EYES, FOCUS and FAITH

I really do try to keep my eyes and my focus on 'my own' walk with the Lord, but it would be irresponsible, for the sake of love, not to watch what goes on around me. Like any army unit - and we are the 'army of the Lord', we are to operate as one man. We are a unit. And as a unit, it is our job to watch out for 'one another'. And like any battle, as we fight the enemy, we try to cover for one another, shout warnings, and send in the medics for the wounded. When a fellow soldier sounds a warning, that warning does not go unheeded. Yet for the 'Christian soldier', we often act as if there is no war and no enemy. You have to consider that 'unusual' because if we were in a physical army unit - that wouldn't happen. This 'spirit of unbelief' does not exist on the battlefield where the enemy is often unseen, yet it does on the Christian battlefield and the man who does not heed the warning - - meets his death, not seeing DESTRUCTION and DECEPTION. [Matthew 7:13] For wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it.'

And that is what I'm thinking about today. When you have an army unit in battle, if a fellow soldier shouts a warning, that warning is not going to go unheeded. because the soldier knows the danger is real. The soldier takes cover, assumes another position, reacts to the warning. Yet warnings to the 'Christian' are being shouted from the pulpit, by preachers, prophets, and teachers, and by friends who have a heart for truth, that go totally ignored and we watch loved ones walk right into the arms of the enemy - DECEPTION / DESTRUCTION - and call it God. 'But God said, God told me', 'I heard an audible voice', 'I had a rhema Word - the Scripture jumped off the page'. Yet the Word, the voice, the rhema does not line up with the whole Word of God and how God desires us to live.

DECEPTION / DECEIVE
kaw-khash'
[same letters as 'darkness' different order]

to deceive, lie, fail, grow lean, be disappointing, be untrue, be insufficient, be found liars, belie, deny, dissemble, deal falsely, feign obedience ...

The purpose of DECEPTION is to SUPPRESS our consummate life in God as our first love. In deception you give your hand to the enemy consummating a lie that leads to death, just as in Genesis. The serpent beguiled the woman - and she believed 'she would not die'. Do we receive the lie of the devil and think as the woman did - that we will not die? As the 'army of God' we have no 'life of our own'. Our life is 'Christ'.
 
2 Timothy 2:4          
No one engaged in warfare entangles himself with the affairs of this life,
that he may please him who enlisted him as a soldier.

I am DECEIVED if I believe I can live a double-life as a Christian, ignoring the warnings of 'fellow soldiers'. I am DECEIVED if I receive a 'Word from the Lord' and it doesn't support the whole of Scripture to 'live as Christ'. I am DECEIVED if I believe forgiveness erases 'consequences'. I am DECEIVED if I don't believe that God's Word means what it says.
 
Psalm 99:8-9          
You answered them, O LORD our God;
You were to them God-Who-Forgives,            
Though You took vengeance on their deeds. 
Exalt the LORD our God,           
And worship at His holy hill;           
For the LORD our God is holy.  

For the Christian soldier who has turned his eyes to the Word of God, for truth, or one who engages in intellectual pursuit of the Word, deceiving spirits (demons) / religious spirits) will use the Word of God either out of context as entrapment or as the letter of the law appealing to 'religious duty'. This is a (counterfeit) double edged sword. For one it it twists the Scriptures to show God as a respecter of persons (partial), racist, sexist, unfair or ruthless, getting the believer to then deny God.   For another it 'leads in religious works belief'.

For the Christian soldier that is wounded or needy emotionally, the spirit of sexual immorality is most often employed to accommodate wounded feelings receiving a false (real to the person) sense of love. For sure the warfare is intense, using unbelief, bitterness, anger, jealousy, rejection, fear, addictions, idolatry (all kinds of fleshly gratification), strife, adultery, divorce. But [1 Corinthians 13] love does not seek its own.

As God is love and requires faith, the spirit of sexual immorality (false love) often employs a religious spirit using faith as a tool. Faith works - of God - or not of God. One can fast and pray, and have 'faith in faith, proclaim Christ, and 'receive an answer to prayer' accompanied by 'signs and wonders'. Wow, it must be God. Faith rewarded. Just one problem. DECEPTION. Seducing spirits were never commanded to leave. Divorce, find a new lover - - NOT OF GOD - [http://shalag-alaska.blogspot.com/2011_07_16_archive.html]. Living together (sexually active) - NOT OF GOD. Living together as a relationship - as friends - NOT OF GOD. DECEIVING SPIRITS out for the kill using an immature mind not transformed to the Word of God.

Romans 1
  
18  For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven
      against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, 
      who suppress the truth in unrighteousness,

28  And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge,             
      God gave them over to a debased mind,             
      to do those things which are not fitting;
29 being filled with all unrighteousness, sexual immorality,                
     wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; 
     full of envy, murder, strife,
     deceit, evil-mindedness; they are whisperers, 
30 backbiters, haters of God, violent, proud, boasters, 
     inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, 
31 undiscerning, untrustworthy, unloving, unforgiving, unmerciful; 
32 who, knowing the righteous judgment of God,
     that those who practice such things are deserving of death,
     not only do the same but also approve of those who practice them.


God shows no partiality,  giving each man a 'free will' to choose Him - or not.   The devil also is impartial and goes about as a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour.  For the unregenerate the devil's work is easy, hooking men on worldly lusts. For the regenerate of spirit who have received Christ, his work is the same, to hook men on worldly lusts. He relies on a mind that has not been transformed / renewed to the Word of God, and goes for the kill upon seeing a wounded heart - to destroy the life, the marriage, the family.

Our focus really does need to be, 'What has Jesus said', who only spoke what He heard from His Father.  We have ALL taken hits from the destroyer, but NOW for a committed Christian can we willfully disregard the Word? God's forgiveness and our repentance does not annul the Words of Christ, 'But I say', to become again entangled in the pursuit of flesh. Repentance means to 'withdraw, turn away' from sin. Rather than turn away from sin many seek 'new relationships' and 'call it God' when clearly the Word of God, for the committed Christian, does not support this. Without repentance we are much like an AWOL soldier. And when an AWOL soldier, who has walked off the battlefield, or away from his unit, is apprehended - what fate do you think he will meet? Selah! Are we 'UTTERLY DECEIVED'?

BEGUILED / UTTERLY DECEIVED

Deuteronomy 11:16  
Take heed to yourselves, that your heart be not deceived, 
and ye turn aside, and serve other gods, and worship them;

The danger of deception is to 'speak the Word of God', but not obey it. Words are ALWAYS in 'demonstration of power'. IF one speaks the Word of God and fails to obey the Word of God, that Word has not met the criteria of 'demonstration of power' and the DECEPTION of Satan is openly revealed. For the 'forgiven Christian', - REPENTANCE / GO and SIN NO MORE - from what I understand, is REQUIRED to maintain fellowship. Hebrews 10 says, 'I will write my law on your heart'. 'Hold fast to your confession'. 'If anyone draws back my soul has no pleasure in him.'  Christ came to His own as the 'way, the truth, and the life [John 14:6] and revealed Himself as truth to the Gentiles also.  The sin God came to convict the world of, and will convict the world of on His return,  is UNBELIEF - 'because they believe NOT on me.  

[John 1:14] The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us [Jews and Gentiles].  It is recorded by many witnesses that Jesus  was crucified, died, and was buried.  The resurrection of Christ is biblically and historically recorded For the 'unbelieving without Christ', the fearful expectation of judgment.   Christ appears a second time, apart from sin, for salvation [Hebrews 9:28].  REPENTANCE is required. 

For those who choose to willfully remain in the sin of unbelief:

Hebrews 10:26-31
For if we sin willfully after we have received'
the knowledge of the truth,        '
there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins,
but a certain fearful expectation of judgment, and fiery indignation          
 which will devour the adversaries. 
Anyone who has rejected Moses' law dies without mercy 
on the testimony of two or three witnesses.
Of how much worse punishment, do you suppose,            
will he be thought worthy who has trampled the Son of God underfoot,           
counted the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified a common thing,           
and insulted the Spirit of grace?  
For we know Him who said, "Vengeance is Mine, I will repay," says the Lord.          
And again, "The LORD will judge His people."
It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

For those BELIEVING on Christ, in His atoning blood for our sin / sins, should we not seek repentance?

REPENTANCE
shoo-baw'
withdraw from evil, restore your relationship with God

 

THOUGHTS, WORDS, ACTION  -  RELATIONSHIP  -  CONNECTED to  -  GOD'S LOVE

We are in a war and the battle is for the mind. I stand beside you and fight this war daily repelling the fiery darts of the enemy. My prayer: RELEASE for all POW'S - including myself. Repentance releases the captive. 

Romans 8
   1 There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus,
      who do not walk according to the flesh, 
      but according to the Spirit.  
   2  For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus
       has made me free from the law of sin and death.  

 
   Take note here:  
   we are not free from 'the law of God' which is holy and good [Romans 7]
   we are freed from the 'law of sin and death'.


 3  For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, 
      God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, 
      on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh, 
  4  that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us 
      who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.  
  5  For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, 
      but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit.  
  6  For to be carnally minded is death, 
      but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.  
  7  Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, 
      nor indeed can be.  
  8  So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God.
  9  But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, 
      IF INDEED the Spirit of God dwells in you. 
      Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His.  
10  And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, 
      but the Spirit is life because of righteousness.  
11  But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, 
     He who raised Christ from the dead 
     will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.
12 Therefore, brethren, we are debtors—not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh.  
13 For if you live according to the flesh you will die; 
     but IF by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.  
14 For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.  
15 For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, 
     but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, “Abba, Father.”  
16 The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God,  
17 and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, 
     if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together.
 

Selah

Shalom

Reprinted from 9-7-2011