Money don’t grow by itself. You’ve got to water it with sweat.”
–Elmer Kelton (Stand Proud)
“Good planning and hard work lead to prosperity, but hasty shortcuts lead to poverty.”
–Proverbs 21:5 (NLT)
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Revelation 2:6, is an interesting verse, “Yet you do have this: You hate the practices of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate.” (HCSB) In this verse, and also verse 15, God says He hates the works of the Nicolaitans. It means something or someone that is utterly repulsive. Their doctrine was based on compromise. “Their belief was to have truce with the world; to meld with the changing moral climate of society.” (Rick Renner) This is something that God abhors–hates.
This is a major problem within the church today. How many churches, and/or individuals are practicing the works of the Nicolaitans? The following is a list of characteristics that a Nicolaitan would show.
1) No emphasis on living holy and separated from the world.
They much prefer to be acceptable with the multitude.
2) No emphasis on the doctrinal teachings of the Bible.
They work under the guise of progressiveness; the Bible is too restrictive and should only be used as a reference.
Sound doctrine is replaced with social action and social justice.
3) No emphasis on absolute truth or absolute biblical authority.
The idea is to be “open-minded.” To be absolute is to be negative.
4) No exclusionary belief that Christ alone is the Way to Heaven.
They use as their disguise–tolerance, asserting that everyone has a piece of the truth. This will lead to universalism. It is interesting that one third of young Christians have this belief. (Rick Renner)
Do you know anyone that has these ideas? Their practices are ones that God hates. What Jesus hates, we, as His followers, must also hate.
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Ponder This: “But know this: Difficult times will come in the last days. 2 For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, 3 unloving, irreconcilable, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, without love for what is good, 4 traitors, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, 5 holding to the form of godliness but denying its power. Avoid these people!” –2 Timothy 3:1-5 (HCSB)
That Scripture goes right along with the Nicolaitans. I saw on the news that students at one school had a walkout, took down the American flag, stomped on it, and supposedly did it in reverence to those killed at Parkland. No, it was chaos, disrespect. Take time to ponder each portion, but I want to draw attention to a few words.
Ponder verse one, hmmmm. Then think of these: lovers of self, disobedient to parents, unholy, without self-control. Do you know these type of people? Do you hang around them? Look at verse 5, Avoid these people!