Rejecting Misconceptions

Many things can be said between the lines. When Satan said to Eve in the temptation in the garden of Eden about eating the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, he said, “You will not surely die. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil” (Genesis 3:4-5).

First of all, Satan gets Eve to doubt the word of God and consider it a lie. Satan is still attacking God’s word the Bible and has a great desire for people not to consider it the Word of the Lord. Adam and Eve did die spiritually and physically and were put out of the garden lest they also take of the tree of life and live forever in a state of death. (Genesis 3:22). God had a plan of redemption.

Secondly, Satan attacks God’s character and misrepresents God’s character. He lies about God’s character. Satan is basically saying God is selfish and is trying to have everything for Himself. He doesn’t want you to really enjoy the fulness of life, by having your eyes opened so that you can know good and evil by experience. He is denying you because God wants to manipulate you. However, God does not know evil by experience. That great corruption is known only by Satan and those who follow him. In a sense Satan is saying, sure you have experienced good but you have been denied evil. If you really want to live you should experience evil.

Thirdly Satan tempts Eve to be in competition to God like Satan himself. Satan is basically saying you can be your own God and man has been trying to and setting himself up as God, at least in his own mind, ever since. Man makes himself his own god.

Satan paints God, as Satan is himself. This is a great strategy of deception, which puts the focus on someone else, even though it may be a lie, a distortion and a misrepresentation. In rejecting God, people are accepting the devil.

Satan misrepresents God in your mind and in our culture. This is the way he competes against God. He wants to win at any cost. Many people have rejected a misrepresentation of God rather than the true God as He really is. They have huge misconceptions of God and are being deceived. They don’t even know the basics about God’s character.

Satan paints God as a major kill joy who doesn’t want us to have any fun. He says that sin is the way to have fun. However, this is an enormous lie. Knowing and loving God is the greatest joy of this life and the life to come. As God’s word says, “Thou hast put more joy in my heart than they have when their grain and wine abound” (Psalm 4:7). Or as the Bible states again, “Thou dost show me the path of life; in thy presence there is fulness of joy, in thy right hand are pleasures for evermore” (Psalm 16:11). There is not greater joy than truly connecting with God and His love, goodness and Holiness. God made you and He made you to be happy. Enjoying God is man’s greatest happiness. However, there is no real lasting happiness if not connected to holiness.

Satan also says your life will not count unless you are your own God. You don’t want God dictating to you and pumping up His giant ego by having you worshipping Him. Does God have a giant ego? This is certainly true of Satan. The cross of Jesus says no to God having a giant ego.

Another very common misconception today is to think God is a patsy. This is the thinking that you can use God and try to manipulate God and have God as a miracle working God at your command. Does God love you unconditionally as many propose. He loves the true Christian unconditionally, but He loves all other only without their merit. God’s love is unmerited. The reason that man can do any good today is because of God’s common grace in this world. Judgement day will remove common grace for the unrepentant. There will be an accounting of what you have done with common grace and God’s saving grace in Jesus Christ. Jesus came preaching, “Repent for the Kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matthew 4:17) The unrepentant will be cut off from God and all that is good in hell. This will be a self-inflicted punishment because the remedy is available to all people. Use God in this life and grace for you will be in vain. Man, also thinks that God is here to serve them, rather than primarily the other way around. We like the idea of Jesus washing our feet instead of responding like Peter and stating that he Peter, was not worthy to have God wash his feet. (John 13:6)

Sin brings consequences even for the true Christian. We refuse to exercise and we will have medical problems. If you think you can sin and there will be no consequences, socially, physically and spiritually think again. God will also discipline His children who continue in wilful sin. Think your getting away with it. Think again. (Hebrews 12:5-11) We are spurning grace when we sin willfully and then ask for forgiveness later. (1 John 1:9) Sin always brings consequences, especially if it is willful sin. Sin of omission are also very serious. (Mathew 25:35-40) We can be forgiven, but often there are consequences and corruptions that must be overcome. Don’t mistake God’s goodness and grace for weakness. Don’t separate God’s goodness from His holiness which is also incorporated in His holiness and His justice.

God could force His sovereignty upon us and we would have no choice, but God has given us free will and we can choose to love Him or reject Him. God however, humbled himself as God of the universe and came as a child and lived among us and allow His own creation to nail Him to a cross and this is and was God’s plan. God took the penalty for our sin on the cross to satisfy His own divine justice and goodness. This is the character of God. Would you reject this God? He invites us from spiritual death to life and connection with Him in a beautiful love relationship. Who in their right mind would reject this God. The only true God. God doesn’t force us but wins us with His love provision to a beautiful love relationship now and forever.

We can choose to worship Satan and thus sin and self, or we can worship the one true God. When we get down to brass tacks this is what it comes down to. We can pretend all day, but pretending does not make it reality. We are to reject the misconceptions of God but receive the one true God. Jesus is Lord. To be Lord in the Biblical context means to be God. Will you worship Him or Satan. Who do you love? Do you love sin or God? Who, will you spend eternity with? Satan and or God, both want you in relationship. Choose this day who you will serve. (Joshua 24:15) Your choosing will have very serious consequences.

We must repent of sin to receive Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord. In a sense you must forsake Satan and all of his ways and choose God’s. You must trust God instead of Satan and find your life in God. You must admit your sin has greatly offended a holy God as the cross portrays. Who do you love sin or God? In Him is fulness of life. (Colossians 2:10) Apart from Him is death and evil.

Receive God’s unmerited grace and come just as you are. Confess yourself a sinner to God. (Ephesians 2:8-9) Ask for His forgiveness and be willing to be a public follower of Christ and confess His death and resurrection and pray to receive Him as your Savior and Lord and then go on to grow in the Lord with diligence. Read and study your Bible, pray, fellowship with other Christians, find a good church, be baptized after conversion and love and serve the Lord. Why live in a misconception rather than in the truth in Jesus Christ? The truth will set you free. (John 8:32)