Friday, July 15, 2016

Satan's Political Agenda

This nation has been moving in a certain political direction in the last 60 years. Politically, morally, and culturally we are a very different country than we were in 1956. Politicians and advocates on the left have gained dominance in education, entertainment, politics, and the news media.

Things are accepted now that were not accepted then. And criticism of wrong behavior is squelched and labeled "hate speech".

Homosexuality is being accepted and promoted by those who advocate for it, and they have gained power in society. They have managed to install a majority of Supreme Court justices who are sympathetic to their cause and care little or nothing about the Constitution but are only concerned with their own views of right and wrong. Thus they ignore the Constitution and use their position of power to push their values on society.

Religious freedom and freedom of speech are being overturned in favor of promotion of anti-family values. Efforts are made to label teachings against homosexuality as "hate speech" in an effort to silence critics.

It has reached a point, in my opinion, where a kind of "mass insanity" has become dominant in our society, and it is increasing. We have passed a point of no return, and our nation will become more and more corrupt, till the end. Those with common sense have become a minority and can never regain influence.

It is not just the United States that is moving in this direction, but many other nations that are descended from the tribes of Israel, United States being one example, Canada being another.

God foresaw this centuries ago.

"Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; who put darkness for light, and light for darkness; Who put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!" (Isaiah 5:20).

"Therefore the prudent keep silent at that time, For it is an evil time" (Amos 5:13).

Satan is the invisible ruler of this world. God is allowing Satan to deceive and influence and rule the nations for a purpose, and that purpose is to teach mankind a lesson about the folly of following Satan's way of life.

Satan is busy promoting his way of life and attacking God's truth and law most strongly in Israelite nations in areas such as sex, marriage, child rearing and child discipline, and evolution. He is influencing the government of the United States to spend itself into oblivion, creating an economic crisis that can bring United States down economically and militarily.

Some have discerned that the real purpose of this movement is the destruction of the family, and I agree that this is a purpose. Another purpose is the weakening of the United States and other Israelite nations. We are being set up for a fall. We must be weakened to the point that a foreign enemy can attack us and prevail over us.

But there is a third purpose behind Satan's agenda, one that I think is really his number one purpose.

Satan wants to criminalize the Bible so he can use the forces of government and society to stop the preaching of the gospel. That is a direction we are headed.

I do not know exactly how things are going in Great Britain, Canada, and Australia. I am not as familiar with their situations as I am with my home country, the United States, so I can only speak about the U.S. But in this country, we are moving step-by-step in that direction. It may seem impossible that our governments would outlaw the Bible or outlaw public teaching from the Bible, but it is not. Sixty years ago, it would have seemed impossible to people that we would be the way we are today. No, it is not impossible.

When you have presidents and Supreme Court justices that care little for freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and the Constitution itself, there is no limit to how far they can go when the majority of the population is lukewarm and unwilling to inconvenience themselves by standing up for what is right.

Our nation is like the proverbial frog in the pot of water set to boil. According to the story, you can boil him to death and he won't jump out because the temperature rises gradually.

Those promoting an anti-religious agenda are succeeding in indoctrinating the younger generations with their wrong values. They are being successful. As older people die out and children who have been indoctrinated grow up and reach voting age, this movement gains momentum and can go further and further.

There are several parallel movements that are converging on outlawing teaching from the Bible.

The promotion of secular science with godless evolution in education, the news media, and entertainment is breeding a disrespect for the Bible and all things religious. Many people growing up in this environment are conditioned to think of the Bible as a sometimes harmless but sometimes harmful, and always silly, book of superstition and fable. The population is losing its respect and appreciation for the Bible, and this is helping to set the stage for it being outlawed.

Another trend is the promotion of homosexuality and deviant sexual behavior and the labeling of criticism of these things as "hate speech". Under the guise of protecting "rights", this sets the stage for outlawing or persecuting those who teach God's truth about sex from the Bible.

There is a steady erosion of respect for the Constitution of the United States. Supreme Court justices are allowed to ignore it and make their decisions based on their own opinions about what is best for society. Yet it is the Constitution that protects our freedom of religion, freedom of press, and freedom of speech. It is the Constitution that protects our right to preach the gospel and our right to use the Bible in the preaching of the gospel.

These three trends, and probably others also, are converging towards a society that can criminalize the Bible and make it impossible for us to preach the gospel and the Ezekiel warning.

For we cannot preach the true gospel and the Ezekiel warning without the Bible. We have to be able to tell the people as Mr. Armstrong did, "Don't believe us, believe your Bible". We need to be able to quote the Bible in our speaking and writing. We need to be able to prove what we teach from the Bible so the people's faith will be in God and the Bible, not in us. Only those who are willing to believe the Bible more than their traditions will be willing to give up their traditions, but we need to be able to use the Bible to show them the truth.

I do not say that the police will be knocking on everyone's door with a search warrant and confiscating Bibles they find. That is not necessary. For the purpose of stopping the gospel, all that is necessary is to stop public preaching from the Bible.

I think that is one of Satan's major goals, more even than weakening the United States or striking at the family. More than anything, I think he wants to stop the preaching of the true gospel and the Ezekiel warning to Israel, as I have posted about before.

Why?

As I point out in my book, our people need a warning of the tribulation to come so they know that God was fair to warn them. This is vital. They need to accept responsibility for ignoring the warning so they do not blame God for not warning them. This is especially true for religious people who do not know that some of the things they do and the religious customs they practice are wrong. They need to be prepared for the tribulation so they can repent during it and be teachable in the millennium so they can be a model nation for the rest of the world.

Satan wants to go all out to stop our message. He is all prepared, once the tribulation starts, if our Israelite nations have not been warned, to pump the thoughts into people's minds, "It is not your fault. God never gave you a chance. You never knew your religious customs were wrong because God never sent anyone to warn you. God is unfair to punish you for things you never knew. You therefore cannot trust God." Thus he could poison the attitudes of the very people that God wants to use to be the model nation for the rest of the world.

So Satan wants to stop the gospel and the Ezekiel warning, and he is advancing trends in this country that will make it possible to stop our message.

Our response?

We need to go all out to preach the gospel and the Ezekiel warning to the United States and all the Israelite nations while the door is open. It is open now, and we need to go all out while there is time.

Jesus Christ practiced and taught this principle. "I must work the works of Him who sent Me while it is day; the night is coming when no one can work" (John 9:4).

Also, "Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with your might; for there is no work or device or knowledge or wisdom in the grave where you are going" (Ecclesiastes 9:10).

There is no justification for anyone in the Church of God who understands the importance of preaching the gospel and the warning to say to himself, "We have plenty of time. In a few years we can preach the gospel. We don't have to do it now."

Now is the time to act, now is the time to work. We need to be zealous now while the door is open. For there is coming a time when that door will close. " 'Behold, the days are coming,' says the Lord God, 'that I will send a famine on the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord' " (Amos 8:11).

Those who recognize the seriousness of God's warning to the watchman in Ezekiel 3:16-22 and Ezekiel 33:1-9, but who postpone their efforts and zeal to support the preaching of the warning, may find themselves in a situation where they no longer have the ability to do so, and the blood of the people will be on their heads.

We need to be zealous in our love for our neighbors and willingness to sacrifice to preach the true gospel and the Ezekiel warning to all Israel and the world, now, while the door is open.


Here are links to posts in this blog on a related subjects:

"What Is the Church of God's Greatest Sin?", dated February 27, 2014, link:
http://ptgbook.blogspot.com/2014/02/what-is-church-of-gods-greatest-sin.html

"Priorities of True Christianity - Priorities in the Church of God", dated January 16, 2015, link:
http://ptgbook.blogspot.com/2015/01/priorities-of-true-christianity.html


Here are links to related chapters or sections in Preaching the Gospel:

CHAPTER 3 - THE EZEKIEL WARNING

CHAPTER 4 - WHY PREACH THE GOSPEL? - A LESSON FROM THE HOLOCAUST

2 comments:

author@ptgbook.org said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
author@ptgbook.org said...

John submitted a comment pointing out that the frog story is apparently a myth. It seems that someone tested it and a frog jumped out when the water temperature was increased gradually. I have made the correction to my post, adding the words, "proverbial" and "According to the story,". Though the frog story may be a myth, the principle, that we tend to accept or tolerate changes and not notice them as much when they come gradually, is not a myth. It applies to what is happening in our country, and it can apply to other things as well.

Thank you for the correction, John.

I could not approve your comment because of a problem in the language of someone you quoted, and I do not have the ability, with this blogspot blog, to edit comments.