David uttered the words of the title in the midst of fear and reproach on every hand, and with Israel’s armies fleeing in defeat. None-the-less, God’s chosen and prepared servant went forth fearlessly to the conflict in full confidence of victory, relying for his strength and power upon the Lord alone. Saul, backslidden and forsaken of God, had lost all his courage and power. But he still wanted to put his own armor on David.
Thus a cold form of godliness today insists upon putting its carnal armor upon the faithful servants of the Lord, raised up by God. Thus, he who would prevail in this holy warfare against the overwhelming forces of darkness and evil that come in upon us in these days as a flood, must not put on the fleshly armor of a powerless and apostate Christianity from which God has withdrawn Himself.
“And David said unto Saul, I cannot go with these, for I have not proved them. And David put them off him.” He not only had to see that these things were going to be hindrance to him, but he had to actually take them off. Weighed down thus, he would never had been able to conquer his powerful foe. He said, “I have not proved them.” What proof have we made of all this man-made armor of these days, when a form of godliness denies the power thereof, that we should put it on to better equip us in our efforts to lift up the standard of God’s Word against the power of the enemy?
What revival of God’s power and working has all this man-made machinery brought to us since we have departed from the simplicity of the Gospel. The committees and the organizations; the programs and the entertainments; the vain display and seeking and receiving honor to the flesh, and the giving of it to others as an inducement to greater effort and zeal; the musical attractions; the emphasis on educational attainments; and the recreational projects that are to serve as a bait to lure the young into the gospel net: what proof of its virtue has all this humanly devised armor given us that we should put it on as we seek to go forth against the coldness and deadness all about us unto victory in the name of Jesus our Lord, until the revival fires of the Holy Spirit and His burning love are kindled again in the hearts and lives of His people?
Has not simplicity and humility and separation from what is worldly and fleshly been always characteristic of the time of true revival and manifestation of God’s power? And has not the astonishing growth and multiplication of these carnal means and methods within evangelical religion been marked by so great and unprecedented a withdrawal of the glory and presence and working of the Holy Spirit, that all can see that professed Christianity is being left to its own coldness and deadness, while sin rages on every hand unrebuked, and the world rushes to the swift destruction that awaits it?
May God help us to reject all this carnal armor, which not only has not been proven and tried and found true in the holy warfare, but which has been fully proven to be the powerless weapons and defense of an apostate church.
Where God works, He will be glorified, and He will manifest Himself according to His will. But all this human machinery and display give the Holy Spirit no place nor room to manifest Himself. When we let the Lord clean out the temple, He will fill it with His glory. As we read the records of revival in many different times and places, we cannot help but notice how God worked outside of the ordinary and expected channels, where the human systems would have choked out the workings of God’s Spirit. Often times envy, as with the Pharisees, would raise up a storm of persecution, but God worked through men who were willing to follow His plan at the cost of all things. Through faithful men, a great victory was gained for God. And over and over again we have seen these times of refreshing followed so soon by a spiritual decline and backsliding. As the newly imparted spiritual life began to mold itself into another human system, and the revival fires began to die out and the spirit of worldly apostasy began to work.
No, we cannot go forward and gain victories for God that He sets before us until we put off all this unproved and untried armor of the flesh, and go only in the strength and power of the Lord God. The early church had none of the present-day accompaniments to religion. They served God in the simplicity of the gospel and relied upon Him: and He wrought wonders!
In a generation, the message was proclaimed far and wide over the known world, in the power of the Spirit. The didn’t have to advertise and lure the people in by worldly expedients. The power of the Spirit was manifested, they relied upon Him, and He did the work.
We read in the account of the Welsh revival of its simplicity. The works of men were notably absent, but the Lord was exalted; no choir, but everybody sang; no collections. People got out of the way and gave the Lord a chance to work.
We know that the Christian life is a supernatural life. We know that this is so in the individual soul or life: That it is not our own works, but “Christ in us the hope of glory” who is manifested by faith through a life wholly yielded and separated unto Him alone. Then why must we believe that the church—which is composed of souls and lives yielded to God and led and moved by His Spirit—must be organized, led, and controlled by the hand of man, and filled with men’s works and plans of a godless age in order to function at all? It seems that there can scarcely be found one group that is not swallowed up in the spirit of social activity and entertainment and in the multiplied works and programs of man’s own making. It seems that a people can scarcely be found where pride and the flesh are not on display, drawing attention to itself. There are suppers and parties and youth activities of various kinds that keep the young people active in the church, but which never lead them into the living fountains of waters that Christ has for those who seek His face.
Christ said, “Let the dead bury the dead; but go thou and preach the kingdom of God.” When will the church be ready to let the world carry on the material things of this world, and devote themselves to the one task of proclaiming the everlasting gospel in the power of the Spirit to a lost and perishing world? There is an attraction and a power in the simple preaching of the word of God—when the Holy Spirit anoints—which draws and satisfies the hungry soul, and which does not require as a prelude a musical entertainment.
If we trust the Spirit of God to lead us in His way in our own personal life, why not trust Him to lead us in our public worship, into the pure worship in spirit and truth that God seeks from His creatures, and which He will accept? If we cannot come before God individually in our own dead and empty works, why should we offer to Him the works of our own hands in our public assemblies? If we live thus in our personal lives, in our own way and works, they will be empty and void of His presence and power; and this is not less in the church?
Where is the people who will have the courage to put off all these heavy weights that the enemy has loaded upon us, to follow from henceforth the simplicity of the gospel, the “faith which was once delivered unto the saints?” Who will forsake completely the worldliness and the empty forms of these days of apostasy , and learn from God’s word and from the example of the primitive church the pure worship that God will own and bless, and through which He will manifest Himself in working a mighty work of salvation in the hearts and lives of men?
As we pray for revival, and that God may make us strong soldiers for Him, able to defeat a powerful and wily foe, and to rescue precious souls from the clutches of Satan, let us pray for God to give us grace and courage to put off the armor like David did; the carnal armor of an apostate generation from which God has departed. And let us pray that we may be clothed with the armor of God, that we may be able to stand in the evil day, and to stand against all the wiles of the devil. Like David, we cannot go forth and prevail with unproven armor; we cannot go forth to victory carrying these things.
May we through the name of Jesus put on the whole armor of righteousness, “on the right hand and on the left,” and may we take unto ourselves “the weapons of our warfare, which are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds”; the armor which has been tried all down through the ages, and which has stood the test of every battle.
~Author unknown

The Bohemian Brethren were a group of men and women in Bohemia, which is the western half of modern Czech Republic.  The eastern third of the republic is comprised of yesteryear’s Moravia.

While most Christians who read church history have a basic idea of the Moravian Brethren with Count Zinzendorf in Germany, very few have any idea of their forerunners, the Bohemian Brethren.

While not 100% like the later Anabaptists, their practice and doctrine was similar enough that some of the Bohemian Brethren seem to have joined up with (their own movement was drifting by this time) the Anabaptists when the latter finally showed up in Moravia a century after the Bohemian Brethren had starting tracing their course.  They were definitely a “kingdom church”.

Anyways, you can read about the birth, life, and death of the Bohemian Brethren revival by clicking the link.

Or if you write me at mike at primitivechristianiy dot org, I now have some hard copies available.

The Fire

These latter days are days of fire;

The flame engulfs the world entire;

And Satan rules; but there is One

Whose purposes are not outdone…

In hell’s abysm, long ago,

The flame was kindled, and it’s glow

Has daily since been stoked and fanned

By a fireman who has shrewdly planned

The ultimate defeat of grace,

And the grim destruction of the race.

Behind the gleam is a whirlwind’s breath,

A searing blast that burns to death,

It sweeps the multitudes away,

But… only the stubble, wood and hay!

After the blast, the gold’s still there,

In heavenly luster, pure and rare.

God’s saints have ere been tried by fire,

They humbly brave the tempter’s ire,

The flames of lust and greed and hate,

And passion… hell’s most luring bait;

When tried and tried and tried again,

They come forth purer, stronger men.

By fire and whirlwind set apart…

The consecrated, pure in heart.

Though seven times hotter the flame be made,

They walk therein, all unafraid,

For it is there, in the furnace heat

That they their Lord and Savior meet.

The chaff and hay will soon be gone;

When fire and wind at last have done

With faithless men, and churches cold,

And false religion, and false gold…

God’s purpose in this last day flame

Is men that glorify His Name!

–James Troyer

After that Jesus adds the words, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is
coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God;
and they that hear shall live. For as the Father hath life in Himself; so hath
He given to the Son to have life in Himself.”

As yet He does not speak of the second resurrection, that is, the resurrection of the body, which shall be in the end, but of the first, which now is. It is for the sake of making this distinction that He says, “The hour is coming, and now is.” Now this resurrection regards not the body, but the soul. For souls, too, have a death of their own in wickedness and sins, whereby they are the dead of whom the same lips say, “Suffer the dead to bury their dead,” — that is, let those who are dead in soul bury them that are dead in body.

It is of these dead,
then — the dead in ungodliness and wickedness — that He says, “The
hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son
of God; and they that hear shall live.” “They that hear,” that is, they who
obey, believe, and persevere to the end. Here no difference is made between the good and the bad. For it is good for all men to hear His voice
and live, by passing to the life of godliness from the death of ungodliness.
Of this death the Apostle Paul says, “Therefore all are dead, and He died
for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves,
but unto Him which died for them and rose again.”

Thus all, without one
exception, were dead in sins, whether original or voluntary sins, sins of
ignorance, or sins committed against knowledge; and for all the dead there
died the one only person who lived, that is, who had no sin whatever, in
order that they who live by the remission of their sins should live, not to
themselves, but to Him who died for all, for our sins, and rose again for our
justification, that we, believing in Him who justifies the ungodly, and being
justified [made just] from ungodliness or quickened from death, may be able to attain
to the first resurrection which now is. For in this first resurrection none
have a part save those who shall be eternally blessed; but in the second, of
which He goes on to speak, all, as we shall learn, have a part, both the
blessed and the wretched. The one is the resurrection of mercy, the other
of judgment. And therefore it is written in the psalm, “I will sing of mercy
and of judgment: unto Thee, O Lord, will I sing.”

-Augustine, The City of God

Jesus said:

“I am come that they might have forgiveness, and that they might have it more abundantly.”

Is that really what He said?  No, of course not.

Forgiveness of committed sins does not save a man from his sins, in the same way that washing the mud off a pig does not save the pig from getting dirty again.

Only the life of Christ, His blood transfused into us, can save us from the corruption of spiritual death, which we all inherit.

The blood of Jesus gives life into the human spirit once again.  With Life Eternal now in us, we can be saved from sin.

That is why Jesus said, “I am come that they might have life!”

Saved from sin by the blood!

Deut. 12:23

This is a potent little phrase, taken out of one verse.

How is a man saved?

By the blood, of course.

What does “saved by the blood” mean?

Salvaged by the life of Christ!

Christ saves (salvages, rescues from ruin) me by putting his blood (life, Spirit) on the altar (my heart), thus cleansing it (purging, catharizing) it from sin and self.

His life conquers my death!

Ok, the picture is falling together in my mind.  As soon as the Lord opens my eyes for a few pieces that are still missing, I hope to be able to post here the complete story of redemption (purchasing back a lost possession-again by the blood, life, of Jesus) and salvation by grace (I didn’t deserve His Spirit that freed me from the power of sin, it was a free gift!)

For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and goats should not take away (remove from the heart) sins, but the blood (life of Christ poured into me) could indeed sanctify my selfish heart!

More later, God permitting.

My latest book is finally finished enough to post it online. It needs another edit to take out some typos, but you can download a pdf of The Birth, Life, and Death of the Bohemian Revival, or read it in html online. At present, I do not have all the html pages built, but hope to within the next week or so.
The pdf is 3.5mb, and set up so that it can be printed out in a booklet form, although it is too large to neatly make a booklet.
Here is the back cover.

Sword or pen?

You see two men, armed to the teeth, warring for righteousness.
One is looking left, the other right (on purpose, for the composite I made).
They are real historical figures, etched as a relief in stone.
On the left is John, on the right is Peter.  No, they are not John and Peter the apostles.
They are men you likely never heard of- John Zizca and Peter Chelcicky.
John and Peter hailed from medieval times, in the early days of the 1400s.  Both of these Bohemians-now called the Czech Republic-had a zeal for God, and a desire that the church of Jesus recover from the Roman Catholic apostasy.
John picked up his sword to defend against the Catholic crusaders.  Peter picked up his pen.
See the above picture.
One-eyed John Zizca was a formidable man to war against.  Five times he and his peasant warriors repelled Catholic crusaders who had come to squelch the “heresy” that Read the rest of this entry »