BTZ Blog

For centuries the church world as worked under worldly concepts and structures of authority believing they are acceptable in the kingdom of God. The acceptance of the worldly concept of authority and the hierarchy structure of power has deceived those in its grip into believing they have power to rule over people, to enforce their will, their opinions and their decisions upon those people they deem to be under them.  The worldly concept of submission means subservience and unquestionable acceptance of what they believe, teach and require. If a believer has this understanding that this is kingdom authority he opens himself to subtle satanic deception. In their genuine desire to please God, they submit to an hierarchy structure thinking they are pleasing God. They do not understand that this is not Godly submission nor that such allegiance actually hinders spiritual maturity and growth of believers and is also an hindrance to the purpose of God’s kingdom. To come ...

It is impossible to LOVE God if we do not LOVE people! Therefore, verbalizing that we love God when we do not love people, is lying! Though we may speak His praise with our lips, our heart is far from Him! There is more to Heart-Service than Lip-Service!

We are told by leaders in the present church structure that Jesus is our example and that we should pattern our lives after Him. with, that most believers agree.  The question begs to be asked, Since Jesus is the first born of many brethren, the first Apostle, our Savior, our Shepherd, our High Priest and according to scripture the only Master and Teacher we are in need of, why is His example not followed? Jesus never called Himself, neither did people call Him Reverend, Right Reverend,  or Superintendent, He never dressed in clerical garb to identify Himself as God’s spoke person, He never built a building called a the church to conduct services and recruit people to attend, He never suggested His disciples or the people He ministered to tithed to Him or took up offerings to support His ministry with a promise of God’s blessing if they did so, or that they lived under a curse if they  did not do so.  Why isn’t His example practiced today by the institutional...

If the “church” you attend is doing the wrong things in the wrong place at the wrong time, conclude that it is led by the wrong head, (man)...If it were led by Christ who is the Head of His Church, it would be doing the right things in the right place at the right time because Christ would never lead His Church wrong!

The original inspired manuscripts of scripture is the only validation that is valid in determining if the Bible, which is a translated composition of hand-me-down by word of mouth stories and copies interpreted from copies because the originals could not be found, is the inerrant, infallible word of God in its entirety. The Bible you hold in your hand and your minister preaches from, is only with out error to the degree that it was correctly translated, from copies that are in agreement with the original manuscripts and then correctly scribed by the translators, and to the degree that the correctly translated copy is correctly interpreted by the reader/preacher. Confusion of man, when it comes to scripture interpretation, comes from the profusion delusion of Satan' illusion infusion to bring confusion to the already confusion of man evident by the myriad of illusional interpretations that has led to the myriad of segregated denominated churches.

Many people allow the Bible to influence the way they think, speak and act and claim that how they speak, think and act is valid because their thinking, speaking and acting is based on the word of God. Wheather they know it or not, if their interpretation of the Bible is incorrect, the way they think, speak and act is incorrect and downright wrong.  People who interpret the word in light of what their belief system is or led to believe by professionals in their belief system, are likely to get the wrong interpretation of what the Bible actually says therefore, their thinking, speaking and acting is wrong also. If we based our thinking, speaking and acting on the WORD...(JESUS), and interpreted the word in light of Him much of our thinking, speaking and acting would change drastically! 

The fundamental doctrine of theology in the bible was never meant to establish religious organizations in the form of denominations. The fundamental doctrine of theology is not a set of beliefs on a certain dogma of scripture.  JESUS is the FUNDAMENTAL DOCTRINE of THEOLOGY, He is also the CAPSTONE and CORNERSTONE of RELATIONSHIP, and a STUMBLING STONE to RELIGION!

If the prodigal son’s father never loved him enough to let him go, the son would have never known the depth of his father’s love for him, shown by the father’s reaction upon his return from wasting his inheritance. To give one an inheritance after a father dies may not be love, to give one an inheritance while the father is alive is love, to forgive the son after he wasted the inheritance is a demonstration of the LOVE of God! When you love someone enough to give them the freedom to be who they are, you are demonstrating of God's LOVE!

Some of the people who need the Gospel the most are those who think they have the Gospel, share the Gospel and love the Gospel! We has a redeemed community need to understand that the Gospel is not just for non-believers in trying to bring them into the redeemed community of God. The Gospel is MUCH BIGGER than that. Believe it or not, the Gospel is for BELIEVERS as well! The Gospel is both the basis for becoming a believer and the means of a believer’s spiritual maturity,  growth and life living. Our progress in our spiritual lives is in the direction that leads us deeper into the Gospel, not aside from it. This is why that law-keeping is not the Gospel because it renders the GRACE that Jesus provided to mean Jesus plus something is the thing that assures we are loved by God. But Jesus plus something equal nothing, while Jesus plus nothing equals everything, Jesus has done it and there is no doing that we can do to add to the done it that Jesus has done! Let’s live in His Gospel of...

The Church is a community of people of faith  that is redeemed from amidst the fallen community of humanity but still live within the fallen community of humanity that is serving the prince and power of the air through its ideologies and systems. The sad part about it is, the religious redeemed community has been influenced by the fallen community of humanity with regards to its ideologies and systems to where the religious community now operates by the fallen communities ideologies and systems. The religious community and the fallen community are now at enmity with God’s redeemed community the Church, which is supposed to operate by a different set of standards than the fallen community of humanity. Unknowingly to them...the religious community is in opposition to the redeemed community of faith, the Church, by being in unity with the fallen community in its ideologies and systems. The segregation of the body of Christ into the myriad of different denominations is due to the adher...

The problem with church people living in the performance world, performing for acceptance and recognition is that we become the star of our own show. The performance-event-driven-meetings has its church-going-stars, music stars, singing stars, dancing stars, worship stars, preaching stars and stardom is a destroyer of relational spiritual life because life becomes about us, our world, our performance and smothers the blessing of Grace and the true STAR (Jesus) is veiled by star performers. When we have everything riding on us we are in an atmosphere of bondage and despair, not freedom and deliverance. When we are trusting in our performance, our rule-keeping our ability to sustain our relationship with God we are living in apex of legalism not the humbleness of Grace! When we participate while assembling because of God’s Grace and Love, by God’s Grace and Love and in God’s Grace and Love we will demonstrate humility, thankfulness, kindness, compassion, understanding and forgiveness and...

Is there anything wrong with good things? It is if the good things are a barrier to experiencing the BEST thing. If the good worship you deem to take place in programmed-event-driven meetings, distracts from Christ who is the ONE to be worshipped then, there is something wrong with it, in that the good worship is an hindrance to the best worship by preventing worship to the ONE to be worshipped. Where and to whom is the focus of your worship?

Which is more damaging to the kingdom of God, unrighteousness....bad works, or self-righteousness...good works? I believe the answer is self-righteousness. Self-righteousness is about what we do to establish or maintain our relationship with God instead of depending solely on Jesus accomplishment to establish and maintain relationship with God for us. Self-righteousness causes us to focus on the wrong source, it is anti-gospel and therefore oppressing to where we become enslaved to keeping a preferred set of religious rules and regulations thinking it will enables us to obtain what we are so desperately seeking for within. We look to self to satisfy what only God can satisfy. We are deceived into believing that because of what we do for God is pleasing to Him because of our obedience. Though our good works may provide much self-comfort, self-approval and approval from the hierarchy within religion it does not give us God’s approval...in fact...it is a barrier, a relationship destroyer ...

The way some people interpret and use the word of God hides their ignorance and kills the truth of the WORD. If people allowed the word to formulate what they believe instead of making the word conform to what they believe, the truth  of the WORD would kill their religion.

SPIRITUAL MATURITY is not determined by CHARISMATIC GIFTING, RELIGIOUS VERBALIZATION, ELOQUENT PRAYING, HIERARCHICAL POSITIONING or TITLE RECOGNITION.   SPIRITUAL MATURITY it is the constant awareness of the presence of God through a RELATIONAL RELATIONSHIP with Jesus that is authenticated by LOVING and SERVING people in the POWER of GRACE.

How can people who claim that they point the way to God be so fearful and hateful as to shun and kill others that do not agree with them. The Pharisees did this during Jesus’ day. History bares out that religion is guilty of this also. Is it that religious people love the system they have created more then they love their creator.  If Jesus walked into “religion” to tear down the system because it has gotten in the way of His original purpose, would religious people try to re-crucify Him?

If you maintain that love is the driving force behind your theatrical charismatic performance, your commanding and demanding charades to get God to do your bidding, manipulating people to give to your cause so you can continue to call people’s diseases so you can pray for them, your understanding of God’s love is misunderstood. 1st Corinthians provides the def inition of divine love and then it invites us to share in it. As we read it, it becomes clear that the love described here is more than an emotional response to a person or a thing. I will take the liberty to place love in two different categories: Grace-Love and Performance-Love. Simply put, Grace-Love is wholly and solely based on loving without expectation of anything in return. Performance-Love is based on loving to get what you think you need for whatever reason you need what you thin you need. An example of Grace-Love would be that love which moves a person to work and save for the future well-bei...

I wonder....if believers who crave for, pray for, want the Spirit anointing for, “SUPERNATURAL POWER” would instead develop and demonstrate a LOVE RELATIONSHIP with GOD and with PEOPLE, would we not have the SUPERNATURAL POWER to meet the needs of humanity? All of the charismatic gifting that people may possess, all of the articulate voice deflection people may exhibit, all of the shouting at the devil, all of the commanding the sickness to go, all of the religious formulas people may use, is of no benefit.  What counts is LOVE RELATIONSHIP with GOD, who is LOVE! From that love relationship, love people with compassion and a miracle will happen.

All believers begin in the Spirit but to many try to mature in the flesh. It cannot be done! Your spiritual man has to be fed spiritual things. You cannot feed your spiritual man on the carnal things of the world that is against God and His purpose (including the traditional trappings of religion) and expect to mature spiritually even if the carnal is coated with religiosity.

It is time to become a radical believer and embrace the cross. And I don’t mean the cross upon which Jesus died, that cross is empty. We need to fall in love with Jesus instead of the old rugged cross! When Jesus said; “take up your cross and follow me,” He did not mean take up the cross He died upon...He meant for us to take up our cross. What is our cross? It is the end of ourselves! When it comes to gaining and maintaing salvation, self effort is out of the picture. Self is to die on our cross so that Christ can live through us as Jesus died on the old rugged cross so that we could live in Him! The CROSS is all about LIFE and LIVING, not about DEATH and DIEING! Jesus died to provide life and life more abundantly, we die to self and our selfish desires so He can live His life through us. Thus, the reason for our cross.

In my opinionated opinion people are so conditioned to what is portrayed as a must to become men and women of God that the vast majority of people feel disqualified from knowing Him. Many people who poses inner honesty  throw their hands in the air and give up on because of the religious pious acting. People need to see the true picture of spiritually. People need to know that they can hear God for themselves in a personal manner. Yet they are bombarded with super drippy sweet talking super-duper holy people who outer self-righteousness reeks with stink. These reeking stinkers are on their best behavior while talking the language of religiosity because they have been told and believe that it sets a good example for others yet, their living of life is quite different. Presenting a picture of God that looks like that doesn’t do a thing for His image and it does nothing to help people to want to know Him personally. It causes them despair because they realize, in their honesty and by ...

Becoming a Father is easy enough, but becoming a father only brings a moment of pleasure. Being a Father can be very tough, but being a father to offspring's brings a life of pleasure from a treasure!

The Rock that Jesus is building His Church upon is the revelation from the Father of who Jesus really is. I wonder...is the reason why there are so many religious denominations because they do not have a revelation of the real Jesus? Are they portraying a Jesus they want rather than the Jesus who is? Or, do they reject the Jesus who is because He is not the Jesus they want!

Weather storms never come to last, they may reap havoc on their journey, but they always come to pass. It is the same with the storms of life that we may go through, they never come to LAST, they come to PASS. In weather storms people can learn what to do and what not to do and are better prepared for the next storm, that comes to pass. The storms in life that come to pass are opportunities to grow and become strong and as we trust our pilot to bring us through we gain strength to trust Him more.

Why are religious institutions like bum burps? Because each religion believes their religion emits the aroma of righteousness and goodness but other religions reek with the smell of stink. The fact is; ALL RELIGIONS STINK! Why? Because religions are man-made, man-run, man-controlled, and man-manipulated by people who are egotistic and self-righteous and the Bible declares that “our self-righteousness is as filthy rags” and filthy rags reek with stink, sometimes stink worse than a bum burp!

The Church Jesus established is more about a relationship with God and with people, segregation demolition, unity based on Jesus Christ, love and sharing that love on a daily basis with the across-our-path people we meet.

The Gospel of Grace is about FREEDOM...freedom from the bondage of legalism, freedom from fear of failure and freedom from the apathy of fruitlessness, freedom from the power of sin, and freedom from trap of worldliness. The Gospel of Grace is about POWER...the power of God at work in our lives, power for victory over sin and failure, power for Christian service, and power for fruitfulness. It is about experiencing the life of Christ living through us. It is about being led by God's Holy Spirit under the Headship of Jesus. The Gospel of Grace is about LIVING...living by grace is living out the new-creation-life, living by grace is putting off the old man and putting on the new man, living by grace is living in unity with Christ and with each other, living by grace is living out the “law of the Spirit, not the letter of the law.” It is living experiencing crucifixion, burial, and resurrection, the crucifixion and burial of our self-life and the resurrection of ...

Fellowship with God requires an intimate relationship with Him. An intimate relationship with God is only found by GRACE, through GRACE and in GRACE and true worship can only stem from such a relationship. Worship is then not what we do as acts of worship that is taught and practiced in event-drive-meetings, but by our daily living actions that bring glory to God.

Trying to live the Christian life by trying to do all the right things to please God to gain His favor brings dissatisfaction and frustration because we come to the realization that the life we need to live cain't be achieved. While trying to keep the law by our performance our inability to keep the law becomes all the more obvious. The reason for this failure and frustration is that we have been taught to measure our successes in living the Christian life by using what God designed to be the mirror to show us our inability to live the Christian life!

Living in a constant state of insecurity about your security in God because of your failings, mistakes or sin permits religion to have power and control over you. Religion wants you to subscribe to such guilt theology so as to maintain control over your life. Anyone who subscribes to such guilt theology CAN’T TRUST that God has resolved to be with us forever, will never turn His back on us to forsake us, and will live in a constant cycle of bondage, fear and spiritual unrest.

God is Love. He will never expose your sin to transpose you. Love covers sin, not expose it. God will never humiliate you to teach you a lesson. You are a person in the making, God is not finished with you yet. You are His masterpiece and He will protect your faults and failures from others as He forgives them until you are complete in Him and conformed to His image. As God looks upon you through Jesus He sees the finished product.

The Gospel of Grace is not about things...it is Jesus Himself! Making the gospel a set of rules to be followed, ideas to be taught, doctrines to live by, strategies to implement, methods to conform to, techniques to administer, programs to follow, and formulas to prove, etc... have veiled the beauty, the glory, the power and the reality of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. It is not about trying to live like Jesus, it is about living by His in dwelling life as He lives and works through us. The gospel is not knowing about Jesus, it is KNOWING JESUS!

It is time for believers to embrace the cross. I am not referring to the cross upon which Jesus died, because that cross is empty. To many people have fallen in love with the old rugged cross instead of falling in love with Jesus! We need to fall in love with Jesus and not the old rugged cross! When Jesus said; “take up your cross and follow me,” He did not mean the old rugged cross...He meant for us to take up our cross. What is our cross? It is the end of ourselves! When it comes to gaining and maintaing salvation self effort needs to be crucified. Self is to die on our cross so that Christ can live through us as Jesus died on the old rugged cross so that we could live in Him! Jesus died to provide life and life more abundantly, we die to self and our selfish desires so He can live His abundant life through us. Thus, the reason for our cross.  The CROSS is all about LIFE and LIVING, not about DEATH and DYING!

The love that is mostly portrayed in religious circles depends on the receiver as to whether or not they agree with the philosophy of the religious stance taken by the givers of such love and is dependent on how the receiver responds to the the expectations of the love that is offered.  If they were loving with God’s love that would not be so, His love is not based upon what He sees in us or what He can get from us by attached expectations, His love is not causative, His love is expectationless and unconditionally positive.

The Gospel of Grace is; Striking in its simplicity,     Stunning in its clarity         Supreme in it’s authority,             Strong in its necessity,                 Satisfying in its complexity,                     Sufficient in its centrality,                         Successful in its sufficiency,                             SCORNED for its INCLUSIVITY! What is ironic is; it is the religious institutionalized, christianized people, who are capsulized, terrorized and paralyzed by the Old Testament Law that is in opposition to . Not realizing that it is only God’s Grace th...

Watchfulness is wise and profitable to partake of in this world because it will alert you to prepare for the world to come. Slothfulness is foolish and unprofitable to partake of in this world because it causes you concern for this world without giving any though about the world to come. BE WATCHFUL NOT SLOTHFUL!

God intends church to be a community of believers in which each member contributes their special gift, talent, or ability to the whole, so that, through the active participation and contribution of all, the needs of the community are met.  In other words, what we ought to see in the Church is "ministry of the people to people while living life on a daily bases," not "the ministry of the professiona l on a Sunday morning."  In this way, the church is to act like a body, with each unique, necessary part working for the good of the whole body and not just segregated denominational bodies. And, Paul argues clearly that each member's gift is indispensable, that the body needs each part to contribute or else it will be lame (1 Corinthians 12:20-25).

When someone focuses on our flaws remind them that we are a work in progress as are they and both us and them will move into perfection at the same time. In the meantime, while He is working on us we should forgive each others flaws and refrain from condemnation by showing each other consideration.

You can hold the hand of a loved one only for a little while, eventually you will have to say good bye and watch them leave, but you can hold a loved one in your heart for a lifetime!

Matthew 17:4, Then answered Peter, and said unto Jesus, Lord, it is good for us to be here: if thou wilt, let us make here three tabernacles; one for thee, and one for Moses, and one for Elijah. Peter wanted to establish three “churches” with a flare to house what God was doing. God cannot be housed in the smallness of buildings called “churches”, agendaized by the smallness of man-made agendas or organized by the smallness of “event-driven-programmed meetings”. He desires us to forsake religious buildings, programs and gimmicks to simply follow Jesus. Because of a relationship with God through Jesus the same glory that was present with Peter is present with us, why have we reverted to programmed religiosity, man-initiated-form and spiritually dead works instead of trusting what Jesus accomplished for us to establish a vibrant relationship with God is beyond explanation?

The pain and agony from refusing to love or to know love, is hell on earth and the torture of a loveless life is hell to the soul! The refusal of loving people may mean that the hell that people go through from not experiencing love because of our lovelessness may mean the longer they suffer the hell of lovelessness. If you carry the message of grace and love, and lovingly love in living, you will bring hope, inspiration and forgiveness to the across-your-path people that you meet in life you.

“What is in it for me”, seems to be the though process of many in christendom. This mentality is a carryover from O.T. times where spiritual realities were seen more in the natural realm, it was the way God made Himself known. Since Jesus, God has made Himself known through Him and spiritual realities are more played out in the heart and life of people. A lack of love is what drives the “‘what is in it for me” attitude.    God is LOVE, He gives because He LOVES and LOVE gives!

BELIEVER! Isn’t it in a believers nature to believe...I believe it is. I believe that because it is in our nature to believe, we have been duped to believe that anything with God attached to it and looks, sounds or feels to be spiritual we accept as genuine and believe it.  Everything we hear from the mouths of people behind the pulpit is not truth! If it is, then TRUTH can be TWISTED to mean whatever a pulpit orator feels it should mean.  

As believers we have a awesome opportunity regarding people and their recognition and acceptance of Jesus Christ. We are also on times responsible for people’s rejection of Jesus because of their ignorance of who He is and what He is about because of our misunderstanding of who He is and what He is about. A misunderstanding of who He is and what He is about is a result of how people perceive the Church and its relationship to Jesus portrayed by those who claim to be His followers. The church established by christ-ians of consisting Sunday-programmed meetings, segregation because of different beliefs of the way people interpret the Bible, a God who loves Christians and meets with them in their specific meeting-place at a specific time and reigns blessings on them for allegiance to the specific group they belong to by obeying the rules and participating in the rites of the group. This presents to the world a Christ whom even His followers cannot unite under because they view who He is an...

Religious hierarchy has created tremendous ministry problems within denominations by corralling the people. If people are going to break from the bondage's of “churches” the Body has to be unleashed to work with Christ in His ministry. Sometimes that means jumping the coral.  The man behind the pulpit has got to realize that God depends upon body ministry to accomplish His will on this earth, not pulpit ministry. Pulpit ministry has not and never will be the means to carry out the Great Commission!

We can only LOVE God freely when we are utterly free from fear, guilt, condemnation, and religious duty. We are free because of His Gospel of Grace now we can lovingly accept and LOVE people with His LOVE!

Head knowledge of scripture may be good but being good does not mean that there is nothing better. Trying to live life by our informed Bible knowledge stored in the head will lead to a life of disappointment, discouragement and discontentment because life is not in found in head knowledge of the word (bible), life is in the Word (Jesus).  Come on now Regular, aren't preachers and "lay people" suppose to teach that their thinking, preaching and decision making are based on their knowledge of scripture?  Yes, but it's not quite the total picture of what we need to demonstrate. We are not called merely to demonstrate our knowledge of God, but to demonstrate the life of God as He lives His life through us. John 5: 39 and 40...Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me. And ye will not come to me, that ye might have life. To be head "informed" by scripture, then to use the Bible as anothe...

The pain and agony from refusing to love or to know love, is hell on earth and the torture of a loveless life is hell to the soul! The refusal of loving people may mean that the hell that people go through from not experiencing love because of our lovelessness may mean the longer they suffer the hell of lovelessness. If you carry the message of grace and love, and lovingly love in living, you will bring hope, inspiration and forgiveness to the across-your-path people that you meet in life. By being God's loved child and loving the unlovely you may save people from a life of hell!

Religious people claim that it is THEIR love for Christ and His word that controls them as as they live out their segregation while spewing out condemnation and judgment. I wonder if they allowed Christ the Word to live through them and CHRIST'S LOVE for them CONTROL them instead of THEIR LOVE for Christ and His word controlling them, would they be more  accepting, forgiving and loving?

Anderson Cooper, while hosting 60 Minutes, April 5, 2009, interviewed a woman activist who helps women victims.  She said that when a woman is condemned and sentenced to death for adultery she is first buried leaving only her head sticking out of the ground.  Then rocks are trucked in which have been selected with care by religious officials so that they are just the right size—not to big to kill quickly and not too small so as not to break the skull, but just right to inflict maximum pain and suffering and to prolong death!  But, of course, the executions are carried out in the name of Allah/God, "Most Gracious, Most Merciful!" This probably causes most people’s stomach to churn no matter which religion they are affiliated with. Yet religions fail to see absurdity in how they view, teach about and promote the God they say they serve. There are some religions where people believe that God will condemn a infant to hell if they die before He/she is baptized. Can anyone even...

Without giving the name of the “church” here is what they deem to be a part of spiritual maturity according to this direct quote; “Regular giving is a sign of spiritual maturity. A person who claims spiritual maturity and doesn’t practice generosity toward their church is similar to a person who claims spiritual maturity and doesn’t show up on Sundays.” Here is one of their ads. : “Online Giving Now Available...Moving God’s Kingdom Forward By Your Generosity”. Wow! How is that for a spiritual measuring stick that under minds spiritual maturity and has nothing to do with spirituality?

Repeat a fabricated religious belief long enough, frequently enough and back it with some nonsensical interpretation of scripture, for many people, it will submerge spiritual reality and truth no matter how scriptural-sensical the reality of scriptural truth may be.  What is ironic about this is that the religious fabrication is then regarded as the spiritual truth it submerged by the people who have been conditioned to accept the fabricated nonsensical, non-scriptural belief as truth. The non-scriptural belief is then accepted as truth by unwarily people who are seeking truth by seeking it from the  people who who present the fabricated belief, believing to to be spiritual truth.