Seduction vs persecution

While listening to a sermon recently the pastor quoted another pastor saying; "the biggest struggle for bible believing Christians in America is not the persecution from the world but the seduction of the world."
Tho the message was from a couple years ago it nonetheless seemed applicable if not prophetic in light of events since it was first spoken.
What are your thoughts on this, is it a legitimate statement in your view and if so/not why?
btw I'd love for saints outside the U.S. to offer their perspectives if you have one-

I agree 100%.

As Art Katz would say the LACK of persecution is primary facia evidence that the Church is living far below the Kingdom level.

Brother Todd those are shared thoughts,...
I hear much talk about the coming persecution but perhaps we'd be better served addressing the point you make. I mean we don't have to wait or prepare for that as its already here.
So what's the answer to our below the level, apathetic living?

Yes, I also believe Seduction of the world is the main problem in most places where we do not have persecution.

Satan persecutes Christians in 2 ways, one he tries to attract them to prevent their progress towards christlikeness. Second, he tries to physically attack them to prevent them from continuing in the Zeal.

I have been a Christian who lived long enough both in US and India. In US I find Christianity being more theoretical. Their society that propagates Do It YourSelf, makes them more and more self dependent and self satisfied. But in India we need to depend on God for everything. There is no guarantee for anything. There is a scarcity for everything starting from water, food, power, land to live, road transport etc. Hence you need God to survive in this country.

Even the Christian messages that we hear in India is more practical because people here experience something from God each and everyday that they can talk about it. But in US there is lack of everyday Christianity in messages.

I would agree with this. A year ago while I was out running this word 'Seduction' was spoken to me suddenly. I was listening to music and it spoke over the music. I meditated on it and looked through the bible on this. Seduction of the world as well as seduction within the church is the end result of this. After this episode I found myself gaining a hunger for scripture and found a couple of podcast to tell me fill in the blanks. ( A few months after that I had JW's on my doorstep).

John

So what's the answer to our below the level, apathetic living?

Well that's the million dollar question isn't it?

I don't want to live a mediocre Christian life and so I have been crying out for something to happen, for a filling, a sensation, a movement, a "something". It seems that the Lord's answer is simply " I am..."

It seems that the answer is to know Him like a branch knows the vine. I seek experiences, He wants me to abide in Him. The cause, the secret, the source of everything is Christ Himself.

In Christ,

Brothers Thank each of you for your responses as they each bring out points I hadn't wholly considered,... From our need to be reliant upon the Lord in more real ways to the sad fact this is being taught in our gatherings. Brother Ron your response to the question, what is the answer to this, got me thinking and the words to a song keep running thru my mind. I pray this doesn't belittle this matter or found to be inappropriate on my part but I'd like to submit them for y'all's consideration as they speak a clear message to me about how to deal with this. If you feel my doing this is itself below the level please correct me as it does seem to be an unusual thing (at least for me) but unusual issues sometimes call for unorthodox solutions and this brother seems to present a legitimate option for believers relating to this problem.
Josh Garrells- The Resistance
I was born into a system constructed for failure
It's a sinking ship manned by drunken sailors
An escape artist behind the bars of a jailor
An asthmatic attack when we forgot the inhaler
If the shoe doesn't fit what good is a tailor
In the midst of a crisis please cancel the gala
Without a symphony there's no need for a prelude
To foreshadow what's to come.
See the secret committees, commence with their meetings
To make red tape in response to simple questions
Questions threaten the perception of the beneficial systems
A pyramid scheme with it's cogs and it's pistons
Mechanization of men, making more and more
Live in a miserable existence
How can so few, claim so many victims
And this begs the question

My rest is a weapon against the oppression
Of mans obsession to control things
Look at the long line of make believe kings
The lord of the flies want's you to kiss his ring
Follow new rules with invisible strings
And become a puppet in the diabolical scheme
How do good men become part of the regime
They don't believe in resistance.

Hold fast like an anchor in the storm
We will not be moved

Lesson number one, overcome
Every fear of regret and confusion
It's all illusion, delusion
Sent to disconnect the holy fusion
Of spirit and the flesh
Every mortal breath, is meant to bring forth fire
But only when the fear of death, gets consumed
On the funeral pier
So let the flames rise higher
Let every man be considered a liar
If he doubts the goodness and faithfulness of God
Itching ears will compulsively nod in approval
When unbelief is taught in all our temples and schools
But God can restrain the madness of a fool
He can bring His truth through the mouth of a mule
You can move an mountain without any tools
It just takes the faith of a little seed
To make a way through what might seem to be
Impossibility,
And the ability will match the occasion
The outcome will defy explanation
The liberation will not be televised
When it arrives like lightning in the skies

Hold fast like an anchor in the storm
For your love, we will rise and overcome
Through the fire

Hold fast my people and sing
Through peace and through suffering
All for the joy that it brings, to be free
It's gonna cost us everything
To follow one Lord and King
True love endures everything
To be free

Hold fast, like an anchor in the storm
We will not be moved

Hold fast, like an anchor in the storm
We will not be moved

I like the theme of the anchor in a storm and it reminds me that the Christian life is lived in the context of constant storms of temptation. Even when things are going well we are tempted to become proud and self-satisfied.

We have lived most of our lives in prosperity; I don't know about you but I've never really lacked for much in my life. I think this has much to do with our state of apathy and ease. We've failed to remain watchful in this particular storm.

In Christ,

Brother Ron,
I was thinking the same type of thoughts.... and yes tho at times I've lived very poorly by most western standards I too have generally lived in a state of relative earthly comfort but it comes at a price which at times meant the compromise of Gods principles. There are so many verses these lyrics invoke for me from James to Hebrews to Ephesians and others still. I can appreciate (tho I hadn't realized it before) that this brother has apparently also seen the "seduction" aspect of this thread and proscribes an answer to it. Tho not to say a formula or a theoretical proposition as Brother Sree pointed out our western prosperity tends to induce but rather a very real and living commitment to the cause of Christ that is nonetheless very practical in application in that it is wholly dependent on God.
"My rest is a weapon against the oppression" I had never considered this tho now as I read Hebrews and we are told "beware lest we fail to enter into His rest"
That is an amazing revelation to me!
Then he remarks about overcoming and the death of self and the new birth in Christ is implied.
This got me to thinking, we can only enter into His rest when we have been "born again" for it is impossible for the "old man" to enter in.
How often we want to "go back to Egypt" with our "old man" it's like the movie "Weekend at Bernie's" where they literally drag around the corpse of there dead friend pretending he is alive so that they may partake of his earthly wealth.
Tho as the first few verses of the song establishes, we are born into and continue to be seduced by a system that encourages, if not out right demands, that we are dependent on it and therefore not resting in Him.
He then explains why this system claims so many of us lulling us into an apathetic state and that he says is because we don't believe in resistance which brings my thoughts to James where we are told to "submit yourselves to God, resist the devil and he will flee from you" and then to Ephesians where after we are fully armored "having done all else, stand" again implying resistance to the tendency to depend on the world system and this is to prepare us for the time when "no man shall buy or sell if he has not the mark of the beast".
So as I meditate on this, the image of Jesus separating the sheep and goats comes to mind and again as brother Sree testified of a state of complete and utter dependence on God for virtually everything, this image finds a place in my mind where I can see that only those who are in this state of rest, resisting the temptation to compromise thru the new birth are the sheep, as sheep are wholly dependent on their shepherd for their food and security but goats will eat anything and somewhat like Esau they are controlled by their belly.
Finally he makes no small declaration that " it's gonna cost us everything to follow this one Lord and King" but that this is indeed freedom.
Freedom from the world, from fear, from apathy, from our attempts to control, from the old man.
I guess for me it's like Paul after Romans 7 realizing in Romans 8:1 Praise be into God for He has delivered us from this body of death. It's been there all along...the way of escape hidden in Christ and as you say dear brother, abiding in the vine~
Edit for spelling

Interestingly our Pastor spoke today on these two topics seduction and persecution,... thought to share some of the points here-
It would seem that one of these two words will describe us as believers as we near the return of our King, either we'll be seduced by the world or persecuted from the world for not succumbing to it and living righteously.

The 5 stages of Persecution in Church History
1. Stereotypes
2. Vilification
3. Marginalization
4. Criminalization
5. Open persecution

I see us entering into the fourth stage of this progressive movement,... Where do you all see us in this, if at all?

John 15:18 If the world hate you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you.
19 If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you.
20 Remember the word that I said unto you, The servant is not greater than his lord. If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you; if they have kept my saying, they will keep yours also.
21 But all these things will they do unto you for my name's sake, because they know not him that sent me.

Philippians 3:18 (For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ:
19 Whose end is destruction, whose God is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things.)
20 For our conversation is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ:
21 Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself.

1 Peter 2:11 Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul;
12 Having your conversation honest among the Gentiles: that, whereas they speak against you as evildoers, they may by your good works, which they shall behold, glorify God in the day of visitation.

"Cultural Christianity will continue to deminsh and true Christianity will continue to grow and thrive and the contrast will become more apparent"

"We all deny sinful desires to follow Christ,... in our denying the things of this world we never miss out on anything good."

"Don't forget why you are here and what your mission is"
"Keep your heart on our home"
"Stay connected to your group"
" Don't lose your passport while you're here"

While life has moments of awe and great appreciation that seems to communicate joy, some of us spend our lives trying to recreate those circumstances here- this world is not our home~

This topic isn't going away for me and has me taking a very real look at how I live out my faith and seeing that there are so many things that distract me, weigh me down and keep me from running the race as I could.
To be honest the reason I haven't completely let it all go is I didn't want to be seen as weird and disconnected but I'm seeing that what the world calls familiar, calls its friend is the enemy of my God and therefore must be for me or else I've been seduced myself. He says "come out from among them" and I have in the ways I'm comfortable with doing and have secretly patted myself on the back for it but there's more and im not gonna lie it's scary to go all in...I've been using the excuses of getting my doctrine and theology straight and lined up but really He works that out with us when we are in the harvest fields with Him. It's so easy to sit back and feel confident in what we believe, but if we actually lived what we believe, I mean really lived it like the apostolic church I honestly doubt the world would be as it is today. The church would definitely be different,..healthier, more vibrant, more effective in the cause of Christ.
If it's not something we don't want to give up then it's not "our cross" and we can't follow Him without one... I mean as deep as I think I've gotten in my relationship with Him I realizing right now for the first time I'm more like the "rich young ruler" than any of the disciples, ha and I'm not even rich!
It's so easy to get distracted and then to start rationalizing it, seeking to justify myself by aligning with the world rather than being justified by abiding in Christ.
Lord have mercy on me, I'm a sinner and I pray you grant my foolish heart repentance from my own self indulgence and apathy to the dead and dying around me! I pray Father that you will again find me profitable in your hands and pleasing in your sight, thank you Lord that you have reminded me of your son and His willingness to receive me when I come to Him empty handed.
Father I ask you in Jesus name to help us be ever mindful of eternity and just how little time we have left to magnify Christ in our bodies that He may be exalted in all we do and say, in our hearts and minds, in our attitudes and practices. I pray Lord that we be single minded, with faces set like flint as we behold the glory of your son and allow you to live thru us, love thru us, work thru us, speak thru us, reach out thru us to the praise of your glory and for your namesake, keep us close and press us closer still. We love you Lord and give thanks and praise unto you in Jesus Holy name, amen.