evil – Page 2

If God is good, why didn’t He stop the tornado?

Posted on May 21, 2013May 9, 2016 by elizabethprata

It is admittedly hard to read of news where children are killed or harmed. The shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary school in Newton CT this past December 2012 was surely horrific. Reading about the 20 children who died in the Plaza Tower Elementary school yesterday in Moore OK via a EF-5 tornado is also heart-rending.

At times like these, people often ask, “Where is God?” “How could He allow this to happen?” “Is God good?”

I can put it this way. When a serial killer is placed on death row and eventually executed, we say that justice was done. If a person breaking and entering a home is shot by the homeowner, we often say ‘good! He got what he deserved.’

When Korah rebelled against Moses and Aaron, he was rebelling against God. (Numbers 16:3). The LORD told Moses to tell the congregation to separate from Korah, and Korah, Dathan and Abiram and their household and the goods in the household were swallowed up as the earth opened up and took them alive to Sheol. When this happened, we say “God is just and right to do this thing. Korah was performing a moral evil in rebelling against God trough Moses and Aaron.”

When the tornado came and the earth swallowed the children in the bottom of the Plaza Towers Elementary School,” do we say, “God is unjust and bad to do this thing?” No! God is the same yesterday, today, and forever. (Hebrews 13:8).

What we cannot fathom, we must trust that the Lord is good and His purposes are good. On the one hand, He directly put down a rebellion by performing a supernatural disaster as He did in the Old Testament.

On the other hand, what of the children in the elementary schools which were razed by the tornado? If they are declared innocent by a righteous God, as Deuteronomy 1:39 and Isaiah 7:16 and also explained here, then why did they have to die? Why did God allow a natural disaster to take them?

And that is where I stopped my essay, many hours ago. I was stuck on the answer myself because I was unsatisfied with saying that sin is a blanket cause for all evil, including natural disasters. Though the sin done n the Garden of Eden was indirectly the cause of the weather patterns turning deadly, how and what are we to think of a deadly tornado such as the one yesterday, more specifically? My theology brought me to an understanding of sin as a reason for the general evil in the world, including disasters such as the Oklahoma tornado. But it wasn’t a deep enough answer.

But later today, Dr. Al Mohler wrote today of this exact subject. He said, “But Jesus rejected this as a blanket explanation for suffering, instructing His disciples in John 9 and Luke 13 that they could not always trace suffering back to sin.”

What are we to think, then? As I read the rest of Dr. Mohler’s essay, that more thorough explanation became clear through his precise and mature understanding of theology. He wrote,

However as Dr. Mohler explains that passages in Luke 13 and John 9 show us that “the problem of evil and suffering, the theological issue of theodicy, is customarily divided into evil of two kinds, moral and natural.” [emphasis mine]

The moral problem of evil was exemplified in Korah. Korah’s pride and ambition was his undoing. He committed a moral sin and ended up rebelling against God. Suffering ensued for him and his family.

He says that a discussion of both kinds of evil are included in the Luke 13 passage.

“In Luke 13, the murder of the Galileans is clearly moral evil, a premeditated crime–just like the terrorist acts in New York and Washington. In John 9, a man is blind from birth, and Jesus tells the Twelve that this blindness cannot be traced back to this man’s sin, or that of his parents. Natural evil comes without a moral agent. A tower falls, an earthquake shakes, a tornado destroys, a hurricane ravages, a spider bites, a disease debilitates and kills. The world is filled with wonders mixed with dangers. Gravity can save you or gravity can kill you. When a tower falls, it kills.”

Further, Mohler wrote,

A venerable confession of faith states it rightly: “God from eternity, decrees or permits all things that come to pass, and perpetually upholds, directs, and governs all creatures and all events; yet so as not in any way to be the author or approver of sin nor to destroy the free will and responsibility of intelligent creatures.”

But if God is sovereign, doesn’t He allow the tornado to occur? How do we reconcile God’s sovereignty and our responsibility? We can’t really. Not with our finite minds. Mohler answers,

God is God, and God is good. As Paul affirms for the church, God’s sovereignty is the ground of our hope, the assurance of God’s justice as the last word, and God’s loving rule in the very events of our lives: “And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, who are the called according to His purpose.” [Romans 8:28]

We dare not speak on God’s behalf to explain why He allowed these particular acts of evil to happen at this time to these persons and in this manner. Yet, at the same time, we dare not be silent when we should testify to the God of righteousness and love and justice who rules over all in omnipotence. Humility requires that we affirm all that the Bible teaches, and go no further. There is much we do not understand. As Charles Spurgeon explained, when we cannot trace God’s hand, we must simply trust His heart.

What we do understand is that God is good in having sent His son to die for us. Jesus took upon Himself all sin and exhausted God’s wrath for it, and then died, to be accepted by God as the eternal sacrifice for that sin and raised on the third day. He now imputes His righteousness to His saints who believe this Gospel by faith, and it is by that vehicle we declare His righteousness to those who are afflicted and suffering.

He allows us to be His witnesses, the indwelling Holy Spirit glowing and bringing God glory. If we were to see a visible manifestation of His Goodness, would it be in Christians’ Spirit lovingly racing TO the place of terror, danger, and devastation, to help their neighbor? Like this photo from the Baltimore Sun, with the lens flares I inserted?

As my friend Pastor Phil wrote yesterday, “May our suffering Oklahoma neighbors and friends see the manifest presence of God in the midst of their suffering, especially through the ministries of Christians.”

This is where God is good, and all that Goodness stems back to the only One who is Good, God, who sent His Son. (Mark 10:18).

If we could part the curtain and see His goodness visibly, would it be that we’d see the myriads of ministering angels? Especially at the flattened school? As I try to show with this photo from the Chicago Tribune containing lens flares I put in? (Those aren’t floodlights)

Dr. Mohler said,

“The second great error is to ascribe evil to God. But the Bible does not allow this argument. God is absolute righteousness, love, goodness, and justice. Most errors related to this issue occur because of our human tendency to impose an external standard–a human construction of goodness–upon God. But good does not so much define God as God defines good.”

Yes, we mourn and we cry when we see the terrible calamity of children killed, neighbors dead, homes lost, and businesses smashed. The heart of the matter is not whether God is good or God is bad, the heart of the matter is repentance. A calamity could happen any day. Like in Luke 13, the tower of Siloam fell on 18 workers constructing it and they died. Jesus said, “Or those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them: do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others who lived in Jerusalem? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.”” (Luke 13:4-5). Your eternal destiny awaits, are you ready? A tornado could take your life, it is a natural evil that is blind and thoughtless, taking with it into its deadly vortex a child or a sinner or a repented one. Any day, any time. If you do not repent, you shall likewise perish, not just body, but soul

God’s goodness is that He made a way for you to escape eternal destruction, no matter the manner of death. That way is Jesus. (John 14:6). Talk about good! It doesn’t get any better than the Savior.

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The rapidity with which the world is descending into chaos is amazing

Posted on April 16, 2013May 9, 2016 by elizabethprata

I’m dizzy. Literally dizzy- physically, emotionally and spiritually.

Just in the last 24 hours there has been a terrible terrorist bombing in Boston, a meteor that swooped across Spain and was seen from the north to the south, a series of quakes at Oklahoma and a major quake at the Iran-Pakistan border.

I wrote about the meteor, and a few minutes after that I saw the quakes at OK, so I wrote about them too. Then I went to dress for work and when I checked the news again just 10 minutes later, the quake at Iran had occurred.

Is there any doubt by now that the signs are not coming year upon year, or month upon month, but minute upon minute?

When people say, ‘it isn’t the end because there have always been earthquakes and meteors and signs as described’ they are right AND they are wrong. There always have been these things, to be sure.

The only question that Christians who understand prophecy have, is how long these will be signs and not

Credit: Courtesy Dan Lampariello

judgments. Because the rapture is a sign-less event, not presaged by anything in particular. The birth pangs of Matthew 24 relate to the Tribulation. However, if we can see the solidity of the groundwork being laid for those signs, how much closer is the rapture?

The Christians are not under judgment, we are not appointed to wrath. (1 Thessalonians 5:9). The wrath upon unbelievers will begin in Revelation 6 as stated by those who are left on the earth after the rapture, in Rev 6:16-17. The seal judgments will have been opened, thus signaling the beginning of the wrath. The earth’s population cries out and mourns because of it. (Revelation 6:15-17). The Church will be gone by then.

At some point the Church Age will end, the rapture will occur and the wrath will begin.

Bystanders in Karachi Pakistan after today’s 7.8 mag quake

Until then, remember what Jesus said–

I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33).

And this–

“and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you heard was coming and now is in the world already. Little children, you are from God and have overcome them, for he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world.” (1 John 4:3-4).

Notice the tense, not that you will overcome the spirits of antichrist who hate. But that you ALREADY HAVE.

boston marathon explosion, evil, suffering

God is not our therapist, and why is there suffering and evil?

Posted on April 15, 2013 by elizabethprata

T.M. Luhrmann wrote an Op-Ed piece in the NY Times Sunday. It is called, “When God Is Your Therapist.” It is a devastating indictment on our faith from someone who is actually not trying to be devastating.

Apparently Ms Luhrmann spends time in a couple of Protestant churches, trying to make sense of it all. She has attended long enough as a curious outsider to have formed some opinions about what Christians are all about, who God is to us, and why. None of her opinions are correct if looking at the bible. All of her opinions are correct based on who the emergent, therapeutic, touchy-feely, ‘God is your boyfriend’ crowd presents to the world. It is so, so, so, so sad.

All Ms Luhrmann wants to know are the same things that have haunted people for eons: why is there evil? Why does God allow it? Why do bad things happen to good people? She wrote,

“I saw the same thing at another church, where a young couple lost a child in a late miscarriage. Some months later I spent several hours with them. Clearly numbed, they told me they did not understand why God had allowed the child to die. But they never gave a theological explanation for what happened.”

Those questions can be answered theologically, and that is what she wanted. She did not want an emotional answer. She is perplexed by the constant references to emotion when talking about God. Hence the name of the piece, God as therapist.

Relying on God as therapist does NOT equip us to answer the question as to why these things happen. Relying on God as therapist does NOT equip us enough to be sanctified by the Holy Spirit to grow in truth. We see the deficiencies of such a limited relationship when things like the bombings at the Boston Marathon happen.

Her editorial comes at a precise time when we ask those series of questions again. The US has seen horrifying violence such as the Aurora CO movie shootings and the Sandy Hook CT kindergarten shootings. Today, there were bombings in Boston and many are injured and several have been killed. After Aurora, Pastor Lee Strobel delivered a sermon titled–

Why Does God Allow Tragedy and Suffering?

There IS a theological answer. Christians whose go-to position is ‘feel God’ instead of ‘know God’ do an eternal disservice to people like Luhrmann and others who want solid answers to these questions. That is why we need to be able to give an answer to all who ask for the reason that we have this hope inside us. (1 Peter 3:15).

Strobel said in his sermon, which is once again sadly applicable to today given the bombings in Boston,

“That “why” question goes back thousands of years. It was asked in the Old Testament by Job and the writers of the Psalms, and it was especially relevant during the 20th century, where we witnessed two World Wars, the Holocaust, genocides in the Soviet Union and China, devastating famines in Africa, the killing fields of Cambodia, the emergence of AIDS, the genocide in Rwanda and the ethnic cleansing of Kosovo. And the 21st Century didn’t start any better. There was 9/11 and now the Syrian slaughters, and on and on. Why all of this if there’s a loving and powerful God? Why do bad things happen to good people?”

Strobel continues with five ‘points of light’ in explaining why there is suffering in general. I encourage you to read his sermon after today’s events, especially.

We do our unsaved neighbors such a disservice by changing Yahweh into a therapist. He is not there to talk to when we feel low and need a pick me up, or to ‘hang out with’ as one of Luhrmann’s pastors said. He revealed Himself in the bible and it is important for us to read it so we know of Whom we speak when giving an answer to those who ask.

Yes, I do feel better when I pray or I read the word but that is not because God is a therapy I go to in order to sort out my feelings. It is because I know of Him enough to know He is sovereign and in control and works all to the good for those who love Him. I know His attributes by having read of Him in His revelation. I want to know God as God and not as a tool in my ever-enlarging toolbox of pick-me-ups. God is not the same as a comedy show or chocolate.

Please read your bible. Get into a good church. Plan to study with someone more mature than yourself. In any way, engage with God as God, not as therapy. The more you study Him the more you will know him. The more you know Him the more you will want to share Him with others. I hope Ms Luhrmann gets the answers she is looking for and I hope the people in her church do too, even though they are not looking. Stay away from the God as your therapist, and learn about the the real Jesus, the Jesus you can’t ignore.

deception, evil, faith

Evil men and impostors

Posted on February 9, 2013May 9, 2016 by elizabethprata

“Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, while evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived.” (2 Timothy 3:12-13)

There is a lot packed into these two verses! Our Lord is truly great in the way He speaks in such depth in so few words!

The verse is connected with a comma and the word “while”. It is plain- Christians are going to be persecuted. And persecution is going to happen because evil men and impostors flood the world and the church in ever increasing numbers. So no, it is not your imagination that things are getting worse. It is because they are getting worse.

The verse says evil men “and impostors” will go on. The word impostors is Greek, “goētes”. This is translated as “shameless cheat pretending to use supernatural power; an actor (cheap impostor), looking for self-gain, i.e. posing to be someone he isn’t…’a charlatan’, used only in 2 Tim 3:13, refers to a seducer (properly, a wailer) – a fraud who “sounds off” like a whining enchanter. This person uses their verbal spells and incantations to give the (false) impression they can do miracles.”

The entire comment is linked to the description at the start, a long list Paul records for Timothy, and us, to be warned by. He’d mentioned Jannes and Jambres, two of Pharaoh’s sorcerers who (for a while) copied God’s miracles He performed through Moses. What we should be wary of is the fact that we’re being told that these aforementioned evil men are going to use their verbal skills to deceive, and I’m not just talking about the obvious ones like Benny Hinn or Joyce Meyer. Or even Joel Osteen. These were sorcerers who can charm you and deceive you like no others. Remember, the two that Paul mentioned copied God’s miracles one for one during the first few plagues! They are powerfully deceptive.

Paul had said that the deceivers are evil. MacArthur wrote, “They are evil. That’s poneros, it’s used of Satan in Matthew 13:19, they’re as malicious and wicked as he is.”

OK, so that’s pretty evil.

And they are going to get worse and worse. Each individual man will wax worse and worse, and the general deceptions will get worse and worse. Attendant with the deceptions will come persecution.

Barnes Notes explains,

“But evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse – That is, it is the character of such men to do this; they may be expected to do it. This is the general law of depravity – that if men are not converted, they are always growing worse, and sinking deeper into iniquity. Their progress will be certain, though it may be gradual, since “nemo repente turpissimus.” The connection here is this: that Timothy was not to expect that he would be exempt from persecution 2 Timothy 3:12, by any change for the better in the wicked men referred to. He was to anticipate in them the operation of the general law in regard to bad men and seducers – that they would grow worse and worse. From this fact, he was to regard it as certain that he, as well as others, would be liable to be persecuted. The word rendered “seducers” occurs nowhere else in the New Testament. It means, properly, a “juggler, or diviner;” and then, a “deceiver, or impostor.” Here it refers to those who by seductive arts, lead persons into error.”

The Latin phrase ‘nemo repente turpissimus’ is translated “No man becomes a villain all at once.”

And the last part of the verse, ‘being deceived” is explained thus by Barnes Notes,

And being deceived – Under delusion themselves. The advocates of error are often themselves as really under deception, as those whom they impose upon. They are often sincere in the belief of error, and then they are under a delusion; or, if they are insincere, they are equally deluded in supposing that they can make error pass for truth before God, or can deceive the Searcher of hearts. The worst victims of delusion are those who attempt to delude others.”

MacArthur wrote,

These are dangerous times…dangerous times. The closer we come to the time of our Lord’s return, the worse men get. And the worse their influence gets and the accumulation of all the lies and false teaching mounts and escalates and we’re in dangerous times. And dangerous times call for strong people.”

Are you strong? Jesus said in Matthew 12:29

Or how can someone enter a strong man’s house and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man? Then indeed he may plunder his house.”

You ARE strong! Barnes tells us, “A man could not break into the house of a strong man and take his property unless he had rendered the man himself helpless. If he had taken his goods, it would therefore be sufficient proof that he had bound the man. So I, says he, have taken this “property – this possessed person” – from the dominion of Satan. It is clear proof that I have subdued “Satan himself,” the “strong” being that had him in possession.”

Jesus is the strong One in you! He has busted satan out of your house (your body) and delivered you from the dominion of darkness! There is no one more strong that Jesus, and it is He that is in you. He is the best,t he top, the most, the superlative among all superlatives. There is no possible way you could be stronger than to rely on the Strong One who is inside you and loves you and made you His child. It is He that is in us who resists satan and overcomes that old serpent. No charms or deceivers can come if you rely on Jesus because even though things on the outside of us go from bad to worse, HE IS ALWAYS THE SAME. (Hebrews 13:8)

Victory in Jesus!

But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

1 Corinthians 15:57

photo credit: Sprengben via photopin cc

evil, God, good, tragedy

Why does God allow evil?

Posted on December 19, 2012 by elizabethprata

God doesn’t cause tragedy. But God allows it. Why?

Todd Friel of Wretched TV answered this in a very good and biblical way. It is 7 minutes long and I recommend listening. The video is below. Here is a short, written summary of what Mr Friel said-

The bible makes sense to help us understand what appears to be senseless. We need to be proclaiming the reasons for evil the bible gives generally so that individuals can apply them specifically. We can’t point fingers and say that ‘this is the reason that happened to YOU,’ but if we share the general principles of why God allows evil it may help someone understand and apply it to their own situation. God is always doing something for everyone involved in a tragedy. God uses sin sinlessly. He is always at work to the Good.

1. The Gospel
If there was not sin in the world we would not need Jesus as Savior and not know how amazingly kind God is to send Him to us. Without sin there is no Gospel.

2. Magnify His Goodness
When God’s kindness is portrayed against the backdrop of evil His goodness is even brighter.

3. Repent
In Luke 13:1-5, in a sermon on the need for individual repentance for sin, Jesus talks about to 18 who died when the Tower of Siloam fell on them. They were innocent victims of a calamity which was due to no fault of those killed. Are we less sinful than those who were killed? No. We don’t know the day or hour of our appointment with death, therefore the need to repent NOW is even greater.

4. Jesus loves children
He loves them. Maybe He wanted them with Him today. Let that comfort you.

5. Make us long for Him
The churches were packed after the tragedy and the candlelight vigils were frequent. We long for Him and rush to Him when under such duress and heavy weight.

6. Draws us to Himself
See above

7. Equips us to comfort
We can comfort someone else.

8. Prepare us for service
He uses sin sinlessly by increasing our gratitude today for service tomorrow. He uses something really hard to do some and to equip us for something in the future to empathize with others going through a similar thing, or for us to be able to endure something in the future.

9. Remind us of the battle
He uses sin to remind us of the battle in the spiritual realms for the souls of men, and to refocus our priorities.

10. Genuine decisions can be evil
He allows us to make decisions and sometimes those decisions can be downright evil

11. Reaping and sowing
Is it possible a nation is reaping what it has been sowing?

12. Deuteronomy 29:29
“The secret things belong to the LORD our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law.” Some things are too high for us to know, or too burdensome. Would you tell your five year old the adult things we know of? They would either not understand or be able to handle it. Sometimes God reveals things to us later, or in heaven, when we can handle it.

big bend, chisos mountains, distinguishing of spirits, evil, haunted, spooky

Hiking in the spooky Chisos Mountains- discerning of spirits

Posted on November 20, 2012May 9, 2016 by elizabethprata

I don’t often talk about personal experiences on this blog, because frankly, I don’t think most people are interested in me, lol. We are all more interested in Jesus, and His soon return.

I was thinking today about a few times in my life when I felt fearfully spooky for no reason. These occurred before I was saved. However, all my life I could feel the emotional and spiritual temperature of a room. When I got saved by His grace, the Holy Spirit delivered to me the Gift of Discerning of spirits, also known as the distinguishing of spirits (1 Cor 12:10). So now I can use that ability He planted in me from birth to His glory as a child of God

Discerning of Spirits is discussed by Alexandra Clair on her blog. Her definitions of terms in my opinion are scripturally apt and well-written to boot. So what is discerning of spirits?

“In simplistic terms this means that one has an awareness of the unseen world and its influence and workings, both godly and evil, as people or circumstances are impacted, led, opposed, or guided. … People with the Spiritual Gift of discernment have sensitive antenna, a God-planned innate ability, to probe beneath the superficial exterior to get at the truth. They may not initially understand the reasons why they feel uncomfortable even as others are on board supporting a person or plan. And yet, they have discerned that there is a spirit at work here that is not quite right. They are being moved by the Holy Spirit to take the next step, to investigate and question, to “test the spirits.” …

“Persons with this gift use intuition balanced by knowledge of scripture to spot a disingenuous person or false teaching. They sense when others have been deceived by experiential or “new age” encounters and can counsel on the perils of occult involvement. They can investigate claims of miraculous healing to know if this is truly a touch from the divine or a person claiming power that only belongs to God. They can investigate conflicts within the church body facilitating peace and resolution, Christ-centered intervention, intercessory prayer and deliverance.” …

“They have a deep abiding confidence in the power of God to change circumstances and people, balanced by a healthy and cautionary insight into the reality that may present as wrong or even malevolent.”

In the mid 1990s, my husband and I traveled by VW camper van across country. We took three months to travel from Maine to Key West, across Texas to San Diego, and then north to Carmel, CA before running out of time. We especially loved the Big Bend region and the National Park at Big Bend, Texas. It was spectacularly beautiful! I recommend everyone visit there once in their lives.

One of the campgrounds we stayed at was high in the Chisos Mountains. It is at elevation 5,400 feet. My husband and I took off on one of the trails to hike and enjoy the view in the clear desert air.

As we walked up and up, my feet slowed and slowed. I was not out of shape or tiring- in body. It was that my soul sensed something wrong. As we ascended higher on the trail, the hairs on the back of my neck stood up. I began to hyperventilate, and not from the elevation or the exertion. It was a panting kind of fear. Finally, my brain was screaming STOP and my feet would go forward no more. I refused to budge and inch. My husband and I turned back. He was totally perplexed but supportive.

For the first time in many years I thought about that moment today It all came rushing back to me. Was I crazy? Irrational? What WAS that spooky feeling? I looked up the Chisos area in Google and plugged in the search term “spooky.” This is what I found.

Big Bend Mysteries
From Winter Texas Online
“‘Chisos’ in native language means ghost, or spirit, and most native people avoided the pristine mountains like the plague, believing them to be alive with the spirits of the dead. Standing in the primary campground of the Chisos Basin and listening to the wind whistle through the desolate range, you can easily understand their reputation and the many myths and legends associated with them.”

Spooky Days, Frightful Nights- the Haunted Big Bend Region of Texas
From Texas Less Traveled

“The Big Bend region has always been a spooky place, dating at least as far back as when the relatives of the pit-dwelling Anasazi roamed the region and only traveled through the Chisos Mountain region with great respect and much apprehension.”

“But it’s not just what you see in this mythical land that can bring a chill to the back of the neck and make the hair stand up on your arms. It’s what you can’t see, or what you thought you saw, if even for a fleeting moment. At times like these you can easily understand why those ancient travelers through the area did so with great care and caution. According to their legends, it’s not the harshness of the environment or the hostile bands of bandits and renegades that troubled the region most, but the spirits of the mountains and the witches that live near the river. To the natives, the region was terribly haunted.”

“Today, you don’t have to look very far to find strange tales about the region. Not far away are the famous Marfa Lights, and on more than one occasion similar lights have been seen throughout the national park. Other strange events and encounters that are told often around Big Bend campfires are stories about moving, human like figures in the desert at night, but investigation the next day seldom reveals any footprints or other signs.”

When we traveled to Chisos at Big Bend, we had no idea of its reputation, and I still had no idea until today. (Left, me in the Chisos, with traveling cat.)

Now, there is no such thing as ghosts. When the body dies the soul goes either to heaven or to hell. However, demons do haunt the world, (Matthew 12:43-44). After all, satan is the god of it. (2 Corinthians 4:4). They roam and prowl as does satan, looking for someone to devour. (1 Peter 5:8).

I believe it was the presence of evil that I’d sensed there on the trail, and by the looks of the history of the place, I was not the first one to sense it.

I’ve written one other time on the blog about sensing evil. It was when the first strange humming noises started to emerge. I’d written–

“Traveling in Scotland was amazing. I loved it. I’ve always been spiritually sensitive, and I noticed that in Scotland, land of standing stones, Celtic Druids, foggy moors and crumbling castles, that the veil felt particularly thin. It wasn’t the Godly I was feeling nearby, but the eerie or demonic, particularly in standing stone circles. It is a place where legends of giants still persist. Other places where I felt that was the Salton Sea in California, and Gray, Maine. Did you ever feel that, a place that gave you the willies for no reason? Or a place that was so pure you felt you could drink it in forever?”

I can’t wait for the pure air that I’ll drink into my soul in heaven. Can’t you? But meanwhile, if you have the gift of Discerning of Spirits, no, you’re not crazy when you sense something off. It is the Spirit speaking. If you do sense something, refer to scripture and appeal to the Spirit in prayer for insight. That is the best way to go. We can’t go forward based on feelings and intuition, but the Spirit will lead. I hope never to feel that spooky fear again. I can completely understand the verse in Luke,

“Men will faint from terror, apprehensive of what is coming on the world, for the heavenly bodies will be shaken.” (Luke 21:26 NIV).

I felt like fainting in fear on the Chisos Mountain trail, and it wasn’t even the Tribulation yet which all those who have not trusted in Him will have to endure. That time will be really frightening! Jesus is the surest way to safety. He saves us from the bondage of sin now and soon, one day, He will release us from its presence forever.

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For further reading-

If you have the gift of Distinguishing of Spirits, I feel your unease. There is very little written about it and what little there it is distinctly unhelpful, as it veers to easily into the paranormal or the just plain silly.

Got Questions has a good essay on the gift-

What is the spiritual gift of discerning spirits?

John MacArthur discusses it in this sermon, The Permanent Edifying Gifts Part 3

Pastor Tim Challies write about the Gift of Discernment in three parts, here, here and here.

evil, repent

So you think man is good? Only Jesus is good.

Posted on August 16, 2012May 9, 2016 by elizabethprata

The conditions preceding the last global judgment- the Flood- had reached a point where the LORD was grieved He had even made man, because the thoughts of man’s heart were only evil, continually.

God said that at that time He “saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And the Lord regretted that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart. (Genesis 6:5-7)

Jesus said, those conditions will reappear prior to the second global judgment- the Tribulation.

“For as were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man.” (Matthew 24:37)

People seem good on the surface. They’re not. The bible is replete with verses telling us that man is evil from the get-go. We’re bad from birth-

“What is man, that he can be pure? Or he who is born of a woman, that he can be righteous?” (Job 15:14)

We’re bad as youths-

“And when the Lord smelled the pleasing aroma, the Lord said in his heart, “I will never again curse the ground because of man, for the intention of man’s heart is evil from his youth.” (Genesis 8:21a).

We’re bad as adults-

In this verse Jesus is speaking- “Or which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!” (Matthew 7:9-11) [emphasis mine.]

Man is not good and earth is a hostile, dangerous place. It is satan’s place. When we read about a shooting in a movie theater we like to think that this kind of evil from man against man is an anomaly. “Aw, we’re all right,” we fool ourselves, “that was just one crazy man. Man is basically good.” But all men are crazy, or at least have the potential for that kind of evil. Witness these few examples from recent news which resulted in great pain to people. These are photos of the pain of the world. It is agony!

The agony of war

“A man cries in front of houses destroyed during a recent Syrian Air Force air strike in Azaz.”

The agony of mass rape

“Nicolas Kristof, Journalist and NY Times Columnist, recently wrote a column for NYTimes.com titled “On Top Of Famine, Unspeakable Violence.” He describes the horror of “mass rape” that many women fleeing Somalia, in pursuit of food and water, are currently facing. He challenges the reader to “Imagine that you’re a Somali suffering from the drought and famine in that country. One of your children has just starved to death, but there’s no time to mourn. Depleted and traumatized, you set off on foot across the desert with your family, and after 15 exhausting days finally reach what you believe is the safe haven of Kenya. But at the very moment when you think you’re secure, you encounter a nightmare broached only in whispers: an epidemic of violence and rape.”

The agony of starvation made worse by thieves stealing the food

“One of the UN’s largest international relief efforts is under investigation after it emerged that thousands of sacks of food aid were being diverted from starving refugees and openly sold for profit.”

The grief of a father whose 9-year-old daughter was found dead in an alley

The grief of an Aurora CO family whose child was killed in a mass shooting

The grief of a nation shocked by terrorism

The grief of a nation all-too-familiar with terrorism

And this is the time of gentility! This is the time of the Holy Spirit’s restraining ministry on earth! And yet we see man’s inhumanity to man on a constant basis. We have seen man’s evil ever since the Fall. Cain killed Abel. There is none good, no not one! (Romans 3:10). Only God is good. (Mark 10:18). We are evil.

If we are this inhumane to each other now, with the Spirit’s restraining ministry on earth, what will happen when He takes it away? God took Him away before the first judgment. “My Spirit will not remain with man forever,” says the LORD God.” (Genesis 6:3). God will take Him away prior to the second judgment,

“For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work. Only he who now restrains it will do so until he is out of the way.” (2 Thessalonians 2:7).

And yet, Jesus sacrificed Himself on the cross, dying in history’s most agonizingly brutal terroristic, heinous act for the very people who flew planes into buildings, bombed a residential area, murdered a 9-year-old, shot up a movie audience, knifed a sleeping Jewish family- including a months-old infant, stole food from the starving, and raped refugees. Jesus is THAT Good. He died for bad people, which means He died for all of us.

Don’t you want to follow a God who came down to us and taught us and then sacrificed Himself for those sins, your sins? Man is not good. But Jesus, who once lived as a man, is Good.

Repent. The end is nigh, and when it comes, and people’s inner evil will come bursting out. If you repent to Jesus, you won’t be here on earth to experience it. Jesus made a way to escape it. He IS the way, and He is the truth and the life. If life is agony now, just wait until satan is given full sway to allow unrestrained evil to take over the world.

If this could happen when the Holy Spirit restrains man’s inclinations…

What do you think these guys could get man to do?

Repent.

evil, Obama, women fainting

What’s up with that? 20 people faint at Obama speech

Posted on July 14, 2012 by elizabethprata

More than 20 people faint at Obama rally
“The pool report on President Obama’s trip to Roanoke, Virginia says that more than 20 people fainted during the president’s speech this evening. “TV viewers may have heard POTUS pointed out a couple of faintings during the rally in downtown Roanoke,” writes the pool report. “In fact, fire officials say more than 20 people fell out during the course of the speech. There were waves of exclamation as one person after another swooned.” Paramedics treated 21 people on the scene and took one to the hospital, according to the Roanoke fire department. It was warm out and the crowd of 3,000-plus was packed tightly into the 4-block area, the deputy fire marshal said by way of explanation. Volunteers passed around cups of water but some people didn’t take them, he said.”

One after another fainted? ‘By way of explanation’ is what gets me. They try to explain, but they can’t. It is a phenomenon. I wonder why people faint when Obama looks at them? I have my theories. I am sure you have yours. In any case, I can’t wait for the rapture…

Also of interest:

Feb 2008: Obama’s swooning supporters

Aug 2008: Stars React To Obama Speech (Oprah: “I Cried My Eyelashes Off!”)

Oct. 2010: Dozens faint or fall ill at Obama campaign rally

Mar 2012: At Obama Rallies, Fainting Spells Resurge

Mar 2012: Mayor who says Obama a ‘carnal manifestation of evil’ won his Mayoral election. I wrote this article, and in it, I lead the reader through a series of documented fainting episodes (mostly from women, but also documented from men), and why this might be happening.

evil, first responders, perilous times

First responders on the front lines in perilous times

Posted on January 5, 2012 by elizabethprata

I know that we all read headlines these days and just shake our heads in shame and agony, seeing the tragedies of the world deepen and become worse daily.

–Police kill armed 8th grader dead in TX school…
–Texas Family Killed by Relative Dressed as Santa

Those are just two headlines, but I don’t need a slew of them to make my point. I want to focus on the heartache of the First Responders. We automatically feel bad for the families and relatives of those who experience such incomprehensible tragedies. But in these days of worsening horror of man leveled against man, First Responders choose to wade in, restore peace, protect us, and carry the bodies away. I can’t imagine what emotions the policeman is feeling who had to shoot the armed 8th grader. He will have to live with that the rest of his life. I can’t imagine the scene the first responders had to deal with when entering the home of the slain Santa family, those images will be burned in their hearts for the rest of their lives. I can’t imagine the terror of a wife of a cop who sees her husband put on his uniform and head out for the day, knowing that the smallest incident could erupt into unimaginable horror or death. I read of the 53 arson fires over four days in Los Angeles and know that many firefighters worked themselves to the bone in protecting life and property. These days are so precarious.

It hit home to me as I read the political news last week of Iran in the Strait of Hormuz doing their naval war exercises. The Fifth Fleet is stationed at nearby Bahrain, and several US ships were mentioned in the news by US media and alluded to in Iranian media. One of those was the ship USS John C. Stennis. I began to think about the men and women on the ship, out there, protecting us and protecting & supporting our deployed troops in Afghanistan. That global spot was tense and could erupt into violence and war at any moment. And yet there were thousands of US navy troops in that very spot. I needed to make these people seem more real to me, and not just be part of a cold, factual news article I read and then move on. These are our people.

My family served in the US Military, my dad and uncle were in the Navy, my other uncle served many years in the US Coast Guard. But the men in my family had served before I was born or while I was very little. All I remember of my uncle’s Coast Guard service were the shiny belt buckles lined up in his drawer that he let me look at sometimes. I feel distant from those who serve and protect us, both at home and in the military. But I feel close to them in heart, especially as the days become more dangerous. What can I do?

Then I saw on Facebook that the USS Stennis has a page. I joined it. I look at the photos of the navy men and women on board, I watch the video they put up about the daily lives of the ship’s crew. On one of the first days after I’d joined the Stennis facebook page, there was a poll, ‘What drew you to ‘like’ the Stennis page?’ Answer choices were something like ‘serving on the ship, had served on the ship, family member serves on the ship, patriotic fan.’

I clicked “patriotic fan”. It is a very small thing I can do, but at least when I see the photos and comments and articles the Stennis officers put up, I can take part vicariously in their life, supporting them invisibly but fervently, from afar. At least I can leave a comment or two now and then thanking them for their service. Most importantly, I can put some faces in my mind as I pray for them.

Please remember as the days worsen that those on the front lines and who wade in to unutterable violence and horror do so out of duty so that we are protected, so that we have a place to turn to when or if we are harassed or attacked or threatened. All too sadly harassment and attacks are happening in the most benign of places these days. In our own rural county there was an attempted child snatching right from a backyard. I can’t imagine the terror in the hearts of the police who responded, chasing after the man who thankfully ended up leaving the child behind as he fled. Other police blotter news from our little county that is downright startling recently shows that an AK-47 gun was stolen from a bedroom. Great. So now they have that to worry about.

There was a good article in the NY Times yesterday that was also put up on the Facebook Stennis page today, “Work as Usual for U.S. Warship After Warning by Iran“
“ABOARD U.S.S. JOHN C. STENNIS, in the North Arabian Sea — If Iran’s warning on Tuesday to this American aircraft carrier was intended to disrupt the ship’s routine or provoke a high-seas reaction, nothing of the sort was evident on Wednesday.The American aircraft carrier John C. Stennis, in the North Arabian Sea, is carrying out its normal operations after Iran warned the ship not to re-enter the Persian Gulf.Steaming in international waters over the horizon from the Iranian fleet, the John C. Stennis spent the day and the early hours of the night launching and recovering aircraft for its latest mission — supporting ground troops in Afghanistan. All visible indications were that the carrier’s crew was keeping to its scheduled work, regardless of any political or diplomatic fallout from Iran’s warnings.”

It was comforting and reassuring to read this. I firmly believe that our military are saturated with earnest, hardworking and diligent men and women. I feel the same about first responders, EMTs, police, ambulance, emergency room doctors and staff, etc. Is there a way that you and I can show demonstrable support to these people? I know that it’s pretty lame to click on a Facebook page to ‘like’ and to make a comment. But at least now I have some names and some faces, I have a picture in my head of their lives aboard, and their challenges and triumphs. I can pray specifically.

Please be sensitive about our first responders. They see evil doings that are worsening each day (2 Timothy 3:1-5) and soon as the tribulation begins will be worse than man has ever seen or done. (Matthew 24:8, 21). They carry the people’s hurts and wounds and harms with them in their mind and their heart. They do it because they have heart to protect and to serve. They run in where we run out, and they look where we turn our eyes. Love them, and pray for them. It is a harsh world, and they are on the front lines of an evil rising that “has not been since the beginning of the world until this time, no, nor ever shall be.” (Mt 24:21b)
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9/11, bible jesus, evil, prophecy

9/11

Posted on September 10, 2011September 11, 2020 by elizabethprata

I was in my newspaper office. Tuesday is a big paper day, we go to print Wednesday morning. I rented the office from my friend who lived a big farmhouse, and she called me from her living room. I thought it was unusual that she phoned, being just a few feet away from me in the same building. But her voice evaporated all other thoughts. She said quietly but with fervor, “COME HERE NOW”.

The first plane had just hit the twin tower in NY. We watched with eyes open, breathing shallowly, standing with arms numbly at our sides…until the second plane hit at 9:03. Our eyes locked together, and we knew without saying a word that this was an attack. We also knew that nothing would ever be the same. We watched until another plane hit the Pentagon 34 minutes later. It felt like the world was coming to an end. It really did. We thought the world was ending. A knot was in my stomach and coherent thoughts refused to form in my head. We got our purses and the first thing we did was walk across the street to the hardware store and we bought the biggest flag they had. We went back to the office and put it up. Then we went to the bank to get money. Cash was going to be important if the electricity went out or we were ordered to evacuate. We didn’t know what was coming next and we wanted to be prepared. It could have been a nuke coming next, for all we knew. At the bank, they had the TV on in the break room with the door open and the volume up so customers could hear what was going on. A fourth plane had just gone down in PA. We saw the smoking crater. We knew that plane was part of whatever was happening.

We resolved that our freedom was under attack. Running a newspaper which reported the news and offered a platform for the people to speak their thoughts on any political or civic matter freely, we decided our most patriotic thing we could do to support the Constitution that day was to get the paper out. The terrorists were not going to stop the presses. They were not going to stop freedom from ringing out. And that is what we did.

Churches were full that Sunday, though a bit less full the following Sunday. By about four slim weeks, churches were back to their spotty attendance. Why is this? Why do people fly planes into buildings and kill others? Why is there murder? Why is there war? Why are there conflicts at every level? Because man is inherently wicked. Our hearts are evil above all things, who can know it? (Jeremiah 17:9). Because man is basically evil. If we didn’t have laws and limits we would be killing each other at every moment.

Jesus is the hope we have to become good. Not on our own merits. We do not become good through our own efforts. No, “Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good–except God alone.” It is not a popular thing to say, that we are not good, but we are not. [Click on the link for John MacArthur’s sermon the Sunday after 9/11/01 as he takes us through a biblical understanding of death, terrorism, and the Middle East]

I thank Jesus that He poured out His life so that we may live…and become righteous. “It is because of him [God] that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption.” (1 Corinthians 1:30). Even at that, our fleshly lives on earth are a struggle, a struggle against sin and growth in righteousness. I long for the day when flesh shall be glorified and sin shall be banished.

So people are evil, and we struggle against our nature. We want what we want and we sometimes terrorize or go to war to get it. Such will be the way, until the end. The end that comes before the beginning!

In the meantime, as we watch the death throes of this old world (which means the birth of the Glorious World!)…we mourn but also we love our nation America.

The song you are about to listen to is from a Las Vegas Diamond Rio concert. They received an immediate resounding standing ovation, and continue to do so every time they perform it!

Here in America, In God We STILL Trust:

The photo below has a wonderful story behind it. Please click on the link to read about the “Photo of eagle on Fort Snelling gravestone touches hearts, goes viral”

Minneapolis Star-Tribune story of the photo here

On the day of 9/11 there were people trapped above the strike zones who thought it would be preferable to hurl themselves out the shattered windows of the twin towers rather than burn to death. One photo in particular caught the world’s attention. It is called “Falling Man” and it seems that his graceful swan dive plummet was poignant in the extreme. Here is the back-story of that photo.

Five months after 9/11 the Superbowl came along, just as it always does. The Superbowl is noted for artful, funny, or avante garde commercial debuts, due to the high viewership of the game. Budweiser showed a commercial called “Respect” and showed it only once, then until now. Thanks to Youtube, the ad has resurfaced. It is sure to bring a tear to your eye. We remember American greatness, American products, American ways.

Jesus will return in glory with His glorified saints. He will institute new nations and new cities populated by sinless resurrected chosen ones. There will be no more war because our hearts will be made right with Him. There will be no more terror because we will want nothing, having been given it all by our Savior. If you bow low to the Savior, He will lift you up high. Please do it soon.
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