The Devotional – Search the Scriptures – 262
Christ’s = Our Only Hope
Deceptions of False Teachers
2 Peter 2:18-22 – For when they speak great swelling words of emptiness, they allure through the lusts of the flesh, through lewdness, the ones who have actually escaped from those who live in error. While they promise them liberty, they themselves are slaves of corruption; for by whom a person is overcome, by him also he is brought into bondage. For if, after they have escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome, the latter end is worse for them than the beginning. For it would have been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than having known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered to them. But it has happened to them according to the true proverb: “A dog returns to his own vomit,” and, “a sow, having washed, to her wallowing in the mire.”
Jesus, the Christ, God’s Messiah
Deception looks and sounds like this: “All roads lead to heaven!” or “purgatory is simply a holding place for the dead until someone who loves them prays and pays for your sins” These statements and many more like them are words that lure one’s flesh to live in the lusts of this world and feel in their fleshly soul that they can do NO wrong. Matthew 7:13-14 – “Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it. Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it.”
We could stop with the words of Jesus and return to the epistle of Peter, or we can continue in the CONTEXT here in the gospel of Matthew—we will continue in Matthew’s gospel. Matthew 7:15-20 – “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves. “You will know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes from thorn-bushes or figs from thistles? “Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. “A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. “Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. “Therefore by their fruits you will know them.”
Therefore, there is a responsibility that the child of God ought to be aware, that ‘counterfeit religions’ are the works of fleshly minded men and women who know the Truth, but willing suppress the Truth with deceptive words that can and do lead people down the wide path of destruction. 1 Corinthians 3 is a good chapter to meditate on for the child of God, we will just look at four verses. 1 Corinthians 3:14-17 - If anyone’s work which he has built on it endures, he will receive a reward. If anyone’s work is burned, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire. Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? If anyone defiles the temple of God, God will destroy him. For the temple of God is holy, which temple you are.
Lastly, We must follow God’s way—and not the way of man! John 14:6 – Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.
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