“You, however, have followed my teaching, my conduct, my aim in life, my faith, my patience, my love, my steadfastness, my persecutions and sufferings that happened to me at Antioch, at Iconium, and at Lystra—which persecutions I endured; yet from them all the Lord rescued me. Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, while evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.” (2 Timothy 3:10-15 ESV)
I believe the Lord Jesus would want me to share here a
personal example of such persecution as this from my own experience. And I will
state ahead of time that this situation is not necessarily an exact duplicate
of Paul’s experience, but that there are similarities and some parallels. For
this does have to do with deception and false (misleading) teachings of the
Scriptures based on man-made religion and not on the truth of the Scriptures. For
many are altering the Scriptures to fit with their own personal preferences.
A few years ago I was watching and listening to another
woman’s online (live) Bible studies. This was a person that I knew, so she was not
a stranger to me. And I had written her several encouraging responses to some
of her Bible studies. But then she misquoted Matthew 7:21-23, primarily verse
21 which says, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the
kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven”
(but he who is doing the will of my Father who is in the heavens).
But she changed the wording to say, “Not everyone who says
to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who is in
relationship with me.” And this was to fit in with her theology of being saved
and on our way to heaven based on a profession of faith in Jesus Christ which
is absent of God’s requirements of us that we must die with him to sin and now walk
(in conduct) with him in obedience to his commands in daily practice. Sin and
disobedience to our Lord, in practice, should no longer be what we do.
Now this woman had thousands of people following her online,
but I did not know how many of them were watching her morning devotions. But
she was leading them astray by telling them that they could believe in Jesus
and be guaranteed heaven when they die but that obedience to God and to his
commands is not required of them for salvation because that is works, and we
are not saved by our works. It is true - our own fleshly works do not save us,
but God requires works as part of us living the salvation he provided.
See: [Matt
7:13-14,21-23; Matt 24:9-14; Lu 9:23-26; Jn 6:44; Jn
8:31-32; Jn 15:1-12; Rom 2:6-8; Rom 6:1-23; Rom 8:24; Rom 11:17-24; Rom 13:11; 1 Co 1:18; 1 Co 15:1-2; Gal 6:7-8; Eph 5:3-6; Col
1:21-23; 2 Tim 1:8-9; 2
Tim 2:10-13; Heb 9:28; Heb
3:6,14-15; 1 Pet 1:5,9; 2
Pet 1:5-11; 2 Pet 2:20-22; 1 Jn 1:5-10; 1 Jn 2:3-6,15-17,24-25;
1 Jn 3:4-10]
So the Lord led me
to write to her privately and to ask her just 3 questions: 1. How approachable are you? 2. How committed are you to
making certain that what you are teaching the people is the whole counsel of
God? 3. Are you open to having your words tested against the Scriptures?
Well, she responded
with hostility, and she said she was not approachable and that she is not
willing to have her words tested against the Scriptures. Then she got
very defensive. She felt that having someone test her words against the
Scriptures would be a deterrent and might keep her from saying anything at all.
And then I mentioned that we who teach the Scriptures should make ourselves
open to have our words tested because we want to be certain that what we are
teaching is the truth.
I mentioned that she
had misquoted a Scripture which is “a life and death situation” if the people
that she teaches believe it wrongly. She responded back by telling me that my
“life and death” comment was disturbing to her because comments like that turn
people away from teaching and spreading God’s word. She wanted me to just
encourage her and she felt that I was rebuking her instead. And then she told
me that I should not be the reason someone runs from spreading the word instead
of embracing it.
The next morning I
sensed that I was to listen to her next devotion, so I did. The passage was
from James about confessing our sins one to the other so that we may be healed,
and about the prayer of the righteous person. She focused on the subject of
prayer and did not talk about confessing our sins one to the other, as I recall.
But then she spent about 20 to 25 minutes blasting me, although publicly she
did not name me, though she did talk to some people privately about me and she
may have named me to them.
She admitted
publicly that she is not approachable, and she said that the Scriptures do not
say anything about us testing one another and what we teach against the
Scriptures, and so she said publicly that she did not want anyone testing her
words against the Scriptures. But, in the same sentence, she told them that
they could challenge her if they thought she was wrong, but then she went right
back to saying that they had better not try testing her words against the
Scriptures.
Then she claimed
that what she was teaching was straight from the Scriptures and she went off on
how we are saved merely by a profession of faith in Jesus and not by works. And
since I said nothing of that at all to her, I believed she knew the Scripture
she misquoted, and why she misquoted it, that it was because it did not fit in
with her “not by works” theology. She was very hostile in what she said about
me, and she took a lot of liberties in how she described our conversation. And
she was definitely trying to paint herself as the persecuted and me as her
persecutor. End of story.
All this came about
because I asked her those three questions. But all of us should ask ourselves
those 3 questions:
1. How approachable are you?
2. How committed are you to making certain that what you are teaching the people is the whole counsel of God?
3. Are you open to having your words tested against the Scriptures?
For if we are going
to be teachers of the Scriptures, or merely those who are sharing the message
of the gospel, as we understand it, with others, we should be diligent about
making certain that we are teaching the whole counsel of God and not a diluted
and altered gospel message which uses Scriptures out of context to support
their theologies. And if we teach the truth, and not the lies, and if we
confront the lies, we are likely to be persecuted by those who do not accept
the gospel that Jesus taught.
An Original Work / December 18, 2013
Christ’s Free Servant, Sue J Love
“About
midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the other
prisoners were listening to them.” Acts 16:25 NIV ‘84
Lord, I praise You forevermore.
You, my Savior, I now adore.
Hope in heaven awaiting me,
Because You died at Calvary.
I have been forgiven,
And I’m bound for heaven.
Jesus set me free from
All my sin, I say.
I will praise Him always!
Lord, I love You for all You’ve done:
Overcame death, my vict’ry won!
Jesus saved me, and now I’m free!
I rejoice in His love for me.
I will walk in vict’ry!
My sin is but hist’ry!
I am free to please Him
With my life today.
I will love Him always!
Lord, I thank You for giving me
A new life bought at Calvary.
Loving Jesus, I meet with Him.
Tender mercies now flow within.
Lord, I am so thankful;
Through my Lord, I’m able
To sit at His table;
Fellowship with Him.
I will thank Him always!
Deceiving and Being
Deceived
An Original Work / February 12,
2025
Christ’s Free
Servant, Sue J Love
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