In this piece, we will conclude our review of chapter ten of David Kupelian’s book, How Evil Works. Please find a link below where you can purchase the book from Amazon, should you desire to do so. This chapter has taken several postings to review, and has been a worthy investment of time.
A challenge for each of us. Really prideful people will find this very difficult, if not impossible to do. Examine introspectively your genuine commitment to Truth. Attempt to observe your thoughts and feeling honestly and you will find out whether or not you are commitment to Truth and to Jesus’ Way of life, the life that leads to a life of abundance.
John 10:10 (NKJV) – Jesus speaking.
“The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.”
Separate yourself from rehashing the past or worrying about the future, and instead focus on what you see inside yourself right now. This will draw you closer to God. In that quietness, God can show you with great clarity your flaws and give you the insight needed to change them. Doing what He shows you to do – doing it Jesus’ Way – will bring real change. If we spend our time rehashing the past or worrying about the future trying to figure things out for ourselves we will literally block His Divine Light that provides us with the answers we need.
Sadly, due to past event many people’s normal mental state is, to put it in the author’s words, “a turbulent, ever-churning mixture of thoughts and feeling and unconscious mental riffraff.” Evil can take root in us when we make our home outside of the Light of Christ – when we were “emotionally reacting to the cruelties and confusion of everyone around us.” We must choose to walk in the Light and we must choose to take our thought captive. Remember that any pain without its friend resentment is much easier to walk through. We can see and acknowledge our anger inside without reacting to it. Then as we calmly and steadfastly wait it will gradually yield to the Light and lose its hold on us. We can acknowledge our desire for sin without wallowing in that sin. We do not have to respond to what is inside of us, we can obey God instead.
1 Peter 2:9 (NKJV)
But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light;
2 Corinthians 10:5 (NKJV)
casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ,
By obeying God, we are our true selves, we are who He intended us to be. We do not need to fix ourselves, we only need yield to who God created us to be. His grace is there for us to do that. It is when we attempt to live contrary to who He created us to be that we find ourselves in a struggle because there is no grace available for living in self (the state contrary to God’s intent for us). As the author sates, “When the one we reconcile with is our Creator, the result is peace with God.”
The concept of “being still” in Christ means we choose to observe “ourselves with the upmost sincerity: “watching” our thoughts, feelings, problems, and upsets, in a way that effortlessly calls out to God for help.” “Simple, honest observation of our compulsively sinful tendencies is sufficient for God to transform us through genuine repentance.” When those things rise up within us that are contrary to what God has created us to be, we call out to Him to keep us from them.
We will begin exploring chapter eleven in the next posting. This chapter deals with turning the tables on evil, especially here in America.
How Evil Works
Evil can be understood and overcome before it transforms our country entirely. Evil can be understood and overcome before it transforms someone you know or even you. Knowledge is power and without it we will perish. We need to be extremely knowledgeable when it comes to evil.
Hosea 4:6 (NKJV)
My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.
Because you have rejected knowledge,
I also will reject you from being priest for Me;
Because you have forgotten the law of your God,
I also will forget your children.
The Marketing of Evil
Evil is sold in our society just as anything else might be sold, through marketing. Satan has marketed his product through those willing and those ignorant to his schemes. Through his craftiness he has turned the minds of even Believers to think that tolerance of his evil is some form of love. In so doing he has transformed to a large degree the once Devout Church and transformed our society to an enormous degree. He has not accomplished this without his workers however, the willing, the sold out for their own gain, and the ignorant masses following blindly behind the majority.
Spiritual/Political Disclaimer:
This blog will not be for the faint of heart or the easily offended. It will not be in any way politically correct. It will make every effort to share the truth in love, [Ephesians 4:11-16], to a decaying and dying society and church. I share what I share not to hurt, harm, or offend any person[s] or group; I do it because Christ’s Standard and Truth is not being represented by enough of His Followers, and I do it out of love. I love enough to tell His Truth.
Ephesians 4:11-16 NKJV
11And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, 12for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, 13till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ; 14that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, 15but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head—Christ— 16from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love.
God's Truth in Love 