Overseas Outreach Rick & Della Deighton P. O. Box 1224, Nampa, ID 83653-1224 overseasoutreach@earthlink.net 208-467-6563 September 2011 Cultural and Political Warfare Are Actually Symptoms of Spiritual Warfare Dear Friends & Prayer Partners, I want to share with you a copy of a letter I wrote to a personal friend after the November 2008 election. He was elated that Barack Obama won the election and was disappointed and frustrated with me because I did not share his joy and enthusiasm over the results. In fact, I was grieving. The results of the November 2010 elections and the actions of the Tea Party movement are greatly encouraging – but we recognize that the “cultural warfare” and “political warfare” are only the outward symptoms of the deep reality of spiritual warfare raging in our nation, in our churches, in our communities, and most of all in our own hearts. Therefore, I want to share with you a copy of this letter to my friend dated November 17, 2008, but first I want to share with you a copy of a response I sent to a young lady who wrote to us about our February -March letter, which requested urgent prayer for America. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * March 18, 2011 Dear Friend, Thank you for taking the time and effort to write to us about our last prayer letter and the Agenda DVD. We are sending you the DVD as a gift. Please be sure to watch it all and share it with as many as you possibly can. About your concern that “it is very close to gossiping” (what I wrote about Barack Obama) – then your “Oops, so sorry. I am a hypocrite! I just did….” Don’t worry! What you wrote is a fact – not gossiping. You wrote: “I also believe that our world (US) is falling apart. I believe it is because of Obama’s taxes. He is making the economy bad.“ Jesus said, “By their fruits you shall know them.” That is, we will know the difference between true believers and hypocrites by their deeds!!! Exposing and refuting the teachings and actions of false teachers is not gossip! God commands us to do so. Their teachings and deeds are public record – not whispered secrets. Barack Obama is the blatant hypocrite! He professes to be a Christian, but his deeds are anti Christ. If exposing false teachers and calling as hypocrites the workers of iniquity is wrong, then Jesus and His apostles were guilty because they did that. But Jesus never sinned! He (and they) are not guilty! Please read carefully Matthew 23, 2 Peter 2, and the epistle of Jude with this in mind. In fact, the apostle Paul said to expose and rebuke evil. We will send you more documentation to prove that Barack Obama is in fact a false teacher whose deeds need to be exposed. Now concerning your observations about homosexuals. You wrote: “Homosexuals. I am against it, although I do not protest against it. They are mostly nice people. I have met gay guys before, like at a store. They are weird, but they are not bad people.” By whose standard do you declare, “they are not bad people”? By yours – or God’s? Yes, it is true that all people are sinners, but it also true that some sins are far more dangerous and harmful than others. All diseases are diseases, but some diseases are much more dangerous than others. Wouldn’t you agree that cancer of the brain is more dangerous than chicken pox? God also categorizes some sins as more toxic and dangerous than others. Homosexual practices are categorized in God’s Word as “abomination.” Please read Lev. 18:22; Romans 1:16-32; and 1 Cor. 6:9-11. By the way, the average age for death of most Americans is 74 – but the average age of death for homosexuals who don’t repent is 42. (Or even for some who do repent and stop practicing their perversion, but have already contracted AIDS or other deadly diseases.) Dangerous? Absolutely! Also, I refuse to call them “gay” because this is the word homosexual leaders chose to redefine their behavior to make it sound good. The word “gay” means carefree and happy. Those who practice homosexuality are not carefree and happy because they are practicing corruption and perversion in the eyes of Almighty God. We have three relatives in this perversion – one of them already died of AIDS. Their lifestyle is not “gay” (carefree and happy). We are mandated to love them, pray for them, and seek to rescue them from the pit. Please carefully read Jude verses 17-25. You wrote: “Is the president not a person?” Yes, Obama is of course a person! I pray often for him to repent and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sin. That would be the greatest blessing he could ever have – and a tremendous blessing to our country. I pray for him, but I do not respect him. He has already been exposed in too many lies and his evil deeds are on record. Is that gossip? No! It’s public record of his deeds. He has adopted an evil philosophy – this is not just “mistakes”. He needs to deeply and thoroughly repent. Yes, we will also pray for you! Will you pray for us? For America? For Ukraine? In the grace and love of our Lord Jesus, Rick * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * November 17, 2008 Dear Brother, You told me that you doubt that Harry [his preacher] has ever been converted, that he is a liar and a con-man. Why? Because his actions don’t fit with his words. That is exactly what I believe about Barack Obama and why I pray for him to be converted. Please carefully and prayerfully read his voting record and the documented record of his lies. Don’t just believe his rhetoric – look at his record! His very first appointment is a man named Rahm Emanuel, who was involved with the scandal of Fanny Mae and Freddy Mac – and yet walked away with $18 million severance pay. Ridiculous! Obama’s voting record shows him to be 100% pro-abortion and 100% pro-homosexual. The sanctity of life and the sanctity of marriage are the most vital issues of our times, as slavery was the issue of the times in the 1800’s, but Obama is dead wrong on both of these vital issues. We need to pray for his conversion. As I said to you on the phone, “If I wanted a socialist nation run by homosexuals and abortionists, I would have voted for Obama.” Especially when seeking to woo evangelicals into his camp, Obama talks the talk about his faith in Christ. He does not walk the walk. His record rebukes his rhetoric and exposes his hypocrisy. I don’t care that John McCain called Barack Obama an honorable man in his defeat speech – it was the politically polite thing to say. It proves nothing to me because his record speaks for itself. McCain’s record is better than Obama’s, but I’m not thrilled with him either. So do I believe McCain was lying about that? Yes, of course! “Let God be found true, though every man a liar.” Romans 3:4. I realize that Obama gets multitudes of glowing reports (that ignore his lies, blunders, and distortions). Why? Because most journalists listened to their professors who told them “socialism is good.” Obama is not our savior, nor is he the messiah as some are claiming! You said socialism is not bad – it’s godless socialism that is bad. I strongly disagree. Socialism is bad – evil to the core – because it is godless in its very nature. It is based on the godless, anti-Christian philosophies of Karl Marx, Charles Darwin, and Sigmund Freud. Socialism is not a Christian (Biblical) worldview for the following reasons: The goal of socialism is the destruction of private property. Ideally, everyone equally owns everything (but in practice everyone becomes equally poor except the ruling elite). It was Karl Marx who wrote “To each according to his need – from each according to his ability.” Sounds good on the surface, doesn’t it? But who determines the need and who takes from those who have ability? The government (ruling elite)! So this violates the Biblical teachings as follows: It creates a wrong focus of dependency. “The Government is my shepherd” instead of “The Lord is my Shepherd.” It is idolatry. It violates the Biblical principle of ownership. The command, “Thou shalt not steal” has no meaning if there is no ownership of private property. Under socialism, the government steals all private property from its citizens and gives it to whomever they will (usually themselves). Poor people remain poor, wealthy and middle class citizens are reduced to poverty. Socialism undermines the Biblical principle of responsibility. I am responsible for my actions; I should bear the responsibility of my foolish actions, but on the other hand I should reap the rewards of wise decisions and hard work. The Book of Proverbs is full of such wisdom. If you believe in socialism you may as well tear up and throw away the book of Proverbs. You cannot believe both! It’s schizophrenic to believe you can combine these two contrary belief systems. Socialism is now falsely called progressivism; more accurately it should be called regressivism!!! Socialism shifts the responsibility and the blame from the individual to “society.” This is devastating. Socialism means that whenever I foul up, IT’S NOT MY FAULT! Society bears the blame! Also, what is everybody’s responsibility becomes nobody’s responsibility (perhaps this is why so much trash and garbage is tossed on the ground in the cities, forests, and countryside of former Soviet Union nations. It takes time for people to recover from socialism and take responsibility!) In contrast, the Bible teaches individual responsibility. “Let him that stole steal no more: but rather let him labor, working with his hands the thing which is good, that he may have to give to him that needs.” Ephesians 4:28. This is God’s way! On the other hand, the liberal left (socialists) love to be liberal (generous) with other people’s money. If John Kerry cares so much about the poor, when is he going to sell any of his seven mansions and distribute the funds to starving people in America, Africa, or Haiti? Socialism destroys the incentive of the ambitious, hard working individual by taking from him what he earned and giving it to the lazy and immoral slouch. Our own welfare system is a socialistic disaster that rewards immorality by giving more and more money to unwed mothers who keep having more children. It punishes those who get married or who work hard to produce a garden, etc. Socialism teaches that human nature is basically good and the problem is with the environment and the economy. “Take these nice people out of their bad environment and give them a good education and they will become productive citizens.” One astute observer wrote that if you take a thief out of his bad environment and give him a good education, he will steal the whole railroad instead of stealing scrap metal from the railroad. (Basically this is what has happened with Fanny Mae and Freddy Mac – but the thieves were officers in the company. They are walking away with millions of dollars in severance pay in spite of their bad decisions, while all of us tax payers are left to foot the bill because Congress decided to bail them out. This is socialism in practice! It stinks!) The Bible teaches that human nature is basically evil. It is corrupt because it is the fruit of a corrupt tree. We inherit the corrupted, selfish nature of Adam; we need to repent, be converted and transformed into the new nature of the second Adam. If any man is in Christ he is a new creation. “By their fruits you shall know them,” Jesus said. (I do not see the fruit of a new nature in Barack Obama.) Jeremiah wrote by Inspiration “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked; who can know it?” Jeremiah 17:9. Freud didn’t know it! Darwin didn’t know it! Marx didn’t know it! But God does! He is the One – the only One who knows the human heart. He says we each need a new heart. A radical heart transplant! Yes, America needs change, but not a change of economy to total socialism. America needs a change of heart – one heart at a time. I have traveled extensively in Eastern Europe and have seen repeatedly the poverty and devastation of socialism; however, in each of those nations, I’ve seen the beauty of transformed lives – changed hearts by the power of the Holy Spirit – lives reflecting the glory of God in the face of our Lord Jesus Christ. True Christianity can survive, and even thrive in spite of oppression, opposition, ridicule, and persecution. So what is the difference between socialism and communism? Very little! They are the same basic philosophy. Usually socialism is viewed as the soft form and communism the hard from of the philosophy. Actually, I think socialism is simply the polite name for communism. I see the election of Barack Obama as a judgment of God upon America. We are getting what we, as a nation, deserve. One of the seven things that God hates is the shedding of innocent blood. What blood is more innocent than that of a baby, born or unborn? With the blood of over 48,000,000 innocent babies on our hands since 1973, when the Supreme Court judicially “legalized” the murder of the innocents, we have far more blood on our hands as a nation than Nazi Germany. Was the election of Obama the will of God? Obviously yes – His permissive will – as it was when rebellious Israel clamored for a king like the other nations. Was Samuel disappointed? Definitely! But God told him “They have not rejected you – they have rejected Me!” Do I see this as the death of our nation? Yes, I do, and I am seriously disappointed. I am grieving. Some are saying to grieving Christians like me, “Come on. Get over it!” Would you be so cold and heartless with a widower who just lost his wife? Yes, I am hurt and I am grieving, but I will recover. I thank God for the good that He sovereignty will bring from this election, even though I can’t see it now. We sorrow not as others who have no hope – but we do sorrow. I sorrow that millions more babies will die under an Obama administration while Planned Parenthood flourishes with their godless slaughter houses falsely called “health clinics.” I sorrow that the free enterprise nation I once knew, that was built on godly principles and slogans like “In God we trust” and “Under God” may soon be thrown on the scrap heap of history under the nebulous banner of “Change.” I grieve that Obama will appoint hundreds more radically liberal activist judges and Supreme Court Justices who will promote abortion, homosexuality (under the “gay rights” banner), and pornography (under the “free speech” banner). They will glory over their arrogant power thrust over the legislative branch and gloat over the oppression of those “right wing fanatics” (meaning Christians who truly uphold Biblical standards of morality and marriage). It has already been happening, but it is about to hit the skids and speed up dramatically. So please, cut me some slack and give me some time to grieve. I still say with Job, “The Lord has given, the Lord has taken away, blessed be the name of the Lord.” For many years we, as a country, have been sliding down the socialist slope, but now in electing Obama I’m afraid we’ve gone over the edge. We have become a socialist nation and will reap the bitter consequences that Russia and all the former Soviet Union nations are reaping. The country I grew up in had many positive role models, even in Hollywood, like Roy Rogers and Dale Evans. Instead of family bashing sitcoms and cartoons (like The Simpsons), we even had positive TV programs that honored father and families; Father Knows Best, Leave It to Beaver, Ozzie and Harriet. We had wholesome humor from Lucille Ball and Red Skelton. A man’s word was his bond, we rarely locked our doors, a man and woman got married first, and then lived together, we kids could roam the neighborhood after dark playing hide and go seek, and “gay” meant carefree and happy. Why? Because our nation had a foundation built upon a Biblical worldview with Christian principles. That has been undermined by Darwinism and socialism. If I sound nostalgic…you’re right. I miss it and I grieve over what we have lost and where we, as a nation, are heading. We are very far down the road of rebellion, but it still isn’t too late for repentance and a turn around. There are some very positive signs; prayer and fasting movements, purity conferences, etc. Earnest prayer is what we need yet more and more. With God all things are possible. His grace is our only hope for ourselves, and for our country. So do I see Barack Obama as our enemy? Yes, definitely! I believe he is severely lacking in moral integrity and that he is an enemy of truth and righteousness. Any man with a heart so cold he will vote repeatedly to let the living baby die in a soiled linen closet or on a cold surgical table after he survived a botched abortion, and then lie to the public in spite of his record, is an enemy of truth and righteousness. This same heartless man voted repeatedly to protect the inhumane practice of partial birth abortion. Yes, I see him as an enemy! But Jesus said, “Love your enemies”, so I pray for God to fill me with His Holy Spirit and pour out His love into my heart for this man. I am determined to love him and pray for him in spite of the fact that I view his policies and practices as ungodly and despicable. (Also behind Obama are George Soros, Tom Gill, and other liberal billionaires. Pray for them to repent too.) My feelings toward Barack Obama’s election have absolutely nothing to do with racism. Skin color is no issue with me – it’s his heart that matters. Actually, there is only one race – the human race! We all come from Adam and Eve through Noah. I have very high regard for Alan Keyes, a black American statesman who carries himself with dignity, speaks with integrity, and has a passionate fervor for protecting the sanctity of life, the sanctity of marriage, and the sanctity of the Biblical work ethic. He knows better than to lead us down the primrose path of socialism. Alan Keyes often quotes our Bill of Rights, pointing out that we are endowed by our Creator with certain inalienable rights – life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. I may have some serious theological differences with Alan Keyes on some important issues, but on these foundational basics for good government, we are in complete agreement. If Alan Keyes were our president elect, I would be elated, clicking my heels, and finding it much easier to be hopeful about the future of our nation. (By the way, Jeremiah knew and believed in the sovereignty of Almighty God, yet he grieved deeply over his decadent, rebellious nation and the resulting judgment from God. He is known as the “weeping prophet.”) To understand more clearly my grief at the direction our nation has chosen in following Obama, please read thoughtfully the enclosed article “From a Vision of a Socialist Utopia: A Report From Auschwitz”. Did you know the Nazis were the “National Socialist Party”? Two very powerful sentences from this article say, “The German people found the Nazi party compelling because they were bitter about economic hardship and wanted immediate change. They cried out for it in trance-inducing rallies led by an appealing, gifted orator who possessed an almost magical self-assurance.” This is almost eerie! Obama’s rallying cry throughout his campaign has been change – change – change! But the changes he wants look ominous to me. The change America needs is not socialism, but a change of heart! We need a deep, true spiritual awakening wherein millions come to their knees in genuine repentance and surrender of their lives to the Lord Jesus Christ. (By the way, concerning socialism, you aren’t forgetting that the former Soviet Union’s official name was “Union of Soviet Socialist Republics”, are you?) I am disappointed and saddened that a majority of Americans voted for Obama. But I believe that God will bring good from this, and I will continue to love Him, thank Him, and praise Him. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Moving On… Friends, I am still fasting and praying often for revival in our churches and spiritual awakening in our nation, but I’m now recovered from the grief stage and feeling much more encouraged than I did in November 2008. God has used the election of Barak Hussein Obama to shake up and wake up many believers to the grave danger we face in this nation – but there are still multitudes of deluded ones, and far too much apathy prevails, so please fervently pray for repentance! Now for the good news….. Very Good News! September 5th on Family Talk, James Dobson and LuAnn Crane interviewed Janet from Ohio about the powerful pro-life bill that has already passed in their House of Representatives and only needs a handful more Senators to sign on in order to pass in their Senate. Already many pro-life groups are lining up to get such a bill passed in their states. It’s called the HeartBeat Bill, and you can check it out at www.heartbeatbill.com . Please pray that it passes in Ohio and then one state after another. The bill forbids the murder by abortion of an unborn baby with a beating heart (which would eliminate about 90% - 95% of all abortions). Have you seen the bumper sticker which reads, “Abortion Stops a Beating Heart”? Soon we may see one that reads, “A Beating Heart Stops Abortion”. There have been many pro-life bills passed in lots of states since so many conservative, pro-life legislators were elected last November. Praise God! Yes, elections have consequences! Yes, Christians are waking up to their responsibilities as citizen of a constitutional republic. Pray! Pray for lives to be saved! Pray for the overturning of Roe vs. Wade! Janet says it is now in sight. Let’s praise God, pray and press on! “Rescue the perishing! Care for the dying!” Yours & His, Rick “Pray fervently. Great movements of faith have always spread on the wings of prayer.”