THE TUG-OF-WAR

Part 3

 

While it is very true that God will be near during these spiritual windows (see Part 2), calling and drawing you closer in ways you will not even realize or recognize, something else is also busy happening during these times. The mere fact that we are busy here with a spiritual journey means that what we are dealing with are things beyond this natural realm. We are essentially touching the spiritual world.

 

That spiritual world has, as you will know, two sides to it: light and darkness, God's kingdom and Satan's domain. Both sides have a vested interest in your spiritual journey and since a spiritual window is a crucial moment of choice, a veritable fork in the road, Satan will not waste the opportunity to try to derail your salvation. It's not my intention here to make you concerned about the ploys he may use, I simply wish to make you aware that some of the spiritual opportunities that will come your way at this time will not be from God. How will you recognize the enemies works? Actually there is a way.

 

Unlike God, who is always the same unchanging One, Satan comes in a hundred different guises. So how will we recognize him? Simply by the goal which lies behind all his efforts. He is desperate to ensure that you do not surrender to God. Since surrender is not a natural inclination (as we discussed in Parts 1 and 2) he will appeal to those inclinations that oppose God, the ones that come much more naturally to you. In short, he will appeal to your ego. His spiritual path will offer you more power, more hidden or secret knowledge, more, more, more! He doesn't mind gift wrapping it in Christian terms, for example offering you hidden knowledge about the Bible, or the Secret life of Jesus, lost books of the old and new testaments or anything that will give you an edge on the rest of them. He is offering you knowledge to make you more than others are. But there is a snare behind that 'gift'. See how secrets and shadows were never the character of the Lord Jesus Christ:

 

John 18:20

Jesus answered him, “I spoke openly to the world. I always taught in synagogues and in the temple, where the Jews always meet, and in secret I have said nothing.

 

The same principal of discovering secret knowledge holds true for Satan's less Christian-coated offerings. For example learning to read tarot cards, tealeaves, star signs or maybe uncovering ancient secrets, harnessing Chi energy or learning the occult path of contact with ascended masters. All of these appeal to the human ego. They tell you that you can become more than what you are if you simply learn to control or access the higher functions lying dormant within you. Human nature is hopelessly curious about occult (secret) power, we become so intrigued at the mention of it. That alone has been the downfall of millions of souls since the beginning of time. It is exactly the same ploy used on Eve in the garden of Eden when Satan said secret knowledge would not kill her, but that:

 

 Genesis 3:5

“...God knows that in the day you eat of it (learn its secrets) your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

 

In contrast to this, God offers salvation. He offers to rescue you, to do what you cannot, to step in on your behalf and remedy your pain. For this He asks that you hand it over to Him. He asks you to give Him the wheel of your life, to surrender the little bit of power you have into His loving care. Can you see how dramatically different the two sides are? You cannot walk away from an encounter with God and boast about your own efforts. But you most certainly can walk away from such an encounter in awe of His efforts, feeling whole, clean, new and loved.

 

At the end of the day the great question you will have to answer is "who is on the throne of your heart?" If you choose to be the god of your own life, "you will be like God" and have achieved Satan's objectives. Choose to offer that throne to God Almighty and you have just discovered the way of salvation... the answer of how to find God.

 

In the next section we will discuss one more matter which could still hold you back...

 

 

Click here to continue to Part 4: If God is Love.

 

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