PREACHERS WHO DO NOT TAKE UP THEIR CROSS AND FOLLOW IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF LORD JESUS CHRIST ARE VERY FORTUNATE IF THEY ARE FOUND OUT BEFORE THEY DIE. Indeed, Jesus Said That There Are Those To Whom He Will Be Saying That Even Though You Called Me Lord, I Did Not Know You. Grace is extended to everyone, faith that becomes faithfulness is another matter because true faith is only evidenced by the fruit of being faithful to the calling.

What sin nature is Jimmy Swaggart always talking about?

He also says the answer for which you seek is found in the cross. What does all that mean?

Happy Riches, student of developmental psychology

Answered Jan 16Answer requested by Jamar Grimsley

Jimmy Swaggart is a very public example of people who preach to others about what God is saying for the preacher to do himself.

All of us project our own issues upon other people in some way, even those who learn to deflect and diffuse their inner conflicts, as they tell people what needs to be done in the world in which they also live.

Politicians are renowned for accusing their opponents about the very things they themselves are doing and, when doing so, describe how untrustworthy their opponents are in such detail. When politicians describe the sins of the their opponents, this becomes a form of confession for them, even if it is a false witness.

Preachers who hammer a certain topic are doing either one of two things: walking the talk, or projecting with talk what they are not prepared to walk.

Jimmy Swaggart was hammering prostitution hard when he was visiting them.  Instead of walking with the God he claimed to love, Jimmy Swaggart was projecting upon others the very thing he himself was doing; even though he knew that he should not have been committing the sin he delighted in.

But nobody can outrun sin. Sin gets everyone in the end. Either you acknowledge your sin now and take it to the cross—the exit door from this world—or you carry it yourself, so it can eat you up within—the worm that never dies!

Anxiety is a fear of the unknown that eventually grabs everybody. Any denial that death reigns is invalid once you are claimed by it. The doctor may sign your death certificate, and the vultures may have plucked your eyes, before stripping your body to its bones, but regardless of what people say in respect to how you die, death reigns—of course, in respect to vultures, circumstances depend upon where you happen be located when you exit your biological body.

Why wait until you die (which could happen at any time against your will) before you meet your Maker? You can take up your cross now and follow Him to the place where the door to eternal life is opened; the place where you can secure your own assurance of being resurrected from the dead.

Everyone of us is like a box. We all have six sides. There is the top, the bottom, the front, back, right side and left side. When opened up, just like a box, we would form a cross. Either we open up and let Lord Jesus Christ take our place on our own cross that we will have to bear or we go it alone—being alone is a long time when it comes to eternity. When you die, having been born sometime since 1900 AD, in the year fifty-five fifty-five (5555 AD), you will not be alive, unless you have received eternal life.

Death may mean ceasing to exist, according to one definition, but when a person is pronounced dead, the body still exists. The Cross speaks of the crossover from temporal existence to eternal existence—the biological to the spiritual.

Wise people understand that life on Earth is futile because we cannot continue forever; therefore, eternity must point to having a purpose for existence on Earth.

The sin nature that Jimmy Swaggart talks about is the one he himself cultivated when he was tempted and enticed by his own desires (James 1:12–16) for the lusts of the flesh, the lusts of the eye, and selfish desire because of his own pride of life—exaggerated self-perception of personal worth and grandeur (1 John 2:16-17 ).

Had Jimmy Swaggart not entertained the thoughts that led to the desires that permitted him to be tempted and lose control of his mind, as he yielded to the prince of the power of this world, then he could have been one of the greatest preachers of all time. Instead, he became a public disgrace; something he himself had to face. Fortunately, for Jimmy, Jesus died for sinners and not the righteous, therefore, the love of God is able to forgive even an ungodly hypocrite who preaches but does not practice, providing he repents from his iniquity and lets Lord Jesus in to take away his sin.

Those who point the finger at others always have three more fingers pointing back at themselves. Get the log out of your own eye and then you shall see clearly how to take the speck out of somebody else’s eye, is what we are advised by our precious Savior to do (Matthew 7:3-5). Call a spade a spade, but don’t club people with the Bible, for a rough diamond is still hard, even if everything comes down to the matter of what is in each one’s heart (NB. Mark 16:14; Romans 2:5)

The good news is that if we take responsibility for our lives and own up to our ineptness and inability to overcome death, we will pick up our cross and follow in the footsteps of Jesus of Nazareth, so that we might be raised with Him in newness of life.

• The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together. For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.(Romans 8:16–18)

Hand the sin nature to God to take away and He will raise you up. This is what the cross is all about, not standing at the bottom of the cross and pointing the finger at other people.

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