Have you been separated or set apart unto the Lord? Being separated unto the Lord takes a born-again experience, in other words it can only be done through a miracle brought about by the Lord. When a person is convicted by the Holy Spirit that he is a sinner and drawn by God the Father to Jesus His Son, when is cleansed by Christ’s blood through repentance and acceptance of the grace of God through faith and receives God’s forgiveness then he is separated unto the Lord! Then that person becomes a new creation in Christ, praise the Lord.
My question to you is, do you understand what it means to be set apart or separated unto the Lord? The Apostle Paul said in 2 Corinthians 6:14, “Do not be bound together with unbelievers for what partnership have righteousness and lawlessness or what fellowship has light with darkness.” This covers marriage, business, and ecclesiastical or personal relationships.
A believer has no business dating a non-believer. So many believers think they can change the non-believer and more often than not the believer starts to conform to the non-believers standard of living, in other words the non-believer brings the believer down and ends up weakening or destroying the believer’s faith. It takes wisdom and much prayer to discern whether the other person is a believer or not. When people start dating they are on their best behavior at first even many times pretending to be a believer so as to win the person over to their way of thinking. It is a crying shame that many believers get married to non-believers and live with regret the rest of their lives. That is why Paul gave us, and the church at the time, this warning.
The problem with having a non-believer in a partnership with a believer is somewhat the same. There will be far too many disagreements and arguments because they don’t think the same, nor can they. The same things can happen if you have a personal relationship with friends if you are a believer and they are non-believers.
If you are a believer you know about idols, we are to have none before us, period. Paul says it this way in verses 15-16, “Or what harmony has Christ with Belial, (Satan) or what has a believer in common with an unbeliever? Or what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; just as God said, I will dwell in them and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.”
If we don’t heed these warnings then we are going to bring problems on ourselves and we will have no one but ourselves to blame. Sometimes people do these things after they have heard this kind of message and then they start blaming the Lord which is wrong, the Lord had these things written so that we wouldn’t fall into these traps. This is called hearing the Word then acting on it, not rejecting it and doing our own thing. This may sound harsh but it is the truth.
Then the Word goes on to say in verses 17-18, “Therefore, come out from their midst and be separate,” says the Lord, “and do not touch what is unclean; and I will welcome you. And I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to Me,” says the Lord Almighty.” The Word also says in 7:1, “Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.”
We need to exhibit Christ’s likeness every day and separate ourselves from everything that is evil. If we put these things into practice then we will spare ourselves much grief and heartache. Something to think about, and may God bless you and yours and have a great day!!
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