Recognizing and dealing with deception

Lies surround us. The very core of evil is lying. Every sin is a lie in some way. When you sin, you are lying to yourself that God doesn't care about you, or know what is best for you, and therefore, you must take care of yourself. Look out for number one. We are told that the world will bring us pleasure. That the world is all we need. That there is no God. That we are all that is. That the world is what it is all about.


For those of you who claim to be Christians, if someone came up to you and said, "There is no God," you would be in total opposition to them. So, the world comes at us in different wording. "Can't we all just agree? You believe what you believe, I'll believe what I'll believe. Don't ram Christianity down my throat. Get Christianity out of the schools. Get God off our money. Get God off our monuments. Don't post the ten commandments." In effect, they are making God irrelevant. Unfortunately we didn't fight it. We don't fight it. So they make God irrelevant in their lives, and ultimately in everyone else's lives. Basically they are saying "God does not exist."


One of our biggest mistakes, in my opinion is buying into the lie that America is a Christian nation. That Christianity is the majority in America. America is a country. America is run by humans. We are, or at least were started, as a republic. A republic is ruled by law, which is better than a democracy which is ruled by majority vote, but the best system is a theocracy which is ruled by God. Our country has since turned into, I believe, a democracy. Instead of being ruled by law, we are ruled by popular opinion. Instead of wishing justice we look for loopholes to get around the law. Our country is secular. The world hates Christians. Whether they admit it or not, Christianity is offensive. God is offensive to the evil. 


What is evil anyway? Evil is the absence of God. When the world buys into lies, they reject God. Everyone is born separate from God, and is therefore evil. Those that have been called out of darkness have begun a transformation. We are to be imitators of Christ, and therefore are offensive to the evil. Sure, they mask it as other things, but ultimately, the world hates Christians. Christianity is the hard way out. The world wants nothing better than to write God off as some irrelevant, not caring, being without power, or existence. Therefore, they will do everything they can to oppose Christians and draw them astray.

So, the American people truly are attempting to destroy God. There will come a time when we will be shown real persecution. On that day let us not fall away, but embrace it. Ready to suffer for Christ. To suffer for Christ is greater than anything we could ever do. Let the world despise and leave us. They have left our savior too.

The world is full of wolves, ready to devour the unwary sheep. They twist scripture and the definitions of words. They quote verses so close to the original, that it sparks just the smallest memory, and we begin to question if that was in fact what the verse said. They choose their words wisely, making their message sound friendly, when in reality, it is dripping with death. The new believer, or the one unsure in his belief, fall victim to this trap and start believing lies. Once a lie is believed, it is very difficult to change that belief to the truth. 


We must be grounded in the word. We must memorize and meditate on scripture. We must ask God to guard our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. When people come at us with false doctrines, we must recognize it for what it is, and not let our brothers or sisters be lead astray. This is a battle. The battle is spiritual. We must understand that it is a battle, that we are at war 24/7, know our enemy, and know how to fight it. We must know the truth. We must be sure of our faith. We must be sure we have forgiveness, that God exists, that we need him, etc. 


Our enemy is not the world, though we are theirs. Our enemy is evil. We should view the world as prisoners of war, for we were once dead in our sins, but God didn't give up on us. When He called, we ran and hid. Not only that, we actively opposed Him. We hated Him. We didn't want Him. We wanted to destroy Him. But He rescued us. He loved us enough to not give us what we wanted, death, but gave us eternal life. Therefore, when the world hates us, show them the love shown to us. Let our life song sing to Christ, so that when the world looks at us, they see Christ at work in us. If we believed the way we claim we believe, and the way we should believe, we should be on our knees begging unbelievers to come to know Christ.


We have many hard times ahead. The way of Christ is most certainly not the easy way out. The world will hate us and reject us. We will be persecuted. We may even be beaten, tortured, or killed. But this world is not our home. I consider myself a patriot, and am very proud of this country, but this nation is not ours. I love this country, I am willing to die for it, for freedom, and for my fellow Americans. But no matter how patriotic we are, understand that it is a nation of the world, and therefore we should not give our ultimate loyalty to it. Our loyalty lies with Christ and his kingdom. There will be a time when this great nation turns against us. It has already turned against God. We must figure out now, where our loyalties lie. Do we follow America when we know that it would be sin to do so? It was one of my hardest decisions to make, but in the end, God is the ultimate authority. We must follow his commands first. 


Take care my dear readers.


~Sheepdog