#553

The Silence Of God’s Lambs

I Wish We’d All Been Ready

If you were a Christian in the early 1970s like I was I’m sure you’re familiar with the prophetic movies about the Rapture and the Tribulation. The first one was “A Thief In The Night” and it started with a band playing the Larry Norman song “I Wish We’d All Been Ready.” The song is simple but it is completely Biblical and the point of the lyrics are also very basic. Norman wanted everyone to ready for the Rapture and the moody music makes the point that there will be many who will not be ready. The lyrics state that there’s no time to change your mind, the Son has come and you’ve been left behind.” I know quite a few people who think that it was a time of being fearful of missing the Rapture and now are decrying that teaching as being disingenuous and even hurtful and harmful for them. However, I lived during that time and I too had some moments when I was alone in the house and had a tinge of panic when I thought I somehow missed His coming in the clouds. I have learned to see the teaching much differently now and Norman’s song needn’t be one of doom and gloom, but a somber reminder that Jesus really wants anyone to ready if they will only take the time to get beyond all the doctrinal clutter and outright misinformation about prophecy. And that’s why I’m talking about what I believe both Christians and those seeking to know the truth need to understand.

Discernment Is Needed

I was talking with a brother in Christ and we just noted how many people we know that simply don’t see the spiritual battle being waged all around them. It’s like they are letting others tell them how to think about the hard issues of our day and are willing to follow the masses even if the masses are like lemmings running to their demise. And with the advent of the Internet and social media we aren’t uninformed but misinformed. With such a massive onslaught of false prophets streaming their opinions on the Bible, end time prophecies and even on if Jesus is real, people are willing to glom onto whoever fits their belief systems, or worse create their belief systems. Social influencers are running amok in people’s lives with seemingly an endless supply of unbiblical and even demonic teachings all the while telling people they only want people to see the truth and be set free from all the dastardly dogma they’ve been taught by the old time religion of the past. Couched in all their delightful deception is that rather than building a solid foundation they are first tearing down the very rock of your salvation even questioning if being saved from sin is even in the Scriptures. On the contrary, they really think the Bible is just the raw material for doctrine and gives you what you need to believe based on modern culture. As Jesus plainly told us, a lot of false prophets will be abounding in the time just before He returns and we need to be ready. Which is why we need a boatload of discernment.

This Isn’t Your Mother’s Deceitfulness

While I run the risk of presuming here, I know the kind of false teachers I grew up with and even taught how to know what they taught was Biblical or not, but this intensity of false teachings now takes things to higher level. And it’s not like we shouldn’t have seen it coming, we just know what we know now. Who knew that technology would advance to the point where we can watch just about anything we want with a device that fits in our hands? And we can search for instruction videos on that same device? Information is not only readily available it is bombarding us every second of every day if we let it. Whether is benevolent or malignant it is there doing its best to influence us if we let it. Satan makes sure that he even sneaks sinful lifestyles into everything you ingest from this media. And he also makes sure that a Godly lifestyle is denigrated at every turn. We may say we are strong enough and discerning enough to handle it, but I’m seeing believers who were strong in their faith getting worn down by this growing rise of deception. I’m not saying there are pod people replacing these believers, but it sure feels like it. I deem this to be a precursor to the great delusion predicted in 2 Thessalonians 2:1:

And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie… KJV)

I’ve said many, many times before that the spirit of Antichrist is getting stronger and more prevalent and this coming delusion is already here in perhaps a less virulent form, but influencing the globe, nevertheless. The only way to detect and fight it is to have a large amount of discernment in our lives. Unfortunately, I’m not seeing more of it, but less of it. We know the problem, but what is the solution?

Discernment Is Available

We can’t even come to a saving knowledge of Jesus without Holy Spirit given discernment, but we need to grow in it if we want to continue to be Godly people. I like how an article from lifehopeandtruth.com explains this point:

When God calls us, He opens our minds to the reality of our deception. If we repent of our sins and commit our lives to Him through baptism, we can receive the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:38).

God’s Holy Spirit is described as a spirit “of power and of love and of a sound mind” (2 Timothy 1:7). A mind aided by God’s Spirit can discern what is true and what is not. This is why the apostle John referred to the Holy Spirit as “the Spirit of truth” (John 14:17; 15:26). And of special importance, he wrote that “the Spirit of truth . . . will guide you into all truth” (John 16:13).

Paul likened our natural state to having a veil over our minds that obstructs the understanding of spiritual matters. However, he also noted that “the veil is taken away in Christ . . . when one turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away” (2 Corinthians 3:14, 16).

As you can see, discernment starts our Christian walk we should continue in it as long as we develop our relationship with Holy Spirit. This guiding into all truth is exactly what we need more than ever now. Instead we follow “guides” who sound spiritual but are leading us into not truth but lies and half-truths. It’s like exchanging one veil for another. Turning back to the same article we read about living in the truth:

Spiritual discernment is a gift from God that must be continually sought and applied. Proverbs 2:3 admonishes us to “cry out for discernment,” and Hebrews 5:14 speaks of mature Christians exercising their senses “to discern both good and evil.”

Paul told the Philippian brethren that he prayed that their “love may abound still more and more in knowledge and all discernment” (Philippians 1:9)

Discernment is available, but it must be diligently sought out. It won’t happen by just being around people with it.

Even The Elect Can Be Deceived

If anyone tries to flag you down, calling out, ‘Here’s the Messiah!’ or points, ‘There he is!’ don’t fall for it. Fake Messiahs and lying preachers are going to pop up everywhere. Their impressive credentials and bewitching performances will pull the wool over the eyes of even those who ought to know better. But I’ve given you fair warning. (Matt 24:23-24, MSG)

The Message version is pretty strong, but I like its phrasing. But I also like how it reads in the Amplified Classic version:

For false Christs and false prophets will arise, and they will show great signs and wonders so as to deceive and lead astray, if possible, even the elect (God’s chosen ones). (Matt 24:24, AMPC)

Basically we know how strong and deceptive these false prophets and false teachers will be because Jesus tells how good they will be and how even those well versed in the Bible can fall under their sway. How can we not be hoodwinked by such signs and wonders? Follow the Bible-bricked road as we read in my last quote of the lifehopeandtruth.com article:

Given the certainty of these future miraculous occurrences, how will the elect be able to discern that these amazing signs performed by the false prophet are not from God, and that they should not follow this individual?

The people of God will have spiritual discernment and will be well-versed in God’s Word. They will understand that Satan and his demons can perform supernatural acts. They will also recall God’s warning to the ancient Israelites: If a prophet announces a sign or wonder that comes to pass and then advocates the worship of other gods, they should not heed that prophet (Deuteronomy 13:1-3).

Furthermore, the people of God endowed with discernment in the end times will heed John’s counsel: “Do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits, whether they are of God; because many false prophets have gone out into the world” (1 John 4:1).

Test, test, test. That’s it. And what are these deceptive diviners tested against? The Bible which is why the first thing these false prophets will do is tear it down. Without the inspired word of God to use to discern right from wrong, true from false, good from evil, it’s really a matter of opinion. Fortunately God isn’t giving up without a fight. We overcome by the blood of the lamb and the word of our testimony (see Revelation 12:11) and God is raising up people with powerful testimonies that these TikTok Bible scholars can’t refute no matter how many degrees they have or peer-reviewed papers they can cite. If you want a strategy for dealing with these social influencers, go online with what God has done and is going in you. Let’s see them stitch those.