The Great Deceptions of the Christian Church

By Donald Werner

What is a Deception? A Deception is when somebody gets you to believe a falsehood or a lie as truth. The deceived person then considers that falsehood to be the truth. It should be noted that the deceiver isn’t necessarily malicious, they themselves may be deceived and they are passing on their deceptive truth to another.
Obviously, those who are truly deceived don't know they are deceived, that’s the nature of deception. So, those who are deceived will not look for the real truth because they believe they already have the real truth. However, if they are open to hearing the real truth, and they may come to see that what they were originally told is not the truth, they can then overcome their deception. John 8:32 (NKJV), “And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” John 17:17 (NKJV), “…. Your word is truth.” Jesus spoke YHVH's words of truth, and those words will set us free from the deadly deceptions. When a person knows the truth about an issue, it will set them free from being deceived on that issue.
The word ‘deceive’ and ‘deception’ and other forms of those words, appear 169 times in the Bible. It is a major issue. Matthew 24:4 (NKJV), “And Jesus answered and said to them: “Take heed that no one deceives you.” Matthew 24:11 (NKJV), “Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many.”
There will be many deceptions given by many false prophets according to Jesus, and of course he is speaking of religious deceptions. Surprisingly enough these great deceptions are coming from within the Christian Church. And those false prophets in the Christian Church are deceived themselves. And because of those deceptions, many will be deceived and it will cost them their eternal lives. But fortunately we have been warned. But if we will pay attention to Jesus’ words of truth and take heed to His warnings we can avoid being deceived ourselves. This book will address the deceptions coming from within the Christian Church and how to avoid them, from Jesus' own words.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Jul 22, 2021
• ISBN: 9781257830671

Book preview

Donald Werner

7/22/2021

Copyrights

The Great Deceptions of the Christian Church

Copyright © 2021 DONALD WERNER. All rights reserved.

Published by DONALD WERNER

ISBN #: 978-1-257-83067-1

Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.  All Scriptures, unless otherwise marked are from the NKJV.

Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved

Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, English Standard Version® ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved. 

Scriptures taken from the New American Standard Bible (NASB)

Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation

All bolding, highlighting, underlining,, italics, parenthetical inserts or other emphasizing of the Scriptures is mine.

THE PREFACE

What is a Deception? A Deception is when somebody gets you to believe a falsehood or a lie as truth.  The deceived person then considers that falsehood to be the truth.  It should be noted that the deceiver isn’t necessarily malicious, they themselves may be deceived and they are passing on their deceptive truth to another.

Obviously, those who are truly deceived don't know they are deceived, that’s the nature of deception.  So, those who are deceived will not look for the real truth because they believe they already have the real truth.  However, if they are open to hearing the real truth, and they may come to see that what they were originally told is not the truth, they can then overcome their deceptions.   John 8:32 (NKJV), And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.  John 17:17 (NKJV), "…. Your word is truth."  Jesus spoke YHVH’s (YAHOVEH) words of truth, and those words will set us free from the deadly deceptions.  When a person knows the truth about an issue, it will set them free from being deceived on that issue.

In the Book of the Revelation we read about some who overcame their deceptions because they found the truth.  Revelation 15:2 (NKJV), And I saw something like a sea of glass mingled with fire, and those who have the victory over the beast, over his image and over his mark and over the number of his name, standing on the sea of glass, having harps of God. They had the Mark of the Beast but they overcame it by embracing the real truth.

The word ‘deceive’ and ‘deception’ and other forms of those words, appear 169 times in the Bible.  It is a major issue.  Matthew 24:4 (NKJV), And Jesus answered and said to them: Take heed that no one deceives you."  Matthew 24:11 (NKJV), Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many.

There will be many deceptions given by many false prophets according to Jesus, and of course he is speaking of religious deceptions.  Surprisingly enough these great deceptions are coming from within the Christian Church. And those false prophets in the Church are deceived themselves. And because of those deceptions, many will be deceived and it will cost them their eternal lives.  But fortunately we have been warned.  Now if we will pay attention to Jesus’ words of truth and take heed to His warnings we can avoid being deceived ourselves.

THE INTRODUCTION

At the beginning of time, as we know it, God created the Heavens and the Earth and all that is in them.  God then created man and woman in His own image and placed them into the Garden of Eden. 

Being made in God’s image means that mankind was given the ability to thinking, had free will, and could make his/her decisions independent of any outside influences. Human beings are autonomous, vs. being programmed robots or as animals that act purely on instincts.  Love, trust, worship, and obedience are only honoring when they are given by the free will,

God desired for a close personal and loving relationship where His people submitting to His divine authority by their own free will – and for that He would continue to bless them.  However, in order for free choice decision to happen, God had to allow for the option of their rebellion against His authority.

So, to test their free wills, their loyalty to God and their love for God, God commanded them not to eat off the tree in the middle of the Garden.  That command was the test of their love, loyalty and submission to His authority.  But seemingly it wasn’t much of a test without some temptation, because if there was no temptation for the forbidden fruit, it wasn’t really a desirable option to choose.  So God allowed the serpent to come into the Garden to tempt Adam and Eve.  The Serpent would make that forbidden fruit a desirable option.

The passage in Genesis 3 tells us that the serpent was the ‘most cunning of beast’.  The serpent was a serpent beast.  And we read about that same beast in the Book of the Revelation.

The serpent beast’s goal in the Garden was to get Adam and Eve to reject God’s divine authority, and in doing that, the serpent would usurp God’s authority and he would then be Adam and Eve’s true god.  Obedience to our true god (whoever it is) is an act of worship.  So if the serpent beast could get Adam and Eve to obey him instead of God, they would unknowingly be worshiping the serpent beast.  That was the serpent beast’s ultimate goal.

The serpent beast’s strategy to achieve his goal was through deception.  All he had to do was to put doubts in Adam and Eve’s minds about God’s goodness and His authority, and then telling them that by rejecting God’s authority and eating the forbidden fruit they can be their own authorities knowing good and evil – i.e. their own gods.  They were told that God lied to them, when He told them that they would die if they ate the forbidden fruit.  The serpent assured them saying, ‘go ahead and eat the forbidden fruit and surly you will not die’.

Adam and Eve had two authorities giving them two different instructions.  One instruction was to not eat the forbidden fruit, and the other instruction was to eat the forbidden fruit.  The instructions were contrary to each other, Adam and Eve had to choose between them.  And they chose wrong.

We are all familiar with the story, we know that Eve fell for the deception and both Adam and Eve ate from the forbidden