Deceive - v. To cause to believe what is not true.
If there is one thing I have come to loath and fear it is deception. Having spent years fooled by the deception of someone I thought I loved and who I thought loved me, I still guard myself against falling prey to this again. I have always been a trusting person, and still probably trust a little too easily, but I now have an edge of skeptisism. There is almost nothing worse than in hindsight finding out all the things that were right before your eyes, the words I heard, the signs, the evidence, that all went unnoticed because I was under a spell of deception. It's down right terrifying, hearing the recounting of my friends, explaining all the things they themselves witnessed yet I have no recollection of. Because I was caused to believe in what was not true.
With God's help I worry less about this on a personal scale, but now I am recently seeing it on a spiritual scale. So the question is, how to avoid being deceived? How can we be secure in what we know is the truth? Personally, there has only been one source of real truth in my life, I have never been decieved by God. Just the book of John alone confirms the truth about truth:
"Jesus told him, 'I am the way, the truth, and the life.' "
"But I will send you the Advocate—the Spirit of truth."
"Make them holy by your truth; teach them your Word, which is truth."
So that is where we find truth, how can we use it to protect against deception. Part of it is what I already mentioned in my fasting entry, which is nourishing our spirits with God's word. I find lately that I'm led to think of truth largely as protection, "put on all of God’s armor so that you will be able to stand firm against all strategies of the devil." The devil is where decption originates and so where does placing on God's armor start? "Stand firm, therefore, having fastened the belt of truth around your waist" - Ephesians 6:14
That's what I want, to be able to stand firm in truth, so what does it mean to wear a belt of truth? Studies in armor design say that the first piece of armour is a belt because it holds up and keeps in place all the other pieces of armor. Common knowlege is that a belt is used to hold things in place; spiritually the belt of truth holds together and makes effective all the other pieces of armour. How strong is our shield of faith if we are not immersed in the truth of God's protection, and how can we walk in shoes of peace if we are not resting in the truth of God's promises?
So, obviously to find truth I have to immerse myself in the Word, I have to seek the voice of Jesus and I have to listen to the whispers of the Spirit in my heart. Truth spoken into our heart opens us to God's view of the world, making us sincere, pure in motives, and teachable before God. Our heart becomes earnest and honest which God can use to continue to mold us into the people we were meant to be. And the truth of His Word absorbed in our mind (oft read scripture is often memorized) is clarity of sound doctrine, which helps to strengthen and exert our wills to serve the Lord, the courage to act on what we know is true.
Admittedly I have not been the most dedicated Bible or devotion reader, and although this makes so much sense, I have still not accomplished much Bible reading this last week. This last week the importance of truth has been made even more crucially important to me, and so I work harder at it but it is still a struggle. Especially since there are books in the Bible I just don't understand, and am not sure how to glean truth from them. I have previously relied on 'personal revelations' like when God uses a passage to speak to me even though that may not be the exact reason for that verse or chapter, however I realize that doesn't always cut it because I don't always get personal revelations. So I looked to the Word for some answers on how to make it easier.
"Be sincere in seeking the truth. Approach it with a sincere heart. This will make all the difference" - 1 Tim 1:5
"Receive the ministry of the Word from those God has equipped to serve it. God has given gifts to the body of Christ. A sincere heart will aid you in discerning the truth." - Eph 4: 11 - 12
I look forward to finding more ways to make the whole Bible more personal and submerging myself in the truth. And again, I am leaving you a little cliff hanger, I've mentioned my eyes have been opened, and now I've mentioned truth plays a crucial role in that revelation, but I'm saving the best for last and again, am needing some time to give the best voice to my thoughts that I can. All I'll say is, in North America we sometimes put our beliefs about God and what we think the Bible says in a box, we focus on the love of God and have blinders on to many subjects we'd rather ignore exist. We do assuredly have God's abiding, powerful, unconditional love but that doesn't change the fact that until Jesus returns "we are not fighting against flesh-and-blood enemies, but against evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against mighty powers in this dark world, and against evil spirits in the heavenly places." We are fighting deception experts.
1 comment:
deep. I am enjoying my read through the bible and am really enjoying the commentary on the passages on the blog in my sidebar. It helps me to understand a bit better what the passage is saying and they often have a link to a music video which applies to the passage and that really helps me to connect the dots. I look forward to your next post :)
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