Deception and Truth

Many years ago I was involved in a deliverance ministry, whoes primary purpose was to deliver Christians from demonization and to set them free from the chains that Satan uses to Bind them with. I was involved, through the ministry in a type of bible college, as it where, with a heavy emphasis on the actual practical aspects of the whole deliverance side of things. As the course progressed, after about a month I started to notice a lot of both the teachers and the students in constant fear of Satan, fear of what he could do, fear of being “contaminated” by him and by demons, so much fear.

I looked at the fear that was being displayed and thought it all rather strange and contrarty to what scripture teachers in terms of fear, that:

a. We are Sons of God and not to fall back into fear

b. We have not got a spirit of fear, but God’s Spirit which is Power, love and self control

c. God is on my side so I don’t have to fear

d. God’s perfect love caasts out fear 1 jn 4:18

So knowing that something was rotten in the state of Denmark I started to seek the Lord in prayer for the answer to what was going on. God interrupted me, one night with a question, the question was this: “What is the only power that Satan has over a Christian?” Honestly at the time I actually didn’t know and I responded to the Lord “I am really not sure,” The lords response was this “The only pwer that Satan has over a Christian, is deception”.

Being someone who required scriptural confirmation (which we will talk about today), I received a scripture in:

(ESV)

31 So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed him, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, 32 and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”

If Jesus was saying that the Jews would be free through knowing the truth then obviously they were now walking in deception, that is what was keeping them in bondage, and that, being deception is Satan’s primary weapon of choice.

So here in we see the outcome of deception which equals bondage and the outcome of truth which equals liberation and freedom.

Today I want to talk to you about deception, how Satan uses it to keep us in bondage, and truth, what truth is and isn’t and how it relates to the Authority of the word of God. The reason this is on my heart to talk to you about this is because of the current ideological, and societal context that we are in, and because of the direction that biblical prophecy points in.

So we see here that the primary source of deception is Satan, in fact deception is not simply a tool that Satan uses it is actually at the very core of his being. Jesus, in , said that when Satan lied, he was simply doing what was natural to him, because that is what he is, he actually is a liar, in a sense he cannot help himself because deception is at the very core of his being. In a sense its very much like a sinner, outside of Christ, they sin because that is what their nature demands of them and they have no other nature to help them to overcome that essence of sin. Fallen man however can be redeemed and transformed through the blood and Authority of Jesus Christ, there is no such transformation for Satan. His die, as they say, is well and truly cast.

In fact if you look up the following scriptures you will see that when Satan is spoken of in his interaction with mankind, he is associated with two Greek verbs planao and exapatao.

2 Corinthinas 11:3

Now to understand both words of course is important, however the word planao is of particular importance to understand, as we shall soon see, and actually features in a great deal of Jesus teachings, particularly, interestingly, on the end times, so I would suggest today as I go through this teaching that you take out a piece of paper and pen and start to write down some of the scriptures I am going to give you and some of the definitions.

2. Defining truth

Now if we are going to talk about deception, we need to not only look at its source, which is Satan, but we also need to understand how Satan uses deception, i.e. what is his MO or modus Operendi, but before we do that, it would be a good idea to define truth.

It is important that we allow the scriptures to define for us what the truth is. Before jumping in and looking at the biblical definition of Truth, I want to share with you what I believe to be a good “working” definition of truth.

Truth is that which corresponds to reality.

That definition is extremely helpful, because the truth which ultimately is Christ Himself is that which corresponds to the reality of God, His kingdom and His work. Everything else that is peripheral to that is merely shadow.

You see Truth is not a thing or a feeling or an idea or a philosophy or a simple thought, these things may convey truth, but the truth is a person, an objective person. In other words, all reality corresponds to God, so when Jesus was saying I am the Truth, He was saying that all the reality of God, and ultimately of all things, seen and unseen have their source in me. That is why Paul says that the fullness dwells in Him. It is why Paul Places Jesus at the very epicentre of the entire created order, both spiritual and physical in his wonderful doxology.

(ESV)

15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. 16 For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. 17 And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. 18 And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. 19 For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, 20 and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.

So just as Satan is the source of Deception, Jesus is the source of all truth. Now the Scripture not only describes Jesus as being the truth, but it also states that the Spirit is the truth, and of equal status the word of God is also described as the truth.

(ESV)

17 Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth.

(ESV)

5 because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. Of this you have heard before in the word of the truth, the gospel,

(ESV)

15 Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth. 16 But avoid irreverent babble, for it will lead people into more and more ungodliness,

3. The Word of God as truth

Before I move on I want to camp a little bit on the word of God, as truth. This will become relevant when we move on to how Satan uses deception against the Christian.

There seems to be a misconception by many Christians regarding Jesus views on the scriptures as expressed in . Lets read

(ESV)

38 and you do not have his word abiding in you, for you do not believe the one whom he has sent. 39 You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, 40 yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life.

Many Christians seem to think that because Jesus was saying that the He, rather than the scriptures, contain life therefore the scriptures have become irrelevant. However Jesus was not subordinating the word of God, what Jesus was doing was defining its function. This does not make the scriptures irrelevant, it simply states that this is what the Scriptures are for, He was correcting the false assumptions they had made about the scriptures.

Jesus, Himself, still held the word of God in very high regard:

a. Jesus affirmed the divine authority of the Old Testament. Jesus used the term “It is written 90 times”.

b. Jesus rested on the Authority of the Old testament when confronting Satan , , .

c. Jesus affirmed the imperishability of the word of God. -17

d. Jesus affirmed the Old Testament to be inspired.

e. Jesus affirmed that the Bible is unbreakable.

f. Jesus affirmed the Old testament as the Word of God ,

g. Jesus ascribed ultimate supremacy to the Old Testament , .

h. Jesus affirmed the inerrancy of the Old Testament

If this is the attitude that Jesus, our Lord and Master, had towards the Word of God, then shouldn’t we have the same attitude as Jesus regarding the Scripture?

It is important that we lay this foundation and that we be firm in our conviction that it is indeed the word of God.

4. Satan’s primary modus Operandi

Now that we have looked at a correct view of scripture, we turn to the reason this foundation needs to be laid securely in our lives. We now look at the Modus Operandi of Satan.

A modus Operandi is a term that is used to denotes someone’s habitual way that they conduct themselves. For example, someone’s modus Operandi at work may be to coast along and do the bare minimum by appearing sickly etc. It is the way someone works. The Apostle Paul applies this same Idea through the Greek word methodia (from where we get the word method) to Satan in Ephesians twice. Stan has a favoured methodology of working to bring deception.

We are going to look at two significant scriptures and show you how the two cooborate the way that Satan seeks to deceive Christians, by looking at the two most significant temptations in the scripture. The temptation of Adam and Eve, and the temptation of the last Adam, Jesus.

Turn with me firstly to:

(ESV)

1 Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the LORD God had made.

He said to the woman, “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?” 2 And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, 3 but God said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.’ ” 4 But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. 5 For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” 6 So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate.

Note what Satan says “Did God actually say” The primary means by which Satan will try to insert Deception into our lives is by undermining what God has said to us. In other words, he will try to undermine the Word of God. It has been the way he has operated from the very beginning Starting with Eve and even with Jesus he tried the same thing. in Matthew we read this.

Now turn to:

(ESV)

16 And when Jesus was baptized, immediately he went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on him; 17 and behold, a voice from heaven said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”

1 Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. 2 And after fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. 3 And the tempter came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.” 4 But he answered, “It is written,

“ ‘Man shall not live by bread alone,

but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’ ”

5 Then the devil took him to the holy city and set him on the pinnacle of the temple 6 and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down, for it is written,

“ ‘He will command his angels concerning you,’

and

“ ‘On their hands they will bear you up,

lest you strike your foot against a stone.’ ”

Look at the context of this passage of Scripture we see that God the Father gave a direct word that Jesus was His “…beloved Son,...” What where the very first words out of Satan mouth when Tempting Jesus? “If you are the Son of God.” God says you are, Satan says IF you are. In those 3 words, Satan was doing the very same thing that he has done in the garden of Eden, which was to undermine what God had said, i.e. the Word of God.

Therefore, we can see that the primary modus operandi of Satan is to bring deception by undermining the Word of God, and he undermines the Word of God by bringing doubt about what the Word of God says.

So, when we sketch out the frame of temptation Satan’s tries to bring a right left blow:

Firstly, he tries to get you the Christian to doubt God, i.e. to sow seed of doubt about God’s Character or His trustworthiness

Secondly, He directly undermines the Word of God itself. Did God actually say

The reason why understanding this now and learning to defend against it now is because the church at large is starting to succumb more and more to deception. In fact it is growing exponentially as we start to move further towards the end times.

5. Deception and the end times

So why is this subject of relevance in today’s culture. Hasn’t Deception always existed? Yes, Historically the Church has always been subjected to various deceptions of differing types, in fact many of the epistles in the NT that you have in your hands today where written as a means of rebuttal to false doctrine coming into the Church. In addition, many of the so called “negative statements” made in the NT are statements that are directly related to False teachers that where infiltrating the church.

However, as the time of Jesus draws near, the Scripture is clear that deception, in addition to wickedness will increase, that they will believe a lie, and that ultimately, the world, will totally reject God in a wholesale manner.

When Jesus Himself, spoke about the end times He uses the word planaeo 4 times, in other words Jesus spoke about deception to characterise the last days. Paul uses the same type of language when talking about the last days.

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