Deception

Deception comes in all forms. In the world we can be deceived by a spouse, a family member, or a friend.  We can even be deceived by a stranger knowing how to exploit money out of those that are trusting. We get bombarded daily with phone calls of deception from those wanting to get information from us, so that they can steal identities, and/or talk us into something we neither need or want. In the Christian circles we know that the devil is very good at deception. He deceived Eve at the beginning of our world. He still deceives and is the master deceiver of all times. Most of the time we view his deception as something sinister and we should be able to identify it before we are deceived, but I want you to listen to this story about Jesus when He was being questioned by some Sadducees: “Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother dies, leaves his wife behind, and leaves no child, his brother should take the wife and produce offspring for his brother. There were seven brothers. The first took a wife, and dying, left no offspring. The second also took her, and he died, leaving no offspring. And the third likewise. So the seven left no offspring. Last of all, the woman died too. In the resurrection, when they rise, whose wife will she be, since the seven had married her? Jesus told them, ‘Are you not deceived because you don’t know the Scriptures or the power of God? For when they rise from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage but are like angels in heaven. Now concerning the dead being raised – haven’t you read in the book of Moses, in the passage about the burning bush, how God spoke to him: I am the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob? He is not God of the dead but of the living. You are badly deceived.” Mark 12: 19-27  It’s easy to be led astray by the adversary’s deception, when we want to believe something that is not true. And it starts within us. So the way to combat deception is to stay away from trying to formulate all that the word says, into what we want it to say, instead of taking it for what it is – God’s word, and not ours. If another tells us something, they might not even realize they are spreading deception, so all things should be weighed against what Scripture says, and what we are being told by the Holy Spirit. Notice how Jesus used Scripture to answer the deception. and we should also. So the next time you hear something that doesn’t quite sit well with your heart, search the Scriptures, pray about it, and if necessary seek out godly men and women you trust to get their opinion on it before you act on it or spread it as something true even though you have never heard about it before. Let’s not be deceived! There is too much deception already in the world without us being an innocent party to more, especially of the brotherhood. P. Andy