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YUP. INDEED. Yet, the human critter is persistently of the mind-set—“WON’T HAPPEN TO ME! I don’t need to wear my seat-belt.” “I thank God that I’m not like that publican over there.” MY GROUP, church, congregation, family, person . . . is exempt from such troubles, flaws. WE’RE DIFFERENT! WE’RE NATURALLY [organizationally, habitually, practicedly, orthodoxly, ritually, labeled-ly] AUTOMATICALLY SAINTLY! . . . by definition.... And they fail to see that they have ALREADY BEEN seduced by lies from hell. They are ALREADY snared in satan’s trap.

So very true, Quix. And yet groups, churches, congregations, families, persons, organizations, habits, practices, orthodoxy, rituals, and/or labels are not what save one, taken singly or collectively. What saves one is to live in Christ. But only the poor in spirit can abide in Christ. The vanity and narcissism you describe in the above italics is far, far from the poverty of spirit, or humility, that the Lord our God requires. But from these Satan will bring in an abundant harvest....

Pride — pride of life, pride of mind — arrogance, vanity, narcissism — all are vicious traps. They make Satan's "job" easy for him.

I have this overwhelming sense that objective Evil is moving and gathering strength in this world largely because of loss of faith in God.

I pray God to strengthen us in our faith, for Christians to look to their hearts; that He may bless us and our fair country.

Thank you so very much, dear brother in Christ, for your kind words, and for your profoundly insightful essay/post!

All glory be to God!

Thank you so very much for sharing your insights, dearest sister in Christ!

I have this overwhelming sense that objective Evil is moving and gathering strength in this world largely because of loss of faith in God.

I pray God to strengthen us in our faith, for Christians to look to their hearts; that He may bless us and our fair country.

I join in your prayer for Christian revival or renewal throughout our land.

Truly, there is only One Great Commandment - loving God surpassingly above all else (Matt 22) is the most thing any of us will ever do.

And if we do not return to our first love, no matter what else we may get "right" we run the risk of the Ephesians, that our light will go out.

Unto the angel of the church of Ephesus write; These things saith he that holdeth the seven stars in his right hand, who walketh in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks; I know thy works, and thy labour, and thy patience, and how thou canst not bear them which are evil: and thou hast tried them which say they are apostles, and are not, and hast found them liars: And hast borne, and hast patience, and for my name's sake hast laboured, and hast not fainted.

Nevertheless I have [somewhat] against thee, because thou hast left thy first love.

Remember therefore from whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works; or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will remove thy candlestick out of his place, except thou repent. – Revelation 2:1-5

To God be the glory!

"I have this overwhelming sense that objective Evil is moving and gathering strength in this world largely because of loss of faith in God."

There is an old Scottish belief/myth my Grandmother used to tell me about when explaining why/why not I got polio at age two ... she used the myth to debunk my childish irrational fears. Roughly, the myth is that those who are loved too much by their parents are the ones the gods torment out of jealousy. My grandmother's message was that I didn't come down with polio because some god was angry or jealous. Things just happen.

As the world becomes more secularized, an interesting phenomenon occurs: those with a penchant to believe in God for the magic thinking aspect of religiosity will begin to move more toward fear of what satan will do to them if they don't 'go along to get along', rather than fear the Lord's judgment. They rational ignoring God's judgment and His clear messages regarding same written in the Bible as 'God is a loving God, so if I can't stand against the onslaught of evil which I cannot individually stop, God will understand and forgive me my weakness.'

What we are seeing is not so much 'loss of faith in God', it is the satanic plea to 'stop fearing God and God's prescribed judgment.' And after all (satan will whisper) didn't Jesus actually say 'fear him who can destroy body and soul', and soul is equated with 'the cares of this world' in our growing secularized society. We are witnessing the 'believing of a lie'. We are seeing the great delusion playing out in these end times.