Test The Spirits

0:00:00     How do I know who the Antichrist is? How do I know it’s not? You find out on the next podcast of more faith, more life. Hello everybody, and welcome to another More Faith, More Life podcast. What an important podcast is today. When we look at first John chapter four and it says do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they come from God, whether they’re from God. Now when we talk about spirits, automatically we begin to think of demonic spirits or just ghostly spirits or whatever, but that’s not what this means at all. So John here is when he says test the spirits, and by the way, this is the same John, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, same John that wrote the book of Revelation, John.

0:00:42      Now he wrote three small letters, 1st, second and third John. And this one is from which book it is, first John, I think, yeah, first John chapter four. And he says do not believe every spirit. And he’s not talking about demonic ghostly spirits, the spirits he’s talking about are the spirits of people. He’s talking about people. All right, for many, I’ll just grab my bible here. Difference, do not believe every spirit, okay, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God because many false prophets have gone out into the world.

0:01:20      Now let’s get a background on it so you can save yourself from this and protect yourself from what’s going on then and what’s going on now, which is the same thing. So when he says have many gone out, here’s what he’s talking about. There were people in his church and they disagreed on who Jesus was or is, okay? And so some came up with some false ideas and they came out from his church and went out into the world to convince people that live in the world that they are right, okay?

0:01:54      And that John’s church is wrong. Now I’m going to go with John on this, aren’t you? Because I mean, he walked with Jesus, he leaned on Jesus, he was know all through the miracles and the crucifixion, I’m gonna go with him, I don’t know who these other guys are, but anyway, so there was some question of who is Jesus? And one group would say, well, he was all human and another say, well, oh, he was all God, right?

0:02:20      And they would argue back and forth. And John’s point is, you’re wrong. He was with him, he says he was both because in order to represent you in the heavenly realm and in salvation, he’s got to be, shall we say it, kind of like you. So he became human, that’s what we celebrate at Christmas, right, Emmanuel, God has come to be with us and so he can represent us in the heavenly realms and in the kingdom of God.

0:02:48      So he’s all human or he couldn’t represent you. Right. It’d be like talking about the greek gods who were not human at all. They’re just gods, right? And then other ones would say, no, he’s all God and so he’s in this other realm and you can’t make him human. You’re lowering him. Whatever. Well, John would teach, it’s both. It’s both. He’s all God, so he can represent us. He’s all human so he can represent us. All, right?

0:03:20      So there was this arguments and there’s trouble. And these people left the church and went out and said, john’s church doesn’t know what it’s doing is wrong. And he says, you need to test the spirit. He says, because many false prophets have gone out in the world, and these are the people he’s talking about that are teaching the wrong representation of who Jesus is. And when you change who Jesus is or get the wrong theology, then we don’t know how to apply ourselves to who Jesus is.

0:03:51      Okay, I’ll keep explaining it to you. All right, so anyway, test the spirits. So when I was first starting out in Christianity, I’d see people that you got to test the spirits. And they go, they’d say to, I guess, into the wind spirits, demonic spirits. Are you from God? I remember. I’ll go ahead and tell you a funny story. When I was early on getting started, too, I went to a meeting, and afterwards they were praying for people and a woman came up to me and said that God had told her that she’s supposed to marry Elvis Presley, all right?

0:04:29      And there’s a problem with that because even then Elvis Presley was dead, is dead, and she’s supposed to marry Elvis Presley. And I’m looking at her like, I don’t even know what to say to this woman. And so I’m trying to talk to her. And then finally just let it go. And so I went to one of the other leaders that had been there longer than I had in this, longer than I had, and I said, told them what she’d said, I’m supposed to marry Elvis Presley. And they said, well, there’s a way to do.

0:04:55      So. They went up to her and kind of pointed a finger at her and said, do you believe Jesus is the Christ and you believe Jesus? She said, yes. Then it’s not demonic. She’s from God because she said, yes. Well, totally out of context. What this is is finding who Jesus is and then giving him the position of who he is, all right? He’s all human. He’s all God. He’s the king of kings. He’s the lord of lords. And today we need to give him that position of the throne in heaven, but in the throne of our lives.

0:05:35      The throne of our lives, all right? Because if he’s all God and he’s all man and he represents me, I got to give him his rightful position. If I do not do that, then none of this is going to work for me. And it’s confusing. Like, then you come up with people saying, well, religion or Christianity or church, it just doesn’t apply today to what’s going on today. I don’t know how to apply it. It’s just a sermon or whatever.

0:05:59      Listen, this book, you can apply it to you, and it will work for you and it will be powerful in your life, but not if you don’t understand this and you don’t test the spirits. All right? So he said, this is the spirit of Antichrist that does not recognize and acknowledge who Jesus is. But it’s not just saying, well, Jesus is the Messiah. Jesus is the savior. No. Who Jesus said he was. Who did Jesus say he was? He said, I came from the father.

0:06:30      I came down. I was up there first. I’m in the godly realm. And I came down and became human and took all that to represent. So we have to give him that position. He is now the king of kings, the lord of lords, and he has that position. He has a position in my life. All right? So those that would not give him that position, they would say whatever they say needed to be tested. Said, listen, because. Just because they come to you, isn’t it so amazing?

0:07:02      I’m going to take my bible again. Do not believe every spirit. And they’re not talking about flying around ghost spirits. It’s talking about humans that go around and preach certain things, don’t believe everything they say, don’t believe it just because it’s religion, just because they have a cross on the church or they’re friendly people and they hand you something or offer you this or that. Don’t believe every spirit, because not everybody is understanding the position of Jesus. If you don’t give him the position and that acknowledges that Jesus is from God, says, this is the spirit of Antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is already in the world. He’s already in the world. 2000 years ago, antichrist all right, so a lot of people are going to miss this because millions of people around the world are looking for the Antichrist.

0:07:56      And by reading the book of Revelation that John wrote. Yes, but what about what John wrote here? All right? And so they’re making the Antichrist a person, and so they’re looking for this person, Antichrist to come. I told our church the other day, I said, listen, I’m not going to do that. That’s not scriptural for me, all right? I’m not looking for the Antichrist to come. A lot of people are doing that, and they try to scare you and frighten you into serving Jesus or coming to church or whatever, or being a good person, because you don’t want to get mixed up with the Antichrist, do you? And that’s not the reason you do all this stuff and the things that we do.

0:08:35      And so the spirit of Antichrist does not give Jesus his position. Do you understand? In heaven, Satan, Lucifer was the name before Lucifer, who became Satan, was kicked out of heaven. Do you know why? Because he says, I will sit on that throne. And the throne was reserved for Jesus, and he wanted to sit on it, and it wasn’t for him. And he ended up leading a rebellion and got thrown out. That’s how he came to the earth.

0:09:05      And so you can’t believe every spirit because they’re not giving you the true story of where Jesus is supposed to be in position in your life. Okay? And so they’ll talk Jesus. They’ll believe Jesus. They’ll say Jesus. But the key to it here is giving him the position. So he called them Antichrist because they went out from his church and they were preaching a Jesus that wasn’t the right one, if we can say that, the right realization of who he is.

0:09:40      And so they went out and we’re preaching that he says, so test the spirits. Because they were infiltrating the church, trying to get people to leave with them, test the spirits. So you have to acknowledge everything about Jesus, not just, well, I believe he’s real. I believe he died for my sins. Great. Those are all great things. But you have to take the total package of he’s everything. He said he was everything.

0:10:06      Zion, was it. You and I, maybe, or whoever, had a discussion last week, whenever about somebody said, well, I just believe Jesus was a good man. Somebody was talking to somebody. And I said, how can you say that? Because either he was God is God, or he lied. He said, I came from the father, right? He said, I’m the only way the only way to the father is through me. And so either he can’t be good and be a liar at the same time. So is he God or is he not?

0:10:39      And if he is, then why don’t you serve him? You got to serve him and give him the right position in your life. All right? Now, knowing that there are people that you cannot trust, you need to test the spirits, and you test them by who is this person and talking to me? And where and how are they placing Jesus in their own lives? But how are they describing the position of Jesus in my life? All right, so what we have today, first of all, let’s back up in something. You understand? Let’s back up to high tech. All right? What does high tech do today?

0:11:21      I’m sure you have a phone. And isn’t it amazing? I was sharing. I typed something in, or I saw something. Oh, that’s interesting. And I watch it, and I was watching about these generators and about these products of, if the grid goes out, you need this product and you need this radio. And I was looking at those things just for fun, basically right now, at least. And all of a sudden, I’m getting all these stories, not ads, not advertisements, but all these people talking about these products, one right after the know.

0:11:55      How do they do that? Well, they profiled me, didn’t they? High tech does. High tech profiles you to see? What do you like? What are you reaching for? What articles do you read? What makes you push that button? Like, what makes you follow? All those things are being recorded. So then after that, they’ll take the information about you and use it to attract you to what you say your need is. Your hurt is, your interests are, your past is, or whatever.

0:12:25      Okay? And so they’re profiling you. All right. Now, the church then, religion today, has picked up on that, and it sounds good, but you need to test the spirits. Is it from God? So what happens is, and I know we train younger pastors. I know they just kind of copy everybody else. And this doesn’t mean they’re bad people. It means they just got bad theology and nobody taught them, and yet they’re in the ministry or they’re in the church or whatever.

0:12:58      Okay? So we back up and understand who is Jesus and who is this person giving Jesus that position in my life? Well, what the church has done, what religion has done, I should say, too, is they’re profiling you just like high tech does. And so this is what they teach. And so you need to get in, and I need. Let’s just talk about me. So I need, as a pastor, I need to find out how you’re hurting. I need to find out if you’ve been divorced. I need to find out how many children you have. I need to find out your income level, kind of where you live and all those things about you. All right, profile you.

0:13:37      Then I’m going to reach into your life based on your profile. I’m going to win you. I’m going to make you nod your head and like me or come to my church or join this, do this because I’m going to profile you and then find out, oh, I see. You’ve been divorced and you’re hurting. You’re a single mom, single dad. You’re struggling financially. You don’t know whether life is worth living. Okay, I got all that about you now.

0:14:06      Now I’m going to take that and I’m going to start ministering to you based on that and say, okay, I’m going to start a group for you and we’re going to have divorced people are going to meet and they’re going to love on you because we know you’re hurting. So come to our church. We’re going to have a group for this, and we’ll teach you this. We’ll have a cooking class. We’ll have this class, and we’ll put you with the right people. We know you’re hurting because we care about you, because we’ve profiled and we realize by asking you questions, putting them in our computer, pulling up your name, and then I see your profile, and then I speak into your profile, all right?

0:14:44      So what it is, is it’s psychological, all right? It’s psychological religion, all right? It’s getting into your psyche, it’s getting into your mind, your heart, your hurts, all that. Now, it sounds good because it sounds like, well, that’s what we do, isn’t it? We help people. We help their hurts. Yes, we do. And I’m not even against that asking. We’re going to do that. We may ask you a little bit about you.

0:15:10      Who are you and what’s going on in your life, because we do want to help you. All of us do, right? But it’s the second level after finding out about all your hurts is what I do with it, all right? Because the key, listen, the key to the power of God and the freedom from God is getting you to give Jesus the right position in your life, right? He cannot be equal to soccer. He cannot be equal to sports. He cannot be equal to food, club or whatever.

0:15:41      He’s got to have the highest position. And you serve him. You serve him. He helps you. Yes, but you serve him and you serve him. And once you become the servant, what does he want? What is he saying? What’s God saying? What’s the spirit of the Lord saying? And you’re going to help meet that need. All right, now you’re on right track because you’ve given Jesus the higher position. All right, now let’s talk about the Antichrist.

0:16:10      If you understand the Antichrist. John said, the same john that wrote the book of Revelation says the spirit of Antichrist is already in the world. So he’s not talking about a person. Could that be like Antichrist everywhere? Right? He’s not talking about a person. He’s talking about a theology. He’s talking about a teaching that teaches a different level of Jesus or position of Jesus, right? And so there you go. So you go to a church, oh, it’s so loving.

0:16:39      And you go away like, hey, it’s all about me. This church is all about me. They spoke right into my hurt. They spoke right into my need. They get me. They’re serving me. They’re lining me up. Okay, I get it. That’s all right. But if you do not give him the position that you’re serving him, then that’s the spirit of Antichrist. But listen, Antichrist means a couple of things. First of all, it means opposed to Christ, the Messiah, opposed to the messiah. All right, all right. We get that, and we pretty well get it. There’s a lot of things that are against Jesus in the world today, right? Okay.

0:17:19      But the true and strongest meaning for us is instead of Christ. Right? Listen, what he said when he was in heaven, he said, I will sit on that throne instead of you. He knew it wasn’t for him, but I’m going to do it. I’m going to force my way, and I’m going to sit on the throne. Well, that got him thrown out of heaven, as I said. But that’s where it is. It’s the position instead of Christ. All right? Now, what churches are doing today and what religion is doing today, that’s hurting us, it may be well meaning people because somebody taught them how to do this.

0:17:56      Let’s help people. Right? But the idea, it doesn’t work. That’s the problem. You can be sincere as you want to be, and you can get them in your church by pulling on the strings of their hurts, confusion, right. Their path. You pull on those strings and you get them in the church. Right. All right. That part’s okay, somewhat. But it’s got to change from being psychological and out of the profiling. See, the kingdom of God is transforming us, changing us, not continually helping us through our hurts, but changing us so we don’t hurt.

0:18:34      Right. And so we need to understand what the gospel is. Right. I’m not looking for the Antichrist. That’s not even scriptural as a Christian like I’m supposed to be. It’s the Antichrist. And a lot of churches are scaring people into serving and coming to church by saying, well, if you don’t, you’re going to end up in this great, terrible tribulation. You’re going to miss God, you’re going to miss it, and you’re going to be in the hands of the monster Antichrist. Who’s coming? He’s coming.

0:19:04      He’s already here. How is he here? By the wrong position. He wants to be in your life instead of Christ. He’s the instead of Christ. Right. Antichrist. But the slyness of it is the position that the churches and religion, and not everybody, of course, you understand generalization is giving you so that when we walk away on a Sunday morning, let’s say, and we go and we have to eat or we go home or whatever, we have put. The position of that service was putting you in position.

0:19:41      You are the one leading your life, all right? You’re the leader of your life, and we’re going to help you feel better about you. We’re going to make you feel better about your past, better about your circumstances, all right? But it doesn’t transform you. It doesn’t change you because it’s out of position, you see? And so the spirit of Antichrist is the instead of Christ. So if you’re listening to someone, it says, don’t believe every spirit, don’t believe every person that’s giving you this. Make sure it’s theologically correct.

0:20:15      And listen. Where are they putting Jesus? Are they putting me on the throne? Are they making me the. Instead of Christ? Are they saying. Making me the leader of my life and Jesus is my helper? Jesus is my encourager and my comforter? Yeah, through the. Yes, yes. But that’s not where you’ve got to stay. You’ve got to enthrone him. Otherwise we stay on the throne. We enthrone ourselves instead of Christ.

0:20:51      And with that, that is the spirit of Antichrist. So we can have many antichrists in churches today, many in the pulpits today. Not bad people, bad theology. That’s keeping us in bondage for 30 years. Now Christianity has taken over. Radio. The radio stations. You just go across the dial. There’s Christian tv everywhere, Christian music everywhere. Christian products everywhere. Churches everywhere.

0:21:22      Huge churches. Some of the most magnificent buildings in a city are the churches, right? And millions of people attend. But guess what? Look at our country today. We’re no better. Are you in a better position spiritually or just personally than your grandparents or your parents? So you have your grandparents and your parents and now you, and then your kids. And it just gets worse and worse. We get more in debt, more hurts, more saying, you don’t understand me, more divorce, more conflict, more just hurt and confusion inside of us.

0:22:01      And today, people don’t know who they are, right? They’re searching for their identity. But my identity doesn’t come from me. Where does it come from? I identify myself with somebody else. I identify myself with Jesus. I identify myself with the king, the messiah, the savior. Yeah. That’s my identity. Right? So I’m not trying to find myself. I’m not trying to find my own identity. He is the king. I enthrone him. So now he’s the boss.

0:22:31      He’s the boss. He’s the leader, and he’s the captain. He’s the champion. And so once I give him that position in my life, and I mean, seriously, do it, not just say it, not just sing it, really say it. Now, I’m going to get this right because I’m going to give him the position of he is the messiah of me as a human and as a universe, as God. Right now, I get free of the spirit of Antichrist. And so you can’t trust every spirit. So you got to listen.

0:22:59      You know what? They’re really nice people. I’m sitting across drinking coffee, and they’re really nice people, but all they’re doing is talking about me and my hurts, and we’re going to love you and we’re going to take care of. Okay. Okay. But who is Jesus to you? Who is Jesus? Who’s the Holy Spirit? Right? Who is the Holy Spirit to you? What’s happening with that? Tell me spiritual things. What’s going to happen in my spirit? What’s going to happen in the spiritual realm?

0:23:26      If I follow what you say? If I start coming to your church, am I going to get free of these things? Not am I going to be soothed? So I told him the other day, I said, what we have to watch today is churches today are excellent in soothing you but not saving you. You see, to be saved doesn’t mean to die and go to heaven includes that. But you could study the first century Christians. That’s not what they preached.

0:23:55      Trust me on that. Go look yourself. They didn’t preach. If you believe in Jesus and you were to die today, would you go to heaven? There’s zero in history that they ever said that. The early Christians, right, theirs was, do you believe in Jesus, the resurrected Jesus? Right? Do you believe in who he is and are willing to repent of who you are and how you’ve been serving yourself? And now can you become the servant? Because he’s all God, he’s all man.

0:24:25      He is the messiah of the world. He’s the savior of the world. And you give him that right position and you serve him and you worship him and you’re concerned and you’re listening and you’re being guided. It’s everything. He’s the center. Jesus is the center. Jesus is. And we sing about it. Jesus is the center of my life or whatever. But then you look at the people. Is it? No. Most everybody has enthroned themselves and are leading their own lives with God’s help, not with God’s leadership, not with God’s. As Jesus, as the Messiah of my life, as the leader of my life.

0:25:09      And so through the centuries, we’ve lost that totally. And the spirit of Antichrist then does not acknowledge who Jesus is in fullness. And that means everything he said about him, everything he said about himself. Do you believe that? Everything he said about himself, everything the Bible says about him, all right, through the New Testament. Do you believe all that? Do you believe enough that you want to serve him?

0:25:34      Because you have to. Because if he’s God and he represents me, then I need to let him represent me. I’m the human right. So the spirit of Antichrist is not looking for a monster, all right? It’s a theology. It’s not a person. It’s a theology that enthrones humanity, us, and is motivated by selfishness, self-centeredness, and all the things that Satan is. Remember, if you’re a big student of the book of Revelation or you love all that things about monsters coming out of sea and mark of the beast and all that’s going to happen to you if you don’t, so you got to stay right here or else you’re going to get the mark of the beast.

0:26:16      What is that? That’s no motivation. I’m motivated because I get the mark of the Lord, right? But the book of Revelation, get this, says the mark of the beast is what? Six. Six. And what is that? Is that the number of the Antichrist. No. You know what it says? That’s the number of man that people man. Now, in the book of Revelation, they were speaking of Antichrist more personally, but they had one picked out, right? And it was the Caesar there, the leader, the emperor of Rome.

0:26:58      And they labeled him because he was opposed, but he was the. Instead of Christ. He called himself God instead of God, instead of Jesus. Right? It was instead of. That’s why he got called Antichrist. And people have misrepresented that and said, oh, it’s one person. And it was not him. So that means maybe that one person is here today. Maybe he’s coming today. I better be afraid. I better find out who it is.

0:27:23      It’s a theology. It’s a system where it enthrones 6 6 6. It enthrones humanity as deity. I’m the God of my life. See, that’s the way to. You are the God of your life. You decide. You make all the decisions with God’s help. But that’s not the know, the early believers, or when Peter was preaching in acts, they said, what must I do to be saved? And that’s where we need to do. What must I do? Not what will the church do for me?

0:27:58      What will you do for me? I will do this for you. I’ll help your hurts. I’ll help your discouragement, I’ll help your path. I’ll help you get. But you don’t change. You get help. You get soothed, but you don’t get saved. So you need to listen to every spirit. You need to listen to sermons. If you’re going to go to that church, be honest, listen to it. Is this about Jesus or is this about six six six me?

0:28:24      They’ll throw in scripture. They’ll profile you. If you love, they’ll find out all your hurts, and then they’re going to get you in their group by talking to you. And we care about, we understand your hurts. Okay, I get it. We should. But if it ends there, it’s not the gospel. It’s the spirit of Antichrist. If it keeps you on the throne instead of Christ, are you getting that powerful? It’s important, and very few people will probably have the guts to tell it to you. But I did.

0:28:54      That’s what it is. And that’s the true theology of John, who also wrote the book of Revelation. Well, I hope you’ll go to more faith, more life, and see some of the things I got there. I got a new CD. We have books there. We have, if you only knew. A guide to the clueless generation. Get that guide. Because this sort of plays into this whole clueless thing. You can go to church your whole life, never experience the living God, but you will experience psychology and concern and all these things. But it’s not the power of the spirit that will change you.

0:29:32      It just soothes you to be able to accept all the things that are going in your life that are not helping you. Go to first John, chapter four. Or just read the whole chapter and realize this was the battle he was having in his own church. People that were being the antichrist by enthroning themselves and lowering Jesus to just humanity and not God. If he’s just humanity, we don’t have to serve him. If he is God, we better serve him, right?

0:29:59      All right, so go to the website, get some things, let this soak into you. Send a donation in if you haven’t ever done it, and let this message get out. This is freeing because we’re going to make Jesus Christ Lord. Till next time. Bye.