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From Eliyahu
One
needs only to look around and it quickly becomes clear: the masses prefer
the fake over the authentic. Fake news outsells real news, by a wide margin.
Fake products sell better than authentic products - that's why they put red
dye in so many "food" items. Fake game worlds are far more appealing for
many than the real world, so a surprisingly huge number of game addicts
squander endless hours of their precious time in them. Movies are the same
thing - digital effects with super heroes and space aliens dominate the
movie screens, with little interest in real stories about real people, and
the real world. I'm not saying a little digital entertainment is necessarily
a bad thing. It just shouldn't be the only thing.
Then we have politics: mostly all show with very little substance. Democracy is touted as government by the people, but if that's true why do politicians routinely ignore what the citizens really want? Democracy really seems to be about elites buying off the politicians, while simultaneously using all kinds of media propaganda to try and bring a reluctant public on board with the elite agenda. Currently there is somewhat of a backlash against that, which is encouraging. However, recent polls show that most of the population, about 77%, are suffering from news fatigue - they just don't care anymore. Could this indicate that the backlash we've seen could soon subside into nothing more than the last desperate gasp of an exhausted civilization, as the tsunami of lies and deceptions swallows up any last vestiges of reality we've got left?
P. T. Barnum said "there is a sucker born every minute." That fact is what seems to drive all the fake marketing, fake politics - oh, and fake science as well - oh, and fake history too, etc, etc, etc. The huge public appetite for lies and false promises creates a market to be exploited by the pretentions of opportunists and conmen, at every level.
Why do the masses of humanity never learn to discern the fake from the authentic?
In a phrase: fallen human nature. Greed. Selfishness. Lust. Something for nothing.
This
brings us to fake religion. Fake religion is far more popular with the
masses then a real relationship with the living God. Fake religion is not
about God at all. Fake religion is all about you. And it is all about magic.
It is about how you can extract the things you want from God. Really, how
you can force Him to give you what you want. Speak the right words, and go
through the right motions, and like magic, you are spared hell and
guaranteed heaven - or even, guaranteed wealth and influence in this world.
Fake religion is God for sale, and that is foretold in Scripture.
For the time will come when they will not listen to the sound doctrine, but, having itching ears, will heap up for themselves teachers after their own lusts; and will turn away their ears from the truth, and turn aside to fables. -2 Timothy 4:3-4
See the news article below. There you will find a news report about some of the "teachers after their own lusts" who have learned how to play to the lusts of the crowd to satisfy their own lusts for money and fame. They pass themselves off as holy men of God. Millions believe the pretensions of these smiling serpents, uttering seductive deceptions from their father, the devil. Why are so many people fooled? Deep down, a lot of us want to believe the candy-coated lie. Many love to believe that wishing will make it so. They are hearing what they want to hear - and they are willing to buy into the lie to get what they want. They call it faith. In truth, it is lust, it is greed, but it is not faith and never will be. Faith is about God - not about you.
If
you want to know how faith and giving go together consider the "poor widow"
of Mark 12:41-44:
Yeshua sat down opposite the treasury, and saw how the multitude cast money into the treasury. Many who were rich cast in much. A poor widow came, and she cast in two small brass coins, which equal a quadrans coin. He called his disciples to himself, and said to them, “Most certainly I tell you, this poor widow gave more than all those who are giving into the treasury, for they all gave out of their abundance, but she, out of her poverty, gave all that she had to live on.” Mark 12:41-44
Now, some might interpret my comments here to mean I'm saying that YHWH does not reward faith. That's not what I'm saying at all. To say that would be to ignore so many verses that tell us of the many blessings and benefits our Father holds in store for the righteous. What I'm saying is, that's not meant to be a formula by which we can force divine compliance with our private agenda. We are here to serve God - not the other way around. Real faith is an authentic expression of love for our Father in heaven, involving gratitude for all that He is and does.
Why did the poor widow give all she had? Was she "sowing in" so that she would receive money and fame? Money: there is no report of any "prosperity gospel" at the Temple. Fame: we don't even know her name. The point of the story is quite the opposite of the "prosperity message." She was just a humble person giving from her heart because of her love for God! That's it! That is what authentic faith looks like. That, my friends, is the rarest treasure in the world.
It is likely that you are receiving this newsletter because you are not like the masses who lust after sugar-coated lies. You want truth and authenticity. If you are like me you are just so done with all of the endless lies and hype. In this world it would be easy to become jaded, believing nothing is real. That is no way to live, especially since we have something that is absolutely authentic. I'm talking about the Scriptures. "God is not a man that He should lie." His Word is absolute truth - the parts we like as well as the parts we might not like. Truth is not always what we want to hear - but it is always the truth. What was true two thousand years ago is true today. This truth is a lamp for our feet, to get us through these crazy, confusing times with our sanity and our souls in tact. Commit yourself to the truth, and truth will lead you home.
Join us tonight at 8 PM CST at Tsiyon.Net to be refreshed with fountains of truth from Messiah.
Shalom,
Eliyahu ben
David
Tsiyon.Org
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From Eliyahu: This article is included to show just how far lust after lies has taken us.
A televangelist wants his followers to pay for a $54 million private jet. It’s his fourth plane.
Reprint: The Washington Post,
May 29, 2018
Louisiana
televangelist Jesse Duplantis says he wants a new jet to serve
Jesus Christ. The price tag? About $54 million, and he's asking
supporters to donate.
And Duplantis thinks the Light of the World wouldn’t exactly settle for 30 inches of legroom or getting patted down by TSA.
Why would He choose anything less than the Falcon 7X, a private jet that nears the sound barrier but also has noise-limiting acoustic technology, a Bluetooth-enabled entertainment center and an optional in-flight shower?
Duplantis, saying he needs about $54 million to help him efficiently spread the gospel to as many people as possible, has asked the Lord — and hundreds of thousands of hopefully deep-pocketed followers across the world — for just such a plane.
He is the latest aircraft-seeking preacher to draw raised eyebrows and outright condemnation from critics who say asking for a multimillion-dollar luxury jet is not exactly what Jesus meant when he said “store up for yourself treasures in heaven.”
But this is not the first time Duplantis has been enmeshed in the preacher private plane debate. The Falcon 7X would be his ministry’s fourth jet — all paid for with cash drummed up from followers.
And before anyone asks, he already has an answer for nonbelievers and critics who want to know why, exactly, his ministry requires a luxury jet that would make his fleet the same size as Donald Trump’s.
“We believe in God for a brand new Falcon 7X so we can go anywhere in the world, one stop,” he told people on “This Week With Jesse,” a regular video broadcast on his website. The video on May 21 carefully mixed the gospel with a few insights into the economics of international aviation.
“Now people say … can’t you go with this one?” he said, pointing to a picture of the plane he uses. “Yes, but I can’t go it one stop. And if I can do it one stop, I can fly it for a lot cheaper, because I have my own fuel farm. And that’s what’s been a blessing of the Lord.”
Duplantis didn’t immediately return calls from The Washington Post seeking comment.
In the video, Duplantis didn’t specify which ministry-furthering missions the plane would be used for, although he has indicated in the past that he has an extensive travel schedule.
Duplantis is the founder of Jesse Duplantis Ministries, which includes a weekly television program that reaches 106 million U.S. households, according to his Amazon author biography. In 1997, he and his wife founded Covenant Church in Destrehan, La., just outside New Orleans.
“It is his mission to reach every soul of the 7 billion people that now inhabit the earth, making sure that each one has an opportunity to know the real Jesus — approachable, personable, compassionate, and full of joy-the way that he knows Jesus,” the biography says.
He preaches the prosperity gospel, which says God shows favor by rewarding the faithful with earthly riches. Giving money to pastors and their ministries, leaders say, is a sort of investment.
And prosperity gospel preachers have encouraged their flocks to invest heavily in aviation.
In
2015, televangelist Creflo Dollar was widely mocked for starting
“Project G650,” a means of getting a state-of-the-art Gulfstream
G650 plane of his own, financed by his 200,000 followers. According to The Post’s Abby Ohlheiser, Dollar said he “needs one of the most luxurious private jets made today in order to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ.”
The campaign was widely ridiculed online, and Dollar never made it to the waiting list, which consisted mostly of billionaires.
Kenneth Copeland, another prosperity gospel adherent who has appeared on-screen with Duplantis, announced his ministry had purchased a Gulfstream V jet that probably cost millions. The announcement on Copeland’s website showed him wearing a bomber jacket in front of a gleaming white plane.
“Glory to God! It’s Ours!” the website said. “The Gulfstream V is in our hands!”
But
the ministry needed more, it told followers. The plane was “an
exceptional value” but needed another $2.5 million in upgrades. The
ministry also needed to build a new hangar, buy special maintenance
equipment and lengthen its runway to accommodate the new plane.
After making the ask, Copeland prayed on camera for God to bless contributors.
He and Duplantis defended their use of private jets in a widely shared — and mocked — YouTube video.
“The world is in such a shape, we can’t get there without this,” Copeland said of private aircraft. “We’ve got to have this. The mess that the airlines are in today I would have to stop, I’m being very conservative, at least 75 to 80, more like 90 percent of what we’re doing because you can’t get there from here.”
“That’s why we’re on that airplane,” he said. “We can talk to God.”
Copeland said he used to travel with faith-healing prosperity preacher Oral Roberts, who flew commercial, and it “got to the place where it was agitating his spirit. People coming up to him. He had become famous. And they wanting him to pray for them and all that.
“You can’t manage that today. This dope-filled world. And get in a long tube with a bunch of demons. And it’s deadly.”
During his request for a new plane, Duplantis said he realized some people would remain skeptical.
He said there was no obligation, and there was only one surefire way to determine what exactly God wanted them to do: pray.
“So pray about becoming a partner toward it, if you like to and if you don’t, you don’t have to, but I wish you would,” he said. “Because let me tell you something about it, it’s going to touch people. It’s going to reach people. It’s going to save lives one soul at a time …
“If you pray about it, I believe God will speak to you.”
