"THE LORD PROVES MEN IN THE FURNACE OF HUMILIATION."
(From Ecclesiasticus 2:5 NEB).
When one is being humiliated by God, it is good. It is intended to remove such dispositions as overweening pride, self-exaltation, impatience, and so on. While being proved in this way, it hurts like a "fire" within one's deepest feelings.
Human spirits within flesh begin with superfluous things, but God sanctifies those who fear Him. A great deal of superfluousness has been handed down to us from our forefathers. Over the centuries, and particularly since Babylonian times when religious idolatry was rife, most of mankind has acquired the instinctive habit of worshipping false gods. Whether it be through the worship of lifeless things that cannot move or reason such as sacred poles, church buildings, and so forth, by those who wear outlandish dress, or through the worship of effigies, erected bardic stones, gods of mythology, etc; OR, WORSHIPPING HUMANS DIRECTLY.
In olden times, some humans were worshipped through the rules and laws that they attached to stone idols. But today it is being done in a more direct way. People worship the ear-tickling utterances of certain people, instead of the corrective disciplines from God. They listen and believe in ideas from the hearts and minds of mere men. Consequently, the Babylonian babe has now become full-grown in 'her' wickedness! Her glory-seekers today love becoming "drunk" with the intoxicating glories they receive from each other, in the gifts of demonic authority (as newly appointed so-called 'elders' through usurpation) with which they appoint each other.
To hold by enslavement the spirit of other human converts to listen to every utterance that comes from their mouths, glory-seekers must constantly be on the lookout for new ideas. And, being without Holy Spirit, they have to manufacture them. For example, a so-called Jehovah's Witness and member of their 'governing body' named Rutherford did declare at a large open-air assembly of people that all those present were anointed. This man by means of this utterance began fulfilling Paul's words to the Thessalonians: "He is set in opposition and lifts himself up over everyone who is called "god" or an object of reverence, so that he sits down in the temple of The God, publicly showing himself to be a god." (2 Thess 2:4). Didn't those people already know whether or not God had anointed them, and whether they were or were not objects of reverence? Whatever, only Almighty God anoints human spirits by means of His Holy Spirit. The question remaining is of course, what did Rutherford anoint all those people with?
That man committed the unforgivable sin against the Holy Spirit of God. Yet his followers today, the composite "man of lawlessness" who usurped God's anointed sons on earth, still give glory to this man in their publications! "So that is why God lets an operation of error go to them, that they may get to believing the lie." (2 Thess 2:11,12). Reverting to the reason for the above title, one should ask: Why didn't God prove Rutherford in the "furnace of humiliation" before he could even commit the unforgivable sin against the Holy Spirit? The answer is that this man did not fear God, so he would not be "patient under humiliation". (Ecclesiasticus 2:4 NEB). Therefore, God ignored him because this "man of lawlessness" had lifted himself up over everyone by taking upon himself the authority of God. Unsealed 'elders' today, those claiming to be spiritual Jews (by acting as 'elders' in congregations) are similarly sinning against the Holy Spirit of God.
25/8/94.