There is nothing more delusional than for anyone to read exactly what God’s Word in straight forward declaration says and not accept it on its face. Instead, they read into or spin it to say what they want to support their own ideas confident God approves. Why would any professed Christian that truly knows and loves God purposely delude themselves and if a pastor, elder, teacher, preacher, prophet, evangelist or apostle (missionary) other people too, in this way? Fortunately for those of us that care, God in His Word objectively read, interpreted and applied with the leading of the Holy Spirit provides some answers and warnings about persons that deliberately disobey and corrupt it.
Before going further, I must disclose the divine burden on my heart that has led to this post. It is directly tied to the uniquely American professed Christian conservative delusional narrative that has caused many to pray and act at cross-purposes with God in the times we are in that I wrote about last week.1 I have read through the Bible many times since my surrender to Christ in 1979,2 but have not come across any promise of perpetuity for any nation but Israel! Also, it is certain not the American flag or any other nation’s flies in Heaven since Christ is and “will set up a banner for the nations” as He “assembles the outcasts of Israel...” in His Kingdom coming to earth (Isaiah 11:10-12; NKJV).
Having written the foregoing, you would be very mistaken to accuse me of not caring about my nation and its welfare! Because I deeply care about America, I have been faithfully obedient to the Lord at great cost to keep crying out against the wickedness bringing it down and proclaiming His way of salvation in the Gospel to fellow citizens of every hue--that He died on the cross for our sins, was buried and rose again to save sinners who will repent and believe! And realizing my natural allies on earth in helping our nation besides the Holy Spirit are ostensibly fellow believers He fills, empowers and leads in their churches that in the many are not, I have cried out with His grief for repentance.3
Alas though, in their largely compromised, corrupt, self-absorbed and divided state, the many guilty professed Christians and their churches in America also resist God's call to repentance and count me an enemy as the spiritually deluded and dead religionists have done from time immemorial (Genesis 4:1-8; Jeremiah 26:1-9; Matthew 23:27-39; John 8:37-47; Galatians 4:16).4 And so, once again the hard truth: how can any serious Christian really believe our nation will long endure without repentance by all the guilty from sin plainly defined and described in God’s Word? To think this is possible is to be completely deluded which apparently is acceptable among professed Christians.
Indeed, the American right and freedom to think, believe or say whatever one wants has led to the prevalence of false teaching from among many professed Christian liberals (progressives) and conservatives!5 Amazingly, many of these false teachers use Scripture as they deceptively assert it is written to undergird their particular philosophical narratives, related doctrines and opinions voluminously disseminated from pulpits and in Christian media. And because it is a permitted Americanism, the deluded, loyal followers of these false teachers will defend their right to teach falsehood to the death! But what men approve is not necessarily so with God (Luke 16:13-18)!
Everyone wants to believe and act on the Word of God as they see it rather than as it is. Scripture is clear, this was never God’s will nor is it now (2 Peter 1:16-21)! The average American in the pew does it deceiving him or herself to believe God is fully supportive of the American way of individualism, freedom and tolerance. The willfully deceitful false teachers do it puffing themselves up in pride to believe they are great teachers and their spin is right; competing with others to gain the largest possible following and income that in America’s free marketplace of ideas is acceptable. Such wicked motives, however, are not acceptable to God (Acts 20:25-31; 2 Corinthians 2:12-17, 4:1-6)!
We are supposed to come humbly to God and His written Word as eager learners ready to be taught His knowledge in Christ by the Holy Spirit (John 16:12-15; 1 Corinthians 2:6-16). If this were more widely the case now, there would not be as it is thousands of interpretations, false narratives, doctrines and opinions lest someone would even arrogantly believe God is the One confused about His own Word and the cause of confusion in His house (1 Corinthians 14:33)! But now, for those still mystified about what possible reasons the Lord might be put out enough with the current state of American Christianity and its churches to bring judgment, know that disobedience and corrupting of His Word causing “one of these little ones...to stumble” remains among them (Mark 9:42-48, NKJV).
1 See the January 10, 2021 post, Praying At Cross-Purposes With God, under the category, Bible Prophecy. Purely prophetically speaking, some generation had to roll up
on being close to the last before Christ’s coming. What does that say about the depth (not to mention authenticity) of relationship one has with Christ to selfishly want
Him to delay His coming because it interferes with your world narrative and plans? Seriously? The Lord instructs that we take the signs of His coming to heart and while
we keep living for Him and serving His causes, watch expectantly until He comes (Mark 13:28-36)! This is the heart of every aspiring strong man and great woman of
God in the image of Christ I write about in my book, The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics published by Open Door Communication Ministries, Inc. and available in
print or digital formats at major internet booksellers. You can also purchase a print copy in the Strong Man Store
2 Read my February 17, 2019 testimony in part, Surrendering All To Jesus, under the category, Glory To God!
3 Survey my posts in the categories Call To Repent and The Cause to see the consistency of the Lord’s message and heart through me to His Church in America.
4 “Well, maybe it would be different if you were not so harshly direct,” some have told me over the years. Without getting into the religious subterfuge behind such state-
ments, I cry out what God puts in my mouth with the same spiritual urgency all of the prophets of the Bible before me did and one that cares in the moment a person
about to be run over in the street needs to be warned to get out of the way! More poignantly, what is going on with the folk that have to be harshly spoken to (Ezekiel 33:
1-11; Matthew 3:1-12, 23:33; Galatians 5:7-12; James 4:1-10)?
5 As examples, consider the following. On this Sanctity Of Life Sunday created righteously by conservative President, Ronald Reagan’s 1984 proclamation to uphold un-
born life in the womb as sacred from God and to protect this life from murder by the parents (Genesis 9:5-7; Job 10:8-12), professed Christian liberals reject the occa-
sion falsely teaching a woman’s right to murder nowhere to be found in Scripture supersedes the unborn right to live. Tomorrow, many professed Christian liberals and
their atheist allies from many hues will celebrate Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on the holiday in his honor (quite apart from the God he honored) as one who fulfilled Scrip-
ture’s mandate of concern for the less fortunate, while many political and religious conservatives will falsely teach in denial the numerous historically documented acts of
oppression visited upon blacks and other American minorities by them and their forefathers has any application to them as “the oppressor” named in Scripture (Isaiah 1:
17, NKJV).
In the September 20, 2020 post, What Will It Profit A Man?, under the category, The Cause, I wrote in a footnote about how I (and you as an authentic Christian) am regularly visited by Satan, the tempter in some manner to tempt me to the sin of compromising God’s Word. As the Lord leads today, I follow up that footnote with a more thorough word of instruction and exhortation to the aspiring strong men and great women of God in the image of our Lord Jesus Christ reading this to help in these latter times.1 Truly, it is absolutely imperative that we cling to what we know about God, His will, way and Word as it is written to “wage the good warfare,” (1 Timothy 1:18, NKJV).
In the post footnote referenced above, I was discussing the truth of how “we all have been tempted by the satanic deceit of feminism from whatever weakness or desire of the flesh to believe the lies God is no longer honoring His Word as it is written, biased males from Moses and to include Christ for centuries have misunderstood or purposely misinterpreted the Word to subjugate females or blasphemously, God made a mistake and is wrong (Genesis 3:1-6; Isaiah 29:16, 45:9-10; Romans 9:20; 1 Timothy 4:1-2; James 1:14).” From the foregoing, it is clear weaknesses and desires arising from the sinful flesh makes us very susceptible to being tempted and deceived.
The deceiver remains crafty and subtle from millennia ago in Eden with Eve; having since gained a wealth of experience tempting and deceiving mankind (Genesis 3:1, 13; 2 Corinthians 11:3, 10-15; Revelation 12:9). After God, only Satan and his minions better know sinful fallen human nature, our weaknesses, common desires and proclivities based on observation and success employing methodologies that entice. He is the master of suggestion, planting thoughts (beware your memories), ideas and doubts. He stirs up feelings (sensual, bitter and even happy) to ensnare and unabashedly lies on and contradicts God along with His Word toward his deceptive ends (John 8:44).
Satan’s core strategy of deception from the beginning is formed by the limitations God has placed on him. He, of course, wanted to destroy mankind from the face of the earth and for all eternity in Eden, but God would not allow that. God did allow Satan to attempt to seduce the first humans to sin leading to the carrying out of the divine decree of death, but with a turn of events he did not foresee knowing God to be righteous: God would Personally make a way for His fallen creatures’ deliverance (Genesis 3:14-15; Romans 1:16-17, 3:21-26; 1 Corinthians 2:6-10; Colossians 2:11-15)! Nevertheless, temptation to sin through deceit remains Satan’s chief weapon against men.
His weapon has been repeatedly and successfully used on God’s people such as in the Bible when Balaam deceived Israel and the Nicolaitans, first century Christians (Numbers 25; Revelation 2:12-17).2 So confident is he with his ability to tempt to sin using deceit, he went after the sinless Son of God, but failed (Matthew 4:1-11)! Our Savior and Lord wills that we not be overcome by the tempter either; teaching us to pray to that end and praying for us while still on the earth (Matthew 6:9-13; Luke 22:31-32; John 17:15). Indeed, we are to stay alert for the crafty working of that evil one to avoid being his unwitting vessels or deceitfully tempted into sin (2 Corinthians 4:1-6; 1 Peter 5:8-11).
Despite there being no temptation to suddenly come upon us “except such as is common to man,” the history of Christianity from the first century until now, follows the examples of Israel’s failures (1 Corinthians 10:1-13a, NKJV). From sexual immorality, manmade religion (allowing unimaginable corruptions) to now, full on rebellion against the Lord in the order of mankind, we professed Christians have been so easily deceived as again, James warns through our “own desires” (James 1:14-15, NKJV).3 Because he craftily and subtly operates in the unseen spiritual shadows (Ephesians 6:12), many in ignorance and/or pride underestimate Satan’s ability to tempt and deceive us at the point of even latent desires (which he counts on) we discover too late ensnared us.4
The Lord Jesus and His apostles repeatedly warn us about the prominence of deception in these latter times and the need to avoid being deceived (Matthew 24:3-5, 11, 15-28; 1 Corinthians 3:18-23, 6:9-11; Ephesians 5:1-7; 2 Thessalonians 2:1-11; 2 Timothy 3:13; 2 Peter 2:1-3; 1 John 3:4-9; Revelation 13:1-3, 11-15, 18:21-24). Being tempted by Satan is inescapable since God allows it. But He wants us to successfully endure it as James reminds us (James 1:12-13). To that end also, the apostle Paul writes, “God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape...,” (1 Corinthians 10:13b, NKJV). To experience His deliverance, we must not yield to, but stand firm by faith in the temptation!
Therefore, to make ourselves as deception proof as possible we must daily do the following seven things. One, take Jesus Christ seriously when He demands of anyone that will follow Him to “deny himself” (Luke 9:23, NKJV). Two, practice putting the sinful flesh and its desires to death by and “walk in the Spirit” (Romans 8:12-13; Galatians 5:16, NKJV). Three, know our God, the God of the Bible--He does not change no, not even to accommodate our desires (Daniel 11:32; Hebrews 13:8; James 1:16-18). Four, know God’s Word (Psalm 119:9-11, 2 Timothy 2:15). Five, be content in Christ (1 Timothy 6:6-10). Six, keep short sin accounts with God--practicing sin invites Satan’s temptations (Psalm 32:1-5; 1 John 1:8-10). Seven, forgive so, God can forgive you (Mark 11:25-26)!5
1 Learn about who the aspiring strong men and great women of God in the image of Jesus Christ are in my book, The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics. It is published
by the Publishing Division of Open Door Communication Ministries, Inc. with fresh editing in 2019 for greater clarity and updated web addresses in the footnotes. It is
available at major internet booksellers such as Amazon, Barnes & Noble and ChristianBooks.com. These book sellers with Apple also have the digital download of the
book. Type the title into their search engines if necessary. You can also purchase the book and all related Strong Man Of God Brand Group Study Print Resources in
the Strong Man Store!
2 See the January 26, 2020 post, The Spirit Of Harlotry and its footnote on the Nicolaitans, under the category, Call To Repent.
3 Lusts (desires) for riches, positions, privilege, power etc. are reasons many professed Christians of all hues and genders will not fully answer God’s call to repent from
plainly seen sins of corrupting and compromising His Word as well as rebellion against Him and apostasy they are caught up in at this hour (Titus 1:16).
4 An excellent case study is this past century’s uprising of Western women armed with a number of righteous grievances against their male led societies, but which by the
midpoint of the century, had morphed into an all out rebellion against God and His order of mankind. Called now, feminists, these women and their male supporters in-
spired other rebels against the divine order such as those practicing same sex relations, infiltrated many churches and while allying themselves with black Americans for
example, have smeared their righteous cause for racial justice. At this hour the pursuit of secular and professed Christian feminists is for power and accolades amazingly
in line with that of Satan who incited, tempted, deceived and ensnared them into this great evil (Genesis 3:4-6; Isaiah 14:12-15; Luke 4:5-8; Revelation 13:4)!
5 Holding grudges in unforgiveness leads to bitterness and is a flashing neon light summons to Satan to tempt you to greater sin (Ephesians 4:25-27, 31; Hebrews 12:12-
15).
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