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Pointers along the way #766

Checking out new doctrines

- Jacob Ninan

We have to recognise the fact that it's becoming more difficult to live faithfully as Christians (2Ti.3:1 TLB). Many of us are going through tough situations, and it becomes more challenging when we can't find any explanation about what is going on. The situation becomes complicated when new teachings come up which appear to provide quick solutions. Let's look at a couple of teachings.

When there are inexplicable calamities happening in families, someone comes up saying that these are due to curses resulting from some ancestor's sins. They quote Deut.28 which lists examples of different curses that God would place on those who disobeyed His commandments in the old covenant. Since the present calamity resembles one of those curses, people quickly assume they are under a curse, and proceed to ask someone to break the curse. That person rebukes the devil and breaks the curse. Everyone seems to be happy. But did you just notice that according to Deut.28 God was the one to put the curse, and someone has just broken it by rebuking the devil! What about the fact that when we are in the new covenant of grace, our curses were taken away by Jesus and God has instead placed us under His blessings (Ga.3:13,14)? What about the fact that God has said He would not punish children for their father's sins (Ez.18:20)? Actually, it was not God who brought these calamities but Satan trying to trouble God's people and also bring deceptive doctrines in the bargain!

There are times when God gives someone supernatural faith and he speaks and it happens just as he said. There are other times when people spoke foolish things and Satan used that opportunity to make them happen. When people can't understand what is happening someone comes up with a teaching that our words have power and what we say will happen! Then they misquote Pr.18:21 and Jas.3:3-5. But we are just created human beings even after getting adopted as children of God and our words have no such supernatural power. If we really had such power, why is it that when we speak nothing happens almost all the time? But these people quote a few instances to prove this teaching, while they can be explained simply as from God or from Satan as said above.

The problem is, instead of taking God's word just as it is written, people are trying to fit the word into different situations. For example, if we take the plain teaching of God's word that God won't punish children for their father's sins, and He has taken our curses on Himself, we can be immediately start looking at other explanations instead. But many people get taken in by such teachings because they don't know the word of God themselves and because these teachers sound confident and have examples to show!

The solution is to get to know the character of God and see how new teachings reflect on His good, loving, gracious, compassionate, righteous, impartial nature. Don't swallow anything just because the teacher is famous!

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