhaps has disappeared from the church. And we've filled in the spaces with dead works, inserting doctrines and practices that Christ did not approve of. Will the Son of man find us worshiping our Papa, our Abba, in spirit and in truth, as they were doing when the Holy Spirit arrived. God is a Spirit my friend and we must worship Him in spirit and in truth, it is the only way. We must worship Him in this manner, in this season. We are not to worship Him the way our denomination says to worship Him unless it lines up with scripture. We must worship Him in the way that He laid it out for us with sincere and truthful hearts. And we must worship Him in the power of the mighty Spirit of the Living God who will keep us on track. And this is the way that we are instructed to worship Him, in spirit and in truth. We must worship Him crying out with our entire heart asking forgiveness for the sins of our neighbors, asking forgiveness for the sins of our children, asking forgiveness for our own sins. And this we must do with repentant hearts that genuinely desire to return to our Abba, begging him to have mercy on us, and forgive us our sins, cleansing us of all unrighteousness, in Jesus name, amen. God bless and keep you in His mighty name amen.

You've been listening to this message and perhaps you do not know Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. We want to give an opportunity as usual to make that commitment today. Please engage your heart. Jesus Christ did all the work for our salvation, and made it simple for us to come into the kingdom. Please say this prayer after me:

-Father I am a sinner. I am sorry for all my sins.

-I crave Your forgiveness with all my heart and I thank You for Your mercy, for Your grace, for Your forgiveness.

-I have decided to invite Jesus Christ into my heart.

-Dear Lord Jesus make my heart Your home.

-Today I give You the key to my heart because I now belong to You forever.

-Please give me the Holy Spirit to lead me into all truth.

-Thank You Lord for saving my soul. Amen.

Welcome friend to the body of believers in Christ. We are all here awaiting the return of the Good Master. In the meantime we want to encourage you to become water baptized as quickly as possible. It is the fulfillment of all righteousness. Begin reading the Word of God. Begin in the book of John, reading audibly as often as possible, because faith comes by hearing the Word of God and then go to Matthew, Mark and Luke. Pray daily and attend at your local church. And one glad morning the Savior will come and receive us all unto Himself and we shall forever be with the Lord. God bless and keep you in His mighty name. Amen.