To acknowledge God simply means admitting or recognizing or accepting His authority or expressing gratitude to Him. In the time that you have been a believer, you have seen some who you know well, who were active in the Lords work backslide, go back to sin or become lukewarm Christians. This has happened so often and almost no one seems to care about. The weeping for the backsliders has become a thing of the past and the reason is the church has lost her discernment and most believers are lukewarm. And since backsliding can happen to any of us, it is good to know where backsliding all begins.
Looking at Rom 1, we read three times that God gave up some people and the moment that happens, they got deeper into sins. See verse 24,26, 28. Backsliding therefore begins when God gives up on someone. God is patient but has said that His Spirit will not strive with man forever. Gen 6:3. He always gives a time limit for repentance but once this time ends, only judgment remains. Rev 2:21. Going back to Romans 1:21, we see that the very first step of backsliding is failure to acknowledge God as God, and honor and give thanks to Him. This made God give them up to their own hearts lusts to impurity; vs 24.
The second time God gives them up is that they served and worshipped the creature more than the creator who is blessed forever. vs 25. Worshipping the creature more than the creator simply means valuing anything above God, e.g job, family, material possessions… for example if God calls you to do something and one of your loved one does not think is important- it maybe your father or mother or a loved one, and you choose to disobey God and please your loved one, that is worshipping the created thing (loved one) more than the creator (God). Or if by telling a lie you will earn some extra money and God tells you to speak the truth, if you decide to tell the lie and then later ‘repent’ you are serving the creature (money) more than God. Everytime you silence the voice of your conscience, you are worshipping the creature more than God.
The third time God gives them up is the because they did not see it an important thing to acknowledge God. Vs 28. God giving up on people is the reason they start living a life of sin. Reading from vs 24-31, we see people living in impurity, homosexuality, all unrighteousness, sexual immorality, wickedness, greed, evil, envy, murder, strife, deceit, gossips, slander, haters of God, despiteful, arrogant, proud, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful- THOUGH THEY ARE FULLY AWARE OF GODS RIGHTEOUS DECREE THAT THOSE THAT DO SUCH THINGS DESERVE TO DIE; THEY DO IT AND APPLAUD AND APPROVE THOSE WHO DO THEM.
All this begun with failure to acknowledge God and give thanks to Him. WHO MAKES YOU DIFFERENT FROM SOMEONE ELSE? WHAT DO YOU HAVE THAT WAS NOT GIVEN TO YOU? IF IT WAS GIVEN TO YOU, WHY DO YOU BOAST AS IF IT WAS SOMETHING YOU ACHIEVED YOURSELF? 1Cor 4:7. These are the three questions that we need to ask ourselves constantly to teach us to always acknowledge God.
If you have something that others don’t have, it was God who gave to you, and thus recognizing this, you will not despise one who do not have what you have. You have good health, and someone is hospitalized, God gave you health. You are always number one in your class and someone else is always last, God gave you your memory. Your business is making profits and another is making losses, God gave it to you. If God takes away the mind He has given you or the health, will you be able to do it? If He took away the opportunities that have made you reach where you are, where would you be? Learn to always acknowledge that it is God who has given you everything you have, and you will never despise or judge others. If you are still standing today and someone else has backslidden, it is God who kept you from falling.
TRUST IN THE LORD WITH ALL YOUR HEART AND LEAN NOT ON YOUR OWN UNDERSTANDING. IN ALL YOUR WAYS ACKNOWLEDGE HIM AND HE WILL MAKE YOUR PATHS STRAIGHT. HE WILL DIRECT YOU ON WHICH PATH TO TAKE. Prov 3:5-6
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