FALSE OR TRUE?
When bank tellers train to spot counterfeit money, they do not study fake ones. They look at and memorize every detail of authentic specie and legal tender. The money becomes so familiar to their eyes that they can spot a false bill or coinage immediately.
Likewise, when someone wants to know if a line is straight or crooked, he las a ruler along it. If they are parallel, the line is straight. If the line intersects with or veers away from the straight edge, the line is crooked and can't be used. It must be erased or refrawn.
By the same token, God's people must be very familiar with His word in order to identify false or misused Scripture. We must eat and digest the Bible daily, so that our minds and hearts are saturated with His truth. Jesus said of Himself:
"I am the Way, and the TRUTH, and the Life; no one comes to the Father but through Me."
His word is the plumb line, the straight edge that quickly identifies whether something propagated as truth is from God or from the devil. Truth always lines up perfectly with the Bible. The devil's lies do not.
In Matthew 24 Jesus warned that in the last days we need to beware deception by the enemy of our souls. Jesus said more than once, "See to it that no one misleads you."Farther along in the discourse, He said, "Do not believe him," when referring to false prophets and their proclamations.
Particularly now, in these last days when many false prophets and Christs masquerading as the real Person attempt to persuade us with their rhetoric, the Word of God hidden in our heart will quickly reject the false by using truth to identify that it is a sham. There is one devastating hitch to that argument, however.
Today's church is notorious for NOT knowing their Bibles. Church goers rely on their weekly church attendance and the pastor's word from the Word to sustain them until the next week's message.
Ignorance of the bible is not an excuse for sinning or mistakenly believing what a false teacher or prophet says or does. Hosea 4:6 says:
"My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. Since you have rejected knowledge, I also will reject you from being My priests."
Not reading the Bible daily, not memorizing key verses and not becoming very familiar with both the Old and New Testaments is evidence of rejecting knowledge of God's word. He has given it to us, so we can unerringly follow Him in truth. It is up to us to make time to read and meditate on what He says. God cannot do that for us.
Many professed believers are guilty of making their pastor or church leaders their gods or idols, blindly following and obeying whatever they say without testing it against Scripture. Is what they say true and holy? Does it line up with what God says? It is impossible to test what is being propagated from the pulpit if we don't know what God says is truth.
God in His mercy is in the process of identifying and revealing many of those false teachers, prophets and corrupt preachers for what they really are. These pseudo-leaders have misrepresented God for too long. They have twisted Scripture to meet their own ends, either to hide their sins or to enjoy financial gain and notoriety by lying to people who sit under their ministry and trust their integrity.
But God's people have been duped largely because of their ignoranace of the Bible and His declared truth. They find time to chase the distractions of modern society: social media, clubs and sports activities, hobbies, making more money---any and everythig that soaks up time and attention that could be spent in God's presence instead.
Who is willing to set aside television, hobbies, extraneous reading, working out---the list can go on--to make time for the secret place of prayer and reading God's word? Until that happens in a believer's life and heart, false teachers and preachers will have a field day unchallenged. Who will rise to the occasion and stand for God? That is a decision only you can make!