Fear God, Not People
The cost of following Jesus can be great, but the cost of not following Him is even greater. Many Christians, of the world, are not entertaining angels, but are entertaining lying spirits and the doctrines of demons. And it can be expected that they will do battle against the true followers who have not sold their souls for the comfortable lies. Do not fear these lying spirit insults and their prophets. Hateful put-downs are born out of the mouths of darkness, they can be a litmus test of the genuine light of Christianity in our lives. You can take these slanders as wonderful compliments. Receive such verbal abuse as unwitting praise. The vitriol you'll experience as a believer is the nature of devils, and unfortunately mankind also. All the more reason to believe that there is a need for both repentance and a Savior in Jesus Christ.
The savage bears agree among themselves, but man is a wolf to man. Even church leaders can coerce people into violating their conscience. Jesus told his first disciples to do just the opposite of what the bullies want, by shouting their faith from the rooftops for all to hear.
DISCERNING LYING SPIRITS:
Matthew 10:26 “So don’t be afraid of those people, because everything that is hidden will be shown. Everything that is secret will be made known. 27 I tell you these things in the dark, but I want you to tell them in the light. What you hear whispered in your ear you should shout from the housetops. 28 Don’t be afraid of people, who can kill the body but cannot kill the soul. The only one you should fear is the one who can destroy the soul and the body in hell. 29 Two sparrows cost only a penny, but not even one of them can die without your Father’s knowing it. 30 God even knows how many hairs are on your head. 31 So don’t be afraid. You are worth much more than many sparrows."
I know mankind has always been filled with deception, lies and slanderous thoughts and deeds, but doesn't it seem that lying has been on the rise these days and finding new levels of corruption and wickedness in these days? Jesus Himself said that the deception and lying in the last days would reach towards such a fever pitch that even the very elect church might be deceived if it were possible. And Jesus also spoke about not being fearful of these wicked people and their lies.
7 Ways to Recognize Lying Spirits:
1. A lying spirit can not understand the truth. (John 8:43-45)
These slanderous liars are in truth following after the ways of the wicked because they cannot tolerate doing what they know is true. They are owned, enslaved to their prideful masters who preached lies that gave their sinful ways aid and comfort. And because of this wicked spiritual influence their minds are closed to the truth.
2. A lying spirit denies the deity of Jesus Christ (that He is God). (1 John 2:22)
Fact of the matter is, to deny the Lordship of Jesus Christ is to become a spirit of AntiChrist. That spirit cannot tolerate the objective truth because the truth is not in them and they are not in the Father. Their words sparkle with all the colors of the rainbow until such time that the bright light of the truth finds them out. Then the evil tongue breaks out. And so often they will end up denying the Son of God. Even in subtle ways, "that's not the Jesus I know".
3. A lying spirit stands with a majority opinion. (2 Chronicles 18:21a)
Often times these followers of the lying spirits will lean on the majority opinions. They'll quote the popular poll driven belief. They'll gather to themselves a consortium of lying paid prophets to give the report they prefer. They'll follow what's trending and glamorous. And they'll close their minds to the light, in favor of the favorable.
4. A lying spirit practices unrighteousness. (1 John 3:7-8)
Jesus destroys the works of Satan, and yet the lies persist. Why is that? The answer is the ones practicing wicked ways have wickedness in their hearts, as Forest Gump said, "stupid is as stupid does". Likewise the lying spirit lies because they are liars. They are liars because they do lies. They live lives of lies. And so often they believe all people are false because they know that in their own hearts and minds they are liars and therefore it must be likewise with all the people. And this therefore justifies in their own minds the lies they speak and do.
5. A lying spirit doesn’t listen to believers. (1 John 4:5-6)
These deceivers are from the world and therefore speak from the viewpoint of the world, and the world listens to them. They'll refuse to council with the believers and even accuse them of being dangerous, and doing harm by questioning the spirit of deception. The simple test is their refusal to acknowledge that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God. Every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus' deity is not from God.
6. A lying spirit speaks words that fail to come to pass. (2 Chronicles 18:27)
As we discern between the prophets of light and dark, one simple test will prove them out, examine their sources, and the validity of their words and claims. Charmers, sorcerers and sorceress's, astrologers and fortune tellers, mediums and psychics will even employ Christian-like practices mingled into their dark arts. Some will even pray in Christ's name as they then call upon the dead. Some will conjure up the nature spirits of the earth in Christ's name in their witchcrafts. And more subtly, many today speak God's name in vain as they profess the humanist propaganda. In all these vainglorious ways they ultimately fail to produce results as promised. They cannot stand the test of time and results. A message from someone who claims to have a prophetic utterance from God must be compared with the Bible. We must test the prophet by the Bible, and not the Bible by the prophet. A prophet of God must acknowledge and teach the truth about Jesus Christ--that He was God in human form. True prophets must also exalt Jesus, not themselves.
7. A lying spirit entices men to destruction. (2 Chronicles 18:19-21)
The lying spirit has one job, to put words into the mouths of the prophets in order to bring them down from their heights of deception. "What's that you say?"
That's right...God sends these lying spirits to speak through the corrupted prophets (because the incorruptible would not listen to let alone repeat the lies of lying spirits) in order to bring them down and destroy the wicked works of men.
"How does this happen?"
As so often is the case, the preachers, teachers, and prophets can become deceived by the semblances of repentance. They'll rejoice for time with the repentant rulers and leaders, and overtime gain prominence and comforts in the company of the proud. They'll see results where there are none. They'll eventually invent results in order to not loose face. And before they know what's happened they've been corrupted by the deception. Many false doctrines and apostate denominations have been established by this human trait. In time they are found out. And this revelation comes by the lying spirits speaking through them. As the true prophets come and question the words, the lying spirit encourages them to say the quiet part out loud. Can you think of any protestations like these that you've heard recently? Have you noticed many will now proudly speak their true intentions as if it's virtuous? That's the lying spirit at work. That's God's work, exposing them by their own damning evidence.
Friends,
I believe that the spirit of Antichrist appears as a prophet who is gregarious, charismatic, charming, and very clever with words. A prophet like this can take over a nation, convince the intelligentsia to commit incredible acts of brutality, exterminate over six million Jews, and start a second world war, with nothing but words. The spirit of Antichrist, personified by Satan himself, will rise to the highest level of influence by the power of diabolically inspired rhetoric. Other leaders captivated by his words will become his puppets, and they will have even weaker willed puppets under them. They all will be proficient masters of spin and doublespeak. Their words disguise, distorts, or reverses the meaning of words. We've seen this very prominently today and widespread throughout the world via the social media platforms. Doublespeak disguises the nature of the truth. Doublespeak is language which pretends to communicate but doesn’t.
In this environment of deception it can be very difficult to discern the truth. I believe an unprecedented number of lying spirits have been unleashed in this world. This is a period of intense deception and apostasy. In fact, I believe that this is the period prophesied by the Apostle Paul in 2 Thessalonians 2:9-10.
These wolves among men no longer make any effort to conceal their lies. They know that the people have become deaf to the truth. They know they can deceive them and cause them to perish because they refused to love the truth. And so they test the waters of deception by creating one crisis after another. In the same way that sleep deprivation is employed to break down the will of a captive, the people have been led deeper and deeper into despair in order to weaken their resistance. Like a squeezing Python coils and tightens its grip crushing and suffocating its prey. They force the prey to focus on gasping for just one more breath and ignore the pain of their broken body being crushed by the ever increasing coiling snake.
If you ignore his (the lying spirit) doublespeak and simply consider his works (fruit), you realize that he is doing exactly what you thought he was doing before becoming distracted by his doublespeak. The only hope is to stay clear of his grip. You must remain agile and soaked in the anointed oils of the truth. In this way the snake will not be able to seduce you and get coiled around you in the first place. You must recognize that you are the prey, your soul is the point.
Remember--"The only one you should fear is the one who can destroy the soul and the body in hell."
Guard your hearts beloved ones.
God bless your ways.
Speak the truth always and you will be saved.