I want to talk to about something that’s been the heart behind what I do. My goal for Cosplay For Christ is to encourage and strengthen the Christians that are in the cosplay community. I know a lot of non-Christians follow me or interact with my content, which I love!! I love that you guys are here and coming along the ride with me as well. I just wanted to give a warning and a promise to the Creative Christians that are out there. This is for the Christians doing the the creative things that God has put in your heart.

Hebrews 3:13 says, “exhort one another daily while it’s called today, lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.”

I want to talk about the deceitfulness of sin in our culture today. In our society, the Christian culture is different than the worldly culture. Something happens though while we’re in the creative world if we are not firmly rooted in the Word of God. When we are surrounded by people who are non-believers, sometimes instead of us being able to influence them in a positive way, encourage them, or to lead them to Christ, we sometimes can get pulled into sin ourselves. Another way to put it, we can go more dark than we go light. We can start to drift of course and fade slightly to the right or the left (and that’s not political don’t get me started on that!) What it is though, is this spiritual drifting. We get complacent. We just don’t read our Bible as much or we’re not praying to God as we used to or we start to agree with sinful behaviors or thoughts. It’s a slow little separation away from God. What the deceitfulness of sin is, is that there’s an allure, there is an argument, there is a narrative that would say the things of the world are not that bad.

What the deceitfulness of sin is, is that there’s an allure, there is an argument, there is a narrative that would say the things of the world are not that bad.

We’re drifting. Sometimes we can be drifting and we don’t even know it. I envision a little snake whispering in our mind… “Oh, did God really say this”?… and the seed of doubt that comes in with that thought. It can come in the form of empathy. We have empathy for our fellow believers and non-believers in Christ. When people are struggling and people are hurting, we feel what they’re feeling and we want to help them. That is a normal and God-given emotion! But the problem is when we try to do things in our own way, in our own method, in our own understanding of help, instead of directing them to God, a lot of times things can get skewed and we are trying to find worldly solutions that harm them instead of helping. The Bible says to renew your mind which is talking about putting your mind back in alignment with Christ at the center of it. Instead of getting your advice from TikTok theologians or your buddy down the road who may have OK advice, if it’s not Godly, if it’s not biblical, if it’s not straight from the word of God and align with His ways, they are not going to get the real help they need.

Romans 12:2

² And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.

The Holy Spirit will reveal to you His truth through the word of God. That’s why reading your Bible and praying every day, is so important to knowing and identifying what God says is good and acceptable. For me, I love in the morning spending time in the word of God and praying because that resets my mind. It sets my thoughts on Christ and how I go about my day. Now I’m not perfect and I will derail here and there when things come up. But the most part is that I’m trying to view everything that I do through the lens of what Jesus showed us and told us to do.

I’ll just say this about the current state of events going on in our world. I think social media can be a good tool to use, but right now, social media is being used against us to divide us. I’ve seen so much vitriol and hate coming out of the social media world, but when I go outside, it’s not really equivalent to what I’m actually seeing. I feel like there’s a lot of division being purposely put on us to drive us to emotional responses of things. You have to take a step back, look at the bigger picture. Who benefits from manipulating people and their emotions? Who benefits from dividing the the people and pitting each other against each other? Does that sound like something that is Godly or does that sound like something that is ungodly? It’s ungodly! Division is ungodly when it’s pitting people against each other, dehumanizing them and driving people to hate each other or to acts of violence. None of that is good, and I don’t care what side the aisle you land on. If we can’t have conversations with people without being so emotionally distraught, that all they feel like they can do is yell and scream and hurt, then we’ve lost. We’ve lost it. We as Christians have to be better than that. If you are thinking of typing something trollish, super salty or if you’re thinking about being a keyboard warrior on someone’s page to show them that you’re right, I would tell you to stop. For all our sakes and for your witness, you are doing more harm than good. If you don’t have a relationship with people and you’re commenting on their pages, please stop, just stop. If you do have a relationship with that person, give them a call if you are really upset about a post, maybe hide their feed for a while or even just step back and pray for them.

We’ve lost it. We as Christians have to be better than that. If you are thinking of typing something trollish, super salty or if you’re thinking about being a keyboard warrior on someone’s page to show them that you’re right, I would tell you to stop. For all our sakes and for your witness, you are doing more harm than good.

That’s the drift though. Satan wants to get us so wound up, get us triggered, more emotional, more invested in dividing the sides left to right, right to left that we don’t even see the damage we are doing. It’s so Satanic. And what we love to do as these bad world events, personal events or even the social media feeds are occurring is pick which sin is greater. They can both and all be bad and you don’t have to pick which one is worse. I’m kind of sick of seeing the deflection or the redirection of comments. Guys, it’s all bad and we all think our side is right. But unless we’re on God’s side, we’re all wrong. We are all broken and we all got issues and we all need a Savior.

Guys, it’s all bad and we all think our side is right. But unless we’re on God’s side, we’re all wrong.

So going back to the scripture, “but exhort each one daily while it’s called today.” I encourage you to smile, to encourage someone today that needs to be told and shown the good that is in us, which is Jesus Christ. The Holy Spirit through us, can show people His love, and His kindness. We can be His hands and feet. So don’t harden your heart. If your heart has started hardening, or you have become apathetic, or even kind of nihilistic in your ways of thinking, Christian! Christian, there is hope! We have hope in Christ! Jesus is our hope and He will give us perfect peace for those whose minds are steadfast because we trust in Him. We have to trust in Christ and He will give us that peace. He will give us the joy, the hope that’s overflowing, because we are putting our daily tasks, our daily lives, our daily thoughts towards Him. And even though the bad is still there, we can still get through it because we know that we have that hope in Christ, that at the end of the day, God is with us, God is for us, God will not forsake us. He has given us every tool we need to walk in the Godly gifts that He has given us, to walk in a godly life.

2nd Peter 1-3 says, by the divine power, God has given us everything we need for living a godly life. So when we look to the word of God, we can see what that godly life looks like. And when we fall astray from it, we just need to repent, ask God to forgive us for the derailment of our track, and get back on and keep doing the work that God’s called you to do.

That’s it guys. I just wanted to encourage you guys to keep doing the good. Keep doing it. Keep walking in the faith and keep going. It’s worth it. It’s worth the struggle. It’s worth the conflict. And at the end of it, God will reward you for your faithfulness. So be blessed. Know who you are in Christ. And remember, take that ground for the Kingdom!