The Modern Day False Gospel

A different gospel is no gospel

Jesus rebuked the “religious” crowd of His day for their false worship which is vain worship and of no effect.  Such worship is as phony as a three dollar bill, looks good, sounds good but it is fake and cannot help you.  The false gospel  prevalent in modern-day churches is as phony as a three dollar bill.  Jesus was an expert at identifying counterfeit religion and He judged righteous judgment out of love and told people the truth even though they rejected Him (the truth) and His message. 

Matthew 15:3-9 He answered and said to them, “Why do you also transgress the commandment of God because of your tradition? ⁴ For God commanded, saying, ‘Honor your father and your mother’; and, ‘He who curses father or mother, let him be put to death.’ ⁵ But you say, ‘Whoever says to his father or mother, “Whatever profit you might have received from me is a gift to God”— ⁶ then he need not honor his father or mother.’ Thus you have made the commandment of God of no effect by your tradition. ⁷ Hypocrites! Well did Isaiah prophesy about you, saying:
       ⁸ ‘ These people draw near to Me with their mouth,
      And honor Me with their lips,
      But their heart is far from Me (an impure heart)
       ⁹ And in vain they worship Me,
       Teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’”

Understand this.  God saves people not men or church organizations.  God saves people out of churches that teach a different gospel and worship another Jesus. God even saves people that walk in partial darkness, these simply miss out on the blessings of God in this life.  God alone gives the increase.  I am not judging anyone’s heart by my rebuke of church doctrine; but sound doctrine and instruction is important to equip the Saints and keep them from falling victim to the deception of the serpent.  My hope is to help change hearts, not to have anyone change churches as your heart is the only thing that matters to God.  Love God with ALL your heart.

False teaching keeps people from coming to full knowledge of the truth and leads many down the broad road of destruction.  The majority of our church organizations and systems are deceived at best or led by enemy infiltrators at worse.  

2 Peter 2:1-3 But there were also false prophets among the people, even as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies

The teaching of the true gospel, at least in America has long ago strayed from the truth shown in the Scriptures.  The one simple litmus test is this:  Any doctrine that does not conform us to godliness (holiness) and teaches us to Love God with our whole heart is a false doctrine.  From my vantage point, that pretty much sums of the egregious errors of the denominational heresy that dominates today’s Christianity and has been repeated so often it is now the Christian dogma.  Beliefs such as say a prayer one time and you are signed sealed and delivered to heaven or teachings that tell us we can keep on practicing sin and be in the will of God are all lies straight from the pit of hell.   We know the end is near as all the signs of apostasy and delusion are now in place.   We have heaped upon us teachers who tell our itching rebellious ears what we want to hear. The sin nature we are born with does not want to hear it must suffer and be conformed to godliness.  It wants to hear we can keep on living in the world and say some words with our lips, give God part of our heart and everything is going to turn out all right.  That is a false gospel my friends.

Let me say on the front end that I do not have all the light.  I write this out of love for the truth not out of any condemnation.  It is not my place to judge anyone’s heart, that is reserved for God alone.  But He has given me revelation and is urging me to speak out in confidence the wisdom He has provided in His service.   Believe me, I understand how my credibility as a witness for God is directly proportional to my walking faithfully with Him, being pure, holy, spotless and blameless.  God has been working on that for some time and a recent breakthrough that I spoke about this post:  God’s Foremost Commandment has truly been transforming and God has shown up big time.

I mean no offence to anyone but judging righteous judgment is our God given command.  We must make a stand for the truth but do it with gentleness and humility.  If this post does offend you, I ask that you prayerfully study the scriptures cited in context and ask God for wisdom per James 1:5 and Jeremiah 33:3.  I am confident He will show you something that you had not previously seen.  God has been calling me and many others out of darkness, awakening those that have fallen asleep and raising up disciples to bring home the end times harvest for the Kingdom.  That is the love that saves even though it may not win and influence friends the way the world defines it.  Jesus came against the religious traditions of the Pharisees and the Jews of His day and they tried to kill him by pushing Jesus off cliffs and stoning Him.  I pray thoughts such as this will not come upon you but if they do, know that they are thoughts from the enemy  My point in this post is this:

Most of what is called Christianity today or Church is teaching another gospel and leads people to worship another Jesus.

Galatians 1:6-10 I marvel that you are turning away so soon from Him who called you in the grace of Christ, to a different gospel, ⁷ which is not another gospel (there is only one truth); but there are some who trouble you and want to pervert the gospel of Christ. ⁸ But even if we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel to you than what we have preached to you, let him be accursed. ⁹ As we have said before, so now I say again, if anyone preaches any other gospel to you than what you have received, let him be accursed.

This passage from Galatians has been thrown at me and others that are espousing a gospel of repentance from sin and putting to death the deeds of the flesh by walking in the Spirit.  That is what Loving the Lord with all your heart is all about in its simplest terms.  Many call that legalism or a works salvation but I call it the gospel or truth because that is what it is.  The gospel of perverted grace and perverted love is the fake gospel.  Another though less common fake gospel of our modern times is ones that teach we need to obey all the Mosaic Law rituals.  Paul’s warnings on a false gospel applies to all false gospels and read in its entirety, the  Book of Galatians speaks warnings about both primary fake gospels.  Oh how great the apostasy that the whole truth has been totally flip-flopped with deception.

Paul wrote to the Galatians very strongly about their falling away from the truth so soon after having come to the light of Christ.  The arch deceiver, the devil is out to kill us or destroy us outright — but barring that “they” (the demons) will come to steal and pervert the truth to keep us in bondage.  That is what happened in Galatia and as we will see it happened to the Roman church and the church at Corinth. 

Anyone will admit that Paul’s epistles can be difficult to read straight up without thorough study and referencing of other Scriptures.  It is easy to invent new doctrines and misrepresent what Paul wrote about.  In fact Peter warned us that this would happen, specifically citing Paul’s Epistles as a subsequent source of perversion of God’s truth.  Keep the context of 2 Peter in perspective, the whole book was about being deceived, following false teachers and falling away from the true gospel which was for us to walk in holiness by the Spirit of God.  Here is what Peter said, beginning with an admonishment for us to be without spot, loving God with a pure heart.

2 Peter 3:14-17 Therefore, beloved, looking forward to these things, be diligent to be found by Him in peace, without spot and blameless; ¹⁵ and consider that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation—as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given to him, has written to you, ¹⁶ as also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which untaught and unstable people twist to their own destruction, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures.  ¹⁷ You therefore, beloved, since you know this beforehand, beware lest you also FALL (away)  from your own steadfastness, being led away with the error of the lawless

Lawlessness is sin.  The way to spot the error is simple.  Anyone saying you can keep on practicing sin — is the false teacher and is preaching another gospel and a different Jesus.  Peter’s prophesy about Paul’s epistles has come true as the grace Paul taught about has been turned into a license to sin.  The walking in the Spirit Paul wrote about has been turned into saying an intellectual prayer one-time.  This false gospel has us nullifying the law rather than the fulfilling the Law as Jesus taught us we would do.  I am not talking about the Mosaic Law or Law of Moses as that was done away with.  I am speaking about the God’s Law, the 10 commandments but more specifically the Royal Law as James put it.  Love Your Neighbor As Yourself. 

Paul’s epistles properly divided are true and powerful instruction into godliness and righteousness. Paul did not teach another gospel.  Paul was taught directly by Jesus via revelation and anything Paul wrote about must be aligned with what Jesus said to be properly divided.  Paul was an amazing man of God that taught the same gospel Jesus taught as recorded in the Four Gospels and the Book of Revelation.  

1 Cor. 15:1-2  “Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand. By this gospel you are saved IF you hold fast to the word I preached to you—otherwise you have believed in vain.” 

The Scriptures warns us repeatedly that the children of God could be deceived just like Eve was in the garden into following false Gods and believing lies about God’s truth.  We are given ample examples and the means to identify the false teaching,  the demon spirits behind them and the foundation of truth to expose the deeds of darkness behind it all. Please do not be deceived.  Read and take into context the verses shown on the following links under the key word search as indicated:

Do not be deceived

Let no one deceive you

The Enemy Brings Deception & Blindness

God is in control.  God allows the enemy to work and to accomplish His purposes.   When we harden our heart in rebellion to God, the tormentor demons come upon us.  God removes His protection (the hedge of protection) as our sin separates us from God.  See my recent post Understanding Our Enemy for a good primer on how evil operates in the world.

Consider the story of Eve, who was deceived in the garden.  Satan continues to use his chief scheme today and that is deception.  If Satan came at us straight up and said he was Satan we would run away, but he is clever and will entice us with half-truths and perverted love even using the name of Jesus.  We were warned many would falsely come in Jesus name and that the Spirit of AntiChrist was already at work before the New Testament was even completed.  This is where we are at folks – deception has gripped the world and the most professing Christians are foolishly asleep and have no oil in their lamps.

The devil lied to Eve saying she could sin without consequence.  The modern-day perversion of grace is the same lie just reconstituted.  Sadly this lie has permeated most all the modern-day church systems.  This is a false gospel my friends and I don’t care how nice or how loving the Pastor is, they are blind to the truth.

Genesis 3:1-5 Now the serpent was more cunning than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said to the woman, “Has God indeed said, ‘You shall not eat of every tree of the garden’?” ² And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat the fruit of the trees of the garden; ³ but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God has said, ‘You shall not eat it, nor shall you touch it, lest you die.’” ⁴ Then the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. ⁵ For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

Paul chastised the early Church at Corinth for falling for the same deception. Because they had faith and believed in Jesus (but not with a pure heart), they were being lied to that they could practice sin and still walk with God.  Oh how I wish Paul could write a letter to today’s churches.  He would say the same things as follows:

2 Corinthians 11:2-4  For I am jealous for you with godly jealousy. For I have betrothed you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin (pure) to Christ. ³ But I fear, lest somehow, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, so your minds may be corrupted from the simplicity (Love God with All Your Heart)  that is in Christ. ⁴ For if he who comes preaches another Jesus whom we have not preached, or if you receive a different spirit (a demon when you sin) which you have not received, or a different gospel which you have not accepted—you may well put up with it!

Salvation By Works

The powers of darkness have deceived many just as Jesus said would happen.   The modern-day false gospel has twisted faith into worshipping Jesus with our lips and not our whole heart.  Go reread the Matthew 15 passage shown at the top of this post.  Jesus spoke harshly against such worship.  Do you see it now?  The “many” in the following passage from Matthew’s Gospel according to Strong’s Concordance means the “preponderance or significant majority of” in the Greek.  These professing Christians that Jesus speaks of, practiced sin even though they did many good works in Jesus’ name.

Matthew 7:21-23 “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. ²² Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ ²³ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’

The foundation of these deceived “Christians” is not the real Jesus.  They have idols in their hearts and Jesus does not have their whole heart.  One of their idols may well be the doctrines and perverted gospel they practice.  That is why when truth comes against them, you touch their idol and then they want to throw the real Jesus off a cliff or stone Him to death just like the Jews did 2000 years ago.  Jesus said blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness sake!  All Christians walking with a pure heart will be persecuted, we are promised it would happen.  Some are even pushed off cliffs or stoned to death, maybe not physically in this country but certainly spiritually by carnal minds defending the church idol that is founded on lies.

The enemy has now blinded so many to the truth in God’s word that the very warnings about preaching another gospel and worshipping another Jesus have been transposed and used to attack the true gospel.  Those that preach obedience to God by walking with a pure heart (in the Spirit) are accused of legalism or a works salvation.  The reality is those making such accusations do not understand the truth in the Good News.  Unless we repent of all idols and turn (repent) FULLY to Jesus and surrender our fleshly/sinful nature, we are worshipping another Jesus.  Jesus shares His glory with nobody or no thing including the religious traditions and organizations of men; even those that use His name.

A heart set 70% on Jesus and 30% on selfish ambition is not a pure heart and Jesus cannot be one’s Lord.  When Jesus shares your heart,  Jesus is an idol and while many good deeds may get done and while Jesus may be preached, it is not bringing people to knowledge of the truth that is necessary to save their soul.  This creates tares that look like the wheat but are plucked up and burned on the Last Day.  At the heart of this vain worship is winning the approval or favor of men.  The roots of that lust of the heart is pride or greed both of which are fruits of Satan.  Jesus made clear that quality matters more than quantity when it comes to who enter His kingdom.  He said “few there be that shall find it”.

The so-called prosperity gospel is an offshoot of a deceived heart and one that has not been Born Again.  The deceived want their ears tickled and love to hear nice sounding smooth words of love and peace.  This creates a false security of phony lip based faith and a total lack of real peace and the fruit of righteousness that comes with a heart set on pleasing God first and foremost.  When pride or greed gets into your heart and takes root, you want to build a reputation for yourselves, you seek esteem from the community, your neighbors, your friends, your business associates and the world in general.  By your actions and deeds you will show partiality and favoritism.  This is false love my friends, it is not godly love. God is not a respector of persons, He is a judge of hearts.

All partiality is sin even if acted upon in the name of Jesus.  The bottom line is this:  Those who are led by the Spirit of God, are the real sons of God.  Those that practice sin and operate with impure hearts are children of the devil. 

1 John 3:8-10  He who sins is of the devil, for the devil has sinned from the beginning. Whoever has been born of God does not sin, for His seed remains in him; and he cannot sin, because he has been born of God. ¹⁰ In this the children of God and the children of the devil are manifest: Whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God Whoever has been born of God does not sin, for His seed remains in him; and he cannot sin, because he has been born of God.

Jesus told the Jews their father was Satan as their hearts were far from God.  Whose child are you?  The depth of Satan’s deceptions know no bounds and the truth has been turned upside down and inside out.  I will say it here:  Any teaching that does not teach you must be led by the Spirit of God is a works salvation.  If one is led by the Spirit of God they do not break the law with any practice and if they do break it,  they go right back to Jesus and repent when God disciplines His children.   

Romans 8:13 For if you live according to the sinful nature, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live, ¹⁴because those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. 

Grace through true faith is what saves us.  Grace is not the unlimited forgiveness of sin, it is the power from God to obey His commandments and walk in Love.  We do all things, including crucifying our flesh and overcoming sin through Christ Jesus who strengthens us.  The righteousness that comes by faith is accomplished by following Jesus and His Holy Spirit.  Anything else is the real works salvation. 

This is a very difficult message to grasp if you are immersed into the doctrines of men that have been handed down for centuries by those fallen away from the truth of the gospel once preached to the Saints.  If hearts are hardened in rebellion to God, the blinders will stay on until God takes them off.  Many are always learning but never able to come to knowledge of the truth.  That is because they have separated themselves from God thru their sin and rebellion.  Church attendance and  Bible Study participation while admirable,  satisfy their idol or religious practice yet their hearts remain far from the real Jesus if they practice sin.  

 God has indeed already sent the delusion Paul wrote about in 2 Thess.  Those that take pleasure in their sin, irregardless of their “religious” practices or outward expression of faith in Christ are ensnared in a big deception.  I wrote a post about this a few months back that you may find helpful.  God Has Sent The Delusion

Jesus said we cannot serve two masters.  We are slaves to the Master we actually obey.  Are we slaves to sin or slaves to righteousness, the choice is ours.  We cannot live with two natures, a sin nature and a divine nature.  Who is your master is a very valid question that we need to be asking constantly.  Is Jesus your Lord, the one Master you follow?  Jesus said why do you call me Lord Lord and not do what I say?

Jesus gave us the analogy of being born again.  A kernel of wheat must fall to the ground and die to produce life  (John 12:27). The truth and wisdom contained in the parables of Jesus teachings have been hidden from all who do not have a pure heart.  The Word of God tells us this expressly.  Many church denominations teach a variety of “to do” lists of things we must do to be saved.  Nowhere on the list is the  only issue that really matters which is to Love the Lord with All Your Heart and the corollary of Love Your Neighbor as Yourself.  Do this and you will live.  Depending on the denomination you will have been taught various things such as these:

1.  Say a prayer and invite Jesus into your heart.  Sounds nice, but Jesus must have our whole heart.  Love the Lord they God with all your heart.  Do this and you shall live said Jesus.

2.  Make a commitment for Jesus.  Jesus said that anyone who does not Love Him more than his mother, daughter or son is not worthy of Him.  He also said anyone who puts his hand to the plow of God and looks back is not fit for His Kingdom (Luke 9:62).

3.  Joining a church, specifically or generally.  Joining an organization was never a criteria from the Lord.  Belonging to a church can be helpful but is no substitute for giving your life to God.  Whomsoever seeks to save his life shall lose it, but to he who loses his life shall gain it.  I am not anti church as fellowshipping and serving together is a joy if done with a pure heart.

4. Go to bible studies.  Studying the word of God is important to prepare us and train is in righteousness.  It is by the Word that we are washed and sanctified, but — the whole council of God must be taught and when grace and love are perverted into doctrines of demons that tell Christians they can walk with Jesus and their sin at the same time, lives are lost and people are led to the pit of hell.  Let no man be your teacher.  By all means go to Bible Studies but know it is just a dead work if your heart is not pure with God. 

5.  Learn how to speak in tongues.  God doles out His gifts as He alone determines.  Speaking in tongues or possessing any of the other gifts was never linked by God to being saved.  It is a perversion of the truth that has come from inside the church.  2 Peter 2:1 But there were also false prophets among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you. They will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the sovereign Lord who bought them—bringing swift destruction on themselves

6.  Making Jesus Lord of your life.  Jesus is Lord, we do not make Him Lord, but we need to surrender our lives to Him and follow Him.  This is done in our hearts not in our heads.  Many church systems teach this as an verbal or intellectual ascent where we can outwardly profess faith but inwardly be unchanged, not transformed walking in our body of death.  We must aside our flesh and put on the image of Christ and by purifying our hearts.  That means Jesus has 100% of our heart with zero room for other idols or loves that ascend above God.  The heart set on the flesh cannot please God ever!

7.  Tithe and give lots of money.  This is where I used to be and only recently had the blinders taken off.  These are good things to do if we are so led by the Spirit but if they are done without a pure heart, they are dead works, of no effect to God.  Matthew 5:23 Therefore, if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, ²⁴leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to your brother; then come and offer your gift.

8.  Perform mission work and other good deeds.  God works all things for His greater good.  Good deeds are our duty to God and we are not to do them to seek credit for them or build reputations or seek the approval of men.  A large number of good deed doers, do their deeds without pure hearts to win favor from God, men and institutions.  This type of faith is of no effect with God.  God had a higher standard in mind as Jesus explained.

Luke 6:32-35 “If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even ’sinners’ love those who love them. ³³And if you do good to those who are good to you, what credit is that to you? Even ’sinners’ do that. ³⁴And if you lend to those from whom you expect repayment, what credit is that to you? Even ’sinners’ lend to ’sinners,’ expecting to be repaid in full. ³⁵But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked.

9.  You must not drink any alcohol or other legalistic claims of righteousness.  The Law of Moses is done away with, the Law of God is not. We must know the difference and what a works salvation really looks like.   Some will claim having a drink sends you to hell yet in the next sentence these people are sowing hate to their brother or gossiping about their neighbor.  What hypocrisy.  Don’t get me wrong, getting drunk is a sin having a few drinks is not as can be clearly shown in the Scriptures.  If you are led by God’s Spirit, you will know in your heart where to draw the line as this has been one of my weaknesses that the enemy has utilized to entice me away from God.

While I speak mostly in this blog to the gospel that perverts grace and says we can keep on sinning, there is another deception of self-righteousness that comes from following inventions of men.  Do not be deceived,  righteousness only comes by a true faith that results in us fulfilling God’s law to Love Your Neighbor as Yourself.

Please do not misunderstand.  Many of the above things we are taught to do are good things.  But if not done with a pure heart are worthless religious exercises. 

Repentance From Dead Works

If we do not have a pure heart and Love God with all of it, all the good things we do, we do to earn favor with God or man.  These are simply dead works in God’s eyes and while He uses them for His good purposes, it means nothing as it pertains to your salvation or right standing with God.   Once we come to faith and belief in Christ as our Saviour, we must mature, we must be transformed, otherwise we deceive ourselves. The writer of Hebrews spoke about the need to move beyond the basic milk of salvation and into maturity of the knowledge of true righteousness.

Hebrews 5:9-14 He became the author of eternal salvation to all who obey Him, ¹⁰ called by God as High Priest “according to the order of Melchizedek,” ¹¹ of whom we have much to say, and hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing. ¹² For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the first principles of the oracles of God; and you have come to need milk and not solid food. ¹³ For everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe. ¹⁴ But solid food belongs to those who are of full age, that is, those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil. 

Hebrews 6:1-3  Therefore, leaving the discussion of the elementary principles of Christ, let us go on to perfection, not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God, ² of the doctrine of baptisms, of laying on of hands, of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment. ³ And this we will do if God permits.

We should indeed be helping others as I have written about.  believe me we will all have ample opportunity to help as the misery of the world is fast ratcheting up.  We need to obey the spirit of God when He leads us and we are especially told to help the brethren, those that believe in Christ.

Conclusion

Jesus and the Apostles warned us of the antichrist’s and the false workers of righteousness that would be prevalent in the end times.  We are there already my friends.  We are to be sober and alert, not asleep like foolish virgins clinging to a false security promoted by the enemy. 

I pray this post might get you to think about what is the true gospel, if only a little bit.  If you have been deceived in any way, I hope God will give you confirmation in your spirit and awaken you to the missing truth.  I will leave you all with a favorite passage from 1 Timothy.  This verse defines where the modern-day church system is today.  It is in Apostasy my friends.  

1 Timothy 6:3-6 If anyone advocates a different doctrine and does not agree with sound words, those of our Lord Jesus Christ, and with the doctrine conforming to godliness,  ⁴he is conceited and understands nothing; but he has a morbid interest in controversial questions and disputes about words, out of which arise envy, strife, abusive language, evil suspicions,  ⁵and constant friction between men of depraved mind and deprived of the truth, who suppose that godliness is a means of gain.  ⁶But godliness actually is a means of great gain when accompanied by contentment.

I am indeed saddened to see these modern-day teachers using their professed godliness as a means to gain, either money or reputation.   This is the error of Balaam which could easily be a lengthy post of its own.  The truth and simplicity of the true gospel is easy to see if we have a pure heart.

Love the Lord thy God with ALL your heart.  Anything else is idolatry and look out as deception will come upon you.

One of the reasons the truth has been lost is that pastors have been intimidated (made timid) by fear whose source is religious demons.  Paul told Timothy to not be surprised and understand the Spirit that God gave us overcomes fear and intimidation.

2 Timothy 1:7 For God hath not given us the spirit of fear (timidity); but of power, and of love, and self control.

The powers of darkness rule by fear and intimidation using deception.   I was afraid for a time to even write this post.  But I have seen through the schemes of Satan and I am not going to let my selfish ambition or want of reputation, friends etc – compromise the truth contained in God’s word.  Speaking the truth out of love,  I takes solace knowing the persecution and rejection that does come back provides confirmation I am walking in the true light. 

May the Love, grace and peace of God be with you and your family.

May God Bless You Richly!!