Template:Deception
“The measure of a man is what he does with power.” ― Plato
Jesus, as the Christ, through His redemption gave the power of change back to mankind if they will repent and seek the kingdom of God and His righteousness.
Deception
Deception is defined as the " The use of deceit." or "The fact or state of being deceived."
There may be a division of blame in every deception on the part of the deceiver and the deceived.
Nothing makes us more deceivable than eating of the tree of knowledge which was a choice that has governed many of we think has been subsequent choices. There continues to be consequences for the lie of the serpent but also for the part that the lie and denial of Adam and Eve and their descendance. We have all played our own part in numerous ongoing deceptions where we lie to one another and deceive ourselves.
There are the deceitful meats of rulers which the slothful and those greedy for gain have chosen over the love and charity of The Way of Christ which has always been a snare and a trap that brings mankind back into captivity because he chose the wages of unrighteousness over the endowed dominion of God because he gives up the power of choice in exchange for the benefits of men who exercise authority one over the other.
From the book The Higher Liberty
Deception
Caesar was right, mankind is governed by names and their definitions. This was the definition of democracy in 1928:
“DEMOCRACY: A government of the masses. Authority derived through mass meeting or any form of direct expression. Results in mobocracy. Attitude toward property is communistic - negating property rights. Attitude toward law is that the will of the majority shall regulate, whether it is based upon deliberation or governed by passion, prejudice, and impulse, without restraint or regard for consequences. Results in demagogism, license, agitation, discontent, anarchy.” 1
By June 1952, the following definition was altering the understanding and attitude of the American nation:
“Meaning of democracy: Because the United States is a democracy, the majority of the people decide how our government will be organized and run - and that includes the Army, Navy and Air Force. The people do this by electing representatives, and these men and women carry out the wishes of the people.” 2
Changing definitions deceives the people. “The multitude of those who err is no protection for error.”3
“If you establish a democracy, you must in due time reap the fruits of a democracy... with great increase of the public expenditure. You will in due season have wars entered into from passion and not from reason; and you will in due season submit to peace ignominiously sought and ignominiously obtained, which will diminish your authority and perhaps endanger your independence. You will in due season find your property is less valuable, and your freedom less complete.”4
Ben Franklin advised that “A nation of well informed men who have been taught to know and prize the rights which God has given them cannot be enslaved. It is in the region of ignorance that tyranny begins.” Those rights depend upon us valuing our neighbors’ rights as much as we value our own, which is virtue.
Nothing is beyond re-examination. In a constitutional republic, you might have some safeguards but Patrick Henry argued against the Constitution of the United States because he saw that “When evil men take office, the whole gang will be in collusion! They will keep the people in utter ignorance and steal their liberty by ambuscade!”
Do we understand those flaws, and are we prepared to guard against them? It was not the Constitution5 that made this nation great, but the noble individuals who rose up every day, worked in the fields and factories, cared for their families, and provided for the honest needs of their community.
James Russell Lowell said “Democracy gives every man the right to be his own oppressor” and he begins the process by oppressing his neighbor.6 “Can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are of the gift of God?7 That they are not to be violated but with His wrath?”8
Democracy has no inherent right to the rights of others. We relinquish right by consent for mutual benefits. “I often wonder whether we do not rest our hopes too much upon constitutions, upon laws and courts. These are false hopes, believe me; these are false hopes. Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women;9 when it dies there, no Constitution, no law, no court can save it.”10
God “let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.” but not over his fellow man. The Cains of this world gain power over you by first offering you power over your neighbor.
Footnotes:
11928 U.S. Army Training Manual
2Army Field Manual Soldier’s Guide,1952.
3Multitudo errantium non parit errori patroeinium. 11Coke, 73.
4Benjamin Disraeli(1804-1881), British Prime Minister
5Covenants, Constitutions, and Contracts
http://www.hisholychurch.info/study/covenants/ccc.php
6Ex. 23:9 “Also thou shalt not oppress a stranger... seeing ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.”
Lev. 25:17 “Ye shall not therefore oppress one another; but thou shalt fear thy God: for I [am] the LORD your God.”
7Psalms 119:45 “And I will walk at liberty: for I seek thy precepts.”
8Thomas Jefferson: Notes on Virginia Q.XVIII, 1782. ME 2:227
9James 1:25 “But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth [therein], he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed.”
10Judge Learned Hand , Spirit of Liberty 189