Shape Shifter

I was watching an episode of the X-Files the other night, and the story reminded me of something that is becoming very clear to me.

Shape-Shifter ~One that seems to be able to change form or identity at will.

"For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ. And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light."

Mulder and Sculley were investigating a supposed murder and in the process of their investigation stumbled into discovering a cave, but before they went into this cave they accidental stepped on some mushrooms that exploded with a release of spores.
Little did either of them know, that by stepping on those mushrooms and ingesting the spores, that this was a deliberate and planed strategy by something that had no resemblance to what was going to try and kill both of them.
Deep beneath the surface there was this plant life that covered numerous acres, it was a fungus plant life that needed to feed on living (human) tissue. Before it could begin its work of dissolving the tissue, it attacked their minds, sedating the victim and rendering then powerless. Maybe this looks something like this in one of the conversations Paul was having with a group of believers.

Paul: "Will you put up with a little foolish aside from me? Please, just for a moment. The thing that has me so upset is that I care about you so much—this is the passion of God burning inside me! I promised your hand in marriage to Christ, presented you as a pure virgin to her husband. And now I'm afraid that exactly as the Snake seduced Eve with his smooth patter, you are being lured away from the simple purity of your love for Christ.It seems that if someone shows up preaching quite another Jesus than we preached—different spirit, different message—you put up with him quite nicely."

I think Paul saw through the smoke screen here and was warning them and us that there are no other options to consider in knowing Freedom. The baited hook that was and is offered to us all as it was in this setting was an enlightenment, but hidden within it was the entrapment.

All the time, in this case with Mulder and Sculley the hallucinogenics from the spores from the mushrooms were working in giving then the illusion of being somewhere else, living their normal existence, but in fact they were being slowly dissolved by this fungus.
They both ended up escaping, but just barely.

Isn't it interesting that Satan can not stop the miracle of grace translating a person out of his kingdom into the realm of the Father, but it does not mean by a long shot that he simply rolls over and says, the hell with it!He is the hidden shape-shifter in us all, and until, (and this is a process), we come to see that even though rebirthed, we can still be very busy, according to our understanding, following hard after God, doing the stuff, whatever that might be. But maybe as in the episode I watched, the hallucinogens of religion working its work in us, gives us something tangible, measurable, what we think is really happening, but in fact we're going fast nowhere.

It was for this purpose that the Son of God was manifested in the flesh, that he might destroy the enemy's bewitching/beguiling works, or release us from the religious Matrix that wants to keep us trying, resorting to our efforts to please God, by trying just a bit harder.

Why is it so soon in most cases after a person has been rebirthed they end up sucked into something so far from reality? Maybe it is because we are trying to mix or blend this relationship with the Father with something that has nothing to do with Life.
The shape-shifter (Satan) hidden within our flesh is working through the hallucinogens of religion to keep us believing we are in fact pursuing and pleasing God.

Our enemy knows that there is only one thing that can shift and shape our being and that is the Love of the Father, and so he works with whatever it takes to keep the believer fixated on lies that will flatter the persons fleshly ego.

I love this quote from A.W. Tozer.."We are to a large degree the sum of our loves and we will of moral necessity grow into the image of what we love most; for love is among other things a creative affinity. It changes and molds and shapes and transforms. It is without doubt the most powerful agent affecting human nature next to the direct action of the Holy Spirit of God within the soul."

Rich