Sermon Tone Analysis

*What is Truth?*

1 John 4:1-6

!

I. INTRODUCTION

Information overload.

We are bombarded with information.

Question:  Do you believe everything you read? 

 

·       Penny Brown is missing

·       For every person that you forward this e-mail to, Microsoft will pay you $245.00

For every person that you sent it to that forwards it on, Microsoft will pay you $243.00 and for every third person that receives it, You will be paid $241.00.

Within two weeks, Microsoft will contact you for your address and then send you a check.

·       At the grocery store the headline on a tabloid reads:  Evidence of Noah’s Ark found on Mars.(some believes anything that is in print!)

What to believe?

This is nothing new.

Look in Bible to Pilate, a man with no particular spiritual discernment.

The Priest and Scribes, the “religious authorities” on one side saying one thing, when questioning Jesus, Pilate hears another.

\\ Pilate said to Him, "*What is truth?*"

John 18:38 NASU

*(Some times I identify with Pilate – I don’t know who to believe!)*

That same question is being asked today over and over and many different ways

·       What is true and what is false?

Is this for real?

·       How can I know the difference?

·       Whom and what do I believe?

Da Vinci Code?

People are too willing to believe?

Is there any truth to it?

The Gospel of Judas??

 

\\ Open your Bibles and we will read from God’s holy Word:

1 John 4:1-6

1 Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. 2 This is how you can recognize the Spirit of God: Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, 3 but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God.

This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is already in the world.

4 You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world.

5 They are from the world and therefore speak from the viewpoint of the world, and the world listens to them.

6 We are from God, and whoever knows God listens to us; but whoever is not from God does not listen to us.

This is how we recognize the Spirit of truth and the spirit of falsehood.

(NIV)

 

!! Prayer

 

 

Tonight we will examine:  Why you should not believe all you hear, read, or feel and

How you can know what is true.

*II.

Don’t believe everything you hear, read, see, touch, or feel.*

Don’t always believe your senses.

The situation in John’s time:

* False teachers--Gnosticism:  one of the branches of which said that Christ came upon Jesus at His baptism and left Him at Calvary.

 

* Little or no Scriptures no written authority-No New Testament.

\\ John warns us about not believing everything you are told.

New Living Translation reads:

1 John 4:1

Dear friends, do not believe everyone who claims to speak by the Spirit.

NLT

 

Why?

Verse 1 Many false prophets are in the world

* Waste your time (at very least)

* Hurt you (many cults)

* Lead you away from God

* ULTIMATELY – THEY LEAD TO DESTRUCTION.

Who are these false teachers?

John tells us in verse 3 they are the spirit of the anti-Christ \\ In the Greek “/anti-/“ means “against” or “instead of” or even a substitution.

\\ \\ Let me tell you a little about my AF job.

I work with flight simulators – I certify that a pilot can train in them /instead of /a real aircraft.

A pilot get in the simulator, starts the engines, takes off, fly to a far away destination.

They experience weather, system malfunctions, troubles, emergencies, and the pilot overcomes them.

He experiences and feels all the realities of the flight.

He goes through all the steps and does all the right things, but when we he gets out, he finds that he has gone no where.

\\ \\ So many things in life will looks right, feels right, but gets you nowhere.

So many things are substitutes.

So many things are deceptions.

What is behind all these false teachings?

Satan.

Satan is responsible for the deception in our world today.

The Bible tells us in John 8:44

You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father's desire.

He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him.

When he lies, he speaks his native language, */for he is a liar and the father of lies/*.

(NIV)

 

* Satan is the master of deception, miss information.

\\ The worst lie is the one that is 99% true \\ That one percent has lead many to their ruin.

* Satan is counterfeit.

The Bible tells us in 2 Cor 11:14 --  /2 \\ 13 For such men are false apostles, deceitful workmen, masquerading as apostles of Christ.

14 And no wonder, for Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light.

15 It is not surprising, then, if his servants masquerade as servants of righteousness.

Their end will be what their actions deserve NIV./

There are many cults and “isms” out there.

Its not just Islam --

Just turn on the TV!

* “May the Force be with you”  New age religion  (actually it is ages old just Hinduism“repackaged”.

* The feel good generation.

What is wrong with living together with out being married?

(movies – TV)

* Its about protection not abstinance

* TV preachers – Can you trust them?

* Political climate makes you cover up your Christianity but will preach evolution and humanism as fact in the classroom.

* The woman right to chose because after all it her body and, that is not a baby but just a mass of cells.

All this and more is coming from our authorities, our role models.

No different now as it was in the days of Pilate.

Look at Verse 5 – offers us another clue someone is not from God:

 

Who listens to them?

God message is now and has always been unpopular.

\\ How will they lead you away?

* Intellect – what appeals to our human reasoning.