Bad News - Unmasked .

" Then Rabshakeh stood and called out in a loud voice in the language of Judah: “Hear the words of the great king, the king of Assyria!

Thus says the king: ‘Do not let Hezekiah deceive you, for he will not be able to deliver you. Do not let Hezekiah make you trust in the Lord by saying, “The Lord will surely deliver us. This city will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.”

 "Do not listen to Hezekiah. For thus says the king of Assyria: Make your peace with me and come out to me. Then each one of you will eat of his own vine, and each one of his own fig tree, and each one of you will drink the water of his own cistern,until I come and take you away to a land like your own land,a land of grain and wine,a land of bread and vineyards ". Isaiah 36: 13-17.

Everybody rejoices when they receive good news , but not so with bad news. Nobody likes to receive bad news 

Bad news always comes loaded with distressing information and evil intentions.
In my previous blog " Bad News : Whose Report would You Believe " ( on 16/03/2015 ) I wrote about how not to react to bad news .

Behind every bad news report there are many stages the news passed through before reaching the targeted audience. Chief amongst these stages are :

the "stars" of the news - these are the persons , the events , things or places about the main topics of the bad news; 

also there are the compilers , reporters, editors and producers of  bad news ;

and then there are the publishers / broadcasters who disseminate the bad news reports .

The compilers, editors , publishers and broadcasters have to work together for the bad news to reach its targeted audience.
If no bad news is gathered and complied , there will be nothing to publish ; if the bad news compiled is not published or disseminated , there will be no bad news received.
 In order to survive the evil effects of bad news, we should be aware of the proper way and how to REACT to bad news
What do we DO in order to triumph over the effects of bad news and not only triumphing over bad news , but retaining our victory over  it ?
 Some believe that all bad news should be rejected immediately and ignored by confessing that evil stuff has not happened, they have not receieved bad news and so they sweep all bad news under the carpet ! 
When we receive bad news, the ways NOT to react to bad news are by glossing over it or being in denial of the existence of  its contents, or by rebuking and quarreling with the bearer of the bad news .

Sometimes bad events happen even when people are not expecting them , thinking about them or confessing negative words about their situations.

Could people prevent bad news from landing on their door steps by stopping others from reporting any bad news to them, ever ? Such as, by warning the postman never to deliver mail with contents of bad news at their address or  by smacking the news reporters across their mouths to stop them from doing their normal duties which include the broadcasting of  long lists of BAD NEWS, every day ?!

We cannot pretend not to hear bad news , neither can we pick up quarrels with postmen or smack the mouths of reporters of bad news .

Do not shoot the messengers ; rip off the mask and identify their master whose bidding the bearers of bad news are doing . 

Knowing how best to react to bad news and identifying the source and the purpose or intention of the bad news received are most essential factors in surviving the devastating effects of bad news.
The first proper reaction to bad news is to identify the face behind the mask , that is to identify the creator and source of that bad news. Then rip off the masks to reveal the lies inside that bad news which are warring against the Lord's good report concerning your life.

When Judah and Israel were attacked by the Assyrians , Rabshakeh the Assyrian warlord and spokesman came and shouted about the bad news of the military might of the Assyrians and about the hopelessness of Judah's situation; in order for his listeners to be gripped with fear. Isaiah 36: 11- 22.

Rabshakeh blasphemed against the God of Israel by reminding King Hezekiah and all the people of Judah about the other nations which Assyrians had crushed and the  useless gods of those other nations which could not save them.

Enemies would always shout , from the tallest roof tops about the bad news concerning their victims; but they would never reveal the bad news in their own lives and in their own nations.
Rabshakeh told King Hezekiah and the the terrified people of Judah the bad news about their "weak,deceitful and King
"Beware lest Hezekiah mislead you by saying, “The Lord will deliver us.” 

Has any of the gods of the nations delivered his land out of the hand of the king of Assyria? Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim? Have they delivered Samaria out of my hand?

Who among all the gods of these lands have delivered their lands out of my hand, that the Lord should deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?’' Isaiah 36:18-20 .

But what Rabshakeh the Assyrian messenger of bad news never did was to shout about the good news that the gods of the other nations who the Assyrians had defeated in battle , the gods of Hamath and Arpad and the gods of Sepharvaim were impotent " little g " gods . Isaiah 37:16 -20.

The boastful Assyrians did not shout about this very important good news about the God of Israel ,which they must have heard before they attacked Israel and Judah.
 The awesome news that in all the earth , there is no other God like the Holy One of Israel .

The oppressing Assyrian invaders did not shout about the good news of the certainty of their own impending defeat and their destruction by the God of Israel whose name the Assyrians blasphemed. 
They knew the same God had delivered His chosen people many times before by destroying greater invading nations than Assyria , to bring His people to where they were then.
  Jehovah is His name and He is the God who is mighty in battle , glorious in holiness and mighty to deliver !
The author of all bad news is our adversary, Satan, the enemy of our soul generating bad news with the evil intention of sowing doubts about the goodness of God; doubts  which could make any one  deny the goodness and mercy of God and to forget who they are in Christ and who God is.

"And Hezekiah received the letter from the hand of the messengers, and read it: and Hezekiah went up unto the house of the Lord, and spread it before the Lord ". Isaiah 37 : 14.

What is that bad news you have heard which is threatening your peace? 
The bad news is real, it is loud  and it is very bad ?!

 Is that bad news mocking your God , saying, " You see?
 How could your God allow this  to happen to you?!" 
 Where is your God ? He has abandoned you ! 

Surely this your evil situation proves there is no God any where to help you !"
 

 In order for oppressors  to succeed in controlling the lives of the oppressed, the oppressor must feed their victims constantly with massive doses of bad news packaged with the falsehood about them.

Satan and his invading army demand worship and recognition from human beings in order to claim his control over human lives.
This control would give Satan the free hand to reign and rule in human lives , in their bodies and souls, over their nations and to seize control of their earthly treasures .

Satan can only achieve his destructive agenda when he succeeds in making people forget God, deny God and make people to be ignorant of who God says they are.
  
"Like a sparrow in its flitting, like a swallow in its flying, a curse that is causeless does not alight ". Proverbs 26:2 ESV.

Satan and his agents are oppressors who strive to convince their victims that they are not good enough for anything , that nothing in their lives is working fine ,that they are doomed and destined for massive failures UNLESS the victims allow Satan to rule over them and manage their lives and their treasures for them . 
The source of all Bad News is Satan and his demonic spirits and they use demonic sons and daughters of men as their messengers. 
However without people's ignorance, Satan and his agents cannot succeed in destabilising them with bad news.
Sometimes, bad news reaching you could have even be caused by YOU allowing yourself to be used by the devil to cause bad news and to broadcast bad news about yourself , your family, your job , your nation , your race ,the government of your country and about everything concerning you.

When you do or say things which would cause problems for you and for other people , you will receive bad news and bad press , eventually.

Your chicken will surely return home to roost.

If you think you are scoring points by dishing out bad news free-of-charge concerning yourself , your family , your race and your

country; then you should not complain when other people help you to spread your self-proclaimed bad news after they have embellished your bad news with salt, spices and sugar to taste !

When people complain of getting constant bad press, complain of receiving insults and injustice from citizens of other countries , of being singled out for humiliation in foreign airports they should realise that these attacks of disrespect and bad news against them are the deserved rewards for the citizens of any country who do not love and respect each other and for citizens who see nothing wrong in being the first people to jump up and spread very degrading bad news, freely, to the world press ,on the internet , on newspapers pages, on TV and everywhere; running down their own country  to the hearing and viewing pleasure of every body who cares to listen to their self-destructive rantings!
People talk as if the same evils and the bad news in their countries are not happening even on a greater and worse dimension in other countries. But the smart citizens of some countries would rarely be the ones spread bad news to run down their own Fatherland by telling everybody what a terrible hell on earth their own countries are , about how "corrupt and useless " their government officials and elected leaders are and about how dishonest and selfish their fellow country men and women are .

Bad news is the weapon of Satan and his cohorts , used to destabilise lives and to make people deny the goodness of God in our lives.
The lies of the Devil are beamed daily into human minds as psychological warfare and spiritual attacks carried out by demonic spirits and demonic human beings.
The enemy comes only to steal, to kill and to destroy.
People should not help Satan and his agents to feed them with lies about who God is and what He has promised.   

When we recognise the agenda and the face behind the bad news, it loses its impact and credibility; it becomes just another lie from the Devil's arsenal of stale news and over-used "old hat ".

In the same way, unrelenting bad news reports of horrible, biased and misleading bad news have lost their credibility because people are no longer deceived .

They know that such mischievous news are disseminated in order for people to to be discouraged.

Good examples of how and why bad news reports are prepared and sent out is the fact that there are media groups whose official policy is to gather and broadcast very bad news only about selected peoples and places on earth.
People are amazed and disgusted that the deliberate and repetitive bad news reports by some media houses have become very boring and ridiculous.
 Such media groups nowadays sound like broken records by repeating the same bad news of "diseases, wars, corruption, poverty,100 children die every 3 minutes etc,etc!"; all the time about the same parts of the world.
People living in those parts of the world are asking when and where did they conduct the census and statistics to confirm the widespread death of children every 3 minutes and their other ridiculous bad news!
Such media groups are notorious for reporting bad news ONLY all the time, because their News Editorial board are aware that such bad news packed with selected photos and videos perpetuate the warped propaganda which states that "We are high up there and these people are down there below us; and that is where they belong forever !"
Also, such selective bad news sound good and console depressed people in their own society who in their misery are consoled when they see and hear bad news about the " hardships" of others ; even if such bad news are far from the truth of the matter. 
It feels good, doesn't it ; to think that you are better off than some people?
News reports from those media groups which are deliberately never reporting anything good about their targets but they are always quick to report bad news only are what they are.
They are deliberately packaged with derogatory bad news reports with the intention of perpetuating myths, and broadcasting stereotypical, false and degrading impressions of peoples of other races and countries as primitive peoples who are diseased, poor, ignorant, hungry, dying and dropping  dead "ne'er - do -wells " !.

Surely , such media houses should not be helped to do their unfair and biased broadcasts by receiving free tales of woe from the very same people whom they have chosen as objects of constant ridicule in their unrelenting bad news" .
Thanks be to God because Satan can deceive some of the  people, some of the time ; but he cannot deceive all of the people all the time. 

Most people nowadays are aware that pictures , videos and news reports do lie and could be manipulated to project lies.

People know that the policy of reporting bad news only about targeted person and places, is "old hat" propaganda.

The facts are that it is as preposterous as it is impossible that bad news only happen in some parts of the world where nothing good ever happens . 
Also, it is ridiculous to suggest that there are countries on earth which are "Eldorado", where the grass is always green and their lives are always rosy!

Just as some human beings take great delight in broadcasting bad news ONLY about selected peoples and places on earth ; in the same way , Satan attempts to distort people's perception of who they are and who God is ; in order to achieve his evil agenda on earth.
When Satan and his agents of bad news come calling, be aware of the face behind the facade. 

It is the face of the Liar and the father of all lies.

 When Satan attacks us with bad news which paints distorted and ugly images of all what we hold dear; bad news about all what the Truth has assured us is good , glorious and beautiful in our lives; who and where is our confidence and our refuge ? 
The Truth we know about our God and about who God says we are, becomes our defence against the destabilising lies of the enemy.
What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? Romans 8: 31,32

Unmask the facade of lies in those bad news and enforce the truth about the mercy of God in that situation. 
 The Truth says our God reigns in all our situations .

Yes ,the news could be BAD indeed , but our God is aware of it and He is in control of all its messiness and "badness" . Isaiah 37: 33 - 38 .
Reject the Devil, the father of all liars with his over-used lies. 

Take the devil by the nose and show him the door . 
We are more than conquerors through Christ who strengthens us.