That Satan’s deceptions began swaying parishioners in God’s church shortly after its inception is an historical fact that even the unchurched can recognize. From the very beginning the devil has polluted the gospel message with “tweaks”–small, mostly ignored changes in the gospel that significantly alter the Lord’s love message to mankind. One will notice that the devil’s alterations all follow a common theme. Without exception they change God’s message from obedience to His will to satisfying man’s wants–from strict adherence to His “My way only” to the devil’s “Any way you want it.” The episode in the Garden of Eden is an excellent example of this subtle shift. Satan’s addition of one word–“not”–changed the course of mankind’s history. There, using only one word, the great deceiver nullified God’s love message to the jewel of His creation. God’s message to Adam and Eve was: “Do what I want and live in paradise forever.” One three-letter word changed the message to “Do what you want and live in paradise forever.” Man has been choosing self over the Almighty ever since.

Though not a tweak, Satan uses another, extremely powerful tool to keep religious man separated from God. He convinces churchman that, because he believes, he is saved and born again. Because he continues to believe, his position in the Body of Christ is assured. God’s gospel/Law of love has been replaced by a perverted gospel that places man (actually Satan) in the religious driver’s seat. Now it is man (in obedience to Satan) who determines good and evil. This comes as no surprise to those who believe God Who said that man would call good evil and evil good, and that he would do what was right in his own eyes (Isa. 5:20,21). See Bait and Switch and All That Glitters. One can recognize the citadels of these Scripture-rejecters by the steeples and crosses that adorn them and by the fact that they are inhabited every sun god day, Christmas and Easter when their inhabiters gather to worship their deity –Tammuz, the sun god (Eze. 8:14). See the Christmas, Easter and The Mark of the Beast series.

Since the founding of the New Testament Church a counterfeit version of God’s love gospel has been substituted for the real thing by various segments of God’s church. Beginning small, the false gospel has continually gained in popularity and its adherents have grown in numbers until today those who openly obey Satan comprise some 99% of professing Christendom. This in spite of the Lord’s numerous statements to the contrary. Ironically, these misguided souls “know” that they are right. The Book of Acts chronicles the apostles’ continuous war against the false church which, even then, was gaining in power. In their epistles the apostles repeatedly warned the church about what was happening. God’s message to the seven churches (church eras) found in the first three chapters of the Book of Revelation present His most graphic warnings to those who call Him their God. In chapter 3, verses 14-20 He speaks to the modern, end-time church, warning her that she is doomed unless she repents and turns to Him. She not only refuses to do so, but is growing steadily more evil while believing that she is growing steadily more righteous. God’s Truth (Word-Jn. 17:17) has no effect on her mindset. The Apostle John wrote the Book of Revelation around 96 A.D., only 65 years after the founding of the New Testament Church. Within two generations Satan’s false prophets had gained control of most of the church. The Apostle Paul’s scathing letter to the churches of Galatia was written only 22 years after the founding of God’s church in the upper room. The fake had already replaced the real (1:6-9) in the hearts of many church people.  Love for God had been replaced by love for self. The apostasy continues. L.J.