"...have left your first love" - What does it mean?

[mmijares]

I was raised Catholic and was very religious at a very young age.  I was even a "sacristan" (I don't how this is called in English), one who helps (is beside) the priest during the mass.  But when I became a teenager (probably 14), I forsook my being a catholic and joined the Oneness Pentecostal movement.  My energetic attitude made me to become "someone" in the Pentecostal Church.  But it also faded when I discovered the "secrets" of our pastor.  I left that Church and had gone to world for several years until I felt the "need" of being in the church again because I wanted to raise my two kids with a "church" to attend to.  Then I found one of the splinters of Worldwide Church of God.  I was there for more than a year, "keeping" the sabbath, tithing, "observing" the holy days, "abstaining" from unclean meats, etc.  But then, I kind of "fed up" from these "strict letters of the law."  As I was again with "no religion", I stumbled to the universal salvation, "Christ being made" topics.  This is new, I thought.  Then my further searching and studying led me to Bibletruths.com.

I repented of my sins.  But I still sin.  I'm completely aware of them.  I still keep grudge to someone, I steal a number of hours of my work, I sometimes look lustfully to other women..... I seldom pray anymore.

Now, I'm here in BT.  Just reading and learning.  Am I eventually will be called and chosen?  But to be chosen I must have "left my first love".  Surely from the above story, I haven't, have I?  I was deceived.  I did not love the real God and real Christ then.

So, if I haven't left my first love yet, at what point in my life will I do that?  Is it after reading the truth and ignoring them?

Thanks for the time reading and commenting.

- Mijares

[Deborah-Leigh]

Hello mmijares

Welcome to the Forum!

I was raised Catholic and was very religious at a very young age.

It was there that you left your first love when you became very religious at a very young age.

The spiritual house you have been building  on sand has for ever since been crashing down. Look. It could never stand on the sand. It has to be built on the Rock that is the Truth of Christ and His Word that is expounded here in Bible Truths. Look how your house could not stand no matter how earnistly you tried to build it.

...it also faded...I discovered the "secrets" of our Pastor.....I left that Church...fed up.....

You ask:

Am I eventually will be called and chosen?  But to be chosen I must have "left my first love".  Surely from the above story, I haven't, have I?

On the contrary. You have left your first Love at a very young age as you became "very religious".

Jas 1:27  Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.

You are definitely being called!

You are being called to COME OUT OF HER. The her you are being called to come out of is Mystery Babylon the Mother of all the Harlot Daughter Church's of Christendom.

Keep reading the teachings here to familiarise yourself with Truth and this should lead you further and further away from the deceptive, devisive  seductions of Mystery Babylon.

Arc

[soberxp]

Hello mmijares

Welcome to the Forum!


Revelation 3:  
1 "To the angel of the church in Sardis write: These are the words of him who holds the seven spirits of God and the seven stars. I know your deeds; you have a reputation of being alive, but you are dead.  
2 Wake up! Strengthen what remains and is about to die, for I have not found your deeds complete in the sight of my God.
3 Remember, therefore, what you have received and heard; obey it, and repent. But if you do not wake up, I will come like a thief, and you will not know at what time I will come to you.


Wake up! MAN !! O' it's too easy to say,hard to do,isn't it?

[mharrell08]

So, if I haven't left my first love yet, at what point in my life will I do that?  Is it after reading the truth and ignoring them?

Thanks for the time reading and commenting.

- Mijares

Hello Mijares,

Like Arcturus pointed out, you have left your first love...and actually (just like many people on the forum) you have left your first love NUMEROUS times. Welcome to the club 

In all seriousness, take a look at the following excerpt from Lake of Fire part 13, with bold sections in particular:

WHEN FIRST WE SEE THE BEAST

Why is John standing on the sand of the sea when he first sees the wild beast rise out of the sea? Why isn't he standing on solid rock when first he sees this wild beast? Because standing on the sand of the sea depicts our spiritual condition at the time that we see a wild beast come up out of the sea. When we see the wild beast, God shows us our vulnerability.

We are standing DEFENSELESS on the sand of the sea!

There is a spiritual process that God takes His called and elect through that only the few ever experience. The common opinion seems to be that one can become sick and tired of his sinful ways, and so turn to Jesus Christ to get him out of his mess. Once he has accepted Jesus as his Saviour, it is presumed that all will begin to go well with the new convert.

Finances will improve, health will improve, our social life will improve, and certainly our spiritual life will improve. As we study and pray and go to church, it is believed that one will progress further and further until one's life is nearly perfect. In fact, if one is still having trials and tribulations after decades in a church, it is assumed by all that that person is not living right and that God is cursing him for some sin or disobedience.

I showed you in a previous installment that the very first thing that Jesus pointed out as a spiritual flaw in the first of the Seven Churches, was that they "LEFT their first love."

This is referred to in fundamental circles as "backsliding." But, supposedly, only a few ever "backslide." Most, it is assumed, just keep growing and growing from grace to grace until they die a happy death of old age.

The Seven [COMPLETE] Churches of God represent the WHOLE CHURCH OF GOD in all generations. And so, what is it that God says those who are ALREADY IN THE CHURCH have to do if they are to overcome and be in the Kingdom of God? Answer:

    "Remember therefore from whence you are FALLEN, and REPENT..." (Rev. 2:5).

Repent of WHAT? Repent of "...leaving your FIRST LOVE."

But you say, "I have never left my first love." Well then, this Scripture isn't speaking to you. But everyone who does make it into the Kingdom, does leave his first love. There are those, however, who have left their first love, AND DON'T EVEN KNOW IT! Repenting will come especially hard for them, as they see nothing to repent of.

Whenever someone is called of God and he repents, is baptized, confirmed, initiated, or whatever, it is into a church. And sooner or later that particular church will bring you to the point where you will leave your first love for God and turn to the church and its religion as the idol of your heart. God calls His people OUT of the Babylonish System of Religion which has a strangle hold on 'The Church.'

"Mystery Babylon the Great" is a CHURCH! But it is also A SPIRITUAL WHORE:

    "For this Agar is mount Sinai in Arabia, and answers to JERUSALEM which now is, and is in bondage with HER CHILDREN. But Jerusalem which is ABOVE is free, which is the MOTHER OF US ALL" (Gal. 4:25-26).

Jerusalem above is our MOTHER. Jerusalem below is also a MOTHER with children in bondage. Revelation speaks clearly of this Mother and her Children:

    "And there came one of the seven angels which had the seven vials, and talked with me, saying unto me, Come hither; I will show unto you the judgment of the GREAT WHORE that sits upon many waters [peoples and nations and tongues]:

    With whom the kings of the earth have committed [spiritual] FORNICATION, and the inhabitants of the earth have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication.

    So he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness: and I saw a WOMAN [a church] sit upon a scarlet colored WILD BEAST, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns.

    And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet color, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls [possessing many of the blessings of God including the pearls of God's Word], having a gold cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication:

    And upon her forehead was a name written,

MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT,
THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND
ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH"
(Rev. 17:1-5).

And now for one of the most amazing Truths in all Revelation:

    "And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, "Come out of her [Mystery Babylon the Great], MY PEOPLE, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues" (Rev. 18:4).

GOD CALLS HIS PEOPLE OUT OF THE VERY CHURCH THAT HE CALLED THEM INTO!

    "Many are called but few are chosen" (Matt. 22:14).

Few realize that there is a "church WITHIN the church." When God chooses us FROM AMONG the called, we become separate from their doctrines and sins. We are still "The Church of the Living God," but we are a peculiar people that no longer follows the traditions of men, which the many called who are building the house upon the sand continue to follow.

Therefore, WE WILL SEE THE BEAST that comes up out of the sea. We will be forced to WAR with the beast from the sea. And we will be OVERCOME by the wild beast. This really is serious business.


And like Ray points out, this is the sum of one 'leaving their first love':

Whenever someone is called of God and he repents, is baptized, confirmed, initiated, or whatever, it is into a church. And sooner or later that particular church will bring you to the point where you will leave your first love for God and turn to the church and its religion as the idol of your heart. God calls His people OUT of the Babylonish System of Religion which has a strangle hold on 'The Church.'

That's it...no great or elaborate mystery. When you initially wanted to serve and obey God, you (and everyone else on this earth) thought that had to be done in a church. So that's where we went, and once there, that's where we went from 'serving and obeying God' to 'serving and obeying ourselves' (ie 'traditions of men'). Even the few who wanted to serve God outside a church building, even they STILL followed the idols of their hearts over the Word of God. We could not obey the Word of God until He began to open our understanding of the scriptures. [Luke 24:45].

Now, I'm here in BT.  Just reading and learning.  Am I eventually will be called and chosen?  But to be chosen I must have "left my first love".  Surely from the above story, I haven't, have I?  I was deceived.  I did not love the real God and real Christ then.

You will be called, chosen, and faithful when God lifts you up and makes you into the 'new man' not in accord with the old man (fleshly/carnal) [Eph 4:24, Col 3:10]. It will happen because that's WHY God has placed the desire in you to seek Him. In this age, God only gives us the earnest of the spirit [2 Cor 1:22], which is a promise of our full inheritance [Eph 1:14]. It is what works in us to seek Him and His Kingdom [Matt 6:33], it is what works in us to good works [Eph 2:10], and ultimately it is what works and inspires us to have faith and believe in Jesus, the Son of God:

1 John 5:13  These things I write to you that you who are believing in the name of the son of God may be perceiving that you have life eonian.

That 'life eonian' is being in the Kingdom...being of the Elect and with Christ, healing and blessing the nations.

Gal 3:8-9  the scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the heathen through faith, preached before the gospel unto Abraham, saying, In thee shall all nations be blessed. So then they which be of faith are blessed with faithful Abraham.

Rev 22:2  In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.

It will happen in your life because God is working in you, not of yourself. Trust in Him


Hope that helps,

Marques

[mmijares]

Thank you very much friends.

I didn't understand at first that there is "a church inside the church," and that my love towards God and my desire to serve Him had become idol of my heart by thinking "I CAN" become a good servant of God by following the traditions (or rules if you may) of church or men not knowing that I didn't possess anything good in myself that will enable me to do good works.  Indeed, that was the time I left my first love.

I pray to our Father that He give me that fire in my heart again to love Him with all my soul because He first loves me.

-Mijares