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STUDIES IN DECEPTION PART VII

HOW TO JUDGE A DOCTRINE

My people are destroyed for lack of Knowledge: because thou hast rejected Knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to Me: seeing thou hast forgotten the Law of thy G-d, I will also forget thy children. Hosea 4:6

DETERMINING TRUE FROM FALSE DOCTRINE

We are to have Knowledge concerning Doctrine. Knowledge is obtained by Study. When we say Doctine, we mean a Teaching; what someone Teaches as a Christian belief. For purposes of this study, the True Doctrines are those Doctrines that are Accepted as True by the whole Church. [1]

WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT?

We are told in the New Testament that there will come false doctrines and false teachings. We need to be aware that they are already out there, and that people believe them. Therefore, we need to know how to identify false teachings and avoid them.
The Bible is clear. Those that receive the True Teaching are called Wise. Those that do not receive it are called foolish.
Judging a Doctrine is not as difficult as it sounds. There are what we call "Warning Signs" that can alert Believers that they are being exposed to False Teaching. Here are some:

WARNING SIGNS

1. Does your teacher tell you that studying is too difficult? Or that they don't listen to "mens' words", but just believe whatever he says?
2. Does your teacher tell you that studying Church history is of little value?
3. Does your teacher tell you he, "Has no Doctrine, he just believes the Bible"?
4. Does your teacher tell you that we are never to "judge" anything? Just "love everyone" and that's all the Gospel is? [2]
5. Does your teacher issue death threats to those that disagree with his teachings or "prophecies"?
6. Does your teacher deny the basic Doctrines of the Church such as The Three Persons of The Trinity?
7. Does your church teach that you must "speak in tongues" or be "baptized into their church" to be Saved? [3]
8. Does your teacher tell you that you have the power to "Summon" the Holy Spirit?
9. Does your teacher reject the True Church Councils and Synods? [4]
10. Does your teacher claim "infallibility" or is he led by someone who claims to be "infallible"?
11. Does your teacher teach Salvation by works? Conditional Salvation based on "human responsibility"?
12. Does your teacher claim to be a "prophet"?
13. Does your teacher claim to be a "protestant" on the one hand, while rejecting the actual Teachings of The Protestant Reformation on the other?
14. Does your teacher tell you not to be concerned with heresies? And those that try to study them to learn to avoid them are "heresy hunters"?
15. Does your church or teacher tell you that there is a form of "praise and worship" called, "being drunk in the spirit"? [5]
16. Does your teacher tell you that "all are elect" or that anyone can "elect themselves" or The Elect can "lose their Salvation"?
17. Does your teacher tell you that the Blood of Christ was not sufficient to Save you, but that He died "spiritually" and that is what Saved you? [6]
18. Does your teacher tell you that Jesus "took on the nature of Satan", "suffered the flames of Hell" and then was "Born Again in Hell"? [7]

If your church or teacher is teaching any of the above things, they are but a few of the Warning Signs that you are receiving false doctrine and false teaching.

MORE FOLLOWING SOON!

Translations:

PEOPLE OF G-D MINISTRIES

Copyright 2003 People of G-d Inc. All Rights Reserved. Not for reproduction or redistribution without Written Permission and Consent of People of G-d Inc.

FOOTNOTES

[1]By the whole Church, we mean the whole Reformation-based Protestant Church. The Protestant Reformers demonstrated that their teachings were founded historically upon the early Christian Church.
[2]This is what is known as the The Love Gospel which is not True Teaching.
[3]The United Pentecostal Church teaches both points 6 and 7. They were declared heretical and thrown out of the Pentecostal Church in 1915. They go by U.P.C., "Oneness" "Apostolic Holiness" or "Jesus Only".
The U.P.C. doctrines are the ancient heresy of Monarchianism or Sabellianism. T.D. Jakes preaches U.P.C. doctrines on TBN and it is also found in the "God Chasers" books by Tommy Tenney.
[4] Has your teacher not told you for instance that Antinomianism, Arminianism, Semi-Arminianism and Dispensationalism are not accepted Protestant Christian teachings? Has your teacher not even explained to you what these teachings are, or the history behind them?
Some wrongly teach that Martin Luther remained unrepentantly anti-Jewish his whole life long. Go HERE for the facts.
[5]False teachers take Acts 2 as an example that Christians are to "seem drunk" to be as those at Pentecost? The Apostles immediately corrected them:

For these are not drunken, as ye suppose, seeing it is but the third hour of the day. Acts 2:15

They did not start "acting like they were drunk" as some false teachers advise their congregations to do. Drunkenness is never happiness and does not bring "holy laughter" in Scripture.

They grope in the dark without light, and He maketh them to stagger like a drunken man. Job 12:25
They reel to and fro, and stagger like a drunken man, and are at their wits' end. Psalm 107:27
The L-RD hath mingled a perverse spirit in the midst thereof: and they have caused Egypt to err in every work thereof, as a drunken man staggereth in his vomit. Isaiah 19:14
Babylon hath been a golden cup in the L-RD'S hand, that made all the earth drunken: the nations have drunken of her wine; therefore the nations are mad. Jeremiah 51:7
In their heat I will make their feasts, and I will make them drunken, that they may rejoice, and sleep a perpetual sleep, and not wake, saith the L-RD. Jeremiah 51:39
To "act drunk" is not Spiritual.

[6]They use this verse where there is a plural for "death" in the Hebrew:
And He made His grave with the wicked, and with the rich in His death; because He had done no violence, neither was any deceit in His mouth. Isaiah 53:9
In the Hebrew it does say: "with the rich in His deaths" (plural). Therefore they assert most definitely that this proves there was more than one death (in this case, two, a physical death and also a "spiritual death") in Christs' crucifixion.
In Hebrew however, a construct also pluralizes a word to accentuate it. In this case, it uses the plural to emphsize and accentuate the excruciating type of death the He suffered physically (but not "spiritually") for us.
[7] The Word of Faith Movement teaches these very things.

BIBLIOGRAPHY AND CREDITS

Edwards, Dr. Jonathan. Veritas Redux. 1707.
Luther, Dr. Martin. The Bondage of the Will.
The Westminister Confession of Faith. 1646.