Be Not Deceived

[0:00] Could you be wrong? Be not deceived. Be not deceived. I'll put the picture there of that sheep because I was thinking of the wolf in sheep's clothing.

[0:11] ! What a picture that is. Our Lord paints it of a wolf in sheep's clothing. It seems so harmless, yet so dangerous. There's two D words which are most important in these times in which we live.

[0:26] And the first one I'll put here is deception. And 2 Timothy 3 verse 13 reads, Could you be wrong? Have you ever been deceived?

[0:43] To be deceived means to be tricked, to be cheated. It means being taken for a ride, being led up the garden path. It could be the victim of a hoax.

[0:55] I know there was one time I got some email and it almost sounded too good to be true. I'd just been offered some huge amount of money from someone in Nigeria.

[1:09] And I believed it for a little while. I actually believed it. But of course, with a little bit of thinking and care, I realised it was a hoax.

[1:22] Some people believe a lie such that they actually follow through and they end up getting swindled, don't they? We can believe a lie. We can all face it.

[1:34] Deception. There was one time I bought a car in my younger years down in Adelaide, a Cortina station wagon. And it was only $150. And it was such a bargain.

[1:47] And the used car salesman was very slick and sold it to me. And I thought, yeah, what a buy. And I drove it from Adelaide up the main north road.

[1:59] And it conked out around just a bit above Jepp's Cross, somewhere there. And I had to get an RIA kind of verdict on it.

[2:10] And they said it's not really salvageable. You know, the motor had gone or blew the head gasket. And it was beyond saving. So I think somehow I got it towed to a wreckers and I got $15 for it.

[2:27] Something like that. That was a big experience for me of deception. Now, whether that used car salesman realised it was such a lemon, I don't know.

[2:38] But sometimes when we buy a car, we can get deceived, can't we? To think that it's better than what it really is. Or there was one time where some worker I engaged to do some work for me.

[2:49] And he asked for some money up front to buy materials. And I dished it out to him. And not long after that, it sounded like he disappeared.

[3:01] And I tried his phone and there was no answer. I couldn't reach him anymore. And he's still at large, that criminal, that scoundrel that took my money and shot through on me.

[3:12] And I think, wow, another deception. You know, he looked like such a nice guy. And he seemed quite a genuine type. And he was, well, I did talk to him about the Lord.

[3:26] Maybe that's why he thought he could pull a fast one on me. But we can believe a hoax, can't we? We can believe a lie. And the Bible talks about deception. It says the devil is a deceiver.

[3:38] I looked up the word deceiver in the computer thesaurus. And it came up with an equivalent word. A deceiver is an imposter. An imposter. That's what the devil is.

[3:48] He's an imposter. He's called the father of lies. Interesting, isn't it? God is called the father. And the devil is a father. He's the father of lies, though. He's an angel of light that he transforms himself into.

[4:03] And people ignorantly follow right after him. And I know there's folk, even folk that I've reached and talked to and thought were on the same page as us.

[4:15] Now he's following the spiritualist church. That's the kind of extent of his ability to read truth from error.

[4:26] That he's actually worshipping in a spiritualist church, which we know is full of occult readings and such and falsehood and deliberate spiritual falsehood.

[4:41] The devil is an imposter. He deceives. He mimics the true, even such that people might believe such a lie.

[4:52] He's a trickster, he's a liar, and he's a con man. Now the word deceive is also elsewhere translated in our King James Bible as seduce. So there's a seduction.

[5:03] Deceiving, seducing. And it means an attracting away from the right. For what is faithful and right into something that is wrong and sinful.

[5:14] The Bible tells us of people deceiving and being deceived. It's important then to know that, according to the Bible, there's some areas in which we can be deceived.

[5:25] So I've put to you two ways we can be deceived. One is we can be deceived in the area of doctrine. Doctrine. It's almost a dirty word in some circles, in some churches.

[5:37] Oh, doctrine, that divides. Well, yes it does. It divides between truth and error. Doctrine is a good thing. Doctrine is a sound, a vital thing, an essential thing. Doctrine, it means teaching.

[5:49] It's about teaching, about learning. And Ephesians 4.14 talks about doctrine. And Paul exhorts the Ephesians, chapter 4, verse 14, talking about growing into the perfect man.

[6:05] He says that, Henceforth we be no more children, tossed to and fro, carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the slight of men and cunning craftiness we're in, whereby they lie in wait to deceive.

[6:21] Tossed to and fro like a ship on the high seas, blown around by the winds, not steady and straight, but here and there, blown about.

[6:36] One of the most tragic things we can see is the false teachings that abound. Prosperity preachers seem to have the limelight.

[6:47] And you see the Christian bookstores, it's often these ones that are so popular. People love it. There's places, some towns, even cities that I know of where there's no church that I could recommend.

[7:02] And we love to recommend godly sister churches, like our friends here from Ranella. But there's some places, some towns and cities, there's no church I could recommend.

[7:13] Error so prevails, but there's nothing there that you could say, yes, that's something we'd recommend for you. Here in Ephesians we're told about deception, deceived people.

[7:25] And they have these characteristics of immaturity and instability. So they've not grown up, they're still children. They're immature and they're unstable.

[7:36] They're carried about like a ship on the windy seas. Instability. The Bible warns us about various winds of doctrines and being aware, being mindful that these will come and how some can be led astray with such things.

[7:54] Now, I can testify, I spent 13 years in the deception of Pentecostalism. I was in the inaugural class of our denominational Bible school and spent time being trained in it and furthermore being an ordained minister in a Pentecostal denomination.

[8:17] And I believed it and taught it. And I was deceived and being deceived. But now I see the light that that was false.

[8:30] Elements of it indeed were false. There was some good, but certainly it was tainted. And we see this so broadcast now.

[8:41] Different fads and fashions, all kinds of wacko ideas. And I've seen it. I've been in it. And I've seen, particularly we could see in charismatic churches, dancing in the spirit.

[8:54] They had these little fads and phases of these particular things. People would jump on the bandwagon and everybody did this. And there was an emphasis on demon deliverances.

[9:05] And of course, there is real deliverance from demons, but this is a demon under every bush or every sneeze. The shepherding movement, where there's this heavy discipling, where there's a very top-down, very domineering headship of the pastor.

[9:22] Laughing in the spirit, so-called, or slaying in the spirit, which we know is absolutely non-biblical. Drunkenness in the spirit. And some churches just fall over for all these unbiblical extremes.

[9:35] They're not biblical. They're not biblical. And that says it all, doesn't it? But sadly, it seems, as much as there's good people, there's a lack of maturity and stability.

[9:49] And this fairy floss that they're feeding on, there's sugar candy, not the plain teaching of the word of God. And so it's no wonder there's delusion. People are deceived. They're led astray from biblical truth.

[10:02] And they cannot see it. They're blind to it. They don't realise they've been duped. Like I was conned to buy that heap of junk, the lemon car that I have. And people can be deluded to think that it's biblical when it's not, or scarcely.

[10:18] They cannot see it. And they can't come to fully come out of it. It's hard to extricate from it. It's almost unusual for someone to come out of it. But these people, sadly, they're deceived in their doctrine and in the teaching they're receiving.

[10:34] And this is the most deadly device of Satan, that he would so mimic or so counterfeit, so con people with something that sounds okay, but when you dig deep enough, you see it's deadly.

[10:49] The deadly device of Satan, of deception. We see that in 2 Timothy 4, verses 3 to 4. It reads, Here we see sound doctrine is something that will not be endured.

[11:15] People will not want sound teaching. They won't want it. But they'll want that which will itch their ears or give them some false pleasing, which is not the true truth.

[11:34] It's some superficial thing to just itch their ears to cause them to be misled. The word sound, it means wholesome or healthy.

[11:48] It says how the Lord got the man, the paralytic man, to extend his hand and it was made sound. It was made wholesome. It was made healthy. And it's the same with doctrine that is sound.

[11:59] Something that is healthy. Sound doctrine will build us up. It will bless us. It's healthy for our soul. Some doctrine, on the contrary, is like spiritual junk food.

[12:10] It's toxic and damaging. It might feed you to a degree, but it's not good for you. It's unhealthy. It's unwholesome. It's unsound. False doctrine.

[12:21] Paul gave us here a forecast of a time to come when sound doctrine will be refused. It won't be wanted. And rather people will chase after teachers.

[12:32] Now, there's so much teaching out there, on the internet especially. It's an overburdening mass of teachers.

[12:43] And it's saying literally here that they shall heap to themselves. It's literally, there's going to be piles of such teachers. Piles and piles of them. And this deception is going to happen within the church.

[12:56] Within the church. So, it says they will turn away their ears from the truth. And we see this wholesale rejection of absolute biblical truth. And they'll turn to fables, it says.

[13:09] The Greek word for fantasies. Fictions. They'll discard the truth and replace it with fables, with fictions. And friends, I've seen stories which seem, again, popularised books these days.

[13:23] Trips to heaven and such experiential things. And there's numbers of them that have been critiqued. And have been shown that a person is not true.

[13:35] It's not a true account. It's not, it doesn't measure up with the Bible. And some of these people have been exposed as frauds. That it's fraudulent. It's false. So false that it's a lie.

[13:47] No, it's a lie. And our doctrine must be consistent with God and his inspired word. It's been truly said, I'm quoting, one of the biggest dangers Christians face is when truth is mixed in with error.

[13:59] Outright error, when it's presented, is usually obvious as such. And should not, for mature biblical Christians, be so very difficult to spot. But when it's disguised and masquerades as the real thing.

[14:12] And also mixed in with the authentic. Then the danger is immense. I heard an example of a preacher illustrating this. And he told the congregation, is this a real plant or not?

[14:27] And the plant that he showed to them, it actually had a mixture of some real plant plus some artificial plant. And that's just what the devil does. He mixes the true with the false.

[14:40] He mixes the real with the counterfeit. With the copy that's not real. And it's important that we're taught right. As a Bible teacher of truths of the Bible, it's vital that what I teach is right and biblical.

[14:55] Because I and everyone who teaches, who ministers, we have an awesome responsibility. We face a greater judgment if we fail. And that's something to take really seriously.

[15:08] And so it's really essential that I am very conscious of being balanced and solidly biblical. Not just giving my own opinion about something or my own experiential thing.

[15:23] But that it's biblical. The Bible basis is what's paramount. We know the time comes. The Bible tells us of a time men will not endure sound doctrine.

[15:33] They'd rather have amusements or lightness or pleasant speeches. Maybe mix in the humour and things that are non-threatening. You know, just something that's going to make people feel comforted.

[15:46] But we must have the hard truths. Because these are a time of falling away. It's a sign of the last times. We're in a world where untruth seems prevailing.

[15:57] Falsehood. It is biblical teaching that such things will happen. One lady asked about our church, do you have women preachers?

[16:10] And the question that really matters is though, are we biblical? Clearly women pastors are not scriptural. Of course we do have women ministries that are scriptural.

[16:23] We have a women's meeting. We have women ministering in many capacities. In our church. But we don't have women pastors. Because what matters, what really matters, what clearly matters, is are we biblical?

[16:37] Is what we do biblical? There's some people who are deceived to think that they are witnesses of Jehovah. That's what they call themselves. Yet they do not know him. Many believe a lie.

[16:49] And many are Jews, told a lemon. Their religion cannot save. There's no saviour in it. There's no salvation in it. Some folk are saved and yet their teaching is off centre, off track. There's whole movements in deception.

[17:01] As I was saying this morning, tens of thousands of denominations and some of them are right off track. Right off. There's whole movements in deception.

[17:12] Sometimes basing their views on misapplied proof texts or even experience as their guide. Not the whole counsel of the word of God. So it's mindful that we ought to be mindful to be a people moved by the love for the truth.

[17:28] That's what we want. That's what must be our guide. Our sure guide. Some people are unteachable. They will not be corrected. They refuse to search the scriptures. They cannot accept that they can be wrong.

[17:41] You know, I can say it's a humbling experience to say I was wrong. I was wrong. I was misled. I was misleading. Doctrine is about teaching and learning.

[17:54] Christ says learn of me. So the doctrine must be right. We can be deceived such that our doctrine, what we believe, is not right. We can also be deceived in a second way in our doing.

[18:07] We can be deceived in our doctrine. We can be deceived in our doing. Doing. It's about how we behave. James 1.26 says this. If any man among you seem to be religious and bridleth not his tongue but deceiveth his own heart, this man's religion is vain.

[18:25] But be ye doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving, deceiving your own selves.

[18:36] So some people's religion is vain. There's deceived people that have a vain religion. It's a hearing-only religion. If that. Some will not even hear.

[18:47] They won't be accountable even refusing to come to church. How will they learn except they hear the word of God? So they grow spiritually weak.

[18:59] There's no practical reality to their profession of faith. It's all blah, blah, blah. But it's not here. It's theoretical religion. It's an abstract, an ideal, a theological concept.

[19:13] They have a profession of faith, professing it, but not a possession of faith. They don't possess faith. Are we deceived in our doing?

[19:23] People are watching us. Believers. Even more so, oughtn't we to be mindful? Does how we live a match-up with what the Bible says? Are we a good example?

[19:37] Can we say, follow me, even as I follow Christ? That ought to be so, oughtn't it? For the false converts, these false professors, they have a head knowledge of biblical ideas, but biblical truth has not entered into their heart and soul.

[19:54] Christ does not become a reality in their daily life. In fact, the Bible tells us that Christ is our life, or he should be. Christ in you, the hope of glory.

[20:07] We live. Christ lives in us. We live in him. Our life is incomplete without him. With him, he becomes our life, Christ in us. So does Christ show in our life?

[20:21] Someone was asked to define what a saint is. Of course, the Bible says a saint is a holy one. Every believer is called a saint, made a saint by God, not by some pope of Rome, but every believer is called by God a saint.

[20:39] It's a title that you have, as one who believes in Christ. And someone defined a saint. They looked through the church, which had stained glass windows, and had pictures of people who were called saints, and they said, saints are people the light shines through.

[20:59] And that is a true thing, isn't it? But we don't have to wait to become a stained glass window feature. But we are shining the light through us, aren't we? As God's people, God's light shines through us.

[21:12] And so, the people spoken of here, who have a lip service of faith, they listen to the Bible, they file it away in their brain, but it makes no real change in their life.

[21:28] It's not applied. It's vain. It's not real. It's not applied. It's not put into action. And there's many so-called Christians like this, that make an empty profession. It's a form of religion.

[21:41] It's inactive. There's no real change. No real witness. But true faith makes it smart. It's genuine. It affects our walk, our life, our talk.

[21:52] People will see we talk different. We don't use the gutter language. We become a glowing testimony for our Lord, a radiant witness, an ambassador, to represent him on earth as citizens of heaven.

[22:07] It's about lifestyle, it's about lifestyle, our practice. We read, Paul tells the Galatians, be not deceived, God is not mocked, for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.

[22:23] I know some professing Christians who smoke dope. Some who excuse foul language. Some people live as though they will not have to answer for their sin.

[22:38] They think that they can get away with it. If such a one is a believer, then they are subject to the chastening of God. Do we not care about a holy God that we profess to believe, that we can just go and please ourselves and not care about the consequences of a life lived unwisely, of the consequences of a life lived without God, a life lived carelessly?

[23:06] What a shame and reproach. If you are a believer and you are willfully taking that course of action, we will all reap what we sow.

[23:21] We talked about our practice. Another area of doing is people.

[23:34] It says, Be not deceived. Evil communications corrupt good manners. Relationships can be blessed, but they can be damaging.

[23:47] It says, Be not deceived. Evil communications, in other words, mixing together with those who are ungodly in that closeness of mixture can be damaging.

[24:05] Evil communications. are the people we relate to such that they bless us or corrupt us?

[24:18] Are we being a good testimony to them? Are we being salt? Or are they corrupting us? The wrong way around. Are we mixing with those who will help us to truly grow in our faith?

[24:30] Get around believers where you can to help you to grow, to help them to grow, to help you walk with Christ? Amen. Or are the people that you spend the most time with damaging your spiritual life?

[24:47] Do the people we spend time with share our spiritual values? Are our relationships wholesome and godly? Or are they corrupting good manners?

[25:01] Rubbing off on us that which is not good. Do we mingle with those who love God and his truth? Or are the people who will laugh and scorn?

[25:12] Or are they people who will laugh and scorn godly living? Now, of course, that's not to say that we're meant to be monks living in some cave, but we're meant to be making an impact on them, not the other way around.

[25:28] It's not that we cut off ourselves from ungodly people, but that they're not the people we spend our time with in an accompanying way.

[25:41] We're there when we mix with the unsaved, we're there to impact them, to communicate Christ to them, to be a testimony unto them. So be not deceived.

[25:54] Be not deceived. Be not deceived in those matters where we talked about that area of doctrine, that area of doing, in the practice, in the lifestyle of our lives and in the relationships, in the associations with people.

[26:18] So that's the first D word, is deception. And the second D word is discernment. Discernment. In days of deception, we need discernment. Discernment.

[26:29] How do you define that? Here's the definition. Discernment. It's the ability to decide between truth and error. Right and wrong. Discernment. It's the process of making careful distinctions and correct judgments and our thinking about truth.

[26:44] Discerning. It means to judge, measure, check, test. Now the Bible speaks about discerning of spirits. It's a needful call in these days where there's multiplied spirits and some not of God.

[27:03] So biblical discernment is that application of the scriptures. It's rightly dividing the word of truth, not taking scripture out of context to support our personal belief.

[27:17] Discernment means, I put to you, be spiritual. Be spiritual. We can be fleshly.

[27:28] We can be carnal. We can use our own reasoning and mental capacities and there's some usefulness for that but above all, it's being spiritual.

[27:39] It's spiritual. It's spirit-led. It tells us in 1 Corinthians 2.14 that the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God for they are foolishness unto him.

[27:50] Neither can he know them because they are spiritually discerned. But he that is spiritual judgeth or discerns all things. Yet he himself is judged of no man.

[28:05] He that is spiritual. So I put to you, be spiritual, check everything. The hallmark of a spiritual one one is that they will check things out.

[28:17] They'll judge things. Is it biblical? Is it right before God? We won't be afraid to check, to challenge things. We're called to do that.

[28:29] That's good. And we need this discernment, spiritual discernment in our day more than ever with many teachers and preachers, many even professing apostles and prophets.

[28:43] So-called. Many supposedly anointed miracle workers. There's churches not far from here that say miracles, signs and wonders. They would say they have such as many weird and wacky movements claiming to be from God.

[29:00] Some of what we see today stems from way back when you dig deep down you find the shady roots that underpin modern movements.

[29:11] You look at the flimsy foundation that Pentecostalism was built on. When you check church history we know men and women of God have got their faults and failings and there's many warts and all we could say of believers and reformers and revivalists of old.

[29:37] Some had room for improvement. But Pentecostalism we see people like William Brannan he was an outright false teacher.

[29:48] He didn't even believe in the Trinity and all manner of other false doctrines. William Brannan is one of the leading lights of Pentecostalism. They look up to him.

[29:59] I've got a whole bookshelf of his sermons because people would revere William Brannan. They wrote down they actually transcribed his sermons word for word even the stumbling words of his sermon because they looked up to him as some great guru some great prophet and yet he was really plainly a false teacher William Brannan.

[30:23] And then we see such events as the Azusa Street revival so called. And I've seen some telling books that exposed this for what it was. This slaying in the spirit was there.

[30:35] these weird gyrations and manifestations and we're seeing that all happening today and it all stems back to these false outbreaks of false revivals.

[30:46] It's happening all around us today and yet these are the ones the leading lights of the top ten at Kurong Bookstore and such. These are the ones that people would say these are the best reading materials for the modern Christian.

[31:01] deception. But it's deception. It's deception right from beginning. Right from the inception of it. It's been wrong from the beginning the Pentecostal movement. And one current issue that shows deception and I know someone was asking me lately Pastor what do you think about the chosen?

[31:19] The chosen. It sounds good when I kind of first heard about it. Oh it seems harmless enough for retelling of the life of Christ. It's endorsed by many including big names Kirk Cameron.

[31:34] This popular movie series The Chosen. Yet the makers of this series reportedly say 95% of the content is not in the Bible.

[31:48] It's all just a bit of a you know artistic license. And what raises red flags especially is how much collusion with Mormonism is in the making of this series.

[32:04] I wasn't aware of this when someone asked me Pastor what do you think of the chosen? Dallas Jenkins is the creator of the chosen. He's the director and co-writer. He says about the Mormons I don't deny that we have a lot of theological differences but we love the same Jesus.

[32:22] No sir. No sir. We do not love the same Jesus as the Mormons. The Jesus of the Mormons is an absolute falsehood. False God.

[32:34] A demon God. And the book of Mormon is a demonic manifestation. And the chosen use a movie set that's actually in Utah that belongs to the Mormons.

[32:47] And there's all kind of collusion and a compromise with Catholics with Mormons you name it. The chosen is tainted. It's bad news. Don't touch it.

[33:01] Deception. It's in every quarter. There's a Christian politician in recent news in Finland she's facing up to six years in prison simply for sharing biblical beliefs on sexuality and marriage.

[33:14] six years of jail potentially for this woman who's standing up in the political sphere against these evils.

[33:27] And the church is under attack with new age trends it's all across. Much compromise on many fronts. Look at the shameful tolerance of what the Bible calls clearly abomination that's in the Uniting Church of Australia.

[33:42] What a disgusting reproach. It's shocking and evil that there's men dressed as women and probably the other way around standing in Uniting Church pulpits wearing their dog collars and waving their LGB flags and standing up for abomination in the house what should be the house of God that's the house of devils deception.

[34:12] It's happening now and it's an age old problem. This is happening all across and it's happened in history as we see Israel's priests even they set up idols in the very temple of God in two kings.

[34:26] The people of Israel went along with all of this and the priests who should have represented the almighty they joined in they brought in these idols of the worship of Baal we see that and king Josiah withstood this in two kings 23 it says the king king Josiah he removed the idols he would not have it he commanded Hilkiah the high priest the priests of the second order the keepers of the door to bring forth out of the temple of the lord all the vessels that were made for Baal and for the grove and for all the host of heaven and he burnt them without Jerusalem compromise abounds and we should be like king Josiah and say we're not having a bar of it clear it out remove it there's no place for compromise this synthesis of the false and the true people were still worshipping God in the temple alongside idols of Baal and what not a spirit of deception and that's what's happening now deception it caused for the people of God to be like king Josiah and take strong action in their response in days of deception we must be alert to recognise it for what it is to see what's happening to withstand it to take a spiritual stand the truly spiritual man or woman will test things and judge things we must do that in our own life and in the church life in our bible studies in our research in our fellowship with other believers we need to be constantly discerning and that's not to say we're meant to be some critic out to pick fault and find some trivia to make some complaint about to find a fault with some some might be like this in a church setting where they just want to find something to find a fault about and never make a positive contribution that's not what we're talking about but the spiritual will make a spiritual judgement a spiritual discernment to be biblical to stand on biblical truth to stand up for it speak up for it tell the pastor if you see something that's unbiblical and the pastor should at least give you a hearing to ensure that we do what is biblical

[36:54] I was talking with a man lately who asked about this church and made some comment of this or that and I said my response was we try to be a biblical church we aim not to compromise that's not to say there's always room for improvement there is room for improvement I acknowledge that we can aspire to be better to be more biblical to be more fervent to be more zealous to be more led by God's spirit in his will in his ways and to always have that heart that mind and that willingness to judge to determine right from wrong biblically discern truth from error false teachers must be exposed for what they are and we've criticised some leading lights from this pulpit as they can seem to be angels of light that's not to say we are to be judgmental but we are to take careful examination what is said and done and measure it by the word of god that's rightful that's needful and where it doesn't match up we will say so let's call a spade let's call a false prophet a false prophet let's call a false teacher a false teacher 1 john 4 1 it says this is what we ought to do prove all things hold fast that which is good 1 the 5 21 and 1 john 4 1 it says beloved believe not every spirit there's spirits out there don't believe all of them some of them are not of

[38:27] God but try the spirits whether they are of God because many false prophets have gone out into the world there's well-meaning people that will follow the teachings of Ellen G White or who knows all manner of names we could reckon and they might be very spiritual in what they say and sound so spiritual but if they are not of God then we recognise that they are not of God so be spiritual and secondly be sensible there's a sense where there's actually a right sense as well as a spiritual response God uses our intellect our reasoning our rational powers that we will be so discerning that we'll make sensible decisions biblical decisions we will be sensible spiritual judgment is about spiritual discernment and it's also about sensible discernment there's a sense where we should be sensible it says in hebrews 5 14 but strong meat belongeth to them that are of full age even to those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil so there's a maturity that we develop as believers in

[39:48] Christ that we actually build some biblical sensibilities! senses there's a chewing on that meat of the word there's that nourishing and sustaining God has given us sense senses and our sense comes especially from the scriptures now I know it's been said sometimes a female has that sensitivity that a male might not have there's that sense where there is a sense a sense of what is right of wrong of picking people of being having that perception of people that yeah that right judgment a spiritual judgment a sensible judgment God has given us senses such we can sense things and he tells us to exercise our senses if you like I kind of thought of this one this is what we need our church exercise program exercise the senses we should have that as our church exercise program that our spiritual senses are exercised right that will actually exercise the spiritual senses because one of the big problems these days people are not exercising their spiritual senses another big problem these days and I look at for example what's happening on the news and I read this news article just a couple of hours ago that shows how people just will not heed warning they just will not heed warnings warnings and I'm quoting here from this news source

[41:28] Australia's east coast is on alert and beaches have been closed but that hasn't stopped hordes of beach goers taking to the water there's a tsunami potentially about to hit and the beach goers are just taking to the water isn't that Australia isn't that Aussies they don't heed the warnings what about the warnings of scripture they don't heed the warnings of scripture even more so even more important than some tsunami warning which might just be a little splash on the beach this is the warnings of scripture they do not heed the warnings of scripture and we ought to brothers and sisters we ought to have that sensibility that sense that there's truth here and we want to exercise our senses to discern between truth and error this is what tells us what's right and wrong this is what tells us what's error and what's true this is what tells us what's scriptural what's sin what's compromise what's righteous what's godly there's some scope where we can't always fully judge there's some areas we might not be fully clear where we can't be prescriptive or legalistic but some things are very clear that it's dogma that there's commandment so have your senses exercised god's given us senses and sense common sense biblical sense a sensitivity that grows keener as we apply it more as we spend as we grow up through life we'll be able to discern hopefully that used car salesman that's a shonky one we'll actually we won't just sign on the line we'll actually have a bit of a think about it am I getting sucked in is this a false is this a con and spiritually so too that we'll have sense common sense spiritual sense biblical sense not to take everything a preacher says as gospel but to discern what is said there's many churches where preachers get up and they pronounce thus saith the lord and they'll prophesy even a personal prophecy over someone and bring what they would call a new inspired word from god i used to be in a church where there was such prophecies and they would write them down word for word keep a little book of the prophecies of the prophet of the preacher some preachers would get up and give a vision of supposed direct revelations from god and extra biblical messages but when we have our senses exercised we'll say actually that doesn't measure up it's not that is not right we've got a canon we've got 66 books we don't add to it with some other writings not some supposed prophecies not unbiblical practices god warns us of such to not be led astray i spoke some while back with one a charismatic preacher who actually believed that the writings of muhammad were prophecies that he relied on he actually was so deceived that he would believe even the prophecies or the writings i don't think muhammad ever prophesied but the writings of muhammad could be relied upon such deception it's astonishing astonishing that he could not see the error of that surely these are days of deception that we're living in so he must have spiritual discernment now more than ever the last times tell us of such a deception that threatens to deceive if possible the very elect that such a deception could be so convincing

[45:28] that even the best could be swayed potentially the master deceiver is busy still but thank god for this friends as we close we have a more sure word of prophecy you know there's some prophets pentecostal prophets so called that say they've got an 80% what's it called an 80% accuracy rate or something whatever it be but we know well if you're a prophet of god it's 100% if it's 99% it'll take you out and stone you to death if the bible prophet test is applied it must be 100% but friends this prophecy this book of prophecy this book the bible the word of god is a more sure word of prophecy where unto you do well to take heed as unto a light that shineth in a dark place until the day dawn and the day star arise in your hearts the bible is for us it's more it's more sure it's the more sure word of prophecy and we can take heed to that we don't need some new revelation we don't need some new experience some new story or some new fable we need the bible the bible the complete final authority the ultimate standard of truth and we need discernment now more than ever these are days of deception there's a famine of hearing the word of god some would rather have some substitute some new fad something that will tingle their taste buds or tickle their ears thank god we do have a wonderful assurance there is a more sure word of prophecy it's the revealed inspired inerrant word of god and we can know with an assurance that there's no falsehood there it's absolutely true so let the word be the be the test for you test me test this test this church test what we stand for our doctrine our proclamation the gospel we deliver let it be tested that it is spiritual truth and it's sensible biblical truth the main thing do we know him who is the truth we can hear this and yet not personally know am i saved the truth that you are heaven bound and by his grace you can know that that grace of god can't you pilate pilate asked he eyeballed the very son of god and he says what is truth people ask the same question today the lord jesus he is the way the truth and the life be saved today trust in him let us pray our lord we thank you for this more sure word of prophecy that we can do well we need to take heed unto it it is that shining light that penetrates the darkness of this deception that is abounding all about lord that we can in these days of deception we can have discernment let it be a spiritual thing let it be that our senses are exercised as we are biblical people to discern biblically that which is right lord help us not to be afraid to say where we wrong where it doesn't add up that we can be guided by your spirit into all truth lord guide our steps we pray each one might know that trust that saves a soul and knows that sure reservation

[49:29] made of heaven for their soul that heaven is their home and we meantime just passing through lord for the meantime help us to make an impact such that we'll be mindful to not be deceived that evil communications can corrupt good manners that we need to be wise about our life our living our talking that we won't be like the man with the vain religion with the unbridled tongue but we'll be wise in our life our living all to your praise lord give us that quality that spiritual quality of life that so matters that at the end of it all we won't be called into account for false things we've said or taught but we'll be commended for that truth that we stood for lord give us that grace we pray in jesus name amen