Fearlessly Courageous
Desk of Dennis Piller
9 9 2024
Root deception is not an intellectual problem but a moral one. Part II
I am reading a book by Michael Sullivant called Prophetic Etiquette and he uses the example
of a vision that God gave him regarding the contrast between the flagpole and the flag.
The flagpole was steel light, silent and unbending. The flag was attention grabbing and
highly responsive to the wind. Both of them were dazzling in their own ways.
He understood that the flagpole and flag were pictures of two sides of our Christian faith.
The objective and the subjective side. The objective, essential, historically proven truth, and doctrines of our faith are stable, plain, unchanging, firmly grounded, and established, they are fundamental and vital as they shined forth. The subjective, experiential aspects of our life in the spirit of God are more delicate, visible, and fluid, they inspire passion, enthusiasm and flare.
What’s the flagpole without a flag? What’s the flag without a flagpole?
It’s good for nothing except to be thrown down and trampled upon my men of the earth.
He talked about Gods work in our day to bring together these two aspects of our faith.
Complementary elements of a unified hole. What God is joined together, let no men divide.
The objective ministry of the Holy Spirit go together – like spoken words, and the breath that attends them Psalm 33 6 “by the word of God, the heavens were made, and all the host of them by the breath, spirit, of his mouth”.
The Wedding of Truth and Experience
It is central to remember that the objective truth of scripture that we know and build our lives upon were once subjectively communicated by God to humanity. (other than the 10 commandments written by God himself. The divine reality and veracity of these experiences were objectified by, passing the test of their universal and enduring impact and the corroborating witness of credible people who knew and loved God. God has provided us with a reliable measuring rod to evaluate other subjective experiences that claim divine inspiration as their source.
In 2 Peter, Peter refers to a powerful, personal prophetic experience and explained how he viewed it in relationship to the Old Testament scriptures; 2 Peter 1:16 21
This very account of Peter’s experience on the mount of transfiguration ultimately became a part of the holy scriptures. He speaks about what he saw and heard when the supernatural power of God was demonstrated on the mountain. See Matthew 17: 1 –9.
Peter utilized this testimony as a part of his preaching of the gospel as he sought to persuade people to put their faith in Jesus and to build up believers in their faith in Jesus. But he also refers to the prophetic word of scripture itself and implies that it must stand as the superior, more sure, and confirmed, prophetic revelation of God through which we are to evaluate any subjective supernatural experience.
Peter is simply appealing for us to always ground our experiences by evaluating them in the light of the objective viable truths of the Bible itself. Just as he did himself.
If we are firmly grounded in the objective side of our faith, we don’t need to fear welcoming the subjective experiential side of our faith. In other words, we need not fear being deceived by an experience. Christians have often attributed more ability to Satan to deceive us than to the Holy Spirit to lead us into truth. Deception is certainly possible. But it is not inevitable.
Two reliable internal safeguards against deception are the continual receiving into our heart of the love of the truth whenever Gods truth, intersects are lives. And it is up to us to listen and obey the Word and His Holy Spirit so that we can find and pursue our life pleasures in God in the things of his kingdom. This is the essence of possessing integrity. When these two things are not firmly in place within us, then we are in great danger of being deceived in one way or another.
The book of Proverbs and the apostle warn us, about the absolute need for such an integrity
Whoever walks in integrity walks securely, but whoever takes crooked paths will be found out.
Proverbs 10:9
The integrity of the upright will guide them, but the perversity of the unfaithful will destroy them. Proverbs 11: 3.
2nd Thessalonians 2:9–12
“The coming of the lawless one is by the activity of Satan rwith all power and false signs and wonders, 10 and with all wicked deception for sthose who are perishing, because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. 11 Therefore tGod sends them a strong delusion, so that they may believe uwhat is false, 12 in order that all may be condemned vwho did not believe the truth
but whad pleasure in unrighteousness”.
Notice that it is actually God himself who allows these people to be deluded. BECAUSE they have rejected him as the legitimate source of pleasure in their life. Root, deception is a moral, not an intellectual problem.
To use the same example again, the flagpole Is the word of God – steel – unbending, and the contrast of the flag as the attention grabbing and high response to the wind.
The unchanging foundation of the word of God marrying the experiences of the Holy Spirit.
Which are the subjective aspects of our life in the spirit of God, telling us that we are to test every experience, every thought, every pleasure, by filtering it with God’s word, and in that, we will find the true joy in living for Christ, and true integrity marked by God standards and Gods rewards.
I will sing of the goodness of God Carrie Underwood.
