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requiring thousands of ministers and tens of thousands, even hundreds of thousands of Christians worldwide to be for or against.
Hopefully, this article can be a help to you who love the Lord Jesus and seek to be faithful, both to His call for His own to be united in love, as well as His command and warning to be discerning, even critical, in these last days. I would say at the beginning of this article (since I do believe these are the last days) that the great issue which confronts the flock of God is neither unity, nor power, signs and wonders. The question is not, "Will the churches ever come together like the Lord prayed in John 17?" Nor is it, "Will we ever have the power to do signs, wonders, and miracles like the Book of Acts?" The issue is Truth. Will we receive the love of the truth or will we believe the lie?
Even him, whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders. And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth that they might be saved. And for this cause God shall send them
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above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north; I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the Most High. Isaiah 14:12-14
Now this is the heart of iniquity, lawlessness, that the created being can try to raise himself up out of his God-given role, by an act of his will, to become equal with God! This spiritual principle, this heart of all false religion, starts with the creature, who would "ascend up to heaven." You can follow this all through the Bible and human history to this present day. Adam and Eve, willing to believe that they could be "like God" even if it meant grinding love, loyalty, commitment and gratitude into the dirt, as they saw and wanted their own "personal fulfillment." Nimrod, whose very name means "Let us rebel" (1) organized a worldwide revolt against the will of the God of the Bible and could only be stopped by the earth changing event of the confusion of tongues at Babel--they wanted to "ascend up to the heavens," "to make a name for ourselves." This is the ancient lie, the continuing temptation of fallen man which countless pyramids,
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strong delusion, that they should believe a lie; That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness. II Thess 2:9-12
Though there are so many different spiritual choices flourishing in the world today, there are really only two religions underlying them. All religious expression or experience can biblically be put into only two categories, two spiritual principles or mysteries as the Bible calls them. They are either the Mystery of Godliness or the Mystery of Iniquity. As far back as the Garden of Eden (and even before that) these two spiritualities have existed side by side.
The first of these two mysteries to appear in scripture is called the Mystery of Iniquity. It found its first expression in the very mount of God, in the Garden of God where Lucifer the angel of God proclaimed his well known and evil "I Will's"
How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! How art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations! For thou has said in thine heart, I will exalt my throne
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God's Word: Our Guard And Guide by Dave Hunt
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The fruitful man in Psalm 1 meditates upon God's Word "day and night," and not from a sense of duty but because it is his "delight." In his heart and on his mind continually, God's Word guards and guides him. How essential this is! Common sense and logic are helpful. However, without God's Word (which transcends human wisdom) to guard and guide us, we are
susceptible to temptation and error, especially when the latter is presented convincingly "in the name of God" by those looked
up to as Christian leaders.
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God works through His Word: "[M]y word...shall not return unto me void..." (Isa 55:11); "Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee" (Ps 119:11). Satan works to snatch God's Word from the heart: "Then cometh the wicked one, and catcheth away that which was sown in his heart" (Mt 13:19). If it suits him, Satan quotes the Bible (Mt 4:6) and attempts to pervert it in order to deceive. He also inspires false prophets with "new revelations" which subvert the Word. We have many such "prophets" in the church today.
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God's Word repeatedly warns about false prophets. We need to heed those warnings. Jesus said, "Beware of false prophets" (Mt 7:15); "Many false prophets shall rise...and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect' (Mt 24:11, 24). Christ clearly warns of a last-days false signs-and wonders movement promoted by false prophets. Paul likens the latter to Jannes and Jambres, who opposed Moses and Aaron (2 Tm 3:8) with signs and wonders done by the power of Satan.
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