Lesson 138 - Junior

Memory Verse

"Try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world" (I John 4:1).

Notes

Predictions

What excitement there is today when a man predicts an outstanding event and it comes to pass! Newspaper headlines proclaim it across the country, and people take note of his new prophecy when they read: "The man who correctly foretold the first world war and the second world war, now predicts. . . . " But the fact that a man can make a prediction which comes true does not mean that he is a man of God.

Fortune-tellers can sometimes foretell the future with uncanny accurateness, but that is satanic power. The devil can do supernatural deeds, and he may even bring good things to people who believe in him, in order to deceive them into following him. However, the wages of sin is death, and eternal punishment awaits everyone who follows the lure of Satan.

Delusions

Even in a religion which is supposed to be of Christ, Satan will enter and deceive the people if they are not honest. If we love the Lord with all our heart we do not need to be afraid of being led astray; but if we want to have a form of religion and still do not want to obey all the Word of God, we had better be careful. God will send strong delusion to those people who do not love the truth, "that they should believe a lie: that they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness" (II Thessalonians 2:11, 12).

Dreamer of Dreams

There were people with false religions already when the Israelites were marching to the Promised Land. God had warned His people never to worship idols of wood and stone, which could not see nor hear, nor do anything for them. In today's lesson we learn of a new danger: prophets would come and tell beautiful stories about other gods, things they dreamed or saw in visions. God said that people right in their midst would have false dreams and visions, and He would prove the Israelites to see if they would obey the commandments of God or would believe any fanciful story they heard, whether it were true or not.

Perhaps someone would dream an interesting dream which would make it sound exciting to visit the groves where the heathen worshiped idols. He might even think God had sent the dream, because God did speak to His prophets in that way in the Old Testament ([NUM:12:6]). The way the Israelites could tell whether the message was false or true was to compare it with the commandments of God. The commandment was: "Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, . . . thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them" (Exodus 20:4, 5), so, of course anyone who loved the Lord would know that such a dream was not from Heaven.

Modern Dreams and Visions

Many people today have great confidence in dreams and visions. They believe God gives them instructions and foretells their future through dreams. Sometimes God does lead and encourage His people in this way. But the dream or vision must correspond with the Word of God, or it is not sent by Him. God will give no revelation that will contradict His Word. The Bible is our sure guide to Heaven, with all the instructions we need to be ready to meet Jesus. God's laws and commandments to the Israelites were complete, and he warned, "Thou shalt not add thereto, nor diminish from it" (Deuteronomy 12:32). And John the Beloved heard the Voice of Jesus say: "If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book: and if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book" (Revelation 22:18, 19). That tell us that even people who have been Christians at one time will try to take from the Word. Jesus said that the name of such a man would be taken from the Book of Life; and it would not have been there unless he had been a Christian.

False Prophets

One time in Israel's history their king, Jeroboam, had made two golden calves for the people to worship. God told a true prophet to curse the altar of Jeroboam, and the prophet obeyed. The words he prophesied came to pass. The king was angry at his sayings, and put out his hand to take hold of him, but God made Jeroboam' arm stiff so he could not put it down again. He asked the prophet to pray for him, and God answered and made the arm well. The king was so grateful that he asked the prophet to come to his palace so he could honour him. But God had told the prophet that as soon as his work was finished he was to return home by a different way, and not stop to eat nor drink. The prophet obeyed God rather than the king, and started for home.

However, his zeal did not last. He loitered along the way; and while he was sitting under a tree a false prophet caught up with him with a message he said had come from an angel, inviting him to the home of the false prophet to eat. This was contrary to the message God had given; but as the man of God had already disobeyed in stopping to rest under the oak, his discernment of the false was dulled; and he returned with the false prophet. Do you know what happened to him? This is the message God sent to him: "Forasmuch as thou hast disobeyed the mouth of the LORD, and hast not kept the commandment which the LORD thy God commanded thee, . . . thy carcase shall not come unto the sepulchre of thy fathers" (I Kings 13:21, 22). After he had again started for home a lion met him and killed him. That was the judgement of God on this backslidden man who listened to a false prophet.

Every Word of God Important

There was nothing in the Law about which the Israelite could say, "This rule is not important. I will be care-ful to keep the necessary ones, but some are unnecessary." Every word that God spoke was important.

When God told the Israelites, before they left Egypt, to take a lamb a year old, without blemish, and kill it and put the blood over their doors and on the side posts in order to escape death, it was necessary that they take a lamb a year old, without blemish, and kill it and put the blood over their doors and on the side posts. God said, "When I see the blood, I will pass over you." He would save alive everyone in that house. In the homes of the other people the eldest child would die that night.

That lamb was a type of Jesus, shedding His Blood for the sinners. If the lamb had had a spot on it, it would not have been a type of the sinless Jesus who was pure and holy. If the Israelites had kept the spotless lamb in their house without killing it, it still would not have typified Jesus, because Jesus shed His Blood. If the blood of the lamb had been kept in a basin and not applied to the door, it would not have fulfilled the type of Jesus' Blood which must be applied to the heart of each one of us in order to take our sins away. Every instruction God gave for the killing and eating of the Passover Lamb was necessary; and leaving out any part of it would have brought death to a member of that family.

That is how important every commandment of God is. Jesus said, "Ye must be born again." That means we must repent of our sins and pray until we know they are forgiven. It is not enough to say we believe in Jesus, and accept Him as our Saviour. We must know that our past sins are gone; and then we have power to sin no more.

Sanctification

There are many who believe it is necessary to be born again, but that sanctification is not necessary. But the Bible says: "This is the will of God, even your sanctification" (I Thessalonians 4:3). Jesus wants all His children to be one; He wants them to believe the same thing. Sanctification purifies the heart and brings oneness. Jesus prayed for His disciples: "Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we are. . . . They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. Sanctify them through thy truth: they word is truth" (John 17:11, 16, 17). And it was not only for the disciples of Jesus when He was on earth. He added, "Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word" (John 17:20).

The Apostle Paul tells us: "Wherefore Jesus also, that he might sanctify the people with his own blood, suffered without the gate" (Hebrews 13:12). Jesus fulfilled the type of the sin offering that was made at the Tabernacle in the wilderness when the body of the sacrifice was burned outside the camp of Israel, and the blood was taken into the Tabernacle and sprinkled on the golden altar.

The Spirit Our Teacher

How do we know who is right and what we should believe? By reading the Bible; and if we are honest, the Spirit will teach us. If a man really wants to obey God and go to Heaven, he will want all the promises in that Word fulfilled in his heart. When he reads in the Bible, "This is the will of God, even your sanctification," he will not say there is nothing to it and it is not necessary, before he has tried to receive it. The man will not stay saved long who fights against the Word of God. You would think anyone who wanted to please the Saviour would at least try to have the promises of God fulfilled in his heart before he said it could not possibly happen to him nor to anyone else.

The Latter Rain

When the Latter Rain first fell, in 1906, the baptism of the Holy Ghost came upon sanctified people who were pure in heart and in one accord. However, some false teachers came among them and it was not long until some began to depart from the faith.

The founder of the Apostolic Faith held to the doctrine as it is in the Bible and as it was preached when the Latter Rain first fell, even when her former leader decided sanctification was not necessary. One minister told her she would come to their way of preaching, because everyone else was "falling in line." She answered, "Never! Never! It is not a matter of falling in line. It is a matter of standing true to the Word. If you value your soul, if you value the souls of those with whom you come in contact, you will preach the whole Word." God honoured her stand for the second work of grace in the heart, sanctification, purity of heart, in which the carnal nature is destroyed and God's people are made one. There is today a great body of people scattered throughout the world who worship God in the beauties of holiness, in the unity of faith that comes with sanctification. And they have received the blessed Holy Ghost in the clean, sanctified life.

If people are not sanctified, and they receive something that they call the baptism of the Holy Ghost, it is not of God, because it is contrary to the Bible. And the lives of the people who receive such an experience prove that they are not of God.

False Visions

On one occasion a fellow minister of our founder told her of a great revelation he had had. A beautiful light had filled his room, and to him was revealed that something they had been preaching was no longer necessary. She answered, "If your revelation takes anything from this Word or adds anything to it, it is a false revelation." He asked, "What about that wonderful light?" She answered, "The devil can give great lights. No light nor revelation will turn us from the Word of God."

The Apostle Paul said that if an angel from Heaven came with a different doctrine from that which Christ had given to His Apostles, including Paul, "Let him be accursed." If Paul should change his mind and begin to preach another doctrine, let him be accursed ([GAL:1:6-9]). God is not changing His Word. "Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled" (Matthew 5:18).

Separation

What is a person supposed to do to the false prophet, the man who brings another doctrine? God told the Israelites: "That prophet, or that dreamer of dreams, shall be put to death; because he hath spoken to turn you away from the LORD your God. . . . to thrust thee out of the way which the LORD thy God commanded thee to walk in. So shalt thou put the evil away from the midst of thee" (Deuteronomy 13:5). Even if it were a member of their own household -- the brother, or son, or wife, or their best friend -" the Israelites were not to pity him, but destroy him for bringing a false teaching. First their own hand should be upon the guilty one, and then the whole congregation should join in stoning him until he was dead.

If they heard of a city that had turned to idolatry, that entire city must be destroyed: the inhabitants, the cat-tle; and the buildings were to be burned so that nothing would remain of the "accursed thing."

If God dealt that strictly in ancient times with the people who tried to turn His children from the true way, do you suppose He would want us to listen to people who tell us it is not necessary to believe the whole Bible? In the dispensation of grace we do not literally kill people, but if they come to our church and bring a false doc-trine, we are commanded: "Mark them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them" (Romans 16:17). "Whosoever transgresseth, and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ, hath not God. He that abideth in the doctrine of Christ, he hath both the Father and the Son. If there come any unto you, and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither bid him God speed: for he that biddeth him God speed is partaker of his evil deeds" (II John 9-11).

That means if someone comes to us claiming to be a child of God and wants to teach us that some of the teachings of Jesus are not for us to obey, we should not be friends with him, nor wish him well in his false work. We should treat him just as though he were dead to us; because if we pay attention to what he says, he may lead us away from God.

If we really love the Lord we will not compromise with anyone who brings false teachings. The Spirit of God agrees with the Word, and will show us what is right. Then we must obey the right, even though the per-son who brings the false doctrine is someone who is dear to us. It is more important to obey God and have His approval than to please men or our natural desires. One day Jesus is coming for His Bride, the sanctified Church; and all who have compromised the truth will receive this condemnation: "I tell you, I know you not whence ye are; depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity" (Luke 13:27).

Questions

1. Where would the false dreamers come from?

2. How were the Israelites to treat them?

3. Why would these false visions and dreams come?

4. How would the Israelites know which were false and which were true?

5. How much of God's Word is necessary?

6. How much depends on whether we obey all the Word or not?

7. How should we treat people who bring false doctrine to us?