A Call for True Worship

The church today is fraught with a prevalence of mixtures – a mixture of good and evil; mixture of truth and falsehood; a mixture of spirits (the Holy Spirit and unholy spirits); mixture of law and grace; and a mixture of God’s children with the slaves of Satan.

These dubious mixtures are the underlying reasons behind the confusion, doubt, divisions and spiritual pollution among many Christians. The powerlessness and ineffectiveness of the Faith in this century can be traced to a blurring of spiritual lines; iron has been mixed with clay.

The enemy we were fighting on the front lines has not only entered the vineyard through the backdoor, but is also launching his missiles from within.

Even from church history, it’s clear that the core issues that prompted the Protestant Reformation – authoritarianism, image worship, relics, replacement of Christ with men, legalism – have all found their ways back into several Christian denominations today, though, in a more trendy and enticing form.

Indeed, we are fighting the same theological battles at each generation of the church. The very compromise with paganism that caused problems for first century Corinthian Christians has re-emerged as ecumenism and interfaith which is sinking some mainline denominations today.

The strange mixture of Judaism and Christianity which deceived many Christians in Galatia in the first century is still with us today as the “Sacred Name/Hebrew Roots” Movement.

The message to the church of Laodicea in the first century is still very relevant to several churches in our land today where colourful entertainment, pop psychology, syrupy “all-about-me” teachings and jamborees have drowned out the still voice of the Holy Spirit calling for repentance.

From Scripture, we see that God hates any worship that is a mixture. Jesus said “God is Spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and truth” (Jn. 4:24). God seeks true and spiritual worship. He has no regard for those who mix their worship with the leaven of falsehood or the filth of the flesh.

In Deut. 22:9, God warned His people, “Do not plant two kinds of seed in your vineyard; if you do, not only the crops you plant but also the fruit of the vineyard will be defiled.”

“Do not plow with an ox and a donkey yoked together” (vs. 10)

“Do not wear clothes of wool and linen woven together” (vs. 11)

The principle conveyed by these prohibitions is that when we serve the Lord, we should not mix two different types of things. We are not to sow a mixed seed, which represent a message comprising of both truth and error.

To allow mixed livestock to breed can represent a Christian group aligning itself with another group that is not Christian. Mating a sheep with a goat will result in sterility and possibly a malformed creature. When a church unequally yokes itself to a false religion, even for positive purposes, it results in spiritual fruitlessness.

To wear a garment of mixed material is like living simultaneously in accord with Scripture and in accord with the pattern of the world. It’s a hallmark of spiritual confusion.

All through the ages down to the present day, people don’t always reject God outright; rather, they mix some falsehoods into their worship of God. Satan knows too well that if he can’t get you to forsake God, but encourage you to absorb some strange and impure things into your service, it will be rejected and you will lose out in the end.

Even when the nation of Israel made a golden calf they still appended Yahweh to it: “Tomorrow there will be a festival to the LORD” (Ex. 32:5). These were the same people who had witnessed supernatural miracles by the hand of God, yet they became so blinded by the devil that they effortlessly called a debased work of their hands their God. About 3,000 of them died for this abomination.

During their 40 years of wandering in the wilderness, the Israelites carried the tabernacle of God, but they added “the shrine of Molech and the star of your god Rephan, the idols you made to worship” (Acts 7:43; Amos 5:26). For this, God dealt with them.

In 2 Kings 17:32-33, we read about the nations living in Bethel:

“They worshiped the LORD, but they also appointed all sorts of their own people to officiate for them as priests in the shrines at the high places. They worshiped the LORD, but they also served their own gods in accordance with the customs of the nations from which they had been brought.”

Doesn’t that sound like many contemporary Christians from various pagan cultures? They fear the Lord in appearance, in words and even occupy high positions in their churches, yet they still send money to priests who perform pagan rituals on their behalf; they still partake in family/communal pagan rites; they still pay homage to the gods of their ancestors and participate in pagan festivals.

In the time of Ezekiel, God transported the prophet in the spirit from Babylon to see what was happening in His temple in Jerusalem. He saw “an idol of jealousy” (possibly an obelisk) right at the entrance of the gate. He “saw portrayed all over the walls all kinds of crawling things and detestable animals and all the idols of the house of Israel.”

He saw “seventy elders of the house of Israel … each had a censer in his hand, and a fragrant cloud of incense was rising” to pagan deities. He “saw women sitting there weeping for Tammuz [a fertility god] … between the portico and the altar, were about twenty-five men … they were bowing down to the sun in the east” (Ezk. 8:10-11, 14, 16).

This was a pagan gathering of a second degree. The people had turned the Temple that was once filled with God’s glory into a filthy shrine.

Mind you, all these pagan rites were being practiced while the Ark of the Covenant – the token of God’s glory – was sitting right in the Holy of Holies. What a deliberate insult to God!

To numb their conscience, these abominable practitioners were saying, “The Lord does not see us; the Lord has forsaken the land,” just the same way many today who profess Jesus in the open think God doesn’t hear the strange names they chant with their lips in the corner of their bedrooms.

They think He doesn’t see the strange places they visit for power and inquiries to find missing items. They think He doesn’t know of the occult rings, ointments, books waistbands, talisman, incisions and New Age medicine they resort to when they feel God is not answering their prayers when and how they wish.

When God could no longer tolerate the defilement in His temple in Ezekiel’s time, His glory finally departed from there and His judgement descended on them (see chapters 9-11). God’s response to a defiled worship is judgement.

The inebriated King Belshazzar learned this the hard way. He held a great banquet for his nobles, wives and concubines, then gave orders for the golden goblets that had been consecrated to Yahweh and taken from the Temple in Jerusalem to be used for drinking their wine.

No, this wasn’t an ordinary banquet; it was a pagan gathering: “As they drank the wine, they praised the gods of gold and silver, of bronze, iron, wood and stone” (Dan. 5:4).

It was a worship of mixture – worshipping demon gods using vessels dedicated to God – and suddenly, he received his sentence from above. His life was taken and his kingdom was given to another.

In the days of prophet Zephaniah, God pronounced His judgement upon “those who worship the host of heaven on the housetops; those who worship and swear oaths by the Lord, but also swear by Milcom [or Molech]” (Zeph. 1:5)

Prophet Jeremiah had to challenge the people “who come through these gates to worship the LORD” and had mixed in pagan rituals, “You are trusting in deceptive words that are worthless. Will you … burn incense to Baal and follow other gods you have not known, and then come and stand before me in this house, which bears my Name, and say, ‘we are safe’…? (Jer. 7:2, 8-10)

With this understanding Elijah called out to the people of God: “How long will you waver between two opinions? If the LORD is God, follow him; but if Baal is God follow him” (1 Kgs. 18:21)

Of course, Baal is still active and operative in our world today; he is a god with almost a thousand faces. He is in the fashion world; he’s in pornography; he is in the gay movement; he’s in the corporate world; he’s in abortion; he is in polytheism; he is in lasciviousness; he’s in erotic novels and musicals; he is in drunkenness; he’s in paedophilia; he even manifests as the false Christ in cults like Jehovah’s Witnesses, Mormonism, Catholicism etc.

In the New Testament, the church in Pergamum is a case in point. This church was located in a rich ancient Greek city which was “where Satan has his throne.”

In this city was built a shrine to Asclepius, the Greek god of healing and occult medicine, and it was considered one of the most famous therapeutic and healing centers of the Roman world.

The church in Pergamum was so invaded by pagan delusions that many believers there were eating food sacrificed to idols and embracing Gnostic teachings. Jesus’ message to them was stern and straight to the point:

“Repent therefore! Otherwise, I will soon come to you and fight against them with the sword of my mouth” (Rev. 2:16).

That doesn’t sound like the cheap grace teaching emanating from some pulpits today.

All through Scripture, we can see that God will never accept a movement, church, doctrine or religious system that is founded on imprudent mixtures. God wants His people to part ways totally with the guidelines of the god of this world. That’s why He calls His people out of false worship and pagan religions into true worship.

Samuel told the Israelites: “If you are returning to the LORD with all your hearts, then rid yourselves of the foreign gods and the Ashtoreths and commit yourselves to the LORD and serve him only, and he will deliver you…” (1 Sam. 7:3)

This is the same admonition given to the Corinthian believers. We cannot drink from the table of the Lord and also from the table of demons. There is no agreement between Christ and Belial; no fellowship between light and darkness.

We are to renounce all evil works and links with Satan’s kingdom – no matter what “benefit” they seem to offer – and be totally committed to the Lord Jesus Christ.

“White” Witchcraft or Repackaged Demonism?

“Pls help me to [join] white witchcraft”

This was the message I recently received from a fellow Nigerian on this blog’s Facebook page. Interestingly, I was just reading an article which a friend tagged me in about the revival of “white” witchcraft in the U.S. when the message came in. I then felt it was timely I revisited this topic.

In my reply to the above request to join witchcraft (from what I observed, he already subscribes to several pages dedicated to ceremonial magick), I explained that white witchcraft is simply a disguise for evil, one that Satan came up with in the 20th century in order to trap more souls.

White witchcraft is being widely promoted in movies, books and social media. It is often depicted as a benign “Old Path” that involves doing positive magick for the benefit of the earth and humanity. Wicca is the most visible face of modern witchcraft.

Although pronounced differently, the modern English term “Wicca” is derived from the old English word wicca and wicce, the masculine and feminine terms for witch used in Anglo-Saxon England. Wicca is basically a form of Western occultism. Hence, Wiccans are occultists with a religious bent.

Many white witches are pantheists who worship the earth mother and the sky father; or some form of nature worship. They gather in congregations called covens – usually Matriarchal —with memberships no larger than thirteen, and they have an initiatic degree system somewhat like the Masons.

History

Some late 19^th century works by Charles Leland (1824-1903), Robert Graves (1895-1985) and Margaret Murray (1863-1963) laid the background for white witchcraft by promoting the theory of the existence of a pre-Christian religion of Western Europe which was driven underground by Christianity.

In actuality, there is no link between ancient (or medieval) witchcraft and Wicca which was “made up” in the 20^th century – except that they are both facets of the occult. It was this idea of surviving ancient covens in Britain that influenced Gerald Gardner (1884-1964), a British anthropologist, to revive and popularize witchcraft for the modern world.

Gardner was a Freemason, Rosicrucian, an initiate of the Ordo Templi Orientis (O.T.O), and affiliate of the notorious Satanist, Aleister Crowley. Though some modern Wiccans have tried in vain to distance Wicca from Crowley or sanitise his occultism, evidence shows that much of their rituals came from him.

For one, much of the Great Rite ceremony practiced in Wicca came from Crowley’s obscene revelation, Liber Al Vel Legis (Book of the Law) and his Gnostic Mass, both published years before Gardner’s material saw daylight

Occult historian, Francis King, recorded that Gardner hired Crowley “at a generous fee, to write elaborate rituals for the new ‘Gardenerian’ witch-cult, and at about the same time, either forged or procured to be forged, the so-called Book of Shadows, allegedly a sixteenth century witches book, but betraying its modern origins in every line of its unsatisfactory pastiche of Elizabethan English.” [1]

Gardner spent much time in Ceylon where he was initiated into Masonry and became a nudist. He gravitated towards paganism in indigenous societies and even participated in the archaeological excavation of a pagan worship centre of the goddess Ashtaroth in Palestine. [2]

He was finally initiated into witchcraft in New Forest, England. He asserted that there were covens of witches in Britain practicing not an anti-Christian religion, but a ‘pre-Christian’ religion involving worship of a supreme Mother Goddess (whose secret name is Arayda) and a Horned God. This he called Wicca. He revealed these in his novel entitled High Magic’s Aid published in 1949 under his witchcraft name, “Scire.”

Gardner later published other books drawing on his occult experiences, travels, Margaret Murray and Aleister Crowley’s writings, knowledge of Masonry, Western ceremonial magick and Eastern religions. From these and other sources, he synthesised his brand of modern witchcraft.

Gardner’s early disciples were Alex Sanders, Sybil Leek, and Raymond Buckland who spread and mutated his version of witchcraft, with some of it shipped over to the U.S. in the late 1960s.

Structure

Wicca is a highly eclectic, creative, decentralized, “make-it-up-as-you-go” movement. Therefore, it consists of many covens and groups having a wide variety of rites, beliefs, styles of worship and traditions.

From the early 1970s, dozens of traditions have splintered off Gardnerian and Alexandrian covens (about the two oldest Wiccan traditions). Now, some of them are:

British Traditional Wicca, Georgian, Algard, Norse, Celtic, Thessalonian, Seax-Wica, Order of the Brotherhood of the Wicca, Blue Star, Central Valley, Faery, Dianic, Cymry Wicca, Covenant of the Goddess, Sicilian, Tameran, Odyssean, Erisian, Discordian Wicca, Panthean Temple, Witta, Reclaiming, Universal Eclectic Wicca and many others.

There are also Neo-Pagan traditions which are revivals of older heathen religions or new creations of the same, such as Church of the Worlds, Asatru, Odinism etc. Not all neo-pagans practice Wicca, however, but they are strongly related.

There are many associations, centres, festivals and gatherings, newsletters, books, websites, media and shops all dedicated to teaching and networking the ideology of Wicca and Neo-Paganism.

As shown in the article linked to at the beginning of this post, in 1990, there were an estimated 8,000 Wiccans in the U.S. In 2014, Pew Research Centre estimated approximately 1 to 1.5 million people identifying as Wiccan or Pagan in the States. Indeed, they have experienced much significant growth. This shouldn’t be surprising, if seen through a logical and biblical lens.

In the last days “evildoers and impostors will go from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived” (2 Tim. 3:13). There will be people who “will abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits and things taught by demons” (1 Tim. 4:1).

There is a “mystery of lawlessness” that is already at work in the world which is ushering the way for the Man of Sin (2 Thess. 2:7).

Beliefs

There are certain features that are common to all Wiccan beliefs:

• Experience

Wicca is an experiential religion. Like a Wiccan author said: “What really defines a witch is a type of experience people go through. These experiences depend on altered state of consciousness. The Craft is really the Yoga of the West.” [3]

They lay much emphasis on feeling energies – energies flowing through their hands, flowing up from inside them or swirling around them. If they are in nature (walking in a garden, the woods or close to a water body) they are programmed to feel spiritually “connected” to it.

They also observe various rituals one of which is called “Drawing down the Moon.” During this ritual, a coven’s High Priestess enters a trance and requests that the Goddess enters her body and speaks through her to “her children,” the Wicca. The High Priestess may be aided by the High Priest who invokes the spirit of the Goddess into her (or from within her).

Others describe feeling a surge of electrical impulses in their bodies or a warm, orgasmic sensation when they are in touch with their deities.

The validity of their beliefs is hinged on these experiences. As Christians, however, we identify these as demonic manifestations.

• View of Man

Like New Agers, most Wiccans have an “Aquarian” view of human destiny – the notion that persons can evolve spiritually through their own efforts and ultimately attain enlightenment or godhood. While many New Agers tend to be futuristic and mentally turned to the East, many Wiccans look to the “romantic” past of European lore and myths.

Wiccans believe that all that exists are manifestations of the Divine, which includes human beings. Thus, they reject the Christian doctrines of the fall and sinfulness of man and reject the need for Saviour. A Wiccan rather dryly stated:

“We are aware of our own goodness and strength, and we are not afraid to admit it. We are not sinners and we know it. We don’t have a Devil to blame our mistakes on and we need no Saviour to save us from a non-existing hell.” [4]

Now, this Wiccan may not realize it, but she is mouthing the creed of Satanists. Anton LaVey, the founder of the Church of Satan wrote in his Satanic Bible:

“Here and now is our day of joy! Here and now is our opportunity! Choose ye this day, this hour, for no redeemer liveth. Say unto thine own heart, ‘I am mine own redeemer.’”

To reject the Saviour, Jesus Christ is to be eternally damned. Denying the reality of sin, Satan and hell does not make them non-existent.

• Animism and Pantheism

They believe the “life force” is immanent within all creation: rocks, trees, deserts, streams, mountains, oceans, forest and animals. This is animism. It’s one of the glues connecting Wiccans with New Agers, thus leading them to venerate the earth and commune with spirits.

Most Pagan ceremonies usually begin with the marking out of a ritual circle (“sacred space”) at the quarter of which points ‘the four guardians’ are invoked: Earth, Air, Fire and Water elements.

They also believe that divinity is inseparable from, and immanent in nature and humanity. This is why some neo-pagan groups greet its members thus: “Thou art Goddess,” “Thou art God.”

• Magick

This involves the manipulation of spirits or forces to accomplish personal objectives. Raymond Buckland used Crowley’s definition of magick: “the art or science of causing change to occur in conformity with Will.” [5]

In white witchcraft, there is an 8-fold path witches are taught to utilize in raising spiritual powers for magick and personal growth: music, trance, dance, drugs/wine, rites/spells/incantations, meditation, cords (ceremonial binding), scourging and the Great Rite (ritual sex).

The working of magick is the key that opens many Wiccans and Pagans up to demonic possession, because this involves making pacts with evil spirits and invoking the so-called good spirits to protect the witch from the harmful ones.

They are told that there is “white magick” (involving permission of the recipient) which is for good and black magick (no permission involved) for evil. There are three facts to note here, however:

(a) Contrary to what many “white” witches say, magick is not a science, though it’s an art of sorts. Science is a system of knowledge that is based on unbiased, testable explanations and systematic experimentation of the physical world. It implies empirically established repeat-ability.

In other words, because of science, when we turn on a light switch, a light turns on. Even if you try this using a closed circuit connected to a light bulb, you can be secure in the fact that the light bulb will light every time you turn on the switch. And this has a logical, scientific explanation. That’s why if the bulb doesn’t light up, you know exactly where you’ve flouted the rule. That’s science.

But witchcraft is not like that! Casting of spells for instance is quite complex; witches have to cast their circles correctly, call their (fallen) archangels correctly, visualize an image to accompany it and observe several other procedures, yet they don’t have even a 50% confidence that their spells will work.

There is no guarantee for any magick they do and none of its mechanisms have been empirically tested; neither can its efficacy (or lack of it) be reasonably explained. So, it’s not science. Not by any means.

(b) There’s no distinction between white and black magick. Respected Wiccan High Priestess, Doreen Valiente admitted that, “The distinction between black and white magic has no validity.” [6]

Another Wiccan leader wrote: “This might actually offend some, but it hides one of the great truths of witchcraft, that there is not white or black magick, there is only magick…” [7] This is actually in line with what the Word of God says all such magick emanates from Satan (1 Jn. 5:19; Rev. 12:9).

(c ) Both white and black witches invoke the same spirit entities/deities for magick. Since Wiccans are drawing their powers from the same “old ones” as Satanists and black witches, whether they admit it or not, they are utilizing demonic powers.

Much of Wiccan teachings, ceremonial magick and philosophy came from the teachings of Aleister Crowley, a Satanist who admitted he received his knowledge from a demon guide named Aiwass (another name for Set, the Egyptian god of evil); therefore, “white” witchcraft is more or less a sanitised version of demonism.

• The Wiccan ethic

Many Wiccans abide by the Wiccan Rede which says “An it harm none, do what ye will.” They also abide by the “Rule of Three” (which is the Wiccan version of karma). Plainly stated, it is the belief that everything one does, whether physically or by magick will come back threefold, whether good or bad.

Many Wiccans use these rules as “proofs” that white witches never harm anyone, but this moral umbrella fails to cover them. Since in magick, there’s no valid distinction between white and black or good and evil, who legitimately determines what is benign or harmful or good and evil for them?

Let’s remember that Wiccans are relativists; they believe whatever is right for you is right, but some things can be good for one person and bad for somebody else. If a Wiccan has a relative who has cancer of the pancreas, would it be alright to put a spell on him to kill him to “put him out of his misery”? Why is it right or wrong? Who decides on these issues for them?

Many Wiccans will say they rely on the “Universal Law,” but we must ask, who made this “Universal law” and where does it come from? And what is good about a law that comes from nowhere? Why does this abstract law allow for moral relativism? Because if something is called a universal law, it should have a definitive, consistent and universal stance concerning morality.

In the High Priesthood initiation into Alexandrian/Gardnerian tradition, the speech read says:

“For learn that in the Wicca thou mayest ever give as you receive it, but ever triple. So where I gave thee three (scourging), return nine. Where I gave thee seven, return twenty-one…” [8]

This three-fold law is a moral sword that cut both ways. It applies to both good and evil. For instance, if a witch perceives that someone has attacked him/her (whether real or imagined), by this 3-fold witch law, he/she has a right to attack that attacker three times worse!

If someone slaps them once, by that law, they have the right to slap him back three times. This is a twisted wisdom of the jungle.

The Bible’s verdict is: all men have sinned. Wiccans are sinners like other people, so the “we do not harm others” rhetoric rings hollow.

• The Wiccan God and Goddess

Among theistic Wiccans, there are pantheists, duotheists, monotheists and polytheists. Many Wiccan groups, however, adhere to the duotheistic worship of an eternal Mother Goddess and her consort, a Byronic Horned god who dies and is reborn yearly.

Their deities are believed to be archetypes of universal symbols of processes and events of nature, hence, their Goddess has three forms: maiden, mother and crone – symbolizing a stage in the female life cycle. There are goddesses identified with each stage e.g. Artemis as maiden, Selene as mother and Hecate as crone.

The Horned god is associated with nature, hunting, sexuality and the wilderness. In some traditions, he has dual aspects: the Holly king and the Oak king – bright and dark. In some traditions, he has a triple aspect: youth, father and sage.

The Wiccan god and goddess take different names in different covens. The horned god is invoked as Pan, Cernunnos, Apollo, Dionysus, Eros, Odin, Hades, Thor and Lucifer while the goddess is variously invoked as Luna, Venus, Dione, Lilith, Athena, Isis, Astarte and so on.

The history of these deities reveals the trail of death, bloodshed, destruction and sexual depravity that have followed those who worshipped them and the same are being done today.

The representation of male fertility deities as goats – such as “the goat of Baphomet” in Eliphas Levi’s occult work – has been known from even ancient Egypt (Mendes). As a source pointed out:

“In medieval times the Devil was sometimes called the Goat of Mendes because at this temple in ancient Egypt bizarre rituals were performed involving naked priestesses performing the sex act with goats” [9]

The inverted pentagram represents the goat of Mendes, a celebrated image of Satan in Satanism. In the higher degrees of Wicca, initiates are taught that the horned god of the inverted pentagram represents Lucifer.

Of course, when one compares the Wiccan horned god with the Satan of the Bible, several striking similarities are seen:

1. Both are lords and the source of death.
2. Both rule in an underworld kingdom of some sort.
3. Both represent bestiality and excessive sexual lust.
4. Both are known as Lucifer in some circles.
5. Both are believed to be the source of “light.”
6. Both demand commitment by oaths and covenants.
7. Both are opposed to the God of the Bible and seek to draw their worshippers away from Him. [10]

Notes

[1] The Rites of Modern Occult Magic, NY: Macmillan, 1970, 176.

[2] Gordon Melton, Encyclopedia of American Religions, 3^rd edition, 1989, 144.

[3] Aidan Kelly in Margot Adler, Drawing Down the Moon, Beacon Press, 1986, 106

[4] Valerie Voigt, “Being a Pagan in a 9-to-5 world” in Witchcraft Today, ed. Charles Clifton, MN: Llewellyn Pub.1992, 173.

[5] Complete Book of Witchcraft, MN: Llewellyn, 2005, 222-223.

[6] An ABC of Witchcraft, St. Martins’ Press, 1973, 271.

[7] Starling, message #1420, November 22, 2001, posted at Pagan Perspective.

[8] The Grimoire of Lady Sheba, MN: Llewellyn, 1974, 135.

[9] Michael Howard, The Occult Conspiracy, 1989, 13.

[10] William Schnoebelen, WICCA: Satan Little White Lie, Chick Pub., 1990, 59.

The Great Snare

In my experience, I’ve found that one “front line” weapon that the enemy deploys against Christians is fear.

In fact, I’ve come to realise that the depth of a person’s fear is equivalent to the extent to which the devil and his host can operate in his/her life. From my study in demonology, I can tell you that demons love to feed off human fear.

Fear comes in different forms, but one of its most paralysing variants is the fear of man. Proverbs 29:25 says “Fear of man will prove to be a snare, but whoever trusts in the Lord is kept safe.”

The fear of offending people, fear of being ostracised, fear of losing friendships, fear of being misrepresented, fear of being rejected by people, fear of being branded as “weird” or “radical” has kept many Christians from making any significant impact in Christianity. It has kept many Christians from serving God totally.

Satan loves using the threat of physical death to try and stop people from unmasking his lies and standing up for Jesus. The Lord Jesus too faced this threat and overcame it, and the same confronts us today.

The Bible talks of “those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death” (Heb. 2:15). People can be so held up in the fear of death that they completely refuse to respond to God’s call in any area of Christian service. That is why Jesus admonished us:

“Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.” (Matt. 10:28)

That means our(healthy) fear for God must be far greater than any iota of fear for what man or the devil can do. God is greater and He has our lives engraved in the palm of His hands. Our walls are ever before Him. He told His people:

“Do not call conspiracy everything this people calls a conspiracy; do not fear what they fear, and do not dread it. The LORD Almighty is the one you are to regard as holy, he is the one you are to fear, he is the one you are to dread” (Isa. 8:12-13).

It doesn’t matter the host that are ganged up against you or the fear that tries to assail you, always look up to God and have a strong confidence that He will keep you safe.

I remember in 2012, a certain Muslim swore that he would deal with me with his curses after I exposed his bogus religion. I replied to him on that platform to in fact, circulate my name to all his clerics and his other bearded brothers so he will be convinced that even if he flies in the highest plane of that realm – via Satan – his power source, is still under my feet.

I also added that if he failed to get me down with his deprecatory “prayers,” then he must realise that his “Allah” is a fake, powerless god and Jesus Christ is real.

When I told a friend later, she was visibly afraid. “Did you pray for protection?” she asked, “No. There’s no need to pray over something that has already been settled 2,000 years ago.”

She looked at me as if I dropped from the moon. See, when Jesus died for me on the cross, He nailed every handwriting of ordinance against me to that cross and defeated Satan and his host right there. That is where my faith is in.

The depth to which your faith is in what took place at Calvary for you is the extent of your protection and exploit in Christ. By the way, I didn’t have as much as a headache all through the rest of that year.

Now, if I had entertained fear at the first instance, that a possible harm would befall me because of some Facebook threat, if a mere breeze blew in my room or I had a slight headache, it would have made my hair stand up on end and I’ll start to pray in fear – whereas the person who made the threat was just being emotional without possessing any supernatural powers at all.

Faith is a shield; it blocks the door of fear. It quenches the enemy’s flaming arrows and protects us from the sword of the wicked.

But fear opens the door wide. It makes you vulnerable to all manner of superstitions, delusion and hysteria. If you hear and read the extent to which people have become slaves to fellow humans all because of fear, you’ll realize that fear is a deadly weapon.

Satan loves causing people to dread because he knows he loses his power when his lies are confronted and exposed.

I read a book by a notable Christian author in which she said she awoke one night to hear some noise upstairs. The longer she listened to it, the more frightened she became.

Finally shaking from fear, she went upstairs to see what it was and she laughed when she found it. The noise was coming from ice cubes falling in the ice tray from the ice maker. It just happened that the way they were falling, they were making a noise they don’t normally make.

You see, ignorance and fear walk together. But once you have knowledge, especially of how great God is, fear will no longer control you.

In Doreen Irvine‘s autobiography, From Witchcraft to Christ, she said after she left the craft and began to expose them and preach the Gospel, these witches sent her several awful letters, some written in blood, warning her, “You will die if you don’t stop running down witchcraft.”

At first, she was really frightened because she knew too well as a former high priestess that black witches always carry out their threats. But courage came when she read Romans 8:38-39

“For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

She said she added “No witch nor satanist. No, nothing can separate me from Jesus or the truth. My Jesus was stronger than any witch or Satanist.” And that fear melted away like the wax of a candle.

The choice is ours: to keep being enslaved in fear or to stand like a warrior and look fear in the face and say, “No, I will not succumb to you, I will trust in the mighty hand of God and I will keep following Him.”

When the three Hebrew boys were made to choose between God and a fiery furnace, they chose to die for God rather than compromise and God showed up and proved Himself faithful.

Daniel could have given up at any point of his persecution, but his confidence in God was stronger than the jaws of any lion or the orders of any Babylonian king.

When David stood before Goliath, he didn’t see his height, expertise, weapons or even curses, he saw the Great and Mighty God of Israel and he brought his head down. That is the way out of the great snare, faith in God and His Word.