Real Faith in a Fake News World

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Transcript:

We live in a world that is filled with fake news. There’s been fake news since before there was even the term fake news, which now just seems to be synonymous with something I don’t agree with, so it’s fake news. I’ve seen on Facebook for years these kinds of stories, these fake news.

I’m getting sick of seeing the one where a friend of mine posted the story all upset about about how they injected HIV into bananas at Walmart and they’ve been found. And I read the article and I said, okay, here’s about seven red flags why I know this is not true. And went through it piece by piece and she said, oh, okay, I feel better.

Here’s fake news. Or the stories that you’ll see where Joanna Gaines, I don’t know what show she’s on on HGTV. Somebody help me out.

Somebody has watched the show. HGTV. HGTV.

Fixer Upper did somebody say? Okay. Everybody knows who she is except me.

About how she left her job and everything to sell face cream. You click on these stories, it ends up it’s an ad for face cream. We are surrounded by fake news, and sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference.

Sometimes it’s hard to know what’s the fake news and what’s the real news. And we think this is a modern invention. Now this stuff’s been going on since the beginning of time.

You look at the beginnings of American history, and after George Washington retired and the political parties started to form and some of the early campaigns. It was nasty. We think 2016 was bad.

It was nasty. There were stories about illegitimate children and people killing each other and made up stories, fake news, even from these guys that we look at and say they’re the founders. They’re these wonderful people.

Yeah, there was lots of stuff going on that was fake news. And sometimes you look around at the fake news and it’s hard to know what the truth is. It’s astray by these fake headlines.

Sometimes we can be tricked into believing something that we never thought we would have. And the early churches were surrounded by these kind of fakes as well. Now, they didn’t have the internet.

They might have been better off in some ways not having the internet, but they had fake news as well. They were surrounded by false teachers. They were surrounded by pagan philosophies, and they were surrounded by worldly temptations, all of which offered them promise of something better than the gospel but these counterfeits are always just a poor substitute.

They’re never as good as the real thing. And they were being led astray by these fake news stories in the early church. Well you need Jesus plus this or you need this instead of Jesus you need this or that.

They’d be led astray by these pagan philosophies some of them. Some of the people from the early churches they looked at first outwardly like they were followers of Jesus Christ and then eventually they’d be swept up in these fake news beliefs, these pagan philosophies, false teachings and worldly temptations. They’d be swept up in them and they’d be carried astray.

And some people from the early churches looked at first outwardly like they were following Jesus Christ and not only left to follow these false ideas, but they left to teach these false ideas and get other people involved in them. And this led to all kinds of questions in the early churches as they saw some of their number being led astray and some of their number leading others astray, they became concerned as we would be if we saw this happening in large numbers. They became concerned and they worried about the ones in their number who had gone astray and they would have been concerned, am I next?

What’s going to keep me from falling to something I know is not true? And I’ve had this worry myself. I remember being in high school and being in church and hearing the statistics that are just, I can’t remember the numbers now, but just astronomical about the number of kids that leave the faith after they leave high school.

And I remember being scared to death to go to college. Now, I knew I was going into ministry. I wanted to go to OBU.

I wanted to go to Central Baptist in Arkansas. There were a couple places that I really wanted to go, and my deal was, God, wherever you want me to go, just provide a way for me to go there. And every way you slice it, God sent me to OU.

I didn’t care anything about OU other than the football team. I didn’t want to go to OU, and I was scared to death to go to OU because I was scared to death that they were going to turn me away from Jesus Christ. And I remember being in, right before school let out my senior year, talking to one of my favorite teachers that I was real close to, and her talking about college, and I just broke down. I’m not a crier, okay, more so since I had children.

But I’ve never been much of a crier. Children make you cry, especially when you step on a Lego, barefoot. I wasn’t real emotional before I had children, but I broke down in tears and told her I was just scared to death.

What’s going to happen? What are they going to trick me into believing? And then she tried to reassure me it was going to be okay.

I went to college, and my first semester of my freshman year, I got stuck in almost nothing but philosophy and psychology classes. And I remember sitting there thinking, okay, if this doesn’t turn me away from Jesus, nothing is ever going to. And I feel like God used it to make me stronger in my faith.

But I was worried going into it, am I going to be turned astray? Am I going to be led to believe something that I know is not true? And maybe you’ve wondered that.

Hopefully I’m not alone in this. Not that I want you to worry about it, but I’d just like to know I’m not alone. Maybe you’ve been through a situation in life where you’ve thought, can my faith withstand this challenge?

And maybe it wasn’t like me going and dealing with professors who hated Christianity. Maybe you did that. But maybe it wasn’t that.

Maybe it was a situation in your life where you thought, because of your circumstances, I don’t know if my faith is strong enough to withstand this storm or this challenge. Could have been the death of a loved one. Could have been a divorce.

Could have been the loss of a job. Could have been a sickness. Could have been an injury.

We all go through things where we think, I don’t know if my faith is strong enough to withstand this. And if you’re anything like me, you worry, am I going to someday walk away from Jesus? We see other people do it and we think to ourselves, what’s going to keep that from happening to me?

Well, as we’ve been studying for the last several weeks, these letters from the last apostle, the last surviving eyewitness to Jesus’ ministry, and the advice that he gave to the generations of Christians that were just coming up as he was on his way to his reward at the end of his life. He wrote these letters of advice to them, and that’s where we find ourselves today in 1 John 2. And he’s writing to them about some of the assurances and some of the warnings that come along with this.

And if you’ll start with me in verse 18, 1 John chapter 2, he says, Little children, and remember that doesn’t mean, we learned last week, that doesn’t mean that he’s writing to small children. That means he’s an old guy and he’s writing to the new Christians. And he says, Little children, it is the last time.

And as you have heard that Antichrist shall come, even now there are many Antichrists, whereby we know that it is the last time. That doesn’t mean that it’s the end times, that the second coming is right around the corner necessarily. What that means is this is the last time period before the coming of Christ. This is the end of God’s redemptive time clock.

Everything has happened that needs to happen. Jesus has come. He’s fulfilled the promises of the first coming.

He’s lived the perfect life. He’s fulfilled the prophecies. He has died on the cross.

He’s risen again. He’s ascended. that now all you’re waiting on is him to come back.

And they didn’t know if it was going to be a few days or a thousand years. And now here we’ve been for over 2,000. Well, actually under 2,000.

Waiting for him to come back. But we know that’s what’s coming next. And he says it’s the last time and you’ve heard that the Antichrist shall come.

We hear this word Antichrist. We think this monster guy, like the beast in Revelation, we think this one big monster leader who’s going to lead everybody astray. He says, even now there are many antichrists, whereby we know that it is the last time. He warns them, and he’s not saying all these people are the antichrist. He’s saying there are lots of little antichrists.

There are lots of people who are against Christ. He’s not saying lots of little monsters and imps running around. He’s saying there are lots of people around us who are against Christ. And he said, and so we know it’s the last time. By the way, Jesus told them it was going to be this way.

Jesus warned us that it was going to be this way. That not everybody, unfortunately, we’d love it if everybody said yes to Jesus, if everybody trusted Jesus as their Savior, knew the peace that we know through that, experienced the hope of knowing that there’s going to be a resurrection one day and that there’s eternal life with Him. We want everybody to experience the hope and the peace.

It’s not about controlling people’s behavior. It’s about them finding the peace with God that we’ve found. But sadly, not everybody will.

Because God created us with this pesky free will where we do stuff we shouldn’t do and believe stuff we shouldn’t believe. And so Jesus warned us that not everybody was going to be warm and fuzzy toward Jesus. Some people were going to be downright hostile and against Him.

And He said, they went out from us. He’s talking about the people in the churches. He said, they went out from us, but they were not of us.

There were some people in the churches who appeared at first to be part of the Christian community. He said, but they went out from us, but they weren’t really of us. They weren’t really with us.

For if they had been of us, they no doubt would have continued with us. He said, if they had really been us, and this is not an us versus them, oh, Christians, we’re better than everybody else thing. This is just, if they had really been Christians, if they had really been transformed by the power of God, then they would have stayed.

But they went out that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us. He said, eventually they left to show who they really were. We can hide our true nature for a little while, but we can’t hide it forever.

Who we are is eventually going to shine through. Jesus said, out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. And I can try to act nice and kind, and sometimes I am, but I can try to act nice and kind, but eventually I’m going to get in traffic.

And out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth is going to speak, and you’re going to see my true nature. You’re going to see my sinful self if you ride with me. But he says, these people were going to go out from the church because they never really were part of the Christian community.

They were playing a part. They were playing a role. I think that’s part of what’s wrong with churches in America today.

Oh, people are leaving in droves. The churches are shrinking. Maybe the churches are getting healthier as people decide which side of the fence they’re actually on.

Because people who want to act Christian until it’s inconvenient are going to do more harm to the cause of Christ than a small church. It’s the people who say, oh, I’m a Christian, and then never act like it. And the rest of the world looks at them rightly and says, well, you’re a hypocrite, and they’re right.

That gives Christ a bad name. So he says they went out from us to make manifest that they were not all of us. He says, but ye have an unction from the Holy One and you know all things.

This word unction is a great word. I use it to describe when I can’t describe any other way the feeling. So I don’t want to say being led by feelings.

Well, I have a feeling. I feel like God wants me to do this. Sometimes you know God speaking to you.

It’s not audible. It’s like a feeling, but it’s more than a feeling. It’s like a feeling and a conviction all rolled into one, and it’s unction.

And there’s just no better word for it. He says, you have an unction from the Holy One. In other words, God has given you the ability to understand.

He said, you know all things. Do you know that, believer? Do you know that, Christian, this morning?

The Bible says, you know all things. Don’t you feel smarter? Doesn’t mean we know every fact, every little detail, that I could quiz you on math and geography and all sorts of things today, and you’d get a hundred on it.

it’s talking about our ability to discern spiritual truth. Now we don’t always use that, do we? Some Christians get twisted up in crazy ideas.

It’s because we’re not looking at our Bibles, we’re not interpreting them the way that we should. It’s because we’re not listening to the leadership of the Holy Spirit. But with those tools that God has given us, spiritual truth is just unlocked whenever God is ready to give it to us.

He says, I’ve not written unto you, in verse 21, I’ve not written unto you because you know not the truth, but because you do know it, and that no lie is of the truth. He’s saying here basically that because of the presence of the Spirit of God within us, we know the difference between a truth and a lie. We can tell the difference.

And if we’re confused, he’ll show us the difference. Who is a liar but he that denieth Jesus is the Christ. So when they had two teachers standing up in the early churches, and one saying, well, Jesus was just a good man, and the other says, no, Jesus was the Messiah, Jesus was the Son of God, And there was some question about who’s telling the truth and who’s telling the lie. John says, here’s how you know the one who’s telling the lie is the one who says Jesus wasn’t the Messiah.

That word Christ is not his name, it’s his title. And it means the same as the word Messiah. He’s the Son of God, the fulfillment of God’s promises.

He’s the perfect sacrifice, the one who died to pay for our sins. He said, the guy who says that’s not true is the liar. By the way, that doesn’t come from me.

You can read it right there. John said it under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Who is a liar but he that denieth Jesus as the Christ?

He is Antichrist. It doesn’t say he is the Antichrist. It says he is Antichrist that denieth the Father and the Son. And by the way, when we deny the Son, we’re denying the Father as well. Everybody’s okay with God, or lots of people are okay with God, until you mention Jesus.

You can pray to God in public, but it’s when you mention the name of Jesus that everybody gets all upset. I hate to break it to you, but if you don’t have Jesus, you don’t have the Father. Because Jesus said, this is not Jared’s opinion, Jesus said, I am the way, the truth, and the life, and no man comes unto the Father but by me.

And I know that sounds narrow-minded, it sounds exclusive, it is. And I wish I could tell you that you come to God any way you want to, but that’s not what God says. So John says if you’re denying the Son, you’re denying the Father as well.

He says in verse 23, Whosoever denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father, but he that acknowledgeth the Son hath not, excuse me, hath the Father also. That last part may not be in some of your translations. The important part here is in the beginning of the verse, whosoever denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father.

There were some that were saying, not only is Jesus not the Messiah, he’s not the Son of God either. And John says that’s a lie as well. Jesus is both the Son of God and the Messiah.

He’s God’s Son and the Savior of the world. Verse 24 says, let that therefore abide in you. This is really the most important verse, I think, of the whole passage.

I told you all on Wednesday night, some of you who were here, I struggled and struggled with this passage all week, saying, what is it? If I could boil this down to one point that they need to understand, what is it? And it wasn’t until I really grappled with verse 24 that I understood what it was.

He says, let that therefore abide in you which ye have heard from the beginning. If that which ye have heard from the beginning shall remain in you, ye also shall continue in the Son and in the Father. So there’s an imperative, there’s a command in there where he says, let that therefore abide in you which you’ve heard from the beginning.

In other words, the truth of the gospel which you’ve heard all along, there’s the command, let that abide with you. Keep that in there. Cultivate that in yourself.

But then there’s also the promise that comes with it, that if that which you’ve heard from the beginning shall remain in you, if the truth of the gospel remains in you, if the truth of the gospel is in there and remains, then you’ll stay with the Father and the Son. If the truth of the gospel has taken root in your heart, you’re not going anywhere. And when we find ourselves wondering, can my faith sustain this challenge that it’s taken?

There’s our answer. If the truth of the gospel has taken root in your heart, you don’t have to worry about going anywhere. And this is the promise that he has promised us, even eternal life.

So then there’s a promise that comes with that too. That when the gospel, when the gospel has taken root, and we’ll talk in just a moment about what the gospel is, but when it’s taken root and it remains there, and you have that relationship with the Father and the Son and the relationship with the Father through the Son, then there’s the promise of eternal life. These things have I written unto you concerning them that seduce you.

So he said, I’ve written these things to you about those people who are trying to lead you astray. In other words, don’t worry about it. They’re not going to win.

We left here last Sunday morning, and my mother remembered one thing. She always feels like I throw her under the bus in messages. I don’t mean to.

My mother remembered one point from the message. It was that the devil’s not in charge of me. And I said, that wasn’t even one of the points I had.

I said it. And I’m glad she got that out of it. But that wasn’t even one of the points I was trying to make.

Well, I’ll give you a point that I don’t have in my notes that I’m not really trying to make. But it bears saying, the false teachers aren’t in charge of you either. If the gospel’s in you, it doesn’t matter what anybody on TV says.

Doesn’t matter what the professors down at the college say. They’re not in charge of you. Because God’s given us the ability to know the truth from error.

The whole point of this message this morning, and if you’re following along in the notes on the back of the bulletin, the first blank you’ve got this morning. The main point of all of this, the main point of this passage, is that believers who start real, stay real. Believers who start real, stay real. There’s a contrast built in this passage. There were some people who looked like they were believers.

They were outwardly doing all the right things, all the religious things, but the Bible says they were never really real. They manifest their true nature when they abandoned the faith, when they walked away. And they were able to walk away, he says, because they never really were of us. But to those who remained, he said, if the gospel’s in you, if you’ve truly been changed, if the gospel has taken root, then you’re not going anywhere because believers who start real, stay real. So the first thing that we need to understand from that is if the gospel of Jesus Christ, if the gospel of Jesus Christ has done its transforming work in you, you will not fall away.

Now there are challenges all throughout the New Testament that talk about falling away and being careful about falling away. But a lot of them accompany challenges to check yourself and make sure it’s real. Make sure that what you say is going on in your heart. Make sure what you say that Jesus did in your heart really happened.

Make sure it’s real faith and not just make belief. But if the gospel’s in there, if it’s done its transforming work, if it’s taken a sinner like me and changed me into somebody who still sins, but hates the sin now, and not even everybody else’s, hates my own sin, and wants to be right with God, and it’s transformed me into somebody who wants to hear the voice of God and tries to follow the voice of God, if the Holy Spirit, if the Holy Spirit has changed you from the inside out because of your belief in the gospel, if the gospel has transformed you, then you’re not going to fall away. That’s not me saying it.

That’s not my promise. That’s the word of God. It tells us if the gospel has transformed you, you’re not going to fall away.

He says in verse 24, let that therefore abide in you which you have heard from the beginning. If that which you have heard from the beginning shall remain in you, ye also shall continue in the Son and in the Father. Believers who start real, stay real. If you had a real start, a real transformation, where the Bible teaches us that the old things pass away, and Jesus makes all things new, if you’ve been transformed in that way, you’ll continue on to the end.

Second of all, God enables believers to know and discern the truth. If we’re worried about what we’re going to fall into, God will enable you to know and discern the truth. Now, it’s great to come to church and hear a message.

It’s great to come to Sunday school and hear a lesson. Those things are good for us. Those things can encourage us.

Those things can help point us in the right direction. But that shouldn’t be all the teaching and learning that you ever get or do. We should study the Word for ourselves.

And God has enabled each believer to understand His Word. Now, will we all understand as much as each other? I think God gives it to us when we’re ready.

But the things that you need to understand, God will enable you to understand. God helps us, or God enables us, a better way to say it. to discern the difference between truth and error.

He tells us in verses 20 through 21 talking about having an unction from the Holy One and knowing all things. And then he reminds them, I’m not writing to you. This is in verse 21, my paraphrase of it.

But he says, I’m not writing to you because you’re ignorant of the truth. I’m writing to you because you do know the truth. He says, you’re capable of understanding this.

There’s no need to worry and stress and fret over can my faith sustain this challenge because you’re capable of seeing the truth through the lies.

if God has transformed you if you’ve trusted in Jesus as your Savior and God has transformed you and His Holy Spirit has taken up residence in you and is your teacher and your comforter and your convictor then you’re going to continue in the truth because believers who start real stay real and when people, teachers, come along and say Jesus is not the Savior He’s not the only way to God we know better because His Word teaches that He is the Messiah and John here says it’s a lie when men say He’s not when people say he’s not the son of God he was just a man we know better Jesus claimed to be I preached a whole series of sermons on this Jesus was either a liar a lunatic a legend or lord he claimed to be the son of God now he either made that up and he’s a liar he’s a lunatic because he wasn’t and he believed it anyway he’s a legend because somebody invented the whole story centuries later and I gave you evidence for why that’s not the case or he’s lord he falls into one of those categories and John here says John here falls in with Lord because he says it’s a lie to say Jesus is not the son of God finally this morning a routine of religious motions won’t last there’s a warning in here too if we may be sitting on the fence this morning that a routine of religious motions won’t last you know going through the motions I’m just going to come and be religious I’ve heard the phrase many times fake it until you make it applied to a bunch of settings I feel like there’s some of that involved in pastoring and you start out and there’s no seminary course, there’s no training that really fully prepares you for the job, so you just come in and act like you know what you’re doing until you figure it out.

A lot of jobs are that way. Just pretend like you know what you’re doing until you figure it out. Just pretend like you like the person until you do.

Just pretend this, just pretend that I’m telling you, fake it until you make it doesn’t work in Christianity. Maybe if I just hang around believers, and if I pretend and I just do the right things and go through the motions, maybe eventually it’ll become real. it doesn’t work that way. It doesn’t work that way.

We don’t get any blessing, we don’t get any credit with God for going through religious activities and motions if there’s not truth behind it. And you can read all throughout the Old Testament. Well, you can read through the New Testament too, but some of the most glaring examples are in the Old Testament.

I look at the book of Malachi, the last book of the Old Testament, right before we get into Matthew, and we think, well, God wants people to worship Him. God wants the priests doing their thing and offering sacrifices and incense and all this. God looked at the priests and said, your hearts are not even in this.

You’re a bunch of hypocrites. You might as well just shut the whole thing down. And God looks at us and says, if you’re being fake as a Christian, you might as well shut this whole thing down.

If your heart is not in it, it’s worthless. And he tells us in verse 19 that they went out from us, but they were not of us. For if they’d been of us, they no doubt would have continued with us, but they went out that they might have made manifest that they were not all of us.

And I’m not trying to beat up on people who are in church this morning and saying, well, I don’t know if I really believe. Hey, I’m glad you’re here. I’m glad that even if you’re not sure about this Christianity thing, that you would at least have the intellectual curiosity to come try to figure it out.

There’s nothing wrong with coming in and honestly saying, I don’t know what I believe or where I stand with God. The problem is when we try to act like we’re Christians, when we try to act like we somehow think we’re closer to God than everybody else, and there’s nothing in our hearts behind it. There seems to be nothing Jesus got more frustrated with than religious hypocrites.

And I’m not trying to attack you this morning, again, if that’s where you find yourself. But what I am telling you is that if you’re just here, or anywhere for that matter, and you’re just doing Christian things because you think, well, it’ll get me somewhere with God, or maybe I’ll start to feel like God’s real if I do these things. It’s not going to last. It’s not going to last. John said their true nature eventually was made manifest. They showed who they really were.

if we don’t start real it’s not going to last again that’s not to dissuade you from being here that’s not to attack you for being here that’s not to say you’re a bad person if you don’t know where you stand or what you believe what it is is a challenge to say maybe it’s time to think about it maybe it’s time to consider where you are with God maybe if you’re on the fence somewhere maybe it’s time today to look and say did I start real is any of this real is anything that’s going on in my heart with God real this morning. What matters in all of this is that the gospel is in us and that it remains in us. Today is a great day to make sure that what you started, wherever you are in your spiritual journey, that whatever you started with God is real. Did you repent?

And when I say repent, I don’t mean did you get your whole life cleaned up before you come to God. There’s this idea of repenting from sins, that I have to stop sinning in order to believe. No, God knows that we can’t stop sinning.

We are sinners by nature. It’s like asking a dog to stop barking. We can get them to bark less, but we can’t change their nature.

Repentance means agreeing with God. I’m not repentant because I sinned less than I did yesterday. I’m repentant because before I came to Christ, I sinned and I loved it.

And who cares what God says? And I’m repentant because once I come to Christ, I sin and I hate it. And I realize it’s wrong and I need God to forgive me.

There’s a difference in the heart. There’s a difference in the mind. That’s repentance.

Did you repent? Or did you just say, well, I’ll try Jesus. I hear some great preachers.

I’m not talking about heretics on TBN. I’m talking about some great preachers that I’ve heard in the last few weeks say, just try Jesus for a week. You might like Him.

And I think, what kind of insanity is that? They’re on the fence about Jesus and you’re saying, just try it. Like He’s something we can hop in and out of.

I’m asking, did you repent? Not did you just say, well, maybe I’ll try Jesus. Maybe he’ll work out better than what I’m doing.

Did you repent? Did you realize your sin before God and realize that you needed his forgiveness? Was there genuine faith in Jesus or was it just, yeah, I believe he was real?

Yeah, I believe he’s real is as much as the demons believe and it’s getting them nowhere. There’s a difference in, yeah, I believe he’s real and I believe he died for my sins and he’s the only way I’m getting to heaven. Did the Holy Spirit of God transform you?

I don’t mean did he make you sinless, but I mean has there been a change of heart? and I tell you all the time I got saved at five I didn’t have time and I had what would be strict parents today I didn’t have much opportunity to get in too much trouble so it’s not like I look at my rough past and see the difference of where I was and where I am now but I see I still see changes I still see where God has softened my heart I still see where God has made me different than I was ten years ago I see how God has made me different from where I would be without him has the Holy Spirit of God transformed you at all What have you placed your faith in? Everybody this morning has their faith in something.

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