The last days of apostasy is upon us. In these evil days we can see churches bringing in rock and roll bands, doing the purpose driven heresy, and jumping on all the latest ecumenical fads. Congregation members have found the occult very entertaining and enjoy studying Satanism via Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings. Of course many give excuses for their baseless love of things that are evil before the Lord. I correct that, many give excuses for enjoying that what the Lord calls an abomination!
The occult is an abomination and there is no excuse for it! No "Christian" author will produce occult works. This includes Tolkien and C.S. Lewis! These men had a love for the occult and this evil can be seen in their writings. They are not saved Christian authors!
But in reality this is not an issue to those who are born again and who love the Lord Jesus. Such people want nothing to do with occultic entertainment. It is to be rejected and all of God's people do just that.
However, this is not the case in liberal and apostate churches. The occult is the latest rage with professing Christians enjoying all the Satanistic entertainment they can justify with their baseless arguments. Even pastors do not teach and warn those in their congregations of the great evil of the occult.
In this article we will look at a new channel for apostasy. Christian bookstore businesses are more interested in the bottom dollar than they are in obeying and pleasing the Lord. Occult entertainment has found another outlet. It is being sold in Christian bookstores!
What is a Christian bookseller? Such a person is a businessman with little or no theological training. The owner/managers of Christian bookstores are not pastors. These are people who run a business. What is the goal of a business? To make a profit. This is not a bad goal and it is the foundation of running a business of any kind. The problem is this: What is a person willing to do in order to make that profit? Will they do something illegal? Will they embrace and sell something evil before the Lord? The occult is something that is very evil and it should never be sold in a bookstore that claims to be "Christian".
When the occult is selling in a "Christian" bookstore then I have to say the owner/manager is in the business just for the money. Such a person has no love to the Lord or any desire to please Him. Instead, this business person seeks to earn cash and to make a profit for their business. This would be an example where the LOVE OF MONEY is the root evil.
Let me clarify that statement. Money in itself is not evil. However, the love of money is root of evil. It causes a person to make money their god. Such a person will do things in order to gain more money. The things they do may be very evil before the Lord but a person in love with money does not care. Instead they just care about getting money.
This is what I see when I hear of a "Christian" bookstore that stoops so low as to sell occult entertainment. This would include the current popular occult pieces of Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, and C.S. Lewis's Narnia. These "Christian" bookstores do not love the Lord. Instead they love money, the almighty dollar!
1 Tim 6
9 But they that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare,
and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in
destruction and perdition.
10 For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while
some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced
themselves through with many sorrows.
11 But thou, O man of God, flee these things; and follow after
righteousness, godliness, faith, love, patience, meekness.
Here is an example of an apostate bookstore that dares to call itself "Christian"!
Christian bookstore sells Harry Potter
Most religious shops avoid the popular novels [Excerpts]
Walk into the Logos Bookstore in Oak Park, Ill., and you'll find Bibles, the Left Behind novels and a lot of other works you'd expect at a Christian shop.
But go to the children's section, through a make-believe castle door at the back of the store, and you'll see a series of titles that make Logos unique among its peers: Harry Potter books.
Our thinking is that because the mainstream public is reading the books, Christians should be aware of them and use them as an opportunity to bring in Christian themes and values, manager Beth Ann O'Reilly-Amandes said.
I know a lot of Christians who read them and enjoy them, but it just wouldn't fit with what our customers expect of us,˛ said Chris Childers, owner of the Georgia-based Macon Christian Bookstore and chairman of the Christian Booksellers Association's board of directors.
But O'Reilly-Amandes believes the Potter books fit the store's mission to bring in more customers. The Oak Park Logos is part of a 0-store chain in the United States, Canada and the Bahamas that targets both Christians and non-Christians. The philosophy is to attract hidden people,˛ including those who don't shop in religious bookstores, and are completely unaware of the wealth of Christian literature written on their level and addressed to their needs.
At Logos of Ohio, based near Kent State University, store manager Shane Cardos said he has read all the Potter books and enjoyed them, but didn't think it was worth the fight to actually sell them.
I've had people complain about the The Lord of the Rings' and I feel like I've got good reasons for carrying that, Cardos said. But with the Harry Potter books, I don't have the same number of arguments to use that would justify carrying them.
O'Reilly-Amandes said that the Potter books are popular with her customers and that she is ordering 100 copies of Half-Blood Prince, comparable to what she would order for one of the Left Behind novels, the million-selling apocalyptic series by Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins.
Her store carries other secular works, including Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code, which has angered Catholics by implying that Jesus and Mary Magdalene were married. The Oak Park Logos also sells J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings˛ trilogy, another fantasy series criticized by Christians.
If a customer has a question about why we carry the Potter books, then we'll suggest one of the Christian books, like (Connie Neal's) What's a Christian to Do With Harry Potter?' said Amandes-O'Reilly, referring to a sympathetic Potter book.
It's a way of bringing more people into the conversation, without preaching to them. It's something that opens us all up (MSNBC.com, Feb. ', 2005).
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