How to Get Deceived Real Good

All right. if you guys would open up in your Bibles. To, we're gonna have, have you turn to 2 Corinthians chapter 11. 2 Corinthians chapter 11.

last week, Pastor Milton delivered a message entitled Good Bad News from Genesis 3, and one of the verses that he covered said this. The woman said the serpent deceived me and I ate. And just a wonderful exposition of the passage last week and one of the things that's unique about Eve being deceived and Adam falling is that there was nothing really in their hearts at this point that would predispose them to sin. Eve was genuinely deceived without a sin nature.

But what is our world like since the fall? What is it that we deal with when we're dealing with temptations and dealing with deception? And so we're gonna be considering this broad theological topic under the title, How to Get Deceived, Real good. And since the fall, human beings have done an excellent job at getting themselves deceived.

2 Corinthians chapter 11, Paul says, but I fear lest somehow as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, so your minds may be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. And Paul's fears are legitimate, because there really is a devil and Christians, even born again Christians can be deceived as we're gonna see this morning. Now I have a lot of experience. to speak on this topic, I can preach with authority this morning, this morning because of my personal background.

So I hope you appreciate that. back when I was in college, I had an opportunity to preach, one of my first gospel messages in front of a larger crowd of people. I was, performing in a Christian rock band at the time, and I was sporting my Bono rock boots. My long hair that looked like Ronald McDonald with a mullet.

I was wearing jeans tighter than I would like to admit. And with an untucked, what you might call a male midriff shirt from the 1980s. That just barely touched the top of my belt. And, we were gonna make it big for the Lord.

even though we didn't have anyone in our band who could sing. and so here I was at the end of one of our concerts and I'm preaching the gospel. I'm very nervous and one of my nervous tics was to scratch my stomach and chest and so I reached up underneath this shirt and began to scratch my chest in nervousness. And at some point, I got my words mixed up and I asked everyone to believe in the devil for the forgiveness of their sins.

And I didn't hear what had come out of my mouth. I was two sentences ahead of myself, but all of a sudden I saw all these smiles turn to frowns. And I, I really didn't know why people suddenly started frowning. But after my message, Pastor Dan Warda came up to me.

I don't know if you, any of you guys remember Pastor Dan Warda from back in the day, and he shared with me in such a way that only Pastor Dan Warda can. He looked at me and he said, Mike, That was not cool, brother. That was not cool. And I suddenly began to realize what had happened as he explained to me my exposure of my I guess, six pack.

My faulty gospel message. And so on and so forth. so as Dan Warda and others began to share with me, I began to realize that there was all kinds of things going on that I was totally unaware of at that time and then even later on when I look back at some of these pictures of myself, I, I just, I wonder what was going on in my skull. to wear some of the things I wore.

Well, I did get a girlfriend. That's probably part of it. this was, that, that can make a lot of changes in the way a person dresses. but this morning, I want to, to talk about this topic, how to get deceived real good, and we're gonna give you one thing to do and 5 things to, to not do if you wanna get deceived real good.

One thing to do. And 5 things to not do. Let's talk about the first thing, and that is just get yourself born and you're already on the way to being deceived. Get yourself born.

the Bible is very clear. One of the one of the passages, Psalm 51:5, behold, David says, I was brought forth in iniquity, crookedness, and in sin, my mother conceived me. He's not blaming his mother for sin. He's saying, I was conceived a sinner.

I was already prone to miss the mark. I was already prone to crookedness and deception as soon as I was born. David tells us. Psalm 58:3 goes further than that.

The wicked, and here the psalmist is not just talking about the wicked people over there. He's talking about the wicked, that is us, are estranged from the womb. They go astray as soon as they are born, speaking lies. So if you just get yourself born, you've already accomplished the first step in getting yourself deceived, real good.

Because we've inherited a nature actually from Adam and Eve, Adam particularly. And as we are born, we go astray from the womb. So get yourself born, but also within this idea, don't get yourself reborn and you will be even more assured of continual deception throughout your life. Ephesians 4:17, Paul gives a description of the average human being who is not born again.

this is his, his description of lost humanity. Now, I would not necessarily recommend that you walk into your first conversation with an unbeliever and make this assessment of them, but this is what Paul says. Starting in 17, this I say, therefore and testify in the Lord that you should no longer walk as the rest of the Gentiles walk. OK, he's talking to Christians, don't walk like the unbelievers.

Here's how unbelievers walk. Here's how they live. In the futility of their mind, their minds, the way they think is futile. Having their understanding darkened, being alienated from The life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart who being past feeling have given themselves over to lewdness, to which all unclean, to work all uncleanness and greediness.

OK, it's OK for Paul to tell Christians don't behave like this, but just imagine walking into your first conversation with an unbeliever, trying to make an impact on them and just saying, you, your thought process is futile. Your ability to think is darkened. You are alienated from God, you are totally ignorant, you are blind, and you are past feeling. That would see, that would seem utterly rude.

But this is the assessment that the Bible gives of people before they're born again. This this is their natural inclination from birth. And yet, we also see, let's take a look at, let's see, Titus. we see the, the same, the same thing that there, there is a difference between those who are born again and those who are not born again.

And Titus, Paul says to Titus, be peaceable, gentle, showing all humility to all men. Who we ourselves, for we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, and deceived, serving various lusts. So Paul is categorizing human beings pretty consistently, in his writings that human beings, apart from being born again, are foolish, deceived, serving various lusts. But then what happens in verse four?

But when the kindness and the love of God our Savior towards man appeared, not by works of righteousness, which we've done, but according to His mercy, he saved us through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, having been justified by His grace, goes on gives all kinds of attributes of peaceable, gentle, showing all humility. So Christians, take on a, a different nature or a new nature that is distinguished in the Bible from unbelievers. We come out of the womb, already prone towards sin and prone towards lies and deception.

But then regeneration happens to a believer, and there's something new that happens in the mind.

They are now given what's called the mind of Christ. So there really is a difference between a believer and an unbeliever. But I wanna suggest to you that if you want to get yourself good and deceived as a Christian, Just assume that you can no longer be deceived after you're born again. Just assume that now that I'm born again, now that I'm a Christian, now that I have the Holy Spirit dwelling in me, I can no longer be deceived like those unbelievers.

the, the Bible several different times says, has a phrase like this, do not be deceived. And is this phrase given to Christians or non-Christians? Christians. These are commands that are given to believers, which implies something about us.

And what does it imply? We can be deceived. Paul wouldn't have to say, do not be deceived if we could never be deceived. I don't know about you, but I've been in situations where Christians were not the smartest people in the room.

Myself included I've been in situations where unbelievers seem to have the most sense in the room. And so Christians can be prone to deception as well. Let's look at a few passages that indicate this. James 1:13 says, Let no one say when he is tempted, I'm tempted by God, for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he himself tempt anyone, but each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed, do not be deceived.

That's one of our phrases, my beloved brethren. This is Paul speaking to Christians, do not be deceived, brethren. You can be deceived by your own desires. This means that even after a person's born again, there is still sinful desires that can rise up within the heart of a Christian, and a Christian can be deceived by sin.

Are we stretching anything, do you think? No, James 1 is delivered to Christians. So, first of all, here's the thing, is just get yourself born, right? If you don't get born again, that's gonna continue you on this trajectory towards deception.

If you get born again, just say, oh, now I'm born again, I don't need to worry about being deceived, and that will also help you get deceived. But let's talk about 5 don'ts now. Don't take human nature seriously. Don't take human nature seriously.

It's one thing to be born in sin. But the Bible indicates that there is a continual problem with sin and our hearts. Jeremiah indicates this in Jeremiah 17:9 when it says the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked, who can know it? When the Bible says heart, it's not just talking about the organ, obviously, it's not just talking about like love, like we would think of hearts as meaning just love and emotions in our culture.

It's the seat of the thoughts, the will and the emotions. Both in Hebrew and in Greek, the concept is fairly, is very similar, that the heart is the seat of the thoughts, the will, and the emotions. And it's really what our, our, our problem, the Bible it seems to indicate is primarily an issue of what comes from within us, not what comes from outside, as Jesus says in Mark 7:20 and following. And Jesus said, what comes out of a man that defiles a man.

For from within, out of the heart of men proceed what evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lewdness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness, all these things come from within and defile a man. So human nature, if we are understanding human nature from a biblical perspective, we've got this heart that is deceitful, and what comes out of our heart, what rises out of our heart, naturally is not goodness, but deceit. CH Spurgeon, one of his famous quotes is that our hearts are idol factories.

We are constantly producing idols.

And he wasn't speaking of just Christians, when he, non-believers when he made that statement. He was also speaking of believers. John tells us that if we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. Again, this is being spoken to believers.

If we say, hey, I'm a Christian now I'm filled with the Spirit, I don't have sin. He says, you are deceived. The truth is not in you. Paul says in another place, 2 Timothy 3:12, that it not only is it bad, but it's gonna get worse.

Yes, all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution, but evil men and impostors will go worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived. Now, this is clearly talking about the unbelieving age as compared to Christians, but as we look at the world around us, we're not to expect it to get better, but actually deception will get worse. so let's, let's expose a few more items here about this, this, this human nature thing. again, if you want to get really good and deceived, don't take human nature seriously.

Rather have unfailing trust in your own abilities to reason and perceive. Just have unfailing trust in rationalism and empiricism. Just believe, like good medieval Roman Catholics, that the fall had no effect upon our reasoning abilities, and that we can start with nature and just reason to God and reason to good theology, apart from the Bible. We can reason our ways to good life, to good thinking.

We can observe the world, and we can trust our senses. That's empiricism. The Bible comes along and says, no, no, no, hold on. There's an effect that sin has upon our ability to reason.

And theologians have called this the noetic effect of sin. Not Noah, like on the ark, noetic, the Greek word noe for mind. There's an effect of sin upon the mind. Speaking about the Ephesians four passage that we looked at earlier, Hendrickson says this, this darkening, moreover, is far worse than physical blindness, for the man who is physically blind knows it and admits it, but the person who is spiritually and morally darkened is blind even to the fact that he is blind.

And so this is a dark picture of humanity, right? that we've got, not only we, we're born in sin, we've got this, but, but also the sin of Adam and Eve has an effect upon our ability to reason and to think. Now, let's just, let's draw some lines here of what we mean and what we don't, don't mean. The Bible indicates that all people are created in the image of God, right?

Adam and Eve were created in what? His image and likeness, right? After the fall, did Adam and Eve lose the image and likeness? No, because we see Adam, we see Noah and his sons getting off the ark and was it Genesis 9 and they're still being spoken of as made in the image and likeness, right?

And God commands that nobody should commit capital punishment except for those that God has ordained because human beings are made in the image of likeness, correct? And so believers over the years have argued that the image of God remains in man. And so we can affirm the fact that there is a nobility of man, even after the fall, that when we look at all of the things that man has created or humans have created and all of the, the, the things that humans have been able to accomplish, we think of science and technology and cures for diseases, we can look and see God's common grace.

that God pours out his rain on the just and the unjust.

He pours out his knowledge on the just and the unjust. And so believers and unbelievers can go out into the world and can investigate his world and whilst the glory of God to conceal a matter, it's a glory of Kings to search it out and that total pagans can actually find wonderful things about God's creation and use it as it were for God's glory, even though they don't acknowledge it coming from God. And so there's this nobility of man concept. So human beings, we can study cultures that have had no contact with the gospel and we'll find amazing things about these cultures, Egyptian culture, even the Hittites, we find amazing things.

If you study the Aztecs, there's incredible things about the way they would organize their government and, just incredible inventions that come from the Aztecs. And yet, because of the fall, we have what we would call the depravity of man. The image remains that speaks to the nobility of men, but the image is marred. That speaks of the depravity of men.

While human beings can go and discover incredible things, they will never of themselves take these discoveries and take their nobility and turn it to worship of God and turn it to ultimate eternal good. We will take wonderful things that we have been discovered, science and medicine, and by nature, human beings will eventually turn them to evil. We have amazing things that have been discovered in medicine and science and, and that have brought great healing and, and to diseases and so on.

And yet we'll take the same discoveries, we'll use them to kill millions of babies.

We'll take these same discoveries and we'll take and we'll use them to kill old people because they're old. Or we'll use them to kill mentally disabled people because they're mentally disabled. and so we have the nobility and the depravity of man. This all goes to the noetic effect of sin.

All that saying that we as a human race, though we are noble and made in God's image, we can still, and we constantly deceive ourselves and do not give God the glory that he alone deserves. So if we don't take human nature seriously, we're gonna perpetuate this. If we put unfailing trust in our reason and our ability to perceive, we're gonna perpetuate the human deception. Another thing that we can do is just do whatever seems right to you.

The Bible says there's a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of what? Death. what's the message of just about every Disney movie that you ever watch, right? Just follow your heart, do whatever, whatever seems right to you.

Go out and do it. The Bible says, don't follow your heart. That thing's deceitful and crept above all things. but the world is telling us and what we tell ourselves is just do what seems right to you and everything will turn out OK.

1 Corinthians 3:18 tells us, Paul, he says, let no one deceive himself. If anyone among you seems to be wise in this age, let him become a fool that he may become wise. The idea is that you can't trust your own wisdom outside of the revelation of God in His word through the interpretation of the Holy Spirit. We're gonna talk more about that here in just a little bit.

OK, here's another thing about not taking human nature seriously., put unfailing trust in your, in your own reason, and your ability to perceive, do whatever seems right to you, and realize that bad company won't corrupt you. You're too smart for that. You're too smart. You can go to just about any movie you want and it won't affect you.

You can listen to any music you want, it won't affect you. You can listen to all the bad teaching and false doctrine you want, it won't affect you. That's what we tell ourselves. That's what the world tells us.

What does the Bible say? The Bible says 1 Corinthians 15:33, do not be deceived, evil company corrupts good habits. And the context here is interesting because this isn't a context of people falling into gross sexual immorality. The context here is about doctrine.

That the Corinthians were hanging around with people who denied the resurrection, the physical resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. And Paul's command to these Corinthians is, do not hang around with people that are denying the resurrection of Jesus Christ, because bad company corrupts good morals. Paul says other things like this, Let's see. Well, for the sake of time, we'll skip that one.

But the, the big idea here is, is we can be corrupted by those that are around us. those of you guys who have taught any school or I, I used to teach junior highs in the public school system and really had a lot of fun. And, but one thing that you notice is you could always tell when there was some new cartoon or new movie that came out because every kid would imitate it. Right?

I hadn't seen, like, I, I had never seen Fire Marshal Bill, a Jim Carrey character, but I could, I could do it perfectly because of my junior hires. They could imitate Fire Marshal Bill, right? You guys, I don't even wanna do it. I'm, I'm not gonna embarrass myself.

whenever I forget these guys that came out when they're always like, fire, fire, fire. What are those guys? Beavis and we won't say it. OK.

As soon as those guys came out, every junior high boy in the whole school was imitating these guys, right? It doesn't take much before everybody's imitating these folks. And for me, this is just my personal application, when, I, when it comes to like doctrinal stuff, I try to read. A lot of Bible and a lot of people who uphold the word of God and who I trust their view of Scripture.

When I, when I find people who I trust their view of scripture, I listen to them a lot. Like a guy, right now, I've really been in this kick of listening to Al Mohler's briefing. I really recommend it to you. Go to Al Mohler.com, read it.

He, he hits like 4 or 5 stories every day from news and then he'll talk about it through a Christian worldview. I trust his, his view of the Bible inerrancy and, and Christian worldview and so I listened to him a lot. And maybe this is just my own heart and my own misgivings, but I don't listen to a lot of unbelievers who don't uphold the Bible. I'll read the Wall Street Journal or I'll read, read The Atlantic or this or that, but I don't spend a ton of time just trying to figure out what all the, what all the false teachers say.

I'd rather go out and find out what the good teachers are saying and then let them tell me what the false teachers are saying. That's just me, because I think there's a principle for that. Bad company, corrupts. Good morals.

I don't want to constantly be hanging out with bad company when it comes to doctrine. Let's talk about another thing here under this, this point, trust your own inner sense of spiritual guidance without question. Hey, I'm a Christian, I'm full of the Holy Spirit. I've just got a sense of what the Lord wants me to do.

I think the Lord wants me to do this. And just don't check anybody else's perspective on that. Don't look at the Bible. Don't ask your parents.

Don't ask your pastors, don't ask your church family or your care group. Just trust that inner sense of what the Spirit's telling you to do, and everything will go OK. Not. It's a good way to get deceived.

even one of my spiritual heroes, George Whitfield, fell into this. In 1743, he had his first child, and he named this child John after John the Baptist because he really felt that the Lord had given him an impression that his child John was gonna go on. And be an amazing preacher of the everlasting gospel. He had him baptized and he announced to everybody that was there, believer and unbeliever alike, that God was gonna use his son to accomplish great works for the kingdom.

And then just 4 months later, his son had a seizure and died. Right after he had announced that God was gonna use this little boy for his glory. And his, he and his wife were grief-stricken. and he particularly, George Whitfield, was very convicted.

about his inward, how that he placed his inward impulses and intuitions as being essentially equal to the word of God. He realized that he had led his congregation into the same delusion. And he confessed his sin before his church. He said that he had given himself over to perhaps fatherly pride and the joy in his son and and it had taken that as God speaking to him personally.

And he wrote a, a wrenching prayer in which he said, he asked the Lord, render this mistaken parent more cautious, more sober minded. More experienced in Satan's devices and consequently more useful in his future labors to the church. So even a a credible man of God like George Whitfield was, was deceived by this inclination in his own heart, and yet praise the Lord that he was able to see the deception and even confess it to his own church. so, so the two things we've looked at so far is if you want to get deceived real good, first of all, just get born.

How's everybody doing on that? OK, good. don't take human nature seriously. Hopefully, we're convincing you to take human nature seriously.

but thirdly, don't take sin itself seriously. Just don't take sin seriously. First, let me see, do we have 1 Corinthians, I don't, yeah, there is. 1 Corinthians 6:9, Paul says this, do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God?

Do not be deceived. This is another one of our statements. Neither fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, homosexuals, sodomites, thieves, covetous, drunkards, revilers, extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God. Paul says to Christians, don't be deceived.

These people who practice these types of things do not inherit the Kingdom of God. They don't go to heaven. But he goes on and says, but such were some of you. You guys used to walk in this way, but the gospel has washed you, it's cleansed you.

And so, but don't take these things seriously and you'll be on the road to more deception. In fact, just go ahead and just make up jokes about sin. humor makes a, a message more receptive. That's what we're taught, in our, in our speech classes, right, is if you're funny, then people want to hear your message more, right?

That's why I try to be hilarious. Right? you, you guys ever seen the Lego Movie? I love the Lego Movie.

Even though it's postmodern, I love it. I love it. So, but, there's a scene where Emmett is right at the very beginning. He's watching some TV with the Lord President and the Lord President's talking about Taco Tuesday and all this stuff and he goes, I'm gonna put you to sleep, by the way, and, and he goes on to the next thing and Emmett's like, Whoa, what did he say?

Put us to sleep. And then a commer and then a, a television program comes on about where are my pants? Have I seen that? Yeah.

And so he starts laughing, he falls over and he's like, what was I thinking about? I don't care. And that's actually one of the things that humor can do to us. And I love humor and humor can be used for good, right?

And then humor can, can be used to just turn people's brains off, right? Get them to not think about what's really going on in the world. In fact, And even, honestly, some of the shows on television that I really like that I've enjoyed, will use humor, crass humor at times, it kinda gets you laughing and then, as you really start to analyze and thinking about it, they're trying to make light of something that the Bible doesn't make light of, that it's, it's a very serious thing.

And so, but just look at what Paul says in Ephesians 5:3 about this.

He says, fornication, this is the believers and uncleanness or covetousness, let it not even be named among you, among you as is fitting, is fitting for saints. Neither filthiness, foolish talking, coarse jesting, which are not fitting. This whole idea is what we, what we've seen in culture from the very beginning is you just make jokes about things that are sinful, people laugh at it, and it diminishes the seriousness of the sin. Paul saying Christians should just not be involved in that.

Should not be involved in coarse jesting because coarse jesting minimizes sin. It causes us to not take sin seriously. is ultimately what it does. Verse 6, Paul says, let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things, the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience.

That thing that you're laughing at is the very thing that is going to damn a person. And so how can we laugh at what damns? But if you wanna get really deceived, go ahead and make jokes about sin. be an expert in evil.

Here's another thing, just get really a lot of expertise in all the different varieties of evil that are out there. Paul says the contrary in 1 Corinthians 14:20, Brothers, stop thinking like children. In regard to evil, be infants, but in your thinking, be adults. So when it comes to like spiritual things and things that really matter, let's be adults is what Paul's saying.

When it comes to evil, be an infant. Be somebody who really doesn't know a lot. I don't know about you, but I can just remember the lady that led me to the Lord, was, an older senior citizen lady. We called her Mammer.

And sometimes I come home from school before I came to know the Lord and start talking to her. And you could just tell that she was just really not in the know of all the things I knew about as a junior high school student. That she just didn't really know the jokes and all the little things, and just, she just seemed so ignorant of things that us junior high boys knew about. And so I, I, I could just remember myself snickering about her.

But what, she, she did have a relative innocence of evil, and it made her incredibly effective for the Lord. she was just able just to focus on spiritual things and she was just constantly about the word and always listening to Chuck Smith on the radio, and she had all these tapes and stuff. And, Lord willing, we want to be as innocent as possible within, providence and God's sovereignty of, of evil. If not, evil can lead us further down that path of deception.

don't control your tongue would be another thing. If, if you don't want to take sin seriously, just say to yourself, it really doesn't matter what comes out of my mouth. But James would say the opposite. James 1:26.

If anyone among you thinks he is religious and does not bridle his tongue, he deceives his own heart, right? If we just think, it's just This is just who I am. this is just, you just like, you just wear everything that comes to your mind. You just say it.

Some people say things like this, yeah, I'm just being honest, right? Just an honest guy. And the Bible says that the fool speaks forth his own heart, right? It's a wise person that holds things back and is discerning.

Should this be said now? Should this be said in this way? Should this be said to this person? and when we just give unfettered, just release to our tongue, we're putting ourselves in that path of deception.

love riches. Matthew 13:22 in the parable of the Four soils says the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke out the word. We get so caught up in riches and our life is all about getting the degree, getting the job, so we can get the best toys, so that we can go have fun and then die. Right?

but riches can carve up our hearts. It can, it can put us on a path, that's different from what, where the Lord would have us to go. So don't take sin seriously. If you want to get yourself good and deceived, just get yourself born.

Don't take human nature seriously, don't take sin seriously. But 4th, don't take the devil seriously. We looked at the passage in 2 Corinthians earlier about how Paul's fear that the devil would deceive the Corinthians. Paul says to Timothy, that now the spirit expressly says that in latter times, some will depart from the faith, given heeds to the deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons.

That ultimately, a lot of the, a lot of what we're dealing with when we talk about spiritual warfare, we're talking about ideas. We're talking about the gospel over here, and we're talking about doctrines of demons over here, and there's a battle of ideas that's going on for the hearts of men. And so we see in our age, and it's, it's been this way for, really hundreds of years. People coming along and, and suddenly, there's another new fad of teaching.

in, in this case, Paul talks about forbidding to marry or telling people they can't eat this or can't eat that when the Lord permits them to eat this. And there's always something new that comes up, the lost books of the gospel, right? There's something new that always comes up that's trying to convince people. of something to do.

And the devil is a real person. The Bible indicates that this is a personal being who goes around seeking to deceive, just like Iago seeking to deceive Othello. You guys ever seen Othello or read Othello? It's a spooky play.

I don't know what Shakespeare was thinking. Maybe he was reading the Bible about the devil. Iago is this guy that seems to be Othello's friend, and he sets things up in such a way to convince Othello that his wife has been unfaithful to the point where Othello eventually murders his own wife. And you get to see the inner workings of Iago, and when you're reading Iago, you just think you're reading, the dialogue of the devil.

And, and, but this, this is a real person. there's some errors that we can fall into in our culture. We can, we can, as, CS Lewis says in the screw tape letters, there are two equal and opposite errors into which our race can fall about devils. One's to disbelieve their existence.

The other is to believe in fear so excessively and unhealthily that we have an unhealthy interest in them. We wanna have a healthy understanding that the devil does exist. and take him seriously. And ultimately because the Bible indicates that false teaching comes from demons, we're talking about, doctrines of demons.

We need to be, aware of the devil's use of false teachers like the false teachers that came to the Galatians, who bewitched them, who, tricked their senses. we wanna be careful of, False prophets, Jesus told us that there would be false prophets in the last day that would come and say, here I'm the Christ, here I'm the Christ. I want to be careful of false writings. This was going on already in the New Testament period where people were writing, pretending to be from Paul saying, hey, the day of the Lord's already here.

And so we wanna be aware that the devil does exist and his business is to deceive. And so, so get yourself born. You wanna get deceived real good. Don't take human nature seriously.

Don't take sin seriously, don't take the devil seriously. Fifthly, don't take religion seriously. And we're speaking of religion in the biblical sense and the best use of the term, pure and undefiled religion. And there's lots of things that we would fit underneath the category of religion.

The first thing is just family, family is the center point of religion, right? So if you wanna get yourself good and deceived, don't be family oriented. Just kinda be out there. Don't be connected to your family, don't see the value of the family., Vode Baum presents some just disturbing statistics of fatherlessness in our culture.

And how that 70% of the prison population comes from fatherless males. That's just one of many statistics of the tragedy that's happening, not just in our country but around the world, of, of people that are being raised without a mother or a father. Write this down. Deuteronomy 6, Proverbs 6, Ephesians 6.

Deuteronomy 6, Proverbs 6, Ephesians 6. These are just three chapters that speak of the, essential nature of the family for religion. How it is important for parents to pass on the word of God, how it's important for children to listen to mom and dad, Proverbs 6, that's important for mom and dad to raise their children up in the fear and nurture of the Lord. And when we don't have a mother and a father, then it's the whole body of Christ that comes around to gather ourselves around these spiritual orphans and to minister to them.

And that's the second part of religion is, if you want to get yourself deceived, just don't be too churchy. Right? Don't, don't be so churchy. Maybe go to church on Easter or, or, or Christmas or whatever, but if you get too churchy, then you're gonna be, kinda like these caricatures that you see on television, right?

Hebrews 10:25 says, don't forsake the assembling of ourselves together, is the manner of some. And one of the reasons for that is in Hebrews 3:13, but exhort one another daily while it is today, lest you be hardened to the deceitfulness of sin. It only takes a day before our hearts to get hardened to the deceitfulness of sin, just one day. And then we're already off on the wrong path.

And so we need to be assembling together with family, with the church. And so, seriously, I would say don't, don't be afraid of being churchy. It used to be a, a, a term that used to be really in vogue, was to be a good churchman. That was something that people aspired to actually, was to be a good churchman.

But if you wanna keep on this trajectory of getting deceived, then don't listen to teachers who are too preachy. Like me, right? So don't, don't go and listen to good preaching, But, Paul actually contradicts this idea in Ephesians 4, he tells us that Jesus Christ actually gave pastors and teachers to the church to equip the church and look down at verse 14 that we should no longer be children tossed to and fro, carried about by every wind of doctrine, trickery of men, cunning, craftiness of deceitful plotting.

What's one of the reasons why Jesus has given teachers to the church?

To protect us from deception, to protect us from deceivers. That's exactly what he commissions the Ephesian elders to do in Acts chapter 20 Paul talks to the Ephesians elders and he tells them, he says, you guys are overseers, you guys need to shepherd the flock, because what, there's wolves that are coming from the outside, there's wolves that are gonna rise up from inside, and so you pastors have a very important role. As believers, we should highly value the preaching of our teachers.

We should value when gathering together to hear Pastor Milton preach or whoever happens to be preaching that Sunday, that it's something we need.

we need it. we cannot just go out all on our own, as a Lone Ranger, but the Lord has in his, in his wisdom given us preaching and teaching. But if you wanna keep on your trajectory of deception, don't be a Bible nut. Don't read your Bible too much.

Because if you read the Bible, you might just find out that it's discerning your thoughts and intents of your heart. There's something very interesting about the Bible that is entirely unique from any other book that's ever been written, and that is that this book has the power to discern the depths of your hearts. the heart is a deep thing, who can know it? But God knows it.

And through the Holy Spirit, he's inspired his word. And as we read the Bible together, and as the Bible gets illumined by the Holy Spirit before us, as it's preached, as it's read, it discerns our hearts, it discerns our intents. And so as we read it, as we hear it preached, as we memorize it, while a part of our hearts are prone towards deception, The Bible counteracts that idol making factory that's in our hearts. Does that make sense?

If we make use of the Bible, we're on a, we're, we're constantly putting down the deception, we're fighting against the deception. If we put the Bible aside, then we're letting the deception continue to rise up in our hearts. John Wesley himself had this to say. He said, when I was young, I was sure of everything.

In a few years, having been mistaken 1000 times, I was not half so sure of most things as I was before. At present, I am hardly sure of anything but what God has revealed to me. That's actually an incredible philosophy. is to consider the Word of God and to realize that there are a lot of things that we may not know a whole lot about.

There's a lot of things that we can get deceived by. But one thing that we can bank on a firm foundation that we have is the Bible, is God's revelation as it is revealed in His word. But if you want to continue on this trajectory of deception, don't be family oriented or, don't get too churchy or too preachy or listen to the preachy teachers. don't be a Bible nut and don't pray too much.

Don't pray too much. Jesus says in what, what we've commonly called the Lord's Prayer, other people call it the Disciples Prayer. This is part of what he tells us to pray. Do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.

Why would Jesus have to tell his disciples who were going to become the apostles, who were gonna write scripture to pray something like this, do not lead us into temptation but deliver us from the evil one, that is the devil. Because they could fall into temptation, and they could be deceived by the evil one. And so it's a daily prayer, it's something that we should be praying constantly, Lord, protect us from evil, protect us from the evil one, because we are so prone to wonder, prone to leave the Lord we love.

Take my heart, take and seal it, seal it for thy courts above.

And so we pray things like this because we understand how that we are disposed towards deception. And then, Sixthly, and finally, if we wanna get ourselves good and deceived, to get born, we're all doing good with that. Don't take the human nature seriously, don't take sins seriously, don't take the devil seriously or religion. And finally, don't take judgment seriously.

Paul says in Galatians 6:7, do not be deceived. There's another one of our do not be deceived verses, God is not mocked for whatever a man sows that he will also reap. time were to permit, we could take a long look at Romans 1:21 that talks about this downward spiral of humankind into giving themselves over to sin and then God giving them over to their sin, and they give themselves over to more sin and deception, and God gives them over. There's this, this spiral of choices and judgment, choices and judgment.

And you see a similar thing in 2 Thessalonians 2:9, when we're talking about this future day of the coming lawless one or the anti-Christ. Paul says the coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan with all power, signs and lying wonders, and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish. Because they did not receive the love of the truth that they might be saved. to talk about deception without absolute truth is nonsense.

If there is no absolute truth, then there is no deception. But because there is absolute truth, there can be such a thing as deception. And Paul is telling us right here that there are people, and this is speaking of a future day, that will not receive the love of the truth that they might be saved. Verse 11, and for this reason, because they would not receive the love of the truth, God will send them strong delusion.

That they should believe the lie, that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness. We could preach a whole sermon just on this passage. That God, judgment is not just after you die, and God raises us from the dead, and then we enter into the great white throne judgment. Judgment begins in this life, as people turn away from the truth of the gospel, and they suppress the truth and unrighteousness.

And as they continue in this path, God begins to enter into judgment in this life, as he sins providentially, sovereignly. Strong delusion. It's, it's hard to get around this passage, verse 11, for this reason, what reason? Because they would not love the truth.

God will send. He is active in sending strong delusion with the result that they will believe the lie. The idea here is, you don't wanna believe the truth, you don't wanna receive the gospel, you wanna persist in your. Deception.

Here's a deception, believe this, God in His sovereignty will allow world, worldviews and cultures to develop that will allow people many different options to deny the gospel, many different ways to suppress the truth and unrighteousness. And God will say, you don't want my truth, here's one you can believe. And so God actually begins this judgment in our lifetime. And we want to participate.

I'm speaking of we as humanity, not necessarily we as Christians. One of the famous lines of Martin Luther in his lifetime is the world wants to be deceived. It's not that the world is just running around and just, is just deceived out of their own will, they want it. They want to deny God, they want to suppress the truth and unrighteousness.

And we bring the gospel and the Holy Spirit can break up that fallow ground. But the gospel, the same gospel that is light to some is an aroma of death to others. So, let's just ask this final question, seriously. Are you being deceived?

This morning, are you being deceived? The thing is, is, as Tom Ascol says, self-deception is an insidious condition. You will never meet a person who knows he's being deceived. By definition, those ensnared are completely unaware that they are.

it's really strange is I was preparing the sermon and I was trying to think of ways in which I've been deceived in my lifetime. And I was just staring into space for a long time. And it got me worried. That I had trouble thinking of ways in which I've been deceived.

And that just illustrates the point right there. I, we're, we're deceiving ourselves every day. Every day there's things going on that we're unaware of. one of, one of the things, I, I would have never imagined this when I went to seminary, I was studying to be a pastor, I was going into the ministry.

I don't think I would have believed anybody if they would have come to me and said, one of the main things that you will be doing as a pastor. is sitting down with godly spirit-filled people. And helping them identify their own self-deception. I just never would have imagined that in a million years.

But I've been a pastor now since '98 on full-time staff here since 2000. And that's a huge part of my job. is sitting down with people just like you, people who love the Lord. who get into conflicts with other Christians, and each of you is absolutely assured that you are right.

And yet both of you are deceived. And other people can see it, and you can't. And you guys can see things in my life that I can't see, right? And so that's why part of why we're in the body.

It's part of why we need to be religious in the biblical sense. It's why we need family, it's why we need church, it's why we need prayer. It's why we need the Bible, because every one of us in this room has hearts that cannot depend upon rationalism. We cannot depend upon empiricism.

Our reason, our senses will deceive us. And there really is a devil, and there really is a flesh. And yet we've been given the Word of God, we've been given the Holy Spirit. And the good news is, is that the, that you can be awakened, whether the Lord this morning or not.

If you don't know the Lord, you can be awakened to the glory of the good news of the gospel. You could have been walking in what appeared to be the right life, and then the Holy Spirit can take the preached word of God and can open up your mind this morning and you can call upon him for salvation and walk into heaven as it were, knowing that you are going to go to heaven. Just believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, the Bible says, believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved.

If you're a believer here.

You might think, yeah, I, I see ways in which I've been deceived. There's good news for you. You can be awakened every day as we come together as families, as a church, as we read the word, as we hear it preached, as we pray. There's great news.

I love this quote from CS Lewis. He says the gospel means we can stop lying to ourselves. The sweet sound of Amazing Grace saves us from the necessity of self-deception. Notice the necessity of self-deception.

It's something that we want to do, right? It's a need that we have. It keeps us from denying that through Christ, that though Christ was victorious, the battle with lust, greed and pride still rages within us. Let me read that again.

It keeps us from denying that though Christ was victorious, the battle with lust, greed and pride still rages within us. As a sinner who has been redeemed, I can acknowledge that I am often unloving. Irritable, angry, and resentful with those closest to me. When I go to church, I can leave my white hat at home and admit I have failed.

God not only loves me as I am, but also knows me as I am. Because of this, I don't need to apply spiritual cosmetics to make myself presentable to him. I can accept ownership of my poverty and powerlessness and neediness. Isn't that rich?

That we can come to the Lord, the cross exposes us. We can come to the Lord and say, yes, I have deceived myself. Yes, I am needy. Yes, every day, there's ways in which I want to cover up and hide this person inside of me.

I look at the cross and I see his victory on the cross, I see the resurrection, and yet I look at my heart and I still see this disparity. And the gospel says, come with the disparity, come with the weakness. the Lord is here for us all. We can leave our white hat.

At home. And so, obviously, we are hoping that you will not want to get good and deceived. The message this morning is all of us have been deceived already. And as we've come to the gospels, we've come to Jesus Christ, the, the glasses have been taken away, the blindness has been lifted from our eyes, but we still have this heart problem, we still have this idol making factory.

But the gospel goes there throughout our lifetime, and we can come to each other and admit that, yeah, I don't have it all together. I need you. I need you to help me see who I am. We need each other.

And as the church can continue to grab that fact, we can, we can grow more and more in love with our Lord and in love with one another. Amen. Let's bow in prayer, and we're gonna have our ushers come forward to receive the offering. Lord, we thank you so much for your word.

It does surgery in our hearts and some of these things are hard to hear at times, and yet, we thank you for the exposure and we thank you for the salve of the gospel. We thank you, Lord, that we can look at these serious matters and yet look at them in a hopeful way. We pray, Lord, for any of our friends and family who may not yet know you, Lord, that your spirit would move amongst us, convict of sin, righteousness, and judgment. He, people in this room to know that they can cry out even now for salvation.

And that you will reach down in mercy and save them. We pray, Father, that You would help us to grow in humility to admit that we do not always perceive properly. We do not always know. Ourselves perfectly.

But you put us in a body and that body can help us know ourselves and help us grow, and we thank you for the hope that we have in the gospel. We pray, Father, that you would use your word this morning to accomplish much through your Spirit in Christ's name, we pray, and all God's people said. Amen.