Religion is a scam and is among the things holding us back in this country.someone don't need religion to live a good and peaceful life but if it is religion that is stoping many people from becoming bad person that mean they are already a bad person.#fact

This is the real truth here.

But the Prosperity Gospel proponents who believe you have to sow to be rich irrespective of the state of your soul (I.e. using the theory of "universal principles" to explain why unbelievers are rich and all that hogwash) and that enjoying earthly pleasures is a right for Christians will avoid the topic

Christ'smessage ab initio was a message of self-denial. His disciples even commented on the fact that they had left families to even follow him.

Thank you for this piece. The road to salvation is straight and narrow and few will be found in it. Those who don't understand the position of Christ in fulfilling the Law will come here and start talking what they don't know of.

Janeyinspires:
Trying soo hard to be holy was what made me to conclude that Christianity is hard;in a post I made on my blog.
.
.
.

I was depending on my own effort,not knowing that Christ is my holiness.And He has given me the free gift of righteousness.(Rom5:17)
.
.
.

Of a truth,no one can fulfill the law.That was why Christ came.He fulfilled the law on our behalf.
So,we should all stop trying to fulfill the law on our own, and start resting in what Jesus did for us.......don't know who this is meant for out there.
.
.
.
You shall know the truth and it shall set you free.
Do you know that Romans 6:7 says, "he that is dead is freed from sin?"

Christ died in our place,so we are now free from sin.
Keep rolling'em out,jiggaz.

So we should stop tithing?

Jesus is our leverage, not actually a shortcut but He's the different between trekking and being in flight, not just flying but in autopilot,

How swEet!

How can one man's sin be carried by his descendants? Every man for himself. Prophet Adam (AS) committed a sin, became remorseful and sought forgiveness and was forgiven.

Dreahlami:
Religion is a scam and is among the things holding us back in this country.someone don't need religion to live a good and peaceful life but if it is religion that is stoping many people from becoming bad person that mean they are already a bad person.#fact

Christianity is not religion. Humanity is greater than Religion. Christianity is faith expressing itself through love. Humanity is love. Therefore Christianity > Religion.

Argue with your ancestors

I laugh at people ignorance,
Christianity is hard if you try to follow the law instead of living in grace that is the free gift of Jesus death on the cross.
People following the law means JESUS DIED FOR NOTHING.

bloodofthelamb:
This is the whole truth.
Oh Lord make them see this truth like you make me see it for understanding comes from you. In Jesus name, Amen

Amen my brother

Noting like Christian life so hard. You humans are just wicked.

fecta:
I laugh at people ignorance,
Christianity is hard if you try to follow the law instead of living in grace that is the free gift of Jesus death on the cross.
People following the law means JESUS DIED FOR NOTHING.

Henceforth, I should start living my life the way I like? After all, grace has covered everything.

This is a false teaching that emanates from the deceiving spirits. Or it is more likely you people purposely twist the scripture to suit your lust desires and to keep enjoying the pleasures of sins.

Message of salvation is very serious. The way to heaven is not smooth at all.

The Christian lifestyle is so hard for Naijans because so many of them are perverts and greedy as fūck, don't give a damn about organization or higher society.

I'm not a Christian but holy cow Naijans are the biggest fucking hypocrites, preaching morals to the "decadent West" when they watch more porn than practically all of europe combined - I've even seen Naijans sexualize bloody churchgoers and pastors before.


"I'm a good christian Naijan gonna help the needy and do my bit for societ- Hrrrgh Lisa Ann is so hot Fap Fap gonna look at Naijan booty pics and be a drug dealer who ruins society, or get into govt. embezzle a few hundred million out of state funds and run away to my private strip-hotel in Madagascar"

Every. Fūcking. Time.

Janeyinspires:
Trying soo hard to be holy was what made me to conclude that Christianity is hard;in a post I made on my blog.
.
.
.

I was depending on my own effort,not knowing that Christ is my holiness.And He has given me the free gift of righteousness.(Rom5:17)
.
.
.

Of a truth,no one can fulfill the law.That was why Christ came.He fulfilled the law on our behalf.
So,we should all stop trying to fulfill the law on our own, and start resting in what Jesus did for us.......don't know who this is meant for out there.
.
.
.
You shall know the truth and it shall set you free.
Do you know that Romans 6:7 says, "he that is dead is freed from sin?"

Christ died in our place,so we are now free from sin.
Keep rolling'em out,jiggaz.

Matt 5:48 'Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect'.

I Peter 1:15-16 'But as he which hath called you is holy, so be ye holy in all manner of conversation,
Because it is written, Be ye holy for I am holy'.


No wonder the rate of moral decadence in our society today cannot be over emphasized, because sound doctrine is no longer in the church. There is no difference between the church and the world.

The kind of preaching that comes from the pulpit is what will make the church members laugh, laugh and laugh. After the preaching, they will start clapping for the pastor/preacher.
Nowadays, it is what members want to hear, not necessarily what rebuke sin in the life of a sinner that they preach.

There is no more preaching that will force tears out of the eyes of sinners.
Message of repentance, holiness, righteous, moral, rapture are no longer necessary, Jesus has died in our place?

the christian life is not hard. it looks hard because most of you (or us to make you feel better) nigerian christians are dumb. you say christianity is hard because you pray when you're supposed to be working to get results. you refuse to do little things because you too busy believing in the promises of greatness in the bible. promises which make you expect to be something you will never be if you don't work or work hard promises which make that make our expectations too high. promises that make us over-anticipate. I heared a lot of us pray constantly that god should fix the nigerian government issue when the dollar started rising astronomically against the naira to the point where tomatoes became more expensive than imported apples. and what was the result? we started making foolish jokes that "no condition is permanent. tomatoes are now more expensive than apples." we go to school to become "great in life" expecting that we will become something the word will see as an image to be respected! the world! for f*ck's sake not even nigeria! that is why no matter how rich we are if we have not traveled to america to use a decade or at least some months, we don't believe we have achieved! if we do a small and legal business that makes us millions in secret we are not satisfied until we make sure people see that business as a big business by opening a bigger store for the business for all to see that we have achieved. we go to pastors and oracles to ask for the courses we and our children should do in universities believing the choice of god or the oracle is the best. believing that what the oracle or holy spirit has chosen is the course that will make us or our children millions after they finish school. believing the courses will take them to "greater heights" in life a stupid belief we have had in us before christianity came to nigeria (believe it or not)! we now fuel this beliefs (that grew in us mostly because we are too lazy, too docile and too competitive as a result of tribalism and family issues) when Christianity came to nigeria because we found a god that shares our ambitions but we refuse to see that go works hard even though he's a cosmic being. we refuse to see that god made a earth, a "house" where adam and eve will "live in" (live on actually) before he made adam and eve! he did not make adam and eve in space and later make earth and later put them on it. we refuse to see that he already make the weather and climate and the food (plants) to sustain adam and eve before he made adam and eve! but we get married and have children in poverty believing that there is nothing god cannot do. believing that as long as we serve god a magic will one day happen that will turn our lives around. and to make this worse we instill this beliefs of foolishness in our children and the cycle continues! And before i forget, talking about education, I once met a girl who wanted to do nursing. she loves nursing so much and decided to apply for jamb with the hopes of using nursing as her first choice but her parents refused and forced her to go to their church pastor for a "divine choice" from god. It would seem that at the end of it all "god" or "holy spirit" or maybe even the pastor himself chose computer science for the girl. we met later because of the issue she was having with the course in school (one of my friends had told her about me and my vast knowledge of computers and programming (i did not say unlimited knowledge o! before you all come and destroy me wirelessly)). She could barely keep up and was struggling to not fail the course as she told me! what she needed my help for was to know if if i could give her advice as to how she could eventually apply her knowledge of computer science to nursing in the future, scientifically. I told her that unless she wanted to just print patient reports on paper from a computer using ms word or excel there was no other option. she felt sad but then i told her that she could make (manufacture) or program medical devices using the knowledge of embedded systems programming. she became happy until i told her that that kind of venture does not exist in nigeria. I mean who manufactures ECG or Blood pressure monitors in this prehistoric country? nobody! our discussion ended there and she accepted her fate. she might end up finishing school and finding a job or even creating one for herself but it will not be what she loves. it will not be what she's creative at. mind you the story gets worse for some other people. The mistake her parents made is to believe that life is about making it, that life is about being rich (money is good and important, dudes) and they fuelled their foolish belief with christianity! this is where we get it all wrong. In the end if something bad happens to the girl as a result of the course they chose for her the would say "that is the way god wants it!" Not all our parents are wise, believe me. they were once young. they dont really have much in their brains. if they did we would have met a better nigeria on ground by the time they f*cked us into existence. I had thesame issues with my parents too, my mother especially. but i fought her hard and sacrificed a lot of things in my life to gain my freedom (i almost killed her out of anger and frustration because of her dictatorship attitude). Now she respects my decision after making a lot of cash with the choices i personally made and not her choices and after i made her realized the damage she'd done even to my father's life (i will come to that later). This woman layed a heavy curse on me because i was trying to fight for my life and save myself from her dominion. It was a pastor or should i say god that raised the curse the sunday of that friday she dropped the curse on me (the words came out of the pastor's mouth anyway)! believe it or not! my own mother cursed me because i was not obliging to her orders because she believes in money and religious glory (the kind i mentioned earlier!). Returning to the girl's issue. Her parents refuse to see that what we are chasing after right now took the westerners hundreds of years and generations to put together. but all we want to do is dominate it. we fail to see that the people that made what we are chasing are the ones that are truly great (i hate using that word now). We refuse to see that life is about living it day by day. we refuse to see that everything cannot come together in a day. and when we cause inadvertently cause a spiritual problem for ourselves in the problem while refusing to do things like farming because we see it as a non glorious thing we start saying the christian life is hard.
The next sub topic i want to talk about has been hinted earlier. It's about women and marriage. I have noticed that in nigeria we overrate women and marriage. we see having both as reaching the height of life. We start dating a girl at sixteen doing everything she wants because of dumb love and when the girls grow up and become too demanding for material things we start complaining forgetting that we allowed that and let it grow when we men were young. she grows up to someone that use sex to control you because you were too busy porking or begging to pork her when you were dating not realizing that you were slowly becoming her slave thru sex. so when you grow up and marry her she will start using that as a tool to f*ck with your life, denying you of sex if you don't do something stupid or out of line that she wants. i've met some girls who believe that the fact that men (their husbands) pork means they are being used. get it? they don't see it as a mutual responsibility. so men end up believing they have to "respect" their women because of the sex they get from them. they end up believing that they are actually using their wives when they pork their wives. they end up living in the secret fear that they might end up making their wives upset by asking for sex at all or by doing something they believe thier wives will see as something that is out of line. this slowly makes them weak and docile and in the end they end up believing that the christian life is hard. coming back to my dad's issue. this is the reason why my my dad became an idiot for my mom till today.
I have also noticed that we men in nigeria worship women in a way. a lot of us (and a lot of those that i've met) believe that women must be respected both young and old because "they are our mothers" Our mothers?! how any p*ssy did you come out from?! We believe we should treat carefully any human that has boobs or that will grow up to have boobs. Why because we are secretly dumb and secretly lustful(this is not biblical but my personal conclusion after years of research). We believe it is a curse to beat a woman (i did not say wife (that is not a curse too but it's bad anyway)) no matter how young, even a girl child. We aquire everything we acquire in life to impress a woman. It's stupid! This is why we nigerian men are so docile because right from a young age we have been seeing every woman as a near supernatural being that can lay a curse on you if you do something they don't like and. If you men want to come back on top in this country you have to make sacrifices. loose that sexy girl for one that is not so sexy but respects you. We also have this habit of believing that if we marry at an age more that twenty five, something is spiritually wrong! what gives!!!!!! and when we are done marrying without sense in our brains. the women starts doing to us we are afraid of doing to them. And when we're frustrated we start saying christian life is hard! Sacrifices must be made! we want ta have everything but we end up loosing everything. We are suckers for women. An average nigerian woman cannot make the smart decision that an average English teenage girl can make. They breed themselves with the sole purpose of getting married. and when they do most of them dont really care how their husbands feel abour their bad attitudes. Yet we keep getting married to the blindly. We attribute every beautiful thing in life to the female body (i wont talk about this but it is worth mentioning). Too much on my mind to say. But just know that even though spiritual problems are common in nigeria, our lack of common sense and excessive belief in God's magical intervention in situations will keep dooming us and we will keep saying trash like the christian life is hard. Most christians are mothereffers and b*tches who only serve god blindly because of what they want. I am a christian and i have spoken even though i don't attend church regularly ( i hate it). God would not have raised that curse my mother dropped on me if i were not a christian (or a human) he cared about. and it only took him three days. he did not let it wait until i got married with sixteen kids before he raised the curse. which shows that what my mother did was wrong even though mothers and fathers have authority over their children. what they fail to see is that the authority is to a limited degree. Its should start diminishing once a child reaches a certain age. but evil mothers especially refuse to let go of a child once he/she reaches that age.
What is life? life is about living it day by day. life is about waking up, eating, having fun, doing stuff. If you refuse to live life carefully and slowly life will consume you. The christian life is not hard the problems we give ourselves is what makes it hard.

Fegelfire:
The Christian lifestyle is so hard for Naijans because so many of them are perverts and greedy as fūck, don't give a damn about organization or higher society.

I'm not a Christian but holy cow Naijans are the biggest fucking hypocrites, preaching morals to the "decadent West" when they watch more porn than practically all of europe combined - I've even seen Naijans sexualize bloody churchgoers and pastors before.


"I'm a good christian Naijan gonna help the needy and do my bit for societ- Hrrrgh Lisa Ann is so hot Fap Fap gonna look at Naijan booty pics and be a drug dealer who ruins society, or get into govt. embezzle a few hundred million out of state funds and run away to my private strip-hotel in Madagascar"

Every. Fūcking. Time.

Exactly my point!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
You are on point!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Man2utd:
Christian life seems hard because it gives rest of mind.

It says thou shall not steal, if you don't steal you don't have to worry that someone is after you.

It says do not commit adultery- So the husband won't find out someday and hack your neck.

Love your neighbour as yourself - it gives you peace of mind to know you don't harbour hatred in your heart.

Avoid fornication- you don't have to worry about unwanted pregnancy and STDs.

Then what about be poor so you don't worry about thieves and kidnappers
And also be rich so you don't worry about little things money can make easy?

jiggaz:
Believers, not only is the Christian life hard to live by human effort, it is impossible to live. Only Christ can, so we have nothing to boast about. This is why we sing “‘tis no longer I that liveth, but Christ that liveth in me.” Here’s an illustration:

I'd been doing my best to resolve the mosquito issues we'd been experiencing at my home for some months. This breed of mosquitoes seemed to laugh off regular insecticides when I used it on them. I'd use Baygon on them and see their dead bodies strewn all over the floor afterwards but our relief was always short-lived; they'd be humming all over the place again within hours! They tormented me day and night.

But one day, I remembered Integrated Science or was it Home Economics from secondary school: mosquitoes need stagnant water to breed! I rushed outside: close to our living room windows were two buckets, both of them half-filled with rain/tap water, and with all sorts floating thereon. Mosquitoes everywhere!

My point is no matter how often I sprayed the house with insecticide, our respite from mosquitoes would always be temporary unless their breeding places got destroyed. Plus insecticides have their own harmful effects on humans and the mosquitoes would eventually become resistant to them too. Getting rid of them would only become more difficult. How does this relate to living the Christian life? Romans 5:19 says-

"For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so also by one Man's obedience many will be made righteous."

From the above verse, we see that committing acts of sin is not what makes people sinners. People are made sinners by Adam's sin. Everyone descended from Adam is born with this sin/old nature. The stagnant water in the buckets represents man having the old nature inherited from Adam. The mosquitoes that bothered me represent acts of sin as well as sickness, lack, stress and everything that came to be as a result of Adam's fall. Having this root of sin (stagnant water) is what causes the mosquitoes (acts of sin, sickness, lack, etc) to proliferate. We see this in Romans 7:5-

"When we were controlled by our old nature, sinful desires were at work within us, and the law aroused these evil desires that produced a harvest of sinful deeds, resulting in death."

Unfortunately in the church today, the focus is on preaching the killing of mosquitoes (acts of sin) by using insecticides (law-keeping) as the path to attaining righteousness, when what is needful is ridding the flock of the old/sin nature that was inherited from Adam (getting rid of the stagnant water.) Christ died to rid us of this old/sin nature. See Colossians 2:11–

“When you came to Christ, you were “circumcised,” but not by a physical procedure. Christ performed a spiritual circumcision—the cutting away of your sinful nature.”

In Him, we are a new creation. God made Him to be sin for us so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him, as it is written in 2 Cor. 5:21-

"For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in Him."

When you receive the abundance of grace and believe that you are saved and made righteous by the obedience of Christ (Romans 5:19) and not your own obedience or your self-discipline and law-keeping prowess, you no longer have the old/sin nature. You are dead to the law. Old things have passed away. No more curse. You are a new creation in Christ Jesus, made righteous not by your own obedience to the law but by Christ’s obedience (Romans 5:19.) And this is the result according to Romans 7:4-

"So, my dear brothers and sisters, this is the point: You died to the power of the law when you died with Christ. And now you are united with the One who was raised from the dead. As a result, we can produce a harvest of good deeds for God."

Understand what it means to have "died with Christ" and to be "united with the One who was raised from the dead." God did not raise the Lord Jesus from the dead just because He could. Christ's death and resurrection is the divine receipt showing that we who believe have been forgiven of all of our sins and made righteous by His one sacrifice for sins. See this in Romans 4:23-

“Who was betrayed and put to death because of our misdeeds and was raised to secure our justification (our acquittal), [making our account balance and absolving us from all guilt before God]." See the TPT version: “Jesus was handed over to be crucified for the forgiveness of our sins and was raised back to life to prove that He had made us right with God!”


Christ would not have risen from the dead if our lifetime of sins had not been forgiven and we had not been declared righteous (justified,) all apart from works. His resurrection is akin to seeing someone who went to serve a death sentence in an impregnable prison for the crimes of another alive and walking free. As believers, we have everlasting righteousness apart from works because Christ is risen. When we believe that He is risen (that we are made righteous by His obedience and not our puny efforts at doing good things and obeying the letter that kills,) we get to "produce a harvest of good deeds for God," aka works of faith, yet not us but Christ in us.

Instead of stagnant water (sin nature) in vessels that can only produce acts of sin and such that lead to death, in Christ, we have His righteousness, so we get to live right! Just as the sin nature produces acts of sin, as a new creation with Christ as our righteousness, we bear fruit to righteousness, yet not us but Christ in us.

In essence, no matter how many canisters of insecticide one expends in a bid to kill the mosquitoes (trying hard by one's power to be sin-free through obedience to the letter that kills,) without getting rid of the stagnant water (rejecting the old nature that was inherited from Adam and receiving our Lord Jesus' blood-bought righteousness which is given as a gift to all who believe Him according to 2 Corinthians 5:21,) he can never be free from mosquitoes (acts of sin.) He has the old (sinner) nature. Sin will multiply and the result is death.

Remember Romans 6:14- “For sin shall not have dominion over you for you are not under law but under grace.” Sin has dominion over those who are trying to obey the law in order to be godly (be like God.)

This is why many in the church today are trapped in an endless cycle of committing acts of sin and attending deliverance/curse-breaking sessions all in a bid to be free from one bondage or the other that Christ hung on the cross and died to free us from. Like my insecticide and mosquitoes experience, any results will be short-lived. The old nature is still intact so no matter how much such do to be free from their "mosquitoes" of acts of sin, sickness, lack, depression, etc, more will come.

The one with the old nature rejects the gift of righteousness that Christ died that we might have and strives to attain righteousness/godliness (be like God) by human effort, just like Eve did. He does not believe Romans 5:19– "For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so also by one Man's obedience many will be made righteous."

But Romans 3:20 says :"For no one can ever be made right with God by doing what the law commands. The law simply shows us how sinful we are."

Also, Galatians 5:4 says "For if you are trying to make yourselves right with God by keeping the law, you have been cut off from Christ! You have fallen away from God’s grace."

Yet in many places of worship, people are being subtly taught to reject the gift of righteousness that Christ died that we might have and depend on their own "menstrual rag" righteousness from works of the law. Isaiah 64:6 shows us God's view of the "good things" we do in order to be righteous: "We are all like one who is unclean, all our so-called righteous acts are like a menstrual rag in your sight."

Only the blood-bought righteousness that proceeds from the obedience of the Lord Jesus Christ will suffice for God the Righteous and He freely gives it to all who believe.

Grace is undeserved, unmerited favour. If one iota of our strength is in it, it is no longer Grace (Romans 11:6,) and only by grace through faith are we saved, so we have nothing to boast of in ourselves (Ephesians 2:8-9,) not our own self-discipline, giving, morality, evangelism, tithe payment, dedication or right-living prowess. Wonderful as these things are, they cannot save anybody. Doing them in order to gain God's favour and acceptance is rejecting the gift of righteousness that Christ died that we might have; it is akin to killing mosquitoes inside your house but ignoring their breeding ground. Only in the Beloved are we accepted. Ephesians 1:6.

With the Lord as our righteousness, the old nature is no more; "all these things shall be added unto you." We get to be transformed to the image of the glory of the Lord, from glory to glory, through no effort of ours but by His Spirit (2 Cor. 3:18.) We get to live in triumph over sin, stress, sickness and every ill. We get to love proclaiming Jesus. We get to live a life of moral excellence even beyond that which the law demands, yet not us but Christ in us.

Romans 5:17 says: "For the sin of this one man, Adam, caused death to rule over many. But even greater is God’s wonderful grace and His gift of righteousness, for all who receive it will live in triumph over sin and death through this one Man, Jesus Christ."

This death that is as a result of Adam’s offence is not necessarily immediate. It is a process. Fear, stress, worry, silly mistakes, working so hard only to lose it all, sickness, lack, depression, fast-tracked ageing are all death begun. God said to Adam "for in the day of thine eating of it -- dying thou dost die." Psalms 90:4 says of God "A thousand years in your sight are like a day that has just gone by,"; Moses wrote this concerning God's view of the life of man (v.3.) Adam did not give up the ghost immediately after his death sentence came into effect; he lived for almost 1,000 years aka one day gone by in the sight of God.

Not only is the Christian life hard to live by human effort, it is impossible to live. Only Christ can. This is why we sing “‘tis no longer I that liveth, but Christ that liveth in me.” Only with the abundance of grace and having Christ as our righteousness do we get to live in triumph over sin and death.

Sinners are made righteous by "one Man's obedience": Christ's; when we believe that God "made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." 2 Cor. 5:21. Here, we are a new creation in Christ. When you believe that your right-standing with God and His blessings upon you have got nothing to do with what you did or did not do but have ALL to do with what Christ has done, the old (sinner) nature is no more. The stagnant water is gone.

There might still be some mosquitoes (acts of sin, sickness, etc) inside your house after the stagnant water (old nature) is removed but they will all die off and there will be none to replace them. Remember, “The way of the righteous is like the first gleam of dawn, which shines ever brighter until the full light of day.” Proverbs 4:18. Things will only get better and you will no longer continue to live in sin because you have the only brand of righteousness that counts before God: Christ’s.

In place of the root of sin (stagnant water) that produces acts of sin (death-bearing mosquitoes,) we have Christ's righteousness so we bear fruit to God. We get to produce "a harvest of good deeds for God." No more mosquitoes (acts of sin) but abundant life, right living and every blessing of God in Christ! This is the Good News.

Believe Right and you will Live Right.

http://rightbelieving101..com.ng/2018/02/why-is-christian-life-so-hard.html?m=1

It's not hard to be a Christian.

Christians commit every single sin none Christians commit.


Christians in nigeria live as they like.

I can sense that your brain thinking and reasoning faculty is very very low.so you are telling yourself now that christianity is not religion oh i can see...
Please use this morning and night you must surely be okay

Horlufemi:


Christianity is not religion. Humanity is greater than Religion. Christianity is faith expressing itself through love. Humanity is love. Therefore Christianity > Religion.

Argue with your ancestors

zanga420:

Then what about be poor so you don't worry about thieves and kidnappers
And also be rich so you don't worry about little things money can make easy?

I am finding it hard to understand you, all I quoted was from Gods word.

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jiggaz:
No.. The criteria for our holiness is Christ Jesus not the pureness of our hearts... Our self righteousness is like filthy rag before Him.

hi bro. I have a friend dat prays and studies the Bible very well and also meditates regularly. you will be amazed if you hear him teach God's word. Yet he smokes, fornicates, and even do Yahoo.
each time I confronted him of his deeds, he always tell me we are not righteous by our own efforts. So I'm kinda confuse

Man2utd:


I am finding it hard to understand you, all I quoted was from Gods word.

Seems you don't get it. It was a sarcasm pointing that it means those that was unfortunate on the consequences you listed above committed wrong for them to be afflicted?

Booohaaa

Matinoh:

hi bro. I have a friend dat prays and studies the Bible very well and also meditates regularly. you will be amazed if you hear him teach God's word. Yet he smokes, fornicates, and even do Yahoo.
each time I confronted him of his deeds, he always tell me we are not righteous by our own efforts. So I'm kinda confuse

Am sorry to say this.. But that your friend is not a believer in Christ... Look well...

...the kingdom of God is not meat and drink...

jiggaz:
Believers, not only is the Christian life hard to live by human effort, it is impossible to live. Only Christ can, so we have nothing to boast about. This is why we sing “‘tis no longer I that liveth, but Christ that liveth in me.” Here’s an illustration:

I'd been doing my best to resolve the mosquito issues we'd been experiencing at my home for some months. This breed of mosquitoes seemed to laugh off regular insecticides when I used it on them. I'd use Baygon on them and see their dead bodies strewn all over the floor afterwards but our relief was always short-lived; they'd be humming all over the place again within hours! They tormented me day and night.

But one day, I remembered Integrated Science or was it Home Economics from secondary school: mosquitoes need stagnant water to breed! I rushed outside: close to our living room windows were two buckets, both of them half-filled with rain/tap water, and with all sorts floating thereon. Mosquitoes everywhere!

My point is no matter how often I sprayed the house with insecticide, our respite from mosquitoes would always be temporary unless their breeding places got destroyed. Plus insecticides have their own harmful effects on humans and the mosquitoes would eventually become resistant to them too. Getting rid of them would only become more difficult. How does this relate to living the Christian life? Romans 5:19 says-

"For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so also by one Man's obedience many will be made righteous."

From the above verse, we see that committing acts of sin is not what makes people sinners. People are made sinners by Adam's sin. Everyone descended from Adam is born with this sin/old nature. The stagnant water in the buckets represents man having the old nature inherited from Adam. The mosquitoes that bothered me represent acts of sin as well as sickness, lack, stress and everything that came to be as a result of Adam's fall. Having this root of sin (stagnant water) is what causes the mosquitoes (acts of sin, sickness, lack, etc) to proliferate. We see this in Romans 7:5-

"When we were controlled by our old nature, sinful desires were at work within us, and the law aroused these evil desires that produced a harvest of sinful deeds, resulting in death."

Unfortunately in the church today, the focus is on preaching the killing of mosquitoes (acts of sin) by using insecticides (law-keeping) as the path to attaining righteousness, when what is needful is ridding the flock of the old/sin nature that was inherited from Adam (getting rid of the stagnant water.) Christ died to rid us of this old/sin nature. See Colossians 2:11–

“When you came to Christ, you were “circumcised,” but not by a physical procedure. Christ performed a spiritual circumcision—the cutting away of your sinful nature.”

In Him, we are a new creation. God made Him to be sin for us so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him, as it is written in 2 Cor. 5:21-

"For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in Him."

When you receive the abundance of grace and believe that you are saved and made righteous by the obedience of Christ (Romans 5:19) and not your own obedience or your self-discipline and law-keeping prowess, you no longer have the old/sin nature. You are dead to the law. Old things have passed away. No more curse. You are a new creation in Christ Jesus, made righteous not by your own obedience to the law but by Christ’s obedience (Romans 5:19.) And this is the result according to Romans 7:4-

"So, my dear brothers and sisters, this is the point: You died to the power of the law when you died with Christ. And now you are united with the One who was raised from the dead. As a result, we can produce a harvest of good deeds for God."

Understand what it means to have "died with Christ" and to be "united with the One who was raised from the dead." God did not raise the Lord Jesus from the dead just because He could. Christ's death and resurrection is the divine receipt showing that we who believe have been forgiven of all of our sins and made righteous by His one sacrifice for sins. See this in Romans 4:23-

“Who was betrayed and put to death because of our misdeeds and was raised to secure our justification (our acquittal), [making our account balance and absolving us from all guilt before God]." See the TPT version: “Jesus was handed over to be crucified for the forgiveness of our sins and was raised back to life to prove that He had made us right with God!”


Christ would not have risen from the dead if our lifetime of sins had not been forgiven and we had not been declared righteous (justified,) all apart from works. His resurrection is akin to seeing someone who went to serve a death sentence in an impregnable prison for the crimes of another alive and walking free. As believers, we have everlasting righteousness apart from works because Christ is risen. When we believe that He is risen (that we are made righteous by His obedience and not our puny efforts at doing good things and obeying the letter that kills,) we get to "produce a harvest of good deeds for God," aka works of faith, yet not us but Christ in us.

Instead of stagnant water (sin nature) in vessels that can only produce acts of sin and such that lead to death, in Christ, we have His righteousness, so we get to live right! Just as the sin nature produces acts of sin, as a new creation with Christ as our righteousness, we bear fruit to righteousness, yet not us but Christ in us.

In essence, no matter how many canisters of insecticide one expends in a bid to kill the mosquitoes (trying hard by one's power to be sin-free through obedience to the letter that kills,) without getting rid of the stagnant water (rejecting the old nature that was inherited from Adam and receiving our Lord Jesus' blood-bought righteousness which is given as a gift to all who believe Him according to 2 Corinthians 5:21,) he can never be free from mosquitoes (acts of sin.) He has the old (sinner) nature. Sin will multiply and the result is death.

Remember Romans 6:14- “For sin shall not have dominion over you for you are not under law but under grace.” Sin has dominion over those who are trying to obey the law in order to be godly (be like God.)

This is why many in the church today are trapped in an endless cycle of committing acts of sin and attending deliverance/curse-breaking sessions all in a bid to be free from one bondage or the other that Christ hung on the cross and died to free us from. Like my insecticide and mosquitoes experience, any results will be short-lived. The old nature is still intact so no matter how much such do to be free from their "mosquitoes" of acts of sin, sickness, lack, depression, etc, more will come.

The one with the old nature rejects the gift of righteousness that Christ died that we might have and strives to attain righteousness/godliness (be like God) by human effort, just like Eve did. He does not believe Romans 5:19– "For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so also by one Man's obedience many will be made righteous."

But Romans 3:20 says :"For no one can ever be made right with God by doing what the law commands. The law simply shows us how sinful we are."

Also, Galatians 5:4 says "For if you are trying to make yourselves right with God by keeping the law, you have been cut off from Christ! You have fallen away from God’s grace."

Yet in many places of worship, people are being subtly taught to reject the gift of righteousness that Christ died that we might have and depend on their own "menstrual rag" righteousness from works of the law. Isaiah 64:6 shows us God's view of the "good things" we do in order to be righteous: "We are all like one who is unclean, all our so-called righteous acts are like a menstrual rag in your sight."

Only the blood-bought righteousness that proceeds from the obedience of the Lord Jesus Christ will suffice for God the Righteous and He freely gives it to all who believe.

Grace is undeserved, unmerited favour. If one iota of our strength is in it, it is no longer Grace (Romans 11:6,) and only by grace through faith are we saved, so we have nothing to boast of in ourselves (Ephesians 2:8-9,) not our own self-discipline, giving, morality, evangelism, tithe payment, dedication or right-living prowess. Wonderful as these things are, they cannot save anybody. Doing them in order to gain God's favour and acceptance is rejecting the gift of righteousness that Christ died that we might have; it is akin to killing mosquitoes inside your house but ignoring their breeding ground. Only in the Beloved are we accepted. Ephesians 1:6.

With the Lord as our righteousness, the old nature is no more; "all these things shall be added unto you." We get to be transformed to the image of the glory of the Lord, from glory to glory, through no effort of ours but by His Spirit (2 Cor. 3:18.) We get to live in triumph over sin, stress, sickness and every ill. We get to love proclaiming Jesus. We get to live a life of moral excellence even beyond that which the law demands, yet not us but Christ in us.

Romans 5:17 says: "For the sin of this one man, Adam, caused death to rule over many. But even greater is God’s wonderful grace and His gift of righteousness, for all who receive it will live in triumph over sin and death through this one Man, Jesus Christ."

This death that is as a result of Adam’s offence is not necessarily immediate. It is a process. Fear, stress, worry, silly mistakes, working so hard only to lose it all, sickness, lack, depression, fast-tracked ageing are all death begun. God said to Adam "for in the day of thine eating of it -- dying thou dost die." Psalms 90:4 says of God "A thousand years in your sight are like a day that has just gone by,"; Moses wrote this concerning God's view of the life of man (v.3.) Adam did not give up the ghost immediately after his death sentence came into effect; he lived for almost 1,000 years aka one day gone by in the sight of God.

Not only is the Christian life hard to live by human effort, it is impossible to live. Only Christ can. This is why we sing “‘tis no longer I that liveth, but Christ that liveth in me.” Only with the abundance of grace and having Christ as our righteousness do we get to live in triumph over sin and death.

Sinners are made righteous by "one Man's obedience": Christ's; when we believe that God "made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." 2 Cor. 5:21. Here, we are a new creation in Christ. When you believe that your right-standing with God and His blessings upon you have got nothing to do with what you did or did not do but have ALL to do with what Christ has done, the old (sinner) nature is no more. The stagnant water is gone.

There might still be some mosquitoes (acts of sin, sickness, etc) inside your house after the stagnant water (old nature) is removed but they will all die off and there will be none to replace them. Remember, “The way of the righteous is like the first gleam of dawn, which shines ever brighter until the full light of day.” Proverbs 4:18. Things will only get better and you will no longer continue to live in sin because you have the only brand of righteousness that counts before God: Christ’s.

In place of the root of sin (stagnant water) that produces acts of sin (death-bearing mosquitoes,) we have Christ's righteousness so we bear fruit to God. We get to produce "a harvest of good deeds for God." No more mosquitoes (acts of sin) but abundant life, right living and every blessing of God in Christ! This is the Good News.

Believe Right and you will Live Right.

http://rightbelieving101..com.ng/2018/02/why-is-christian-life-so-hard.html?m=1

Nice and inspiring article but I would you rather title it "Attaining righteousness by works/work of the law/human efforts/good deeds is so hard" because actually the Christian has been made righteous like you rightly quoted from 2Cor5:17, his part on this earth is to live out the righteous life he has been called to live 1Pt1:24, 1Pt1:15, Phi2:12

Its just my honest submission.

remain Blessed

jiggaz:
Am sorry to say this.. But that your friend is not a believer in Christ... Look well...

believers don't sin?

What Are U Saying In Essence

So We Should Continue In Sin And God Will Understand Abi

comradechekov:
the christian life is not hard. it looks hard because most of you (or us to make you feel better) nigerian christians are dumb. you say christianity is hard because you pray when you're supposed to be working to get results. you refuse to do little things because you too busy believing in the promises of greatness in the bible. promises which make you expect to be something you will never be if you don't work or work hard promises which make that make our expectations too high. promises that make us over-anticipate. I heared a lot of us pray constantly that god should fix the nigerian government issue when the dollar started rising astronomically against the naira to the point where tomatoes became more expensive than imported apples. and what was the result? we started making foolish jokes that "no condition is permanent. tomatoes are now more expensive than apples." we go to school to become "great in life" expecting that we will become something the word will see as an image to be respected! the world! for f*ck's sake not even nigeria! that is why no matter how rich we are if we have not traveled to america to use a decade or at least some months, we don't believe we have achieved! if we do a small and legal business that makes us millions in secret we are not satisfied until we make sure people see that business as a big business by opening a bigger store for the business for all to see that we have achieved. we go to pastors and oracles to ask for the courses we and our children should do in universities believing the choice of god or the oracle is the best. believing that what the oracle or holy spirit has chosen is the course that will make us or our children millions after they finish school. believing the courses will take them to "greater heights" in life a stupid belief we have had in us before christianity came to nigeria (believe it or not)! we now fuel this beliefs (that grew in us mostly because we are too lazy, too docile and too competitive as a result of tribalism and family issues) when Christianity came to nigeria because we found a god that shares our ambitions but we refuse to see that go works hard even though he's a cosmic being. we refuse to see that god made a earth, a "house" where adam and eve will "live in" (live on actually) before he made adam and eve! he did not make adam and eve in space and later make earth and later put them on it. we refuse to see that he already make the weather and climate and the food (plants) to sustain adam and eve before he made adam and eve! but we get married and have children in poverty believing that there is nothing god cannot do. believing that as long as we serve god a magic will one day happen that will turn our lives around. and to make this worse we instill this beliefs of foolishness in our children and the cycle continues! And before i forget, talking about education, I once met a girl who wanted to do nursing. she loves nursing so much and decided to apply for jamb with the hopes of using nursing as her first choice but her parents refused and forced her to go to their church pastor for a "divine choice" from god. It would seem that at the end of it all "god" or "holy spirit" or maybe even the pastor himself chose computer science for the girl. we met later because of the issue she was having with the course in school (one of my friends had told her about me and my vast knowledge of computers and programming (i did not say unlimited knowledge o! before you all come and destroy me wirelessly)). She could barely keep up and was struggling to not fail the course as she told me! what she needed my help for was to know if if i could give her advice as to how she could eventually apply her knowledge of computer science to nursing in the future, scientifically. I told her that unless she wanted to just print patient reports on paper from a computer using ms word or excel there was no other option. she felt sad but then i told her that she could make (manufacture) or program medical devices using the knowledge of embedded systems programming. she became happy until i told her that that kind of venture does not exist in nigeria. I mean who manufactures ECG or Blood pressure monitors in this prehistoric country? nobody! our discussion ended there and she accepted her fate. she might end up finishing school and finding a job or even creating one for herself but it will not be what she loves. it will not be what she's creative at. mind you the story gets worse for some other people. The mistake her parents made is to believe that life is about making it, that life is about being rich (money is good and important, dudes) and they fuelled their foolish belief with christianity! this is where we get it all wrong. In the end if something bad happens to the girl as a result of the course they chose for her the would say "that is the way god wants it!" Not all our parents are wise, believe me. they were once young. they dont really have much in their brains. if they did we would have met a better nigeria on ground by the time they f*cked us into existence. I had thesame issues with my parents too, my mother especially. but i fought her hard and sacrificed a lot of things in my life to gain my freedom (i almost killed her out of anger and frustration because of her dictatorship attitude). Now she respects my decision after making a lot of cash with the choices i personally made and not her choices and after i made her realized the damage she'd done even to my father's life (i will come to that later). This woman layed a heavy curse on me because i was trying to fight for my life and save myself from her dominion. It was a pastor or should i say god that raised the curse the sunday of that friday she dropped the curse on me (the words came out of the pastor's mouth anyway)! believe it or not! my own mother cursed me because i was not obliging to her orders because she believes in money and religious glory (the kind i mentioned earlier!). Returning to the girl's issue. Her parents refuse to see that what we are chasing after right now took the westerners hundreds of years and generations to put together. but all we want to do is dominate it. we fail to see that the people that made what we are chasing are the ones that are truly great (i hate using that word now). We refuse to see that life is about living it day by day. we refuse to see that everything cannot come together in a day. and when we cause inadvertently cause a spiritual problem for ourselves in the problem while refusing to do things like farming because we see it as a non glorious thing we start saying the christian life is hard.
The next sub topic i want to talk about has been hinted earlier. It's about women and marriage. I have noticed that in nigeria we overrate women and marriage. we see having both as reaching the height of life. We start dating a girl at sixteen doing everything she wants because of dumb love and when the girls grow up and become too demanding for material things we start complaining forgetting that we allowed that and let it grow when we men were young. she grows up to someone that use sex to control you because you were too busy porking or begging to pork her when you were dating not realizing that you were slowly becoming her slave thru sex. so when you grow up and marry her she will start using that as a tool to f*ck with your life, denying you of sex if you don't do something stupid or out of line that she wants. i've met some girls who believe that the fact that men (their husbands) pork means they are being used. get it? they don't see it as a mutual responsibility. so men end up believing they have to "respect" their women because of the sex they get from them. they end up believing that they are actually using their wives when they pork their wives. they end up living in the secret fear that they might end up making their wives upset by asking for sex at all or by doing something they believe thier wives will see as something that is out of line. this slowly makes them weak and docile and in the end they end up believing that the christian life is hard. coming back to my dad's issue. this is the reason why my my dad became an idiot for my mom till today.
I have also noticed that we men in nigeria worship women in a way. a lot of us (and a lot of those that i've met) believe that women must be respected both young and old because "they are our mothers" Our mothers?! how any p*ssy did you come out from?! We believe we should treat carefully any human that has boobs or that will grow up to have boobs. Why because we are secretly dumb and secretly lustful(this is not biblical but my personal conclusion after years of research). We believe it is a curse to beat a woman (i did not say wife (that is not a curse too but it's bad anyway)) no matter how young, even a girl child. We aquire everything we acquire in life to impress a woman. It's stupid! This is why we nigerian men are so docile because right from a young age we have been seeing every woman as a near supernatural being that can lay a curse on you if you do something they don't like and. If you men want to come back on top in this country you have to make sacrifices. loose that sexy girl for one that is not so sexy but respects you. We also have this habit of believing that if we marry at an age more that twenty five, something is spiritually wrong! what gives!!!!!! and when we are done marrying without sense in our brains. the women starts doing to us we are afraid of doing to them. And when we're frustrated we start saying christian life is hard! Sacrifices must be made! we want ta have everything but we end up loosing everything. We are suckers for women. An average nigerian woman cannot make the smart decision that an average English teenage girl can make. They breed themselves with the sole purpose of getting married. and when they do most of them dont really care how their husbands feel abour their bad attitudes. Yet we keep getting married to the blindly. We attribute every beautiful thing in life to the female body (i wont talk about this but it is worth mentioning). Too much on my mind to say. But just know that even though spiritual problems are common in nigeria, our lack of common sense and excessive belief in God's magical intervention in situations will keep dooming us and we will keep saying trash like the christian life is hard. Most christians are mothereffers and b*tches who only serve god blindly because of what they want. I am a christian and i have spoken even though i don't attend church regularly ( i hate it). God would not have raised that curse my mother dropped on me if i were not a christian (or a human) he cared about. and it only took him three days. he did not let it wait until i got married with sixteen kids before he raised the curse. which shows that what my mother did was wrong even though mothers and fathers have authority over their children. what they fail to see is that the authority is to a limited degree. Its should start diminishing once a child reaches a certain age. but evil mothers especially refuse to let go of a child once he/she reaches that age.
What is life? life is about living it day by day. life is about waking up, eating, having fun, doing stuff. If you refuse to live life carefully and slowly life will consume you. The christian life is not hard the problems we give ourselves is what makes it hard.

O gor

This is nice, Thank you

Kainosdu:


Nice and inspiring article but I would you rather title it "Attaining righteousness by works/work of the law/human efforts/good deeds is so hard" because actually the Christian has been made righteous like you rightly quoted from 2Cor5:17, his part on this earth is to live out the righteous life he has been called to live 1Pt1:24, 1Pt1:15, Phi2:12

Its just my honest submission.

remain Blessed

alright.. Thank you...