I tend to write a lot about various delusions in the world. And I do speak about these same things with family and friends too. Most people who know me know of my faith, but few have any genuine interest in understanding it, so I feel like I get more headway planting seeds about Christ by shaking up peoples world view than talking to them about the Gospels, which they just don’t want to hear. I don’t know if this is a good thing, it probably isn’t, but then maybe the LORD has woken me up before most of those around me so that when their worldview is shattered I can be there to testify the real Truth. Or maybe that’s just me being a pre-resurrection Simon Peter and continuing to focus on the world when I should have total enmity with it? I do know that this week I spent the best 90 minutes of the past two years with two of my best friends whom I’ve been unsuccessful in convincing of evolution being a lie, the earth being flat, aliens being a hoax, or the world being run by the occult! And you know what we did? We read Romans - Chapter 1, verses 1 through 25. The advice I gave them is the advice I think I’d give any one with the slightest semblance of interest in understanding Christianity - Paul’s Epistle to the Romans is perhaps the most significant letter that’s been penned in the history of mankind, and it gives a thorough explanation of Christian doctrine - therefore read that and whether you believe it or not is your choice, but at least you won’t die ignorant of what the claims of Jesus Christ actually were. We planned to go through the first four chapters, but as mentioned, we didn’t get more than 25 verses in. The LORD knows a mans heart, and His Word has a way of speaking to all of us, so my feeling is that Romans 1:20-25 will do more to convince a man of the lies around them in just six sentences than two years worth of arguments from a mortal man like me.
I write all this as a segue into the thing I really want to talk about here. Despite what might outwardly appear as though I have great understanding of matters of this world, the truth is that inwardly my life has been transformed by my Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore I wanted to write a little bit about what He has done for me. One of the first posts I wrote was the story of how I came to faith and that really dove into the backstory and journey of finding Christ, so I won’t rehash that but instead want to talk about what life looks like post that moment. John 3:3 says that a man is born again, which is exactly how I have felt. Though I might be born again, I still possess many of the same personality traits as before, but they are being used differently. I’ve always had an inquisitive mind that was obsessed with working out what was going on with certain things, but now instead of studying financial markets I study the Bible. I was driven to achieve financial security, now I am driven to truly understand the will of God. I used to argue or debate people on just about anything, now I still do but its just focused on the truth of Christ! In his first letter to the Thessalonians, Paul speaks of man being spirit, soul and body [flesh] (1 Thes. 5:23) and this perspective helps to comprehend the change within myself - our soul is that which manifests as our personalities, whereas our spirit is something separate that is more supernatural in nature. It’s our inner spirit that connects with the spirit world - which can be with the Spirit of God, but also with evil or unclean spirits (as I wrote about). In John 3, Jesus clarifies to Nicodemus that it is when one is born again of the Spirit that they can enter the Kingdom of God. So our flesh does not get born again (as Nicodemus incorrectly ponders) and nor does our soul, but it is renewed through the rebirth of the Spirit. Can I explain the rebirth of my Spirit, or can this process be comprehended by a natural man who is reading this? The lesson from Jesus dialogue with Nicodemus is that I can’t, so I won’t try, but I can talk about how this rebirth has manifested in my life.
One of the more obvious things is the various desires of the flesh that have quite literally disappeared from my life. Paul lists them as sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these (Gal. 5:19-21) and I was the master of just about all of these. In His Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said that whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart (Mat. 5:28) and I remember hearing a fellow believer (who came to faith as an adult) say that when he heard this it struck him to his core, because he knew no other way to look at a woman than with lust. I think it’s something like 30% of the entire internet content is pornography and in a world where sexual immorality and impurity is called pride, we don’t consider this to be an epidemic of the highest order. But it is and its not something that I was immune from either. As a teenager at a Jesuit boys school in the early 2000’s when laptops and colour phones started to become prevalent, as far back as I can remember pornography was something that just became totally normalised. We are lying to ourselves if we say that these things don’t impact our marital lives - how normal is it for a man to have more intimacy with his mobile phone screen than with his own wife? Yet in almost two years, I’ve not even looked at a single woman with lust let alone consumed pornography or anything of the like. The crazy thing though, is that it has not been through any effort on my behalf - these desires have literally fled from me and seemingly do not exist. Christianity is a relationship with God, not a religious order, and when we have a relationship with God He has an ability to transform us supernaturally in a way that we cannot explain naturally.
Another desire mentioned in Galatians is fits of anger, which is something that I would fall into several times a day for as far back as I can remember (even into childhood). As a teenager, the fits of anger manifested into physical punch ons, but as an adult I may have mellowed a bit and it would appear as things like road rage or strategic plots to bring down anyone who had wronged me. A few years back, we had a nightmare neighbour (and I do mean nightmare neighbour - the kind who had at least 40 intervention orders against her) and when she came against me, I literally wrestled with her in the driveway, tried to run her over and enquired about how I could have her physically injured. If someone ever cut me off in traffic, I was the sort of person who would hunt them down for the next ten set of lights so that I could get a chance to get back in front of them and return the serve. When covid first hit and I realised what was going on, I would grind my teeth in anger at those behind it seeking their demise. Yet just like the emotion of lust, anger has just totally left me. I don’t think I’ve done so much as utter something under my breath when cut off in traffic. I hate carrying keys, and I prefer to keep the house unlocked, so when I came home from work recently and everyone was out but my wife had locked every door I grumbled and sent her a message with an explanation mark to stop locking the doors! That something as trivial as this is the closest thing to a fit of anger that has occurred shows just how much the Spirit has changed me. And again, it’s not through any of my own doing or self righteousness, but rather the LORD’s ability to renew a terrific sinner like me into a new creation.
I could go on with a similar story for every one of the desires of the flesh that we’re called to stay away from. I’d always been a fairly self driven person with my own set of unique goals anyway, but of course I’d look at other people here and there and envy their position on some things. Yet it’s not only something I cannot do now, but it’s an emotion that I cannot even imagine. All of the people who I might have once envied almost certainly don’t know Christ, so not only do I not envy their position but if anything I feel sorry for them and the eternal separation from their Creator that awaits them should they fail to repent. To know Christ is more valuable than any possible thing in this world - I wouldn’t trade it for all the luxury cars, houses, holidays or experiences that money could ever buy. I feel like its mutually exclusive to know Christ and to be envious or jealous of another - only one state is possible.
As I describe all of these utterly profound changes in my life, one might think that I’ve become the best person you could ever be around, but sadly that’s not the case either. For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow (Ecc. 1:18). My inquisitive mind means that I cannot unsee things that I have seen. Now that I see the world for what it is, I cannot see it any other way (nor pretend I haven’t seen it) and the Word itself tells me not to do this either. In Ephesians Paul instructs us to have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them (Eph. 5:11) and Romans warns about those who become vain in their imaginations not only partaking in these delusions but having pleasure in them that do them (Rom. 1:32). I, therefore, derive no joy from any manmade thing anymore - all of my joy comes from the things of God. I walk outside most nights and look in awe at the stars, the moon and the handywork of His firmament (Psa. 19:1), but then I walk inside and scoff at the Satanic influence in every single TV show, song or movie that comes through those cabal controlled screens in all of our houses. I drop my children to daycare and can’t help but see the predictive programming built into their education program - fulfilling the communist agendas of having children educated by the state, where they can learn about the fake globe we live on, fake dinosaurs and every other delusion to convince them that we are not the beautiful creation of YHVH who formed us in the womb in His own image. I see the theatre of politics and culture wars, where the supposed ‘far right’ types like Andrew Tate, Putin and Donald Trump flash the same Freemason symbology as the ‘far left’ types like Lenin and every ‘Western’ politician since. Then I speak with ‘half awake’ friends who in becoming sick of the deliberately woke agenda turn to the likes of Joe Rogan and Jordan Peterson, who both with their blatant occult symbolism and ideology are leading the masses into the Luciferian new age. Or on topics like economics and finance, I’ll explain how the movement of prices and interest rates is all theatre that is doing nothing other than leading the world into the financial situation planned in the Protocols of Zion 150 years ago. The aforementioned categories cover about 80% of general conversation, the rest being sport which may as well be called politics these days, so it’s not hard to see that so far as those around me are concerned I’m negative on basically everything.
The end result of all this is this really strange dichotomy that I’m still learning how to deal with myself. To most non-believers who know me I’m the most negative person they know, but in the presence of believers, on my own, or with my kids I am the most joyous person there is. All of my joy comes from the things of God. His creation is everywhere, and I can marvel at it in every second of every day. I take notice of nature like I never have before. I first became a father as a non-believer, so most people understand that joy, but I can tell you that the joy is magnified one hundred fold once you know that these kids that you grasp in your arms are a gift from our Father in Heaven. I’ve reached the point in my faith where literally nothing worries me. A bit over a year ago once I realised I could never devote my effort to commercial things, I went and became an apprentice carpenter so that I could work with my hands as we’re advised in 1st Thessalonians. I went from being a pretty successful guy in my early 30’s who was well off financially, owned businesses and ran my own race to earning $820 per week doing often mundane things (like a week of peeling protective sticky tape off windows) under orders from a guy who is several years younger than me and highly strung. It’s fairly standard practice for builders to try and break down their apprentices, but my boss has tried in vain for over a year to get me to crack without success. It was quite funny recently he mentioned to a friend of mine how he has always been able to get under peoples skin, but with me he’s never even gotten close! I can spend weeks now doing really difficult or boring tasks and the emotions of frustration just no longer enter my mindset - I do everything with a smile and let myself be completed immersed in each individual moment, without a single thought for tomorrow let alone the days beyond that. Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof (Mat. 6:34). Imagine having complete faith that the Creator of all things has adopted you as His child and will do what’s best for you, even when you don’t know so yourself? Nowhere in it more evident in the Word than Job, and whilst I’ve been fortunate to avoid persecution or tribulation thus far, I truly feel that I am equipped to go through anything without fear like Job did knowing that He is with me. It’s an emotion thats indescribable to the non-believer - yet for everyone around me who I see perishing under the weight of worldly problems, I just wish that they could experience it themselves. Sadly, so many people will turn to self help books, prescription drugs, Eastern religions (which, by the way, are all Luciferian) and just about every other foolish method except picking up their Bible and coming back to the one who formed them.
I could try and sugar coat it, but the reality is that just about everyone who is close to me would prefer me to go back to sleep regarding the matters of this world and stop believing in Christ. Though this might sound like a difficult situation to deal with, I’ve found it easier and easier to accept over time and I’m not at the point where I really just don’t care what people think of me. I’ll testify Truth, I’ll follow Christ and if people want to hate me for that then that really is their own issue to manage - I can’t help them with that. But I’ve also got a lot better at loving people who hate me, so whilst I wouldn’t go so far as saying that people close to me hate me, I feel within myself that I can love them in a way that I never could before even when they don’t like what I believe. The Book of Acts gives us some really good examples of this - the Apostles were hated by the entire world, yet they returned that hatred with love (even during their executions). It’s such a powerful understanding, because there are no circumstances possible where we cannot determine in our own minds how we respond to a situation, yet conversely there are no circumstances where we can effectively alter someone else’s mindset. So to be a Christian who follows the will of God is to be someone who places no thought whatsoever on matters that he has no control over. I dabbled in philosophies like stoicism before coming to faith and that mentality is a core tenet of that, but doing it with faith in God overlaid takes it to a whole other level.
The other point to mention is that although I am no longer of this world, I am in this world (Joh. 15:19). So just like the Apostles didn’t follow Christ and live out their days waiting in an isolated cave until they went to Heaven, we are called to be a part of this wicked world so that our light might be put on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in the house (Matt. 5:15). Christ has a plan for us on this earth - and it’s that we might be shining examples to others who He is also calling to join Him in paradise. So I still live in the incredibly ungodly city of Melbourne, I still have my kids at ‘education’ facilities that are indoctrinating them on the delusions of this world, I still pay some attention to things like finance and economics (even though I know it’s all scripted), I still spend most of my time with non-believing family and friends. My feeling though is that the world is about the get a whole lot more volatile - as interest rates go from 4% to 8% (as I expect to happen) and oil sells for several hundred dollars a barrel, all of these peoples world views are going to be shattered and the trivial things like mortgage payments and football games won’t feel as important as they once did. Maybe, as I discussed on my recent podcast, the LORD is using me as a bit of a sleeper cell to be there to testify Truth when people finally seek to hear it. But that’s just speculation on my behalf because His thoughts are not my thoughts, neither are my ways His ways (Isa. 55:8). So until that calling comes, I will continue to set my focus solely on Christ and worry for nothing other than the next few hours in front of me.
I love that you understand the history in depth, but also spirituality and how evil tries to poison things around us, but with God we will prevail