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One of the great questions of Christianity concerns the sovereignty of God versus the free will of man. Both are true. In His sovereignty, God gave a lot of freedom to men, even to the degree that we are told in Psalm 115:16: “The heavens are the heavens of the Lord, but the earth He has given to the sons of men.” This is why He will not do many things on earth unless we pray. He knows what we need even before we pray, but we still have to ask Him to move on the earth because He has delegated authority over the earth to us. This is why the Holy Spirit is called “the Helper” and not “the Doer.” He will help us, but He will not do what we are called to do. 

The church is now mobilizing to be the salt and light that we are called to be, but it is far better to have authority with God than with men. Having authority with God is much better than winning elections, stacking the Supreme Court with people who share our values, or anything else we could do on earth. He has given us the earth, but the biggest mistake man ever made was to think we could run things without Him. The most important devotion we can have now is to determine that we are going to seek His help in all that we do, and therefore the Helper, in all things. 

It is our basic devotion to know the truth, to speak the truth, and to stand for the truth without compromise, regardless of the cost. Above all things, we acknowledge and stand for the most basic truth of all—that the Truth is a Person—Jesus Christ. In John 14:6-7 Jesus said, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but through Me.” The deceptions of post-modern relativism and political correctness have tried to impose shackles on Christians by saying that to believe we know the only way to God is the height of arrogance, but the reverse is actually true. If God truly sent His own Son to pay the price that He did for our salvation, for anyone to say they do not need Him, or His atonement to get to God, is showing the ultimate human arrogance. 

Jesus did not leave us an option to believe that there could be other ways to God.  Would He have endured the cross if we could be restored to God by other means? That there could be any other way to God is a basic affront to Jesus, and this is the beginning of a strong delusion for any Christian who entertains this thought. Jesus is the Way, and there is no other way. To compromise this basic truth is the beginning of slipping from the path of life. 

Pride caused the first fall—the fall of Satan—and is found at the root of almost every fall since. It is crucial that we not become proud because we know the Truth, but rather be humbled by it, knowing that we have been saved only by the grace of God. For this reason, we must show grace to others, even those who do not yet know the truth. However, this does not mean that we should compromise what we know. For their sakes, we must stand for the truth boldly and courageously, or it will only make it easier for them to tragically stay in their deception, and we will almost certainly begin to fall into it ourselves. 

Jesus had a lot of mercy for sinners, but He did not have any for the self-righteous. Those who stand for truth with an air of self-righteousness have somehow departed from the truth—it is by the grace of God that we know the truth. Therefore, those who know the truth will be humble, not proud. Those who are not humble about having the truth only know a doctrine, but not the Truth Himself. Even so, being humble does not mean that we are not strong. True humility is a demonstration of the greatest strength of all—that we actually know the real truth. 

Jesus said that He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. Therefore, if we are to know Him as He is, He cannot just be one of these to us, but He must be all three. The Way is not just a system of behaviour, but a Person we must follow. Truth is not just having accurate doctrines, though of course we want this, but Truth is a Person we must know. If that Person, Jesus, is not our Life, is He really the Way and the Truth to us? 

So how does Jesus become our Life? Jesus said in Matthew 22:37-40, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the great and foremost commandment. The second is like it, ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself.’ On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets.” So our highest priority, our number one calling, is to love God above all else. If this is true of us, will we not seek to know Him and be close to Him above anything else in our lives? If we love Him above all else, will we not seek to please Him in all things? If we are seeking to please Him in all things, then obeying Him and doing His will will be the most basic drive in our lives. Is it? 

To walk in truth demands that we be honest. Are there other things that eclipse knowing and doing the will of God in our lives? If so, then we are not fulfilling the great and foremost commandment. C.S. Lewis once remarked, “If you’re on the wrong road, progress means doing an about-turn and walking back to the right road.” To get on the right road, we must return to where we missed the turn and start over. This is called “repentance.” 

The Path of Life 

Because mankind was made first and foremost to have a relationship with God, we can never be fulfilled, or at peace, until our relationship with God has been restored. This is much more than being “born again.” To be born again is simply to begin again—to go back and get on the right road in life, which is to seek God, know Him, and follow Him. Being born again is therefore just the start of the journey, not the end of it. Those who have remained on the path of life are ever growing and maturing into the salt and light they are called to be. 

If we say we love God, but do not even put forth an effort to know Him, we are deceiving ourselves. The more we love anyone, the more we will devote ourselves to knowing them. Those who say they believe something, but do not live it, are hypocrites. It is obvious that neither God nor men have a high opinion of hypocrites. We must live what we claim to believe. Living the Christian life begins with loving God. Therefore, we should seek to know Him and do what is pleasing in His sight. 

When we begin to know God we cannot help but to love Him because He is the most lovable Being there is. Just beginning to know Him compels us to love Him, which compels us to know Him better, which compels us to love Him more, ad infinitum. Therefore, to be on the path of life we will be ever growing in our love for Him. If we love Him, we cannot help but to love His people, and as we grow in love for Him, we also grow in love for one another. The path of life is therefore the path to ever increasing love—for God and one another. 

By this we see that our whole purpose as human beings is fulfilled by love. In II Corinthians 5:14-15 we are told: “For the love of Christ controls us, having concluded this, that One died for all, therefore all died; and He died for all, that they who live should no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and rose again on their behalf.” What would our lives be like if they were controlled by His love? What would our days be like? This is our basic devotion as Christians, to be controlled by the love of Christ, not selfishness, not lust, not greed—nothing but the love of Christ. 

This is why the Apostle Paul prayed for that which is the essence of our Christianity to be revealed to us and formed in us, “that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man; so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God” (see Ephesians 3:16-19). 

What is a person like who is filled up with all the fullness of God? Jesus is what they look like. This is our most basic calling as Christians—to be like Him and to do the works that He did. The path of life is following Him so closely that we become like Him. In the great definition of love in I Corinthians 13, one of the characteristics of love is that “love . . . is not arrogant” (see I Corinthians 13:4). True love can hold the ultimate truth—that there is only one way to the Father. Jesus is that Way, and He is not arrogant about it. Love is attracting, compelling others with the truth because of love. This is the way Jesus came, because that is the way He is, which is why even sinners were attracted to Him and would turn from their sins to follow Him. Love draws, but arrogance repels. Self-righteousness is an ultimate arrogance that repels both God and men. The ultimate self-righteousness is to think that we can be acceptable to God without the sacrifice that He made for us. 

To be righteous means to do what is right in the sight of the Lord, keeping in mind we can only do this because of the power that He has given to us. His great love, with which He loved us even before we knew Him, will enable us to walk in righteousness with the humility that attracts both God and men. If the Son of God humbled Himself to become a man, grew up and worked in a humble profession in the most humble of towns, and even endured the humiliation of the cross for our sakes, how much more should we be willing to humble ourselves? Humility is not compromise—it is the ability to hold to the truth in love. 

As we seek the truth, it will be easy at times to get angry at those who have perverted it, or are attacking it, or us. As we see how the foundations of our faith and our nation are being attacked and destroyed, we will easily fall into a wrong spirit if we do not seek to continually grow in love for God, our neighbours, and even our enemies, as He has commanded us. To stay on the path of life, we must stay in love and grow in love. Love seeks. If we love the truth, we will seek the truth. True love will never quit. 

Rick Joyner is the founder and executive director of MorningStar Ministries and Heritage International Ministries and is the senior pastor of MorningStar Fellowship Church. He is the author of more than forty books, including The Final Quest, a worldwide bestseller. Rick is the president of The Oak Initiative, an interdenominational movement that is mobilizing Christians to be engaged in the great issues in our time. Rick and his wife, Julie, have five children: Anna, Aaryn, Amber, Ben, and Sam.