I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man.
Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)
The Final Revolution
“There will be, in the next generation or so, a pharmacological method of making people
love their servitude,
and producing dictatorship without tears, so to speak,
producing a
kind of painless concentration camp for entire societies, so that people will in fact have
their liberties taken away from them, but will rather enjoy it,
because they will be
distracted from any desire to rebel by propaganda or brainwashing, or brainwashing
enhanced by pharmacological methods.
And this seems to be the final revolution.”
Aldous Huxley (1896-1963),
Tavistock Group, California Medical School, 1961
Powerful Delusion
They perish because they refused to love the truth and so be saved.
2 Thessalonians 2:10b
For this reason God sends them a powerful delusion
so that they will believe the lie and so that all will be condemned who have not believed the truth but have delighted in wickedness.
2 Thessalonians 2: 11, 12
” Their sin is this: They believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness: they did not love the truth, and therefore they did not believe it;
and, because they did not believe the truth, therefore they had pleasure in unrighteousness, or in wicked actions, and were pleased with false notions.
Note, An erroneous mind and vicious life often go together and help forward one another.
Their ruin is thus expressed: God shall send them strong delusions, to believe a lie.
Thus he will punish men for their unbelief, and for their dislike of the truth and love to sin and wickedness; not that God is the author of sin, but in righteousness he sometimes withdraws his grace from such sinners as are here mentioned; he gives them over to Satan, or leaves them to be deluded by his instruments;
he gives them up to their own hearts’ lusts, and leaves them to themselves, and then sin will follow of course, yea, the worst of wickedness, that shall end at last in eternal damnation. God is just when he inflicts spiritual judgments here, and eternal punishments hereafter, upon those who have no love to the truths of the gospel,
who will not believe them, nor live suitably to them, but indulge false doctrines in their minds, and wicked practices in their lives and conversation.”
from Matthew Henry’s Commentary on 2 Thessalonians 2:11,12
But we ought always to thank God for you, brothers loved by the Lord, because from the beginning God chose you to be saved through the sanctifying work of the Spirit and through belief in the truth.
2 Thessalonians 2:13
” When we hear of the apostasy of many, it is a great comfort and joy, that there is a remnant according to the election of grace, which does and shall persevere; especially we should rejoice, if we have reason to hope that we are of that number. The preservation of the saints, is because God loved them with an everlasting love, from the beginning of the world.”
from Matthew Henry’s Commentary on 2 Thessalonians 2:13
This blog was originally posted on November 23, 2020. It bares repeating.
To Every Man’s Conscience
…we have renounced secret and shameful ways; we do not use deception, nor do we distort the word of God.
On the contrary, by setting forth the truth plainly we commend ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God.
And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. 2 Cor 4:2-4
The Mind
The mind of sinful man is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace, because the sinful mind is hostile to God.
It does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. Romans 8: 6,7
“Walking with God implies that the prevailing power of the enmity of a person’s heart be taken away by the blessed Spirit of God.
Perhaps it may seem a hard saying to some, but our own experience daily proves, what the Scriptures in many places assert, that the carnal mind,
the mind of the unconverted natural man,
and even the mind of the regenerate, so far as any part of him remains unrenewed, is enmity,…
Our first parents contracted it when they fell from God by eating the forbidden fruit…and the same enmity rules and prevails in every man that is naturally engendered of the offspring of Adam…”
George Whitefield (1714-1770)
Excerpt from George Whitefield Daily Readings
Edited by Randall J. Pederson P.1
Pharaoh said, “Who is the Lord, that I should obey him and let Israel go? I do not know the Lord and I will not let Israel go.” Exodus 5:2
