The Death of Discernment

Ps.96:13 - Before the LORD: for he cometh, for he cometh to judge the earth: he shall judge the world with righteousness, and the people with his truth.

There is much talk of discernment these days and in fact there should be. It is impossible to keep pace with the avalanche of new and exciting and utterly false teachings that are now being embraced within Christian circles. Think about these teachings:

There is no hell
Everyone will be saved
Jesus was not unique
The cross was not primarily an atonement
The Scriptures are not authoritative
Homosexuality is not a sin

Those topics and more would have caused Christians to faint fifty short years ago but today they are accepted in mainstream evangelical circles. Why can believers sit and listen to preachers reconstruct Scriptural doctrines that no longer resemble the truths that have been established and are reflected in the Word itself? The answer is two fold. First, many churches have unregenerate sinners sitting in the pews who desire a religious form and a spiritual structure in their lives and the lives of their family, but they do not desire Christ. It is a sad but devastating fact and no wonder, more and more churches do not preach the gospel in a way that confronts the sinner to abandon his sin and embrace Christ.

This phenomenon has been growing for decades and now church membership is usually a tool to lock in money but not a way to have a person examine his spiritual standing before God. And the sermon menu includes all the earthly favorites that attract the carnal appetite and not challenge the spiritual commitment. Some appeal to greed, some to lust, and some to the auspices of the intellect. Watch as millions sit and enjoy a message on improving your sex life, or how to get rich, or a deep grammatical and etymological treatise that says a lot without saying anything. It is a redundant religious exercise that sells books and Cds but starves the spirits of the listeners. That is where we are in the church today.

Now the second reason of this wave of new teaching and thinking is that even true believers have lost any personal sense of discernment when it comes to God’s Word. Many of the new waves are being championed by younger people and not the older with their wisdom. And we do not have to wait for any D-day as it were, the crossing is complete, the beachhead has been established, and like driver ants these movements are moving with haste capturing everything in their way. Through printed material, online pod casts, traveling seminars, conferences, the personality of preachers, and miles and miles of discourse these movements have not only found legitimacy they have been embraced as the needed correction to historical Christianity. All while supposedly mature Christians sat and listened without objection.

So if you have been praying for a wayward son and he calls you to say he is attending Rob Bell’s church what are you to say? You are torn between your son’s step toward restoration and the serious issues you have with Rob Bell (or others) and there the devil has caused confusion. Do you see how insidious the devil is in his strategies? The intricate plans are interwoven in both open and clandestine ways so as to maximize what he is doing and Christians are content with the status quo. Like termites that secretly infest the inside of the house structure only to eventually bring the entire edifice down without any warning, so is the structure of Christianity as we know it being secretly dismantled and eventually it will be completely destroyed. And what will we say then? Many say that that day is upon us and like Samson we were asleep and don’t even know our power is gone. I personally do not believe the momentum can be assuaged, but when we stand before Christ we will give a personal account, not an answer for the masses.

No longer do believers scour the Word breathlessly to discover new treasures that satisfy the soul and established doctrines that protect from error. The average believer only desires Scriptures that will positively affect his life, nothing sacrificial or challenging, just some help making his life a success. And he shows no interest in seeking Christ and all His glories, just being His Savior is enough. And so when winsome teachers begin to unfold a teaching about Christ that departs from sound Biblical doctrine this believer is unaware of the departure and in fact embraces this exciting new revelation. Millions are being plucked weekly as these fresh teachings capture the lusts and by-pass the spirit. And what is dangerous is that most feel good about themselves and their spiritual condition.

The average church goer would not even have a working grasp of what discernment is and its place in a believer’s life. This is so very sad when we consider the Lord has so graciously given us His written Word along with great men and women of God to unfold its treasures under the anointing of God’s Holy Spirit. The doctrines that are being tampered with are not fringe issues, many of the fringe issues are already gone. These teachings are altering basic and foundational doctrines that evangelical denominations from a wide spectrum would consider established truth. And yet the average professor of religion drives to “his” church, sends his children to their well organized places of care, and wanders into the sanctuary without a thought, much less a prayer, about the Biblical authenticity of what he will hear. Most of the time the sermon title is all he should require.

The allurement of the new that activates the flesh and silences the spirit is in control in the evangelical community, and it is a fact that preachers stand before their listeners and teach abject heresy to believers who once were orthodox but now are dull of hearing. And the younger generation rejects grandpa’s Christianity and demands excitement and things that are relevant to their modern day lives. Does not your heart break when people say that the glorious Scriptures with their unfathomable majesty are not relevant for today’s believers? I cannot imagine what the angels must think when they have seen their Creator pay our incredible price for sin, give us the Holy Spirit, place His eternal Word into our hands, only to have us treat His Word as an antique and not powerful enough to be relevant today. It is blasphemy.

There are voices albeit rare who continue to warn the body about the doctrinal donnybrook taking place in so many different venues of deception, but they are for the most part voices in the wilderness that fall on deaf ears. And even though some voices of discernment are somewhat caustic and expansive in their parameters, they still are voices that identify some of these heresies. But where is the discernment in the pews? Where are the Godly Sunday School teacher who has studied His Bible for decades, taught it faithfully, and would never allow that type of doctrinal error to be preached from the pulpit under which he sits? There are some to God’s glory, but we need more. Even though I am a staunch Arminian, combative at times, I would 100 out of 100 times sit under a Calvinistic preacher who held to the cardinal doctrines of God’s Word than I would sit under any of these new and relevant preachers. That is how strongly I feel about what they are doing to God’s Holy Word.

So what do we do in the midst of this Biblical free-for-all? We stand strong in what we know to be true, strong, humble, and unwavering. And we teach our children the Word of God and warn them about these false teachings and teachers. Sit with them and watch someone like Joel Osteen (for instance) and teach them straight from his own lips and let them also point out error. I have done this countless times with my three children and when my grandsons reach the age when they can understand I will do the same. The television can be a productive classroom to help you insulate your children from false teaching. Invest in your children.

Look for opportunities to speak with other believers who do not discern, and do not show scorn when someone says they like someone who you consider a false teacher.. You must be careful and patient, remember when the doctor prescribes pills for your illness you do not take the entire bottle at one time. Pray for them and try not to treat them as part of an agenda, but lovingly share some things that may give them some thought. Try not to speak negatively about anyone specifically, especially the pastor or people they would respect. It is a mine field to be sure but perhaps God will use you. Always, always be humble, not a show of humility but a genuine humility that recognizes you do not know it all and anything you do know is by the grace of God. And remember God loves even the ones who are deceived and spreading deception.

Find other like minded believers who generally see what God has shown you and grow together. But do not use all your time dissecting false teachers, this is another deception of the enemy. Build each other up with prayer and meditation on the goodness of God’s Word. You can get so caught up with those with whom you disagree that you spend must of your time thinking about their errors and researching to find more. Eventually this also will remove any spiritual power even when you think you are speaking truth and discernment. Use your discernment to evaluate your own devotional life with Christ and sometimes allow the Holy Spirit to be blunt about the needs in your own spiritual life.

Always remember flesh and blood is not your enemy but the spirits of wickedness. Keep yourself in the love of God and spend as much time discerning your shortcomings as you do the error in others. This war takes no prisoners and it will not be won with requited venom, it will be won by Christ Himself. He demands of us to exalt Him and His Word both in doctrine and personal practice. It is a spiritual challenge to aggressively confront error while remaining humble and in God’s love, but it is a challenge that the Spirit of God can accomplish in and through us.