I have a question for you.

If you were sitting in a jail cell on death row in a highly fortified prison, and the warden himself came to you and handed you an electronic ‘key-pass’ that would open any and every door for you within that complex until you walked out the front gate, telling you that you were ‘free to go’…would you not take him up on that?

If you chose not to, for whatever reasons, it might prompt the warden, or maybe a neighboring cell mate who heard the offer… to ask this question: “How can you neglect so great a salvation?” (Heb. 2:3)

So how many sincere ‘Christians’ today are still imprisoned to ‘sin’, and make no effort to hide the fact they are still ‘bound’ and will most likely remain bound…’until they get to heaven’ someday? What did Jesus say about anyone who ‘commits sin’, in John 8:34? And yet once we come to ‘know the truth’…what will this ‘truth’ do for anyone who receives it? (32,36).

I’ll be the first one to admit that my understanding to all this did not ‘just happen’ in one fell swoop of revelation. It has been a process over time for sure as the Holy Spirit has continued to open up my eyes to the truth that is lying there in your Bible as well. As you might know…sometimes it take longer to ‘unlearn’ falsehoods…before you can truly embrace the truth; but once we do….hold on and buckle up for some dramatic life changes.

So why do many of us sincere ‘believers’ have much to ‘unlearn’? It probably has to do with so many of those ‘empty words’ we’ve been taught, or have been handed down to us through multiple generations (Mark 7:7-9). Those would be the same ‘empty words’ that I mentioned in yesterday’s message, at the close where Paul wanted us to know that God’s wrath still comes on children of disobedience’ (Eph. 5:6). Believe me…there’s no shortage of ‘empty words’ out there that get spewed out of Satan’s mouth today with the hopes of ‘carrying people away in the flood’… of words. (Rev. 12:15; Luke 17:27; Heb. 13:9; 1 Tim. 4:1).

What might be surprising to some is just how often those empty words can be ‘packaged’. Paul alluded that they can come in the form of ‘another gospel’ that opens the door for one to ‘receive another spirit’, (not God’s) where you end up following ‘another Jesus’. And knowing how the ‘deceiver’ works…those words will come from one who might be cloaked as an ‘angel of light’, or as a ‘wolf In sheep’s clothing’. (2 Cor. 11:3-4, 14-15; Gal. 1:6-9; Matt. 7:15)

Now at first response, learning of this could produce a bit of fear and anxiety within, if not confusion… where we are tempted to just throw our hands up in despair”, asking: “How is anyone supposed to know what the ‘truth’ is then?!” And my answer to that is: Trust the word of God…ALL of it! Then, be assured of the promise made by Jesus that the Holy Spirit can and will lead us into all truth (John 16:13). But I will also add here that you might want to make sure it’s ‘truth’ that you want and long for; and if you do…you will know it when you hear it, as the Holy Spirit will bear witness to these things. That, I can promise you.

It is also important to understand that if/when a person is being used to teach or hand down ‘bad intel’, or falsehoods, whether their motive is intentional or simply because they are misinformed and deceived already themselves…it’s still deceptive teaching. Motive does not always come in to play here. Many people can be ‘sincere’ and yet still be…‘sincerely wrong’. (Rom. 10:1-3). There were numerous things I was ‘off’ on over the years, especially in those early years of my conversion because I was just regurgitating much of what I had been fed. The important crossroads that we will all come to is what do we do when confronted with the ‘truth’? Pilate had It/Him killed (John 18:38). And don’t forget, not everyone is that anxious or willing to ‘come to the light…because they love the darkness more’; go figure. (John 3:19-21)

In that text found in 2 Cor. 11:3-4, Paul draws a parallel with what happened to Eve back in the garden when she was ‘deceived by the serpent’…and what can happen to us today. And would you like to guess what the number one topic much of this deception centers around? It has to do with God’s wrath and judgments. That’s probably why Paul pointed to the first recorded case of these deceptive or ‘empty words’ back in Genesis. God made it clear in 2:17 – Don’t eat off this one tree or you will surely die. The serpent slithers in, casts doubt on it, then twists it around before saying just the opposite: ‘You surely shall not die”. (3:1-4)

There’s a reason why we are cautioned repeatedly in scripture to ‘be not deceived’; God knows how easily we can be deceived. It happened throughout much of Israel’s history where God ended up rebuking the false prophets as much as He did His people to whom the prophets had preached deceptive words to. That’s why I often cite Jeremiah 23:16-29; Ezekiel 13; & Lamentations 2:14. And the passage I shared the other day here from Ezekiel, where the watchman was warned what he would be held responsible for if he failed to ‘warn the people when he saw the sword coming’ (Ezek. 33:6-11).

Why do you suppose the prophets back then…and even many teachers/preachers today…are reluctant, if not tempted to ‘avoid’ such sobering warnings? No really…think about that for a moment. Are we afraid of ‘offending folks’? And if that is the case, whose approval and praise are we most concerned with in receiving…God’s…or man’s? (John 12:43). What could possibly be the reasoning in withholding valuable and life-threatening information from people who are in ‘harm’s way’? Whether we are talking about a serious medical diagnosis or rapidly spreading wildfires…don’t people have a right to know what is at stake? Whether they choose to believe and respond to that information is on them; but for goodness sakes…at least present the information to them.

God lamented over the ‘profane prophets and priests’ back in Jeremiah’s day, accusing them of ‘causing His people to err’ (Jer. 23:11-13); and it’s still happening today. How many sincere people remain ‘chained to the pews’ and have not been told they can be ‘free indeed’ since they will always ‘be sinners’? But then they are told, comforted and coddled as they are assured that ‘all is well and they will surely not die’, which is what those prophets of old did as Jeremiah and Ezekiel pointed out.

Finish up today, if you would with a quick look at Romans 8:13; Ephesians 5:5-6; Galatians 5:21; 6:7-8; 1 Cor. 6:9-11; Luke 13:1-5. And please remember this…these are not ‘threatening hints’ to suggest that God is ‘out to get you’. On the contrary…He is out to ‘save you’ or to rescue you (1 Thess. 5:9). He sent Jesus to each and every last one of us with that ‘pass key’ so we could leave that prison cell on death row and walk out of this prison of darkness once and for all..and then 'walk in the newness of life' (Rom. 6:4).

Why…would anyone refuse to get up and walk out…unless they were told that can’t happen to you?