When Good is Evil

 

 

"Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter.  "Many will say to Me on that day, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?'   "And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; DEPART FROM ME, YOU WHO PRACTICE LAWLESSNESS.'”  (Matthew 7:21-23 NASB)

 

The NIV translates, “Then I will tell them plainly, 'I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’”

 

These things, which we might otherwise consider good things, are called by the Lord deeds of lawlessness, or evil deeds, and those who did them are called evildoers.

 

If we fail to recognize what is going on here, we put ourselves at risk of also standing before the Lord on that day and hearing these same words from Him, regardless of how impressive our list of good deeds may seem to us.

 

How can we understand this?  One clue is that apparently these things were not the will of His Father.  Another clue is that He said, “I never knew you.”  A real danger in this Christian life is that we can be religious and busy but have no real relationship with the Lord.  Other scriptures give other clues.  Jesus said, “My sheep hear My voice.”  Many will argue that God doesn’t speak today other than through His word.  But Jesus also said, “You search the scriptures thinking in them you will find life, but you will not come to Me.”  Another scripture says, “The letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.”

 

I have heard God’s voice.  I know He speaks.  I have also heard Him say, “My voice is all around you.”  He speaks in ways other than audible words.  He speaks through events, through coincidences, through senses of His presence when the Holy Spirit visits in a tangible way.  He speaks in a multitude of ways, often in a still, small way.  I have also been disciplined when I did things that I thought were good but were not in the will of God.

 

There is another crucial scripture, which speaks of our works being chosen by God.  How can we do the works chosen for us by God if we do not hear His voice in some way or another?  If we go off and do works of our own choosing, we risk them being called evil deeds.  We must be led by the Lord into those works He has chosen for us.  Jesus said that He never did anything that He did not see the Father doing.  That is how it must be with us.  We must do only those works the Father chooses for us.  This is what doing His will means --- not in our timing and content --- but in His timing and content.  And in order to do those works, we must hear from the Father what those works are.

 

The priority is not works, but relationship out of which those works are identified and then flow.  The problem with the church at Ephesus was that although they were very busy and seemingly successful, they had left the priority of their first love.  Perhaps they had been sidetracked in the kitchen like Martha, even though they were working for the Lord.  But Mary had the best thing, really the only necessary thing.  She was sitting with the Lord, listening to Him. 

 

But who would cook dinner??  As if it is our responsibility . . . as if we need to take charge and see that something gets done.  What do you suppose might have happened if Martha had joined Mary and no food was prepared?    

 

I was zealous during the first year and a half of my Christian walk.  And the Bible says to be zealous.  But my zeal did not please the Lord.  It was a fleshly zeal, not a zeal prompted by the Spirit.  He sat me down one evening and had me read Finney’s “Letter to New Christians”.  This was one of the letters Finney wrote for “The Oberlin Evangelist”.  I literally felt the Lord’s arms come around me as I began reading this.  I was weeping because it was a rebuke, and I was weeping because of the Lord’s presence.   I’ve had people tell me that God would never say that we can betray Christ as did Judas, but He said it to me.  It was said in a spirit of love, as Finney said when he wrote it.  It was the Lord’s discipline, and the Lord comforts us in that He only disciplines those He loves.  And He loves even those who, at times, betray Him even as Judas did.  Peter also betrayed Him, but Peter was led to repent and be restored by God’s grace.  May it be so with us.  I wish I could confess that I have risen above this rebuke, but, alas, it seems as if I often find myself in almost the same situation I did on December 13, 1992, when I was led to pull the book down from the shelf in which this letter of Finney lay waiting to explode into my life.

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To the converts of the great revivals that have prevailed in the United States within the last few years

 

February 13, 1839

 

Beloved:

 

     I closed my last letter by referring to the fact that several professedly religious periodicals have so referred to what I had said in regard to your being “a disgrace to religion” as virtually to represent me as denying the reality, genuineness and power of those glorious revivals in which you were converted.  I denied having said anything in that connection to that effect.  But I did assert in my lecture and reassert in my last letter that I believed many of you were by your lives a disgrace to the religion of Christ.  Now, beloved, I did not say this then, nor do I say it now to bring a bitter accusation against you, but for the purpose of preparing the way to put some questions to your conscience, with the design to turn your eyes fully upon your own life and spirit as exhibited before the world.

     And here let me say that when you receive this issue I desire each of you to consider this letter as directed to you individually, as a private letter to you, although communicated through this public channel.

     I will write upon my knees, and I beg you to read it upon your knees.  And when you have read it as written to yourself and received it, as I adjure you to do, as a private communication to you from me, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, I entreat you to hand it to all your Christian friends in your neighborhood and within your reach, beseeching them to receive it and consider it as a private letter to them, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.

     Hereafter, should the providence of God permit, I may more particularly address different classes of individuals than I can in this letter.  I intend to address fathers, mothers, husbands, wives, children, minister, church officers, editors of religious papers, young men and young women --- all distinct classes of individuals to whom particular truths may be applicable.  In this, I address you without reference to your age or sex, calling or position but simply as a professor of the religion of Jesus Christ.

     I have said that I fear and believe that many of you, at least, are a disgrace to the religion you profess.  By this I mean that instead of fairly and truly representing the religion of Christ in your life and spirit, you in many respects grossly misrepresent it.  Do not at this point let your temper rise and turn upon me and say: “Physician, heal thyself.”  I might, to be sure, confess my own sins; but my business now as “an ambassador of Jesus Christ” is with your own conscience. 

     And now, dearly beloved, bear with me while I put the questions home to you, as by name.

     Are not your life and spirit and habits a miserable misrepresentation of the religion you profess?

     You are a professor of the religion of Jesus Christ.  Your profession of religion has placed you on high, as “a city that cannot be hid.”  You are not hid.  The eyes of God, of Christians, of the world, of hell are upon you.

     And now, precious soul, do you sincerely believe that you feel and act and live and do as the Lord Jesus Christ would under similar circumstances?

     Are those around you forced by your life and spirit to recognize the divine features of the character of Christ in you?

     Would those that know nothing of Christ be able to catch and understand the true spirit and meaning of the religion of Jesus by an acquaintance with you?

     Would they obtain from your life and example such an idea of the nature, design and tendency of the gospel as would lead them to value it, to understand its necessity and importance?

     Are your spirit and temper and conversation so unearthly, so heavenly, so divine, so much like Christ, as to accurately represent Him?  Or do you misrepresent Him?

     Is not the temper that you manifest, the life that you lead, your behavior, your pursuits --- are not all these in many respects the very opposite and contrast of the spirit of the religion of Christ?

     My beloved brother, sister, father, mother, whoever you are, remember that while you read these questions God’s eye is pouring its searching blaze into your inmost soul.

     What is your temper in your family, among your friends, in your private life, in your domestic relations and in your public walks?

     Is your behavior in heaven or is it “earthly, sensual, devilish”?

     What is the testimony of your closet?  Can it bear witness to your sighs and groans and tears over the wickedness and desolations of the world?

     Are those who observe your good works constrained to “glorify your Father who is in heaven”?  Or is the name of God blasphemed on account of your earthly and unchristian life and spirit?

     Can those that remain unconverted in the place where you live bear witness that a great and divine change was wrought in you by the Spirit of God?

     In the name of Christ I inquire, are you unrepentant acquaintances constrained to confess that there must have been a work of God to have wrought so great a change in you, as they daily witness?

     Do you think that the interests of religion are really advanced by your life and that you are continually making an impression in favor of holiness on those around you?

     Do they witness in you the “peace of God that passeth understanding”?

     Do they see in you that sweet and divine satisfaction in the will and ways of God that spreads a heavenly serenity and calm and sweetness over your mind, in the midst of the trials and circumstances to which you are subjected?

     Or do they behold you annoyed, anxious, worried, easily disturbed and exhibiting the spirit of the world?  My dear soul, if this is so, you are a horrible disgrace to religion; you are unlike Jesus.  Was this the spirit that Jesus manifested?

     Let me inquire again:  what are you doing for the conversion of sinners around you, and what for the conversion of the world?

     Would one hundred million such Christians as you are, and living just as you live, be instrumental in converting the world?

     Suppose there are a thousand million of men upon the earth and suppose that one hundred million of these were just such Christians as you are, in your present state and at your present rate of usefulness; when would the world be converted?

     Are the church and the world better and holier on account of your profession?  And are they really benefited by your life?

     If not, your profession is a libel upon the Christian religion.  You are, like Peter, denying your Savior; and like Judas, you have kissed but to betray Him.

     Now, beloved, I will not take it upon myself to decide these questions that I have put to you on my knees and in the spirit of love.  Will you be honest and, on your knees, spread out this letter to God our Maker and Christ your Savior?  Will you not upon your knees read over these questions, one by one, and ask God to show you the real state of your life as it relates to each of them?

     And here, beloved, I leave you for the present; and may the Savior aid you and make you honest in meeting cordially and answering honestly these questions.  You must be searched and humbled and broken down in heart before you can be built up and made strong in Christ.

     Do be honest and in haste, and address yourself to the work of self-examination without delay.  I beg of you to prepare yourself to receive the consolations of the gospel of Christ, for my soul is panting to spread them out before you.

     Providence permitting, you may expect to hear from me again soon.

 

Charles G. Finney

A servant of the Lord Jesus Christ

 

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