Maximize - Make as large or great as possible Minimize - Reduce something unpleasant to the smallest possible amount or degree. One of the best ways to water down something or make it less pure is to over do it. Purity is an amazing thing and the essence of something is best seen in it's purest form, unblemished, with no additives...pure. One of satan's most subtle assaults on God's people is to take the purity of God's Word and make it....less, or with options other than what it says. If he can water down the pure truth then the whole thing is subject to the change that he wants to put in place. Take for example Eve in the garden of Eden. She had a one on one encounter with ole satan himself and things did not work out so well.....for eternity. Paul spoke to this deception in 2 Corinthians 11:3 "But I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ." The church at Corinth had it's own set of problems as the members, through their ignorance, were distorting God's simple plan and making it a monster with more rules, regulations, and spiritual traps. Paul addressed it in both letters and tried to rein them back in to the basic ministry at hand, which was "share the gospel and follow the elementary teachings of God's Word. The people in the Corinthian church were trying to contaminate God's Word with their own impressions of what was being said and it had gotten out of hand. Purity (def)- freedom from adulteration and contamination. When we get into our impressions of what God is saying and then base our belief system on it, we have succumbed to maximizing what we think and minimizing the purity of the message itself.
Our world has gotten to the point in knowledge that we feel we can do anything and our maximizing of our own abilities has led us down a path of self glorification and self gratification. We think our brains, that God gave us, will help us solve any problem if given time to figure it out. The maximizing of what we can do minimizes our dependency on God. It puts us in a position that satan tried to put Jesus in after Jesus had been in the wilderness for forty days. In Matthew 4:1-11 we see that Jesus, after fasting for forty days was hungry. How did satan tempt him? In verse 3 scripture says, "The tempter came to him and said, "If you are the Son of God, tell the stones to become bread." To someone in our world today the tempter might say, "if you think you are so smart, then figure this out on your own." Like Jesus, our best bet is to use the purity of the Word of God to fight this tendency to maximize our abilities and minimize God. Jesus answers in verse 4 "
It is written, Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God." Pure truth to fight a battle of the senses...hunger. satan wanted to take the need for food and make it the BIG thing, but in reality is was a minimal thing for the Son of God because He knew where His real food was coming from. You may say, "Well, being hungry is a huge thing when you are the one who is lacking in food." It's all about perspective. Take fasting itself. The denial of physical food puts into perspective the desire for spiritual food that is only found in the Word of God. Our focus changes during fasting and that focus is tuned in to God and His ways. The purity of the Word begins to make so much more sense to us and we totally rely on it for satisfying our desire in life.
Another way the devil tempted Jesus was to take him up to the highest point of the temple and tell Him to throw himself off. Now here the devil tries to use scripture, or seemingly scripture, to make his point. Jesus has been set forth by the Lord God to His mission and now the devil attempts to stop him even getting started by offering up half truths in scripture to the one who IS the word. Bad move. Of course, the devil in this temptation left out part of the verse he was quoting because it did not benefit his cause. The scripture he stated was Matthew 4:6 as he quoted from Psalm 91 ‘He will command his angels concerning you, and they will lift you up in their hands,so that you will not strike your foot against a stone." The devil left out a very important part of this verse where it goes on to say "For He will give His angels charge concerning you, to guard you in all your ways." The affirmation from God the Father to the Son is this "I will guard all the ways you go and all the ways you are tempted." The devil at times tempts us in the same ways and with great effect if we follow our "humanistic" vantage point about life. Then we will see ourselves going down a broad path of destruction. I have seen learned men take the purity of God's word and pollute it to the point that the devil polluted it when trying to tempt Jesus at the very beginning of His ministry. Those men have decided to follow the commentary on the Word of God and not follow the Word itself. It is very dangerous to water down the word of God with our human impressions taking precedent when trying to study it. The words "I think" and "in my opinion" can maximize our opinions and minimize what the Word actually says. Those words can sometimes lead us to adulter the Word of God. Joining our thoughts and opinions with the Word of God and thus maximizing us and minimizing the Word itself. The art of purity takes the Word of God as it is and as it is portrayed in Hebrews 4:12 12 For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
Those thoughts and intentions can change, thus making them minimal. When we maximize our thoughts and intentions and try to make the Word of God fit them we get in major trouble and the purity of the Word is lost in the shuffle.
What can we do to preserve the Word of God in our lives? Do what Jesus did. When tempted to "explain away a very direct Word from God in scripture" just do what it says and believe it without wavering. Don't put your own "spin" on it because it will make it dead and lifeless. Let the pure Word of God speak for itself and if you follow it you will find wisdom. Don't believe me? Well, that is from the Word of God too. James 1:5 But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all generously and without reproach, and it will be given to him." Nuff said...
The Pilgrimage continues....
David Warren
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