How do you change someone’s perspective of good or evil, right or wrong? There are definitely strategies for doing this aren’t there? In the garden of Eden, the devil added reason to change Eve’s perspective so SHE could decide if eating the forbidden fruit was right or wrong. It is not much different today. Reason is a powerful tool in convincing someone to a conclusion.

To change whether someone considers something to “be right or wrong,” is the chief strategy of demonic wisdom.

James 3:14-16 But if you have bitter envy and self-seeking in your hearts, do not boast and lie against the truth. 15 This wisdom does not descend from above, but is earthly , sensual, demonic. 16 For where envy and self-seeking exist, confusion and every evil thing are there. NKJV

It has been said that comedians are the “prophets of culture”, and that through laughter the heart can be changed. What I can get you to laugh at through irony, I can get you to tolerate. What culture tolerates today, they will celebrate tomorrow. The celebration of same sex marriage and the cultural attempt at normalizing homosexuality started with the comedy writers of Hollywood in the 70’s.

It begins with “if”. What did the devil use to try to turn Jesus? “Reason”. IF you be the Son of God, turn these stones to bread…” Reason: Hunger.

“If you be the Son of God jump of the pinnacle” Reason: Scripture says, “Angels will catch you”.

“If you be the Son of God I will give you the world kingdoms”, Reason: “I have control to give them to you.”

The first step to deception is to remove the fear of judgment through logic and reason.

Something like this: “I mean, if God is a good God then this would only make sense right?”

“If” is a very important word in judgment. It removes the finality of truth and calls to question, the character of truth.

When you listen to the liberal spin doctors of social justice you will hear the power of demonic reason for sure, and it sounds good, makes “sense”, but our “senses” can be deceived very easily. A carnival illusionist can prove that. So we either receive the word of God as absolute truth or we become our own gods.

Genesis 3:4-5 Then the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. 5 For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil .” NKJV

Proverbs 21:2-3 Every way of a man is right in his own eyes: but the LORD pondereth the hearts. 3 To do justice and judgment is more acceptable to the LORD than sacrifice. KJV

Proverbs 18:17 There are two sides to every story. The first one to speak sounds true until you hear the other side and they set the record straight. TPT

The devil has been very successful at changing cultures belief in determining good and evil.

Has it worked on you?

Let’s pray:

Father, I pray over every person reading this post. Lord, re-sensitize us to the things we have become de-sensitized to. Help us to renew our minds to Your word and to decide once and for all, Your word is the final authority in our lives. Let there be no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, but rather by the conviction of Your Spirit, help us conform to Your word. We are thankful that 1 John 1:9 says if we confess our sins You are faithful and just to not only forgive but to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Lord, we have missed the mark and many of us have had our thinking swayed, even unknowingly. Forgive us and cleanse us and we will go forth in Your power and might. In Jesus’ Name. AMEN!

Until next week,

Be blessed!

• Date - April 4, 2018
• Author - David Chisholm

Back in about 1984 I had my first “big misunderstanding” with God concerning His voice in my life. I believed with all my heart that He had told me something, and then I discovered it was not His voice. I was devastated! I made inward vows that I would never believe anything I heard in my heart again as being His voice. I vowed I would never tell anyone anything again that I believe the Lord said, unless it was quoting a direct scripture.

For the next year I experienced the chastening of the Lord. I was broken and did not see any way to ever believe I would hear the manifest voice of the Lord in my heart again. I would receive strong unctions in my heart, to the point I felt like I was going to explode! But I refused to speak what I was hearing in my heart for fear of making a mistake, because my greatest fear was to misrepresent God.

This went on for months until I finally came to a breaking point. I was so immature at that time in the things of God. I was exalted and promoted very quickly as a young believer because of the gift God had put within me. I could do things, “in the Spirit” better than so many who were years, and even decades, older than me in the Lord. Finally, I out of a heart of desperation, I demanded to the Lord in prayer that He meet me at one o’clock on the following Saturday. I wanted an explanation for why He allowed me to be deceived.

So at one o’clock that Saturday, I waited in my living room and nothing happened. Devastated, I began to rant and tell the Lord, “I have given you my life and you can’t even explain to me why I was deceived?” I finally just collapsed and literally gave up. It must have been about 2:30 or so and all sudden a presence came in the room that I will never forget. I was so afraid I was going to die!

All of a sudden the Lord began to speak to me, not like I had ever experienced before. He sounded like an angry Father scolding a disobedient child. “I told you to go to Jackson, Ohio to take this city for Me and you will do it My way or you won’t do it at all! I have called you as an Apostle to this nation” “Not so Lord,” I said, “because an Apostle is one who goes where the gospel has not been preached”. Immediately, He said, “No!” “I called you as an Apostle of the Full Gospel to this nation!”

(Before this time I had fully intended to go overseas to live and preach the gospel.)

Instantly light filled my heart and I saw the spiritual pride I had walked in. During a Christmas trip to my hometown a year and a half or so before, the Spirit of God had called me to come to my hometown and plant a Full Gospel Church. At that time I said, “I am not moving back here, I joined the army to get out of this town and I am never coming back!” I then realized I had walked out of God’s authority, and from that moment, out of arrogance, pride and selfish desire, I determined it was my decision what I would do, or where I would go.

Over the last couple weeks I have written about judging in the church. When do we judge? As I have led the local church for the last 32 years, I have watched many gifted young men and women make the same mistake I did. Because of their gifts and abilities, they confuse the voice of the prophetic with their own desire.

This is where we need the Elders in the church. Men and women who have lived long enough in the Spirit to judge the prophetic. Many like myself, out of zeal and desire for God, get exalted in their own thinking. They actually begin to believe almost every thought and inward conversation they have is the voice of God. We call this time “spiritual puberty” and it is a dangerous time in our spiritual development for sure.

Thank God the Apostle Paul had an unction from the Holy Spirit to write the following instruction.

1 Corinthians 14:29-33

29 Let two or three prophets speak , and let the others judge.

30 But if anything is revealed to another who sits by, let the first keep silent.

31 For you can all prophesy one by one, that all may learn and all may be encouraged.

32 And the spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets.

33 For God is not the author of confusion but of peace, as in all the churches of the saints. NKJV

This is where I erred as a young prophetic gift. I didn’t submit what I was hearing for judgment, I just assumed since I was the most gifted in the room I was right. Didn’t work out to good. We are all subject to deception, thinking otherwise is the first deception you may experience.

Will continue next week!

Be Blessed!

• Date - March 29, 2018
• Author - David Chisholm

This is the third installment of the subject concerning judgment and the believer. Last week, we talked about the necessity of making judgment calls concerning fellow believers who have sinned against us. Let’s now look at some more scripture about judging between good and evil.

1 Corinthians 2:12-16

12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God.

16 For “who has known the mind of the LORD that he may instruct Him?” But we have the mind of Christ. NKJV

Again, we find a common thread that false judgment is when we presume to know the motive of heart behind someone’s actions. True judgment is having a real discernment, not just a suspicion or carnal perception, about someone’s actions or behavior.

Let’s look at a true discernment example of action and motive in the scripture.

Acts 8:9-25. The Sorcerer’s Profession of Faith

9 But there was a certain man called Simon , who previously practiced sorcery in the city and astonished the people of Samaria, claiming that he was someone great,

25 So when they had testified and preached the word of the Lord, they returned to Jerusalem, preaching the gospel in many villages of the Samaritans. NKJV

It seems to me that the church is so desperate to try to win people to Christ, that there isn’t any discernment as to whether the people they lead to Christ are truly converted, or are looking for “success n life”. It was spiritual discernment or judgment in Peter that questioned this man’s motives for desiring the power of God. The Emerging Church has not only convinced people that there is no absolute truth, but also that there is no Spirit of Truth.

Jesus, help us walk in the truth of your word and Spirit today!

Be blessed!

• Date - March 22, 2018
• Author - David Chisholm