Breaking Free
503 Truth - another dose
We
cannot never get enough reminders about how God feels about truth, and the
truth. Remember, Jesus said that
He is the truth. The Holy Spirit
is the Spirit of Truth, so our relying on and practicing the truth, is the same
as relying on God.
When
we rely on a lie, or any form of untruth, we are relying on Satan. There is no neutral or middle ground!
2
Thessalonians gives us much insight into the value of truth.
(2 Thessalonians
2:7-12).For the mystery of lawlessness is already working, only he is now
holding back until it comes out of the midst. And then the lawless one will be
revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the breath of His mouth and shall
destroy with the brightness of His coming, whose coming is according to the
working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders, and with all
deceit of unrighteousness in those who perish, because they did not receive the
love of the truth, so that they might be saved. And for this cause God shall
send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie, so that all those
who do not believe the truth, but delight in unrighteousness, might be
condemned.
Notice
that GOD brings them a strong delusion. Why? Because they did not love the truth. The Amplified version
says: Verse 2:11-12 Therefore God sends upon them a misleading influence, a
working of error and a strong delusion to make them believe what is false, In
order that all may be judged and condemned who did not believe, who refused to
adhere to, trust in and rely on the Truth, but instead took pleasure in
unrighteousness. Therefore
what? Look at the verse before,
verse 2:10. “They did not welcome
the truth, but refused to love it that they might be saved”.
Some principles I wish to point out
1. God judges
people based upon their love of the truth. Even unbelievers, when they truly commit to truth, will
be saved.
Look
at 2 Thessalonians 2:13 But we are bound to give thanks always to God for you,
brothers beloved of the Lord, because God has from the beginning chosen you to
salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth. How were you saved? Through the sanctifying work of the
Holy Spirit, coupled with your belief, adherence to, trust in and reliance on
the truth. Watchman Nee in one of
his books, tells a story about an atheist who he was attempting to lead to
Jesus. Instead of arguing, Brother
Nee simply said, “Let us pray”.
The man replied, “Pray? , I don’t even believe there is a God”. Nee replied, “Ok, then lets pray in
truth. Simply take my hands and
say, God, and I don’t believe
there is a God, but if you are there, then reveal yourself to me”. Amazingly the Holy Spirit got a hold of
this man’s love of the truth, and the presence of God overwhelmed him and he was
marvelously saved!
2. People do not love the truth because they take pleasure in
sin. Verse 2:12 shows the opposite side of
loving the truth is “taking pleasure in unrighteousness”. They feel that if they are honest with
God, God will stop them from having fun with their sin, or at least He would,
they think, reject them for being so bad.
3. God sends them
a strong misleading influence, a working of error to make them believe what is false-verse
2:11. God is indeed love, He
is gentle, kind and longsuffering with our sin, but He is also a Judge! The worst kind of judgment I can think
of is having God send me a spirit of blindness that I could no longer see the
truth.
Why would God hide the truth from people?
This does not seem fair. We
cannot climb into God’s mind and get all of the answers, but I feel that there
is some insight. God looks down
into the very depths of a person’s heart.
He sees, like with Pharaoh, that there is a love of the world, a love of
sin and power and deception so strong, that truth will never be welcomed. These type of people, even though God
loves them, are actually an enemy to God. (James 4:4).Adulterers and
adulteresses! Do you not know that the friendship of the world is enmity with
God? Therefore whoever desires to be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.
In Mark chapter 4, Jesus was teaching about the basic secret
and mystery of the power
of the Kingdom of God. He was
teaching about the Word of God being a seed planted in the human heart, and how
Satan spent his entire existence tearing the Word out of hearts. This is his only weapon.
Well if you had a nuclear arsenal, would you give the keys to it to your
enemy? No way.
(Mark 4:11-12).And He said to them, To you it is given to know the mystery of
the kingdom of God. But to those outside, all these things are given in
parables so that seeing they may see, and not perceive; and hearing they may
hear, and not understand; lest at any time they should be converted, and their
sins should be forgiven them.
Actually
this concept is very fair. God is not
saying to humans that they have to figure our some complicated religious
theory, or go to some mountain range or some desert to find some mystical new
age god. Nor is He expecting us to
believe other people’s arguments, like many cults rely upon. No, God is only requiring mankind to
have some sort of respect and love for the truth. The Holy Spirit will take over then.
Here
is a reminder, to get into the Flowing River and/or Connecting the Crosses and
go through the checklist in Appendix A.
Give yourself an honest evaluation for the truth.
AMEN!