Trent Ling acknowledges what most of the Bible recognizes and attempts to counteract–that the biggest enemies of the truth continue to be false teaching and faux following. While nobody is confused by blatant and hardened sinners, religious pretenders make it look like following Jesus ranks indistinct from following any of the other religious gurus. And yet Jesus insisted that his headship, leadership, and offering to the world was completely set apart. So what gives?
“I lived a spiritually grueling 25 years in the world and despite my spiraling existence, my response to powerless religion was always the same–‘no thanks,'” Trent recollects. “Powerlessness was never attractive. Only when I met the true Christ, the one who demands utter and complete surrender and offers powerful and impossible living, did I realize that there indeed existed a truth well beyond the typically shallow overtures of man. Now, my most difficult work as a minister is to help the blind see that their little, non-delivering piety needs a complete tear down and replacement. False religion is a worse drug than drugs. Only the sick, open, earnest, and rightly hungry will listen. Like Jesus, those are the ones I seek and save.”
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Hello Siauw, I misspoke, I am not always clear with what is in my mind when it comes out in words. The Bible does call us to confess our sins to one another , so we can be healed. IN my thoughts , just speaking for me , personally in the past I would get so caught up sharing my sins with the ministry, that I hardly went to God with my sins for forgiveness, (my fault), I have spoken to Foster and cleared this up. Confession of sins is a standard in the Bible, so that we can be real with one another and for a deeper fellowship and not fake fellowship. Please forgive me for not being careful in what I wrote and misspeaking. I didnt leave my name because I didn’t want to cause any harm, in the end I caused more harm than good. With Sincere Love…I am sorry.
Amen Brother Dave I will continue to pray for you
Hey Anonymous, Thank you. It took a bit. But thank you. I have been beating myself up! God has a purpose for me, and this type of railing on myself doesn’t allow me to stick my head up, let alone be really useful for God. I’m quite sure Jesus, Paul, Peter and John didn’t walk around with their heads down. They had work to do! Thank you for your love. Love you
Hey Anonymous, Sorry for the slow response. My previous comment included RTTM which means Response To The Message. From a preached message I had found out that all I had really been was someone who had rejected the truth. I had lived a watered down version of what God really offers. I have been just a phony!
My attempt here is to be in the open (in the light) as God is revealing me straight up. He is tearing me apart at the core and I am just trying to be in the light as it happens. Everyone loves encouragement – but I will tell you nothing beats the encouragement that comes directly from God. I will also tell you that the core is not at all comfortable. What’s uncomfortable for you to talk about?
Funny, here it is Trent talking about religious people being phony. Oh, Jesus’ never spoken so harsh like that, Jesus was alway sweet and polite… Jesus came to save us, don’t be so hard on yourself! Really? What about when he yelled at Peter in Matthew 16:23 Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men.” And here it is, Dave Foster being in the light of him being selfish, just as Jesus calls us to expose our sins in the open (not in the cubical like most phony religious people say “just confess your sin to God, not to the people”), someone anonymous person tell Dave to do otherwise – just be phony, Dave!
Hey Anonymous! As you know Disciples are always in the light. What is your name so we can fellowship with you? Also, what did you receive from today’s post? How did it minister to your life? You say you don’t have it all together, so lets fellowship so that we all grow together. Love you.
Brother Dave you need encouraged, Jesus Saves, no one else and no church saves you, know who you are in Jesus Christ , do everything you can in God’s strength, Today, because our life is in God’s hands, He holds the future , we are not promised tomorrow, much less the next hour of our life, Love God and Love your family with All you heart, All your mind,today! When you go to bed at night have a clear conscience before God that you lived for Him TODAY to please , honor and glorify God today. Don’t be so hard and critical of yourself, God made you in HIS IMAGE, seek Him today, Do not fret! We do need to repent of our evil ways, remember 1 John 1:9, If we confess our sins, He (God) is faithful and just and will forgive us of our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. Move on.You beat yourself up! ..And do the good we know we ought to do…hope you will be encouraged with God’s word today, not mine. Christ came to seek and save not to condemn His children. You are a child of the King! Stay strong in the Lord. No one else…..Be encourged.
Amen! Very encouraging, thank you. I hope we meet someday :). Love you, Mel
HI Mel, I dont know you, I have been following your comments, this one is encouraging to Me because your words are not words of someone else, this post seems genuinely spoken from your heart and not copied from what you have heard other people say. Thank you for your realness &,I will be praying for you , from A Disciple that doesn’t have it all together to another Disciple, Be Yourself and Be encouraged , You are important to God! You are loved by Him..
Delivery from religious thinking is still happening in my life. When expose to the truth I still find crumbs of phoniness now and then. Religious artificiality was so embedded in the fiber of my being that the Lord had to perform intense surgery on me and I know I still have a few more appointments to go under the scalpel for this disease.
But in retrospect, what really started this delivery process was admitting that I was sick and that my phony baloney spiritual life wasn’t cutting it. I could not kid myself anymore. My religious life was only storing up God’s wrath upon myself. I had been using the cross all this time to appease my conscience and what I was really doing was bringing condemnation to my life. I tried to sanctify myself unsuccessfully by leading a religious, empty life.
This, until I understood I was crucifying Jesus and exposing him to public shame again and again with my sin.
The brokenness and true repentance that this brought delivered me from 30 years of religious bondage. Thank you God for stepping in and delivering me from my religious insanity!
As I am seeing more clearly what this entails. I am going to God and asking Him for this to be done spiritually instead of a manual labor intensive effort from my brother. I have to stop the selfishness and bring God in the picture! He is quite capable and provided it is His will – there won’t be another need. Sorry I didn’t think of this earlier. Love you.
This is the righteous response to my recent RTTM. I need a complete teardown and replacement. This explains everything in every way. Father, ministry and Trent, I am so sorry. You have had to listen to so much from me!