*Following God By His Spirit: Product Description
Eph. 1 ... Every person today who belongs to God is "sealed" by the Holy Spirit Who lives inside each believer.
One work of the Holy Spirit is to show us the will of God so we can make right choices (I Cor. 2) ... and another important work of the Holy Spirit is to remind us of everything Jesus has said. (Jn. 14:26)
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April, 2017, the Holy Spirit brought a word to my mind and by that one word I saw the answer to a mystery that has troubled me for the past 40 years. The word was "restraint".
I recalled that word being in following scripture:
II Thess. 2 ... NASB ... Let no one in any way deceive you, for it (the day of the LORD) will not come unless the apostasy comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, who opposes and exalts himself above every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, displaying himself as being God.
Do you not remember that while I was still with you, I was telling you these things?
And you know what restrains him now, so that in his time he will be revealed.
For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work; only he who now restrains will do so until he is taken out of the way. Then that lawless one will be revealed
The restraint was the scripture. When portions of scripture were removed from the church, lawlessness moved into the churches ... thus the apostasy in the churches.
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Since 1982, I have gone to various churches looking for a church I could attend.
Without exception, at each service I heard pastors omitting parts of scripture, changing doctrine from scripture, explaining away scripture. I went to each of these pastors in private and showed them the scripture. Each pastor became angry at me. No one repented nor felt shame for the mishandling of scripture.
When God spoke the word "restraint" to me by HIS Spirit and when I looked up II Thess. 2, NASB, I saw these many pastors are antichrist in their churches. That is what Paul said had to happen before Jesus could return for the church... the apostasy in the church.
I no longer grieved over those churches when I understood this.
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These volumes of "Exhortations for the Church", are written to encourage the people of God in the scripture and in the way of God in the midst of gigantic corruption in churches today.
Joan Boney.