But he knoweth the way that I take: when he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold. My foot hath held his steps, his way have I kept, and not declined. Neither have I gone back from the commandment of his lips; I have esteemed the words of his mouth more than my necessary food. (Job 23:10-12)
After attending a health seminar with my wife the other weekend, I cannot help but to write how the Lord talked to me concerning the things that I had learned. A statement was made by a woman in one of the seminars that this is the first time in history that people have enough food to eat, but they are still dying of malnutrition. In the past people died from not having enough food to eat, but in these modern times, it seems that we have plenty of food yet people are still starving to death. We have shelves full of food and not just plain food, but food stuffs of a vast variety. Foods from all over the world grace our grocery store shelve’s. Both domestic and exotic foods. Foods that were once difficult to obtain are now easily obtainable. Foods that were once expensive and only for the rich, like chocolate, are packaged for a quick and cheap purchase at the checkout counter. Foods that nations would fight wars over to capture the lands that were able to produce an exotic food are now for our taking with hardly a struggle, except with the pulling out of the billfold. From canned tuna to Mexican food; from frozen foods to fresh produce; our diets are enticed with a cornucopia of options that tantalize the taste buds of our tongue’s. Yet, most people are malnourished. People are eating, but they are still starving. Many are plagued with diseases and are left to be guinea pigged by prognosticating strangers in white lab coats. How can this be? How can such an abundance of food be so easily at the reach of the finger tips of humanity, especially in America, the richest nation on earth, and there be so much nutritional devastation?
Immediately, after hearing this statement, my mind was moved to the sacred Word of God that brings me inspiration. The same thing that is happening in the natural world concerning our literal food is also happening in the spiritual world. The Word is no longer locked up behind the church doors of the Harlot church. It is available everywhere! From the drawers of most hotel rooms to the discount Bible Book Stores; the Word of God is easy to find or purchase. It seems that on every corner there is a church (if not a church, then a bank, but that’s another article for a later date!). Every Sunday many people go to church. A form of His Word is preached or taught around the globe on every Sunday. People of all persuasions hear some figure of His Word throughout any given week. The television and radio airwaves fill the air with programs and preachers. One would think that with all the religious organizations, programs, entertainment, ‘Christian’ musicians, commentaries, computer programs, books, Bible versions, and such like that are available throughout our American culture, that there would be a vibrant, shining, healthy revival as a result of all this ‘spiritual’ food that is procurable at one’s beck and call. As a matter of fact, one would think that America would be Holy Ghost bastion of victory and truth. YET when one looks around there is no such thing. The opposite seems to exists, with sickness and decay spreading like a plague throughout the land. At a time in history with so much ‘spiritual’ food available, there should not be such gross spiritual decay. With so much ‘spiritual’ food stuffs available how could one seeminglg be dying of malnutrition? How can this be? How could our nation seem so lost and undone?
Now, hear the Word of the Lord! As it is in the literal so it is with the spiritual. Our food supply is plenteous, but the love of money is the root of all evil. Remember this...money is not evil but the LOVE of money is the root of ALL evil. In order to obtain a longer shelf life our foods are put through processes that basically leave it void of most nutrients, enzymes, and vitamins. They are pasturized, homogenized, heated and depleted. All in the name of profit. The gummy white bread (and fake brown ‘wheat’ bread) we put in our bodies are devoid of most anything natural. They take the grain and pulverize it to death. They begin by removing the germ, which contains most of the food value, because it gums up their machinery. Next, they remove the bran because it leaves brown specks in the flour. (Crazy thing is that this same wheat germ and wheat bran are then sold back to the public in health food stores as health foods.) They then take what is left after removing the germ and the bran and bleach it (with chemical bleaching agents similar to clorox) to make it nice and white. Next, they add coal-tar derived vitamins, package it, and sell it to the unsuspecting public as enriched bread. These coal-tar derived ‘vitamins’ are very carcinogenic and difficult for the body to absorb. So what was once perfect in God’s presentation of a grain of wheat has now been so adulterated that it could hardly be perceived as even being a grain after they are done with it. All in the name of money and the pursuit of profit. Yes it is pretty. It is soft and packaged so nice. It is smooth and chewy to taste. But it leaves your body longing for nutrients. Rather than being fulfilling, it leaves you malnourished and longing for more food to ease the cry of a trillion starving cells in the body.
And as it is in the literal, so it holds true in the spiritual. The beautiful bread of heaven is first pure and easily entreated. It is holy, righteous and able to heal any that are hungry. In it’s perfect form there is nothing that compares to the healing power of God’s heavenly manna. Jesus said, “I am the bread of life!” Then comes corrupted man. He takes this beautiful word and begins to pulverize each morsel of scripture. Corrupting it a little here and a little there. He takes away it’s natural healing power by twisting and perverting it’s simplicity and making it something that it was never intended to be. And for what? For the love of money of course! The Bible does not lie and it is not wrong! Don’t let the devil fool you into to thinking anything else. The ROOT of ALL evil is the love of money. Church splits are because of the love of money. School problems and enrollment can be traced to the love of money. Disputes between brethren is because of the love of money. Don’t deceive yourself or be deceived by those around you who would seem resolved to ‘blaming’ their problems on the preacher’s faults or the church’s inadequacies. The real problem is their love of money!
False preachers have taken this precious Word and de-germed it. Ravening wolves in sheep’s clothing take away the power of the in-filling of the Holy Ghost and the necessity of being baptized in the name of Jesus. God’s original formula for success and health has been adulterated by corrupted flesh for the love of money. The basic nutrient laden principles of His Word are stripped from the gospel and then they try to make a gospel out of something that isn’t a gospel. Then after they have de-grained His Word, they try to enrich it with seminary degrees, entertainment, and Bible programs. And these ‘coal-tar’ spiritual derivatives, rather than helping the body, only lead to more sickness and decay. Instead of bringing healing to the body, the body gets sicker. Instead of feeding the hungry, the hungry eat and are still starving. Many leave church still feeling empty; still yearning for a true healing touch. A touch that no program or educated sermon can ever bring. Many are fed yet leave His glorious table still longing for a contact with a God that can only come through the unadulterated Word of God!
The sad thing is most Americans just don’t get it. The reaping and sowing of a corrupted food supply should be obvious by now when one looks out at the harvest. Consider what is manifesting itself around you. Cancer, diabetes, heart disease, and untold other plagues are rampaging throughout the land. Hospitals are full, the drug companies are making huge profits, doctors are plentiful...but true healing seems to be as elusive as a sly fox in a hen house. Although, when a true answer to the sickness is delivered, most, like Naaman, get upset at it’s simplicity. Change your diet...eat live, unadulterated foods and healing will come. They storm away acting like the food they eat has no connection with the pain and discomfort they carry in their body. So they walk away with disease still reigning in their body, never ‘seeing’ that their taste buds have been perverted by foods that have been laced with sugar, salts, and fats. It’s just plain easier to stop at a fast food restaurant than to go home and juice some carrots! It’s just easier to trust the system to provide for your welfare than it is to step out of the system and educate yourself. Most look for some great magical pill to take away the problem that they have of their own will created in their body. The masses eat food that is laden with chemicals, additives, and drugs; which in turn creates dis-ease in the body, and then rather than doing what is necessary to bring about healing – like eating healthier food – they take the path of least resistance. It is so much easier to take a magic pill that is made so readily accessible by the pharmaceutical companies. So we take more drugs to ease the symptoms of our lifeless, dead food diets; therefore covering up the problem which then leads to a deeper compounding of the problem...with more affects to be covered by more ‘magic’ pills of escape!
This ‘way’ of going about business is prevalent throughout the American culture. The philosophy of ‘taking the easy way out’ or the ‘path of least pain’ is en-grained into the American psyche. Sadly, this same attitude is in the church. The world and it’s religions have polluted the American spiritual mind-set. All claim to be disciples of Him, but remain steadfast against any form of discipline! Most want the ‘magic pill’ of programs and look to the preacher to be the sole burden carrier of God’s Word. Then, when the preacher stands up, sets the table, and blows the trumpet... “We must fast!”, the preacher cries! The resounding cry heard from the multitudes is... "Hardly every or never!" “Let's cry out and pray!”, says the preacher! "Maybe when I get time!" “Its vital to read His Word!”, again laments the preacher! "Nah! Give me a book with pictures!"
Our spiritual taste buds have been perverted and the preaching of the cross is too hard and calls for too much of a sacrifice. Tell me anything, but don’t tell me I have to change! Tell me anything, but don’t tell me anything that will take me out of my comfort zone! Good food tastes terrible and bad food tastes great. I have met many who have ‘tried’ a diet based upon healthy, living foods and one of their first remarks is how terrible it tastes. How can this be? Perverted taste buds that’s how! And these taste buds have been eating nothing but wrong foods since the umbilical cord was cut! A tongue that gets to suck down 150 pounds of sugar a year will always have a hard time enjoying healthy food. Foods laden with sugar, salt, and fats will always over power the grainy texture of a whole grain piece of toast. So when a good healthy food that is not laden with all this junk, is introduced into the mouth, the tongue and the mind reject it as terrible, because they have been trained, both physically and mentally, to receive only those foods that have been so destroyed. A nice hot fudge sundae from Dairy Queen seems to always win over a fresh juicy piece of fruit. Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter! (Isa 5:20) Therefore the end harvest of this is devastation. A nutrition-less, dead food diet, consumed by a living body will never produce life! Only sickness and despair can be it’s final outcome. Starvation is but a symptom of a food diet that has been totally stripped of it’s vital nutrients and power.
Such is the dilemma in the church and the religious world around us. When a man eats only those things that are carnal and devoid of any spiritual nutrients, the final outcome is starvation, sickness, and despair. When sports, entertainment, television, and Hollywood are the main foods that flow over the palate of the inward man, is it then so surprising that the Word of God is so quickly rejected. How terrible is the Word’s pure and undefiled taste when one has only eaten the sweet and fatty things of the carnal mind. And when preacher’s find the response of preaching His Word to be so appalling then he moves to ‘change’ it into something more palatable. So why not add some fat to His Word and sweeten up the gospel with a few man made additives. To do so makes the Word so much more palatable to a carnal mind who has only been trained to eat perverted foods. No wonder there are churches everywhere, yet America is spiraling in spiritual decay. Homosexuality, divorce, murder, fornication, traitors, heady, proud, lying and deceit...all spreading like a net around it’s prey...sounds like perilous times to me. A time when there is plenty of food, but most still end up starving to death.
Its time to shake ourselves out of this nutritional coma of slackness and step into the trump of God! Its time to arise UP out of our sleep and slumber! Its time for us to not just hear the Word of the Lord, but do the Word of the Lord! "How long wilt thou sleep, O sluggard? when wilt thou arise out of thy sleep? Yet a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep: So shall thy poverty come as one that travelleth, and thy want as an armed man." (Proverbs 6:9-11) I am reminded of something Ben Franklin said at the signing of the Declaration of Independence. "We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately." Its time to take up our cross and deny ourselves. Its time the Body of Christ to rise up in these last days and esteem Him higher and the words of His mouth more than our necessary food!
After attending a health seminar with my wife the other weekend, I cannot help but to write how the Lord talked to me concerning the things that I had learned. A statement was made by a woman in one of the seminars that this is the first time in history that people have enough food to eat, but they are still dying of malnutrition. In the past people died from not having enough food to eat, but in these modern times, it seems that we have plenty of food yet people are still starving to death. We have shelves full of food and not just plain food, but food stuffs of a vast variety. Foods from all over the world grace our grocery store shelve’s. Both domestic and exotic foods. Foods that were once difficult to obtain are now easily obtainable. Foods that were once expensive and only for the rich, like chocolate, are packaged for a quick and cheap purchase at the checkout counter. Foods that nations would fight wars over to capture the lands that were able to produce an exotic food are now for our taking with hardly a struggle, except with the pulling out of the billfold. From canned tuna to Mexican food; from frozen foods to fresh produce; our diets are enticed with a cornucopia of options that tantalize the taste buds of our tongue’s. Yet, most people are malnourished. People are eating, but they are still starving. Many are plagued with diseases and are left to be guinea pigged by prognosticating strangers in white lab coats. How can this be? How can such an abundance of food be so easily at the reach of the finger tips of humanity, especially in America, the richest nation on earth, and there be so much nutritional devastation?
Immediately, after hearing this statement, my mind was moved to the sacred Word of God that brings me inspiration. The same thing that is happening in the natural world concerning our literal food is also happening in the spiritual world. The Word is no longer locked up behind the church doors of the Harlot church. It is available everywhere! From the drawers of most hotel rooms to the discount Bible Book Stores; the Word of God is easy to find or purchase. It seems that on every corner there is a church (if not a church, then a bank, but that’s another article for a later date!). Every Sunday many people go to church. A form of His Word is preached or taught around the globe on every Sunday. People of all persuasions hear some figure of His Word throughout any given week. The television and radio airwaves fill the air with programs and preachers. One would think that with all the religious organizations, programs, entertainment, ‘Christian’ musicians, commentaries, computer programs, books, Bible versions, and such like that are available throughout our American culture, that there would be a vibrant, shining, healthy revival as a result of all this ‘spiritual’ food that is procurable at one’s beck and call. As a matter of fact, one would think that America would be Holy Ghost bastion of victory and truth. YET when one looks around there is no such thing. The opposite seems to exists, with sickness and decay spreading like a plague throughout the land. At a time in history with so much ‘spiritual’ food available, there should not be such gross spiritual decay. With so much ‘spiritual’ food stuffs available how could one seeminglg be dying of malnutrition? How can this be? How could our nation seem so lost and undone?
Now, hear the Word of the Lord! As it is in the literal so it is with the spiritual. Our food supply is plenteous, but the love of money is the root of all evil. Remember this...money is not evil but the LOVE of money is the root of ALL evil. In order to obtain a longer shelf life our foods are put through processes that basically leave it void of most nutrients, enzymes, and vitamins. They are pasturized, homogenized, heated and depleted. All in the name of profit. The gummy white bread (and fake brown ‘wheat’ bread) we put in our bodies are devoid of most anything natural. They take the grain and pulverize it to death. They begin by removing the germ, which contains most of the food value, because it gums up their machinery. Next, they remove the bran because it leaves brown specks in the flour. (Crazy thing is that this same wheat germ and wheat bran are then sold back to the public in health food stores as health foods.) They then take what is left after removing the germ and the bran and bleach it (with chemical bleaching agents similar to clorox) to make it nice and white. Next, they add coal-tar derived vitamins, package it, and sell it to the unsuspecting public as enriched bread. These coal-tar derived ‘vitamins’ are very carcinogenic and difficult for the body to absorb. So what was once perfect in God’s presentation of a grain of wheat has now been so adulterated that it could hardly be perceived as even being a grain after they are done with it. All in the name of money and the pursuit of profit. Yes it is pretty. It is soft and packaged so nice. It is smooth and chewy to taste. But it leaves your body longing for nutrients. Rather than being fulfilling, it leaves you malnourished and longing for more food to ease the cry of a trillion starving cells in the body.
And as it is in the literal, so it holds true in the spiritual. The beautiful bread of heaven is first pure and easily entreated. It is holy, righteous and able to heal any that are hungry. In it’s perfect form there is nothing that compares to the healing power of God’s heavenly manna. Jesus said, “I am the bread of life!” Then comes corrupted man. He takes this beautiful word and begins to pulverize each morsel of scripture. Corrupting it a little here and a little there. He takes away it’s natural healing power by twisting and perverting it’s simplicity and making it something that it was never intended to be. And for what? For the love of money of course! The Bible does not lie and it is not wrong! Don’t let the devil fool you into to thinking anything else. The ROOT of ALL evil is the love of money. Church splits are because of the love of money. School problems and enrollment can be traced to the love of money. Disputes between brethren is because of the love of money. Don’t deceive yourself or be deceived by those around you who would seem resolved to ‘blaming’ their problems on the preacher’s faults or the church’s inadequacies. The real problem is their love of money!
False preachers have taken this precious Word and de-germed it. Ravening wolves in sheep’s clothing take away the power of the in-filling of the Holy Ghost and the necessity of being baptized in the name of Jesus. God’s original formula for success and health has been adulterated by corrupted flesh for the love of money. The basic nutrient laden principles of His Word are stripped from the gospel and then they try to make a gospel out of something that isn’t a gospel. Then after they have de-grained His Word, they try to enrich it with seminary degrees, entertainment, and Bible programs. And these ‘coal-tar’ spiritual derivatives, rather than helping the body, only lead to more sickness and decay. Instead of bringing healing to the body, the body gets sicker. Instead of feeding the hungry, the hungry eat and are still starving. Many leave church still feeling empty; still yearning for a true healing touch. A touch that no program or educated sermon can ever bring. Many are fed yet leave His glorious table still longing for a contact with a God that can only come through the unadulterated Word of God!
The sad thing is most Americans just don’t get it. The reaping and sowing of a corrupted food supply should be obvious by now when one looks out at the harvest. Consider what is manifesting itself around you. Cancer, diabetes, heart disease, and untold other plagues are rampaging throughout the land. Hospitals are full, the drug companies are making huge profits, doctors are plentiful...but true healing seems to be as elusive as a sly fox in a hen house. Although, when a true answer to the sickness is delivered, most, like Naaman, get upset at it’s simplicity. Change your diet...eat live, unadulterated foods and healing will come. They storm away acting like the food they eat has no connection with the pain and discomfort they carry in their body. So they walk away with disease still reigning in their body, never ‘seeing’ that their taste buds have been perverted by foods that have been laced with sugar, salts, and fats. It’s just plain easier to stop at a fast food restaurant than to go home and juice some carrots! It’s just easier to trust the system to provide for your welfare than it is to step out of the system and educate yourself. Most look for some great magical pill to take away the problem that they have of their own will created in their body. The masses eat food that is laden with chemicals, additives, and drugs; which in turn creates dis-ease in the body, and then rather than doing what is necessary to bring about healing – like eating healthier food – they take the path of least resistance. It is so much easier to take a magic pill that is made so readily accessible by the pharmaceutical companies. So we take more drugs to ease the symptoms of our lifeless, dead food diets; therefore covering up the problem which then leads to a deeper compounding of the problem...with more affects to be covered by more ‘magic’ pills of escape!
This ‘way’ of going about business is prevalent throughout the American culture. The philosophy of ‘taking the easy way out’ or the ‘path of least pain’ is en-grained into the American psyche. Sadly, this same attitude is in the church. The world and it’s religions have polluted the American spiritual mind-set. All claim to be disciples of Him, but remain steadfast against any form of discipline! Most want the ‘magic pill’ of programs and look to the preacher to be the sole burden carrier of God’s Word. Then, when the preacher stands up, sets the table, and blows the trumpet... “We must fast!”, the preacher cries! The resounding cry heard from the multitudes is... "Hardly every or never!" “Let's cry out and pray!”, says the preacher! "Maybe when I get time!" “Its vital to read His Word!”, again laments the preacher! "Nah! Give me a book with pictures!"
Our spiritual taste buds have been perverted and the preaching of the cross is too hard and calls for too much of a sacrifice. Tell me anything, but don’t tell me I have to change! Tell me anything, but don’t tell me anything that will take me out of my comfort zone! Good food tastes terrible and bad food tastes great. I have met many who have ‘tried’ a diet based upon healthy, living foods and one of their first remarks is how terrible it tastes. How can this be? Perverted taste buds that’s how! And these taste buds have been eating nothing but wrong foods since the umbilical cord was cut! A tongue that gets to suck down 150 pounds of sugar a year will always have a hard time enjoying healthy food. Foods laden with sugar, salt, and fats will always over power the grainy texture of a whole grain piece of toast. So when a good healthy food that is not laden with all this junk, is introduced into the mouth, the tongue and the mind reject it as terrible, because they have been trained, both physically and mentally, to receive only those foods that have been so destroyed. A nice hot fudge sundae from Dairy Queen seems to always win over a fresh juicy piece of fruit. Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter! (Isa 5:20) Therefore the end harvest of this is devastation. A nutrition-less, dead food diet, consumed by a living body will never produce life! Only sickness and despair can be it’s final outcome. Starvation is but a symptom of a food diet that has been totally stripped of it’s vital nutrients and power.
Such is the dilemma in the church and the religious world around us. When a man eats only those things that are carnal and devoid of any spiritual nutrients, the final outcome is starvation, sickness, and despair. When sports, entertainment, television, and Hollywood are the main foods that flow over the palate of the inward man, is it then so surprising that the Word of God is so quickly rejected. How terrible is the Word’s pure and undefiled taste when one has only eaten the sweet and fatty things of the carnal mind. And when preacher’s find the response of preaching His Word to be so appalling then he moves to ‘change’ it into something more palatable. So why not add some fat to His Word and sweeten up the gospel with a few man made additives. To do so makes the Word so much more palatable to a carnal mind who has only been trained to eat perverted foods. No wonder there are churches everywhere, yet America is spiraling in spiritual decay. Homosexuality, divorce, murder, fornication, traitors, heady, proud, lying and deceit...all spreading like a net around it’s prey...sounds like perilous times to me. A time when there is plenty of food, but most still end up starving to death.
Its time to shake ourselves out of this nutritional coma of slackness and step into the trump of God! Its time to arise UP out of our sleep and slumber! Its time for us to not just hear the Word of the Lord, but do the Word of the Lord! "How long wilt thou sleep, O sluggard? when wilt thou arise out of thy sleep? Yet a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep: So shall thy poverty come as one that travelleth, and thy want as an armed man." (Proverbs 6:9-11) I am reminded of something Ben Franklin said at the signing of the Declaration of Independence. "We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately." Its time to take up our cross and deny ourselves. Its time the Body of Christ to rise up in these last days and esteem Him higher and the words of His mouth more than our necessary food!
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