BEWARE THE POISON

The Lord shared a word with me in my devotions on Friday I will pass along to you. It deals with the poison in Christians and there is also an application for people in general I will give at the end.

I am your God – you see the rapid descent of the nation – the apostasy of the church and the hostility of the world.  You are in the end times so do not be discouraged. Know the evil around you, but be a light.  Do not believe the happytalk of the false prophets and the deceivers. 

                                   

Satan is a viper and poison is in his system. He bites people when they are not looking and sometimes his bites are not even felt at first. Rather, they are subtle entrances into a person at their point of weakness – their Achilles’ Heel.  It might be spiritual pride, a despire to appear tolerant, a deep hurt afflicted on them by others they cannot forgive, a healing that did not occur, a lust of the flesh such as sex, power, or money, or preferably all three – the trifecta he has used to bring down many leaders.  However, all he needs is one entrance, and it is pretty easy with the extremely lax devotional lives of most Christians to find one.  He loves not to be detected so the poison can spread.  Better yet, he enables the person to proclaim some new teaching that actually legitimizes the poison and makes it an article of faith.  Like an IV tube, he continues to pour in his poison which permeates the entire body.  It may start with a strange doctrine or justifying a moral laxity.  Before he is done the person will be perverse in all their thinking, and the zeal they may have had for God is transformed into a zeal for the agenda of Satan.  The more spiritual the person appears, the better.  The poison has done its job, and the brew is such that it kills the spirit and the mind long before it kills of the body.  Like the living wounded in Vietnam and other theatres of war, a live wounded person is far more dispiriting than a dead one.  Satan wishes to permeate the church with walking wounded, with peope carrying around his poison, poised to bite others and bring down the entire house.

Beware, because the poison is among you.  It has come into the serious church, and unless it is dealt with, will bring destruction that knows no bounds. Surely I have warned you.

The Lord is appalled at the decent of Biblical thinking in the church -  an article in Charisma Magazine actually used the term “sexual atheists” to describe the way the MAJORITY of single Christians now view premartial sex.  They are living as though there were no God.  In my post on sodomy, I shared how married Christians are being counseled by many well-known Christian couselors to “enrich”: their marriages with sodomy practices which were all illegal even in the world’s eyes not that long ago.  Is the exploding tolerance for the abomination and oxymoron known as homoseual marriage simply a logical consequence? I believe it is.

It is not just sex, of course.  Pastor Craig Groeschel of LifeChurch, the second largest church in America with nineteen campuses wrote a book called The Christian Atheist, where he makes the case that many Christians (incuidng himself at one point in his life), lived as though there were no God – saying they believe the Bible, but living in a way that would indicate no fear of God or of consequences for disobeying what it says.   I believe we need a major antedote for snakebite, and it is to repent of our sins and lask for the blood of Jesus Christ to cleanse us from all sin.  We need to live a life under the Lordship of Jesus Christ, and ask to be constantly filled with the Holy Spirit in order that we will not only DO the will of God, but BE the bride of Jesus Christ, conformed to his likeness and his character.

I noted there is an application for non-Christians as well.   The fact is that all are bitten by Satan since Eve and then Adam sinned.  We all have gone astray.  However, God laid on Jesus the iniquity of us all.  Some people in the world submit more to Satan than others. Some are really nice people who on the surface seem more righteous than most Christians. However, even ONE little bite is enough to separate you from God.  Any uncleanness that comes from having the poison of Satan in our lives is enough to keep us from God.  One bite is fatal as Satan is a poisonous snake.

If you have been bitten, you need an antedote.  One that is guaranteed to give life is freely available, but it is only administered by Jesus Christ.  Whether you have never known Christ, or if you have but have wandered away and been bitten by Satan in that most vulnerable position, choose life and not death.  Come to Jesus and be cleansed by his precious blood that will wipe away all stains. Your life will never be the same.