The secret conflict referenced in the title of his series does not involve a war between the Institutional (Catholic/Protestant) Church and Satan, as we are repeatedly told from pulpits and podiums, books, movies, radio, television and internet offerings.  This war involves the Counterfeit Church’s relentless, though unrecognized, war against God, His Son and Their Truth and Their saints.  This war also reveals the church’s hidden attitude toward the objects of their efforts.  Jesus Himself revealed their attitude in John 10:16 when He said to those assigned to preach His Word: “He who hears you (speak His Word), hears Me (Jesus).  He who DESPISES YOU (THE WORD YOU SPEAK), DESPISES ME.  AND HE WHO DESPISES ME DESPISES HIM WHO SENT ME.”  Notice that Jesus, His Father, Their Words and those who preach their Words as ONE ENTITY.  This also includes those who believe and obey what they hear.  The word “despise” means to reject with malice.  Again, God, Christ, Their Truth, those who  preach It and those who obey it are, in the eyes of the Almighty, one inseparable entity that is either equally embraced (the minutely few) or equally despised (the other 99%).  Therefore, as Jesus said about Himself, when men see a true saint, they see the Father (Jn. 14:9) because they see one who “walks as He (Jesus) walked” (1 Jn. 2:6) and overcomes (Satan) “as I (Jesus) also overcame” (Rev. 3:21), who purifies himself “as He (Jesus) is pure (1 Jn. 3:3) and whom He has sanctified and cleansed with the washing of water by the Word (Eph. 5:26).  God’s true children are His Word in human form.  These are they who have only one goal in life–to be little Christs in word, thought and deed.

Just as Satan prevented the Jews from recognizing the man Jesus for Who He was, he has blinded Catholics and Protestants so that they do not recognize Christ’s people for who they are.  Rather than view them as His brethren and friends, they see them as ignorant, lost souls who take His Words as broad, pie-in-the-sky suggestions He knows they cannot obey.  NEVER UNDERESTIMATE THE POWER OF SATAN.  He uses that power to deceive church people into ignoring, and in some cases, eliminating unacceptable passages from the Holy Bible.  Many is the time people have responnded when confronted by God’s written Word: “I didn’t know that was in there.”  Then, after admitting the Truth of the offending Words, they summarily dismiss them and look elsewhere for truth.  As one pastor explained when he was reminded that his church’s “truth” was refuted by God’s Truth: “We are stepping outside the Bible” in search of truth.  As one woman in that same denomination said to me, “Obeying God is just too much trouble.”  And why should they?  After all, everyone in “the church” is already saved, born again and rapture ready.

Concerning societal right and wrong, Jurist Robert Bork noted that: “When we look outside the constitution we look into ourselves.”  The same holds true for professing Christendom.  When we look outside the Bible for Truth we look into our own minds.  Men’s minds differ greatly.  By looking inwardly man finds that “truth” is relative, including religious truth.  Those having religious truths that agree join together into groups called denominations, which explains the existence of hundreds of conflicting versions of “true Christianity,” each of which is “the right one.”  Humanly speaking, religion is subjective and varies widely.  Its truths vary, even within the various denominations.  For example, there are numerous differing groups who call themselves Baptists.

Contrary to religiosity which is objective and varied, spirituality  is singular and static.  The Author of spirituality “changes not,” He “is the same yesterday, today and forever.”  In Him “there is no shadow of turning.”  Which explains why God wrote ONE set of rules in a Book known as the Holy Bible.  He commands those who seek Him to look into that one Book in search of eternal Truths, which they must believe and obey.  Religionists, having looked into that Book and finding It wanting, changed some parts of it, rejected other parts, and labeled what little that remained “God’s truth.” which they can believe or not and obey or not.  By rejecting most of the Author’s Words, religious man wages war against Him, His Son and those who agree with Them.  When religionists sing “Onward Christian soldiers, marching as to war,” they do so without realizing that they are waging war against the One they are singing about, the very One they believe they are fighting for.  NEVER UNDERESTIMATE SATAN.

Knowing that he cannot separate religious man from the Bible, Satan’s prophets quote it in order to deceive those whom he wants to join him in the Lake of Fire following the return of Jesus Christ.  Their main weapon of mass destruction is what I call “Scripture-twisting,” the act of leaving out, adding to or changing a Biblical passage in order to hide its true message.  The premier  example occurred when he added one word to a statement God made to Adam and Eve: “You will die,” to which he added one word–“not,” which totally reversed the meaning of the statement.  By adding or removing words, ignoring contexts, refusing to study the fine print, etc., religionists have changed the meaning of thousands of Holy Spirit-inspired statements.  Being sound-byte hunters, they fail to bother with the small stuff.  As a result they ignore the fact that “All Scripture is inspired by God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction and for training in righteousness … and makes one wise unto salvation.”  They do not realize that “Holy men of old spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit,” that “They who are led by the Spirit are the sons of God,” that Jesus told His disciples that they were His friends only “… if you do whatsoever I command you to do,” that we must be “doers of the Law (Word) and not hearers only,” that “Man must live by every Word that proceeds out of the mouth of God,” that “sin separates us from God,” and that “To transgress (break) the Law is sin, for sin is the transgression of the Law.”  Being oblivious to these and many other fine print Truths, churchman feels free to ignore, change or delete God’s Word at will.

Having rejected so much of God’s Word, the church does not know that she is at war with Him.  One day soon that war will be over and she will be shocked to learn that she has waged a 2000 year war against Him. L.J.