Spirit of Truth vs Spirit of Error
Intro
Our scripture for toady is 1 John chapter 4. And we gonna talk about some things that are not very popular. We gonna talk about spiritual realm a little bit.
Science that replaces the Spirit
In today’s world many people do not even believe in the reality of the spiritual world. We’ve been taught in our schools that in the old days, when people were less knowledgeable and more superstitious. They could not explain why certain things happened, so they came up with idea of unseen power and believe in gods and spirits. But in our day we have science that can explain everything. We do not believe that old stuff anymore. Moreover if you believe in reality of spiritual world, you might be treated as a fool, as ignorant wiredaw. We are taught that only fools believe that.
We are effected by no spirit mentality
And because we were taught this way, we tend to skip or overlook biblical scriptures which talk about spiritual realm. We treat them as if they were written for the people of the past. Because those people weren’t particularly smart, so they needed some sort of explanations, which they would be able to comprehend. And so we, modern, educated people mark those scriptures as irrelevant and outdated, and move on. Often we don’t even think twice about it, we skip ahead almost subconsciously.
It is very arrogant and altogether the wrong approach. Spiritual world is very real. Always been. Science and Spirit is not in opposition to each other.But our enemy doesn’t want us to believe that. One might think of why it is the case?
John 4:24
²⁴God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”
Reality of spiritual realm
God is spirit, and if spiritual realm does not exist, then God does not exist either. But also, it’s a great disguise for the enemy himself. He works against us. And if we reject the very existence of the realm where he operates, it makes his job so much easier. Friends, spiritual world as real today as it were in the day when Jesus waked this earth. And we need to be aware of this. Denying spiritual world makes us vulnerable. It is like denying viruses. Viruses do not care weather you believe in them or not, you still gonna get affected, you still gonna get sick. Also, by denying spiritual world we essentially denying existence of God.
So, before we will proceed to our scriptures for today, first we have to make an agreement. Which is that we, as followers of Christ, believe in spiritual world.
1 John 4:1-4
¹Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world.²By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God,³and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist , which you heard was coming and now is in the world already.
Early church believed in spiritual world
Existence of spiritual world was not even an issue for the early church. It was a regular part of life. But it’s not particularly true for us today. I’m not gonna speculate on why. One thing that comes to my mind is that potential cause is our unbelief. We make ourselves deaf and blind to the spiritual realm, because we don’t want to see. With that being said, we still might experience an encounter with the spiritual world. And when that happens: when for example we saw a vision, or someone had a word of prophesy for us. Maybe word of knowledge, and etc. There are a lot of “options”. We get so excited. That we don’t even bother asking questions. We forget that it is not only God’s spirit, that can interact with us.
…do not believe every spirit (verse 1)
Not every inspiration that comes to us is of Gods spirit. Not every person who claims that God speaks to him, who claims to be, or act as a “prophet”, is actually of God. Not every person who claims to have a divine knowledge, claims to be used by God, is actually of God. We SHOULD assess whether they are from God or not.
…many false prophets have gone out into the world
The term “prophet” is not a very commonly used word anymore, in a minute we will look into what that’s mean. But again, If you sitting here thinking it is no longer relevant it belongs to the past. It is not. All this things are true to this day. If nothing else it is more relevant today, because we are so much closer to the end of time, then those who read this letter first.
Who is prophet?
So, who is a “prophet”?
Generally speaking the prophet in Greek writings, is an interpreter of oracles or of other hidden things. The one who speaks by divine inspiration. There were all kinds of people who claimed to be prophets. In our case we can narrow this term to a context of a christian community. So, Prophets that appeared in the apostolic age among Christians are:
People in the assemblies of the Christians, who were moved by the Holy Spirit to speak, having power to instruct, comfort, encourage, rebuke, convict, and stimulate believers.
The blessing and the danger of the prophets
Gift of prophecy is a beautiful gift, and very helpful for building up the church. Gift of the spirit are real and very, very good and very helpful. Bible says that we SHOULD DESIRE spiritual gifts, especially prophesy.
It’s a great gift for the church to have. Very useful and very powerful. It can help us a ton in our christian journey. But it can also be extremely destructive if we will allow a wrong person to speak into our lives. False prophet can do a great deal of damage to the christian community. Cause all kinds of problems, cause the church to split and etc. There are examples of this. Therefore before we allow the person to speak into our life on behalf of God, before we accept the word that has been spoken, we need to assert weather it actually comes from God.
Spirit of truth vs spirit of error
How can do we make those assertions? Well, there are few things that might help. There are scriptures that helps with that. In our passage for today we are provided with a very reliable approach.
1 John 4:2,3
²By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God,³and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you heard was coming and now is in the world already.
Let’s break it down.
To know the Spirit of God
²By this you know the Spirit of God…
Our the most reliable protection layer against false anything is to know the Spirit of God. Maybe you never though of this, but when we receive Holy Spirit, we all receive the same Spirit. Same Spirit dwells in my heart and your heart, not just same kind of spirit, no. One Spirit, abides in you and in me, at the same time.
Water system illustration
I’ll try to give you an illustration. My analogy not the most accurate, but still I think it might help us to understand, at least partially, how that works. When you receive the Holy Spirit it’s like getting connected to a water system. When I open my tap at home I get the same water I would get if I would open tap here, at the church. Same water runs in old city, at Orby Towers, at the airport and etc. All our water comes from the same source. When you open your heart for the Holy Spirit, It moves in you as well as in all others who opened their hearts to God. All who is off God, united in and by His spirit.
Spirit of God works outside of time. Spirit that inspired John to speak and write his letters 2000 years ago, inspired me to speak to you today. Same Spirit inspiring people all over the globe. We all take from the same source. And this source never changes.
So by learning how to recognize the Spirit of God we will be empowered to make an assessments of things we sea and hear.
True Jesus
…every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God,³and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God.
I want to pay attention at the verb confesses. In Greek it is homologeō which means:
to say the same thing as another, i.e. to agree with, assent
If we would re-read this part again it would sound like Every spirit that agrees with that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God. Why John is so specific about that? It is clearly not ultimate comprehensive assessments. There are plenty of those who agrees that Jesus “came in flesh”, as human. But, they are most definitely not off God. What’s up with that.
Context is important
It will all get cleared in the second. As soon as we will take into account time and situation in which John writes his letter. This is very important when you study, or just read the bible. You cannot ignore the context, otherwise it will lead you into heresy.
Today is different
For us today it is not hard to believe in Jesus the man. Historical existence of Jesus is proven. And for vast majority of people is not hard to believe that at some point in the past there were a really good man Jesus. Who was a phenomenal spokesman and impacted the society in a very dramatic way.
Today’s problem
For people of our day it is hard to believe in his divine nature. As we mentioned in the beginning a lot of people reject the very existence of spiritual world. Therefore it is hard for them to believe that there is God, and that God became man.
Issue of the day of John
But in the day of John it was almost opposite. For a lot of people it was not too hard to believe that Jesus was God. There were plenty witnesses of his miracles still around. People saw with their very eyes the impossible done by Jesus. But for some people it was hard to believe that he was actually a man. That he had actual body. Those people would say that he was a phantom. That we appeared to have flesh, but it was only illusion.
They will try to fit Gospel in their world
For some people especially with a Greek background it was hard to believe that God can become a man. For them two were incompatible. It went against their view of the world. And instead of submitting, accepting God’s truth, they’ve tried to fit Jesus into their worldview. This lie started to spread among people. It was easier for some to believe, because it would align with their way of thinking. This false teaching started to creep into churches. It was a big problem. That’s why John address this issue very specifically. That’s why he says “any spirit, to deny Jesus the man is not to be trusted”
True Jesus
Big underlying issue is when we try to fit bible into our view of the world. When we try to modify what we read about God, Jesus, Holy Spirit to assent with OUR way of thinking.
We loose the image of TRUE Jesus. There are communities of such sort, we do not call them churches, because they are not. We have them here in Batumi. Who do not believe TRUE Jesus. Who have their own version. We have individuals who come to our church. Who do not follow same Jesus we follow. They have their own image. Image they created after their own heart.
The truth is not in such person. Any such person cannot speak on behalf of God.
Prophesy will agree with God’s word
Spirit of God will confess, which means - will say the same thing as and agree with Jesus Christ. God is not going to contradict his own word. Whatever revelation, enlightenment, vision or prophesy you’ll receive personally or though other people, it should ALWAYS 100% agree with the word of God.
Any person who claims to speak on God’s behalf, anyone who claims the authority to speak into your life should be assayed. Any such person should confess TRUE JESUS. Should submit to Gods word. And not the other way around.
Conclusion
Friends, spiritual realm is real. If you discard spiritual world, you cannot worship God in a true fashion, because He is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in the spirit. We should not close our eyes on all things spiritual. But, we also should be careful with what we accept. We should be careful with the things people say on behalf of God. Online, and in person. Especially when someone comes to you with “a word from God” for you. It is up to you to assess this word according to the bible. And also assay any “prophet”. Because many false prophets are out in the world.