Matthew 7 - BEWARE!

No Compromise Radio. Thanks for tuning in to No Compromise Radio with pastor and author, Dr. Mike Abendroth. Today on No Compromise Radio, we'll be hearing Pastor Mike open the Word of God in a recent message he preached at Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston, Massachusetts.

Now let's join Pastor Mike in progress as he preaches through the scriptures, verse by verse, with no compromise.

False Prophets in Jeremiah 23 and Matthew 7

Now turn with me, if you would, to Jeremiah 23, verse 16. Thus says the Lord of hosts, do not listen to the words of the prophets who are prophesying to you. Well, that's interesting. They're leading you into futility.

They speak a vision. Now we get a little insight. They speak a vision of their own what? Imagination, not from the mouth of God. Show me somebody that doesn't speak for God. I'll show you somebody that says this all the time, because it's hard to get a big following if you don't say this.

How do you get a compact center in Houston filled to the brim with people? You say this, they keep saying to those who despise me, the Lord has said, now remember this is a false teacher saying, the Lord has said, you will have peace.

And as for everyone who walks in the stubbornness of his own heart, they say to the people as a false prophet, calamity will not come upon you, Jeremiah 23, 18. But who has stood in the counsel of the Lord that he should see and hear his word?

Who has given heed to his word and listen? Behold, the storm of the Lord has gone forth in wrath, even as a whirling tempest will swirl down on the head of the wicked. Oh, would you dare say, oh, peace, prosperity, safety, everything's going to be great.

God's not just love. He's a loving God who's also holy. Verse 20, the anger of the Lord will not turn back until he's performed and carried out the purposes of his heart. In the last days, you will clearly understand it.

I did, verse 21, not send these prophets, but they ran. I did not speak to them, but they prophesied. What would a prophet really say if he did stand before God? Here's the prophet standing before the great king and the king says, I'm going to discharge you into my realm.

Here's how I want you to speak. Verse 22, but if they had stood in my counsel, then they would have announced my words to my people and they would have turned them back from their evil way and from the evil of their hands.

Am I a God who is near, declares the Lord, and not a God far off? Can a man hide himself in hiding places so I do not see him, declares the Lord? Do I not fill the heavens and the earth? This isn't for comfort.

Sometimes omnipresence is for comfort. Here it's not. It's for conviction. Verse 25, I have heard what the prophets have said who prophesy falsely in my name saying, I had a dream. I had a dream. I went to heaven and wrote a book about it.

Oh, sorry. That's not in the text, but that's in Walmart. How long? Is there anything in the hearts of the prophets who prophesy falsehood? Even these prophets of the deception of their own heart who intend to make my people forget my name by their dreams, which they relate to one another, just as their fathers forgot my name because of Baal?

Verse 28, the prophet who has a dream may relate his dream, but let him who has my word speak my word in truth. What does straw have in common with grain, declares the Lord? Is not my word like fire, declares the Lord, and like a hammer which shatters a rock?

Therefore, behold, I'm against the prophets, declares the Lord, who steal my words from each other. You want to have a prophet who always says, thus saith the Lord, thus saith the Lord. Now, when God's speaking, notice how many times in this text, declares the Lord, declares the Lord, declares the Lord.

Verse 32, I am against those who have prophesied false dreams, declares the Lord, related them and led my people astray by their falsehoods and reckless boasting, yet I did not send them or command them, nor do they furnish this people the slightest benefit.

Just like Peter says, they are like clouds without water, declares the Lord. Friends, there are many, but they don't act like sheep. They sneak in. They're deceitful workers. What does 2 Peter 2, verse 1 say?

They smuggle things in. It's like crossing the border. They pack things up underneath the tour bus so the people don't see them, and they just sneak them in in a cunning, covert way to lead, no, to mislead.

And the bad news is, I think they look fine. You meet one of these false teachers on TV, and if you met him at the supermarket, you wouldn't go, run, kids. You'd go, oh, well-mannered, nice, seems to be true to God, seems to talk about God.

But let me give you something that's very, very important. It's not necessarily what the false teachers say. It's what they don't say. It's what they don't say that'll get you. You have to be careful.

Sometimes if you ever go to a church and you want to visit a church, say to yourself as you discern the church, be a Berean in the church, you say, here's what they said, but also I need to pay attention to what they didn't say, what they did and what they didn't do.

And here, what do they not talk about? I'll tell you what they don't talk about. They won't talk about unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees. They won't talk about Matthew, chapter 5, 48.

You have to be perfect to get into heaven. They won't say it's entered by the narrow gate or else. They don't say those kind of things. They want to please everybody. I mean, I can't believe everybody showed back up after last week's sermon.

I was ready for just the front row, a few folks. Who can build a church like that if there aren't real Christians there? So how do you build a fake church? You have to say nice things. Do you know, you should just sit down in your room and just have a little contemplation this week.

And here's what you should say to yourself. You know, I just can't get my arms wrapped around God. You're just so crazy about me. That'll fill a church. What is offensive to a sinner isn't spouted by the false teacher.

They'll say, God, Jesus is God. Jesus is going to come back. But it's what they don't say. There is a standard. And you, listeners of the false teachers, are wicked. You're depraved. You have no ability to turn and repent on your own.

When's the last time you heard a false teacher talk about depravity? When's the last time you heard a false teacher talk about God determined by his infinite wisdom that when Adam fell, you were in Adam, and what Adam did, you got credit for as well?

People don't want to talk about that. Nobody's going to criticize someone that's all love and all, you know, Jesus. What's wrong with this? The only thing we can learn from the cross of Christ is God's great demonstration of love.

Now, was it a demonstration of love? It was a wonderful demonstration. The demonstration of love. But that is not the only point learned from the cross. You have to realize that not just God loves his people and sent his son, but God hates sin, and he is willing to punish his own son.

There's substitution involved, a penalty involved. It's not what they say. It's what they don't say half the time. No repentance, no examining your own soul. I got an email from my friend this week, and he is a neat guy, and he's a lawyer.

And I said, would you please listen to my sermon last week in Matthew 7, 13 and 14 about the narrow road? Because I wanted him to listen to it and get saved. And he said, what did your congregation think when you said there are probably many people in this congregation who aren't Christians?

How did they respond? I guess I can say now most of them came back. Christians came back. Maybe some unbelievers came back. But my point is this. You don't say that if you want to get a lot of people to follow you.

I don't want people to follow me, by the way, and that's the nice thing about preaching the Bible. I want to have you follow Christ Jesus and his word. Oh, it's not really sin. It's kind of sickness. Satan is not really real.

Kind of a myth, but we get kind of a general, you know, he's bad. True prophets stand on the corner and say what? Wake up. Why would God send the prophet if everybody's doing the right thing? He sends prophets to say, listen, you're doing this, you're going that way.

I'm telling you, stop it. Turn the other way. When I used to teach our kids repentance, how do you teach an abstract thought of repentance to little tiny kids that are three years old? So I said, everybody stand up from the kitchen table, all single file line, begin to walk and keep walking until you hear me say something.

And when you hear me say this word, any word, the first word that I say, you turn around like this and begin to walk the other way. And you keep walking until I say the word again. And off we go. So, you know, the kids are like, you know, really, Dad?

You mean it? Yeah, okay. Walking. Repent. Repent. To turn the other way. God sends prophets to say, you're walking that way towards bail, towards universalism, towards Unitarianism. Turn. Paul said to the church of Corinth, they thought that they were following good people.

He says, for such men are false apostles, deceitful workers, disguising themselves as apostles of Christ. No wonder for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. Back to Matthew 7, 15, number three.

False Teachers Are Ravenous Wolves

The third, beware. The third, watch out. Beware, there are many false teachers. Beware, false teachers don't look like false teachers. Number three, beware, false teachers are like vicious wolves. Verse 15, beware of the false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves.

When you think of wolf, what do you think of? You should think of ferocity, aggressiveness. That's what you should think of. I think we've seen too many wolves in zoos, frankly. I did a little research on wolves, and here's what I'm going to try to do.

I'm going to try to make you be convinced that wolves are wicked and evil, and if you saw a wolf, you would run a run from a wolf, and I'm purposely going to shock. Wolves are apex predators in whatever ecosystem they're in.

Top dogs. Some up to 85 pounds. Wolves have scent glands between their toes which leave chemical markers behind so other wolves know where they are and how they can help navigate them. Wolves have long canine teeth capable of delivering.

I don't even know what these words, these synonyms stand for, but I'm going to read it as is. Capable of delivering up to 10 ,000 kpa's of pressure. They use their teeth for weapons, and they've got twice the bite of a dog in terms of pressure.

Wolves are so ferocious, so ravenous, so horrible, that if a wolf has a litter and there's some epileptic pups there, they'll thrash those pups to death right away. If there's another wolf that's been trapped in a trap or wounded by a gunshot, they'll immediately try to kill those other members of their own pack.

When a wolf sees a moose, it chases it, and it wants to bite or tear the haunches or perineum. It wants it to bleed there. Three bites will usually down a moose or a large deer. But they like sheep the best, and they can kill a sheep by either severing the windpipe or the jugular.

They like to grab the sheep by the neck, bring the sheep off to a secluded place, and then tear open the abdominal cavity while eating the sheep alive. Most especially, though, wolves like to attack pregnant sheep to eat the sheep fetuses while they leave the mother uneaten.

Jesus now says, these false teachers are wolves. Not some kind of zoo animal. They're wolves. More dangerous than dogs, more dangerous than hogs. They are thieves, and they want to try to kill. God has His sheep.

The wolves come. It's nothing new. Ezekiel says in chapter 22, her officials within her are like wolves tearing their prey. They shed blood and kill people to make unjust gain. And sadly, it's worse than just a wolf trying to get you, because you can die physically.

There's something worse than this. This is talking about spiritual death. How about this? Acts chapter 20. Paul said, Be on your guard for yourselves and all the flock among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to the shepherd of the church which he purchased with his own blood.

I know that after my departure, savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock. And from among your own selves, people will arise, speaking perverse things to draw away the disciples after them.

Therefore, be on the alert. Ravenous means in this context in Matthew 7, greedy. They just can't get enough. They're violent. And these wolves literally roam the hills and valleys around Israel, and so too do the false teachers roam.

That's why on a side note, if you think you're, and I don't think you are today, because you wouldn't be here. Solo Christians get eaten the first. Well, I'll have my TV church today, and I'll have my TV fellowship, and I'll give online, and I'll do all that other stuff.

You are wolf bait is what you are. Pirates don't look for the armada to attack. They look for the stragglers. Number four. Fourth, beware. You can discern them if you look at their fruit. Beware. You'll need to be discerning so that you can recognize them.

You need to be a fruit inspector. People all the time, oh, you shouldn't be a fruit inspector. Well, I don't know what religion that is, but it's not Christianity because Jesus says be fruit inspectors.

It's tricky. They deceive, but you can see what they're like when you look at their conduct, when you look at their creed, when you look at their characteristics, A .W. Pink says. And look at verse 16.

You will almost know them. No. You will know them by their fruits. Grapes are not gathered from thorn bushes nor figs from thistles, are they? He says, you know, when you go up to a plant, the best way to figure out what kind of plant it is is not to look at the roots.

I'll look at the flowers. I'll look at the leaves. I'll look at the bark. I'll look at what kind of birds sit up in those trees. What kind of animals eat those berries? No. The best thing to do if you want to figure out what kind of tree that is, I guarantee you, you look at the fruit, you'll know what kind of tree it is.

I found it fascinating. See the passage there in verse 16. Grapes from thorn bushes. Who would ever do that? Is this just metaphorical by Jesus? But many commentators say that there were certain kind of thorn bushes back in those days that had small, dark berries.

And if you were far away, you'd look at them and you'd go, Hmm, looks pretty good to eat. But they weren't good to eat. And if you were far enough away, maybe a certain thistle bush might look like it had something good to eat, like a fig.

But when you got close, you'd realize it has nothing to do with something good to eat. Jesus says you can see their fruit. Fruit is just figurative for their life, for their manner of being. What a person does, who he is.

Look at their character. Don't be tricked by their false words. If you want to try to tackle somebody with a football, or if you want to try to guard somebody who's got the basketball, you don't look at their eyes.

You don't look at the ball, kind of yo-yo around. When you want to try to be a good defensive player, you look at the midsection. Because it's kind of hard to duck and jive this. Some harder for others.

Some easier for others. Jesus is saying, don't buy into their words. Because their words are going to be nice. They might not be total. They might not say everything about the word. But they're going to be good, so watch what they say, of course.

But Jesus says, watch who they are. Watch their lives. It is a fact, it is a maxim, that what you are on the inside will come out on the outside. True? Who you are will be manifest in time by what you say or what you do.

By the way, that's another reason why you should have long-term pastors and long-term pastorates. Because anybody can just come in for a year or two and just blow smoke. What's the person's life like?

I can't judge their eloquence. I can't judge their persuasiveness. I can't judge their acumen. I have to judge, is it biblical? And what kind of fruit is the Spirit of God producing in their life? Jesus gives a positive in verse 17 and then a negative in verse 18.

The principle is found in verse 16, and now he gives a positive illustration of that principle, verse 17. Positively, so every good tree bears good fruit. The bad tree bears bad fruit. This is just that Hebrew way again of saying there's two choices, two roads, two destinies, two kinds of teachers, two kinds of fruit.

John Calvin said, Nothing is more difficult than to counterfeit virtue. Eventually, that volcano of false teacher has to blow its top and let the lava come out, and then you see what's on the inside. Oh, you can hide it for a while, but eventually.

And then Jesus says on the flip side, verse 18, A good tree cannot produce bad fruit, nor a bad tree produce good fruit. Some of the bad fruit we're going to look into, but we've run out of time. People twist scripture, some of their bad fruit.

They try to say Jesus isn't going to come back in 2 Peter. That's bad fruit. They're greedy, 2 Peter 2, In their greed, they will exploit you. Over time, you can watch. I watch this false teacher and what comes out of his life.

He's legalistic. He's controlling. He's manipulative. He's sexually immoral. He's greedy, and you just watch it. Just watch, because unbelievers cannot restrain the flesh. Eventually, their divisiveness comes out.

Eventually, their factiousness comes out. Eventually, their arrogance comes out. And Jesus says, You, of course, listen to what they say, but you also watch who they are and what their people become. Well, number 5, lastly, quickly.

The Judgment of False Teachers and the Need to Know Scripture

Fifth, beware. Beware, but also be encouraged. The false teachers will get their due one day. They'll be judged one day. So we need to watch out, but you don't have to try to get them all the time. Jesus is going to take care of that.

He says, verse 19,. Still language of agriculture, still language everybody would understand. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is what? Just discarded, put to the side for maybe another day. It is what?

Cut down, and if that's not enough, it's thrown into the fire. It's one thing if you just, you know, back in the Old Testament days, what would you do if you didn't really like someone? Well, you'd say, well, we'll bury them not in their home country, and then we'll also put an outhouse on top of their grave.

It's like that double whammy thing here. Cut them down and throw them into the fire. That's all they're good for. They're worthless, they're rotten. Cut them down. God did not spare angels when they sinned.

God did not spare the ancient world when they sinned. God did not, if he condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah, what will he do to false teachers? And then he says in verse 20,. So then you will know them by their fruits, what they say, what they do, how they act.

The best thing you can do if you're a Christian to find a false teacher is to know this book. I never say to myself, and it's not based on pride, it's not based on that at all. I say to myself, the Lord has let me know this book well enough that I will never be deceived by a false teacher's words again.

And I'll show you that in 1 John 2. Last passage, please turn there. 1 John 2, I want to encourage you to know this book. And when you know this book, you will easily spot satanic error. All kinds of error.

The error that we saw today in the text is when people say, Oh, salvation's not narrow, it's wide. But there's all kinds of other false teachers. 1 John 2. There are degrees of maturation for the Christian.

Yes, every Christian's justified. Yes, every Christian will be glorified. But as we learn in Christ and as we grow, there are levels to maturity. And John uses three. There are babies, they don't know anything.

They know their dad. They know their mom. There are young men, they are skilled in the Word and they know right from wrong. And then there are fathers who just have known God for so long. It's a very first-name basis.

It's very personal. You can know the Word. When I first read this, I was given so much encouragement, so much hope. I thought, I can know. 1 John 2 .12. I'm writing to you, little children, because your sins have been forgiven for His namesake.

If you're a Christian, even if you're an immature Christian, Jesus loves me, this I know for the Bible tells me so. You're a day-old Christian. My sins are forgiven. The thief on the cross, my sins are forgiven.

I'm writing to you, fathers, verse 13, because you know Him, this deep abiding knowledge and fellowship, because you've known Him throughout the years. It's been from the beginning. I'm writing to you, young men, because you have overcome the evil one.

I've written to you, children, because you know the Father. I've written to you, fathers, because you know Him who has been from the beginning. How do you know that you can overcome the evil one? Verse 13, the last part of verse 14.

I have written to you, young men, and certainly young women as well, but here's the text, is young men, because you are strong. How can you be strong when it comes to overcoming the evil one? Because the Word of God, what?

Abides in you, and you have overcome the evil one. We, at this church, have been blessed. We don't want to hear only smooth things. We want to hear from the Word of God. Be careful when somebody comes to you and begins to tell you what you want to hear.

It's like the New York City couple mailed two tickets to the smash Broadway hit. No sender's information, no address, no explanation, no identification. They went to the show. They thought it was a wonderful gift.

They loved the show. They came home that night, and they found that their home had been totally ransacked, looted. Furs gone, jewelry gone, money gone, everything gone. On the pillow was a little note.

Now you know. False teachers are just like that person. They give the people what they want to hear so they can extract from those people what they want to get. Beware. Let's pray. Thank you, Father, for these words.

Thank you that we can come to you and now ask that your Spirit may generously and liberally apply these truths to our heart. You've taught us from your Word that we are unable, physically unable, spiritually, to somehow try harder or to work these things out on our own.

We know we've been saved by grace, and we know we have the promise of sanctification by grace through the Spirit of God, and so we would ask that you'd help us to do that. We'd ask for Bethlehem Bible Church, the leadership levels that there would be, never a false prophet or false teacher.

We ask for the lay people as well, that we might be very discerning, and when someone comes in and they want to learn the truth, that we're kind and generous, but when they want to somehow talk about our Savior in a way that's demeaning or the Word in a demeaning way, that you would help us be young men, young women who are mature in the Word and we understand right from wrong.

We're thankful, Father, that at the end, we don't have to guard ourselves, we don't have to keep ourselves, we don't have to preserve ourselves. We have a great shepherd, the good shepherd, and that good shepherd, Jesus, has laid down his life for the sheep.

How different than the wolves, how different from the dogs. Thank you that that great shepherd is our shepherd, the shepherd of the flock, and how he's purchased us with his own blood and was raised from the dead.

In Jesus' name, amen.

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