tested by truth and error Archives • Page 3 of 3 • Knowing God and His Ways

January 16, 2023January 11, 2023

Our Responsibility to Love and Choose Truth

It is our duty to love truth, and we are culpable if we choose error.

Suppressing truth

The Bible says much about the culpability of the deceived mind. Paul writes, “The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them” (Rom. 1:18–19, italics added). Ungodly people willfully suppress truth and therefore are not innocent victims.

Choosing darkness

John describes this culpability in terms of light and darkness. Three verses after the well-known verse, “God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16), John explains why people do not believe in Jesus, and it is not because they lack information: “This is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their deeds were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed” (John 3:19–20, italics added). People deliberately choose the light of Jesus or the darkness of sin. They are not innocent victims.

Rejecting the words of Jesus

In Jesus’ day, the religious leaders knew the most biblical information and therefore should have been best prepared to recognize Jesus as Messiah, yet they did not believe in him. Jesus explained why and pulled no punches:

Why do you not understand what I say? It is because you cannot bear to hear my word. You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and has nothing to do with the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies. But because I tell the truth, you do not believe me. Which one of you convicts me of sin? If I tell the truth, why do you not believe me? Whoever is of God hears the words of God. The reason why you do not hear them is that you are not of God. (John 8:43–47, italics added)

Those who deliberately choose lies have chosen their father, and he is the devil. They are not innocent victims.

Hardening one’s heart

In Ephesians 4:17–19 Paul said the fallen person’s mind is characterized by futility. He laid the blame for that futile thinking squarely on each person’s shoulders, highlighting eight culpable traits. Paul wrote, “You must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds. They are [1] darkened in their understanding, [2] alienated from the life of God [3] because of the ignorance that is in them, [4] due to their hardness of heart. They have become [5] callous and [6] have given themselves up to sensuality, [7] greedy to practice every kind of [8] impurity” (italics and numerals added). At the core of this futile mind Paul blamed “hardness of heart,” which led directly to ignorance of God, alienation from God, darkened understanding, callousness, sensuality, greed, and impurity. This person is not an innocent victim.

Continued next week

January 9, 2023January 11, 2023

The Payoff of Self-Deception

A morally deceived person is not an innocent victim.

Lies can be useful. For example, if an unmarried man is having sexual relations with his girlfriend, and he believes they are doing wrong before a holy God, he will suffer guilt and the fear of divine punishment. If he is determined to keep having sex with her, sooner or later he will probably choose to be deceived on this issue in order to quiet his conscience. He does not acknowledge to himself that he is deceiving himself; he just does it, and that change in belief in violation of his conscience and Scripture is an evil act for which he is responsible. He believes what he wants.

And to be consistent he must shift other beliefs accordingly. If he once regarded the Bible as completely true, he now will doubt the divine inspiration of at least some of it, because Scripture plainly says sexual relations outside of marriage are sinful. If he once regarded God as a consuming fire who judges sin, he now will need to believe God does not judge people, or he will question whether God even exists. He must rid his mind of troubling truths.

So his choice to deceive himself with one lie inevitably leads to many more self-deceptions. The process resembles a walk from the bright light of day into a cave of deeper and deeper moral darkness, where he now believes falsehoods he never could have imagined believing before his sexual sin began. If his girlfriend becomes pregnant, he now believes in the need for abortion, even a ghastly late-term abortion.

To quiet his conscience, he must find ways to construe abortion as a virtue. Thus he and his girlfriend are, in their eyes, rescuing the unborn child from a life of poverty or from being unwanted. They are courageously defending rights his girlfriend supposedly has over her body. They are making a prudent decision in the best interests of their entire family. He wants to believe this abortion is moral, and therefore he believes whatever he must to make it so.

To be consistent, he must also find ways to frame opposing ideas as immoral. Those who oppose abortions are now regarded as evil because they are intolerant and judgmental. They are trying to empower government to meddle in a woman’s right to control her body. Churches and preachers are the country’s real problem because they impose their morality on others. In this young man’s mind, the moral universe has turned upside down.

Belief is a choice. What we believe is as much a moral act as choices in sexuality or finances. Belief is a moral act for which we are accountable because we choose our beliefs about life’s ultimate issues to suit our desires. Either we want God and his truth at any cost, or we want to satisfy our corrupt desires. Satan could deceive Eve because she wanted what he offered. If we choose to be deceived, we rebel against God, and the consequences are far-reaching.

Continued next week with more on why we deceive ourselves

January 2, 2023January 11, 2023

We Are Tested by Truth and Error

How we respond to truth and error reveals crucial things about us.

Have you ever wondered why God allows false teachers and heresies to exist in the world?

Deuteronomy 13:1–4 says:

“If a prophet or a dreamer of dreams arises among you and gives you a sign or a wonder, and the sign or wonder that he tells you comes to pass, and if he says, ‘Let us go after other gods,’ which you have not known, ‘and let us serve them,’ you shall not listen to the words of that prophet or that dreamer of dreams. For the LORD your God is testing you, to know whether you love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul. You shall walk after the LORD your God and fear him and keep his commandments and obey his voice, and you shall serve him and hold fast to him.” (ESV, Italics added)

Purposeful Tests

Here Moses identified the purpose of this trial: false prophets test whether people love the Lord with all their heart and soul. In the sphere of medical care, every test monitors certain things. A thermometer measures body temperature. An electrocardiogram reveals electrical activity in the heart. A sphygmomanometer tests blood pressure. In the spiritual sphere, false prophets test a person’s love for God. People who truly love God will not be deceived—or at least not permanently deceived—and will certainly pass the test.

False teachers serve the same function as Satan, demons, temptation, the fallen world, and any opportunity to sin. They reveal who someone is in the secret place of the heart.

Moral beings

God must know the heart because he is a perfectly fair and righteous judge. He is a moral being who created mankind in his image as moral beings. A moral being can distinguish between right and wrong and is responsible to do what is right. Because God is a good moral being and the sole creator and ruler of the universe, he must hold moral beings accountable for their choices. God resembles a human judge who must uncover the truth about a defendant in order to render fair judgment. Good judges want to know everything they can in order to do what is right: to exonerate the innocent or condemn the guilty. In order to judge us fairly, and in order for all moral beings—mankind, good angels, and fallen angels—to witness the judgment and realize that God’s decision about each person is fair, what people truly are must be shown indisputably. What is beyond dispute are a person’s deeds.

The criterion of final judgment

Therefore the Bible says this about the Final Judgment:

“Then I saw a great white throne and him who was seated on it. From his presence earth and sky fled away, and no place was found for them. And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Then another book was opened, which is the book of life. And the dead were judged by what was written in the books, according to what they had done. And the sea gave up the dead who were in it, Death and Hades gave up the dead who were in them, and they were judged, each one of them, according to what they had done.” (Rev. 20:11–13, ESV, italics added)

Twice this says God will judge people according to their deeds. He does that because deeds display the truth. He allows false teachers to test us because how we respond to false teachers is a deed that reveals the truth about us. How we respond to lies reveals whether we love truth, and whether we love truth reveals whether we love the God of all truth.

Assurance

Those who truly love God need not fear the test from false teaching. No one who sincerely loves God and humbly seeks truth from him will be deceived. Jesus said, “False christs and false prophets will arise and perform great signs and wonders, so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect” (Mat. 24:24, italics added). The words, “if possible,” mean it is not possible for false teachers to deceive the elect, who truly love and believe God.

God promises this. The New Testament Book of Jude, which warns about the test from false teachers, assures us that God “is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy” (1:24). We must trust God to keep us in the truth. Jesus assures us, “My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand” (John 10:27–29).

Paul assures us, “He will keep you strong to the end, so that you will be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Cor. 1:8). And, “He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus” (Phil. 1:6). You can be completely confident that God has the ability to bring you successfully through a test from false teaching and that he does not leave you to find truth on your own.

So who does fail this test?

Continued next week.