We Have Come Full Cycle...Apples to Riches.

Hello and Good Health...

I had planned on starting each new post with the words from Simon & Garfunkels "Sound of Silence" but decided that would make each entry too lengthy. Besides, I think you get the point without repetition. In the beginning there was Adam, Eve, God, Satan, and an apple tree. Satan took on the form of a serpent and enticed Eve to try a bite from the apple on the "Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil"...or, so the story goes. This tale of temptation and weakness...inherent goodness and inherent evil...has been around forever it seems...many religions having different versions. But, what is the story really about? Is just a parable explaining what Christians call "the sinful nature of man" or is it something else? Is it a warning about inherent evil in the world? Does it tell us anything about when Satan fell from Heaven? Or, does it simply mean that women are man's downfall? (please...no hate mail).

To tell you the honest truth, I have no idea. I like to believe that God's Word written in the Holy Bible is the spoken Word of God written verbatim as He dictated it to the authors of the many books of the Bible. But, that's just me and my belief. Each of us must determine for ourselves how much, if any, of the Bible we take literally. What I can tell you is that the example of Adam & Eve's downfall has come full cycle in our world today. No...there's no serpent (well, not yet anyways) and you can still eat apples without worrying about being cast out of America or wherever you are. However, we are all being given a chance, once again, to choose between good and evil.

The reality of Eve's choice was to remain as she was...a naked, beautiful, healthy, sin-free, innocent woman who could live an eternity in Eden...or, eat from the Tree of Knowledge and become "like a god" or one with God and attain all the knowledge of good and evil. The temptation proved to be too much for Eve and she succumbed to Satan's forked tongue. Satan gave Jesus the very same choice in the desert when he said he could give all the Kingdoms of the World to Jesus to rule as they were his to give as promised by God. Jesus did not give in to Satan's trickery but rather chose the Kingdom of God...His Father...a Kingdom of Eternity. Today, you and I are facing a whole new plague of trickery from Satan.

He is going to and fro with his many helpers (New Light Leaders, Maitreya, the Ancient Ones, shadowers, the Desert Fathers, etc.) convincing important people...influential people...here on Earth that they can become "one" with God. That, indeed, they are gods because god is in everything and in everyone. It is the exact same ploy Satan used on Eve only it is very cleverly hidden within a message of "Feel Good" faith. But, don't be fooled! It is a faith based in deeds and accomplishments and not in sound Biblical Truth. As a matter of fact, the proponents of this new faith or New Spirituality (as they call it) will tell you that the bible is not to be taken literally. It is not the Word of God but just a story about how to live. I believe that Satan is manipulating many important people today...perhaps even Barrack Obama, Rick Warren, Gorbachev, Leonard Sweet, Oprah Winfrey and many more. Read this excerpt from "Appolyon Rising 2012" by Tom Horn in Part 8, June 1, 2009:

Signs and evidence of such supernatural involvement in the current move towards worldwide totalitarian government have been increasing in political commentary, occult symbolism and numerological ‘coincidences’ over the past decade. As public opinion is engineered toward final acceptance of the international subordination, we would expect to see these ‘mirrors of occult involvement’ continue. Recently there have been so many semiotic messages (visible signs and audible references that communicate subliminal ideas) in the open that it is starting to feel as if the ‘gods’ are mocking us; challenging whether or not we will willingly admit their involvement. This has been exponentially true since the election of US President Barack Hussein Obama, the ‘President of the world’ according to news services around the planet. While the grandiose title “President of the world” granted Obama by euphoric crowds on election night remains to be prophetic, the glorified ideal behind it reflects the global hunger for, and movement toward, the arrival of ‘the one’ who represents the invisible agencies mentioned above and who, for a while, will appear to be the world’s answer man.Consider the unprecedented messianic rhetoric that reporters, politicians, celebrities and even preachers used in celebrating the ‘spiritual nature’ of Obama’s meteoric rise from near obscurity to US President. San Francisco Chronicle columnist Mark Morford characterized it as “a sort of powerful luminosity.” In Morford’s opinion, this was because Obama is “a Lightworker, that rare kind of attuned being who has the ability to… help usher in a new way of being on the planet…” [12] The dean of the Martin Luther King Jr. International Chapel, Lawrence Carter, went further, comparing Obama to the coming of Jesus Christ: “It is powerful and significant on a spiritual level that there is the emergence of Barack Obama… No one saw him coming, and Christians believe God comes at us from strange angles and places we don’t expect, like Jesus being born in a manger.” [13] Dinesh Sharma, a marketing science consultant with a PhD in Psychology from Harvard appraised Obama likewise: “Many… see in Obama a messiah-like figure, a great soul, and some affectionately call him Mahatma Obama.” [14] It would have been easy to dismiss such commentary as the New Age quiverings of loons had it not been for similar passion on the lips of so many people. The following is a brief list of like expressions from a variety of news sources:

“Barack’s appeal is actually messianic… he… communicates God-like energy… What if God decided to incarnate as men preaching ‘hope and change.’ And what if we… let them slip away, not availing ourselves… to be led by God!” Steve Davis, Journal Gazette [15]

“This is bigger than Kennedy. . . . This is the New Testament! I felt this thrill going up my leg. I mean, I don’t have that too often. No, seriously. It’s a dramatic event.” Chris Matthews, MSNBC [16]

“Does it not feel as if some special hand is guiding Obama on his journey, I mean, as he has said, the utter improbability of it all?” Daily Kos [17]

“Obama, to me, must be not just an ordinary human being but indeed an Advanced Soul, come to lead America out of this mess” Lynn Sweet, Chicago Sun Times [18]

“He is not operating on the same plane as ordinary politicians…the agent of transformation in an age of revolution, as a figure uniquely qualified to open the door to the 21st century.” Former US Senator Gary Hart, Huffington Post [19]

“He is not the Word made flesh [Jesus], but the triumph of word over flesh [better than Jesus?]…Obama is, at his best, able to call us back to our highest selves.” Ezra Klein, Prospect [20]

“Obama has the capacity to summon heroic forces from the spiritual depths of ordinary citizens and to unleash therefrom a symphonic chorus of unique creative acts whose common purpose is to tame the soul and alleviate the great challenges facing mankind.” Gerald Campbell, First Things First [21]

“Obama was… blessed and highly favored…I think that… his election… was divinely ordered… I’m a preacher and a pastor; I know that that was God’s plan… I think he is being used for some purpose.” Janny Scott, New York Times [22]

“He won’t just heal our city-states and souls. He won’t just bring the Heavenly Kingdom — dreamt of in both Platonism and Christianity — to earth. He will heal the earth itself.” Micah Tillman, The Free Liberal [23]

“The event itself is so extraordinary that another chapter could be added to the Bible to chronicle its significance.” Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., Politico [24]

Though he tried to keep it subtle himself, Obama encouraged such public perception of him as an ‘anointed’ one whose time had come. Officially produced Obama campaign advertising consistently used such words as ‘faith,’ ‘hope,’ and ‘change.’ Republican nominee John McCain picked up on this during his run for office and put out a cynical video called “The One.” Using some of Obama’s own words against him, the video mocked Obama’s play as a Christ-like figure, showing him in New Hampshire saying, “a light beam will shine through, will light you up, and you will experience an epiphany, and you will suddenly realize that you must go to the polls and vote for Barack!” The video failed to mention that having an “epiphany” actually means the sudden realization or comprehension of an appearance of deity to man. Another part of the video included Obama during his nomination victory speech in St. Paul, Minnesota, saying, “this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal.” Anybody that followed the presidential campaign would have picked up the same nuances—angelic children organized to sing about Obama, logos depicting rays of sunlight beaming out from his ‘O’ shaped hand sign (a gesticulation Hitler used as well), books such as Nikki Grimes “Barack Obama: Son of Promise, Child of Hope” (Simon & Schuster), comparisons to Plato’s ‘Philosopher King’ without whom our souls will remain broken, comparisons to the ‘spiritually enlightened’ Mahatma Gandhi, comparisons to the Solar Hero Perseus, comparisons to Jesus Christ and even comparisons to God Himself.

While all this was highly unusual, even unprecedented, it was not surprising. Obama had spent significant time during the campaign distancing himself from conservative Christians, evangelicals and especially the Religious Right (which had held prominent sway over Republicans since Ronald Reagan held office) countering that his faith was more universalist and unconvinced of Bible inerrancy. In a 5-minute video available on YouTube, a pre-election speech by Obama was highly cynical of Bible authority and even derided specific Old and New Testament scriptures. “Whatever we once were,” Obama says on the video, “we’re no longer a Christian nation,” adding, “Democracy demands that the religiously motivated translate their concerns into universal, rather than religion-specific values… this is going to be difficult for some who believe in the inerrancy of the Bible as many evangelicals do.” [31] Consequently, the conscious effort by Obama to reorient America away from conventional Christianity was widely embraced by people who identified with the man who carried a tiny idol of the Hindu god Hanuman in his pocket—whose blessings he sought in the race to the White House—together with a Madonna and child. For Obama, who grew up in a household where the Bible, the Koran and the Bhagvat Gita sat on a shelf side by side, organized religion was best defined as “closed-mindedness dressed in the garb of piety,” but a useful political tool nonetheless. And so he used it masterfully, and earned a cult following while doing so. By February 2009, Obama had replaced Jesus Christ as America’s No. 1 hero according to a Harris poll, and dedication to his come-one come-all mysticism has continued to spread, with evangelists of the new religion calling for the ‘tired’ faith of our fathers to be replaced with a global new one.

Although it is more difficult to understand the broad appeal of Obama’s New Age philosophy to the many evangelical and Catholic voters who supported him, the phenomenon can be explained to some degree as the result of a changing culture. Over the past 50 years and especially as baby-boomers listened attentively to pastors telling them to focus on human potential and the “god within us all,” eastern philosophies of Monism, Pantheism, Hinduism, and Self Realization grew, providing Americans with an alluring opportunity to throw off the “outdated ideas” of fundamental Christianity and to espouse a more “enlightened” monistic worldview (all is one). Aimed at accomplishing what the builders of the Tower of Babel failed to do (unify the masses of the world under a single religious umbrella), God was viewed as pantheistic and humans were finally understood to be divine members of the whole “that God is.” Pagans argue this principle of inner divinity is older than Christianity, which is true. The gospel according to such New Age concepts—a gospel of “becoming god”— is as old as the fall of man. It began when the serpent said to the woman “ye shall be as gods” (Gen. 3:5), and it will zenith during the reign of the anti-Christian god-king.

If...just if...Satan does have a plan to unite the world in peace with one leader, one government, and one religion, and if...just if...that one person is an instrument of Satan's to eventually force all the people in the world to take his mark, live as he determines, and call him god...what better way to start out than by convincing many of today's most popular political, clerical, authoritarian, and entertainment figures that the true path to happiness and survival (survival being very important) is to accept the idea that we are each gods in our own rights. With no guilt, no fear of death, no sin, and no need for redemption or salvation, what is the downside? I mean, isn't that what everyone wants...a guilt-free life without having to change one eyeota? And, all you have to do to join up is say, "I believe in Oneness...that we are all gods because god is in everything." Or, to paraphrase it: Take a bite of this apple and you will be like God. Hey, I'll even have one of my shadowing demons dictate a book about Quantum life, Comtemplative Prayer, or some other nonsense and make you wealthy beyond your wildest dreams.

You might say to yourself about now, "Well, that's just plain silly. That will never happen...people are too smart to allow that to happen." Well, think again! It is already happening all over the world and Maitreya, the self-proclaimed anti-christ is already buddying up to Gorbachev, Oprah, and too many others to name. He is staying in the shadows for now...but his helpers are possessing more and more people every day and soon it will be too late to stop the tide of change. I can't help but wonder where our church leadership is at this crucial time of salvation for so many people who are being falsely saved by a false christ. Why aren't they ringing the church bells and crying out for the Truth of God? Why are they standing idly by while author after author destroys the Word of God and Bible Scripture? Why aren't they screaming when Rick Warren meddles in political affairs where he has no business being? Why? Why? Why?

As Christians, too many of us have become passively objective and blatantly blinded by the importance our church leaders are putting on "feeling good about ourselves." Don't misunderstand me. There is nothing wrong with that...but it is not enough. We also have to fight Satan at every turn and we cannot do that if we have no idea what he is up to. Has your church talked about Satan and what he is doing in the world today to win the battle of eternal life in the last week? In the last month? In the last year????? Sadly, my church has not spoken about it once in more than a year that I have attended. Salvation is not gained by feeling good about ourselves for what we have done to change our lives or the lives of others. Salvation is not gained by deeds alone! Salvation only comes through a personal relationship with Christ Jesus, the Son of God. And the only way that God is in us is through the indwelling Holy Spirit. God is not inherently in everyone as New Agers would have you believe. They will come at you from every angle with things to make you feel good, things to make your life more functional, things to make you wealthier, things to make you give more, and things to make you think that that is enough. But, the important word in that message is "things"!!!! Apples to Riches...God to Satan...satisfaction to neediness...sin to sinless...nothing to plenty. You choose the side you want to be on...one leads to an eternity of life with God...the other leads to an eternity in the Lake of Fire with Satan.

Everyone seems to think it is simple to tell the difference between good and evil...well, it's not always cut and dry. Satan is no fool...actually, he is one of God's highest ranked angels and it wasn't until his rivalry and his attempt to sabotage God's rule that he lost the favor of Heaven. Now, he rules on Earth...it is his domain...his Kingdom for a time... and he will not give it up without a battle and a very clever plan. To convince millions of people that Contemplative Prayer, mysticism, idol worship, yoga, incense, shadowing, and other mystical and occult practices are not only appropriate, but a logical and acceptable path to a new found freedom and understanding of god's nature is not only clever, it is diabolical. By the time anyone raises an alarm, billions of people will already find themselves under the influence of demons who will be shadowing their every thought and action. Satan will use those who are most influential to change the very intrastructure of the world's governing mechanism so that one person will be in charge...one government, one ruler, one religion. Then, it will be too late.

Yours in Christ, friendship, and LOVE...

David K. Irwin