June 12

“Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching....” —EPHESIANS 4:14

Rarely has false teaching of Scripture been given as much exposure as it has today. Much of it is cloaked in biblical language, which makes it particularly deceptive to those who love the Lord Jesus and the Word of God.

Throughout its history, the church has had to contend with false teachings, and the New Testament warns us about this. More prevalent in our day is a kind of teaching that is cloaked in half truths, where we recognize the half that is true, but then it gets twisted and warped by the other half. We can turn on Christian television any day of the week and hear biblical distortions of truth taught with confidence. Many verses are taken out of context, and rather than understanding the bigger picture and the bigger context, the verse is often taken as a defining statement. Countless people are deceived, especially in the popular materialist doctrines that include prosperity and physical well- being, which may be partially true, but is not the message of the Gospel.

Why are we blown around so easily? This comes about largely because we live in a world that operates outside of the truths of Christian doctrine and will grow even more so. Consequently, huge barriers are set up between Christians and the world we want to reach. The two biggest issues we face today are a doctrinal one and an ethical one.

The doctrinal one is the uniqueness of Jesus Christ. “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:6). This is a completely exclusive statement Jesus makes of Himself, which closes the door to every other avenue of salvation. Ethically, the barriers are primarily in the area of sexuality, in which today’s culture is so alien from Scripture. An issue can become so fixed in our society that we try to find a way around it by taking passages out of context, which construes the meaning in order to back up the issue. It is basically taking the Word of God, treating it like a piece of play dough, and reshaping it to fit the norm in society today.

We live at the end of twenty centuries of Bible study, thought, debate and discussion, and we must connect our roots with those that go deep, so that when the wind blows we are secure. In our Christian faith, a good rule of thumb is – ‘if it’s true, it won’t be new, and if it’s new, it won’t be true’.

PRAYER: Dear Heavenly Father, I know the Bible is your personal revelation of yourself, of Jesus Christ and of how we are to live. Keep me firmly rooted in it, Lord. Thank You.

TO REFLECT UPON: When confronted with any other ‘wind of teaching’, do I take a firm stance in what the Bible says?