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Chapter Ten
Blessings By Inheritance Only
In order for us to see and enter the Kingdom of God we are to believe the True Gospel -- which is -- we are righteous by a gift and receive all things by inheritance. Then we give out of that abundance as a remembrance of what God has done for us. It doesn’t matter if we feel like we have an inheritance of righteousness and blessings by a gift -- we have it and it requires faith to believe it and act on it.
If you don’t receive your increase by inheritance -- then you’ve worked to get it. If you don’t receive your righteousness as a gift -- you’ve worked to get it. When you’ve work to get something --it’s yours because you earned it. You can’t offer that to God. He won’t accept it.
You say -- You mean to tell me that all the money that I’ve given to the church that was ten percent of what I earned -- that God wouldn’t accept that because I worked to get it? That’s right -- it would be a Cain offering. Now before you go off mad – read the rest of what I’m saying.
Cain worked in his field and raised vegetables. He brought them to God and God wouldn’t accept them at his hand. It’s not that God won’t accept vegetables. It says that God wouldn’t accept them from Cain’s hand. Why -- because they were a works to be blessed offering. The fact that there was no remembrance of the blood of the sacrifice in what he brought caused God to reject the offering.
Neither could Cain go and buy a lamb from Abel and offer it. The lamb would still be something that Cain earned. Well then -- how could Cain make an acceptable offering to God?
This is the way God showed him to do it. God said to Cain -- the Sin offering is lying at your door. I have sent it to you -- by a gift. Take it and offer it and I will accept you. Cain still wouldn’t do it because he wanted to earn his blessings from God and God won’t bless you because you worked to get it. You must receive His blessings as gifts -- gifts of inheritance.
(Gen 4:5 KJV) But unto Cain and to his offering he had not respect. And Cain was very wroth, and his countenance fell.
(Gen 4:6 KJV) And the LORD said unto Cain, Why art thou wroth? and why is thy countenance fallen?
(Gen 4:7 KJV) If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? (Here God is saying -- Come to Me the way I’m telling you to come and I will accept you.) and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door. And unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him. ( this is saying -- I have sent a lamb to you and he is lying at your door longing for you to offer him. Isn’t that amazing -- in the Hebrew it is saying that the lamb is longing for you to offer him to God so that you will be accepted.)
The only things you can offer to God are things you’ve received as gifts yourself. Those things you didn’t work to get. Those things you see as gifts from God. Therefore -- you can offer them to God and He will accept them.
The reason that God is revealing the requirements of an offering according to the Truth that you must receive what you offer as a gift from God -- is so that you will have no temptation to think that you are offering something to God that was yours by your works and God owes you His blessings because you gave it.
God only accepting things from us that we received as gifts from Him is protection for us so that we won’t fall into self-righteousness. Self-righteousness tells us that God owes us His blessings because of our works.
I had an occasion to talk with a person yesterday that has fallen into the trap of thinking that all the blessings that they have received are because of the righteous life that they are leading. That belief makes you judgmental with those that aren’t living as righteous a life as you are. You become arrogant and proud and have no patience with those that haven’t been able to live the way they should.
That is how you know if you are self-righteous – you become proud and lifted up because of your record of outward righteousness.
Righteousness that you only receive as a gift makes you humble and contrite because you know that you are only able to live righteously because you have found that relying on the righteousness of God by a gift gives you the power to live right. There is no place for pride in the knowledge of that Truth.
Well -- what if a person gets a hold of this Truth of not working to be blessed and begins to just go out and do the things they love to do without regard for the money that comes to them and just receives all increase as a gift from the Lord?
They don’t go to work to earn money -- they go to work because they love it and to them it isn’t work. Then can they offer that to God because they see it as increase from God by inheritance? Yes -- they can because it is what is in your heart when you are doing a thing that makes it an increase by works or inheritance.
From this we can see that it is the motive of the heart that determines what are gifts and what are payment for work. Out of the heart the issues of life are settled.
We see this Truth illustrated when Abraham came back from rescuing Lot. Abraham refused to take of the spoils that came to him because the King said he could have them. God sent Abraham into that battle and God certainly gave Abraham the victory in that battle -- but Abraham didn’t see the spoil as his until God would give it to him. God gave Abraham the victory for Lot and the people but nothing was said about the spoil. Since the King said you can have the spoil -- Abraham knew that the King saw the spoil as his and so Abraham refused to take any of it because it would have been increase by works or in the Kings eyes payment for what Abraham did. The King would have been paying Abraham for what God had done for him and so --he refused to take any of the spoil.
Do we see the significance of us making an error like that? If Abraham allowed the King to pay him for the victory that God clearly gave him --he would be taking credit for something God did and so submitting himself to another King --other than God-- to be blessed.
Abraham had given that kind of life up – working to be blessed – when he left Ur and made God his Lord and supply. He wasn’t about to go back to that kind of life by accepting the puny gifts that man could give him. God had given Abraham the victory in battle and had protected him from harm. The King wasn’t there to do it and if he had been there --he couldn’t have protected Abraham and his men.
Abraham saw that it was God that gave him the victory and he certainly wasn’t going to let the King take the credit for it.
I see an extreme caution in Abraham’s life when He had any dealings with God. Abraham made sure that all things were gifts from God to him and that is all Abraham wanted. We all need to remember that. That is what the parable of the hid treasure is about. Go and sell all I have gotten by my own means so that all that is left is what the Lord has given me. That is how I buy the field where the treasure is hid.
Abraham was a wise and spiritual man and it is too bad that so many foolish teachings set him as a lustful carnal man. God didn’t give Abraham the name of the father of those that believe God by faith for nothing.
Righteousness by a gift and blessings by inheritance is the True Gospel and the only basis that we can approach God. We must see ourselves as righteous by a gift and multiplied by inheritance only -- then our offerings will be acceptable to God.
I get letters all the time from ministries asking me to give a sacrificial gift out of my need and I will be given an increase. That is a Lie. I’m never to give out of a need. If I’m born again I have an inheritance. I need to be continually reminded of that. That false teaching is responsible for the poverty of Christian people.
The evidence that the wrong kind of offerings are being made to the Lord is when most Christian Churches offer communion. They tell the people to confess their sins to become worthy to take communion. That is a works to be righteous offering. As we said according to (1 Cor 11:30 KJV) that many believers were sick and dying because they were not discerning that the Lord’s body is what made them righteous by a gift and not the confession of their sins.
Coming to the communion table is a time to remember what the Lord has done for us by a gift -- not a time for us to remember what works we are doing that make us righteous enough to approach God.
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