Tuk Tuk Country

Kisumu is literally swarming with tuk tuks.

Image from https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f9/Tuk-tuk_in_Nairobi.JPG

Their hunched-down stance and three disproportionally tiny wheels give them a stubborn, beetle-like appearance reminiscent of schoolyard bullies, which impression their drivers (riders?) only reinforce with unconventional methods on the road. It’s not uncommon for a tuk-tuk to swerve straight into an oncoming car’s path and come to a dead stop a few inches away from impact. Thereafter the tightest of turns and they resume their precarious journey, leaving any road users they may have offended with a blast of hard words.

Riding in the tuk-tuk is no glorious adventure either. It vibrates like a 1960s diesel generator, whether stationery or on the move. That vibration may tickle you or make your nose itchy especially the first time. The entire journey your bones will collide against one another and your nerves will wince. As though that were not enough, the drivers (riders?) have a penchant for finding potholes in the road and hitting them with suspicious relish. The initial impact judders the vehicle’s frame, throws all occupants into the stratosphere, and the descent also ends badly, with one’s bum forcefully rediscovering the thinly upholstered seat, and, depending on whether one was braced for it or not, one’s limbs colliding with the insides of the vehicle.

Now the insides of a tuk-tuk are a safety hazard all by themselves, the roof and sides being manifestly a meshwork of iron rods welded together, over which a tarpaulin is spread and fastened. Some painted iron panels make for a lower body and doors, which the driver (exclusively) knows how to push, slap and fasten the latch to open or close. The quality of welding of metallic parts justly earns condemnation, wrath and censure, because injudicious handling of those roughly welded and unsmoothed rods and panel edges could easily end in a cut, especially when the driver (rider?) swerves across the road just to throw everyone into a pothole or a bump. Funny thing is, you never hear the driver (rider?) exclaiming as all other passengers do at these jarring occasions. His right hand immediately wrings the accelerator, his eye scans the road for bumps, off we go again.

And the contraptions are hardy. If ever they topple over, as three-legged monstrosities are bound to do, the driver merely sets it right side up and continues as though nothing happened – assuming the unlikely scenario that the welding works therein did not mangle the occupants beyond help. 

By the look of things tuk tuks are here to stay, being affordable for the masses, and durable for their owners. Also, apparently, the drivers of today’s carbon-fiber cars fear nothing more than a clash or even a close brush with a tuk tuk, and everybody knows why.

Attraction Differential

A great sage (I suspect it was the tireless Anon once again) said "Obey your instincts." Now in the haste of modern life many influences demand obedience, and sadly there are always stray people lacking direction who thus fall prey to confidence tricksters, simply because they seem to know what they are talking about. I'm always suspicious of people who primarily issue imperatives in their speech, maybe except my football coach, who literally barks orders. Now I need to be getting to the point, how our eyes need to stay open.

Let us telescopically zoom in on love and romance, the way modern culture depicts them. ( Not so close that we must stare at other people's displays of affection. Look in the mirror and you should see quite enough, thank you.) My view of the past presents me as an evangelical believer in the romantic tropes of back in the day.  For example, The One: an exclusive soulmate figure with whom the matching agent is no less than Destiny and without whom there is no Happily Ever After.

With ideas like these filling my head I set out to search for love and soon thought I found it. But my instinct refused to believe the narrative I was forcing upon myself. I ignored the annoying instinct until one day it screamed out: "Love is not this way!" The attraction was compromised from the start by an unfortunate pink hue coming from rose-tinted glasses I was wearing at the time.

Let me explain myself; you see, attraction is a funny thing, it's like binary. When it's on, it's like two magnets close together, they slam into one another and cleave together. When it's off, nothing will happen, like preoccupied strangers in the street. Factors of attraction vary, from physical appearance to virtues and appealing character but there's got to be attraction, it's not magic.

The problem begins when romantic love is made the be-all and end-all of life and happiness, until misguided souls settle with insufficient attraction. The cart is before the horse. There may be other motives which do not qualify as attraction because they are only marginally related to the object of affection, like how the two of you will look, what others will think, other calculations, etc (which are given disproportionate weight despite only being by-products, side effects.) This is the real dynamic behind that oft-rehashed complaint now popularized by the movies: "I feel like you are in love with the idea of being in love and not in love with meeee!" **tears, and then an overdue break up***

In a lovesick mind, having to pep talk oneself every time before facing the partner is more tolerable than being alone. Consequently, these shut their eyes and ears from dissonant facts that indicate that they have been settled for, shielding themselves from the truth by going to extra lengths to obligate their partners to stay with them. But love is not this way. Granted, arranged marriages between total strangers have worked, which somewhat  complicates my argument on the necessity of initial attraction. Never mind,  I'll figure it out. All I'm saying here is, there's no faking love in a relationship, no matter how "romantic" it is made to look.

Why am I talking like this? How do I know? I've been that guy, I've been on both ends of an attraction imbalance, both settling for others when my options dried up and being settled for by others. One kind of feels a nagging pain in the instinct in either format. Unless an isostatic adjustment balances the inequality, which may not happen even with prolonged exposure, do not proceed by any means. Just wait. Keep your eyes wide open in the meantime.

The Jesuit Teaching on Regicide, Murder, Lying, Theft, Etc

"But we should swell beyond all reasonable limit, our enumeration, were we to quote even a tithe of the “moral maxims” of the Jesuits. There is not one in the long catalogue of sins and crimes which their casuistry does not sanction. Pride, ambition, avarice, luxury, bribery, and a host of vices which we cannot specify, and some of which are too horrible to be mentioned, find in these Fathers their patrons and defenders. The alchemists of the Middle Ages boasted that their art enabled them to operate on the essence of things, and to change what was vile into what was noble. But the still darker art of the Jesuits acts in the reverse order; it changes all that is noble into all that is vile. Theirs is an accursed alchemy by which theytransmute good into evil, and virtue into vice. There is no destructive agency with which the world is liable to be visited, that penetrates so deep, or inflicts so remediless a ruin, as the morality of the Jesuits. The tornado sweeps along over the surface of the globe, leaving the earth naked and effaced and forgotten in the greater splendor and the more solid strength of the restored structures. Revolution may overturn thrones, abolish laws, and break in pieces the framework of society; but when the fury of faction has spent its rage, order emerges from the chaos, law resumes its supremacy, and the bare as before tree or shrub beautified it; but the summers of after years re-clothe it with verdure and beautify it with flowers, and make it smile as sweetly as before. The earthquake overturns the dwelling of man, and swallows up the proudest of his cities; but his skill and power survive the shock, and when the destroyer has passed, the architect sets up again the fallen palace, and rebuilds the ruined city, and the catastrophe is effaced and forgotten in the greater splendor and the more solid strength of the restored structures. Revolution may overturn thrones, abolish laws, and break in pieces the framework of society; but when the fury of faction has spent its rage, order emerges from the chaos, law resumes its supremacy, and the institutions which had been destroyed in the hour of madness, are restored in the hour of calm wisdom that succeeds. But the havoc the Jesuitinflicts is irremediable. It has nothing in it counteractive or restorative; it is only evil. It is not upon the works of man or the institutions of man merely that, it puts forth its fearfully destructive power; it is upon man himself. It is not the body of man that it strikes, like the pestilence; it is the soul.It is not a part, but the whole of man that it consigns to corruption and ruin. Conscience it destroys, knowledge it extinguishes, the very power of discerning between right and wrong it takes away, and shuts up the man in a prison whence no created agency or influence can set him free. The Fall defaced the image of God in which man was made; we say, defaced; it did not totally obliterate or extinguish it. Jesuitism, more terrible than the Fall, totally effaces from the soul of man the image of God. Of the “knowledge, righteousness, and true holiness” in which man was made it leaves not a tree. It plucks up by its very roots the moral constitution which God gave man. The full triumph of Jesuitism would leave nothing spiritual, nothing moral, nothing intellectual, nothing strictly and properly human existing upon the earth. Man it would change into the animal, impelled by nothing but appetites and passions, and these more fierce and cruel than those of the tiger. HOPV2 401.5
Society would become simply a herd of wolves, lawless, ravenous, greedy of each other’s blood, and perpetually in quest of prey. Even Jesuitism itself would perish, devoured by its own progeny. Our earth at last would be simply a vast sepulcher, moving round the sun in its annual circuit, its bosom as joyless, dreary, and waste as are those silent spaces through which it rolls."- The History of Protestantism Vol. 2, Chapter 5, The Jesuit Teaching on Regicide, Murder, Lying, Theft, Etc..., page 401

On the Brink of Bliss

I once seriously considered marriage, in much the same way a small boy craves big-people stuff. My thinking back then was that, yes, it's no walk in the park, but if you put in the work it is rewarding. I wasn't really feeling like an adult by that time despite having obtained an ID card. Embarking on the apex of adult relationships seemed like a sure way to accelerate the process. Colleagues and a wife instead of "the boys" and (a) girl pal(s) seemed like a step up into the somber big boy world of Duties and Responsibilities.  Also, hardship greys the hairs. I looked boyish, nobody was taking me seriously. It got so bad that I'd be in the company of my peers yet some ignorant lazy buggers picked on me as the "kijana" whenever an errand called for sending someone. All because I lacked a premature potbelly, stress wrinkles, a steely gaze or a "baba somebody" moniker. I was just Tony to all and sundry, or, in extreme cases, Duski Bolt. Indeed one of the portly girls gathered enough courage to tell me to my face that I had babyish eyes. Luckily for her I looked, and was, harmless back then. But I digress. Point is, I toyed with the idea of marriage for a variety of reasons. Think Marriage Challenge. As for whether my intended was going to accept my proposal, I took it for granted that given enough time, I wouldn't even really need to ask for her hand except as a formality, a ceremony, a gimmick, an exam whose answers I knew beforehand but still had to sit and write anyway. I felt  to be "in love" was a necessary prerequisite for marriage, therefore I strove to feel and act the way a person who is in love is supposed to, according to an unrehearsed mix of my convictions then and contemporary romantic conventions as depicted on TV. Probably I would do it differently today, just relax and steer the ride at my own leisure, but at the time it was an honest effort under the perceived pressure of self-imposed adult burdens and a need to impress. Those were some big shoes I was yet to grow into, but clumsily walking nevertheless, in earnest, a kid trying to become his daddy overnight. In my haste to settle down I skipped vital steps in the metamorphosis. Long story, we leave it for now. It helped that my intended spoke the truth from her heart, often smiled radiantly and redundantly and was easy to talk to. At times she could draw me out of my shell, which is no mean feat. I often retreat too far inwards to bring myself back into circulation but this one figured me out and disentangled me patiently like I was knotted up Christmas lights. In her presence my mental clutter cleared miraculously. Although there were times when she was the cause of fretful contemplations rather than their bane. Still I decided on the balance of things that marrying her might be a good idea... once I started working, if ever. Also there was the little (big) issue of sex, which marriage would not only rubber stamp but also require on the regular, so hooray, another plus. Other specifics like the wedding, and the house, and how many kids, blended vaguely into the blurry background of things that would somehow sort themselves out with time, why stress. Those days I was an atheist due to poor choice of reading material, but she was a believer. I merely assumed I would convert her to my perspective and married life could begin from there, because even in my unbelief I knew enough not to be unequally yoked with a believer, can you imagine! But she was strong, thank God, though my evangelization was not altogether very zealous because I quickly figured out that a little faith in the mother will be good for the kids if for nothing else. Besides, who wants to raise faithless brats in this cold blooded 21st Century? not me. Yeah that's how far my thinking went. Kids. Weird. Anyway, my marriage fantasies (!) were overtaken by subsequent developments (!) and now rants such as these are all that remain of that adventure that never was.

Struggle is Real

I struggle with sin. What I need to do is overcome in the power of the Holy Spirit. The Bible tells me the blood of the Lamb is a complete cure and I choose to believe the Bible.

Nothing can separate us from the love of Christ. But sin? I see what harm sin has wrought in my life and am grieved. For while Christ yet loves me, if I cling to sin my reaction is to run away from Him and hide.

Sin alienates me from my fellow man as well. My love grows cold, I forget the good feeling of selfless service and look only to my own affairs even to the expense of others. Sacrifice becomes to me a repulsive idea. Pride puffs me up and I am ignorant that the swelling is due to my own internal putrefaction!

I struggle with sin. I need to overcome in Jesus' name.

Review: Cross and Crown

I'm currently reading the book Cross and Crown. It details the last moments of notable Protestant martyrs of the Alps, of France and of England. These people were persecuted, tortured, imprisoned, exiled, enslaved and died for their faith despite being offered many opportunities to recant and be set free. Their love for Bible truth exceeded their love for their own lives and so they risked and lost everything while spreading the Gospel of Christ.

The book is excellent for its message. The accounts narrated therein of individual and collective martyrdoms are heartrending for the cruelty of the persecutors and inspiring for the bravery and endurance of the martyrs until their dying moments. If this book does not moisten your eyes even a bit, nothing will.

The prospect of persecution may seem remote today, but the lessons that may be learnt from these people's accounts are very important to our generation. There is danger in forgetting history. Many reforms that have come down the ages to be taken for granted in this day  were dearly purchased by the blood of martyrs. For example, "freedom of information" as we know it today may never have come about but for brave children of GOD who resisted tyrannical censorship to print, translate and disseminate Bibles in the common languages. Nor would we speak of freedom of conscience except many had shed their blood taking a stand for it.

This is an era of great light, and great will be the repercussions of turning away from it, thereby slighting the sacrifice Christ's saints (following His divine example) made to secure it.

But many will face persecution in days to come. will we stand in the face of public hatred and universal ridicule, imprisonment, or even death? Others have done it before. Their blood was seed.

The man of sin appears as an angel of light

The pope has been championing justice and charity as his rallying call to unite the people of the world under one banner, arguing that doctrinal differences are birthing fundamentalist extremism. On the face of it the argument sounds logical and the cause looks noble; so what's the problem?

What's wrong with justice? Justice is good. What's the problem with charity? Charity is excellent! Unity is ideal! But the question is, where do justice and charity come from?

Or rather, do we human beings have our own internal reserves of justice and charity from which to draw? Or, contrary to this idea, is there a greater Source outside of ourselves, which is really the highest Standard of justice and charity?

I'm not splitting hairs here but dividing between truth and error.

Now the Scripture says no good thing comes out of man, but the pope says every man has intrinsic goodness.

According to the pope if everyone unites on the basis of human nature (intrinsically good) they will form a kingdom of GOD (deputized by the pope) and the thing will be blessed by GOD.

According to the Scripture if everyone unites on the basis of human nature (sinful by default) it will be to rebel against GOD (worship the beast and receive his mark) and this will earn GOD's wrath (seven last plagues).

We also have the testimony of history, to test these contesting propositions with. Will you believe the Bible or the pope? One certainly speaks askew. Many of the popular spiritual leaders (and pop stars and politicians and scholars) are choosing the pope's side of the controversy, in many not-so-obvious ways, every passing day.

There is no justice and charity (or virtue, generally) but that which comes from GOD. He is revealed in his Word (both Christ and the Bible.) Therefore correct doctrine is not the fly in the ointment of world peace; rather, it is the knowledge which is a savor unto life for those who look for it as for water of life, avoiding the dry broken cisterns of false teachings. Separation naturally arises, the division is a present precursor of the chasm that will separate the sheep from the goats in the great Day of the Lord. What a day that will be! Are you preparing to stand in that day?

But the "charity" and "justice" peddled by the pope are counterfeits which would turn our eyes away from the character of GOD. It is much like the secular world "legalizing love" by opening the door to LGBT marriage. It is a redefinition of love, a turning upside down of GOD's blessed order, indeed, a rejection of GOD's love by defiling the gift. "License they mean, when Liberty they cry." Sodom and Gomorra also "legalized love" (at least de facto) without scrupling over what GOD declared abomination as opposed to what he blessed and sanctified. While they looked forward to endless days of unbridled pleasure, a hail of fire and brimstone awaited the day their iniquity was full.

What is the basis of unity? The putting away by churches of doctrinal differences for unity constitutes a sacrifice of truth for whatever ends envisioned (at least for some of the consenting parties), so that any union that arises thence is founded on commonly held lies. If unity was the glorious end that justifies such a means, then why hasn't anyone thought of this before, to round up all the fish in the religious seas into one orderly ocean where no troublous extremist fundamentalist species may disturb the peace? Indeed just that has been tried in the past. History calls that period the Dark Ages, when the Papacy claimed authority over all living souls in the known world as far as her hand could extend, persecuting "heretics" who did not embrace her doctrines, unseating self-willed rulers, martyring many, rich or poor, who obeyed their own consciences according to the Word of GOD, conducting lucrative traffic in the very souls of men by her monopoly of the keys of heaven and hell. Truth being set aside for unity, it became a time of great superstition and ignorance on a grand scale; misery and disease were rampant, but the Church remained a wealthy, hard and cruel steward over the masses in bondage to her false doctrines, by which she extorted their very lives and livelihoods. Only with the Protestant Reformation did an enlivening essence animate the societies previously fastened in her iron grip. And what was the Protestant Reformation all about? The inerrancy of Scripture, freedom of conscience, freedom of religion, separation of church and state. Then, with the much vaunted yet cannibalistic unity collapsing, real progress resumed her onward march in history after a hiatus spanning centuries.

Today we see the pope arising in the public esteem to popular status fuelled by his image of a humble man, a pope of the people who champions wide-ranging reforms in church and world with conviction. Amidst all the brouhaha let not sight be lost of the danger. He downplays the role of Scripture and magnifies the role of the Church over which he is the head. And the world has been bullied into the position where she is again ready to sacrifice freedom of conscience for "peace" and "unity" under pretexts like "justice" and "charity". Such a step will represent a massive backward leap for mankind, whose results will baffle belief to see, because GOD Himself will signally disapprove of it.

Contrary to public declarations on the part of deceived and deceiving apostate church leaders, the Protestant Protest is not over. "Great numbers of influential preachers abandoning the Protest for worldly acclaim wholesale doth not a Protest over make!" It only means they are not Christ's, for if they had been His, they would not have gone away from Him. Expect to see much more of the same as the issue gathers steam.

As for the Protest, it will continue as long as there is deception, for GOD's Word stands eternally against the devil's lies. The only thing that will end the Protest is when its opponents are finally silenced forever and truth alone remains supreme. Then there will be nothing in all GOD's creation for us to protest against.

On Beatification

“It is the most impudent of all impudence to affirm that to be a part of Christianity which Christ never taught.”
Martin Luther

A certain dead nun was declared “Blessed”, based on miracles attributed to her. The event took up the limelight as it was the first beatification ceremony to be held in Africa. Among the by-products of the main event were a cleaning upgrading of Nyeri and an explosion of economic activity in the period when visitors thronged the town. Who’s complaining?

Any true Protestant (one who believes in the Bible alone as a rule of faith) should immediately be disquieted by a series of question marks when they encounter this curious ceremony.

1. Who is a saint? Has the Catholic church authority to canonize saints?
2. What is the state of the dead? Are they conscious in afterlife, or asleep in the grave?
3. Can the dead intercede for the living? (Can the living intercede for the dead!?)
4. What role do miracles play in a believer’s faith?

True Christianity is to worship the Creator and believe and obey His revealed Word. The just shall live by faith.

The bitterest enmity against GOD’s kingdom is not to be found in the ranks of sworn Satanists. Rather, counterfeit Christianity fabricates an elaborate series of decoys that masquerades as the real thing. Paganism in the guise of Christianity, like a wolf in sheepskin, betrays the Son of man with a kiss. Paganism simply defined is the worship of the creature more than the Creator.

Counterfeit Christianity is actuated by the same spirit as paganism. While the human heart is naturally awed by scenes of beauty and themes of grandeur, being proud it lacks the humility to ascribe the glory to GOD and rather prefers to view the object itself as intrinsically glorious. Romans Chapter 1. This is the root of idolatry. Satan knows this – idol worshippers really worship Satan. Therefore his counterfeit has just enough religiosity on the surface to be called Christianity. But the substance is the same lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes and pride of life that lays aside judgment and ignites in the heart of man veneration for legendary and monumental false gods of doubtful virtue. The seduction once complete blinds the deceived worshipper to the inefficacy of rites painstakingly observed, even while enchaining the supplicant to a useless round of ceremonies impossible to be understood, being rooted in lies and fables, whose end is destruction.

The history of sainthood in the Catholic church is fraught with controversy. In the early days of the church, the Catholic church made many compromises with the pagan religions in order to attract more followers. One of these compromises was the inclusion of pagan dieties into their worship, except that these false gods were “baptized”: renamed and retitled as “saints!”

Apostasy is like the descent of heavy bodies, it proceeds with ever-accelerating velocity. First, lamps were lighted at the tombs of the martyrs; next, the Lord's Supper was celebrated at their graves; next, prayers were offered for them and to them; next, paintings and images began to disfigure the walls, and corpses to pollute the floors of the churches. Baptism, which apostles required water only to dispense, could not be celebrated without white robes and chrism, milk, honey, and salt. Then came a crowd of church officers whose names and numbers are in striking contrast to the few and simple orders of men who were employed in the first propagation of Christianity. There were sub-deacons, acolytes, exorcists, readers, choristers, and porters; and as work must be found for this motley host of laborers, there came to be fasts and exorcisms; there were lamps to be lighted, altars to be arranged, and churches to be consecrated; there was the Eucharist to be carried to the dying; and there were the dead to be buried, for which a special order of men was set apart. When one looked back to the simplicity of early times, it could not but amaze one to think what a cumbrous array of curious machinery and costly furniture was now needed for the service of Christianity. Not more stinging than true was the remark that "when the Church had golden chalices she had wooden priests." 

James Aiken Wylie, the History of Protestantism, volume 1

The righteousness of men is as filthy rags; it avails nothing to themselves much less to others, only the righteousness of Christ in man constitutes the kingdom of GOD. A saint is anyone who has Christ enthroned in their heart and life. Yet Rome would have men regard and venerate fallen dead men rather than the Savior. The army of intercessors which Rome would interpose between humanity and Jesus Christ and GOD the Father, spanning millennia since Mary until Irene Stefani, with more doubtless to come, serves only to obscure Christ from view.

Besides, these “saints” are dead, unconscious and therefore incapable of hearing anything, much less prayers to them; which even if they could hear (an unwarranted speculation!), they would grieve for their utter inability to do anything with, and would cry sorely for the dire delusion of their petitioners in targeting prayer at them, even prayers to them to pray for them to the Father.

The idea that one’s prayer to GOD for forgiveness needs to be pushed through and by dead “saints” is reprehensible. It calls GOD’s character into question by depicting Him as a hard wrathful avenger only to be placated by the intervention of a dedicated galaxy of austere dignitaries pleading tirelessly on the sinner’s behalf. No, rather GOD himself in His word promises to us that whosoever seeks after Him with the whole heart shall find Him, also that He is afflicted with the feeling of our afflictions. His terms to accept us are our repentance of sins, to turn away from them, but the doctrine of dead saints praying for us non-stop seeks to relieve us of that burden of sacrifice. The attitude is “Let them be praying for me as I go off and live my own life, that will work.”

Truly the need for repentance remains, for our sins have separated us from GOD. But the only one who can mediate our reconciliation with GOD is One who paid with His own blood the penalty our sins demanded. No one else in the entire universe dare stand in that gap but the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. He is the Way, the Truth and the Life. Go to Him with your heavy burdens and He will give you rest.

Nor does Rome’s superimposition of unworthy and incapable intercessors stop at the veneration of dead saints to the work that is Christ’s alone. By the use of priests who hear confessions and claim authority to absolve sinners, a great blasphemy is perpetrated, an attempt to usurp a prerogative of GOD alone – the forgiveness of sins. In truth the sins thus confessed remain unforgiven and the conscience rests carelessly in the shadow of a fellow sinful mortal human. This mindset emanates from the apex of that idolatrous system whose head titles himself the Vicar of the Son of God; in layman’s language the “deputy of Jesus Christ on earth,” a lofty imposture rebuked in Scripture, whose perks include the keys of heaven and hell. Strong delusion!

Many have lent support to this beatification without understanding its background. Of the army of dead people that the Catholic Church declares to be saints worthy of interceding for sinners before GOD, none are actually doing that, for they are dead. Nor would sainthood thus attained confer any special intercessory obligation or capacity on anyone as only Christ can intercede for humanity before the Father in that sense. This is why our prayers are said in Jesus’ name – He alone is perfectly God and perfectly man; he having been tempted as we are and yet overcoming in all points is a worthy representative, he presents His own blood for our justification. Between Jesus and His followers the bond is close and personal, real by faith. Come boldly before the throne of grace. Pray more, pray always, pray directly to Jesus Christ our Redeemer.

But communication with the dead is abomination before GOD. The dead cannot communicate with the living – it is impossible. Yet even here Satan erects a lie. What happens is that evil spirits impersonate the dead person’s voice and appearance so that they may mislead the living that they are hearing instruction from ‘the other side’ whereas it is the league of fallen angels beaming doctrines of devils at them. Saul’s experience at the medium of Endor, when he called up ‘Samuel’ from the dead, is a warning to others in this respect. The whole class of people who claim to be able to communicate with the dead, summoning underworld solutions for temporal problems, are an abomination before GOD, because they are really in advanced talks with Satan and his demons.

ISAIAH 8:19-20 And when they shall say unto you, Seek unto them that have familiar spirits, and unto wizards that peep, and mutter: should not a people seek unto their GOD? For the living to the dead? To the Law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them.

Nor have we seen the worst of this spiritualistic assault from the demon world. Prophecy testifies that in the last days evil spirits will play a leading role in deceiving the world’s political and religious leaders to unite in rebellion against GOD in forming the image of the beast by Sunday legislation. At that time the Spirit of GOD will be withdrawn from the earth, and men will be left to the control of the evil spirits they have allowed to deceive them by rejecting the truth. Only these evil spirits will likely manifest as dead saints and departed luminaries of ages past bringing ‘wisdom from beyond’ which will contradict GOD’s Law.

In short, let us repudiate the veneration and intercession of the saints. Look, I hold nothing against the woman they canonized, I never knew her. She’s just as dead and ineffective as all the other “saints” they pray to/through. Satan would like to take advantage of people’s ignorance of their privilege and responsibility to pray for themselves in Jesus’ name. Just you be certain the whole idea that anyone other than Christ is in heaven praying for sinners is a pleasing fable. It is one of many false teachings in that blend of doctrines Revelation calls “the wine of Babylon’s fornication.”

Love versus Passion

But if the sense of touch whereby mankind is propagated seem such dear delight beyond all other,
think the same voutsaf’t To Cattel and each Beast;
which would not be to them made common & divulg’d,
if aught therein enjoy’d were worthy to subdue the Soule of Man, or passion in him move.
What higher in her societie thou findst attractive, human, rational, love still;
In loving thou dost well, in passion not, wherein true Love consists not;
Love refines the thoughts, and heart enlarges, hath his seat in Reason, and is judicious,
is the scale by which to heav’nly Love thou maist ascend,
Not sunk in carnal pleasure,
for which cause among the Beasts no Mate for thee was found.

(John Milton, Paradise Lost, Book vii)

Apology: I edited the paragraph to align by punctuation. Makes for easier reading than the original.

Here John Milton argues that love is superior to carnal lust ("passion") because mankind has great capacity for reason and emotion than the animals, hence a greater scope for the exercise of love. All other animals can partake of carnal relations but for man to settle for that baseline is to sell himself short. It's quite relevant in this age of overhyped melodramatic romance (also "passion") which is really only confusion in a nice dress. The passage actually tells men to love the aspects of their better halves that are attractive, human, rational, but not to abandon the reins of judgment to "passion." Sound advice?

Should We Then Make Mirth?

Last Sabbath (Saturday) in church the preacher made the divine hour a humorous adventure. By the looks of him he is a naturally mischievous man with an unapologetic sense of humor. He began well enough, with a Bible verse and an exposition of the principles it entailed - the need to pray in faith. Then his natural predilection for jokes kicked in and he went on and on, raising bouts of laughter from the congregation with spontaneous good-natured jokes (the young lady I was seated next to was a particularly rampant giggler), until eventually, when the joke was too good to let slide, he spoke unadvisedly, something downright irreverent, and he reaped a hailstorm of laughter.

Earlier on today (Sunday) I was at a roadside hotel for late breakfast with a friend (long story!). The TV at this chapati-and-mandazi establishment was tuned to a live Sunday broadcast of some church service somewhere in Kenya. The pastor's message was the usual "prosperity gospel" fare that's all the rage these days- "your breakthrough is in the pipeline". The camera cut to scenes of attractive listeners nodding in inspired expectation. Effectively his message was that Jesus' blood had purchased his audience's miracles. Now that may be open to interpretation, but his focus was decidedly temporal. Afterwards the worship team leader turned out to be a shrill, loud lady.

With hindsight there was little difference between these two sermons. That disturbs me. Christians are supposed to have a message for the world that is distinct from the world, especially at this time of world's history. But the podiums have become stages for "charismatic" but meaningless performances of humor and smooth talk. "All will be well, relax, have a laugh."

Elisha's rhetorical question to Gehazi in 2 Kings 5:26  becomes relevant.

...Is it a time to receive money, and to receive garments, and oliveyards, and vineyards, and sheep, and oxen, and menservants, and maidservants?

You may think I'm being uncharitable with criticism. Hear me out.

Ezekiel 21:8-9 (I recommend you read the whole chapter) contains GOD's message to Israel at a time when judgment was imminent. It thus gives us the correct attitude we should have in view of the impending end of the world:

⁸ Again the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,

⁹ Son of man, prophesy, and say, Thus saith the LORD; Say, A sword, a sword is sharpened, and also furbished:

¹⁰ It is sharpened to make a sore slaughter; it is furbished that it may glitter: should we then make mirth? it contemneth the rod of my Son, as every tree.

A sword brings death; GOD's sword is His executive judgment upon the wicked who reject His ways - they shall be destroyed forever.

A rod represents correction; the rod of GOD's Son - the cross - is the only means by sins may be forgiven.

These verses are prophetically telling us that if we reject Christ's "rod", we must then contend with GOD's sword! That someday it will be too late to apply the rod of correction, and only the sword of destruction will be applicable! Could any warning be more urgent? Indeed it is repeatedly given throughout the Scriptures in a variety of ways! 

But the churches increasingly have other things to say.

The signs of the times multiply, prophecies of the end time are fast fulfilling, but many pastors, the shepherds of the flock are blind to these things hence not preaching the need for preparation. Even excepting that, there is a wealth of spiritual instruction for character development (take up your cross daily, etc) that a pastor must overlook before they settle for jokes and nice-sounding promises of prosperity. These two sermons were similar in their omissions, by which the true gravity of the present situation was minimized in peals of laughter and obscured by visions of opulence.

 Ezekiel 13

1 And the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,:1-16
2 Son of man, prophesy against the prophets of Israel that prophesy, and say thou unto them that prophesy out of their own hearts, Hear ye the word of the LORD;
3 Thus saith the Lord GOD; Woe unto the foolish prophets, that follow their own spirit, and have seen nothing!
4 O Israel, thy prophets are like the foxes in the deserts.
5 Ye have not gone up into the gaps, neither made up the hedge for the house of Israel to stand in the battle in the day of the LORD.
6 They have seen vanity and lying divination, saying, The LORD saith: and the LORD hath not sent them: and they have made others to hope that they would confirm the word.
7 Have ye not seen a vain vision, and have ye not spoken a lying divination, whereas ye say, The LORD saith it; albeit I have not spoken?
8 Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; Because ye have spoken vanity, and seen lies, therefore, behold, I am against you, saith the Lord GOD.
9 And mine hand shall be upon the prophets that see vanity, and that divine lies: they shall not be in the assembly of my people, neither shall they be written in the writing of the house of Israel, neither shall they enter into the land of Israel; and ye shall know that I am the Lord GOD.
10 Because, even because they have seduced my people, saying, Peace; and there was no peace; and one built up a wall, and, lo, others daubed it with untempered morter:
11 Say unto them which daub it with untempered morter, that it shall fall: there shall be an overflowing shower; and ye, O great hailstones, shall fall; and a stormy wind shall rend it.
12 Lo, when the wall is fallen, shall it not be said unto you, Where is the daubing wherewith ye have daubed it?
13 Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; I will even rend it with a stormy wind in my fury; and there shall be an overflowing shower in mine anger, and great hailstones in my fury to consume it.
14 So will I break down the wall that ye have daubed with untempered morter, and bring it down to the ground, so that the foundation thereof shall be discovered, and it shall fall, and ye shall be consumed in the midst thereof: and ye shall know that I am the LORD.
15 Thus will I accomplish my wrath upon the wall, and upon them that have daubed it with untempered morter, and will say unto you, The wall is no more, neither they that daubed it;
16 To wit, the prophets of Israel which prophesy concerning Jerusalem, and which see visions of peace for her, and there is no peace, saith the Lord GOD.

Indeed. Not peace, but a sword.