Regarding “Men Have Forgotten God”

Regarding “Men Have Forgotten God”

By Fred Pruitt

(Note: This is a departure from my usual subject. Almost all of what I write is directed at those who already know they are in Christ, and the statements of faith I make in the articles are truth for particularly them. I do not usually write about or to those who do not come to Christ. This article is an exception to my normal “rule.” Nothing I have written below changes anything whatsoever regarding our ministry to the “saints.” But this is more about the “world,” and those who have not yet come to a saving knowledge of Christ. Blessings, fred)

A recent Daily Email from www.christasus.com was a quote from Alexander Solzhenitsyn, the dissident Soviet writer. Below is that quote:

 “More than half a century ago, while I was still a child, I recall hearing a number of older people offer the following explanation for the great disasters that had befallen Russia: Men have forgotten God; that’s why all this has happened.

Since then I have spent well-nigh fifty years working on the history of our Revolution; in the process I have read hundreds of books, collected hundreds of personal testimonies, and have already contributed eight volumes of my own toward the effort of clearing away the rubble left by that upheaval. But if I were asked today to formulate as concisely as possible the main cause of the ruinous Revolution that swallowed up some sixty million of our people, I could not put it more accurately than to repeat: Men have forgotten God; that’s why all this has happened.

What is more, the events of the Russian Revolution can only be understood now, at the end of the century, against the background of what has since occurred in the rest of the world. What emerges here is a process of universal significance. And if I were called upon to identify briefly the principal trait of the entire twentieth century, here too, I would be unable to find anything more precise and pithy than to repeat once again: Men have forgotten God.”

I like that. Boehme talked about it, in the contexts of the history of the nations where the Light first appeared, and then since in other lands where it sprang up with great light – Gemany, England, etc. He said they wandered away from the purity of the Truth and the result was Ichabod, the departure of the Spirit, leaving only the “shell” of religion left, and I think we can see he prophesied truly in our day. Our own nation is following the same track, but what most do not know, I think, is that this is all in the plan, to the glory of God and His elect.

There is a great move out of “religion” for believers in our time, and in smaller ways in times past, but we are not speaking of that. The fact that “men have forgotten God” is as old as the flood of Noah, and as current as our Evangelical “form” of godliness in this country, where many have forsaken the kingdom of heaven to try to manipulate the kingdom of this world in some futile and fleshly attempt to make a “Christian” nation, along the lines of their Pharisaical self-righteousness, living after the fashion of the world to gain the things of the world, rather than the things of the Kingdom.

The testimony of Genesis after the Fall, before Noah, is a testimony of this very thing. Men worshipped the “creature” rather than “the Creator,” and the “glory” of Adam’s beginning was lost in the mire of the flesh and self-in-separation. All forsook their Creator, and there is strong indication that even though Adam “fell,” still the “vitality” of his majestic creation continued long after, witnessed to by the longevity of those early genealogies. I believe that there was still a “memory” of God in those early folk, which declined and declined over the millennia, until it became for most a complete and total apostasy. Noah alone of his whole generation found “grace.” All the rest outside Noah’s family were mockers and scoffers.

It is interesting how Jacob Boehme describes “judgment” when it comes, either in the flood, or Sodom and Gomorrah, or in any other time. In JB’s view, and I am with him on this, “judgment” comes of itself when “sin” has filled up. It is not something that God on the throne looks down from his high perch, sees so-and-so doing something naughty, and decides to “punish” him. It is rather the naturally occurring fruit of the god of wrath as our inner indweller. It is as automatic as burning oneself on the stove by touching a hot eye. God did not “decide” in the moment and say, “Oh look, Jim touched the hot stove. Let’s make sure his hand is burned so he’ll see his error.”

No, it is simply the natural outcome, i.e., the “consequences” of our actions. “Grace” (Christ in us) can come into the picture anytime and change our inner reality and also affect the outcomes of our actions differently than “wrath” does, because the only reward of wrath is wrath for the wrath-manifestor, whereas the grace of God can take that same expression of wrath, and make it beneficial to salvation and enlightenment for the perpetrator as well as those affected by it.

It can be merciful judgment, to get us on the right road, or it can be total destruction, for those who “received not a love for the truth.” As Paul says, “for this reason God sends them a strong delusion, that they should believe a lie … that they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.” (2 Thes 2:11, 12) And also, “he that believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him.” (Jn 3:36).

Of course we know what and where the wrath is, i.e., not in God, but in the inner being of the person who has not received the truth. The Truth, “Christ in us,” is the only avenue available whereby we might escape the wrath that we are in our inner being. There is no other recourse. Not receiving and taking advantage of this one sure recourse that we have and which is available to all men, leaves the wrath intact. When the body falls away, all we are left with is the wrath, and no more “good and evil,” no more comfort and respite from the inner wrath by the things we can use in this world to escape or deny it. We are simply left alone with the devil and his eternal wrath that burns forever. Judgment is immediate; it is in us.

God is a God of Truth and Reality, and what a thing is, a thing is. If it arrives in the glory of the Son, the Father recognizes it and says, “This is my beloved Son, in Whom I am well pleased.” If it arrives as a vessel of wrath, God says, “Depart from me, I never knew you.” This is an “outer” way (because of the dullness of our minds) to show that what we are, we are, and the Divine Stamp is placed on our own choice inwardly.

God cannot “change us” at that point, because it is in His being we have always lived and moved, but we have taken the free being (substance) of God and used it to become a devil. There is no grace for the devil. God will not deny or change our free choice to reject the Light and live in wrath. He gave it into our hands, that we might be free sons, who freely choose, out of Love, to be obedient in faith. Or, God forbid, the opposite.

Therefore, I think it is very appropriate, when speaking of the world at large, to say, “Men have forgotten God.” It is right because we are all born with some knowing inside us of God. I am certain it is there in all men. It calls to us in the voice of conscience, if nothing else. But again we see, if that warning voice of conscience is not heeded again and again and again, and one does not receive a “love for the truth” which in the context seems to be out there available for everyone, then there comes a day, after which the warnings come no more, and the Spirit leaves us to our deadly choice or refusal. As Proverbs 29:1 says, “He, that being often reproved hardeneth his neck, shall suddenly be destroyed, and that without remedy.”

This is the way the universe works. The UR people are on dangerous ground. Among them are the false prophets who prophesy, “All is well, God is pleased with you, and will bring you to Himself whether you receive the Son or not,” and, if you sin, “Ye shall not surely die.” (There is no doubt whose “voice” that is!) This is ULTIMATE PRESUMPTION, because they declare everyone “heaven-ready” and taken right judgment out of the hands of the Father. Even the Son did not do that. They make the scriptures of total none effect. They have made up their own truth, and they will be held accountable.

Of course, we are always available and gracious toward those who seek the truth. We do not quench smoking flaxes or break off bruised reeds. Our vision must extend to all and in all, seeing through to Christ in everyone. Nevertheless, there are those who continually oppose themselves, and teach grave falsehood as those who we mention above. We are always looking for those castoffs from their (and other) ranks who have been brought to the point of “receiving a love for the truth.” As for the rest, Jesus says, “Let them alone: they be blind leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch.” (Matt 15:14).

And as Jesus said in the crowd in Galilee, (Mark 3:35) “For whosoever shall do the will of God, the same is my brother, and my sister, and mother.” The converse of that statement is that those who do not do the will of God, are NOT His family.

These are grave times and the stakes are the absolute highest. The Spirit is longsuffering, but it does not say He waits all eternity for us to turn toward the truth. No, it is clear, we are given a particular time, this time (no other time is promised in scripture for those who think they will get another chance after death), and when we leave this body, whatever we are in spirit is our eternity. God does not decide that for us. We do, and because we have decided, either to receive the Son or to reject the Son, we have our judgment already in us. (See John 5:28,29.)

Wherefore he saith, Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light. See then that ye walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil. (Eph 5:14-16)