In the Bible, in the Book of Revelation Chapter 18 and verse 23, we are told, "… for by thy sorceries (drugs) were all nations deceived."

The Biblical word for sorceries comes from the Greek word, phar-ma-kia, which in today's English would be translated as drugs.

Drugs are a topic we are hearing more and more of as we are about to enter into the 21st Century. But the word "drugs" often means different things to different people.

If you were to ask many people, "What is a drug?" you would probably receive a variety of answers. Some might answer that drugs are harmful, addictive, substances such as alcohol, nicotine, cocaine, marijuana, or the like. Others might say drugs are good substances that doctors prescribe and that can be purchased in a drug store that are supposed to take away our physical problems, such as headaches, high blood pressure, etc.

But for most people, the word "drugs" has a negative connotation. Public opinion polls show that a large percentage of Americans cite drugs as one of the most destructive problems facing our country today. Strangely enough, it is not uncommon for people to discuss the terrible influence of drugs on our society as they gather for coffee, light up a cigarette, pick up a prescription or bring home some colas for their children.

Sadly, drugs have become such a pervasive influence in our society today that most Americans take drugs every day, and many do not even realize they are addicted to drugs. So, we need to ask, what is a DRUG anyway?  As we turn to Webster's Dictionary, we find several definitions: "A substance used in ... chemical operations; a substance used as a medicine ... a substance other than food intended to affect the structure or function of the body... a substance that causes addiction."

Most people think in terms of "good drugs" and "bad drugs," but after further analysis we will see that all drugs have a negative impact on the human body. All drugs could be divided into three categories, based on their intended purpose and their level of social acceptability. As we do, we will see there are fine lines separating these three wide-ranging categories, and that all drugs are sorceries by which our nation has been badly deceived. These categories include:

1. Drugs used for intoxication. Most of these are illegal and not socially accepted. Alcohol is a notable exception because it is a legal intoxicant that is taxed, encouraged by advertising and socially accepted in many circles.
    
2. A second category could be called "grocery store drugs" because these drugs have become so much a part of our diet that many people view them as food items. They can be purchased at any supermarket or convenience store in America. These include tobacco products (with the addictive drug nicotine), coffee, colas and chocolate (which contain the addictive drug caffeine), and processed sugar, which is an addictive drug that can have very powerful affects on mood swings from hyperactivity to depression. (See page 8 for more on sugar.)
    
3. A third category would be medical drugs, which are supposed to relieve physical symptoms or help us to achieve a desired effect. There are thousands of drugs on the market available to treat practically every disease and disorder you can think of. And of course, we have diet pills (drugs) to help us lose weight, sleeping pills (drugs) to help us sleep, stimulants (drugs) to keep us awake, and antidepressants (drugs) that are supposed to put us in such a stupor that none of this will ever bother us again. There are new ones on the market every year. Some of these drugs are prescribed by doctors and others can be bought over the counter. When we include colas, coffee, prescriptions, over-the-counter medications and painkillers, it would be shocking for most Americans to do an honest count of how many different drugs they consume.

Dividing drugs into different categories can allow many people to justify their drugs as "good," while they label other drugs as "bad." But under careful analysis, these three categories break down, as does the distinction between "good" and "bad" drugs. Any doctor or hard-core drug addict can tell you that many drugs prescribed by the medical profession are among the most powerful forms of intoxication and mood altering that can be found anywhere. It is not uncommon to become addicted or suffer severe side-effects, or even death, from drugs prescribed by a physician. Dozens of medical drugs -- ranging from painkillers such as morphine and Demerol to stimulants ("speed") and antidepressants ("downers") -- are sold on the street as illegal drugs. Is it "bad" when drug addicts are buying morphine on the street from drug dealers, but "good" when other people are having the same drug prescribed to them by medical doctors? And is it "bad" when addicts buy amphetamines (speed) on the street, but "good" when people who may be equally addicted acquire their stimulants by prescription or from coffee and colas?

And speaking of addiction, U.S. government studies have found cigarettes are six times as addictive as heroine. (That means that a heroine addict is six times more likely to be able to quit that drug than a smoker is able to kick the cigarette habit.) The cigarette industry is one of several examples of how merchants with a financial motive have the power to  lead millions of people to become addicted to their drug, which practically guarantees the sellers of that drug will have a "repeat customer" for life. Cigarettes were once handed out for free. Our government cooperated by allowing free cigarettes to be part of the G.I. rations in World War II. That's not allowed any more, but pharmaceutical companies use the same strategy today by giving free samples of their drugs to medical doctors to dispense to their patients. (They also give financial incentives to doctors who prescribe their drugs.)

And what about the morality of a company that gets pre-schoolers to identify with a cartoon figure like Joe Camel? Or the logic of a drink with a whole paragraph of artificial chemical ingredients being called "The Real Thing?" Most colas have more caffeine than coffee and up to 11 teaspoons of sugar. When merchants market a drink containing a stimulant such as caffeine, known to be an addictive drug, along with sugar that rots our teeth and robs calcium from our bones, we are being deceived even by calling this a "soft drink." How many people have even considered how outrageous it is to call something "soft" when it rots our teeth, destroys our immune system and is addictive? I have even seen young mothers putting cola into baby bottles for their infants! We are being deceived if we believe a product is safe just because it is advertised on television, endorsed by a famous star or prescribed by a physician.

Whether we are talking about illegal hard-core drugs, alcohol, tobacco, colas or pharmaceuticals, some of the most underhanded methods ever seen are used to get people to try drugs. From the cocaine cartels in Colombia to ad agencies and lobbyists in the halls of our U.S. Congress, merchants who profit from the sale of drugs are backed by some of the most powerful and manipulative forces in the human race. Drugs are big business, so powerful and manipulative organizations are necessary to ensure the profits of these merchants continue to grow.

What does the Bible say about these merchants and their deceptions? We began with a brief excerpt from Revelation 18:23. The Book of Revelation was written around A.D. 96, long before the modern era of Colombian drug cartels, multi-national corporations along with their slick ad agencies and Congressional lobbyists, but Chapter 18 contains several references to the "merchants of the earth who are waxed rich through the abundance of her delicacies." (18:3). Revelation 18:23 clearly states that it is the "merchants" who have led all nations to be deceived: "And the light of a candle shall shine no more at all in thee; and the voice of the bridegroom and of the bride shall be heard no more at all in thee: for thy merchants were the great men of the earth; for by thy sorceries (drugs) were all nations deceived."

So, how badly have we been deceived by these merchants and their drugs? An overwhelming majority of Americans agree that illegal drugs are bad, and most would now also say the same about alcohol and tobacco. And we are gradually becoming more educated about the evils of caffeine and sugar.

But drugs prescribed by a medical doctor continue to have an aura of respectability. After all, they are approved, prescribed and dispensed by the medical profession for the public's well-being. So, there are millions of Americans who have the good sense to avoid intoxicants (legal or otherwise), and who are smart enough to not smoke cigarettes, and who may even avoid colas and candy bars... but they still think they are safe in going the drug route as long as it is prescribed by their physician! Yet, even these people have been deceived by drug-selling merchants!

The front page of the January 9, 1995 issue of U.S. News and World Report in big, bold letters proclaimed "DRUG ALERT!"  With the following in less bold print: "What your doctor may not know: The undisclosed side effects of some prescription drugs could hurt or even kill you."  Inside this magazine on page 50 we read "2 million hospitalized and 140,000 die each year from prescription drugs."

In a front page story in USA TODAY under a bold heading "Prescribing Harm," we read: "37% of people older than 60 are taking five or more drugs and 19% seven or more... Among older patients given three or more prescriptions upon leaving a hospital, 88% had one or more problems; of those, 22% suffered potentially serious or life-threatening problems."

"The disturbing message," says Dr. David Himmelstein, of Harvard Medical School, is that 25% of the USA's elderly are getting "drugs that are likely to do them more harm than good." The USA Today article also quotes Dr. Sidney Wolfe of Public Citizen Health Research Group as saying "young and old are being given the wrong doses and the wrong combinations." The article adds: "16,000 car crashes a year are due to adverse (drug) reactions... 61,000 people suffer drug-induced Parkinson's symptoms... 41,000 people a year are hospitalized for ulcers caused by drugs …" The article provides many more incredible statistics describing the devastating side effects from drugs prescribed by doctors. 

As we turn from these horrible headlines at the close of the 20th Century, let's go back to the Bible, God's instructional manual for mankind. It is written "for I am fearfully and wonderfully made…" (Psalm 139:14).  As we turn to the very first verse of the Bible we read: "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth." (Genesis 1:1). Then follows the six days of creation culminating in Genesis 2:7 where  we read: "And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul." God then placed this wonderful creation in a beautiful garden.

As we look back to the beginning, back to God's creation of mankind, and Back to the Garden, where God placed that original couple, we see that God gave instructions as to what should be used for nourishment to sustain the human body in perfect health. And what did God say? He said that only raw fruits and vegetables are to be our food! (See Genesis 1:29.)

We find no drugs in the Garden or in the entire book of Genesis, which covers nearly the first 2,000 years of human history. In fact, it isn't until we get into the New Testament, some 4,000 years after creation that we find the first mention of a physician:  "And a certain woman, which had an issue of blood twelve years, and had suffered many things of many physicians, and had spent all that she had, and was nothing better, but rather grew worse." (Mark 5:25-26).

As we look at all the physical problems mankind is experiencing today, it is obvious something terrible has happened between the time of creation and this present day. The basic problem is that the wisdom of God has been replaced by the "wisdom" of man. Man thinks he is smarter and knows more than God. Nowhere is the ignorance and foolishness of man more obvious than in the area of what we should and should not put into our bodies to maintain this beautiful temple God has given each of us. In our ignorance we are taking better care of our automobiles than we are our body/temple.

Because man has thought himself smarter than God, and replaced God's wisdom with his own, man is experiencing ever more rapid physical deterioration, agony and early death. 

I contend this is all happening because man has replaced God's wisdom with his own wisdom. The Bible states in I Corinthians 3:19 "For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God."  Sadly, the Christian community is just as guilty of turning its back on God's wisdom as the rest of the world. The Christian community has been so programmed by the world's wisdom concerning the physical body that even preachers and most Christians often have great difficulty accepting God's way of caring for our body/temple.

As we look at the human body, we see a very complex piece of living machinery, with many systems -- the digestive system, the circulatory system, the lymphatic system, the endocrine system, the elimination system, just to name a few -- all designed to work in perfection according to God's design.  These beautiful body/temples can only function properly when provided with the proper building materials within a non-toxic environment. And the only substances God designed to be placed in these beautiful body/ temples of ours are raw fruits and vegetables, pure water, fresh air and sunshine! That's it!  Anything else put in our body is a toxic (poisonous) substance, contrary to God's plan and will usually produce physical problems.

Sickness is clearly not God's plan for man. "Beloved, I wish above all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health, even as thy soul prospereth." (III John 2).  Many believe we get sick because of sin or because of old age, or because we inherited it, or that a germ, virus or bacteria chose us as its victim.  But in most instances, this just isn't so. We get sick and experience physical breakdowns because we put things into our bodies that God never designed these bodies to consume. And that is where we take up our subject for this treatise -- Drugs: A Killer of Mankind!

Earlier we read in Webster's Dictionary that a drug "is a substance other than food... that affects the structure or function of the body." God designed these beautiful body/ temples with a genetic blueprint, DNA and RNA, that recognizes only raw food as nourishment, and anything else as a toxic substance. Our body is an incredibly unique chemical plant created by God that operates on electrical impulses and reacts chemically to all that enters. Everything we consume must be dealt with by the body either as nourishment to help rebuild our living cells or as a harmful, foreign substance that must be neutralized and expelled. 

Sickness and disease are actually the body's efforts to deal with the toxic substances we have placed within them.  A cold is the body's effort to discharge toxins. A fever is the body's effort to burn up poisons. Plaque build-up in the arteries and tumors are an effort by the body to encapsulate and rid itself of toxic substances. A headache is the body's warning device telling us there is a problem inside. Diarrhea and vomiting are efforts to rapidly remove poisons... And on and on we could go. These symptoms are the body's reaction to us consuming harmful substances. We must realize the symptom is not the problem -- it is the body's effort to deal with the problem.

What is the solution? We can take two approaches: We can accept God's way by eliminating from our diet that which created the physical problem and begin nourishing our body with the foods God originally intended for us to consume, thus facilitating our body's ability of self-healing. Or we can go the world's way and take a drug to suppress the symptom.  What the drug does is cause a chemical reaction within the body that will dry up the runny nose, for instance, or take away the fever or headache. But the drug taken to create this chemical reaction is another toxic substance that only further complicates the problem because now the body has to deal with even more poison!  All drugs are toxic to the system and create new problems!  The solution to our physical problems is not more pollution! 

Every drug is liver toxic, even an aspirin! Every drug causes a new problem for which another drug is often necessary to relieve the symptoms of the previous drug. The taking of drugs places a person on a vicious downhill spiral that will create ever more physical problems and ultimately end in an early demise.

In a recent issue of Reader's Digest, there were seven double-page ads for different drugs. Each of these ads pictured a happy person and the text told how this particular drug would relieve some symptom they were experiencing. Yet as you turn the page over, on the back side of the beautiful two-page color spread, you find in very small type in black ink on white paper the adverse potential side-effects that can be experienced if a person uses that particular drug. This is known as a "disclaimer."  Thus, if you take their drug and get sick, develop cancer, destroy your liver or die, they can use this as a protection against lawsuits, saying, "See, we warned you." This type of disclaimer is also found on cigarettes and alcohol containers. And a person with cancer has to sign a paper saying that they will hold the medical doctor or hospital guiltless if the chemotherapy (drug) makes them sicker, causes their hair to fall out, destroys their immune system or causes their death.

The whole approach of the medical community is wrong when it comes to using drugs and other harmful treatments (radiation, chemotherapy, etc.) to deal with disease. They are always talking about cures and treatments for specific symptoms but they will never find a way to cure disease through the use of drugs!

The medical community cannot find a cure for our physical ills no matter how much money or time they spend searching for a cure. Man has been searching for cures for his physical ills for ages. Yet to this very day, in this enlightened age with all of the scientific laboratories and financing, they have yet to find a cure for even a common cold. Where is the cure for constipation? For indigestion?  For pimples? To say nothing of cancer, arthritis, diabetes, heart disease or AIDS. 

The medical and scientific community tells us they are working on a cure and if we will give them ever more money for research, they will eventually find a cure for everything that ails us.  My friend, they will never find a cure, because there is no drug or treatment that can heal our bodies of anything! We have been taught from childhood that when we get sick, we need to get a treatment for the disease, disorder or symptom. What we fail to understand is that before we can heal or get well, we must remove that which is causing the physical problem!

Knowledge is the greatest need in this "dark age" of ignorance in which we find ourselves. We need knowledge as to how God made us... knowledge as to the nature and purpose of disease... knowledge of how to live and nourish these physical bodies so they will not break down and get sick... knowledge of the truth about life! This is the crying need of our day, and until we turn back to the God who made us and the guide book (Bible) God has given us, and start taking care of our body/ temple the way God intended, we will continue to walk in darkness and get sicker and sicker.

Medical treatments must be replaced by education about healthy diet and lifestyle!  Doctors must stop offering costly cures that do not cure and taking the money from people for that which does not make them well. The frenzied search for cures must cease! Drugs, radiation and surgeries only create new problems.

We are dealing with more than just the drugs of the medical profession. We are suffering from the drug effects that come from cigarettes, alcohol, soft drinks, coffee and more. The nicotine, alcohol and caffeine in these products also create monumental problems in the body. And there are other toxic substances that man is putting into his body that are usually not even recognized as drugs.  Sugar is one of the worst of these drugs, a toxic substance that destroys our immune system.  Click here to read Michael Dye's article for incredible information on the harmful, drugging effects of sugar.

Any substance we consume must be dealt with by the body either as nourishment or as a toxic substance. Even cooked food has a drugging effect upon the body because the life-force (enzymes) have been destroyed by the heat, thus our living body does not recognize the dead, devitalized, cooked food as nourishment. It is interesting to note that a person's white blood cell count will not rise when raw foods are placed within the body, yet will increase when that same food, only cooked, is placed within the body. And we know that a rise in the white blood cell count is an indication that the body is doing battle with a toxic substance.

What is the answer?  Here at Hallelujah Acres, we teach that all we need to do to be well and maintain perfect health is  nourish our bodies with living food according to God's plan. We have found that when we live and nourish these physical bodies the way God designed, that physical problems almost always simply go away and that we never experience sickness again. Twenty years ago, when I changed from the typical American Diet and lifestyle to nourishing my body God's Way, all physical problems simply disappeared in less than one year and I have lived free of any physical problems ever since. And my experience is not unique!  We have thousand upon thousands of testimonials from people who have written or called to tell us how they too had a similar experience. 

Please America, and especially the Christian community, turn back to the God who made us and his ways before it is too late!

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