False sons refuse to take instruction from the Lord. They refuse to acknowledge that the sin in their life is offensive to God. They use the excuse that they were made that way. They want to be saved IN their sin, but not FROM it. This is the reason we find so much hypocrisy in the Church. The unbelievers look at us and see no difference in our lives though we often mouth Scripture and would not dream of missing church on Sunday. How condemning this is. There should be a VERY CLEAR distinction between the believer and the unbeliever. Sin should have no part in our lives, nor should we make excuses for it. “Nevertheless, the firm foundation of God stands, having this seal, ‘The Lord knows those who are His,’ and, ‘LET EVERYONE WHO NAMES THE NAME OF THE LORD ABSTAIN FROM WICKEDNESS.’” (2 Timothy 2:19) In others words, do not take the Name of the Lord in vain. So clearly does the Bible speak about removing sin from our lives that we are told to “abstain from every FORM of evil.” (1Thessalonians 5:22) The word “form” means that which we see outwardly as opposed to what we are inwardly. We may have a bad temper, but we are to abstain from displaying it by the grace of God. We may have carnal thoughts and desires, but we are to abstain from acting upon them by the grace of God. Others should see us speak calmly in the face of abuse; they should see us shun magazines, movies, or TV that trivializes and glamorizes violence or sex. We should be seen as a light in a dark and perverted world.

            What we find all too often, however, is “ that the light is come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the light; for their deeds were evil.” (John 3:19) Our rebellion against authority, against rules and regulations is something we are all born with and it becomes increasingly evident as we grow older. We do not like anyone telling us what to do, even if it is for our own good, and even if it is God. When Moses approached Pharaoh to request releasing the Israelites from Egyptian captivity, Pharaoh made a statement that sums up man’s innate defiance to authority. “But Pharaoh said, ‘WHO IS THE LORD THAT I SHOULD OBEY HIS VOICE to let Israel go? I do not know the LORD, and besides, I will not let Israel go.’” (Exodus 5:2) At least Pharaoh admitted he did not know the Lord. False sons claim to know the Lord, yet still refuse to obey His voice. Whose sin is greater? After Jesus had healed the man born blind and the Pharisees had excommunicated him from the synagogue Jesus found him and revealed Himself to the man as the Messiah. He explained that He had come into the world to give sight to the blind and to blind those who claimed to see. Having said that, “Those of the Pharisees who were with Him heard these things, and said to Him, ‘We are not blind too, are we?’ Jesus said to them, ‘If you were blind, you would have no sin; but since you say, “We see,” your sin remains.’” (John 9:40-41) They would not receive instruction from Jesus because they believed themselves to be closer to God than He was; they refused to believe He was the Messiah for to do so would have required them to step down from their place of authority and give it to Him.

 It was the hypocrisy of the religious leaders that so incensed our Lord. The people looked to them for moral and spiritual leadership, but Jesus exposed them at every turn. The Pharisees took pride in their obedience to the written Law of Moses, but Jesus revealed their heart at the Sermon on the Mount. He told them, “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven; but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven. Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I NEVER KNEW YOU; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.’” (Matthew 7:21-23) They were false sons who refused instruction. They looked holy, they performed miracles, but Jesus never acknowledged them as belonging to Him or His Father. They betrayed that truth when they “cried out all together, saying, ‘Away with this man, (Jesus) and release for us Barabbas!’” (Luke 23:18) When Pilate asked what to do with Jesus “they shouted back, ‘Crucify Him!’” (Mark 15:13) They proved they were children of Satan rather than children of God. They could live with a robber and murderer - Barabbas - but they could not endure the presence of Jesus.

False sons have no desire to learn or hear the truth. They shut their ears when the truth is being spoken. It grates upon their souls and spirits like fingernails upon a blackboard. “‘Is not My word LIKE FIRE?’ declares the LORD, ‘and LIKE A HAMMER which shatters a rock?’” (Jeremiah 23:29) Evil, falsehood, sin are fuel for the Lord, “for our God is a CONSUMING FIRE.” (Hebrews 12:29) Just as we avoid or draw back from a flame or hot surface least we get burned, the false sons likewise cannot tolerate the presence of the Lord, who said, “I am the way, and the TRUTH, and the life.” (John 14:6) For the true sons of God, however, fire is never feared, nor is the presence of the Lord. Indeed, the fire only destroys that which binds us and the Lord joins us in our afflictions.

The story told in Daniel about the three Hebrew children who would not bow down to the golden idol Nebuchadnezzar created illustrates this truth most graphically. Nebuchadnezzar gave them an ultimatum - bow down to the golden idol or be BURNED alive in a fiery furnace heated SEVEN times hotter than normal. (Interesting that the number “seven” is the number for SPIRITUAL PERFECTION upon this Earth. It is the number for God.) They responded, “Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego answered and said to the king, ‘O Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to give you an answer concerning this matter. If it be so, our God whom we serve IS ABLE TO DELIVER US from the furnace of blazing fire; and He will deliver us out of your hand, O king. BUT EVEN IF HE DOES NOT, let it be known to you, O king, that we are not going to serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up.” (Daniel 3:16-18) This of course infuriated Nebuchadnezzar. He had them bound hand and foot and thrown into the furnace. What happened next astonished Nebuchadnezzar. “Then Nebuchadnezzar the king was astounded and stood up in haste; he responded and said to his high officials, ‘Was it not three men we cast bound into the midst of the fire?’ They answered and said to the king, ‘Certainly, O king.’ He answered and said, ‘Look! I see four men LOOSED and walking about in the midst of the fire WITHOUT HARM, and the appearance of the fourth is like a son of the gods!’” (Daniel 3:24-25) True sons of God, true Christians, will certainly face trials and tribulations in this life, but their purpose is not to kill us, but to FREE us. That which bound Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego, was all the fire was able to destroy. “Jesus therefore was saying to those Jews who had believed Him, ‘If you abide in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; and you shall know the truth, and THE TRUTH SHALL MAKE YOU FREE.’” (John 8:31-32)

What a contrast this is to the false sons who say they do not want to know the truth. They choose to believe lies. To false sons the revealed will of God, whether it comes through a preacher, a Christian, or even an unbeliever is to be avoided if possible and rejected if confronted. Facing the truth is uncomfortable to the flesh; it calls for decisions to be made; it requires the denial of self, of the soul, of the senses. Lying is wrong, yet how easy it is to lie when caught or accused of doing something we wish to hide; stealing is wrong, yet how easy it is to keep that extra change that was inadvertently given back when we have bills to pay; gluttony is wrong, yet how easy it is to abuse the body with food when we have been blessed with an overabundance of it; drunkenness is wrong, yet how easy it is to over indulge alcohol when the world glamorizes it; lust is wrong, yet how easy it is to have our minds saturated with immorality when sex is pushed upon us in the media and even schools; abortion is wrong, yet how convenient the world has made it; homosexuality is wrong, yet we are told to be tolerant of others.

The world, and false sons, false Christians, would have us believe that there are no absolute truths, that truth is relative to a situation or circumstance you may find yourself in. How many times have you heard, “I do not PERSONALLY believe in abortion and I would never PERSONALLY have one, BUT that does not give me the right to deny someone else the choice of having an abortion”? Really? Does that mean that as long as I do not PERSONALLY murder someone others should have that option or choice? Does that mean that though I may PERSONALLY not participate in a homosexual lifestyle others should have that choice? What happens when our society accepts polygamy, pedophilia, bestiality? Are they right or wrong? For now they are wrong because SOCIETY tells us they are, but what happens when society (and it will) tells us they are acceptable? If there is no absolute truth potentially nothing is wrong or off limits.

But the TRUTH is there are absolute truths. Just because we may not like them does not negate them. There are moral absolutes just as there are physical absolutes. Fire is hot and will burn. You may not want it too and a million people may tell you it is not hot and that it will not burn, but the TRUTH remains. Gravity always has a downward pull. We may not like it and there may be times when we WISH it were not true, but the TRUTH remains. No amount of arguments, anger, frustration, reasoning, or knowledge will change the NATURE of fire or gravity. You either live with the truth about fire and gravity or they may kill you.      

So it is with the Lord. The truth He has revealed in His Word and through His children down through the ages remains. There is no compromise. Listening to the arguments of the false sons is foolishness. “Behold, you are trusting in deceptive words to no avail. Will you steal, murder, and commit adultery, and swear falsely, and offer sacrifices to Baal, and walk after other gods that you have not known, THEN COME AND STAND BEFORE ME in this house, which is called by My name, and say, ‘We are delivered!’-- that you may do all these abominations?” (Jeremiah 7:8-10) False sons do not want to be told what is “right” (a FEMININE Hebrew word that means straightforwardness, integrity, truth) The soul, (will, emotions, intellect) which relates with femininity does not want to be told what to do or what to believe. Nevertheless, whether we like it or not, whether we agree with God or not, He has forbidden us from practicing some of those things that our fallen natures crave, but not to deny us pleasure or happiness which Satan has attempted to deceived us into believing. Rather, He has something better in store for us, but it takes faith and trust to receive it.

 Eve (representing the soul, Adam being the spirit), though she had access to the Tree of Life and God’s permission to eat of it, chose instead the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. Satan spoke unto her “pleasant words” (feminine - smooth, flattery) and prophesied unto her “illusions” - deceptions; the very things the false sons wanted. (Isaiah 30:10) God had told Adam and Eve that if they ate of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil they would die. That was God’s Word; that was the truth. Satan told Eve God did not mean what He said and that He was just trying to deny her and Adam a life they were entitled to. “And the serpent said to the woman, ‘You surely shall not die! For God knows that in the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.’” (Genesis 3:4-5) Eve’s soul, her will, emotions, and intellect, were stimulated by these words and the possibilities they promised. Satan was the original smooth talker. He knew exactly what this woman WANTED to hear. No doubt Adam and Eve had wondered why God would forbid them to eat of a tree that He had created and placed in the MIDDLE of the Garden, easily reached from any location. (This reasoning is used today about sex. God created it and gave me these desires. Why should I not fulfill them whether in marriage or not, whether homosexual or not?) All it took to get Eve to follow her will rather than God’s was a serpent telling her God was not being fair to her. Sin, today, is justified in the same manner. The desire to sin, to transgress, to rebel against God’s will is an innate part of our being, thus we search out those individuals or organizations that will tell us what we want to hear. “For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires; and WILL TURN AWAY THEIR EARS FROM THE TRUTH, and will turn aside to myths.” (2 Timothy 4:3-4) The truth is no longer desired. Lies and deception are WILLINGLY embraced. This should not surprise us. Jesus encountered the same spirit of resistance to the truth. “But BECAUSE I speak the truth, you do not believe Me.” (John 8:45)

There was a song several years ago that had the words, “Tell me lies, tell me sweet little lies”. Lies relieve the prodding of the conscience and the ignorance that we impose upon ourselves is bliss. Often we believe what we WANT to believe. “The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests rule on their own authority; AND MY PEOPLE LOVE IT SO! But what will you do at the end of it?” (Jeremiah 5:31) Often we do not want the truth and seek to kill the messenger in order to silence it. The true son, the true Christian is told, “Get out of the way, turn aside from the path, let us hear no more about the Holy One of Israel.” (Isaiah 30:11) Jesus nor Paul would “get out of the way” and this is why Jesus was killed by the religious leaders and why Paul faced such vehement hatred by the Jews. (One note about getting OUT OF THE WAY. Jesus said, “I am the WAY”. (John 14:6) and Paul said, “But this I admit to you, that according to the WAY which they call a sect I do serve the God of our fathers.” (Acts 24:14) Getting out of the Way literally would be moving away from Christ.) We too, if we are speaking the truth, not compromising our beliefs, will meet with hatred. In fact we are warned by Jesus that if we do not experience resistance because of our beliefs there is a possibility that we are a false son or prophet. “Woe to you when all men speak well of you, for IN THE SAME WAY their fathers used to treat the false prophets.” (Luke 6:26)

Standing up and speaking out on sin is never popular. Eve would probably not have listened to someone telling her that the serpent was lying because she very WILLINGLY listened to Satan. “When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit and ate; AND SHE GAVE ALSO TO HER HUSBAND with her, and he ate.” (Genesis 3:6) She reasoned within herself that the fruit could serve the legitimate purpose of food, that it was pleasant to look at, (no harm in looking) and that she would gain the very legitimate result of wisdom. Everything Satan said SEEMED reasonable and the fruit of the Forbidden Tree SEEMED to meet the same needs as the fruit of all the other trees, but God had said “No”. But what happens so much of the time is that we not only listen to the lies of Satan rather than the truth of God, but we also talk others into joining us in our sin. Lies are always more believable if someone else will join us. 

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