I want to call your attention
in the book of Acts chapter 8 starting at verse 13 and we are continuing
from last week's study as we are dealing with the the idea
of Saul, Philip and Saul and now we are in this parentheses
period in the book of Acts chapter 8 where God is calling our attention
to the ministry of Philip and he has begun a magnificent work
in the city of Samaria As was our Lord's intention, go ye into
all the world and preach the gospel, starting first in Jerusalem,
then Judea, and then where? Samaria. So Samaria is a targeted
place for the blessing of the gospel that was ordained way,
way long ago in the mouth of the prophets that the Gentiles
should hear this word. And so Philip is what we call
a superdeacon. And this superdeacon, he's not
only waiting on tables, but he's waiting on the souls of men.
And he has the gift of miracles. Now, the gift of miracles is
just that, the gift of miracles. It's a sovereign disposition
on the part of the Spirit of God to use whom he wills to bring
about those messianic signs critical to the authentication of the
Gospel. So God used Philip. He didn't
use everybody like this. He didn't use everyone in the
same fashion We looked at Stephen a couple of weeks ago. He had
that same gift But that gift was a breakthrough gift. It was
designed to make way for the gospel Remember and we'll be
dealing with this as we go through the book of Acts the miracles
were never never an end in themselves Miracles are never designed for
you and I to go off Miracles are always designed for us to
say, what is God saying? What is God's purpose in this? If in fact it's an authentic
miracle, which today we would challenge the vast majority of
the claims of those who say they possess the gift of miracles.
We acknowledge also that God works providentially to bring
about healings in kinds of miracles that we would suggest Come from
God alone, but he would do that without the agency of human beings
what that means is the human being does not get to usurp or
steal God's glory and as it were claimed to be a healer are Possessed
the gift of miracles and things of that nature by which and this
is driving us towards our study tonight by which men's eyes would
be taken off of God and Christ and then placed on this instrument
who says he has the power of God if you recall We dealt with
this when we were introduced to Simon who now is the antagonist
of our text when we read in chapter 8 Phillips remarkable work in
verse 7 for unclean spirits, crying with a loud voice came
out. And many that were possessed with them, and many taken with
palsy, that were lame were healed. Many, many, many is the, again,
messianic connotation of the power and effusion of the miracles
that were done during the days of Jesus and in the apostolic
time. Now look at verse 9. But there
was a certain man, whenever the scripture uses that term, you
and I are to halt and be very careful About what's about to
change in the narrative because the certain man may be noble
But very frequently the certain man is a danger that the sheep
have to mark Because he will now serve for us as a model of
a number of things. Will you look at what it says?
There was a certain man called simon Which before time in the
same city used sorcery? Some of your words say magic
That's the legitimate translation of the Greek term Magion. And he bewitched, that is he
brought to a point of stupefying amazement. We'll talk about that
in a moment. The people of Samaria giving
out that himself was some great one. So he went about telling
people that he was great. In fact, he was telling people
he was actually the power of God. And people were believing
this because of the nature of the tricanery and the complexity
of the magic that he was bespelling the people with. They were so
mesmerized. They were so taken aback by his
magical tricks that they couldn't adduce any other conclusion but
that he must be a man of God. That's what he wanted them to
believe and that's what he had done And then we read over in
verse 10 to whom they all gave what that means they were Inclined
to listen to whatever he said because he had demonstrated certain
Magical tricks he had exercised certain powers that were demonic
in nature if not just pure trick anery Because magicians are good
We talked about this last week Optical illusions are easy for
you and me. Whenever you and I are ignorant
of the data or the information or the methodology by which magicians
perform their tricks, our eyes only see what they see. And as
a consequence, our eyes can tell us something that in fact we
don't know. And this is what we mean by optical
illusions. The illusion is not so much that we are made to see
something that is not there or made not to see something that
is there. The illusion has to do with us
not having enough understanding of what was going on behind the
scenes by which that person did that trick. You guys all know
about certain magicians who are worldwide known and famous for
these gargantuan tricks that they do now, right? And you know
how that they have the cameras on them and they appear to have
crowds of people around them who are watching them do these
tricks, right? And it appears that they do things
like levitate off the ground 12, 15 feet in the air, correct? And all of this is magic. But
what you are watching on TV is pure, pure tricanery. Why? Because you're a third party
to a complete hoax that is set up with props and people and
everything designed to make you believe that what's happening
is purely something of a phenomenon. So the lack of information puts
you and me in a vulnerable state by which we can be mesmerized
That's literally the idea here bewitched mesmerized and the
Connotation of the mesmerization is rooted in our ignorance of
not knowing what's taking place And so we are stuck saying how
could this happen? Are you guys following me so
far? Now we're gonna see how this plays into a spiritual battle
that's being waged against the gospel by this man, Simon, who
is now being confronted by a true servant of God. Simon is a false
prophet. Philip is a true prophet. The
two now are at odds with each other. Real power from God is
about to be manifested, and this false prophet is about to be
exposed. This becomes the context for
the theological reflection that you and I are gonna now derive
from the text. We are about to learn the difference
between a true servant of God and a false servant of God. The
true church and the false church. The authentic presence and power
of Christ over against that which is spurious and false. So if you have our previous PowerPoint
up there, try to pull that up for me if you can. I'm thinking
that I'm gonna start working from Cleaving with flatteries. I think
we have that up there But if you if you guys have your outline
you should have in your outline point number four Point number
floor if you do we are dealing with the concept there it is
cleaving with flatteries That's a proposition that I am making
right now concerning this man Simon that this man Simon has
been himself a almost hoodwinked, or brought to a place of utter
amazement, even we might even say bewitched. It wasn't however,
the consequent of some trickery on the part of Philip, but because
Simon is a wicked man, which we're about to prove, his heart
not being right with God, what he saw in the ministry of Philip,
he saw through the prism and glasses of a false hood. He looked through the prism and
glasses of his own selfish agenda, his own crooked and wicked heart. And what he concluded was that
Philip was just a better magician than he was. That he was a better
trickster than he was. And that somehow, if he could
get a hold to the trick that Philip is pulling off, he would
be a top-notch magician. Let's see if I can work that
through, because I want you to see that. God would have you
to see it, too. Here's a proposition. Wherever
God works, the devil always comes behind that work in order to
discount that work, discredit that work, or mimic that work.
This is what we mean by the term a anti-Christ or a pseudo-Christ. You guys follow that? The fundamental
objective on the part of the devil is to be like who? Right, and the operative word
is like. In the Greek, it's the word pseudo. And it means to be a false or
facsimile of the true. And as many people as the devil
can get to believe that he is a Christ type or is God, then
he wins the day through falsehood. That's his objective. According
to Isaiah chapter 11, as you know, I want to be like God.
I want to sit on the sides of the north. I want to rule over
the stars of God. I want to rule over the people of God. I want
a throne like God does. This is the maniacal, demonic,
devilish aspiration of the wicked one. He wants to be like God
and that will never end for him, even in hell. And so many women
who do not know God in a saving way are also bent on the same
agenda. And Simon becomes our first antagonist
in this context. And in our outline, we talked
about how the battle was waged against the gospel. And we use
the language of Daniel chapter 11, verses 32 through 35, where
I shared with you that Antiochus Epiphanes, who was a foreshadow
of the Antichrist, would come in with flatteries on a political
level and win the people over. And the Antichrist operates out
of principles that fundamentally are rooted in appearing to be
nice, appearing to be kind, appearing to be loving, desiring your best,
and in fact, wanting your ultimate salvation. You guys remember
last week, we looked at Revelation chapter 13, and I don't want
you to leave a PowerPoint up there, but you guys go in your
Bibles to Revelation 13, unless you can switch it back. Revelation
13, I want you to see this as we were dealing with this second
beast, that serves as the unholy trinity in the book of Revelation. And I want you to mark his calling
card, his mode of operandi. This is Revelation chapter 13
and 11. And I'm going to read verses 11 through verse 14. And then we're going to go back
and see how on the earth in the dimension of the early church
ministry with the apostles and here certainly with Philip, that
Simon would fit this energy, this power, this agenda on the
part of the dragon. Verse 11, And I beheld another
beast coming up out of the earth. You know, we're dealing with
two beasts in the book of Revelation, right? A sea beast and an earth
beast, right? One is political, the other one
is what? Religious. You gotta understand that paradigm
or you will not understand what's going on in the world. There
are two systems now that the devil operates out of to hoodwink
people. Politics and what? Religion. You've got to know that. And
when the two come together, when the two are fused together, politics
and religion, you have the apostate church. Whenever politics is
able to bring religion on board with its own worldwide global
agenda, then that religious system has compromised its prophetic
position. Because a church is called to
be both prophetic and priestly. Those are the two roles the church
is to operate out of. But you and I cannot operate
out of a prophetic office where we have made a league or an affinity
with the political systems of this world, wherein they now
hogtie us and stop us from certain rights and claims of propositional
truth that we are ordained to set forth. If you are hogtied
by a system that tells you you can't speak forthright about
certain politically incorrect issues, then now you no longer
have the voice of a prophet. Am I making some sense? This
is a real challenge with church becoming so large that it now
gets involved in politics. Like long ago, the religious
right began to get involved with politics. And the next thing
you know, there were compromises that were being made behind closed
doors. Things started happening. Today, presently, the larger
aggregate of the church is liberal. And the liberal branch of Christendom
is so tied in to political issues on a global level for social
justice and social reforms that it too has abandoned the gospel. And this is what we are struggling
with today. So there's a paradigm that runs all the way through
scripture. Either the enemy will get us through the persecution
that comes by politics, political entities that do not tolerate
biblical truth, propositional truth, a biblical worldview,
or they will get us through the compromise and seduction of false
religion. Okay, so now listen to the language.
I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth. He had two
horns. What do horns represent? Authority.
like a lamb. What does the lamb represent?
Peace. It represents unity. It represents harmony. It represents
the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. It points to an institution that
comes off as being peace loving and sacrificial. This here is
the great marquee image of Jesus Christ. The book of the revelation
of Jesus Christ is called the lamb's book of life. In fact,
no other book in the Bible has the term lamb running through
it more than the book of the revelation. It is about the lamb
of God. And yet, as you and I are learning,
the devil always seeks to mimic Christ by putting on a facade
of peace and unity and harmony. When they say peace, peace, behold,
sudden destruction. Looming so what I'm doing is
I'm painting the picture now watch how he operates. Here's
what he says We have a number of things. I want to make sure
that I affirm with us tonight in the Simon account and he exercises
all the power of the first beast now if the first beast is political
and The second beast is religious and they both operate the same
power. That means they have an affinity
don't they? If he has the same authority and exercises the same
power of the first beast, it means that this political, this
religious entity is really affirming the political entity of that
day. Okay, let's go on. And he exercises the power of
the first beast before him and causes the earth and them which
dwell therein to worship what? The first beast whose deadly
wound was healed. So now watch this. This religious
system, is influencing the people in such a way that they do not
bow down to God, they bow down to the secular system of the
world. You guys get that? This religious
system influences the masses not to worship God, but to worship
the earth, to worship politics, to worship secularism, to worship
the first beast. Now, in our studies in the book
of Revelation, if you guys have been following me in the seven
churches, what was one of the major themes running through
the church in terms of the persecution that the believers were going
through? They were told by the political rulers that unless
you bow down and worship Caesar, you would be killed, ostracized,
removed from the guild, not capable of working, and therefore made
of non effect. So here is a strategy on the
part of the political system. When the political system can,
they will actually cause the people of God to be in such a
straight that if we don't yield to their agenda, support their
agenda, approve of their agenda, they will make it virtually impossible
for us to exist. Do you see that kind of push
coming towards us today? with the momentum of politics
and its wholesale secular worldview, particularly in the context of
moral issues, in the context of gender issues, in the context
of sexual issues. These are prevailing everywhere.
This is the sort of final stage for Western Christianity with
respect to what the political trend is and how our churches
are capitulating everywhere. They are capitulating. They are. You'll hear me develop this on
Sunday. And then again, next Sunday,
we'll fully unpack it as we're dealing with the church at Thyatira. We will see that more fully.
So now he goes on to say in verse 13, he does great what? Wonders. See what he does? He does miracles. These are called
signs. Signs. He does great wonders
so that he makes what come down from heaven? On the earth in
the sight of men. Stay right there. I just need
to help you understand. You're dealing with the book,
the Revelation, and the book is devoted to symbolism. Symbolism that serves as a typological
pattern of other realities. So if you don't understand that
you are dealing with symbolism, you are already under the assumption
that the miracle that this false prophet is doing is bringing
literal fire down from heaven. But you are failing to understand
the presupposition of the book of revelation that is dealing
with symbolism. So let me help you briefly. Fire
coming down from heaven is not meant to be understood literally,
but symbolically. And the fire coming down from
heaven was always in the Old Testament a symbol of the presence
of the true God. If God be God, let him rain fire
down from heaven and consume the sacrifice. Right? And he
did. And you'll see this same imagery
in the 19th chapter of the book of Revelation when God will really
bring fire down. When he really will. But here
the text is saying he does the kind of miracles that causes
the people to conclude that he is the great power of God. This
therefore then corresponds with where we are in Acts chapter
8 where the people are deceived by the bewitching sorcery and
magic Simon are you guys hearing what I'm saying? I want you to
understand that verse 14 now here's the objective and he deceiveth
them that dwells on the earth right and he deceiveth them that
dwells on the earth watch this now by means of those miracles
which he had power to do in the sight of the what and saying
to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an image
to the beast, which had the womb by the sword and did live. And
he had power to give life unto the image of the beast, that
the image of the beast should both speak and cause as many
as would not worship the image of the beast should be what?
That's right. So this goes into another phase
of the deception. So the religious entity is forcing
folks to bow down to the state. to the secular institution, to
the agenda and goals and worldview of the state. And if they don't,
then they are forced through miracles to believe that the
image of that first beast, which is the state, is alive. Now, what is that image? In the
historical context of first century Rome, these were the statues
that were devoted to Zeus. Asclepius, to Caesar, to Nero,
to Domitian, to Augustus. to Augustus Caesar, Tiberius
Caesar. And what is meant by giving power
to these images is not that these images were doing anything, but
that the authority behind the image had the power to affect
the lives of the people who did or did not bow down. For instance,
you don't know I'm harboring on dealing with the intrinsic
meaning of the mark of the beast. I'm harboring on that. But I'm
just giving a framework so you can understand that the larger
part of this battle has to do with deception, not actual miracles. It has to do with political power
influencing people through mediums of which if people don't have
a knowledge of the truth, they're gonna fall prey for. Okay, let
me see if I can put your feet in the shoes of our first century
church so you can get this. So here you are, a Christian
in the first century. And you work like everyone else
works. You pay your bills like everyone
else pays their bills. But you get a notice in the mail
that says, on such and such a date at such and such a time, the
whole city is going to be going down to the major hub, the major
marketplace, and they will have an opportunity to burn incense
to Caesar and receive a certificate of accomplishment by which you
can continue now commerce, paying your bills and purchasing your
food. If you don't burn this pinch of incense to Caesar, whoever
that Caesar was, and receive your certificate, if you don't
have that certificate, you cannot buy or sell anything. Now stay with me a moment if
you're bored with what I'm talking about. Think about how pressing
that piece of proclamation was on the heart of the Christian
whose lives were completely interwoven with the culture of that day
as we ought to be. We're supposed to be salt and
light. We're not supposed to be away from the world. We're
not supposed to be cut off from the world. We're supposed to
be right in the trenches with them, living with everyone else,
working with everyone else, commercing with everyone else, engaged with
everyone else. Only you and I are committed
to the true and the living God. Now we are confronted with a
real dilemma, aren't we? So what happens when you don't
bow down to the image of this beast? You lose your right to
interact on a commercial level. Now your family is threatened.
Now your livelihood is threatened. Now your resources are threatened.
And when it gets around that you haven't bowed down in this
pluralistic culture at that time that was feverishly bent on secularism,
now you become exposed as one of those folks who are at odds
with our Caesar. And you will begin then quickly
to see that there are a whole lot of false Christians who burnt
the incense, who also took the certificate and said, hey, in
my heart, I still believe in Jesus. And then they began to
watch one by one as Antipas, as Polycarp, as Ignatius and
others were put to death. Strategically, the leadership
and then the common people. Now, all of a sudden, the Christianity
that Jesus talked about in Matthew chapter 24, Luke 17 through 21,
Mark chapter 13 becomes real. See, in our present day, Christianity
is not real. It's completely hypothetical.
Are you guys hearing what I'm saying? I'm setting a context.
I'm getting ready to show you that in the book of Acts, God
is merciful to the early church to stop and to thwart a process
of momentum of an infiltration into the church by wicked men
so that the church won't be corrupted for at least another 70, 80 to
100 years. During the apostolic era, you
see through the book of Acts the intervention of God. But
you also will definitely see the activity of Satan seeking
to disqualify the church. Am I making some sense? Good. So it tells us this and we will
now go back because I don't want to get inclined to actually do
any real exposition or exegesis of Revelation 13. I just want
you to think about the danger that the first century church
was in. Now let's go back to our account
and work through a proposition that I want you to contemplate
with me so that you are not stupefied or mesmerized or taken aback
by Simon's apparent desire to become a Christian. I am saying
that Simon has no intentions to be a Christian, but he is
intended on deceiving people, pretending to be a Christian,
which is a prominent practice today. I'm going to actually
be doing a show on Monday. The Lord willing, I live, you
live, we all live till Monday. And I'm going to be raising the
question, do you see the trend in the church of so-called Christians
now adopting a position of atheism? It's a pattern developing in
the church where people are moving away from a Christian belief
and now taking on an agnostic and atheistic position. This
is a pattern happening in the church. And I'm going to talk
about why that pattern is happening. And how it's rooted in a biblical
prophecy in Luke 18 where our master says, and when the son
of man comes, will he find faith on the earth? And that discourse
will begin to raise the question for all of us. Is it enough for
us to go through the external form of religion? and pass through
the ushers and get through the sermon and make it through the
week and then do it all over again to basically have our card
calling image of a Christian and not really have examined
ourselves for authentic Christianity. And then one day wake up real
honest with ourselves. Are you ready? Real honest. I
don't believe any of this stuff. So we want to talk about that.
because that's the trend that we're entering into. And there
are people who are in the church who are closet atheists, but
they won't say it because the church is a very smooth operating
machine on multiple levels by which popularity, wealth, prominence,
all kinds of things are afforded in the church if you just kind
of stay in your position. And because the church is not
being tested, people can profess to be a Christian and really
reach echelons in the church without even being exposed. And
so that's really a problem. It's really a problem. And that
could have occurred here in the Acts account if it weren't for
the fact that God was good to the early church and including
the Samaritans. Now, here's where we are in our
point number four. Cleaving with flatteries. Why
do I say that he was cleaving with flatteries? Again, Daniel
11, 32 through 35 asserts that. What do we mean by cleaving with
flatteries? Look in chapter nine, chapter
eight, I'm sorry, verse 13. Are you there? This is where
we left off last week. Then Simon himself believed also. He believed also when? When all
the other people came to believe the gospel and went through the
external form of baptism. Listen, verse 11. And to him
they had regard because out of a long time he had bewitched
them with sorcery. But, verse 12, when they believed Philip's
preaching the things concerning the kingdom of God and the name
of Jesus Christ, they were baptized, both men and women. You know
what happened? All of a sudden, he lost his whole crew. Who takes his
crew? Who takes the Samaritans? Philip,
this evangelist. And now he needs to find out
what kind of power superseded his power when he was, literally
in the Greek, the great power of God. Isn't that what the text
said? He was asserting. And you and
I learned last week for him to even use that type of terminology
is for him to say that he was a savior because Jesus Christ
is the power of God. Is he not? And Jesus Christ is
the wisdom of God. Is he not? First Corinthians
chapter one, verse 18 through 24, Christ, the wisdom of God
and Christ, the power of God. So if a man asserts to be the
power of God, he's saying he's Jesus. But all of a sudden, Jesus
actually shows up in the person of his servant, Philip, through
the preaching of the gospel. And the qualitative nature of
the authentic ministry of Jesus Christ so far supersedes the
tricanery and weakness and superficiality of this crook that the whole
people move away from him. Now the crook is really left
with a dilemma, is he not? You know what the old colloquialism
is. If you can't beat him, join him. And I want you to watch
how this works, because this is how the devil works. Then
Simon himself believed also. Does he really? Let's see. And when he was baptized, he
continued with Philip. See that phrase continued. I
told you we worked with that last week. In fact, that's the
grammatical premise upon which I am asserting that he was cleaving
to him, that he continued with him. It's a very strong verb
to continue with him. That means he stuck to him. He
stuck to him. He stuck with him and he went
with him everywhere. Everywhere. I use the old country metaphor
like white on rice. That's how close he was. So what
he did was he realized that Philip had something he didn't have,
and in order for him to find out, he had to get close to him.
So he followed him everywhere. Everywhere Philip did ministry,
there Simon was. Listen to what it says. And he
continued with Philip. And then he what? Wondered. Doing
what? Beholding the what? Okay, so
now this is our next clue that you and I are going to work with.
The fact that this man, Simon, found himself wondering and beholding. And I ask you, is he beholding
the right thing? See, he's stuck on the miracles.
He's stuck on the miracles. Now, when God works in our life
to save us, we are never stuck on the miracle. We're stuck on
the one who performed the miracle. What salvation is is a revelation
of the person of God to us, not the power of God. The power of
God is just a means. Whenever you and I are authentically
brought to a saving knowledge of God, what we know is God is
real and personally real. So that the power now quickly
gives way to the person and I am now in pursuit of a knowledge
of Him. John 17 3. And this is eternal
life that they might know thee. the only true God and Jesus Christ
whom thou has sent this is one of the evidences of real Christianity
John chapter 6 around verse 39 37 through 39 and this is the
will of him that sent me that all that seeth the sun that's
a revelation and believeth on him should have everlasting life.
I'll raise him up at the last day. What is a saving knowledge
of Christ? When the gospel is revealed to you in such a way
that you see Jesus Christ in his glory. And that overwhelming
and compelling revelation of Christ causes you to stick to
him. And the whole of your life is
committed to knowing him. Philippians chapter 3, verse
10. Don't go there. Oh, that I might know him and
the power of his resurrection. I might be made conformable unto
his death. That if by any means I might
attain unto the resurrection, I want to know the excellency
of the knowledge of this God that saved me. That's what Paul
said. The one Saul right now that's killing people in the
church. When he felt the experience, when he had the experience of
the presence of Christ on the Damascus road, from that point
on, he wanted to what? Know him. I submit to you that Simon is
not interested in salvation at all. He's interested in power. He's interested in power. So
there are a couple of things under our PowerPoint that I want
you to mark. First of all, he is setting forth a false confession.
Simon is no different than Judas Iscariot. Judas Iscariot was
an apostle. Judas Iscariot was baptized.
Judas Iscariot entered into ministry. Judas Iscariot even went through
the evangelism of healing people and casting out devils and doing
all of those apostolic signs. And yet he was a devil himself.
John 6, 70. Jesus called him that. I chose
12 of you and one of you is a devil. And in John chapter 17, he made
it very plain. He is the son of perdition. The
one that's lost, he's the son of the perdition. And he's going
to the place that was appointed to him because he was never mine. Are you guys following me so
far? So what the Bible actually teaches us is, it's not enough
for you to become an apostle. To become an apostle does not
make you a luxury stay for the kingdom of God. Just to hold
an office in the church does not mean that you are authentically
in the kingdom of God. He had a room, he had an office,
just like all the other 11. On his door it said, Apostle
Judas. and he went to hell. Are you
guys following what I'm saying? So it's important for you not
to actually lower the standard of what salvation really constitutes
by getting wrapped up in offices or persons. He claimed to Philip
hard. He persevered. He endured. He was constant.
That's the word there broken up into its parts. He pressed
hard upon Philip. Now watch this. He was fixated
on the gift of what? See the word gazing there? That's
a powerful word and it fundamentally means to be locked in. It's our
word for beholding as if you are in a theater watching a movie. Theoreo is our Greek term and
that term can be translated to things theater. That's the term
for which we have today theater. And it means to behold. You know
how you sit and watch a movie screen for two hours? Fixed on
that screen. So this is the idea with Philip.
It's used in Acts 3, verse 16. It's used again in John 1, 17.
Remember? And we beheld his glory, the
glory of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and
truth. What John was saying is we were fixed on the glory of
God in Christ. This man, Simon, is fixed on
the gift of miracles. Fixed his eyes are on the wrong
place, right? And so it goes on to say this
because I want you to understand that the tricky but also necessary
Subtlety of the language. Not only did he wonder that word
wonder means to be amazed But more so it means to be bewildered
It's a term existano in its root form means to stand outside of
oneself and be utterly perplexed by the experience See Simon now
was experiencing what all of the people he had tricked experienced. He's outside of himself trying
to find reference points for the authenticity of these miracles. He's trying to figure out what
Philip is doing. He has no keys. He has no code.
He has no method, no techniques, no way to identify with what
Philip is doing because Philip is dealing with a whole nother
dimension. All Simon knows are tricks. And he's wondering what
is this man's, what is this man's hook? How is he doing this? And
he is utterly mesmerized by the miracles because they're real.
Are you hearing me? But see, he is so jacked up himself
that he can't actually believe that it's really happening. We're
going to see that here in a moment. So here, this man whose heart
is black as pitch, Exposed to the light of the world in the
person of Jesus Christ by the power of the Holy Ghost working
through Philip He's seen authentic apostolic miracles, and he does
not know how to conclude He's outside of himself He's in the
same state that his listeners are. Now see, the word wonder
in your Bible, in your King James Bible, it has many original Greek
words, so it does not alarm us when we use the term wonder because
wonderment simply means that something marvelous happened
that threw us aback. The word is used constantly in
the book of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John concerning the miracles
Jesus did. And the people wondered at the
gracious things he said and the miracles he performed. They were
themselves amazed, were they not? In the book of Acts chapter
2, when the people of God are speaking in languages, And all
of a sudden these folks who had never heard a people group speaking
in someone's else language, they are Galileans and they're speaking
now in Persian. They're speaking in the dialect
and the tongues of these 13, 14 nations. That is an amazing
sign. And they are just utterly amazed. But the word here is slightly
different. The word here, that word is Thalmezo. This word here
is a word that means to be outside of yourself because you just
cannot anchor, anchor, anchor your reason anywhere. You're
outside of yourself. You're out of your wits. Now,
the one who has been outwitting people for a long time now is
outwitted by God. Are you hearing me? This is the
difference between the true preacher of the gospel and the false prophet,
the authentic presence of God in the real work of grace. Remember,
he healed many. He healed many. I would venture
to quickly say Simon healed none. Are you hearing me? It goes on
to say this is very important for us to capture this. He was
amazed out of his wits that is being beside himself. And there
are a couple of verses to affirm that. Go with me in your Bible
to Acts chapter 12, verse 16. In fact, you can start, stop
at Acts chapter 10, 45. I want to just deal with this one more
and then we'll move on to my next set of points that I do
want to develop. Acts chapter 10, verse 45. Okay. You know,
Acts chapter 12, go to Acts chapter 12, verse 16. Yeah, I know why
I'm using that verse. That's another argument. Acts
chapter 12, verse 16. Listen to this. Are you there
you guys this is the account where Peter was in prison Remember
that and while Peter was in prison prison an amazing thing occurred.
I don't want to talk about that but there was another remarkable
truth that was also taking place simultaneously and That was the
church was praying for Peter, right? So there were people praying
for the Apostles because the Apostles now are being killed
like we believe in prayer, right? See, as soon as American Christians
start getting persecuted, you're going to see prayer services
all over the United States. All over the United States. Right
now, we don't pray because we don't believe God. We don't need
anything. But as soon as people start getting killed, watch how
the church house gets full of praying people. And God works
through prayer. So here they are praying because
their leaders are being put to death. They just put to death
James. They were really wanting to put to death Peter. But Peter
escaped by a miracle, did he not? Now watch the language.
It says in verse 11, and when Peter was come to himself, he
saw, he said, now I know of a surety that the Lord has sent his angel
and has delivered me out of the hand of Herod and from all the
expectations of the people of the Jews. And when he had considered
the thing, he came to the house of Mary, the mother of John,
whose surname was Mark, where many were gathered together.
What? And as Peter knocked at the door of the gate, a damsel
came to hearken named Rhoda. And when she knew Peter's voice,
she opened not the door for gladness. Isn't that wild? Now watch what the language says,
but ran in and told how Peter stood before the gate. And they
said unto her, thou art mad. But she constantly affirmed that
it was even so then said they it is an angel But peter continued
knocking and when they had opened the door and saw him they were
That's our same word wondered out of their wits What's happening? See, they could not believe that
peter was there They were trying to grasp for some concrete basis
for believing that this was real. And this can happen to you and
me when we don't have points of reference, when we are exposed
to experiences. This is why you must never, never,
never anchor your faith and experience alone because you can be deceived
by them. Here at this point, these are
true believers who have prayed for Peter's deliverance and now
they can't handle the miracle. Okay, so I'm just helping you
understand what's going on. Helping you understand what's
going on. I want to call your attention to the proposition
that Simon is cleaving to Philip with the objective of flattering
him. The word is flatter that I want
to deal with now and the apostles in order to get what they have.
Go back to our text. See if I can show you this. I'm sorry, Acts chapter eight,
listen to what it says over here in verse, I'll start at verse
15, no, verse 14. Now, when the apostles which
were at Jerusalem had heard that Samaria had received the word
of God, they sent unto them Peter and John, okay? Here comes Peter
and John, right? Now, why does Peter and John
come down? To affirm the miracle, who when
they were come down, prayed for them that they might receive
the Holy Ghost. For as yet he was fallen upon
none of them, only they were, what? Baptized in the name of
the Lord Jesus. Now watch this. Then laid they
their hands on them, and they received, what? The Holy Ghost. Verse 18, And when Simon saw
that through the laying on of the apostles' hands the Holy
Ghost was given, here it is, he offered them money. So I want you to work with me
now for about 10 minutes. We've got 30 minutes. We stop
at 930. I want you to work with me now for a moment because this
is important, because this is really rooted in a lot of biblical
principles. Listen, whatever is going on
in the darkness of our heart eventually is going to come out,
is it not? So didn't I tell you a little earlier, and I know
that some of you may have thought that I was being a bit presumptuous
about asserting that Simon was not really sincere, that he was
not really true, that he was not really a believer, that he
was still a con, he had never been born again, he was just
playing church, he was hanging out with Philip instead of walking
with Jesus. He was looking for the power
of Philip instead of walking with Christ, who is the true
power of God. He really didn't comprehend the
gospel. He wasn't even interested in the gospel. Now watch this. He thought Philip was bad when
the apostles came down and dropped it. in the Spirit of God effusely
poured out upon the whole of the believing community, he was
like, oh man! And he emptied his bank account
and started propositioning the Apostle. Are you hearing me? See this is what the proverb
means in Proverbs chapter 17 I believe verse 16 now we got
to do a little bit of work because the Spirit of God is really giving
us a prophetic insight into ungodly men and women who do not sincerely
serve God I think it's Proverbs 17 verse 16 if you will Let's
take a look at this Proverbs 17, verse 16. Listen to the question
that's rendered here. This is powerful. And tell me,
does this not also fit our context? Are you there? Listen to this. Why is there a price in the hand
of a fool to get wisdom, seeing he has no heart to it? Why is
there a price in the hand of a fool to get wisdom? And the
preacher here is using wisdom as a sort of an adumbration of
whatever is necessary to prosper. There's good wisdom. There is
bad wisdom. There is earthly wisdom. There is heavenly wisdom.
There's fleshly wisdom. And then there's spiritual wisdom.
What Simon wants is the wisdom that these men have in order
to be able to have the power that they have. Now, remember,
if you are a Christian with a Christocentric perspective of the Bible, who
is your wisdom? Your wisdom is Jesus. If you
are rooted in evangelical truth, if you understand the gospel
of right, 1 Corinthians 1.30, but of God are you in him who
have been made unto us righteousness, wisdom, redemption, and sanctification. He is our wisdom. Christ is our
wisdom. And what we mean by Christ being
our wisdom is not that we put him on as a set of principles
by which we live our lives. He is our doctrine. He is our life, but on a much
more profound level than a set of precepts that we would defer
to every day. He's our wisdom in this, that
we are so totally bankrupt as to how to get right with God,
that the answer to being right with God is Jesus. That if you
have Christ, you have the wisdom of God that leads to eternal
life. And so long as you have Jesus,
you have that infinite, infinite abyss, if you will, of the treasure
of wisdom and knowledge by which you and I know God for all eternity. For God, Christ is wisdom. For
us, Christ is wisdom. And it keeps us from falling
prey, watch this now, to mere intellectual knowledge. Again, this is what Jesus meant
in John 17, 3. And this is eternal life. that they might know you. The only true God in Jesus Christ
whom he has sent. If a man has Christ, he is as
wise as any human being on planet earth. In fact, far wiser than
the wisest men on planet earth. Am I making some sense? For you
have the very key to your eternal security. Why is he doing this?
It's a rhetorical question. He doesn't have a heart for it.
And Peter is about to expose him. Let's deal with this now.
Peters is about to expose this man. Now, ladies and gentlemen,
do you guys know what the word simony means? Simony. Good. I'm glad I can teach you
a few things tonight. This is the term for which the
church adopted, let's say, 700, 800 years ago. Simony. You put the Y on the end of simony,
you have simony. And it's a word that simply means
to be greedy for money. to be greedy for money, simony.
It was one of the cardinal sins of which the early church, the
patristic fathers, as well as the reformers would forbid a
man to enter into the ministry if he was given to the love of
money. I'm getting ready to develop
my doctrine here. This is the point we're going to land on
for tonight, and we'll deal with the rest next week, because I
can tell my time is going to require me developing this one
point. And then we'll come back and
deal with Peter's judgment, because Peter's judgment of this man
Simon is right. And it needs to be developed
on its own grounds. But I want to expose you to what
I consider a real problem in the evangelical church today.
And that problem in the evangelical church today is flattery. Flattery. Flattery with the objective of
prospering. So let me see if I can help you. When we are operating out of
a principle of flattery, what we have discovered is if we phrase
words just right, if we develop a body of language set of terms
a an anthem of communication if we structure it just what
right if we use the right terms, if we use the right gestures,
if we discover the psychological propensities of our auditors
and use the right words to get their attention and to draw them
into us and to get them to really, really, really buy into our ideas,
then somehow we can pull off the great fraud of having them
so like what we're saying that it will redound to my own economic
benefit over and over and over multiple times. Multiple times. If I can learn how to put the
phrases right, if I can learn how to meet your felt needs,
If I can learn how to shave off difficult terms and difficult
concepts, if I can find a way to speak to you in a fashion
that resonates with you, then I have flattered you. That's all I've done. The word
flattery has a broad connotation. But literally, if you were to
look it up in your dictionary, you know what it means? Insincere
praise. Can I develop this for a little
while? Because this is very important. See, I think the American church,
I think the Western church has fallen prey to believing that
true feels good. And what feels good must be right. And that's a form of flattery
that will ruin your soul. I'm going to develop a number
of verses to underscore my point. That because we are emotionally
driven and not propositionally driven, we have placed how we
feel in front of the idea of what people say, and we determine
the rightness or wrongness of it by virtue of how it makes
me feel. And so long as we are psychological
and not spiritual, we now fall prey to the flatterer, the flatterer,
which worketh ruin with their lips. And I suggest that the
Western Christian church is so overwhelmingly trapped by and
bewitched by the spirit of flattery that you can hardly find a local
church where the truth is preached in a naked fashion, not once
regarding the device of flattery as a method of communicating
it. Not once. Not once. What is flattery? It's insincere praise. It's also
false honor. Flattery is insincere praise.
It's also false honor. Here's another way to define
it. Excessive emphasis on one's character and duty with personal
gain in view. When I flatter you, I am always
giving you accolades about who you are, how you dress, how you
behave, what you do. Now, in Christendom, we call
that mature Christianity. But all that is, is a flattery
that is designed to actually achieve some goal on the part
of the person that's doing it. Now watch this, saints. If you
feel a little tug in your heart, it's because you're guilty of
it. It's true. It's true. If I want you to resonate
with me now, I had a chance to study this for the last couple
of weeks. This is why I said we live in a culture of flattery.
We are naturally inclined to it. You choose your friends on
the basis of how they make you feel, not whether or not they
tell you the truth. Because we operate more on an
emotional level than we do on a psychological level. Now, we're
emotional creatures. I understand that. And there's
such a thing as being offensive. But when we judge truth or what's
right on the basis of whether or not I am offended, then now
I am the arbiter of truth and not God. And when we determine
whether or not ministry is successful on the grounds of how well the
speaker delivers his word and how wonderful the impact of that
word was in terms of how good everyone felt when they left,
we have completely missed the nature and character of true
preaching and the gospel. We are in a whole nother dimension.
We're in a whole nother room. We're in a whole nother spectrum
We are way outside of the biblical model. I'm gonna prove that in
a moment. I'm gonna prove to you that presently in our Culture
here in the West and this is true. This is starting to be
true all around the world. We have left off with understanding
that truth Naturally does not feel good We have failed to understand
that truth is designed to grade us in a kind of way So as to
wake us up of being out of kilter with God We have failed to understand
that truth comes in as a representative and ambassador of God first,
not you and not me, but because somehow we have usurped God's
throne. Now we become the ones judging
the truth matters as to whether or not they are relevant, as
to whether or not they are pragmatic, as to whether or not they work.
And I submit to you that all of those terms of qualifying
what right and wrong is, is a fallacy that will send us to hell. and
we'll all be feeling good while we're inundated with lies, fundamentally
flattery. So let me see if I can work through
this with about seven or eight points under flatteries. See if I can do this and you
can take these notes. This will help you as you reflect
on this this week. My first contemplation on flattery
is that you will find in the Bible nowhere where flattery
is honored. Flattery was the technique and
methodology of the harlot in Proverbs 7 verse 5 and I want
you to go there the harlot So now the harlot uses flattery
Because her method is seduction And you and I remember that one
of the methods of the devil if he can't get you through persecution
he gets you through what? seduction or flattery Proverbs
chapter 7 I want you to see it. This study will bless you. I'll
share with you why as you're going there. I remember when
God first saved me long, long ago, back in the days of Noah. And one of the things he did
was drive me into the book of Proverbs as the place where I
learned to study God's word. I was driven there by the opening
verses of Proverbs, which says to make the young man wise. To
give him discretion and judgment. To help him to know how to interpret
a thing. To discern between right and
wrong. To give him the principles of wisdom that would result in
the fear of the Lord. And the fear of the Lord is the
beginning of wisdom. And I didn't have that when God
saved me. I grew up in a mess. So the Proverbs
became the place where God started tutoring me in how to think. and how to see through, discern
means to see through, cut through the facade and see the real activity
going on behind the scene. That's what we all need. And
I was fascinated by the prose of the Proverbs, those quick
sayings, those short storylines, but especially I was fascinated
by the narrative of the evil man and the good man, the evil
woman and the good woman, the harlot woman and the virtuous
woman, the woman who has left covenant and the woman who has
stayed there. That, that paradox, that parody running all through
the Proverbs spoke to me because I lived in a culture of horrors.
You did too. So Proverbs 7 verse 5 says this,
are you there? I'm gonna share with you three
or four verses in this context and then we'll move forward.
Proverbs chapter 7 verse 5 says this. Let me start back at verse
2 and this is the father speaking to the son. By the way, the backdrop
to the book of Proverbs is a father-son relationship. Doesn't exclude
mom, but the problem with our present culture is a lack of
male leadership and a lack of fathers who have trained up sons
to know how to be real men. My son, keep my words, lay up
my commandments with you, keep my commandments and live. And
my laws as the apple of your eye, bind them upon your fingers,
write them upon the tables of your heart. Say unto wisdom,
you are my sister, that's how close I want to be with you.
And call understanding your kin's woman, that they, these two virtuous
sisters, may keep you from the strange woman. See the word strange? That's a Hebrew idiom that means
idolatrous. Now watch what it says, from
the stranger who flatters with her what? Do you see that? And then it gives the proverbial
picture of the snare and net of the woman. For at the window
of my house, I looked through my casement. This is Solomon
looking through his window at what goes on in the streets at
night. And I beheld among the simple ones, and I discerned
among the youths, a man what? So there are three adjectives
here. One is he's a youth, he's a young
man, and he's void of understanding. That's a bad place to be when
you're in the false church. Now watch the language. In the
twilight, in the evening, in the black and dark night, and
behold, there met him a woman with the attire of a what? And
subtle of what? She is loud and stubborn. Her
feet do not abide in her house. Two things, she's not humble
and quiet. That's a problem in our churches.
Neither is she committed to her home. That means she's not devoted
to her husband. And what this describes are the
churches who have departed from the headship of Jesus Christ.
You're going to hear me develop this as I deal with Jezebel.
Listen to what it says. She's loud and clamorous and
she does not abide in her house. Are you guys following me? She's
loud and clamorous. That's a substitute for spirituality. Didn't I tell you that before?
Just because it's noisy doesn't mean the Holy Ghost is there.
I've been telling you that for the longest. Just because it's
noisy doesn't mean the Holy Ghost is there. Sometimes he wants
a little peace and quiet too. So when our churches are always
ramping up the noise, ramping up the music, ramping up the
energy, that's not the Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost didn't get a job
playing the organ in the church. I'm just trying to help you understand
how we can switch and bait substantive presence of God for a facade
that really amounts to nothing but a lot of noise and cacophony. We call this bodily exercise. Which prophet's little? Now watch
the language. She's loud and stubborn and her
feet does not abide in the house. Now is she on the outside. Now
she's in the what? And she's lying at every corner.
What's at every corner? Churches, every corner. Churches are at every corner. They're looking for every ignorant
man. Churches are. This is why they
pop them up so quickly. Churches are there with snares
and nets and bands to get the simpletons. Have you ever been
to one of these churches? Have you been snared in your
ignorance, naivety, your voidness of understanding until God in
His mercy delivered you? Are you with me? Now let's keep
going. I want you to see this. So she
caught him. That's what church folk do. Go get them. So she caught him
and she kissed him. What do we mean by kiss? Flattered
him. See, the kiss is a metaphor of flattery. It's not true affection. Because her job is not to edify
him. Her job is to consume him. She's
however meeting his felt need right now. She's kissing him. And with an impotent face, you
know what an impotent face is? Hard. As calloused as stone. That's how the harlot has to
become. She has to have a poker face because otherwise she shows
her true intent. She's a viper. She wants to consume
you upon her own lust. but she must not show her true
colors because otherwise you might just get out of her snare.
Let's keep going. All right, about 10 minutes.
Listen to this. So she caught him and she kissed
him and with an impudent face, she said to him, I have peace
offerings with me. You got that? Know what that
means? I have salvation. We got the gospel here. The Lord
Jesus Christ is our peace offering. Is he not? Watch this. This day
I paid my vows. You know what that means you
and I can actually actually enter into a liaison because I've already
confessed my sins This really is an allusion to the perpetuity
of false confession that goes on in the Catholic Church this
this diabolical Cycle of sinning going confessing your sin knowing
you getting ready to go out and do it again Just to go back to
the priest and confess your sin and you know Hail Mary's pray
to notters and all of that You're going through a vicious cycle
you guys understand that and I've told you before that kind
of confession is demonic There's no kind of biblical confession
that ever Asserts or affirms the fact that you go in with
the intent of coming out to go do it again Just to come back
next week and do it all over again That's demonic Confession
is always rooted in authentic repentance It's never just going
through a rope form as it were to get your conscious cleaned
up or salve so you can go do it again. I Need you to work
with that because the harlot church Increases the transgressions
among men by giving them a false sense of security with God so
that they can continue living like hell Listen to what it goes
on to say therefore I came forth to meet you. Isn't that flattering? Just you. Just you. No one else, just you. I came
forth to meet you diligently to seek your face. And I have
found you. Are you the one? Never mind that an hour ago the
other chap was the one. And two hours before that the
other chap. And she's got a whole list of chaps that were always
the one. and she makes you feel brand
new. You missed that one. I have decked my bed with coverings
of tapestry, with carved works, with fine linen of Egypt. I have
perfumed my bed with myrrh, aloes, and cinnamon. Come, let us take
our field of love until the morning. Let us solace ourselves with
love. Watch this, for the good man is not at home. Who is the
good man? The husband. Who is the husband
of the church? And whenever the church is in
a position of suggesting or asserting or holding to the idea that Christ
is not at home, it means that she is not aware of the ever
present rule of the sovereign Lord. She has abandoned his headship.
And this is where we see our churches departing from every
biblical doctrine of submission in every category. She's not
in the house. She's in the street. Her pursuit
is not the Lord Jesus Christ. She does not act as if she's
married. She does not hold a position of spiritual fidelity. She is
trying to get as many of the secular people as she can to
enter into that spiritual liaison that ultimately we know is fornication. It's a form of idolatry, right? This is where she is. And this
is where our churches are today as well. When you understand
their thrust and their drive and the projectory of their ministries
is not to present men and women to Jesus Christ, is to consume
upon them whatever mutual and reciprocating lusts we can fulfill
in the name of some kind of religious facade. This is very true. Let's go on. I got a few more
here, and then I want to run through my list of folks in the
Bible that God warns about who are flatterers. You need to know
this. The good man is not at home.
He's going on a long journey. Isn't that New Testament parables?
Is that what Jesus taught in the parables? that he has gone
on a long journey, and when he comes back, he'll be able to
discover and determine whether or not we have been faithful.
Isn't that the language? That's right. And so, see, when
unsaved people, unregenerate men and women, occupy authority
in the church or the church, and they really do not understand
the patience of the saints, and the faithfulness of a bride to
her bridegroom under the construct that her bridegroom has gone
on a long journey and she is waiting for him. She's waiting
for him because when she's waiting for her husband operating out
of biblical principles, she stays under his headship and everyone
knows that she's married to him and she's not going to be out
in the streets. She's not going to be kicking it with every Tom,
Dick and Harry. She's gonna be at home waiting for her husband
preparing her house making sure her children are well So that
when the husband comes home, he sees everything fit. That's
what a local church is supposed to be about Are you hearing me listen to
what it goes on to say He's going on a long journey he's taking
a bag of money with him and he will come home at the day appointed
She's under the presumption that he's gone for a long time With
her much fair speech, she calls the young man to what? With the
flattering of her lips, she did what? That's right. See, listen,
now watch this. She ran enough lines of proposition,
salacious, seductive propositions. She discounted every possible
threat that he could have possibly imagined. Using the earthly metaphor,
for her to tell that man that her husband is going on a long
journey is to liberate him to enter into an adulterous affair
with her that evening, not wondering whether he would come into the
house at that time or not. Are you guys hearing what I'm
saying? And see, this is what's going on in the apostate church
under the assumption that Jesus has gone a long ways. If I had
time, I could prove this for you in the book of Ezekiel, chapter
13 and 14. I will have to go to one passage
in Ezekiel to help us understand the danger of flattery. Because
I do want you to understand that we have been manipulated by that
concept. You and me, all of us, have been
somehow told or been persuaded that truth must Feel good. Yes, indeed. Okay, so I'm going
to leave that there. If you read the rest of it, guess
what he ends up doing? Going to hell. Verse 27. Her
house is the way to hell. Going down to the chambers thereof.
So that's the harlot woman. Guess who else exercises flattery? The false prophet. I'm just going
to run through this list because I don't want to be longer. We
can come back and develop this tonight. But you will find this
in the book of Ezekiel, chapter 12, verse 24. In Ezekiel 12,
24, and this is a fascinating piece of information, because
we're going to develop this too at length around Jezebel. Whenever
you deal with people who call themselves prophets, they are
always positioning themselves, whether a prophet or prophetess,
they are always positioning themselves by the very office of prophet
or prophetess, not to be tested by you. Whenever they put themselves
in a position of prophet or prophetess, they are operating outside of
the boundaries of apostolic authority. The prophet had the prerogative
of personal revelation from God. The prophet had the prerogative
of personal revelation from God. Then the people had to listen
to the prophet and then determine whether or not the prophecy was
valid based upon it coming to pass or not. The danger of that
is if a person is able to hoodwink you into believing that we still
have prophets today or prophetesses today, then that individual can
get you to set aside your Bible as we're going to learn on Sunday
and sincerely contemplate what's coming out of their mouth. Are
you with me now? Watch this. What Ezekiel chapter
12 24 says and this is God who sees everyone watch this. This
is what God says For there shall be no more any what vain vision
stop. I received a revelation from
the Lord. I Got a vision from the Lord But God says it's vain
Listen to the next part nor flattering what? Do you see what it says? I want you to grasp that Here's
the trend that goes on in the evangelical church. Here's the
trend. Are you ready? That all of these
mystics who assert to have a relationship with God and operate out of an
office of a prophetic unction, when they divine, because that's
what it means to divine, to respond out of a prophetic unction, when
they divine, are you ready? And this is all of them to boot. When they divine, their divinations
are always flattery. Whenever you hear them prophesy,
they are always prophesying blessings. They're always prophesying good
for you. They're always prophesying some
kind of prosperity in your life. They never prophesied judgment. They never prophesied the wrath
of God. They never prophesied doom and
damnation, repentance. They never prophesied the tenor
and nature and character of biblical truth that we know to be consistent
through the whole word of God. Are you guys hearing me? So now
watch this now. Not only have they been able to escape the
scrutiny of biblical authority because they call themselves
a prophet or prophetess. And because you don't know your
Bibles well enough to know that to accept the premise that a
perfect person now operates out of a prophetic spirit today is
for you now to be accepting a word that's on a par with your Bible.
Now your Bibles now become subject to the revelation that that individual
brings. Yes, it does. I've told you before,
if in fact they are a prophet and God speaking to them, we
better listen to them. We better. But now if they say
the same thing, the Bible says, and we could have read what they
said out of the Bible. Why on earth is God speaking through
another oracle when he's given us the written oracle that remains
black and white? And doesn't get distorted with
sleep, apnea, headaches, or menopause, or upset stomachs, or attitudes,
or... You understand what I'm saying?
This is called the principle of redundancy. It's observed
for God to now speak the same thing through the mouth of a
living oracle that He would have in His written Word when He plainly
told us to search the Scriptures. Right? This is the tension we
have in the church today with so many holding to the perpetuity
of the spirit in that context. And by the way, because flattery
is the dominating spirit of the day, you will naturally give
way to your Bibles. Whenever you are in a sphere
and dimension where people have a word from the Lord everywhere,
you are not reading your Bibles anymore. Guarantee you. And if
you do, you're reading it for a devotional thing. You're not
reading it to test them. Here's what God says, no more
flattering divinations within the house of Israel. You don't
have any idea what God is about to do in the 13th and 14th chapter.
In the 13th chapter, he's about to expose the false prophet that
flatters. And then he's going to expose
the people that come to him. And in the 14th chapter, he's
going to tell all of the faithful in Israel, I have deceived that
false prophet, and I have given those people over to deception
too, who are now listening to the false prophet. Here is the
reason why, because God had already told the people don't listen
to them and they still listen. So once you cross the line of
rejecting the biblical warning and you start listening to them,
you have no other safeguard. You have no other legitimate
authoritative safeguard to keep you from the propositions that
they put forward. Then compounded with this, they
flatter you. So here's the Hebrew term for
flattery. And I want you to get this as I take you to just two
more verses. Are you ready? The Hebrew term
for flattery is smooth. That's literally the word clock
in the Hebrew clock. Hard C clock in the Hebrew. It's
a prominent word that's used in the Hebrew. And it's the idea
of smoothing stones out, smoothing stones out so that as people
walk on the stones, they don't get abrasions and cuts and things
like that. And this is the idea of smoothing
out. And the connotation is this, that the kinds of teachings and
the words that they communicate are smooth words. These are the
smooth words of the false prophet. One more verse and I'll let you
go home. Isaiah chapter 30. Go with me there. Show you what
I'm talking about. And if it escapes you, my concern
and my warning to you, it's this. That it's been a long time in
the evangelical church that we have been subjected to the kind
of preaching that does not arouse us or wake us up to the reality
of the true and the living God. That we have a false God that
we're presenting in the evangelical church and we're presenting it
through a mechanism, through a process, a methodology that
is defective. It's a defective methodology.
That the methodology is just as corrupt and as deceptive and
as harmful is the message. that the methodology by which
you are being communicated to the dissemination of their information
is by and large the effective element. It's how they communicate
it. Are you hearing me? It's how
they communicate it. They spend great effort in how
they communicate to you. So here is what the word of the
Lord says and we will close here tonight and come back next week.
I'm in Isaiah chapter 30. I'm going to start at verse 8.
Will you join me? Here it is. Now go and write it before them
in a table or tablet and noted in a book that it may be for
the time to come forever and forever. Here's what we are to
write, Isaiah, verse nine, that this is a rebellious people who
the church, the church, the church, Israel, This is what God says.
Write it down, because they're not going to pay you any attention.
See, a rebellious people don't listen to the prophet. The only
thing they listen to is the judgment that comes. So now watch it. This is a rebellious people,
lying children. Lying children. That's a whole
of their ministry is a lie. Right? The devil is a liar. Right? So, lying children. Children,
now watch this, that will not hear the law of the Lord. See
what I meant? See, they don't listen to the
Bible. They listen to their prophets. They do not listen to the Bible.
Now watch this. Which say to the seer, see the word seer?
That's a prophet. Now they're dictating to the seer. They're
getting ready to dictate to the seer what they want to hear.
Now these are all of your seeker-friendly churches. Will you hear me? When the preacher is sending
notes into the audience, to find out what they want to hear. He's
not a preacher from God. I never asked you what you want
to hear. Are you hearing me? And if I had time, if I didn't
think that I was really pushing your patience, I would show you
that every true prophet of God, Old Testament, New Jesus John
Paul Peter never once used that method. In fact, they use the
other method They use the other method So now listen to the language Which say to the seers do not
see and To the prophets do not prophesy. That's just a Hebrew
idiom Seer and prophet are one in the same. These are the folks
that get the vision, right? Watch this. Prophesy not unto
us what? Speak unto us smooth things. Got it? Prophesy deceit. You got it? Take off the rough edges. Sand
down every abrasive biblical precept. Smooth out the contours
that will force us to stop and have to actually pay attention
to God Shave biblical truth down to such a fine point by the masonry
of deceit That we never have to pay attention to God while
we do what we do Smooth it out Smooth it out so that when you
come in and you go out you were never offended Got it? Listen to the language.
Listen to the language. Speak smooth things to us. Prophesy
what? We who hold to a biblical worldview
tell people that God has already said that you know. So when we
teach Epistemology when we teach apologetics when we set forth
biblical worldviews when we deal with anthropology biblical anthropology
We tell mankind that he is not walking around in abysmal ignorance
He's walking around in rebellion against God what we mean by that
is if he were to have a moment of honesty about all of the labor
he's putting in whereby he says he has never seen God, never
heard God. God hasn't revealed himself to
him. He don't even believe there's a God. We would say to him that
you are lying. that you are suppressing the
truth in unrighteousness. That if you and I would take
a moment to be honest and analyze, deconstruct all of the subtle
goings of your thoughts in your hearts, how you build and construct
yourself this fortress of lies whereby you say, God isn't evident,
He hasn't shown up. We would show you that every
proposition upon every proposition that you stated at best, that
contradiction, that proposition is a contradiction from your
own mouth. And at worst, you are just simply suppressing the
truth against the knowledge of God. Because God says they all
know. He's written it in their heart. So what human beings do,
as God has described here, is rebel. We labor at not wanting
to know. Am I boring you? Listen to what
the verse... I only got two verses to go.
Now here's what they say. Get you out of the way. Do you
see that? What is the way? The gospel way. The way of truth. Christ who
is the way. The narrow way. The straight
and narrow way. Get out of that way. Preacher,
don't shut us up to Christ alone, the Bible alone, the word of
God alone. Don't do that. We need a broader
path. I promise you, ladies and gentlemen,
that I am not exaggerating. I am not even scratching the
surface at the pervasive nature of this kind of compromise that
dominates our church. I promise you, I promise you,
because I'm human like everyone else. It just amazes me every
time I get into a group of pastors and scholars and preachers, it
amazes me how broad the road is, how very few men are just
telling it like it is. And the higher you go up in your
education, it seems to be even more bland and insipid and empty
and boundless in their attempts to make it possible for everyone
to come to God any kind of way they want to. And you're supposed
to be learned when you come to those conclusions. She's like,
me, I'm a backyard country bumpkin. I'm actually too stupid to know
the truth because I actually believe what the Bible says.
No, you don't understand. I'm talking about people who
profess to be theologians who really do not believe in the
infallibility, the verity of this book, the plenary verbal
inspiration. They do not, but they pretend
to be preachers to the people. And their whole labor is to flatter.
It's just remarkable if you were ever with them for a moment and
the spirit of flattery is so powerful So palpable. The only
thing you can do is just pull your sword out and just start
going to work just to save yourself Get out of the room. I remember
the last time I was with them. I just said let me tell him Let
me just tell him because i'm out of here I'm not gonna tell
you what I told no Well, you know what I told him because
I tell you what I tell him There's no compromise in this book. Ladies
and gentlemen, this is what I tell them. I don't compromise this
book. So now if you and I are talking
about walking, you gotta be on this book. Otherwise, I'm your
enemy. That's what I tell them. When I listen to the propositions,
I realize that they're speaking smooth things. I tell them, listen,
if you don't follow the dictates of this book, you are my enemy
and I'm your enemy. And they kind of looked at me
all alarmed and stuff like that. And I'm polite. The Lord has
taught me how to be polite after 35 years. And they're polite, too, because
we live in a free country and they're glad when I leave and
my heart is broken. Because these people are the
ones filling the pulpits, they're writing out all of the doctrines,
they're setting up all of the agendas that get pushed through
our denominations and in our churches, watering down the word
of God, being complicit with the agenda of the world. Are
you hearing what I'm saying? This is what we call apostasy.
Here it is. Cause the Holy One of Israel
to cease from before us. Do you see it? Do you see it?
So when, by the time they are done with their divinations,
with their smooth words, with their smooth sayings, Christ
is nowhere in the equation. It's amazing when you go in among
them and you listen. And so you're listening, you're
listening, you're listening for, you're listening. Jeremiah said,
I hearkened and I heard. I hearkened and I heard Jeremiah
said I listened and I hearkened and I heard and no man spake
a right Jeremiah said I listened I hearkened and I heard and no
he was a prophet among multitudes of prophets. He said I listened
I hearkened and I heard and here's my conclusion. No one was saying
the right things Now was he exaggerating? It broke his heart He says God,
you know me, you know me, Jeremiah 15, you know me. I did not sit
in the assembly of those markers and hypocrites. I sat by myself. Your indignation was upon me,
he said, because he just could not endure the compromise. Wherefore, thus said the holy
one of Israel, because you despise this word and you trust in oppression,
and perverseness and stay there on. Therefore, this iniquity
shall be to you as a branch ready to fall, swelling out in the
high wall, whose breaking comes suddenly at an instant. He's
using the metaphor of a plague, a plague. Let's pray. Father,
thank you for this time. Thank you for our fellowship.
Thank you for the sobering words. Prepare our hearts to worship
you on Sunday as you ought to be worshiped. The fear of the
Lord is the beginning of wisdom. Healthy fear. Filial fear. Because we love you, oh God,
as your son loved you. We want to be able to honor you.
Keep us humble. Keep us committed to your word.
Bless our families. Bless our children. You know
all things, oh Lord. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen. God bless you guys.