World/ Pharmacia Sorcery/ False Religion

Are Christians Selling Their Souls for a Little Prescription Pottage?

Rev. 18:23, World Current May 9, 2016

“..for by her sorceries were all nations deceived.” Revelation 18:23

Forty years ago, at the height of the psychedelic revolution, staff members of the Christian Spirit Magazine, LeRoy and Eloise Gardenier wrote and distributed a tract called Drugs in the Last Days. In it, they connected the Greek word pharmakea used in Revelation 9:21 and 18:23 with the deception of drugs that would be used mightily by Satan just before the return of Christ. For the most part, they expected the fulfillment was taking place in the sales of street drugs and in the invasion of drugs in suburban communities all around the world and on every continent. They could never have foretold that its fulfillment would reach as deep and as dark into the personal lives of “god-fearing” America as much as it has.

While many Christian groups are unsettled about political developments, the decay of the judicial system, violence in public schools, the right to life and other issues; a crisis of enormous proportions is fully sneaking in the backdoor and gutting people of their faculties of discernment and spiritual common sense. Drugs, prescribed with the best of intentions (the road to Hell is truly paved with such good intentions) are being used to deceive the unsuspecting person. Especially at risk are the aged who have little defense against wholesale drug prescriptions from the physicians they trust without question These drugs, like Haldol, Ativan, Prozac, et. al. are not merely mind altering drugs, they are mood altering drugs that cause deep chemical reactions in the brain. While designed to curtail and control depression they often have the opposite effect of adding a weird depression that many people believe leads to increased thoughts of suicide as well as other abnormal side effects. It cannot be denied that suicide is on the rise, and it can hardly be denied that psychic drugs have something to do with it. Many drugs, such as Ativan, are by health care to control patients for the convenience of the caretakers. A Clockwork Orange is not just a futuristic Sci-Fi work of literary brilliance. Reality is far beyond the ugly conjectures of that nihilistic scenario. Many experts admit prolonged use can cause irreversible damage to the memory, personality and mood of the user.

These neuroleptics and antidepressants are not medicines, they are legal psychedelics, and much more, because they are twenty-five years advanced. They are like carpenter ants for the mind. They are designed to hollow out the psyche, do away with the unpleasantries of life’s problems. If the emotion is tough, dark or bleak then do away with it and its memory. Don’t deal with it. If I’m reaping the rotten fruits of a crappy relationship which I built by my own self will and vain half-knowledge then mask it and pretend like it will go away. Other people’s’ minds don’t change just because a drug has altered mine. The unrealistic pretense is that I will be relieved from anxieties and that is the source of my bad relationship(s). Have anxiety about it surgically removed with a pill and it is no longer a problem. Yeah, right! Alfred Adler, pioneer in the field of psychology, once said that most emotional depression and anxiety stems from a person’s loss of courage to face overwhelming problems. Should we trade truth in for madness and call it increased sanity. Should we pretend that things are changed when they are not just for feeling better about ourselves? Should Christians trade in faith and courage for the lifeless “lithium shuffle”? What happened to the beauty of repentance and the faith for the maturity of changes brought on by God’s love and promise for righteousness being fused into our life and behavior?

When someone close to me had a “street” drug problem I was not moved by God to just shrug my shoulders and say, “Well, I hope the person will grow out of it. I think I’ll let it run its course. It might be good for him or her anyway.” I was led to do everything in my power to encourage and help this person stop the drug habit. Christians should be careful! The carpenter ants are in the home and they are being touted as a cure for termites. Sure, they may eat the termites, but where do the carpenter ants go? When is their appetite quenched?

Each one of us has to be sensitive as to how we must deal with a drug usage crisis in our lives and what we should insist upon. Drugs for treatment of physical ailments are obvious in their benefit. The wholesale distribution of ritalin in our schools to young helpless children is a national scandal of growing proportions. A six-year-old kid squirms in his seat and someone thinks about giving him some legal dope. The mental depressions and anxieties we are all susceptible to and have all experienced in one form or another are real and need attention, cure and even some form of therapy. But drugs have too easily become the first and last resort. Love and care are irreplaceable in therapy for the conditions of sickness in the soul and spirit. The church should lead the way in this form of treatment, but alas, the church has sold its birthright for a little worldly soup of drugs and abandoned its needy people and cast off one of the prime blessings of the healer and savior, Jesus Christ.

Brain chemistry ought not be the solution (especially in the long term). Christian support through church/fellowship, family understanding and encouragement and, above all, loving kindness and care should be central to treatment of depression, anxiety, personal problems and anguish. It is especially the duty of the heads of households, elders and pastors to direct, as much as possible, every Christian toward believing that “All things work together for good to those who love God and are called according to his purposes.”

A Final, Final Word: Is there absolutely no use for drugs in medicine or treatment of mental problems? Not at all, there is. But be skeptical and on your guard. Do not accept without question what the world is professing to be a cure; often it is only part of the world’s lack of faith and its own system of salvation. In the last days the whole world will be deceived by drugs. It’s happening now! A person’s sin cannot be dissolved or cured by psycho-medication. We must turn our backs and flee from our sin. Be strong and of good courage and Christ will strengthen you!