Sons of Perdition Series
Those who commit apostasy are those who do not accept the discipline of God...
Their eyes have been opened by the truth of the gospel so they see the angels descending and ascending on the earth (1) through the power of faith and faith revealed through the Word of God as the mighty hand of God Himself. Having this awareness makes them more sensitive and a judge to the laws and regulations of Heaven. How they think that things should be done and not as the law of God determines it itself.
This is exactly what happened to Lucifer the angel of light who we now know today to be Satan. Him being so aware and at the right hand of God seeing, watching and observing the ins and outs of the runnings of the Kingdom; he became presumptuous to the administration of how God would put His Kingdom in order. There came a moment in time when he did not agree with what he saw. This disagreement that started to form inside of him, grew and nurtured itself to become the first rebellion, the first apostasy.
This is the blueprint of apostasy. This internalised disagreement to the administration of God; this is Pride as we know it. The apostate does not agree with the judgement of God in His kingdom; the righteous judgement, the discipline, the chastisement, the reaping of what was sown directly or indirectly. The apostate sometimes is the one who experiences it or observes the judgement of God. It is not only a judgement of discipline but sometimes it can be the judgment of mercy. This too can become an internalised disagreement that leads to resistance and the hardening of the heart that forms the seed of apostasy... Pride. The apostate being more aware and sensitive to the heavenly affairs and the judgments of God, the hands of God for discipline or mercy, in their pride instead of accepting the sensibility and final choice of God they opt rather to hold resentment towards God.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth, So are My ways higher than your ways, And My thoughts than your thoughts. (2)
Apostasy begins when we know the Truth, which is God and His kingdom but in the hardness of the heart that becomes nurtured over time by a disagreement, that then leads to a disobedience, that then leads to the rejection and animosity towards the judgement, choice and final decision of God whether for discipline or mercy. Knowing and seeing the Truth, they reject it. They are contemptuous towards it. Their hearts are hardened. They don’t forgive, they don't accept, they don’t understand.
Rather we should always remember the example of King David. At a time in his life he made a grave mistake... He took the wife of another man who was even one of his best soldiers. At first David was blinded by his own iniquity until he was confronted by the prophet Nathaniel. Exposing his wickedness and sentencing his judgement, King David was left with the shame and guilt of his mistakes. Now faced with the fruit of his unfaithfulness the child of the affair on the brink of death (3). He fasted, prayed and pleaded for the child's life. That perhaps God would spare the child and that he would live. God did spare the child but not in the way that David expected or wanted. The child died and was spared the humiliation and prejudice of being born the fruit of the sins of his father and mothers' unfaithfulness. The child was spared of suffering in this world. It was both the discipline and the mercy of God.
David being one who was even called a man after God's own heart, having knowledge and experiences of the workings of the Heavenly courts, did not hold God in contempt when the judgement was issued. The discipline that in turn was a mercy. To leave a lesson and example to do better for the people who David was overseeing and towards David himself to see where he went wrong and make the necessary changes to prepare himself for Eternity.
Davids discipline did not end there, he continued to lose children because of the seed he had sown in his disobedience so that he suffered much loss. But David did not resent God. David humbly accepted the righteous judgment and repercussions of his mistakes looking to the Eternal life that awaited those who believe, that is to trust and surrender to the will of God that is far beyond our own understanding. He was of those who persevered the trials of life through time.
Now the just shall live by FAITH; But if anyone draws back, My soul has no pleasure in him.” But we are not of those who draw back to Perdition, but of those who believe to the saving of the SOUL. (4)
Esau on the other hand had the nature of an apostate already deep rooted in his Pride. We can understand more closely that Esau before despising the birthright in exchange for lentils (5); he would first despise the advice and instruction of his father in whom he would choose to marry. The despising of his birthright to Jacob was just a natural consequence of what he was already doing in his heart despising and not having reverence to keep those instructions passed down from father to son. We can only imagine that Issac would have instructed his son along his upbringing in the most beneficial and sensible choice of wife from his families house in Haran who could contribute to the Abrahamic covenant and livelihood passed down from generation to generation. Esau presumptuously even boldly married against the advice of his father, even boastfully so at the same age of his father (6) when he had married Rebekah; When Esau was forty years old, he took as wives Judith the daughter of Beeri the Hittite, and Basemath the daughter of Elon the Hittite. And they were a grief of mind to Isaac and Rebekah. (7)
Esau first despised his father's instructions, discipline and advice in whom to marry which was the birthright, in whom he would marry. In his Pride, being the favourite and much loved son of his father, he like Lucifer thought he knew best and did not agree with the advice, family expectation and discipline in making the right choice like Abraham did for Issac in meeting Rebekah (8). Probably he was tired of his father telling him what to do and presumptuously chose to marry a Canaanite as an act of defiance to his father's sensibility and the conduction of the Abrahamic covenant. Esau wanted to do something better, something new, something different than the expectations of his family.
He found no room for repentance because he did not see nor understand his error. He was blinded by his Pride. Due to this gift of repentance not being granted to him to see where he went wrong, the root of the problem that started when he would disagree with his father's advice of the family's tradition and expectations in order to pass on the Abrahamic covenant to the next generation through marriage to someone who knew and understood and would support him in fulfilling this more spiritual mission for generations to come and not the present hunger to satisfy of having just any wife from a foreign land who would find it difficult in general to be accustomed to those traditions. Of course let's not forget Tamar, Ruth and Rahab who were adopted into the people of Isreal and accepted the customs of the people of God. However by the sounds of the wives of Esau and their assimilation into the family of Issac it is safe to say there was probably some resistance and conflict proving the incompatibility of the choice of Esau to perpetuate the longevity of the spiritual covenant with those women and not to meet his immediate needs of becoming a man.
What first started in the disagreement of Pride; that led to disobedience of marrying a Canaanite; without the antidote and gift of repentance to see and acknowledge where he had fallen short... grew and fostered into spite at the appointed time. This spite then becomes the offspring of apostasy. After learning about the righteous judgment of God of him losing the birthright he despised, when his father blessed his brother (9) instead of him and passing the same instruction to his brother of whom he should marry... Esau spitefully went to the brother of Issac his father, who was cast out with his mother at a tender age to ask for one of his daughters to marry. Esau married the daughter of his uncle Ishmael (10). Can you imagine the dynamic of this new wife who must have grown up in the bitterness of her father telling her stories of how he was cast out of his own home because of his brother Issac her uncle. What an unimaginable torment that was not even worth mentioning... I think it was left for the reader to digest.
Esau truly had a bad character that was rooted in the Pride of disagreement which then sprouted out to be one of bitterness and rebellion. A simple seed from the Pride of disagreement, leading to the action of disobedience is poisonous and branches out to bitterness and iniquity if not administered to. If the root of the disobedience which is a Pride over a disagreement or strife, is not addressed and uprooted through acknowledgment, humility and repentance, the end result will produce apostasy. We saw this root in Judas. After not agreeing with the spirituality of Jesus in accepting the alabaster oil as a symbolic offering. The root of that disagreement that is Pride led to disobedience, spite and then apostasy. Whereas Davids' humility and faith in the authority and righteous leadership of God is the supplement to uproot the primary seed of the Pride, of a disagreement. Even if we think we know better or are right we need to be ready to surrender in order to cut off the offshoot of spite that will fester the apostate syndrome and look to the heavenly call (11) of the salvation of our souls as the one and only primal focus when everything else seems at lost.
Blessed are the Poor in Spirit for theirs is the Kingdom of God (12)
However we must note that it is not just any disagreement but the disagreement specifically to the direction of God, the will of God according to His Word, His Righteousness and His commandments. As we clearly see that Lucifer himself disagreed with the direct authority of God Himself even so boldly before His throne. Esau disagreed with the direction of God passed onto Abraham who was a friend of God. Even Korah who disagreed with Moses' leadership was disagreeing with the direct communication that God chose to speak through His people by his mouth.
However we have the example of Jesus who also disagreed with the Religious leadership of His time and was not condemned. Condemned by men but not by God who sent Him and many prophets before Him to confront religious systems that would deviate from the plans and purposes in the simplicity of life and communion with God (13). Jesus infamously and boldly stood up against the oppressive systems of the religious system of His time disagreeing with what did not align with the testimony and blueprint laid out in the Word of God.
I did not come to destroy the law but to fulfil it (14)
So we can conclude that some disagreements are justified if it is justified according to the righteousness of the law of God and the simplicity (13) that is in Christs' love, mercy, justice and compassion which does not lead to Perdition but the saving of the soul. Which in this case was the main fault of the religious leadership of the Lord Jesus who would persecute Him for helping those who were in need by breaking religious man made laws of traditions. How to know if the disagreement is rooted in righteousness or rebellion? If it will lead to Apostasy or Salvation? Simple, the Word of God. Does your questioning and disagreements serve the purpose of fulfilling your own selfish inclinations, ambitions and desires like Esau? Or is it rooted in the righteousness of justice and mercy towards the nature of God that we see and understand through His WORD and the testimonies. Nonetheless we can conclude that even Jesus submitted Himself to the governance, authority, discipline and righteousness of God; that He bore upon Himself being blameless... our sins. That God subjected Him to the crucifixion of the Cross and He obeyed and accepted.... Why? Because It was Written (15).
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