IDENTITY POLITICAL PANDERING, PANDEMIC, PANDEMONIUM AND PANACEA…OH MY! IS IT TIME TO PANIC? ~ A Study in Jeremiah

 

Perhaps it will be said of 2020 that it was the year of extreme identity political pandering, a pandemic, ensuing pandemonium, and a seemingly ready-made panacea. (Sounds like an antichrist agenda out of an end-times fiction novel written in the 70s lifted from the pages of the Book of Revelation!) What is at the heart of pandemonium? Panic…fear. A definition of pandemonium is this: a situation in which a crowd of people act in a wild, uncontrolled, or violent way because they are afraid, excited, or confused.

We have been lied to by people we are supposed to be able to trust. That type of betrayal is hard to overcome. Trust is a hard thing to get back. While I am sure it began much earlier than I first became aware, lying has become a way of life in our world. Blatant immorality is at an all-time high. In the last three decades, we have increasingly witnessed a meticulous and methodical plan being implemented to get us to believe all truth is relative. To say ‘truth’ is relative begs the question, “What is truth?” ‘Absolute truth’ is a redundant adjective phrase. The result of relativistic thinking is always going to be pandemonium. Why? Because God is truth. He alone defines what is truth. To take absolute truth out of a society is to remove God from it completely. Look closely at that word pandemonium. What do you see?

The history and etymology for pandemonium: It is from pan + Late Latin daemonium which means “evil spirit,” borrowed from Greek daimonion “evil spirit,” earlier “divine power, inferior divine being,” derivative of daimon “divinity, divine power individual destiny”. More at DEMON.

The history and etymology for demon: Middle English, “evil spirit,” borrowed from Late Latin daemon “evil spirit, pagan deity, idol,” going back to Latin “supernatural being, spirit intermediate between humans and gods,” borrowed from Greek daimon-, “superhuman power, variably evil or beneficent, intervening in human affairs, fate” (Homeric), “personal spirit, bringing luck or ill, that accompanies an individual,” “spirit intermediate between humans and god” (Plato), “evil spirit” (New Testament), probably from dai-, stem of daiomai, daiesthai “to divide, allocate” + -mon, deverbal noun and adjective suffix.

So, when we have pandemonium, what do we have? We have demons at work in this world working in and through the people of this world who are controlled by the prince of the power of the air. All of life on earth is a spiritual battle. It is a battle between God and Satan for the souls of men. Deuteronomy 32:16-17— “They made Him jealous with strange gods; with abominations they provoked Him to anger. They sacrificed to demons who were not God, to gods whom they have not known, new gods who came lately, whom your fathers did not dread.” Idol worship is demon worship. John MacArthur says about verse 17: “Demon spirits impersonate the idol and work their wicked strategies through the system of false religion tied to the false god.”

I’ve known women who have been raised in false religious systems who began coming to Bible studies; hearing the truths of Scripture, they decide they are going to stay in the false religious system and “be an instrument of change in the false system”. They are often confused when I tell them they cannot do so. 1 Corinthians 10:14-22 explains for us why we must make a clean break with false religious systems and false teaching once our eyes have been opened to the truth. Verses 20-22 says: The things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons and not to God; and I do not want you to become sharers in demons. You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons; you cannot partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons. Or do we provoke the Lord to jealousy? We are not stronger than He, are we?  In other words, the idol is not a demon, but demons will act out the part of the imagined god. To participate in idol worship is to interact with demons. People say, “Look! Here is proof. This is what happened during the veneration of this statue,” or “We saw this apparition with our very eyes!” There is a satanic spiritual force behind what they saw, a force that tried to make them believe it was of God because it was tied to a traditional spiritual icon. Therefore, we simply CANNOT base our faith and what we believe on experiences but on the Word of God alone. We can know truth. It never changes. Experiences can be fatally deceiving, spiritually speaking. And this deception will be rampant in the very end of time. Speaking of the antichrist, Paul says in 2 Thessalonians 2:9-12—…the one whose coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and signs and false wonders, and with all the deception of wickedness for those who perish because they did not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved. For this reason, God will send upon them a deluding influence so that they will believe what is false, in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth, but took pleasure in wickedness. God will send upon them a deluding influence. Deluding is ‘mental straying, error, wrong opinion relative to morals and religion’. If they refuse to believe the truth, they will believe lies. The word influence is very interesting in that the transliteration from the Greek is energeia. You can see the word energy in there, can’t you? What is interesting is that this word means ‘working or efficiency’. In the NT it is used only of superhuman power (whether of God or of the devil) so it is effectual working—working that cannot fail to accomplish its purpose. It is the same word used in Ephesians 1:19 when it speaks of God’s working by the strength of His might in the lives of believers.

What is the bottom line? The Bible repeatedly tells believers that we are not to be afraid. We are told not to fear. We are told not to be anxious for anything (Philippians 4:6). In fact, it is sin to be anxious or fearful when it is God in whom we trust. We are not to fear man, circumstances in this world, or even death. Matthew 9:28—Do not fear those who kill the body but are unable to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. We are told to fear one thing: God. Proverbs 9:10 says that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.

 Unbelievers in this world SHOULD be living in fear! For them, it is time to panic!!!

Why do unbelievers seem to have no fear? Because God has sent upon them a deluding influence so that they will believe what is false. What is the false message everyone wants to believe today? “God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life. God will not judge you because God is a God of love! It’s peace and safety for you. Everything is fine. You may live your best life now!” What sounds to their ears as a right message may soothe their souls in this life; meanwhile, the reality is that they are hanging by a thread over the flaming fires of the pit of hell! This is exactly what was happening to Judah. Life was good! They were the people of God who believed they were good people who had favor with God. Yet, they were deceived and blind to their true spiritual condition even as the enemy was headed in their direction. This enemy would consume them.

Their quiver is like an open grave, all of them are mighty men. They will devour your harvest and your food; they will devour your sons and your daughters; they will devour your flocks and your herds; they will devour your vines and your fig trees; they will demolish with the sword your fortified cities in which you trust. (Jeremiah 5:16-17)

God had put His words like fire in Jeremiah’s mouth and made the people like wood. Jeremiah’s words would devour or consume them in judgment. The enemy God was bringing against them would devour or consume them in every way. God would take away from them everything in which they had trusted instead of trusting in Him. In Leviticus 26, where God lays out the blessings of obedience versus the penalties for disobedience, He says in verse 16: I, in turn, will do this to you: I will appoint over you a sudden terror, consumption and fever that will waste away the eyes and cause the soul to pine away; also, you will sow your seed uselessly, for your enemies will eat it up.

Just how strong is this deluding influence over men? Revelation describes for us a time coming when literally all hell will break loose upon the earth. In Revelation 9 in the fifth trumpet judgment, we see ‘locusts’ being released from the bottomless pit to wreak havoc on the earth. The bottomless pit is “the pit of the abyss.” It is mentioned in Revelation 7 times and always refers to the prison where some of the demonic hordes are incarcerated, the place of severest torment and isolation (John MacArthur Study Bible note on Revelation 9:1). They torment men for five months. In the second half of Revelation 9 the sixth trumpet is blown. Repeatedly we see demons being let loose upon the earth to kill and destroy causing a catastrophic loss of life to what is left of mankind. Here’s what is important to see: Revelation 9:20-21—The rest of mankind, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands, so as not to worship demons, and the idols of gold and of silver and of brass and of stone and of wood, which can neither see nor hear nor walk; and they did not repent of their murders nor of their sorceries nor of their immorality nor of their thefts. No matter the severest judgments God will bring, the hardened heart will not repent.

Here is a list of five sins that represent ultimate rebellion against God in that day which is not unlike our own: (1) worshipping demons in the form of idols (idolatry); (2) murders; (3) sorceries (drug use); (4) immorality; and (5) thefts. Sorceries is the word pharmakeia which can also be translated witchcraft. The definition is: medication (“pharmacy”), i.e. (by extension) magic (literally or figuratively: —sorcery, witchcraft. It can mean the use or the administering of drugs; poisoning; sorcery, magical arts, often found in connection with idolatry and fostered by it; metaphorically the deceptions and seductions of idolatry.

What can we know at any given time in history? God is on His throne ruling and reigning over all His creation. Nothing takes Him by surprise. He has more than shown us through His Word and through the life, death, and resurrection of His Son that He holds our future in His hands. For the believer, a right fear of God leads to peaceful trust in this life and hope-filled anticipation for the next one. For the unbeliever who refuses to fear God, every morning should be a new day filled with panic at what is seen around them as evidence of a glimpse of God’s wrath and the sure and utter terror of what is to come.