“The kicker about deception is you don’t know when it is happening…you don’t know you are being deceived.” – Dennis B.I don't know who took this picture, but I love it. It exemplifies child-likeness and joy to me!
Dennis is brilliant. He is the “young peoples” pastor at my church and is a raving lunatic when it comes to Jesus – he is completely unhinged. Most youth pastors are a bit on the weird side; I think the odd hours, high-fat foods, and leisure moment choices perpetuate the illusion (who skateboards after midnight or climbs random trees past the age of 20?).
He preached a couple of Sunday’s ago and one of his closing statements stayed with me. “You don’t know you are being deceived.” He is so right – we think we are “all that” and a cup of coffee but really, we are disillusioned, deluded, and deceived about a lot of things. We think we have the truth, “the skinny” as my mom would say, but in all reality most of the time we only have a fraction of the truth and are basing our opinions, reality, justifications on a bad imitation of the real thing. We are basing things on man, on the created, not on the creator.
The question is how do you know when you are deceived, deluded or disillusioned? How do you know when your plumb line isn’t quite straight – that there is a kink somewhere in the cord?
Cops who work counterfeiting don’t study fake bills to discover flaws. They study the real thing - traits of the authentic are compared to the questionable. The counterfeits get easier and easier to distinguish as the detectives get intimately familiar with the original.
How well do you know the original source? How intimate are you with the truth of God?
I think this is key in discovering the areas of deception in our lives.
We all believe lies; but we don’t know them as lies. They are more widely known as “viewpoints.” Take the 1960’s for example. Certain groups of people really believed that the darker-skinned population was less intelligent, less capable, less able to think for themselves and had little to no ability to secure futures for their families. A lie, but readily accepted by societies at large.
Think about the church…there are certain denominations and religions preaching God is no longer active on the earth, that he is judging the world and Christians need to pray, hang on for the ride and wait for heaven to appear at the end of the long dark tunnel. A lie but readily accepted by a large portion of the Christ-believing population today.
Again, how well do you know the original? How well do you know the authentic, the real-deal, the living, active, speaking God? How many veils of deception are you buried under? If you want to know, all you have to do is ask – God will show you.
Jesus came “to announce release to captives and freedom to those in prison” (Isaiah 61:1) – deception is a prison. Deception, disillusionment, fraudulence, aren’t freedom, aren’t abundant life, aren’t peace.
How well acquainted are you with the truth…because it will set you free (John 8:32).
Updates:
Condo – Still for sale – I am praying hard that it will sell this month so I can end 2009 with the sale and wrap up the taxes etc. this year..
Work – We are two-thirds through our annual planning meeting. We have people in from India, Indonesia, and our US offices. Lots of food, fellowship and fun…as well as long hours planning our upcoming year.
Visitors – Jamie arrives on Tuesday!
Requests:
Condo – It needs to sell and I need the monthly mortgage payment to come in. I have been trusting God since July and he has paid it every single time…I wish the condo would just be snatched up by some lovely buyer and I wouldn’t have to think about it anymore.
Work – we are in need of recruits for the next cycle and for a lead to coordinate the local and international training (alumni).
Websites - If you would like to RSS my update vs. getting them by email visit my blog site http://www.denaandrews.blogstpot.com/. To find out more about rēp visit http://www.repurposing.biz/ for information.
He preached a couple of Sunday’s ago and one of his closing statements stayed with me. “You don’t know you are being deceived.” He is so right – we think we are “all that” and a cup of coffee but really, we are disillusioned, deluded, and deceived about a lot of things. We think we have the truth, “the skinny” as my mom would say, but in all reality most of the time we only have a fraction of the truth and are basing our opinions, reality, justifications on a bad imitation of the real thing. We are basing things on man, on the created, not on the creator.
The question is how do you know when you are deceived, deluded or disillusioned? How do you know when your plumb line isn’t quite straight – that there is a kink somewhere in the cord?
Cops who work counterfeiting don’t study fake bills to discover flaws. They study the real thing - traits of the authentic are compared to the questionable. The counterfeits get easier and easier to distinguish as the detectives get intimately familiar with the original.
How well do you know the original source? How intimate are you with the truth of God?
I think this is key in discovering the areas of deception in our lives.
We all believe lies; but we don’t know them as lies. They are more widely known as “viewpoints.” Take the 1960’s for example. Certain groups of people really believed that the darker-skinned population was less intelligent, less capable, less able to think for themselves and had little to no ability to secure futures for their families. A lie, but readily accepted by societies at large.
Think about the church…there are certain denominations and religions preaching God is no longer active on the earth, that he is judging the world and Christians need to pray, hang on for the ride and wait for heaven to appear at the end of the long dark tunnel. A lie but readily accepted by a large portion of the Christ-believing population today.
Again, how well do you know the original? How well do you know the authentic, the real-deal, the living, active, speaking God? How many veils of deception are you buried under? If you want to know, all you have to do is ask – God will show you.
Jesus came “to announce release to captives and freedom to those in prison” (Isaiah 61:1) – deception is a prison. Deception, disillusionment, fraudulence, aren’t freedom, aren’t abundant life, aren’t peace.
How well acquainted are you with the truth…because it will set you free (John 8:32).
Updates:
Condo – Still for sale – I am praying hard that it will sell this month so I can end 2009 with the sale and wrap up the taxes etc. this year..
Work – We are two-thirds through our annual planning meeting. We have people in from India, Indonesia, and our US offices. Lots of food, fellowship and fun…as well as long hours planning our upcoming year.
Visitors – Jamie arrives on Tuesday!
Requests:
Condo – It needs to sell and I need the monthly mortgage payment to come in. I have been trusting God since July and he has paid it every single time…I wish the condo would just be snatched up by some lovely buyer and I wouldn’t have to think about it anymore.
Work – we are in need of recruits for the next cycle and for a lead to coordinate the local and international training (alumni).
Websites - If you would like to RSS my update vs. getting them by email visit my blog site http://www.denaandrews.blogstpot.com/. To find out more about rēp visit http://www.repurposing.biz/ for information.
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