Turning Point

David Michael Jeremiah: If you think only the lost can fall for deception, consider this: Jesus warned believers in particular to beware of deceivers. Are you on high alert? Today on Turning Point, Dr. David Jeremiah returns to Christ's prophecy in Matthew 24 to examine the rise in deception that will occur in the earth's final days. Here is David to introduce today's message: "In a World of Deception, BE HONEST."

Dr. David Jeremiah: Jesus says a lot about that. In the Olivet Discourse, he said, "Let no man deceive you." Alexander Solzhenitsyn, in one of his famous speeches, warned believers not to believe lies. Obviously, in today's world, that takes a bit of discernment because so much of what we hear isn't true. We've coined the phrase "fake news."

There is a lot of that, and frankly, for me, and I'm sure for many of you, it's hard to know what to believe sometimes. But Jesus warned us. He said ahead of time that in the days before his return, deceit would run rampant. We're going to talk about that today and tomorrow here on Turning Point.

In the meantime, let me tell you that we have a very special resource for you this month. During the month of April, we're making available the book "The World of the End." It is a 142-page hardback book, and it has everything in it that I'm talking about on the radio and a bunch more that we don't have time for.

There are some charts, lots of illustrations, and places for you to go for additional information. It is yours for the asking when you send a gift to Turning Point during this month. Just send your gift and say, "Please send me the book 'The World of the End.'" Let's get started now with part one of "In a World of Deception, BE HONEST."

The Romanian Revolution of 1989 brought to an end the brutal reign of Nicolae Ceaușescu and his wife Elena. The entire story can be wrapped up in one word, and the word is deception. From the very beginning, Ceaușescu's 24-year rule was saturated with falsehood.

He deceived the Romanian people when he described the utopian vision of the nation that he planned to build, promising the end of oppression and the beginning of prosperity. Of course, instead of that, he delivered an iron hand that crushed his own people and squeezed his own nation dry.

Nicolae lauded himself as a man of unprecedented talent in the world, claiming the titles of the supreme embodiment of God, hero of heroes, worker of workers, and first personage of the world. Elena, his wife, made sure the Romanian press referred to her as a model to be followed by all the women in our country, the legendary mother, and the most just woman on earth.

Those were words of deception. Those who were deceived by Romania's leaders were not limited to Eastern Europe either. They basically deceived the whole world. Queen Elizabeth knighted Ceaușescu. The United States government granted his country most favored nation trading status. Former Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin credited Ceaușescu with mediating Anwar Sadat's peace mission to Jerusalem.

In reality, the Ceaușescus were as evil as Hitler; they just didn't have the opportunity to work on as grand a scale. They were, in every sense of the word, liars and master manipulators. Deception is common in our world today, and it is also a frequent topic throughout scriptures.

While the practice of deceit began in Genesis chapter three in the Garden of Eden, it seems to occupy an especially significant place in the prophetic passages of the New Testament. When the disciples came to Jesus asking him about the future, Jesus began his response with this serious warning: "Take heed that no one deceives you."

According to Jesus, deception will play a major role in the world of the end. While we should always be on the alert for lies and misdirection, the Lord warned us to be especially watchful for spiritual deceit as the day of his return approaches. Matthew 24:23 and 24 reads like this:

"Then if anyone says to you, 'Look, here is the Christ!' or 'There!' do not believe it. For false christs and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect." Jesus specifically instructed his disciples not to follow or fall for these false claims.

If the idea of people claiming to be the Messiah sounds strange or far-fetched, know that even in the first century, there were several who made that claim. Fifty years after the fall of Jerusalem, a false messiah came on the scene. The Jews were now ready to follow anyone who would lead them in a new revolt against Rome.

When the courageous fighter Bar Kokhba appeared, he naturally took on himself the aura of the long-awaited Messiah. He said, "Here I am, I am your Messiah." On one occasion, Kokhba supposedly caught a stone from a Roman catapult and threw it back. When the current rabbi heard about that, he exclaimed that this man must really be the king, the Messiah, and gave him the name Bar Kokhba.

That name is taken from Numbers chapter 24, and it means, "There shall come forth a star." So he was anointed as the Messiah. Of course, he was not the Messiah, and his rebellion ended in tragedy for God's people. The Bar Kokhba revolt was also known as the Second Jewish Rebellion, and it was put down by the Romans in AD 135.

That was when Hadrian led Roman legions to once again destroy Jerusalem and the surrounding area. It resulted in the death of over a half a million Jewish people because of his deception. In every century since the first, there have been impostors who have claimed to be the Messiah.

But that is not the only deception about which Jesus cautions. In his sermon, he says to his disciples in verse 11, "Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many." For every one impostor who claims to be the Messiah, there are at least ten false prophets who will rise up to claim knowledge they do not have about a future they cannot know.

For example, back in 1843, a New Englander named William Miller came to ardently believe that in the imminent time, Jesus Christ was going to return. Unfortunately, he began to speculate about the date of that return. Using dubious mathematical calculations, he collected mounds of data, analyzed it, and was certain he had made no mistakes.

He confidently announced to his followers that on March 21, 1843, Jesus Christ would return to the earth. At midnight on the appointed day, Miller's devoted followers donned their ascension robes, trekked into the mountains, and climbed towering trees to get as high as possible so they would have less distance to travel through the air.

But the day came and went, and the Lord did not return. The trees became really uncomfortable. A dejected band of Millerites trudged home to a late breakfast on March the 22nd, accompanied by the jeers and catcalls of their neighbors and friends. It was a sad and bitter day for those deeply disappointed men and women.

Miller is just one example of many false prophets in history. When we read that false prophets based their predictions on their study of the scripture, I cannot help but wonder what Bible they were studying. If there is one truth about which we can be absolutely certain, it is this: the date of our Lord's return is unknown and unknowable by anyone on this earth.

Scripture makes that very clear. Here are just a representative three verses. Matthew 24:44: "Therefore you also be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect." Matthew 25:13: "Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour in which the Son of Man is coming."

Mark 13:32: "But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father." Did you know that when Jesus was on this earth, he did not know when he would return? Somebody might ask, "How could that be true? Wasn't he the Son of God? Wasn't he omniscient?"

Yes, he was. But for the time he was on this earth, he voluntarily divested himself of the independent use of his attributes, so while he was on this earth, he lived as a man. He knows now, and he's looking forward to it, but when he was on this earth, Jesus did not know when he would return. The angels do not know when he will return.

So here is my question: if Jesus didn't know while he's on this earth, and the angels do not know, how in the world did you find out? It is so ridiculous because it is so clear. There are 12 verses in Matthew, Mark, and Luke where it says you cannot know the hour. We should always be ready for the return of Christ, but we should never give dates.

Miller did it, and over the years, many others did it. Whenever you hear somebody say they know when Jesus is coming back, you know they are wrong because you cannot know that and the scripture says that very plainly. No matter how orthodox we may be, no matter how committed we are to the word of God, history teaches us that even faithful men and women have become susceptible to the deception of the enemy.

Jesus said, "Be careful that you be not deceived." That danger will increase greatly as we move nearer to the world of the end. The spiritual deception that Jesus warns us about is not mere happenstance. There is someone behind these deceptions, and that someone is none other than Satan, the evil enemy of our souls.

He is the father of lies, and since the very beginning of human history, one of his primary weapons against us has been deceit. In the book of Revelation, John describes him like this: "The great dragon, that serpent of old called the Devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world."

Here is what Jesus said about Satan in John 8:44: "He was a murderer from the beginning; he does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him. And when he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of lies."

Spiritual deception may be Satan's most insidious weapon against those of us in the church. Jesus and his apostles speak of it nearly 30 times in the New Testament. Satan is a liar, he is a serpent, and he is a deceiver, but he masquerades as something else, and so do those who follow in his footsteps.

Paul wrote to the Corinthians in his second letter, "For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into apostles of Christ. And no wonder! For Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light." Deception has always been the weapon of choice of our enemy.

When this deception is full-blown in the period surrounding the Rapture, it will be unlike anything that has ever happened before on this earth. But the birth pangs of deception will be felt throughout the earth before the Rapture, and many prophetic scholars believe they are being felt already today.

I believe the deception birth pangs have already begun. Have you experienced the increasing saturation of deception in our society? I know the answer has to be yes. We feel it when politicians regularly fail to follow through on campaign promises. We feel it when media personalities tell us that up is down and dark is light.

We feel it when scientists make outlandish claims about basic biology that do not stand up to common sense. We feel it when governments practice censorship in the name of protection and persecution in the name of peace. What we are seeing is more than ever an erosion of trust between the foundations that have held cultures and civilizations together for years.

That erosion will continue to intensify as we approach the world of the end. Someone asked me one time, "How in the world will the Antichrist ever deceive the whole world?" We are preparing the way for him. If we can be deceived as blatantly as we are being deceived right now, the Antichrist is going to have a heyday.

If you have your Bibles with you, I hope you will find your place in the third chapter of Genesis. I want to take you through Satan's strategy. This will impact you if you listen carefully. Someone might say it convicts them. Well, conviction always comes before change, so that's good.

The apostle Paul told the Corinthians we are not to be ignorant of Satan's devices. As followers of Jesus, we need to know our enemy so that we can stand against his schemes, including the scheme of deception. Thankfully, we can learn a great deal about Satan's strategy by studying God's word.

The strategy Satan implemented in the Garden of Eden is the exact same strategy he tried to use on Jesus Christ in the wilderness, and it is the same strategy he uses on you and me today. Satan has only got one game plan, one strategy. He uses it over and over again.

First of all, Satan disputes God's word. The first thing Satan did when he tempted Adam and Eve was to dispute God's word. Genesis chapter three, verse one: "Now the serpent was more cunning than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, 'Has God indeed said, "You shall not eat of every tree of the garden"?'"

Satan immediately tried to water down what God had said, to change it just a little. He suggested to Eve that she may not have heard God correctly. Here is how this happens to us today. We have the clear word of God in front of us. It tells us we should not do something we would really like to do.

Then someone sidles up to us and tries to give us an alternative interpretation of the text that will allow us to do what we know God does not want us to do. That is a moment of decision. We have to choose at that moment either to accept the truth of God's word as it is written or to allow ourselves to be deceived.

Satan told Eve that God did not really mean what he said. Then Satan denies God's word. Next, Satan said to Adam and Eve, "You shall not surely die." The road from doubt to denial is not very long. When Satan said that, he was brazenly contradicting what God had said.

Genesis 2:17: "But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it, you shall surely die." It is important to note the sequence here. Doubt opens the door to denial. If Adam and Eve had not listened to Satan in the beginning, they would not have been victimized in the end.

Every time you try to find an interpretation of scripture that will permit you to do something you know is wrong in your heart, you open the door until Satan can drive a truck through that opening and dump a load of stinking garbage in your life. And he will do it every time.

Satan disputes God's word, he denies God's word, and then he displaces God's word. Satan told them, "If you do this, you will be like God." He was putting into their minds the same disturbing thought that had once entered his own mind, the same impulse that had transformed him from the anointed cherub to the devil of hell.

One of the easiest places to see Satan at work in the world today is to observe how our culture treats sin. How innocent it seems to shift aside the pure truth of scripture when doing it suits our purpose. Lying does not seem bad if we're trying to spare another person's feelings.

Adultery does not feel as wrong when we describe it through double-speak as an improper relationship. Gluttony and addiction aren't the result of personal choices, but genetic disorders or chemical imbalances. When we allow Satan to sow doubt in our minds that some sins are really not sins after all, we have opened our hearts to his deception.

Right and wrong get turned upside down, and God's word is replaced with our own wisdom. You see it everywhere in our culture today. He disputes, denies, and displaces God's word, and then he discounts God's goodness. This is really subtle. Genesis 2:16 and 17:

"And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, 'Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.'" Notice how generous God is. An abundance of goodness was offered freely, with just one restriction.

Yet look at how Eve reframed God's original command when she spoke with Satan in Genesis chapter three. "And the woman said to the serpent, 'We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden.'" Eve omitted God's gracious provision that she and Adam could freely eat of every tree in the garden.

Her comprehension of God's provision was not as magnanimous as God intended it to be. Satan had gotten to her with his evil implication about God. Listen carefully: when you start to question the grace and goodness of God, you are on the road to deception.

Don't allow Satan to push you into thinking God has abandoned you or that he has not been good to you. It is when you open the door to those kinds of thoughts that you will find Satan has sown his seeds of deception in your heart. Is God good? Has he been good to you?

God is good, and life is good when you walk with the Lord. But Satan does not want you to believe that. He wants you to believe God is a stingy, compromising person. The Bible tells us that Satan dramatizes God's restrictions. Adam and Eve not only discounted God's goodness, they overdramatized God's restrictions.

Nowhere do we find that God told the first humans not to touch the forbidden tree. But Eve said to the serpent, "God has said, 'You shall not eat it, nor shall you touch it, lest you die.'" Again, God never said that. He made no mention of touching.

When you give Satan an inroad into your life, you will soon be thinking less of the grace of God and more of the law of God. That is what he does. He emphasizes the restrictions and he minimizes the blessings. That is Satan's strategy. He has used it throughout history and continues to use it today.

The subtitle of this series and of the book from which it comes is "How Jesus' Prophecy Shapes Our Priorities." You can see as we study these end-times deceptions how they relate to what we face today. There is not anything that's more rampant in our world today than deception.

Anybody can be fooled by anybody, and no one seems to be immune to trying. Every day we see it over and over, and we have to pray, "Lord, show me the truth. Help me to see what is really true." We will have more of this tomorrow on the Friday edition of Turning Point.

I hope you will join us then. Please remember that Turning Point produces a magazine that you can have delivered to your home. It is filled with content that will help you in your walk with the Lord. It is yours for the asking. Just say you want the magazine, and we will see you tomorrow.

David Michael Jeremiah: For more information on Dr. Jeremiah's series "The World of the End," please visit our website where we also offer two free ways to help you stay connected: our monthly magazine, Turning Point, and our daily email devotionals. Sign up today at davidjeremiah.org/radio.

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You can also purchase the Jeremiah Study Bible in the English Standard, New International, and New King James versions, complete with notes and articles from Dr. Jeremiah's decades of study. Get all the details when you visit our website, davidjeremiah.org/radio. This is David Michael Jeremiah. Join us tomorrow as we continue this series "The World of the End" on Turning Point with Dr. David Jeremiah.