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church, deception, discerning the spirits, exhortation, experience, eyes of the heart, false spirits, fellowship, Michael Clark, Satan, sin, true faith, worldly spirits
Marienkirche Hof/Bavaria (St. Mary’s Church) – Photo by Susanne Schuberth
“What a strange headline,” one might say here. Leaving aside the fact that I love rhymes, I put the heading that way in order to hint to the possibility that not all snares by the devil can be recognized immediately. The Prince of the Air works in an unseen realm and he is very crafty in manipulating our thought life, which cannot be seen, either. Just recently I read an interesting quote from a man who was finally freed from the bondage of a destructive Christian cult. I took that quote out of a longer testimony which Michael Clark had shared with me. After having left the cult, Tom Murray realized,
No one can consider themselves above the possibility of deception.
As soon as we think we have arrived at a certain point of no return in our walk with God, we can be sure that Satan will test our faith by offering us several temptations in order to draw us back into his realm of darkness where all kinds of sin lurk at every corner. Today I want to point to the necessity of listening to God’s voice in all things, here particularly regarding the choice of our relationships with other people, especially Christians. In order to bring my point home in advance, I do not refer here to ALL those people whom we meet incidentally time and again. We cannot and should not avoid living in this world. Even if some of these people treat us badly, we can be sure that God will eventually enable us to love them, though. However, loving our enemies does not mean that we share our hearts with them and give them the possibility to draw us away from Christ. “Wait a moment, wait a moment…” one might object here, “what could be dangerous about a simple talk with another person?”
Well, it is true that we should open up our heart when we see someone suffer and help them according to God’s leading. But how can you and I resist the devil if we have indeed opened up the heart toward people who are obviously controlled by the wrong spirits and believe living in sin (not stumbling into it) and being a Christian at the same time would be no problem at all? Take care, these “Christians” preach another gospel! Or how can we be friends with someone who is full of pride about knowing it all better than you and me and who, finally, wants to control us and our behavior by bringing us back under a religious law? No matter whether they know it or not, these people simply try to replace God in our lives! Have you ever experienced such a thing yourself? Alas, I did. 😮
Dear brothers and sisters, there is a big difference between rejecting someone and separating oneself from those people God has drawn our attention to. On the one hand we should avoid friendship with those people who are still carnal and belong to this world, that is quite clear. But on the other hand we must be very cautious, too, with what kind of Christians we get into closer contact. The apostle Paul admonished the Corinthians,
Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? What accord has Christ with Belial? Or what portion does a believer share with an unbeliever? What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; as God said, “I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
Therefore go out from their midst, and be separate from them, says the Lord, and touch no unclean thing; then I will welcome you, and I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to me, says the Lord Almighty.” (2 Cor 6:14-18 ESV)
The question is, Do we want to be sons and daughters of the Most High God who welcomes us in our real home in the heavenly places with Jesus? 🙄 The following is one of my favorite Psalms which, right at the outset, clarifies what we should do and what we should avoid doing. It reads,
Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers.
The wicked are not so, but are like chaff that the wind drives away. Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous; for the Lord knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish. (Ps 1:1-6 ESV)
I have never had problems to speak with worldly people at all unless they tried to counsel me kind of forcefully with their worldly wisdom and ideas. I can listen to them and understand them, but I do not need their advice except when God speaks through them (which rarely happens). It is crucial to know the difference between God’s voice and others since we are confronted with so many voices every day. May God help us to discern right from wrong and to listen to His gentle voice before making our decisions. Amen.
Entering the Promised Land 
My heart says come Lord Jesus. Without Him, I have no hope.
Thank you for your faithful writing.
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You’re so welcome, dear sister. 🙂 I love your heart, Pat. ❤
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Susanne,
You wrote:
“‘No one can consider themselves above the possibility of deception.’
As soon as we think we have arrived at a certain point of no return in our walk with God, we can be sure that Satan will test our faith by offering us several temptations in order to draw us back into his realm of darkness where all kinds of sin lurk at every corner.”
Dear sister, you and I have both been caught up in different Christian cults and suffered much as a result and know what we talk about. I have heard many a Christian quote part of this verse,
“For false Christs and false prophets will arise and show great signs and wonders, so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect.” (Matthew 24:24 RSVA).
Then they reason, “Well, these are THE ELECT! Of course it is impossible to deceive THEM! If so, they would not be the elect!” Jesus did not give these warnings to the elect of God just to hear Himself talk! In Matthew 24 He is giving many warning as to what will be coming upon the earth at the end of this dispensation of grace. The New Testament has many such warnings about false anointings (Christs) and false prophets and apostles and teachers sent forth by Satan to deceive the people of God and that there are many antichrists among us and have been since the end of the first century (see 1 John ch. 2).
This quote from Tom Murray in the beginning of your blog is rather personal for me. I was in this cult he was in, though in a different location in 1978 and ’80. The people I knew in it quite well. I had been in the same church with them and some of them I knew from a former Christian cult in the same area. This one was called “The No Name Fellowship,” by the media because they refuse to take a name. The leadership started out all warm and fuzzy as the pastor of our church invited their speakers in to minister to the congregation on Sundays. There was a lot of preaching about going all the way with God and rooting out all sin in our lives and “being holy.” Well, finally these leaders started drawing away church member by inviting them to “special meeting for those who really want to get serious with God.” My wife and I wanted to get serious about our faith and grow in Christ so we started going to these meeting during the week in a large home of a family that was very dear to us that we had become quite close with over the years we went to that church. Even the pastor and his wife were sucked in!
Well, as these leaders got control of this “core group” of “serious saints” the control level started ratcheting up. Women were told they must wear head coverings and dresses and their husbands were told to take control of their wives so that they did not speak up in the meetings (unless they were a recognized prophetess of which the pastor’s wife happened to be one!) The poor pastor didn’t know what hit him. Soon there was a church wide meeting in which the cult leaders after failing to take control of the church facilities from the elders, forced a division among the people and took all of them they could with them and pronounced curses on the church grounds, on the buildings, and on the people that would not follow them including a curse of barrenness on all the wombs of the women who would not follow them! It was the most ugly church meeting I have ever been in and Dorothy and I got up and walked out while this would be “prophet” cult leader was doing his curse routine.
You see, I was deluded up until that point because I had been saying to myself, “I can’t be deceived again, because I have already escaped form one cult!” Thank God we left when we did for over the next eight years the lives of those people that went with these men were destroyed! Women and men who did not obey the letter of the law of these leader’s wishes were publicly ridiculed and even spanked with boards and disruptive children were beaten. Until finally one ten year old boy who was sick with diabetes was prayed over instead of given medical attention and went into sever weight loss and was spanked over and over for a sin that he did not commit that was “blocking his healing.” He finally died after a sever beating by his own father one night while the cult leader looked on. THAT was when the authorities stepped in and investigated. The main cult leader ended up in prison over this boys death as did his father.
YES, Susanne, the very elect CAN be deceived! We need to learn the voice of our Lord and not be cowered by strong soulish people who presume to speak into our lives for God. These were all people I knew that had a sincere faith in Christ! Finally, while in prison the leader, a powerful man who had been a line-backer in the Cleveland Browns, confessed that he too had been deceived into thinking that what he was doing was under the leadership of God.
“Now these things happened to them as a warning, but they were written down for our instruction, upon whom the end of the ages has come. Therefore let any one who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall.” (1 Corinthians 10:11-12 RSVA)
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Yes, Michael, it is good to know how easily we can be deceived. Problem is, we do not see it, once we are captured. We might feel uneasy, still, at times, but if someone tells us we have been deceived, we defend our wrong beliefs. Alas, that was my own experience… 😦
Looking forward to reading your next blog post that will spring from your great comment above, my brother. 🙂
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Yes, Susanne, once the Deceiver gets a hook in us through his lies, it is hard to get free. In m case in the above mentioned cult, I had some help from a brother I respected. I went out to his cabin in the woods to visit him while I was still starry-eyed about this new “holiness group” and the first thing he said to me was, “What is this I hear about you joining a cult?” POW! It was like he hit me right between the eyes with a 2×4 board! He then went down the list of the things they were doing and teaching with me. I drove home quite shaken and KNEW that I had a decision to make. The Spirit used that brother to crack the lies that had taken me captive and through prayer I was able to finally see what was going on clearly. I ended up confronting the cult leaders when they called me into a private meeting to work me over and drive me under their control and we walked away from the whole mess. Yes, they put curses on us, too, and the next 14 years God took me out into His wilderness to dry me out of needing top down leadership in churches and cults any longer. It was the hardest time of my life, being cut off from all meaningful Christian fellowship during those years, but it was worth it, for the Spirit was teaching me in a whole new subliminal way after that, independent of men.
The new blog article should be published today sometime. Thanks for all your encouragement, dear sister. You are a real blessing to me and I am glad we have had these common experiences and victories, too. 🐻
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Thank you for this timely warning, Susanne. Frohliche Weihnachten! ❤
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Pingback: Deceiving the Very Elect or “Don’t Drink the Kool-Aid!” « A Wilderness Voice
Thank you all for your comments on here and for sharing your insights on this issue.
Your Susanne ❤
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This makes me wonder if going to a Christmas party is wrong.
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Good question, Fred.
“…why should my liberty be determined by someone else’s conscience?” (1 Cor 10:29 ESV)
“Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.” (2 Cor 3:17 ESV)
If you feel free to do so because God has assured you of this liberty in your heart, why not? 😉
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Thanks as far as I know he has allowed me to go. I keep thinking of the verse that says not to hide your light.
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I like that song and I think we have sung it at the church I once belonged.
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