Opening Prayer - Heavenly Father we thank You for this opportunity to worship You and study Your Word. We're eternally thankful that the Holy Spirit has given us a knowledge about Your Word, the Bible, so that we can help lead other people to Your Son. We're especially thankful for the opportunity to do this series on false teachings. Please help us to not be deceived by these teachings. We pray that everyone who reads or listens to these sermons who are not a Christian will become a Christian. We thank You for this Easter that You have given us. Your Son overcoming death, hell, and the grave is worthy of eternal praise. In Jesus' Name, Amen.
Worship music - Please click the links and sing along if you know the words (You can also click skip ad to go straight to the songs) -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Oz_caE8oQE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qkqn6kpm3sc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TxaAmNuL7BU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yLgtd_kkxw
False Teachings
The Lord has led me to do a Sunday evening series on popular teaching in churches that has literally sent people to hell. The unfortunate thing is that these pastors and teachers refuse to admit that they are wrong and change their views. However, not all of these pastors and teachers are trying to trick people, but it is very important for you to learn about these unbiblical views and warn others so they will not be deceived by these false teachings. Therefore, please pass these sermons on to others.
Before I begin to warn you about teachings that are false, the Bible actually instructs members of a church to remove people from their church who claim to be Christians, but they refuse to stop their evil ways. This definitely includes proven false teachers who are pastors and Sunday school teachers. 1 Corinthians 5:12,13; 2 John 1: 9-11; 1 Corinthians 5:2,7; 2 Corinthians 6:14-16; 2 Corinthians 11:3-6,12-15; 1 Timothy 1:3; 3:1-10; and Titus 1:6-9 support this.
False Teaching # 18 -
Ephesians 2:8,9 says, "For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast." But I try not to remember the next verse because that talks about works.
The Bible's teaching -
Ephesians 2:10 says, "For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them."
We could never do enough good things that would cause our sins to be erased. The blood that Jesus shed on the cross is the only thing that can erase our sins, and Jesus gave us His blood as a gift. However, someone can trust His blood to erase their sins, but if they "never in their life" (with the exception of those who get saved but don’t live long after that or people who are in bad health and can’t get out and do much) change and begin to do good works, they was never saved in the first place. This is explained in James 2:26 which says, "For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also." A similar verse is Titus 1:16 which says, "They profess that they know God; but in works they deny him, being abominable, and disobedient, and unto every good work reprobate."
These are examples of good works -
spend more of your money on things like evangelistic associations, charities, and things for God’s purposes instead of entertainment and material type things (Matthew 6:19-21), if you have money left over from providing myself with food, clothing, and shelter, you're willing to give to those who have needs and/or ask the church that you attend and support financially to help meet their needs (Luke 12:16-21);
teach people the Bible (Matthew 28:19), counsel with people who are having problems (Galatians 6:2), encourage others (Hebrews 10:25), correct other believers when they sin (Galatians 6:1), and tell people how to become Christians (2 Timothy 4:5) by mouth, through email or social media, and/or by handing out or dropping off Christian tracts in places like stores or restaurants where people can pick them up;
feed, clothe, and provide shelter and financial help for the less fortunate, and visit people in hospitals and jails (Mark 12:30-31);
do acts of kindness for people that will make God look good in front of others (for example - cook, clean, do people’s yard work, help people shop, wash people’s cars, fix people’s appliances) (Matthew 5:16);
Ephesians 2:10 means that each Christian is born into this world for a reason, and that is to do the good works that God planned for them to do. Each Christian should know what good works they are supposed to do because the Holy Spirit will urge them and give them thoughts to do certain things. For example, you might see someone who looks depressed and could use someone to talk to. The Holy Spirit may urge you to talk to them and be a comfort to them and even lead them to the Lord. A verse that is similar to Ephesians 2:10 is John 15:16 when Jesus said, "Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you."
Many people also don't realize that if someone wants to become a Christian, they must be willing "from that moment on" to begin doing good works. I do believe, however, that the majority of people who are Christians right now didn't consider that before they trusted Jesus' shed blood on the cross to erase their sins and let them into Heaven. Their hearts were already very willing to put Jesus first in their life before they made a decision to become a Christian, and it really showed because they began to do good works. When someone gets saved and the Holy Spirit comes into their heart, that person will definitely have a major change in the way they live, no matter what they said in the prayer they prayed to God in order to get saved.
However, the point is that multitudes of people in today's world pray or make a decision to get saved so they will go to Heaven, but they have little or no desire to follow Jesus "from that moment on" (live like Jesus lived while He was on the earth). I promise you, a major part of following Jesus is doing good works. While Jesus was on the earth, He made God look good by helping others (doing good works), and when He wasn't doing that, His mind was on His Father. This is how someone needs to be "willing and wants to" live if they want to get saved. Jesus repeatedly drove thousands of people away from Heaven because they were not willing to follow (imitate and obey) Him - Please see the following websites - http://chriswaug5.wix.com/chap6 and http://chriswaug5.wix.com/chap7
After reading these biblical truths, we definitely shouldn't try not to remember what the Bible says about good works.
If you have prayed or made a decision to trust Jesus' death on the cross and His shed blood to erase your sins and let you into Heaven, but you haven't been following (doing good works) Jesus, please follow this website - http://chriswaug5.wix.com/makingsure
If you have prayed or made a decision to trust Jesus’ death on the cross and His shed blood to erase your sins and let you into Heaven, but you have fallen for this false teaching (1 Thessalonians 5:21), please follow this website - http://chriswaug5.wix.com/makingsure
If you have prayed or made a decision to become a Christian, but you are not sure that you are really a Christian (Hebrews 11:6, Matthew 21:18-22, 1 John 5:14, and Hebrews 11:1), you need to be sure - please follow this website - http://chriswaug5.wix.com/howtogotoheaven
If you have never prayed or made a decision to trust Jesus' death on the cross and His shed blood to erase your sins and let you into Heaven, please follow this website - http://chriswaug5.wix.com/howtogotoheaven