I'm humbled when I realize that the medieval Patriarchs and the son's of the reformation had a handle on reality; and having attained this truth with a price that I can't imagine yet....real blood. I wonder if "White Devil" was not a colloquialism; a common attitude and moniker, and that somehow kept my puritan brothers in line, a little more real, a little more watchful upon their own hearts.
They did not have to look too far over their shoulders to see the strains in the smiles, as they put their mothers and fathers to the rack, the fiery post, or the bloody sword. It was but a mere glance for them, and they fully understood that the name of Christ was spoken over the blood of the martyrs by the devil himself.
I have a crude stamp in my new testament.... [b]RELIGION KILLS![/b]. I, like so many of us, could give testimony ad finitum about the hate of it all. I have never known hate, as I have known it from the bowels of the Pharisee...a religious one. They have a penchant for submission, and I think you will find, it always flows downhill; from them, to everyone else.[me included.]
I think of the counsel of those precious Pharisee's, in deadly and sober counsel. There lives, position, privileged and power were being assaulted by the [b]MAN.[/b] It was a war room. "If we let him continue, the Roman's will come and remove our nation, and our place!"
They really could care less for the welfare of their nation, except in the context that it aggrandized themselves, and their power. So it is today. Nothing has changed.
They counselled to put him to death. They somewhere in that time frame, put the sentence on Lazarus also. Poor Lazarus. All he did was get resurrected. He had no will in the matter. He was simply an object of Life that could not be denied...Jesus is Messiah!
This is Nicolaitanism; The priests of the White Devil. Jesus put it simply. I hate their teaching. I hate their deeds. This is man over man, to subdue and lord over another's faith...and it always kills. This spirit is alive and well in Evangelical America today as much as ever, and any time.
Religious men will always sacrifice the Church, for the sake of their ministries. It is the nature of pride, coupled with her twin sister; ambition. It is a climb to the top. It is the throne of the benefactors. It is the white devil. It is sometimes called; "The ministry."
We must learn to flee such control, and realize that the church will perish without Godly elders, serving from below, under the least of the brethren. The gates of hell, and the white devil, will not prevail over a holy child.
Thanks for this post, Paul. Though small, 'tis mighty, and thrusts to the heart.
