Do you believe, or have you ever believed, that George Washington was the first President of the United States of America?
I did.
Until about 5 minutes ago when I read a chapter in a book that questioned my belief, and then again 4 minutes ago when I went and looked online and found several sources telling me that George Washington was NOT the first President of our nation.
[Here is one of the sources: http://www.marshallhall.org/hansen.html ]
It turns out that he was the first President of our nation under the newly formed Constitutional government. But prior to the writing of the Constitution, our nation was formed under Articles of Confederation, and John Hansen was elected its first President (George Washington was one of those who voted for him!)
But if in the future someone should ask me who the first President of the United States was, I will still tell them it was George Washington, although I might now qualify him as being the first U. S. President "under the Constitution." (Old beliefs, even when proven to be false, tend to die hard.)
So what does this have to do with the Bible?
Well, we've just spent some time looking at what might be false beliefs which might possibly (after you have done your research as I have done mine) cause you to re-think your beliefs about the Sabbath, for example (as it has caused me to re-think mine.)
If nothing else, perhaps that study has caused you to search out the Word to verify that what you consider to be your deepest convicting beliefs are in fact true. But the next thing to do is determine whether or not you truly believe them; for our actions are controlled by what we TRULY believe!
And it is that last statement which will take our focus now away from false beliefs and onto the practice of self-deception; a whole new area of biblical study to explore, for the Bible has much to say about how we deceive ourselves.
Self-deception occurs when we say that we believe something, but we really don't....but we think we really do.
Did you get that? Did you REALLY get that?
Because if you did, then you might also get that we can be self-deceived and not have any clue that we are. If we knew we were deceived, then we would no longer be deceived. But the problem is that we don't know that we are or else we wouldn't be.
OK, enough talking in circles.
It is one thing to search out scripture, unearthing pinciples that we believe we should live by...and quite another thing to actually abide by them. We can agree with scripture, we can know that it is truth, but often something happens between the knowing and the doing. The something that happens is called self-deception.
When the Holy Spirit reveals a principle or command to us, we either get up and "do" that required action immediately and continue to do it OR we go into rationalizing and procrastination mode.
Here is how the latter looks:
Missionaries come to our church, show us photos, and tell the story of what is happening in the foreign country in which they serve. Our hearts are stirred by all of it. We feel an urgent and strong pull to give $100 to their cause. We are sure that this is what the Lord would have us do. BUT...we only have $50 on us. So we decide to wait til we get home where we can write a check and mail it to the missionaries. Only we don't get to it right away that day because after church we are going to someone's home for dinner and it leaves our minds temporarily. We remember it again on Wednesday, but by then we aren't sure that it was really $100 that we were "told" by the Lord to give. It was probably more like $50. But we don't seem to be able to find the bulletin that had the missionary info in it so that we can mail this. We will call the church tomorrow and get the address. But then, somehow, we don't. And by the time we remember it again, possibly another few days later, the urgent need doesn't seem so urgent. Probably the missionaries received lots of donations, and they won't miss ours anyway. Besides we are faithful givers. We give all the time!
We KNEW it was urgent that we give to the missionaries, but we RATIONALIZED and PROCRASTINATED until we came to BELIEVE that it wasn't as important for us to give after all. And so we didn't. Our original belief has now been subverted to a new and totally opposite belief by self-deception. We believed the first belief to be true and correct, and yet the ending belief (which was completely opposite to the first) also appears to be true and correct. How can that be?
Actually, it can't! They both can't be true and correct beliefs and actions...one of them has to be false and incorrect. Only we are so deceived we can't see any of this! We don't even feel guilty because we were able to deceive ourselves that we did nothing wrong; that, in this case, our LACK of action had no real bearing on the missionaries or the people they serve.
You see, we ALWAYS act according to what we believe. And when our beliefs suddenly change to wrong beliefs through self-deception, we STILL act on them. Thus, our ACTIONS, or lack of, are inspired or motivated by our BELIEFS. Which is why we are told to observe one another's "fruit" as it is the "fruit" that determines whether the beliefs are true or false. When the beliefs are false (either due to ignorance of doctrine or self-deception) then the fruit will be bad.
But the disciples of Jesus Christ who formed the early church after the Day of Pentecost (with the exception of Ananias and Sapphira who were self-deceived) KNEW what they were to do and they DID it....and they kept on DOING it! They did not allow rationalizations and procrastinations to enter in and change their mindset. They didn't allow the passing of time to change their determination....they just moved with a sense of urgency in everything that they did.
They believed the truth and they acted on that truth. Or at least most of them did.
We will look at some examples of some who did...and some who didn't.
And we will hope to recognize our own tendencies towards self-deception and then figure out how to avoid it.
I did.
Until about 5 minutes ago when I read a chapter in a book that questioned my belief, and then again 4 minutes ago when I went and looked online and found several sources telling me that George Washington was NOT the first President of our nation.
[Here is one of the sources: http://www.marshallhall.org/hansen.html ]
It turns out that he was the first President of our nation under the newly formed Constitutional government. But prior to the writing of the Constitution, our nation was formed under Articles of Confederation, and John Hansen was elected its first President (George Washington was one of those who voted for him!)
But if in the future someone should ask me who the first President of the United States was, I will still tell them it was George Washington, although I might now qualify him as being the first U. S. President "under the Constitution." (Old beliefs, even when proven to be false, tend to die hard.)
So what does this have to do with the Bible?
Well, we've just spent some time looking at what might be false beliefs which might possibly (after you have done your research as I have done mine) cause you to re-think your beliefs about the Sabbath, for example (as it has caused me to re-think mine.)
If nothing else, perhaps that study has caused you to search out the Word to verify that what you consider to be your deepest convicting beliefs are in fact true. But the next thing to do is determine whether or not you truly believe them; for our actions are controlled by what we TRULY believe!
And it is that last statement which will take our focus now away from false beliefs and onto the practice of self-deception; a whole new area of biblical study to explore, for the Bible has much to say about how we deceive ourselves.
Self-deception occurs when we say that we believe something, but we really don't....but we think we really do.
Did you get that? Did you REALLY get that?
Because if you did, then you might also get that we can be self-deceived and not have any clue that we are. If we knew we were deceived, then we would no longer be deceived. But the problem is that we don't know that we are or else we wouldn't be.
OK, enough talking in circles.
It is one thing to search out scripture, unearthing pinciples that we believe we should live by...and quite another thing to actually abide by them. We can agree with scripture, we can know that it is truth, but often something happens between the knowing and the doing. The something that happens is called self-deception.
When the Holy Spirit reveals a principle or command to us, we either get up and "do" that required action immediately and continue to do it OR we go into rationalizing and procrastination mode.
Here is how the latter looks:
Missionaries come to our church, show us photos, and tell the story of what is happening in the foreign country in which they serve. Our hearts are stirred by all of it. We feel an urgent and strong pull to give $100 to their cause. We are sure that this is what the Lord would have us do. BUT...we only have $50 on us. So we decide to wait til we get home where we can write a check and mail it to the missionaries. Only we don't get to it right away that day because after church we are going to someone's home for dinner and it leaves our minds temporarily. We remember it again on Wednesday, but by then we aren't sure that it was really $100 that we were "told" by the Lord to give. It was probably more like $50. But we don't seem to be able to find the bulletin that had the missionary info in it so that we can mail this. We will call the church tomorrow and get the address. But then, somehow, we don't. And by the time we remember it again, possibly another few days later, the urgent need doesn't seem so urgent. Probably the missionaries received lots of donations, and they won't miss ours anyway. Besides we are faithful givers. We give all the time!
We KNEW it was urgent that we give to the missionaries, but we RATIONALIZED and PROCRASTINATED until we came to BELIEVE that it wasn't as important for us to give after all. And so we didn't. Our original belief has now been subverted to a new and totally opposite belief by self-deception. We believed the first belief to be true and correct, and yet the ending belief (which was completely opposite to the first) also appears to be true and correct. How can that be?
Actually, it can't! They both can't be true and correct beliefs and actions...one of them has to be false and incorrect. Only we are so deceived we can't see any of this! We don't even feel guilty because we were able to deceive ourselves that we did nothing wrong; that, in this case, our LACK of action had no real bearing on the missionaries or the people they serve.
You see, we ALWAYS act according to what we believe. And when our beliefs suddenly change to wrong beliefs through self-deception, we STILL act on them. Thus, our ACTIONS, or lack of, are inspired or motivated by our BELIEFS. Which is why we are told to observe one another's "fruit" as it is the "fruit" that determines whether the beliefs are true or false. When the beliefs are false (either due to ignorance of doctrine or self-deception) then the fruit will be bad.
But the disciples of Jesus Christ who formed the early church after the Day of Pentecost (with the exception of Ananias and Sapphira who were self-deceived) KNEW what they were to do and they DID it....and they kept on DOING it! They did not allow rationalizations and procrastinations to enter in and change their mindset. They didn't allow the passing of time to change their determination....they just moved with a sense of urgency in everything that they did.
They believed the truth and they acted on that truth. Or at least most of them did.
We will look at some examples of some who did...and some who didn't.
And we will hope to recognize our own tendencies towards self-deception and then figure out how to avoid it.
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