Deception: It Can Happen to You
Back to How to Avoid Misinterpreting the Bible
Don’t bury your head in the sand: it is frighteningly easy to fall into deception. Even more devastating is that anyone deluded is completely unaware of it. Those in the greatest danger are the ones who think it couldn’t happen to them. Those who murdered their Messiah were appalled that their ancestors had killed God’s prophets. They were certain they would never do such a thing.
The great apostle Paul wrote:
1 Corinthians 4:4 My conscience is clear, but that does not make me innocent. It is the Lord who judges me. Let these Scriptures chill your spine:
Proverbs 16:2 All a man’s ways seem innocent to him, but motives are weighed by the LORD.
Proverbs 16:25 There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death.
Jeremiah 17:9 The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?
Matthew 24:24 For false Christs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and miracles to deceive even the elect – if that were possible.
Matthew 25:44,46 They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’ . . . Then they will go away to eternal punishment
James 1:22 Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. . . .
James 1:26 If anyone considers himself religious and yet does not keep a tight rein on his tongue, he deceives himself . . .