It has been well documented that Christianity is the most persecuted religion in the world. Open Doors International has all the statistics showing how the lives of Christians in countries like North Korea, Nigeria and several Muslim majority nations are under constant threat. However, in Western countries like here in the United States, there's a different kind of persecution taking place. They're the same "spiritual forces of evil" at work, but under the guise of political, legal and cultural challenges. Dr. James Spencer, President of the D.L. Moody Center, warns that we are now living out George Orwell's 1984. That Christians in the West are being controlled not by external forces, but by being lulled into accepting ideas that are in fact counter to God, not by conscious choice but by the slow "reorientation of one's beliefs". Those that resist, like Jack Philips the cake baker, and the Mid-Vermont Christian School, or little Lydia Booth who just wanted to tell her classmates about Jesus, they've become the problem. On this episode of Lighthouse Faith podcast, Dr. Spencer talks about his book "Christian Resistance: Learning to Defy the World and Follow Christ." He brings up Orwell's 1984 because a big part of the subversion of real Christianity in the culture is how Big Brother seeks to control language. And we certainly see this in the transgender movement's obsession with pronouns. It also helps explain why a politician who calls himself a devout Catholic could advocate for abortion on demand. Resistance takes effort. But more than that, it takes knowledge of what you're up against.

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