confusion, part four

To recap, in part one I started the post with this:

“'For false messiahs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect.'

Working from the premise that deception is a product of confusion about truth, this passage foretells of a great confusion in the world; a confusion that not even the elect would escape save for the supernatural hand of God"

The forth "confusion" I would like to profile comes from more clandestine measures. Such measures make them more dangerous because of the difficulty in detecting the poison that they spread. This confusion comes from assemblies that are on the surface, and in statement, doctrinally sound. On the inside however they have become increasingly ashamed or afraid of doctrine in practice. They have succumbed to the fear of man, and the fear of division, and though they have not perpetrated the lie that truth is unknowable, they have placated the lie by simply avoiding the discussion altogether. These assemblies have chosen instead to focus on man or US, how God is interested in US, how God wants to know US, and bless US, and how WE are important to God. Now while this is true, and it isn't entirely doctrinally unsound, it misses the more important point that these things are not true because of anything we bring to the table. Rather, they are true because of the glory it brings to God. And there is a huge difference. In these assemblies there is a very real feeling that we are redeemed of God because it was the just and right thing for God to do. Such thinking brings about a hideous confusion because it is so close to the truth but veers quietly away from our true state at the last minute. That it is not readily obvious that confusion has even entered the mind and our midst makes this confusion especially dangerous.

Furthermore, this confusion is supported and masked by the comfort of our emotions. These assemblies are very concerned about feelings: good feelings about God trumps the truth about God, and good feelings about ourselves trumps the truth about ourselves. The leaders of these assemblies bend over backward to make God "likable" within the confines of the vain thinking of this age and in so doing confuse many about the Gospel and lead many astray.

Confusion, part two

“For false messiahs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect.”

In my last post I discussed the confusion brought about by Harold Camping's failed judgement day prediction. But if people were able to see Camping for what he is, an outlier to true Christianity, there are still other outliers spreading confusion with much greater efficiency. Some, of one type in particular, have become masters at harnessing the power of television combined with the method of making empty promises. With this powerful medium they are able to blanket the land with their shameless lies of the so called prosperity gospel. For most believers and unbelievers alike the antics of the televangelist, by his making promises from God to some poor soul in exchange for a “sacrificial” check or "seed money", is self-serving of the "preacher". It takes advantage of the weakest of these: the weak minded. Worse yet, it muddies the waters about the real salvation message to all and therefore brings about more confusion as well as more deserved mockery.

Not to be outdone in casting confusion however there is also the confusion wrought by the so-called “social gospel”. This religion is not much more than good old-fashioned communism repackaged in Christian wrappings. As is typical with communism this religion is political in nature and is in its inner workings a thinly veiled arm of leftist party politics. Right and wrong are not determined by scripture but rather is determined by what is in or out of favor at any given time with the party. This is why the social gospel is indistinguishable from its true head, the Democrat party while bearing very little resemblance to Biblical Christianity . It wreaks confusion by exchanging truth for increased government power while parading itself in Christian outer garments. It takes advantage of the least of these, the poor and down trodden, by confusing truth with a lie based on materialistic this-life ends while preaching hate and envy.

These are two more reasons confusion reigns in this day, perhaps more than in previous days. I will be adding several more to this list in the days to come.

Confusion, part one

“For false messiahs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect.”

Working from the premise that deception is a product of confusion about truth, this passage foretells of a great confusion in the world; a confusion that not even the elect would escape save for the supernatural hand of God. Though we have our fair share of false prophets in these days, we have not yet seen from them, as far as I know, “great signs and wonders”. But we are most certainly living in a time of great confusion. That said, it makes me ask if we are living in a time of unprecedented confusion? I don’t know, but consider a few things.

Harold Camping's recent folly is but the latest of many such follies. One of the saddest commentaries on Camping's prediction is not that he ignored clear scripture, or that he had to torture scripture to make it agree with his hair-brained numbers game, but instead it is the amount of confusion he has wrought. Such nonsense plays right into the hands of the mockers of Christianity. Such deserved mockery brings about wide spread confusion.