I hit the ground running in January 2022. It was a great start to my most productive year yet. And now, in these last hours of the calendar year, I will end with post #80.   

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TO MY FAITHFUL READERS

Thank you for your spiritual support. I appreciate each of you taking this annual trip with me. A writer is not much without faithful readers. You have given me much of your time in reading and also added much with your valued comments.

It has now been twelve calendar years. I started this site on May 10, 2011. I also hit the ground running then and wrote 64 posts in less than eight months. By May of 2012 at the one year mark my total posts had grown to over 100. My total posts to date are right at 800 and exceed 2500 pages. I consider this quite a consistent accomplishment and proves my faithfulness to the work the Lord has given me to do though what I do here is only part of my overall work. Also, a great many of these posts required much research, multiple drafts and edits, and contain spiritually mature, sound Biblically-based and topical material which many Christians either cannot handle or don’t care for. This limits potential readership by a large margin.

Though the last twelve years have been good overall, for which I am most thankful, there were also several extremely challenging times. 2022 was one of those. We all go through such. Like many of you, though, I stayed faithful throughout my travels over the years and kept up my work regardless of circumstances.

Regarding my site, I have used the same WordPress Theme since the beginning. It’s old and outdated and whatever but still works for me. Some of you may recall the notice I put on some of my posts asking you to please not read my posts at the WordPress Reader but at my site. I work hard at trying to present the best posts I can (though my Theme will no longer allow me to justify the text) and the WP Reader does a very bad job of reflecting my work. So I ask again, please read my stuff at my site. On the far lower left is a widget containing your comments and additional material. There is also a long list of my current posts on the left. If new to the site please review. I also post my books for sale in the left hand column. At the top is access to all my posts.

Though I have no means of receiving funding on my site I do ask for your prayers toward an increase in income. There is much I need to do but have limited resources. This year was especially challenging in that area. Your prayers are greatly appreciated. Thank you.  

AMERICAN ICHABOD

We now live in different times. We are way past the “times that try men’s souls” phase. America is now a different country. Some say it is no longer a country. The America many of us knew is long gone, with the wind so to speak, and is essentially dead. The Great Awakening was sent by God to wake people up and in part keep the fall from happening but most have stayed fast asleep and prefer it that way. It is much easier than facing the facts, doing research to prove the facts, and standing up for the Lord and against the devil, his henchmen, and a degenerate culture. At the end of the day it is every man for himself in the sense that you are the only one you can control.

There has been a great incessant effort over at least the last twelve years to find the truth, know the truth, and tell the truth but has done little good for the most part. Half the country will never change it seems. It is lost in a strange neverland. Another large percentage continues to hang out among the yellow stripes and dead armadillos taking far too long to decide and merely bickering over things that don’t matter anymore. This leaves about a third, maybe. Maybe 30%. In reality, though, even among the committed, many have only so much time and resources. What remains is a core group of Americans, a small group, absolutely dedicated to the Lord Jesus and determined to serve Him, work with Him, fight the spiritual war with Him, and shed the Light of His true Gospel.

Call it the American Remnant. They know they MUST be salt and light. They know they MUST fill up their oil lamps and keep them filled. Much more effort toward this is required than in the past because so much has been saturated with evil and said evil causes a greater drain on one’s batteries. The country as a whole continually ceased living for God by degrees and refused to stand up and fight against encroaching evil which gave evil an increasingly greater foothold. America, a once great nation, went from spirit to flesh to sin to death.

Therefore, it is no longer about saving the good that once was but is now about resurrection and the remote possibility thereof. But unless you’re the Lord, no matter how much you try you can’t revive a dead guy. America has thus become a national Ichabod. The glory has departed. I said this would happen twenty-five years ago. I put it in writing:

IS AMERICA A CHRISTIAN NATION?

The price of compromise has been great. The United States of America is supposedly a Christian nation. Polls constantly show that at least ninety percent of the population refers to itself as “Christian” of some form or another. Yet, there is blood in the streets; there is an increasing number of kids who can’t learn; much of the population has discarded the idea of monogamy and have become so hedonistic in their relations they could learn morality from the example of numerous animal species; and diseases are coming out of the woodwork and running far ahead of treatments.

The country is enormously successful monetarily, especially compared to other nations, yet we are up to our ears in debt, and we fight from paycheck to paycheck to keep our head above water. For a Christian nation, something’s not right; someone’s dropping the ball. Illumined by the inescapable fact that we have churches on every street corner and airwaves saturated with Christian television and radio (these terms are used very loosely), we are in ridiculous shape if we are indeed a Christian nation.

I submit that we are not a Christian nation, not because we don’t consider ourselves Christian, but simply because we do not uphold the teachings of Jesus or live according to them. Instead, we live according to the twisted teachings of impostors, rogues, spiritual eunuchs, and pretenders. Professional clergymen are wholly responsible for bringing Christianity in America to this point since they are the ones who are largely responsible for teaching and interpreting the words of the Lord. If they were doing God’s will from such lofty places of authority, shouldn’t the effects show up in society as a whole if our society is indeed Christian?

If the ruling clergy class has been mandated by Jesus to be the movers and shakers of His teachings in this country, it has apparently messed up. Whatever guilt they do carry they steadfastly refuse to acknowledge, which makes correction impossible. This is why God is removing them—they refuse to act wholly on His behalf. And if you don’t think this is true, that they’re becoming history, check the stats. Their numbers are dwindling in this country, while the numbers of “nobodies” who simply want to do God’s will are rising dramatically.

Will America be saved? No. But when certain people get out of the way and other people mature en masse, hundreds of thousands of hungry souls will find salvation, and America’s greatest great awakening will take place. [Real Christianity—The Nature of the Church ©2001 by RJ Dawson. All Rights Reserved.]

To refresh your memory regarding Ichabod:

Now his daughter-in-law, Phinehas’s wife, was pregnant and about to give birth; and when she heard the news that the ark of God was taken and that her father-in-law and her husband had died, she kneeled down and gave birth, for her pains came upon her. And about the time of her death the women who stood by her said to her, “Do not be afraid, for you have given birth to a son.” But she did not answer or pay attention. And she called the boy Ichabod, saying, “The glory has departed from Israel,” because the ark of God was taken and because of her father-in-law and her husband. She said, “The glory has departed from Israel, for the ark of God was taken.” [1Samuel 4:19-22]

You will become more cognizant of this in the coming year. Though most will never see spiritually, of course, those who grow closer to the Lord will gain greater spiritual eyesight and see things they never saw before. And it will all make sense. The Lord needs us to have spiritual eyes and ears. Our work with Him is impossible otherwise.

World War is now upon us. Great division is here. Corruption has erupted. We have a Christian Tower of Babel. The entities which once served to act as checks and balances have become derelict in their duty. The forces of Antichrist have gained great ground. The only hope now is ongoing unrelenting victorious spiritual warfare.

I suggested back in March the following: In light of what is coming, every church in America should be having 24 hour daily prayer meetings with all members on their faces before God. That has not happened. In fact, Christians in general have become even more lackadaisical. Like the other sellouts in control in secular realms, most Christian “leaders” in control have also sold out. And like the others, these Christians, a majority, have also done a great job of covering their great sins. Most Christian activity in America is now largely simply going through the motions with no true spiritual motivation toward great gains and big victories. Most churches and ministries are purely institutional status quo outfits intent on doing what they’ve always done, lost in greater ineffectiveness and bound by money and dead tradition. The majority of churches and church “leaders” are not living in the spirit but walking in the flesh. For these, again, the majority, there is no hope of saving the good or of revival. That leaves only resurrection. And the odds are greatly against that.

THE ALWAYS EVERY TIME SOLUTION

So what to do? As always, I suggest seeking the Lord Jesus. More than you ever have before. I suggest, again, that we thoroughly immerse ourselves in the Book of Acts. This historical account teaches us what the greatest Christian generation did, how astoundingly successful they were, and exactly what we must do to be like them and have the spiritual success they had.

I will warn you in advance, though, those of you who may not know, that you will get stiff resistance in doing this. The world and culture will fight you every step of the way as will the devil and his minions. The greatest fight, however, will be with Unreal Christianity and the flesh, both of which hate and reject what is presented in the Acts of the Apostles. Though our spirits cry out for salvation and freedom and love and joy and peace and spiritual victory, our flesh knows all those things come with a price and many simply won’t pay it. They would rather find easy counterfeit replacements to assuage their conscience and fool themselves into believing they’re obeying God or are right with God.

Regarding our immediate future, then, I say turn to the Lord Jesus all the more. He is the only one we ever had a chance with anyway though many discover this only after eliminating everything else after seeing that all of it fails to deliver.

2023 will thus be the worst of times and the best of times at the same time. You will continue to see evil things you never thought you would see and wonder how in the world we came to this. Some of you will also see the increasing miraculous happenings of the Kingdom of God. The Great Awakening will continue and force the enemy’s hand. The enemy will overact and accelerate his efforts. The Lord will bring victory where He can based on our compliance with His will.

Choose wisely.

WALK IN THE SPIRIT

“The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.” [Matthew 26:41]

“That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” [John 3:6]

“It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing; the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life.” [John 6:63]

For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace, because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so, and those who are in the flesh cannot please God. [Romans 8:5-8]

So then, brethren, we are under obligation, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh—for if you are living according to the flesh, you must die; but if by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For all who are being led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God. [Romans 8:12-14]

And you brethren, like Isaac, are children of promise. But as at that time he who was born according to the flesh persecuted him who was born according to the Spirit, so it is now also. [Galatians 4:28-29]

But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh. For the flesh sets its desire against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; for these are in opposition to one another, so that you may not do the things that you please. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the Law. [Galatians 5:16-18]

For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life. [Galatians 6:8]

For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. [Ephesians 6:12]

For the gospel has for this purpose been preached even to those who are dead, that though they are judged in the flesh as men, they may live in the spirit according to the will of God. [1Peter 4:6][1]

© 2022 by RJ Dawson. All Rights Reserved.

[1] Unless otherwise noted all Scriptures are taken from the New American Standard Bible, © 1960, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.