THE GREAT EXCHANGE

"They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is forever worthy of praise! Amen."

-Romans 1:25

In today’s toxic, progressive, liberal, and so-called “new thought” Christian circles, we are witnessing a catastrophic implosion resulting from redefining the very terms and truths that form the foundation of the Christian faith. What's happening isn't an accident. It's not a simple oversight or spiritual clerical error. It's not a matter of semantics. It's what the Apostle Paul wrote about in Romans chapter 1, i.e. the EXCHANGE of God's truth for a lie. Among the most tragic and destructive of these lies of exchange is the distortion of the word "grace."

In these intentionally progressive, toxic, and destructive theological cults, grace is no longer defined as God’s unmerited favor — a glorious gift so beneficial, polarizing, profitable, and advantageous that it produces real, visible transformation in those who receive it. Instead, like many children unwittingly undergoing "gender reassignment surgery," the term "grace" has been hijacked, mutilated, twisted, and perverted into a hollow, toothless, worldly concept of tolerance, inclusion, and coexistence. In these downward spiraling toxic liberal circles, grace has come to mean affirmation without accountability, acceptance without repentance, and belonging without submission to the King of kings and LORD of lords. Read Romans 1 from start to finish. It's all in there.

At least Mary Eddy Bakker, Joseph Smith, and L. Ron Hubbard had the courtesy of renaming their cults rather than calling them Christianity or churches. What the toxic liberal "churches" are passing off as God's divine grace is wicked deception. At the root of this theological heist is not merely inaccurate or reinterpreted language — it is the enemy's crafty scheme to steal, kill, and destroy coupled with rebellious humanity’s willful rejection of God’s divinely authoritative, sovereign, sufficient, immutable, and perfect WORD. The redefinition of "grace" is simply one symptom of a deeper, darker, systemic rebellion: the willful disregard for what God has said and revealed in His Word.

King Jesus gives us a sober and shocking picture of what happens when God’s people abandon divine authoritative truth. Matthew 5:13 states:

"You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot."

Notice what King Jesus does -NOT- say: He doesn’t say, “You could be salt.” He doesn’t say, “You have great potential.” He says, "You ARE the salt of the earth." It’s a definitive statement of our new and exclusive identity in Christ — but it is also a stern and sobering warning!

Salt, by its very nature, is distinct. It is sharp, beneficial, a preservative, and even, at times, abrasive. But when it loses those properties — when it is no longer effective... when it becomes diluted, neutralized, or compromised — its only remaining value comes in the OVERT display of how ineffective and worthless it is (Revelation 3:16-17)! When salt becomes useless and ineffective... when it no longer preserves, enhances, protects, heals, absorbs, kills, binds, repels, promotes, etc., its last act of effectiveness is to be "cast out and trampled underfoot," serving as a warning to others.

That, too, is grace. Because in that statement, King Jesus is not being harsh — He is being gracious enough to warn us! He is demonstrating gracious speech, seasoned with salt, in the best, most loving, most advantageous way possible! He is speaking in such a way that people might awaken from deception and examine whether they have, in fact, lost their (or ever had) divine saltiness.

“Can I lose my salvation?” is and always will be the wrong question. King Jesus poses a far more urgent and undeniable question for us to grapple with: Have I lost my saltiness? Maybe an even better question is whether we were ever salty to begin with.

When “grace” is reduced to permissiveness and affirmation, when sound doctrine is replaced by subjective feelings, when tolerance is elevated above truth, when man’s philosophies compete with or eclipse God’s Word — salt has already lost its savor. And Christ Himself makes clear what happens to such salt: It will be thrown out. It will be trampled underfoot. It will serve as a warning — a divine wake-up call — to those who still have ears to hear.

This is why Paul’s words in Colossians 2 ring out so urgently:

“See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to Christ.”

Much of what passes for "Christianity" today is nothing more than a hollow religion of empty deceit; it is a saltless, spineless, toxic counterfeit. Religion is built on the sinking sand of human ideas and opinions rather than the Rock of Christ Jesus, the eternal and sufficient WORD.

Many "Christians" today are crossing land and sea, laboring in counterfeit churches, doing counterfeit ministry, engaging in counterfeit worship, and exporting a counterfeit GOSPEL through counterfeit missions — only to make their converts twice the children of hell that they are (Matthew 23:15)... only to hear King Jesus say, "I never knew you." This is not hyperbole; it is a sober warning from the LORD Himself. There's no excuse for counterfeit Christianity. God's WORD reveals that all the godlessness and wickedness of humanity issue isn't a lack of information or revelation, but the suppression of truth through wickedness, "...therefore, all are without excuse." King Jesus said, "My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand."

• Have you or has your pastor or church redefined God's GRACE?

• Have you exchanged the biblical meaning of grace for permissiveness or affirmation of sin?

• Have you allowed the salt of the GOSPEL to lose its savor in your life, your church, your doctrine, and your theology?

• Have you unwittingly been taken captive by the philosophies of this age — the idols of tolerance, self-expression, and inclusion? Will you repent of it today... even now?

• Have you, under testing and examination by the objective standard of God's WORD, been exposed as counterfeit, i.e. having built your life on what feels good vs. faith in what God has revealed in His WORD?

The Word of God doesn't bow or acquiesce to our feelings or traditions. The Gospel will never conform to cultural or religious trends. God's grace is not a synonym for tolerance — it is a divine gift that always polarizes, radically transforms, sanctifies, and accomplishes God's will. If whatever you are calling "grace" leaves you "unaffiliated" or unchanged, it's not God's grace at all. As pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer once said, “When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die.” John the Baptist prayed, "He must increase; I must diminish." The Apostle Paul wrote, "We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life."

If whatever you are calling "faith" is missing the "death component" (dying to your "old self"), it will invariably lack saltiness because it's nothing more than superficial belief. Even the demons have that and tremble. If your version of "Christianity" requires no cross of Christ, no death to self, no desperate dependency upon Him and the Holy Spirit (Exodus 33:15-16) and no surrender and submission to King Jesus, it is, without question, a counterfeit.

The Apostle Paul wrote in 2 Cor 13:5, "Test and evaluate yourselves to see whether you are in the faith. Examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize this about yourselves—that Jesus Christ is in you—unless indeed you fail the test and are rejected as counterfeit?"

Does the Word of Christ richly dwell in you? Are you living for His glory or your own? Is your speech ALWAYS gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you should answer each one as you ought? The grace of God, rightly understood through the leading and discernment of the Holy Spirit, is never soft, never dull, and never ineffective. It is sharp, polarizing, productive, effective, and salty! Has the GOSPEL of Christ Jesus accomplished that in your life?

Let today be that day. "For it is by GRACE you have been saved through faith, and this not from yourselves; it is the gift of God, not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance as our way of life."

Blessings & love,

Kevin M. Kelley

Senior Pastor

Big Island Christian Church