Knowing The Terror Of The Lord

[Jay]

Originally Posted by Phoenix

You're only speaking to Christians in this post. You are not speaking to the lost and the message they hear. There are "pet sins" that some churches seem to preach hard about every. single. time. the. door. is. open. Trust me, that message gets out, loud and clear, that God hates the sin so much the sinner has no chance of approaching Him. I will absolutely NOT name preachers or churches where this kind of thing goes on. I'm afraid if I started, I'd have to type all night.

Even the verse you quoted... "but the face of the Lord is against them that do evil." How do "the evil" dare approach this God?? His face is against them, He doesn't want them, He can't stand them... I know this isn't what you're trying to say, and I know even in some of these churches with the "pet sins" that they spend so much time on, it's not what they're trying to say. But it's very, very hard to hear anything else when the message of judgment is so loud. You really do not have to tell a sinner they've sinned. The presence of God is awesome and the Spirit reveals more deeply than any preacher could ever preach. But it's done in love, that draws a person to Christ, it never pushes them away. Preach the Jesus of love and compassion and mercy and grace and introduce sinners to Him and let Him change their hearts and convict of sin. He does hate sin...because it keeps us from being who we were created to be and keeps us from doing what we were created to do....worship Him.

Please do not think I "go easy" on sin. I absolutely do not. I can't. The cost is too high.

I hear so much of this that it makes me ill. It goes right in with the 'judge not' crowd. I have not heard 'pet sins' preached against in any one church. Many times if there is a single sin being preached against, there is good reason for it (sin in the pew). Many times the preacher is trying to reach a backslider in the pew before that person leaves the church entirerly. I have then heard other messages preached where no sin was named, but the mercy of God was preached, or any number of other topics. (I heard of a sinner who repented, was baptized in Jesus' name, and received the Holy Ghost after sitting through a 'dry' lesson on thithing.)