Strategies of Deceit, #2 | Mac Hammond
Recap
It goes against the grain of many people to even consider they could be deceived. They think to be deceived is an indication of a lack of intelligence or perception. But Pastor Mac says, “It doesn’t imply any of those things.” He says your behavior mirrors the things that you most strongly believe. In his second installment of his new series entitled, “Strategies of Deception,” Pastor Mac explains that if you believe something other than the truth of God’s Word, your behavior will produce death and cursing.
Dive Deeper
This is the second message in Pastor Mac’s new series entitled, “Strategies of Deceit.”
Behavior mirrors what you believe. Your behavior will produce either life and blessing or death and cursing.
Some people have the idea that God is God and He can do anything He wants. So if there is something negative going on in your life, then it must be what you need. That’s God’s way of handing out correction or chastisement. And that’s how they explain away the negative things that are happening in their lives. These kinds of different views of God open people up to the worst experiences imaginable.
The enemy tries to impress upon you the idea that the Word isn’t working for your life. Or maybe the Word isn’t true. Or maybe God’s mad at you. He might try to deceive you into thinking you don’t deserve God’s blessings. When you allow these thoughts to move you off the Word of God, you are deceived.
The most fundamental truth is the Word of God. It is a truth that is born in the spiritual arena. The moment you became born again, you became a spirit being alive unto God. The spirit realm is your primary arena of life, where you will exist eternally.
While you are on this earth, there’s another realm you will occupy physically called the temporal arena. The word temporal means “subject to change.” Everything in this realm will eventually die. Our bodies will die. Relationships die. Business efforts die. Finances can also die. Anyone living in this physical arena will be touched by death.
The good news of the Gospel is that if you’re born again, you’ve been delivered from this death realm. When Jesus was raised from the dead and took the keys of hell and death with Him, you were raised with Him. The Word says that when Christ was raised from the death realm, you, if you’re a believer, have been raised up together with Him.
For you to get back under the death realm, the enemy has to deceive you into believing that that’s the real realm of truth… not the Bible, which is a revelation of the eternal (or spiritual) realm.
Deception is getting away from the truth. When you are away from the truth, you’ll make decisions that aren’t good. In Deuteronomy 30, the Lord said, “I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life…”
He’s placed before us life and blessing, death and cursing. He said, “Choose life.” The choice is yours. God will not override your free moral agency. He didn’t make you to be an automaton.
God made you with the ability to choose your own destiny… to choose your path each day. Every choice you make in life will fall in one of two categories: life and blessing or death and cursing.
You can’t do anything to correct the areas of your life that are still being touched by death and cursing unless you examine your choices in the light of God’s Word. This is the moral and ethical standard that defines the Judeo-Christian ethic, that defines Western civilization.
Western civilizations are those that have been based on this ethic of behavior. America is the cornerstone of Western civilization. America’s founding documents were based directly and indirectly on the Word of God.
When making decisions about your life, you need to consider this: “What does God say about this?” The Bible has something to say about every aspect of human life. So the decisions you make every day need to be measured by the Word. Your life will experience life and blessing instead of death and cursing.
The enemy will not just let that happen. Because he is a defeated foe, the only weapon he has to use against you is deception. He will try to get you to believe something other than the Word of God.
The enemy will come at you solely for the purpose of contradicting the Word of God. He’ll use circumstance or unwitting people to influence you into believing something other than the Word. This is what warfare is all about.
Read about it
Deut. 30:19, “I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live.”
Galatians 6:9, “And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not.”