Another Cause of a Difficult Season – Mixing With the World
By John Fast
“But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come.” – 2 Timothy 3:1
I take it for granted that no person reading this study would like to be thought of as a hypocrite. No one likes to think of themselves as being self-deceived, that while professing to believe, and considering themselves to be one thing, they actually live in a way that is totally inconsistent with what they profess to be and believe. The Apostle Paul was grieved over the many professing Christians whose walk was not in keeping with their profession; those “who set their minds in earthly things” (Phil 3:18, 19). Like Demos, while they profess to love God they are actually lovers of self, this present world, and their life in it. There has been cause for the same complaint ever since, but never more than in the present time. Today, the bulk of those who make some sort of profession of Christ never attain to any degree of spiritual-mindedness, to any steadfastness of faith, but are tossed to and fro, carried about by every wind of doctrine, and have their minds firmly fixed on the things of this earth. They seek out and choose teachers and churches that will cater to their worldly and carnal desires, and that will indulge the desires of the flesh and of the mind, or at least not expose their desires and lifestyles for what they really are. The bulk of their reading consists of nothing but the most current self-affirming spiritual junk food. Christianity becomes all about a better life in this world. Even their conceptions of heaven are nothing more than a heightened enjoyment of and endless self-indulgence in all the things they loved to do in this life. Their heaven bears little difference from the Muslim’s paradise.
Others, pretending to be better established in the faith, attain to some form of godliness, but are without its life and power. They seem to have some opinions and notions about the truths of Scripture, the way of righteousness, and what it is to be a Christian, but having never been taught them of God, nor ever having been brought under their mighty influence by the Holy Spirit, their walk is, therefore, very irregular. They waver between two opinions, between faith in the word of God and compromise with the wisdom, principles, and values of the world, and so they generally bring great scandal and scorn upon the name and cause of Christ. Today, hardly a day passes where we do not hear of some prominent and popular preacher who has gone the way of the world, to say nothing of all those professing Christians who have never left it.
We also have many at this time who make a beginning in the way of Christianity, but they have never felt the ruin of the fall, the sinfulness of their own hearts and minds, nor seen and felt their hopeless and helpless condition to save themselves from the horrible wrath and condemnation of an angry and offended God. These are commonly very presumptuous, self-confident, and secure people. They make a shining profession with a great show of religious activity, and for a time are zealous for Christ, until their faith comes to be tried in the furnace of temptation. Then, in a time of temptation, when they must choose between their love for this world and their professed love for Christ, they side with the world and fall away. Like Lot’s wife, they look back. Their heart is still in Sodom.
What the Apostle Paul told the Corinthians is just as necessary for us today, “Therefore, come out from their midst and be separate,” says the Lord” (2 Cor 6:17). In every age of the church this has been one of the great distinctions between true and false Christianity. Separation from the world has always been one of the primary evidences of a true work of the Holy Spirit in the heart. Those who have truly been born again, who have been regenerated by the Holy Spirit, and have been made a new creature in Christ, have always endeavored to “come out from their midst” and live a life separate and distinct from the world. They no longer desire to conform their life, tastes, values, and thinking to this world, but to have their minds transformed by the renewing work of the Holy Spirit (Rm 12:2). It is those who have been Christians by profession only, who have only worn the name of “Christian” without the reality, that have consistently refused to come out and be separate from the world. The very heart of apostasy is in loving the creature and creation more than the Creator, thereby leading the heart and mind astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ to the gratification of self and worldly desires.
Today there is a morbid fear of being too separate from the world, of being thought strange, out of touch with what is currently trending, and of diverging too sharply from the prevailing wisdom and values held by the culture, especially from the immediate circle of friends, family, and co-workers with which we interact day to day, and from the system of religion in which you were raised. Advances in technology have produced a massive overexposure to and infatuation with the world. There is a wide-spread desire to make Christianity attractive, to make it fun, hip, cool, exciting, trendy, culturally relevant, accommodating, intellectually respectable, inclusive, self-gratifying, and above all, to make it comfortable and commercially viable. The goal today is to endear Christianity and the gospel to the world. There is a strong aversion on the part of the mass of professing Christians to following the example of Jesus by testifying that the ways and deeds of the world are evil (Jn 7:7), that its way of thinking is futile, its reasoning is darkened, its affections are corrupted, and its wisdom is demonic (Eph 4:17, 18; Jm 3:15). This might make the world our bitter enemy as it did Jesus. Instead, people continue to look to the world and its wisdom for solutions to all the problems which are the consequences of rejecting God, His word, and His ways for the wisdom of the world. Today, there is an all-out effort to make things pleasant in Christianity by rounding off the sharp edges of its demands and doctrines, making the cross of Christ smooth and the way to heaven broad, turning sin into a virtue, grace into license, obedience into legalism, holiness optional, and avoiding as much as possible any commitment, controversy, and self-denial.
Any person or system that tries to go halves with the world, to compromise, accommodate, integrate, and assimilate the world, is in a way that can only lead to eternal destruction. Today, self is the great idol, self-interest is the governing principle, and self-gratification is the universal end for which the world is the principle means. The corruption of the principles which govern Christianity with those which govern the world can lead to nothing in practice that is not ruinous to both church and state. Only God in Jesus Christ can save from self, selfishness, and love of the world. The effects of worldliness, materialism, and self-indulgence are always the same – self reigns, God and His Christ are dethroned, and forms of godliness are substituted for true saving faith. For anyone to be so far gone to where even the thoughts of God’s eternal judgment and standing before Him cannot recover a person to a sense and feeling of their danger, this is a horrible and dangerous condition. This makes a season dangerous.
Compatible with the World
Since the Enlightenment of the 18th century, and especially since the rise of Higher Criticism in the 19th century, there has been an unremitting attempt to convince people that the doctrines and life of Christianity are compatible with the wisdom, values, tastes, and principles of this world. This premise is one which the bulk of professing Christians now unquestioningly accept as true. But what could be more clear than, “Do not love the world, nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him” (1 Jn 2:15). The 20th century witnessed the increase in all sorts of aberrant theologies – everything from the Charismatic movement and all its various off-shoots, to the seeker, emergent, and spiritual formation movements, Liberation and Liberate theologies, self-esteem cults, carnal Christian theology, the integration of psychology, etc., to strange and quirky movements like the Jewish Roots movement, to the explosion of the “Christian” entertainment industry – all of which operate from the principles of this world and set the mind on earthly things. The 21st century shows no signs of reform. Today we are told that a true Christian can go anywhere, do anything, believe anything, keep any company, indulge all their worldly desires, set their minds on earthly things, be biblically and theologically illiterate, think and live in a way indistinguishable from an unbeliever and the culture in which they live, and still be a good Christian. The most popular preachers, teachers, authors, and churches of our day are those that can best make Christianity compatible with a mind set on the flesh and a love for this present world.
This is the way the bulk of professing Christians live today, even if they profess to believe and acknowledge that there should be some sort of vague, nebulous difference between a believer and unbeliever. Just what that difference should be they are not quite sure, but only that there should be a difference, but not so different as to be too different. Perhaps they think it consists in having a different world-view, or in dressing and talking in a conspicuously strange way, or in having had some sort of subjective mystical experience. Perhaps they think it consists in being very involved in their church, going on mission trips, listening to “Christian” instead of secular music, and having enough Bible knowledge to be the star of the Sunday school class. Possibly they think it includes being more self-fulfilled, reveling in the fact that they are “broken” or in being a conservative rather than a liberal. Maybe they think it involves being less hedonistic and more ascetic.
Whatever difference there may be, it is all external and superficial in nature. However, to insist that the real difference is internal, that the difference from which all other differences spring is the necessity of having a new and different nature that they themselves can do nothing to cause or produce, a new nature that is totally incompatible with that of the world because it has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth (Eph 4:24), and “is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him” (Col 3:10), this is going too far. If you are one of these unhappy people who think that everyone who attends a place calling itself a church is a Christian (or that every church is Christian), or anyone who at one time expressed the slightest interest in Christianity, or who at one time went through a religious ritual or ceremony, or who is basically a good person will go to heaven, no matter what they believe or how they think and live, I fear you will care little about separation from the world.
I fear much for the bulk of professing Christians today. I see no sign that they are aware of the danger of the times in which we live. Like the people in the days of Noah, they are eating and drinking, they are marrying and giving in marriage, they are going on with life as usual, they are preoccupied with their life in this world as if their souls were not in imminent danger. They are obsessed with being accepted by, fitting in with, and gaining and keeping the approval and things of this world. While professing to know and believe in Jesus Christ, by their deeds they deny Him. They proclaim their unbelief in everything. When God commands, they proclaim their unbelief in disobeying. When God corrects them, they proclaim their unbelief in persisting in the sins for which God is chastening them. When their beliefs and practices are exposed by God’s word as unbiblical, they proclaim their unbelief in clinging to their forms of godliness. When God threatens and warns a sinner of the danger of their sin, they proclaim their unbelief by scoffing at God’s warnings and continuing in their sin. When God warns professing Christians of the danger posed by the world, and gives examples like Demos and Lot’s wife who loved this present world, they ignore His warnings and examples and turn their love of the world into a virtue, or at least consider it harmless. When their worldly lives and thinking are exposed as worldliness, they proclaim their unbelief by crying “legalism”. What else are these things but gross unbelief? When God commands, the worldling thinks that God does not mean what He says. When God threatens and warns, the worldling thinks God will not do as He has threatened. When God promises, the worldling thinks God will not be true to His word so they take their cues from this world and forms of worldly Christianity, conform their thinking and lifestyles to the thinking and lifestyles of this world, and walk by sight, sense, and feelings, and not by faith. Walking by nothing but their own sight, sense, wisdom, reasoning, feelings, observations, experiences, and understanding is a characteristic trait of the world.
Today the mass of professing Christians are busy storing up treasure for themselves on earth. They are at peace with Christ’s enemies. They have no quarrel with sin. They are friends with the world. They seek to make alliances with cults, false religions, and civil government. Every attempt at such alliances, to elevate Christianity to a level of political and economic power, and to make friends with the world, has only served to sink Christianity into the spirit of the world. They have adopted the world’s sanitized and psychologized euphemisms for sin, given their sin respectable names, thereby whitewashing sin’s sinfulness, guilt, and deserved condemnation. They involve themselves in the world’s causes. They want all men to speak well of them. They think and reason according to the course of this world. They walk by sight, sense, and feelings, not by faith. They are in love with themselves. Their minds and conversations are consumed with “the worries of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the desires for other things” (Mk 4:19). They have become so familiar with Christian jargon and their various forms of godliness that they have become cold, indifferent, and dead to its power. People have grown so accustomed to thinking of themselves as Christians, and our nation to be in essence Christian, that in current use the word “Christian” has lost virtually all of its meaning and distinctiveness. Their Christianity consists of little more than vague notions of its truths and their humanitarian activities. Their doctrine consists of nothing more stable than their own opinions, feelings, and emotional experiences. Their sanctification is nothing more than sentimental expressions about Christ, while the real practical life of warring against the flesh, sin, and love of the world is not only neglected but disparaged as unloving, legalistic, and psychologically harmful. I warn you, this is not the Christianity of the Bible, but only a cheap form of it. This is not the life of faith, but the world’s counterfeit version of faith. This is not the way to heaven.
The Consummate Humanitarian
Today’s professing Christian is at their best in purely human relations. He is the consummate humanitarian. He is very community-minded. He is very churched. He is at home in this world. All his values, thinking, and reasoning are in relation to mankind and to their life in this world. His conversations are centered almost exclusively on himself and his life in this world. His faith and theology is primarily man-centered and is based on the best of human logic and reasoning. His salvation is a form of self-salvation, which is really self-worship. The Holy Spirit is not the author of his faith, but his faith is a product of his culture, traditions, education, and his own imagination without any work of God in his heart. There is no life in his faith, and no living and abiding effects of it. He has a form and nothing more. He has a zeal, but without knowledge. He has a knowledge, but without any zeal, trust, or action. Therefore, he never produces the fruit of true saving faith, but has only a form of godliness. His mind has never been transformed from being conformed to this world. He is a good pagan.
An extreme sensitivity to all forms of suffering and injustices, and an extreme reluctance to pronounce any moral judgment are some of the signs by which he may be known. From a purely natural set of values he is the most caring and tolerant of people because all his energies are concentrated on the things of this world and their temporal culture. Whatever benefits man is “good”, and whatever is harmful, unpleasant, and contrary to his self-interest is “bad”. How something impacts his feelings, happiness, rights, self-image, and gratification is the standard for good and bad, not the will and word of God. Good and bad are measured in terms of immediate results, temporal benefit, and worldly well-being, so anything that is unpleasant, causes pain and hardship, requires denying self, and forsaking their life in this world cannot be the will of God. As long as his religion and its teachings and doctrines remain on a natural level, as long as they confine themselves to that which is man-centered and to the betterment of their life in this world, as long as his Christianity is community-centered, and as long as spiritual truths and attributes are defined in relation to man and not to God, he is at his best. But try to force him beyond the bounds of his own self-limitation, or speak to him of truths which to him are foolishness, and try to divorce him from his love of this world, and we are brought up short.
In his estimation we have taken a perfectly good moral teaching designed to make us feel better about ourselves, and make us more tolerant, caring, fulfilled, and happy people, and turned it into some fantastic teaching that demands our total love and devotion, not to the creature, but to the Creator. According to him the teachings of Jesus and the New Testament are to be used with discrimination. Those parts that are in keeping with his form of godliness, that boost his self-esteem, that promote his self-interests, that coincide with his preferences and presuppositions, and that justify his love of the world may be retained and the rest discarded, scorned, or ignored as no longer relevant for today. He can explain away any teaching and justify the neglect of any obedience which might interfere with or infringe upon his worldly lifestyle and self-interests. He can come up with a thousand excuses for why he should not walk by faith, but by his own sense, logic, and feelings, especially when walking by faith conflicts with and cramps his worldly goals, ambitions, and desires. He cannot function outside of his own reasoning; he cannot breathe in anything but a natural atmosphere. He cannot walk by faith, but only by his own sense, feelings, and reasoning. His mind is set on the things of this earth. This is another cause which makes a season dangerous, when the mass of professing Christians become indistinguishable from the world in their tastes, habits, language, lifestyles, values, priorities, reasoning and thinking, and practices.
Another Cause of a Dangerous Season
Here is another cause which makes a season dangerous; when professing Christians mix themselves with the world and learn and adopt their ways and methods. If there is anything that will make a season dangerous, this is it. If there is anything that will lead to the degeneration and apostasy of professing Christians, this is it. This was the cause of all of Israel’s apostasy, “But they mingled with the nations,”, and what was the result of it? They “learned their practices” (Ps 106:35). Bad company still corrupts good morals (1 Cor 15:33). Churches, institutions, ministries, and professing Christians strive to be attractive to the world and to go out of their way to let the world know that they are just like them. They seek to be friends with the world, and to make peace with the world. They look at the world to see what is appealing to the various demographics that make up the world and then imitate and offer those things to the world. They entice and retain worldly people with all sorts of worldly and carnal incentives that appeal to worldly people’s felt needs, personal preferences, darkened reasoning, corrupted emotions, and fleshly desires. They accommodate and pander to the sacrosanct ideologies of man which seek to overthrow God’s clear gender roles and distinctions, principles for parenting, and public morality. God’s worship is redefined as an “uplifting experience” designed to gratify the carnal senses of worldly people, and exalt no one but themselves. Worldly-mindedness and its signs and dangers become a despised and taboo subject.
The hard truths about the love of the world are counterproductive to church growth. Jesus and the gospel become nothing more than the means to realizing all their self-centered worldly goals, desires, and ambitions, reforming the culture, bringing about social justice, and healing their self-image. They not only attempt to serve two masters, but to serve two masters whose interests are totally incompatible, irreconcilable, and hostile to one another. They work to integrate and harmonize the wisdom of the world with the word of God, not by bringing human wisdom into conformity with God’s infallible word, not by making the Bible the standard and rule against which all must be measured, but by making God’s word conform to fallible human wisdom, theories, opinions, methods, values, and practices. If the other marks of a perilous season abound among us, this one superabounds. The Christianity that seeks to make peace with and be friends with the world is a Christianity that God despises, abhors, rejects, and condemns.
Jesus did not come to establish an earthly kingdom, but to purchase a people for Himself to be His subjects, “to live the rest of the time in the flesh no longer for the lusts of men, but for the will of God” (1 Pt 4:2), and to separate His people from those of the world, and their affections from the things of this world. God “caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to obtain an inheritance which is imperishable and undefiled and will not fade away, reserved in heaven for you” (1 Pt 1:3, 4). Is it not ironic that the eternal Son of God did not come to establish an earthly kingdom, yet this is precisely what so much of professing Christianity seeks to do, to build its own little religious empires, to gain and exert political, social, and economic influence, and erect its own little monuments to men? Is it any wonder that the bulk of professing Christians set their hearts and minds on the things of this world?
There are only two kingdoms in this world. There is the kingdom and domain of darkness, and there is the kingdom of Jesus Christ (Col 1:13). The vast majority of people in the world have always lived under and operated from the principles of the kingdom of darkness. The kingdom of Christ, however, while being in this world, is not of this world. In establishing a kingdom not of this world Jesus separates His subjects from the principles, maxims, customs, priorities, lifestyles, and thinking of worldly people. Among the people of this world there is none who are righteous; there is none who understands; there is none who does good (Rm 3:10-18). All their thinking, reasoning, governing principles, wisdom, presuppositions, and affections are corrupt. The things of the Spirit are foolishness to them (1 Cor 2:14), while the wisdom of this world is foolishness before God (1 Cor 3:19). What could be more opposite? Man’s ways are not God’s ways. We have infallible testimony that the world through its wisdom never has and never will come to a true knowledge of God (1 Cor 1:21). The primary governing principle of the world is selfishness, whereas the first governing principle in the kingdom of Christ is self-sacrificial love. The second dominate principle which governs the world is pride, whereas in the kingdom of Christ it is humility. The principle which encompasses the entire spirit of the world is lust – lust of honor, praise, wealth, pleasure, comfort, power, influence, ease, and acceptance – whereas the spirit which encompasses the kingdom of Christ is self-denial and being crucified to the world and its maxims and principles.
It is a maxim of the world that they may indulge in as many pleasures, fads, amusements, and desires not expressly forbidden by the word of God as they please and that their income will allow, but it is a principle of the kingdom of Christ that the grace of God instructs us “to deny ungodliness and worldly desires” (Tit 2:12), and that all we do, whether we eat or drink, is to be done for the glory of God. It is a maxim of the world that they may spend much of their leisure time in activities, entertainments, and idle conversations that serve no useful purpose, but it is a principle of the kingdom of God that we should always be “trying to learn what is pleasing to the Lord” (Eph 5:10), and not participating in the unfruitful deeds of darkness, but instead exposing them, making the most of our time, because the days are evil (Eph 5:11, 16). It is a maxim of the world that they should lay up treasures on earth, and even hoard them and hold onto them with a death grip, but it is a principle of the kingdom of God to “be on guard against every form of greed” (Lk 12:15), to seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and that where your treasure is, there will your heart be also (Lk 12:31, 34), and that the love of money is a root of all sorts of evil (1 Tm 6:10). It is a maxim of the world that success is to be measured by wealth, accomplishments, popularity, fame, and gaining the admiration and respect of the world, but it is a principle of the kingdom of Christ “that which is highly esteemed among men is detestable in the sight of God” (Lk 16:15), and “Woe to you when all men speak well of you,” (Lk 6:26). The people who are most esteemed in the kingdom of Christ are the ones whom the world is most likely to despise, ridicule, and overlook (1 Cor 1:26-29). It is a maxim of the world that prosperity, health, comfort, accommodation, and ease are evidence of God’s favor while hardships, trials, afflictions, and persecutions are evidence of God’s displeasure, but it is a principle of the kingdom of God that “all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted” (2 Tm 3:12), and that we are to “Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance” (Jm 1:2, 3).
There is no end to these comparisons. You cannot take the Bible seriously, and then take a serious and honest look at the world, and sadly at the bulk of professing Christians, without discovering numerous strong points of difference. This is because the mass of professing Christians still live under and operate from the principles of the kingdom of darkness. They have integrated and assimilated its principles all under the guise of evangelism and justified them by the supposed necessity of being relevant. The world’s ways, methods, maxims, and thinking now govern virtually all of professing Christendom, all going under the name of “Christian”. The world loves and listens to its own because the principles by which the kingdom of Christ is governed are diametrically opposed to those which govern the lives and thinking of the world, and even more tragically, the lives of the mass of professing Christians. This makes a season perilous.
As long as the cause remains and increases, so must its effects, “the one who sows to his own flesh shall from the flesh reap corruption” (Gal 6:8). God has proven this is His way in all ages. This makes a season dangerous. I pray with much sorrow for our own nation that its national sin is being nationally punished. We are reaping what we have sown. God has told us in His word that these latter days would be the worst in terms of infidelity, worldliness, falsehood, forms of godliness, and apostasy, and so it is. The sacrosanct rights of people have usurped the rights of God and thrown off submission to Him and His word. “We do not want this man to reign over us” (Lk 19:14) is the spirit of the world and of this age, and so God leaves them to themselves, their love of the world, and its effects. O, that God would awaken us to prayer, repentance, humility, and separation from this world.
Today there are multitudes of professing Christians, pastors, and churches, and they grow more numerous every day, which at one time appeared to be the friends of Christ but are now proving to be dishonest to Him and to be friends with the world. Their minds are set on earthly things. They have spiritualized their worldly desires and ambitions to such an extent that most professing Christians now think that the more of the world they possess, then the more they have been blessed by God; the more the world speaks well of them, the more useful they are for the kingdom of God; the more worldly influence they can wield, the more they can advance the cause of Christ; the more they glory in their shame, the more they display God’s grace. Today entire denominations have capitulated to the world and adopted its wisdom, values, methods and opinions either in whole or in part. Entire systems of theology have been built on the love for this present world. Dying churches, in an attempt to revitalize their ministries, turn to the world and adopt its ways. If there is one thing that characterizes the bulk of professing Christians today it is their being indistinguishable from the world. There is no season like a dangerous season for exposing where a person’s heart and true treasure really lies; whether it is in this world or in heaven where Christ is. No teaching is more ignored, ridiculed, and scoffed at by both liberals and conservatives alike, because both alike have their minds and hearts set on this world and their life in it. Oh reader, you will not be able to blame God for not giving you sufficient warning against the dangers of loving and being a friend of this world.
Mingling with the World
Professing Christians intermingle themselves with the world when they mix and associate in that which is proper to and characteristic of the world. Things that are overtly and obviously evil and of the devil, most professing Christians will not easily involve themselves in. But that which is of the world, “the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life…is from the world” (1 Jn 2:15), these things professing Christians are more ready to engage in. All that is from the spirit of the world, all that the world eagerly seeks after and sets its mind upon, all that by which the world corrupts and is corrupted, and all that which is the fruit of a futile mind, darkened reasoning, human wisdom, and corrupt affections, these things professing Christians are prone to mix themselves with. This includes a corrupt, crass, vulgar, evil, frivolous, vain, and profane speech by which the world corrupts the speech of others. Social media has raised this to new heights. The tastes, habits, fashions, and fads of the world are another instance. It is by these that the world goes about displaying itself for what it is. It is by these that the world exhibits its true colors and displays its sin like Sodom (Is 3:9). They are blind that cannot see immorality, immodesty, perversion, vanity, pride, and self-absorption in the clothing (or lack thereof) and ornamentation by which those of the world dress and adorn themselves.
The degeneration of professing Christians into imitating the ways of the world in its fads, tastes, fashions, and causes may seem trivial and harmless, but it is a mixture in which they learn the world’s ways, practices, manners, values, and habits. A little leaven will eventually leaven the whole lump. Over time they learn the world’s futile way of thinking, its darkened way of reasoning, and its corrupted affections by which the world forms their judgment of what is right and wrong, good and evil, true and false, just and unjust, profitable and unprofitable, kind and unkind, loving and unloving, clean and unclean, holy and profane, and what is Christian and what is unchristian. In this way they grow more and more like the world in every respect until they are as oblivious to the sins of the world and as little bothered by them as the world is. This makes a season dangerous.
If Satan can hide the world’s true colors, if he can represent the world as something other than what the Bible declares it to be, and have us see it as he would represent it instead of in its true colors, then professing Christians will mix and mingle with the world and learn its ways, thinking, values, reasoning, and practices. They may profess Christ with their mouth, but by their deeds they will deny Him. By being conformed to the world in their fashions, tastes, values, thinking, practices, and lifestyles they declare to the world that Christ is not worth forsaking the world for, that the world is more dear to them than Christ, that the world’s opinions and approval is more highly valued by them than to be pleasing to God, and that the gospel has no power to crucify them to the world and the world to them. Today the bulk of professing Christians have thoroughly mixed themselves with the world and learned their practices, making them senseless to the danger of the season in which we live and to the sins and abominations which surround us, and upon which the wrath of God must fall. If professing Christians are determined to be like the world, to imitate the world in its tastes, values, fashions, and lifestyles, to pander to the world’s causes and values so as to be accepted and admired by the world, to adopt the world’s sanitized and psychologized euphemisms for sin so as not to offend the world, then they must suffer the world’s fate. God will not separate. As it goes with the world, so it will go with those who seek to be like it, and to be liked by it (Mt 7:21-23).
A Stranger and Alien
The Christian is to be a stranger and alien in this world (Phil 3:20; 1 Pt 2:11). But how can people who spend so much time and effort keeping up with, following, mimicking, and adopting the fads, trends, tastes, opinions, fashions, lifestyles, values, thinking, reasoning, and worries of this world ever imagine they are a stranger in it? How can those who curry the favor of the world, and who seek to make a name for themselves in this world, be strangers in it? How can those who seek worldly power, influence, and prominence be strangers in the world? How can they be strangers in this world when they set their minds on earthly things? But the true Christian, let them live wherever they will, whether at home in their own home town, or in any other land, they are strangers still. Their minds are set on the things above, where Christ is (Col 3:1, 2). Their treasure is in heaven, therefore their heart, mind, and affections are set on spiritual, not earthly joys, pleasures, and honors. They are spiritually-minded, not fleshly-minded because the mind set on the flesh and this world is death and hostile toward God (Rm 8:6, 7). Not only is the true Christian a stranger in this world, but to the world (and sadly to the mass of professing Christians) they are an enigma; they are strange, offensive, and foolish. Because the true Christian has been born of God, and is a child of God, “For this reason the world does not know us, because it did not know Him” (1 Jn 3:1). The true believer is never at home until they are in heaven with Christ.
What Being a Stranger is Not
Before I describe what it means to be a stranger in this world, first allow me to mention a few things that it is not. It is important to be very clear about this. Many mistakes have been made by well-meaning and sincere people in this matter of separation from the world and being spiritually-minded. We live in a time of great spiritual confusion and misinformation. We must always remember that someone can have a zeal for God without knowledge. These mistakes often cause great harm, both to the people who practice them, and to the cause of Christ. They provide the world with an excuse to disparage all Christians and to malign the way of truth. The practice of Roman Catholic monks, nuns, and desert hermits cloistering themselves away from the world in some sort of self-imposed isolation, thinking this will provide them with some kind of special holiness, is an example of how this doctrine can be perverted. Many strange, quirky, cultish, mystical, legalistic, and harmful sects have arisen because of a misunderstanding of what it is to be separate from the world. Many false claims of extra-biblical revelation and subjective mystical experiences have been put forth under the guise of being spiritually-minded. As in all things, the Bible is to be our pattern and instructor. I shall just mention a few of the most common mistakes concerning what it is to be spiritually-minded and separate from the world.
Being separate from the world does not mean we should give up, or not seek to be proficient, excellent, and knowledgeable in our lawful and honorable earthly professions. It is a mistake to think that unless we are engaged in work that is directly spiritual in nature, then that work is worldly. To the contrary, “Whatever your hand finds to do, verily, do it with all your might;” (Eccl 9:10). All we do is to be done to and for the glory of God; “let him labor, performing with his own hands what is good, in order that he may have something to share with him who has need” (Eph 4:28); “if anyone will not work, neither let him eat” (2 Thes 3:10). The biblical pattern is to carry Christ into your profession, even if it means suffering as a consequence for doing so, not to conform Christ to your profession or use Him as a marketing tool.
Being separate from the world does not mean we avoid associating with unbelievers in the course of our everyday life. The Corinthians had obviously misunderstood Paul’s instructions on this subject, so he had to correct them, “I wrote you in my letter not to associate with immoral people; I did not at all mean with the immoral people of this world…for then you would have to go out of the world. But actually, I wrote to you not to associate with any so-called brother if he should be an immoral person…not even to eat with such a one” (1 Cor 5:9-11). Paul’s instructions for disassociation, to the extent of not even eating with someone, are limited to professing Christians whose lives clearly deny their profession. In other words, the believer is to associate with unbelievers in the course of their everyday life, but not choose them for companions and fellowship with them (2 Cor 6:14), or participate with them in their evil deeds (Eph 5:11). Besides, how long do you think your worldly companions will want to fellowship with you if you no longer run with them into the same excess of dissipation (1 Pt 4:4), if you are exposing their unfruitful deeds of darkness (Eph 5:11), if you are no longer conformed to this world (Rm 12:2), and as an alien and stranger you abstain from the fleshly lusts that wage war against your soul (1 Pt 2:11)?
Being separate from the world does not mean that believers should not help meet the real, genuine needs of the people of this world, and to seek to do good to all men when they have the opportunity (Gal 6:10). It does mean, however, that all a believer’s benevolence toward the world is to be accompanied by the true gospel which alone can meet a person’s true and greatest need, which is reconciliation with a holy and offended God. Jesus fed the multitudes in a time of need, but He did not keep feeding them, even when they demanded He do so. Rather He told them of the Bread of Life which came down from heaven. The multitude was only interested in Jesus for the temporal benefits because their minds were set on the things of this world, but Jesus told them greater truths which are not of this world; truths which when they heard them, caused them to no longer follow Jesus (Jn 6:22-66). The greatest good is that which is done for a person’s immortal soul. Sadly, much of the world’s benevolence comes with worldly strings attached, or aids and abets people in their sin, or creates a dependence upon and enslaves them to the giver, and even creates and perpetuates the problem.
Being separate from the world does not mean having no wholesome and beneficial interests, hobbies, or pastimes other than religious. It does not mean being willfully ignorant of the world in which we live, or of subjects which are not directly spiritual, or of the wonders of God’s creation. It does not mean being indifferent to the moral character of the people who govern your country. There is nothing unspiritual about knowing the assumptions and presuppositions upon which worldly people base their thinking and reasoning, of being able to use things from the secular and natural world, as Jesus did, to teach and illustrate spiritual truth and to demonstrate the futility of the mind set on the things of this earth. All secular knowledge can be redeemed for spiritual purposes.
Being separate from the world does not mean trying to be conspicuously unworldly, and thereby attracting attention to yourself by your unworldliness. This was one of the things for which Jesus condemned the Pharisees, “they do all their deeds to be noticed by men; for they broaden their phylacteries, and lengthen the tassels of their garments” (Mt 23:5). The Christian is certainly to avoid imitating and adopting the gross, bizarre, pagan, and shamelessly immoral attire, lifestyles, speech, ornamentation, and “body art” which characterizes our culture today. Being tattooed with a Bible verse is just as worldly as being tattooed with any other image. But a Christian can dress, speak, and act modestly without being conspicuously strange and provocative. It is just as worldly to dress, act, speak, and adorn yourself strangely so as to attract attention to yourself as it is to dress, act, and adorn yourself grotesquely, bizarrely, ostentatiously, immodestly, and shamelessly.
Many more negative examples could be given to illustrate what separation from the world is not. They abound today. Many mistakes have been made concerning this doctrine, and many continue to be made, resulting in much harm and misery to those who fall into them. True spiritual-mindedness and being a stranger in the world produces a joy, peace, hope, and contentment of which the mind set on this world can know nothing. It frees from the desire of gaining more of the things of this world, and from the fear of losing them. Despite all their efforts, all their counterfeits, and all their idols, they can never attain to this way of living and thinking because it is a work of the Holy Spirit which the world cannot receive (Jn 14:17). It is a fruit of true faith, and the tree must come before the fruit. The cause must come before the effect. The fruit does not make the tree good, but the tree must first be made good before it can bear good fruit, and a bad tree can only be made good by the transforming power of the Holy Spirit working through the pure word of God. Faith comes from hearing and reading the pure word of God, something that is very rare in a dangerous season when most professing Christians will not endure sound doctrine, choose for themselves teachers according to their own worldly desires, turn their ears away from the truth, turn aside to myths, and set their minds on the things of this earth. True saving faith – the faith that walks by faith in the word of God, believes His account of things, trusts His promises, and waits for their fulfillment, even when doing so goes against all sense, logic, feelings, perceptions, and the wisdom of this world – is the effect of the new birth, not the cause of it. A person does not become a Christian by being spiritually-minded, but they are spiritually-minded because they have been made a Christian by the regenerating power of God. The tree must first be made good before it can bear good fruit (Mt 12:33), walk by faith, and be a stranger in this world.
How Christians are Strangers in this World
Being a stranger in this world has always been a distinguishing characteristic and requirement of God’s true people. The Patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob “confessed that they were strangers and exiles on the earth” (Hb 11:13), and that they desired “a better country, that is a heavenly one” (Hb 11:16). Moses considered “the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures of Egypt; for he was looking to the reward” (Hb 11:26). The psalmist declared, “I am a stranger in the earth;” (Ps 119:19). Christians are strangers in this world in several respects.
First, true Christians are not born here; they are not born of this world. This makes them a stranger and alien in this world. They indeed have their first birth, their natural birth in this world, and bear the image of this world from birth, “That which is born of the flesh is flesh” (Jn 3:6). However, their new birth and their new spiritual nature are from above. They are born “not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God” (Jn 1:13); “for you have been born again not of seed which is perishable but imperishable, that is, through the living and abiding word of God” (1 Pt 1:23). When any sinner is made a partaker of the heavenly nature – a nature which is not of this world, and is totally incompatible with the nature of this world – this will make them a stranger in this world as long as they live, and it cannot be otherwise.
Secondly, true Christians must be strangers in this world because they have received a different sort of spirit than the people of this world have, “Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God” (1 Cor 2:12). If the world and the Christian had the same sort of spirit, then they should be reasonably compatible. They could easily partner together in all sorts of humanitarian, political, moral, religious, and social causes. They could easily fellowship together, and enjoy one another’s company in all sorts of activities. They could easily integrate, assimilate, and accommodate the tastes, values, wisdom, goals, customs, opinions, theories, habits, views, spirit, tone, and flavor of this world. This they can do only if they share the same sort of spirit. But “a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them” (1 Cor 2:14), therefore the believer must be a stranger in this world. Righteousness can have no partnership with lawlessness, light can have no fellowship with darkness, and a believer has nothing in common with an unbeliever (2 Cor 6:14, 15). The Spirit which indwells and works in the believer is totally incompatible with “the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience” (Eph 2:2). The spirit of this world and the Spirit who is from God are constant and continuous opponents (Gal 5:17). Perhaps this explains why the bulk of professing Christians and Christianity today are indistinguishable from, and compatible with the world. Perhaps it explains why they so easily and eagerly partner with, integrate, assimilate, accommodate, and mingle with the world and its ways; it is because they are still of the same sort of spirit as the world.
Thirdly, their being a stranger in this world appears in that they speak a different language which the people of this world do not understand. Though they both may speak the same language, and the worldling may indeed understand the words which the believer speaks, only let a believer speak of the things of God and of another world, let them speak of the work of the Holy Spirit in regenerating and sanctifying them, and giving them a love and acceptance of His word in its totality as the infallible word of God, and enabling them to walk more and more by faith and less and less by sight, of being a stranger in this world and of being crucified to the world and the world to them, let them speak of holiness, all of this will be a strange language to their ears. There will be something lying under the shadow of those words which no natural mind can conceive or understand. Every unbeliever and worldling has convinced themselves that there is something in the language of a believer which they do not understand, therefore they call what they do not understand, “can’t”. “The Bible can’t say that.” “That can’t be what that passage, what that word, what that doctrine means and teaches.” “The demands of Christ can’t be so strict, and the way to heaven can’t be so narrow.” “The world can’t be as bad, evil, dangerous, and deceitful as the Bible says it is.” All this is because, “They are from the world; therefore they speak as from the world, and the world listens to them” (1 Jn 4:5). For anyone to speak of the things of God, and the work of God, and the doctrines and truths which God clearly reveals, commands, and prohibits in His word, to reject these as “can’t”, is the same as if they had said, “You are speaking a strange language that we do not understand”. By saying this, let them understand and be convince that they belong to another world and another kingdom than the believer does.
Fourthly, believers are strangers in this world in that they have strange garments which the world can neither see nor like. They are unfashionable and ill-fitting to the worldling. A believer wears two sorts of clothing. The first sort the world cannot see and the second they cannot love. The first the world cannot see because it is only seen by faith, and faith, being the fruit of the new birth which they have never known, this garment remains unseen to them. This garment is the righteousness of Jesus Christ by faith. This the world cannot see, they cannot understand it, they have never seen how a sinner could be counted righteous before a holy God by the righteousness of another, and only the righteousness of the perfect God-Man Jesus Christ. They keep trying to improve upon Christ’s righteousness by trusting in their own or someone else’s, by adding Christ’s righteousness to their own wherever their righteousness falls short, and by hoping to gain some special favor and merit with God by their works of righteousness which are nothing but filthy rags. The second piece of clothing which is worn by the true believer is that which they wear in front of the world, that which is seen by the world, but which the world hates, and that is holiness. This the world sees but it cannot tolerate. If it were possible for the Holy Spirit to indwell a person and not produce the fruit of the Spirit, if His sanctifying and transforming work could be smothered and not produce a holy life and separation from the world, then the world would find no great difference between itself and professing Christians. The world would find nothing about believers that would insight its hatred. The world cannot hate what it cannot see. So when the world sees little distinction between itself and its principles and the lives and principles of professing Christians, it finds nothing objectionable, nothing that is a threat to its own self-interests, nothing that is offensive, and nothing to insight its hatred and hostility. The world is at peace with them, and they are at peace with the world. This makes a season dangerous. The world cannot see the justified state of a believer standing before God clothed in the perfect righteousness of Christ by faith, therefore the world cannot hate it, although they can and do hate the fruit of it. However, when the believer no longer walks just as the rest of the world walks, but walks in righteousness and holiness of the truth, this is something that the world (and sadly this includes the bulk of professing Christians) cannot tolerate. What Jesus told His disciples is still true, “If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you” (Jn 15:19).
The world does not hate those who are at peace with the world. It does not hate those who seek to be its friends, and with those who mix and mingle themselves with the world, learn its ways and practices, speak its language, join its causes, and accommodate its principles. Sadly, this describes the bulk of professing Christians today. If it were not so, professing Christians would not meet with the favor of the world as they do today. Their worldly influence would not be courted by worldly people running for political office. God does not need us to save the world. He does not need us to redeem the culture. Jesus Christ came to redeem not the culture, but all those given to Him by the Father before the foundation of the world, and to call them out of the world. All things, all people, all devils, all events are in His power. He rules the wickedness which abounds today. He rules the raging of the sea and any changes in the climate. He makes all of them to work under His power for the good of His people who are not of this world, and for His own glory. The people of this world cannot do any good for the cause of Christ, and they can only harm it when professing Christians mix and mingle themselves with them and learn and practice their ways. This will always make a season dangerous. This world and its works are reserved for destruction (2 Pt 3:10).
The joy, peace, contentment, and fulfillment for which the people of this world are always seeking are not to be found in the things, people, ways, and wisdom of this world. They busy and weary themselves in the pursuit of them, but they cannot find them. They look downward, outward, and inward, but not upward for them. It is the sovereign decree of God Almighty that nothing can give a sinner true and abiding joy but God in Christ Jesus, and fellowship with Him in His will and His ways. What they seek for is the fruit of the Spirit which the world can neither receive nor comprehend (Gal 5:22; Jn 14:17; 1 Cor 2:14); “My peace I give to you; not as the world gives” (Jn 14:27). This the people of this world will not believe, so they go from creature to creature, object to object, activity to activity, fad to fad, from one form of godliness to another searching and asking where this joy can be found. Each promises, “It is with me”, but each in turn disappoints them and leaves them empty. Yet they continue to go on seeking it day after day in the very things that deceived them yesterday, even in their pets. They willingly deceive themselves because they love to be pursuing what it is impossible for them to attain. If, after many attempts, they discover the futility and emptiness of one pursuit, they then turn to another until they try the whole gamut of things, beings, and devises which the world and forms of godliness have told them this joy is to be found, until at last they die in the pursuit of it, rather than ask, seek, and knock for joy, peace, and contentment from where it is holy, perfect, and everlasting. This would require their denying self and the world, thereby being a stranger in this world and crucified to its lusts, pleasures, values, wisdom, and approval. This world – its ways, values, wisdom, reasoning, thinking, and practices – is under the power of the evil one (1 Jn 5:19), and can provide no more true happiness than hell.
I exhort every believer who reads this study to take care that your life answers the name by which you are called, and that you walk in a manner worthy of the calling by which you have been called. Prove yourselves to be what you profess to be by the estrangement of your affections from this world, and by a heart and mind set on the things above, where Christ is. Do not be deceived. If your mind is set on the flesh and on earthly things, you are an enemy of God. If you love and seek to be friends with what hates God, and is opposed to God, you hate God. Flee to the only One who can make you not just a friend, but a child of God, to the only God and Savior Jesus Christ. He alone is the only Mediator between God and man because He Himself is both God and man. Seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, neither of which are of this world. Pray that He would give you a new heart, mind, and nature not born of this world, and for the fruit of the Spirit to be evident in your life as evidence of your being in Christ.
If Christ is the supreme object of your affections, then that is where your heart and mind will be set, upon Him and where He is. This is the way to prove yourselves strangers in this world, by having your affections crucified to the things of this earth, and having your affections set on things above. Ask and pray that God through Christ would wean your affections from the things of this world and set your mind on the things above, not on the things of this earth. Only in this way will you be able to avoid being ensnared by this world and falling into the dangers posed by these last days, as have the mass of professing Christians today. Pray that God would give you the grace to make you sensible of the danger of the season in which we live, and to which it poses to your precious and immortal soul, and to which the bulk of professing Christians are oblivious. Believe me, it is a great grace which very few today desire and even fewer possess. You will find no mention of a dangerous season in the Bible in which no more than a very few came through. Out of the multitudes of people in Israel during the idolatrous days of Elijah, a season in which Israel had mingled themselves with the world and learned their ways, only 7,000 were preserved who had not bowed to Baal (1Kg 19:18). The rest wavered between two opinions (1 Kg 18:21). Most have their faith overthrown, many will follow false and ruinous ways, and many will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths. This makes a season dangerous.
In our next study we will begin to examine how believers should seek to live in these dangerous times and prepare ourselves for the suffering which must inevitably be produced by them, and that are the consequence of God’s judgment on them.