This God-offending sin, which basically remains hidden and unnamed, has caused many Christians to lose their spiritual health, their joy, and their power over their enemy, the devil. It is the sin of idolatry which began to manifest itself near the end of the first century A.D. when believers began depending upon, exalting, and following other Christians as their leaders, instead of depending upon, exalting, and following Christ the King as their leader, as He commanded.
The year 2021 began with the inauguration of a president of the United States that tens of millions of Americans believed was illegitimate. Many Christians had prayed that God would prevent a party that supports and promotes grossly sinful, anti-God policies, such as the murder of unborn babies, from taking control of the government. These praying Christians believed, and often quoted, a Scripture that says God will answer His repentant people’s prayers and heal their land. When their prayers went unanswered, many Christians were left confused and discouraged. The question hung in the air: “Why didn’t God answer?”
The authors suggest that God did answer, and that His answer was, “No.” He was getting His people’s attention through a painful object lesson: He left them with a civil government leader who was not the rightful one, who did not care about them, and who began to take actions that harmed them. By allowing this, and also by beginning to uncover many hidden evils in their civil government, He was also showing His people that they were spiritually powerless to stand against large-scale, evil attacks by the devil unless they repented and returned to Him as their rightful King.
Such individual repentance is an absolute necessity today, at a time when there are massive, fierce battles by evil spiritual forces taking place on many fronts on battleground earth. As believers repent one by one and return to follow their rightful King, their prayers will be effective, and they will begin exercising dominion on the earth. God’s Spirit will be freshly poured out upon His people, turning them into an army of mighty spiritual warriors. They will overcome the enemy by the blood of the lamb, the word of their testimony, and by not loving themselves unto death (Rev. 12:11).