A Squirrelish Path to Defeat and Destruction

By:  Dale Weckbacher

2 Corinthians 11:3

But I fear, lest somehow, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, so your minds may be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.

NKJV

Deception was the tool of Satan in the Garden of Eden and remains his strategy today.  The message of the Gospel is simple, so simple it has escaped, and continues to escape, the minds of great intellectuals throughout history.  This complicating of the simplistic message of the Gospel has led to great deception and I fear caused many to fall from faith or never enter into a relationship with God to begin with. 

Some misconceptions of the Gospel include,

1)      Belief that one must be perfect to be a Christian – Romans 3:23 reminds us that we all have sinned.  1 John 1:9 which speaks to believers in Jesus and not unbelievers reminds us that when we sin God will forgive our sin.  In other words, even though one has accepted Jesus as their savior they do not become perfect and can mess up and need to ask for forgiveness.  However, this is not a blanket excuse to sin (Romans 6:1-4). 

2)      Christianity is just a crutch for the weak – This erroneous belief stems from the belief that meekness equates to weakness (Psalm 37:11, Matthew 5:5) when the truth is that meekness is strength under control.   (1)  During the last 100 years of history, we have witnessed strong powerful leaders like Hitler, Stalin, and Mao who allowed power to corrupt them and get out of control.  Jesus is calling for strong leadership not corrupted by power and following God’s Word is the best way to keep power under control.

3)      Christians should stay out of the political process and place their trust in God – While it is true that Christians are to place their trust in God, the logic that this means they are to completely stay out of the political process is flawed.  This logic is like saying Christians should trust God to put gas in the car and not stop at the gas station for gas.  We who live in countries that give us an opportunity to elect our leaders are blessed and should be involved and continue to trust God and pray for the leaders that end up being elected. 

Satan’s most effective weapon however is the weapon of division.  He used this weapon to cause Eve to sin bringing separation from God and eviction from the pristine Garden of Eden.  He uses this weapon to cause division in Christianity as a whole by causing differing denominations to lose sight of the Great Commission of spreading the Gospel (Mark 16:14-18) and instead divide over petty theological interpretations of God’s Word.  (2)   This weapon of divisiveness not only manifests itself in the spiritual and religious realm but in the business and political world as well.  

I have worked as an accountant in the business world for almost 40 years.  In that time I have seen divisiveness in management lead to decisions based upon protection of one’s position of power within the company at the expense of company success, often leading to the financial ruin of the company.  This does not mean companies must adopt groupthink and discard any new ideas viewing them as threats.  Instead, new ideas should not initially be viewed as threats and instead investigated and if viable adopted.

In the political realm we are witnessing divisiveness within the Republican Party which if not dealt with will result in a third straight GOP presidential defeat.  This is what recently happened in Canada and will happen here if not dealt with.  (3)  The difference this election however is not that the divisiveness is due to the GOP establishment ramming an undesirable moderate down the throats of the GOP conservative base but a divisiveness within the conservative base threatening to suppress GOP voter turnout resulting in another defeat.  I recently wrote about this divisiveness within the conservative movement and invite readers to follow this link (4) and read about this and how to unify the conservative movement. 

The real enemy against Christianity is not people speaking out against it but the satanic powers deceiving these people (Ephesians 6:12).  Jesus wants all denominations of Christianity to unite in the spreading of the Gospel and not allow our petty theological differences to cause us to lose focus.  The real enemy for the GOP this election is attacking and dividing each other over accusations, weather false or true, and losing focus on defeating the real enemy, the liberal progressive socialist DNC. 

In the movie Up, you may remember the dog wearing a collar allowing it to talk.  This dog could carry on an intelligent conversation until a squirrel distracted him.  When the primary season started this election, insurgent candidates like Trump, Cruz, and even Ben Carson surged and collectively garnered a majority of the GOP support.  This is because like in the 2010 and 2014 off-year elections, these candidates were speaking about issues resonating with voters.  Unfortunately, the wedge of division has caused the GOP primary debate to become distracted by the squirrels of personal attacks and they have lost the focus that propelled them to the top of the polls. 

The question is can we return to a debate on the issues and not be distracted by the squirrels of deception for if we do not, I believe conservatives are on the path to another defeat and the nation will suffer irreparable damage. 

1. TOW Bible Commentary. Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth. www.theologyofwork.org. [Online] Theology of Work. [Cited: February 21, 2016.] https://www.theologyofwork.org/new-testament/matthew/the-kingdom-of-heaven-at-work-in-us-matthew-5-7/the-beatitudes-matthew-51-12/blessed-are-the-meek-for-they-will-inherit-the-earth-matthew-55.

2. Gotquestions.org. Why Are There so Many Different Christian Interpretations? www.gotquestions.org. [Online] Gotquestions.org. [Cited: April 3, 2016.] http://www.gotquestions.org/interpretations-Christian.html.

3. David Solway, Janice Fiamengo. A Lesson to Republicans in Canada's Conservative Party Defeat. www.americanthinker.com. [Online] American Thinker, February 7, 2016. [Cited: April 3, 2016.] http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2016/02/a_lesson_to_republicans_in_canadas_conservative_party_defeat.html

4. Weckbacher, Dale. Defining and Unifying the Conservative Movement. politicalavenger.blogspot.com. [Online] Political Aventer, March 23, 2016. [Cited: April 3, 2016.] https://politicalavenger.blogspot.com/2016/03/defining-and-unifying-conservative.html.