My Community

My community like any community has many different facets to it.  Where I live is the oldest community in the province where I live.  It has strong religious components to it.  This can be both a blessing or a curse.  It can bring tremendous blessings or bondage.  Religious spirits are the most devious and damaging of all spiritual beings because they come off as pure and pious but in reality they bind people in ceremonies and traditions that cause nothing but division, strife and curses.  For example during the time of the inquisition both Catholic and Protestant were doing imaginable horrors to each other in the name of God.  Today radical Islam is raging across the planet like a plaque.  Killing and murdering in the name of Allah.  Here are some of the ways you will know that you are being affected by the religious spirit.  First, you have no tolerance for anyone who does share your opinion or view of your theology.  Religious spirits love to quote the Bible out of context and in a way that serves their own purposes.  Next, Religious people judge by appearance and performance.  Thirdly, religious systems love to bring people into traditions and ceremonies that on the surface appear harmless but in reality are rites and ceremonies made up by men.  Fourthly, religionist systems and false cults are all about works.  When man fell in the garden our relationship with God was broken and ever since we have been trying to recapture it by works.  This of course will never happen because if mankind could have done it then there would have been no need for Jesus Christ to come.  Because we could not save ourselves Jesus did come  and died in our place.  Religious spirits do everything they can to turn salvation by grace into salvation by works.  They will come along and say, “Yes Jesus did on the cross but you need to follow the law, worship on the Sabbath, learn the secrets of this prophet or preacher.  Anything they can do demean or nullify the message of the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ.  James tells what pure religion is, “It is taking care of the widows and orphans and keeping  oneself from being polluted by the world.”  Seems simple but is it?  Love God and love your fellow man as yourself.  The complication is always taking these simple truths and applying to our lives.  Somehow we want to jazz it up, make it seem more than it is.  If Christ has set you free, than stay free and rebuke and repel these religious spirits from your life.  When you come across them, recognize them for what they are and refuse to give in to them or become like them.  Your freedom and others depend on what you do next.