HALIFAX, Nova Scotia, April 27, 2025 – I wrote earlier about how God blesses those who look after his children. They don’t even have to be believers, those people; they just have to do right by us. The people who do God’s will without realizing they’re doing God’s will are immensely rewarded for good, both in this life and in the next. This is how important it is to do right by God’s children.

But what I’m writing about today is the other kind of people – the ones who purposely harm God’s children. If you’re born-again, you know what I’m talking about. I don’t mean the people God permits to come into our lives and hassle us to a certain degree by following us around and demanding our attention. Jesus had to deal with those people, as did the disciples, and as do we, if we’re genuinely born-again. It’s part of our job to learn how to deal with them. But they’re not what I’m writing about today.

Today I’m writing about the people who purposely target and work against us, aiming to bring us down spiritually. For their efforts, they earn an entirely different type of reward than those who either consciously or consciously help us. By “purposely target and work against us”, I mean people like Judas Iscariot or Herod or the temple elders and chief priests who conspired to kill Jesus. I mean satanists and witches. I mean the powers-that-be in secret and not-so-secret societies. That’s the level of nasty I’m talking about.  If we don’t have fake friends (“frenemies”) and outright enemies like these in our lives already, we will some day; that’s a guarantee. It’s actually a badge of honor to be targeted by these people. It means our witness is perceived as a threat to Satan’s plans.

And how should we interact with our own personal Judases? We should treat them the way Jesus treated Judas Iscariot – just like everyone else. Even though they target us while feigning to be friendly, we should never target them (except with prayers, in private). We should never “out” them. We should never attack them. We should never condemn them. They’re already condemning themselves by their choices, so there’s no point in our doing it: “Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord; I will repay.”

Our own personal Judases require an especially light touch and certain kindnesses that God will direct us to extend. We should never be spiritually color-blind to our Judases by pretending they aren’t what they are, but we should also never be hostile to them. We’re being tested on how we treat them, once we know who and what they are. For explicit details on how to treat your frenemies, refer to Jesus’ treatment of Judas Iscariot. That’s our gold standard.

As for how to interact with our own personal temple elders and chief priests – well, that’s a whole different kettle of fish. Jesus never held back on them, and neither should we. But at the same time, Jesus didn’t go looking for a fight; he only ever defended his position when the fight came to him. He never went on the attack. If they accused him of something, he unraveled their lies. If they baited him, he refused to bite.

With our own personal temple elders and chief priests, as with our own personal Judases, we need to follow Jesus’ example to the letter. That means we defend our position when we’re attacked, we set the record straight when we’re falsely accused, but we never – NEVER – start the fight. Call them out for the hypocrites they are, certainly, like Jesus did, but for educational purposes only. We need to know who our enemies are. They need to be identified.

Like our Judases, our own personal temple elders and chief priests come into our lives as tests. They’re being used to measure our response to provocations, so we’d better respond appropriately. By “appropriately”, I mean the way God wants us to respond. I mean the way Jesus responded. That doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to be polite or even on the level with them. Jesus on many an occasion famously breached the line between civility and hostility with his tormentors, even getting called out for it by the assorted powers-that-be, but he didn’t dial it back. He didn’t allow them to silence him or even to lower his voice. Sometimes, when it’s called for, and with God’s approval and guidance, ya gotta let loose, ya gotta call a spade a spade, even while holding your own cards close to your chest. In this, as in everything, Jesus is our example.

The world is a spiritually hostile environment for born-again believers. We can’t sugar-coat that reality and we’re not meant to sugar-coat it. Even in the worldly church we have more enemies and frenemies than friends. Still, God protects us constantly and powerfully, which is part and parcel of being born-again. Everyone is under God’s protection to a certain extent, but we’re especially protected not only because we’re God’s children but because we need the extra protection while we’re still here on Earth. We’re constantly being targeted, and if it weren’t for God surrounding us like an impenetrable spiritual firewall, we wouldn’t survive a minute. Jesus could only survive as long as he did because God was so powerfully with him, protecting him like a 24-hour highly trained elite security detail that no-one and nothing could get past. We have the same security detail surrounding us, if we’re genuinely born again, because if we are genuinely born-again, we need the protection.

I’m sending out this guidance for born-again believers, not the general public or people in the worldly church who are not genuinely born-again. This is not and never was an evangelical outreach site. We, the prophesied remnant, are a set-aside people, a peculiar people – a spiritually targeted people – and we need to look out for each other. That’s what this blog aims to do.

We’re surrounded by people who hate us, mock us, smile to our faces and then tear us down behind our back. We are despised, misunderstood, loathed, pitied, shunned, and that by our frenemies. Our enemies just want us spiritually dead.

Don’t respond to them like the world responds. Love your enemies and frenemies even as you see them for what they are. Pray for the ones God guides you to pray for and bless the ones God guides to bless, but leave the rest alone. They’re not our business. Our whole business and full job description is “Do God’s Will”, like it was for Jesus during his ministry years.

As for those who are not born-again but still help us in ways God enables them to help us, they will be generously, generously blessed.