The Great Deception — Denny Kenaston

Hello, this is Brother Denny. Welcome to Charity Ministries. Our desire is that your life would be blessed and changed by this message. This message is not copyrighted and is not to be bought or sold.

You are welcome to make copies for your friends and neighbors. If you would like additional messages, please go to our website for a complete listing at www .charityministries .org. If you would like a catalog of other sermons, please call 1 -800 -227 -7902 or write to Charity Ministries, 400 West Main Street, Suite 1, Ephrata, PA 17522.

These messages are offered to all without charge by the freewill offerings of God's people. A special thank you to all who support this ministry.

Amen. Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings, God has perfected praise. Thank you, Brother Larry and your family. Thank you for being brave soldiers. Well, it's been a joy to be here already this morning.

My heart has been blessed and edified. We just magnify the Lord for all the beautiful things that He's doing. We magnify the Lord this morning for the privilege we have to gather together like this. We thank God for the singing.

We thank God that He loved us so much that He inspired thousands of songs that we can sing. And though we don't have a hymn history on all the songs we sing, you can be sure the ones that we sing, if you knew the history, you would see beautiful marks of inspiration on every one of them.

Because it's God. It's God gifting us with precious hymns. So, we just thank God for every part of the service. And we thank God for this part of the service, for the preaching of the Word this morning.

My heart has been refreshingly remembering the wedding yesterday. I know that not all of you were here at the wedding, but it was a real blessing to witness the vows of Brother Lee and Sister Sarah, which took place here yesterday.

And we thank God for the sweet, simple, holy wedding that was here yesterday. Blessed be God.

The Great Deception and the Danger of the Last Days

The title of my message this morning is, The Great Deception.

The Great Deception. We live in dangerous times. It seems there are deceptions on every side. False teachers abound. There are so many of them in this our day, that at times it causes our hearts to tremble that there are so many false teachers that have gone out into the world.

There is a deluding mixture of truth and error, even in the churches today. And the world is even calling to us in the name of Jesus. Now many things that were unholy in days gone by have been sanctified with the name Christian.

We live in days of deception. When Jesus, our Lord, walked upon the face of the earth, He warned us of the deception of the last days. Those were some of the last words that He said to His disciples. Take heed that no man deceive you.

Now I'm greatly concerned about all of these deceptions which we find in our world today. And I know that not a few of us, we tremble at times as we see the deception and read the warnings in the Bible, and even hear words like, if it were possible, they would even deceive the elect.

These kind of words cause us to tremble as we look ahead and wonder, sometimes even saying the words,.

Lord, how will I make it?

If He didn't make it, how will I ever make it? I'm greatly concerned about all of these deceptions. Yet I would have to say that as a pastor, I'm praying continually to know how. How do you guide the flock through all of this deception?

Through these, what 2 Timothy calls, perilous times. How do you guide the flock? How much do you say? How specific do you get? How strong do you make the warnings that you give to the sheep? All of these things, you know, they go through the heart of a pastor.

And as you move around, you see this slide that is taking place. And I must say, it's a slide that is happening everywhere. Every major denomination is being affected and infected by this slide that is taking place.

And, you know, as a pastor, you think, now God, what counsel can you give to the people? How do you guide them in such a way that they will not also be caught up with that same sliding that's taking place into the world around them?

Self-Deception as the Root of Other Deceptions

But as I ponder all of this, this end time deception, God brought it to my heart, some of the best counsel that I can give to you is to warn you and alert you to the dangers of self-deception. The great deception this morning, brothers and sisters, is not the Antichrist, though he is a deceiver and will be a deceiver, and many shall yield to his deceptions.

But this morning, brothers and sisters, the great deception is not the Antichrist. It is not the false prophets who have gone out into the world deceiving and being deceived. It is not the TV evangelist, my brother, my sister, who wears a $1 ,000 suit and has a $5 ,000 diamond ring on his finger.

These are not the great deceptions that we live in today. It is not the religious, worldly mix of pseudo-Christianity. This is not the great deception. The great deception, my brother and sister, is self-deception.

Self-deception is the mother of all other deceptions. And as I ponder that whole thing, and I think about it in my own heart, and I agree and my heart unites with some of the thoughts and words that many of you have said from time to time, how will we ever make it?

I think maybe we might have an answer here this morning. Self-deception is the mother of all other deceptions, and the cause of them all. So this morning I feel led of God to give you some counsel on self-deception.

And I believe it's some of the best medicine that we can take in order to alert ourselves, in order to immune ourselves, in order to cure ourselves of the deceptions of this land that we live in and the age that we live in.

The Deceitful Heart in Jeremiah

I'm reminded of the words in Jeremiah that we all know very well, but let me read them to you this morning in Jeremiah 17, where Jeremiah, in the middle of one of his sermons, one of his prophecies, said these words,.

The heart is deceitful above all things, above the Antichrist, above the false prophet, above the worldly, mixed-up Christian church today. The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked.

Who can know it? The answer to that question is found in the next verse. The Lord searched the heart. I tried the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings.

Yes, the heart is deceitful above all things. Who can know it? And I'm sure that every one of us have had those times in our life, those times of self-revelation, when we had to say those very words and say,.

Ah, I didn't even see it. I didn't even know my heart. I can't believe that.

How could that have happened? Ah, the heart is deceitful above all things, desperately wicked. Who can know it?

Who can know it? God knows it. God knows it.

And you can know your heart, if you open your heart to the revelation of God, and allow Him to try it and prove it. You can know your heart. Oh, that God would grant us all the humility to acknowledge this verse from the depths of our own souls.

Yes, I know, we can all acknowledge it in our head. We can all shake our head to that and say it's true. But oh, that God would grant us the humility to acknowledge this verse from the depth of our soul.

My heart is deceitful, and I don't know it. I think this morning of the illustration of the Corinthian church. There they were, had some good things going for them. Blessed times of the Spirit of God.

They had gifts in the church. God was bringing forth prophecies in the church. There they were, glorying in the things that God was doing. There they were, rejoicing. They were zealous about their gifts, and assuring their hearts that all was well.

That's the Corinthian church. Yet, while all of that was taking place, and they were rejoicing, and they were shouting, and they were blessing God for all of His goodness to them. There was division among them.

There was carnality among them. There was fornication among them. There was brother going to law against brother among them. There was distorted communion among them. And there were false doctrines among them.

To the point where Paul had to say these words to them. Your glorying is not good. Your glorying is not good. Paul was saying to the Corinthian church, you don't see yourself right. You do not see yourself right.

He had to admonish them to repent. And we thank God for the record that is written in 2 Corinthians. As they responded to the fatherly challenge and rebuke of their apostle Paul, they took his letter as a wake-up call.

They grabbed a hold of his words and his challenges. They opened their heart to the reality of where they were really at, and acknowledged their transgressions, and broke their hearts to such a place that Paul could say to them, they had godly sorrow not to be repented of.

Beautiful words there in 2 Corinthians chapter 7. That was Paul's encouragement to the Corinthian church, because they received a baptism of honesty when they read his letter, and said, you're right and we're wrong.

Laodicea and Corporate Self-Deception

I think of the book of Revelation there, and the letter that was written to the church, the church at Laodicea. And I want you to know this morning that it was a church. This wasn't a letter written to the heathen, although one would feel a bit like it was written to the heathen when you see the deception that they were under.

But it was not written to the heathen in Laodicea. It was written to the church at Laodicea. There in Revelation chapter 3 and verse 14. And unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write, These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God.

I know thy works. There it is again. God is the one who knows. I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot. I would thou wert cold or hot. So then, because thou art lukewarm and neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my mouth, says God.

I will, church at Laodicea, spew thee out of my mouth. Why? Because you are lukewarm. Why are you lukewarm? Verse 17 gives us some insight into why it was a lukewarm church. Because thou sayest, I am rich and increased with goods and have need of nothing.

And knowest not that thou art wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked. Now if you study the history of the Laodicean church and the history of the city of Laodicea, you will find out that they were not just saying, I am rich.

They were rich. They had money in their back pocket. They had all the things they needed. They had a well padded billfold. But God said, you just think you are rich, you are not really rich. You just think you are increased with goods, but you are not increased with goods.

You are not seeing your life or your heart the right way. And God gave counsel to the Laodicean church in verse 18 and said, I counsel thee to buy of Me gold tried in the fire. Throw your gold away and get some gold that's tried in the fire.

That thou mayest be rich and buy of Me white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed, and that the shame of thy nakedness do not appear, and anoint thine eyes with eye salve that thou mayest see. Now God is challenging them here on their spiritual perception.

He is telling them, you've got the thing all wrong. In your heart you are the epitome of self-deception. You've got money. You've got your clothes. You've got all kinds of nice things. You are increased with goods and you're sitting around patting each other on the back for the nice and soft and beautiful life that you have and you think that you have need of nothing.

But I'm telling you this morning, you have great need. You are poor and rich and naked and blind. Now that's quite a different evaluation than they saw in themselves. I just cite this as an example of the great deception which is self-deception.

They were deceiving their own hearts, weren't they? They were deceiving their own hearts. We are increased with goods. We have need of nothing. We are pretty good. God help us. Have mercy on our souls.

I know, it's alright to be excited about church. It's alright to be excited about your church. It's alright to want to come to church. It's alright to rejoice in the good things that God is doing. Oh, may God deliver us all from the self-deception, the corporate self-deception of somehow thinking we have...

How Deception Gradually Leads Away from Truth

Oh, we have not arrived. We have not arrived. What does it mean to be deceived? The word means... The word deceived is to believe what is not true. To believe what is not true. When you believe something, you put your confidence in it.

And imagine putting your confidence in something that is not true. Deceived. It means to roam away from the truth. To just kind of roam and wander away little by little, just wandering away from the truth.

That's what it means to be deceived. I want you to notice that. Nobody just runs away from the truth. No. We wander away little by little. A step here. A step there. A little compromise. Another one over here.

A little blinding of the eyes. And then some seeing, and then a little more blinding of the eyes, and staggering a little further away. And soon we find ourselves, five years later, in a different place.

It means to be misled by dishonesty. It means to slowly seduce out of the way. To be slowly seduced out of the way. To be tricked or cheated. Now, that's what the word deception means. And it's easy for us to look at those definitions and say, yes, yeah, the spirit of antichrist, yeah, that's what he will want to do.

That's what he will try to do. Yes, false prophets, that's what they will try to do. Yes, I can see how a worldly church would try to deceive me and get me to believe that which is not true. But may I just propose to you this morning and consider how easily the heart, the self-deception of our own heart, fits every one of these definitions.

It is very easy for our heart to believe that which is not true. Amen? How many of you have done it? I've done it. And afterwards thought, how did I? How did I fall for that? It is very easy for our hearts to roam away from the truth.

Prone to wander, says the song. Some people changed the song. They didn't like those words. But the fact of the matter is that many of God's people are prone to wander. It's easy for the heart to be misled by its own dishonesty and slowly seduced out of the way.

And we've all experienced it. So how does this great deception happen? Up until this point, we've just been speaking in generalities, kind of as an introduction to the message. But God doesn't leave this matter of self-deception in lofty generalities that float around up here and have no meaning to us people who live down here on this earth.

God doesn't leave it that way. We want to look at several clear areas in the Scriptures where this deception can take place and, yea, does take place probably more often than what we would like to admit.

Sin's Deceitfulness and the Gradual Loss of Conscience

The first place where we'd like to look is in the book of Hebrews. If you'll turn there. Hebrews chapter 3. We have one of God's revealings of the heart's ability to deceive itself. In Hebrews chapter 3 and verse 12 and 13, we find these sobering words.

Take heed, brethren. Take heed. Lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God. But exhort one another daily, while it is called today, lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.

How does this great deception take place? First of all, it takes place through the deceitfulness of sin. God clearly reveals to us here that sin is deceitful. Like the little song says, sin will take you further than you want to go.

And it will. It is deceitful. Ephesians chapter 4 and verse 22 speaks about being led by deceitful lusts. And that's quite a description of how our own hearts can lead us into paths where we don't want to go.

Because we have deceitful lusts. And those lusts deceive us. Our heart, through those lusts, deceives us and convinces us that it will be okay. It will be okay. Oh, it won't be that bad. Oh, it will just be once.

But sin will trick you and cheat you and lead you where you don't want to go. Sin does that. Sin, not dealt with. Brothers and sisters, clouds and quiets the conscience. It will cloud the conscience so you can't see clearly and quiet the conscience so you don't hear that voice so clearly.

Sin does that when it's not dealt with. Then, sin not dealt with will allow more sin to come into the life. And more sin clouds the conscience and quiets the conscience. And it's a never-ending circle that takes place.

And it can end in absolute misery and even destruction for any of the people of God. It can end there. Sin says, you can play with me and not get burnt. Sin says that. You can play with me and not get burnt.

Sin says, you can experiment and you'll be able to stop once you've tasted a little bit of me. But sin is deceitful and sin will take you further than you want to go. I promise you it will. Sin is deceitful.

It will encourage you to go a little further and then you'll be able to stop. It will encourage you just one more time and then you can quit. But the bottom line, fact of the matter is, you will go again and again and again and again.

All the while, while sin is telling you it's who can get right later.

Just one more time and all the while, while it sings its sweet song to your soul, it becomes a cord that binds you tighter and tighter and tighter and tighter. Oh, how well we remember the little children's lesson.

I've seen it a couple of times and I saw it over in Africa also where one man takes a rope. No, not a rope. A piece of thread. Just a piece of thread and winds it around and around and around and around an individual with his hands like this.

Oh, the lesson is so good, you know. You can wind it around there three, four, five, six times and that person will break those threads so easily. But as you go around and around and around all of a sudden you find yourself bound.

That's what sin does. It's the great deception, brothers and sisters. Antichrist, I guarantee it. It's the great deception. I think of the deception of Samson this morning. We've been groaning our way through the book of Judges in our family devotions and all the confusion and all the mixture and the flesh and the deception of the book of Judges.

And every man did that which is right in his own eyes. But in the middle of that context we find the example of Samson who had a call upon his life. Whom God called to deliver the children of Israel out of the hands of the Philistines.

Who was deceived by his own self many, many times. And his life ministry ended in the great deception. There he was laying his head in the lap of Delilah letting her sing him to sleep while she cut off his hair.

And when he heard those famous words the Philistines be upon thee Samson he jumped to his feet as other times but he found out that time there were too many threads around him and he couldn't do anything.

The great deception in Samson's life was self-deception. And they poked out his eyes and made him grind in the mill like a mule.

He jumped up and whist. Not that the spirit of God.

Had departed from him. Pretty sobering word isn't it? I just encourage you brothers and sisters let us deal with sin early. It is a serpent. In the end it bites like a serpent and stings like an ant. And it will take you where you don't want to go.

I just heard recently of the sad, sad story of a young man who walked away from God in his rebellion. He thought he was going to have a fling in the army. He thought he was going to have a little fling in the army.

Try it out. Right boys? Just try it out. Today he finds himself on a convoy in Iraq. The tank in front of him blown to pieces. The tank behind him blown to pieces. He gets out of his tank and goes over to the other tank and sees his best friend laying there no head and no arm.

It's like a serpent and stings like an adder. But all the while it says you can do it. It will be alright.

Hearing the Word Without Doing It

You can do it. Don't worry about it. It will all be okay. No, it won't my friend. It will not be okay. How does this great deception happen? Number two. James chapter one, if you want to turn there, tells us by hearing the Word and not responding to it, this great deception happens in our own hearts.

By hearing the Word and not responding to it. Now this point is not for the rebel who thought he was going to go out and have his good time. It's not for the rebel who decided they were going to go out and sow their wild oaks for a while.

No, this one is not for the rebel. This is for the good church member who sits in a good church and hears a good Word on Sunday morning. By hearing the Word and not responding to it. In James chapter one in verse 21, Wherefore lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness and receive with meekness the engrafted Word which is able to save your souls God says.

But, while you are receiving the engrafted Word which is able to save your soul this morning my brother, my sister, be ye doers of the Word that you hear and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves.

There it is. Our own heart. We deceive our own heart if we place ourselves under the sound, the sound Word of the Word of God and listen to it and go our own way and not respond to that which we've heard.

We deceive our own selves. We are walking down a path. We are slowly wandering our way out of the path of truth and moving slowly, wandering, meandering our way away from that which is right. We don't realize that it's happening because we're still hearing the good sermons.

We don't realize what's happening because we're sitting there saying, Amen. But it's happening. That's what the Bible says. Deceiving your own selves. For if any be a hearer of the Word and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass.

For he beholdeth himself and goeth his way and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was. Hearing the Word of God and not responding to it has a dulling effect upon us. Imagine that. That the Word of God, the Holy Word, the pure Word, the quick and powerful Word, that Word, that life-changing Word which is able to save our souls.

Can have a dulling effect upon us. And may I say.

It this way? Can I be so bold to say it this way? If you're just going to sit there,.

It'd be better if you just didn't come. God would have us respond.

To the Word of God. God would have us receive it with a ready mind. There is a danger of deceitful, emotional repentance that doesn't change the life.

You know, you can do that. We kind of set the stage.

For some of that, you know. We give invitations and you can go to the front or you can go downstairs, but let me warn you, brothers and sisters, there is a danger of the deceitful, emotional repentance that doesn't.

Change the life. We.

Can say to God while we're listening to a sermon, O God, I see it. I see what You're saying, God. Yes, I see it. And walk away and not change. This is not good. It is not wise.

To do that. You can be on that yo-yo for years for years. We deceive.

Ourselves. We can say amen to the sermon, rejoice over it and even discuss it on Sunday afternoon.

And not change. Imagine that. The words.

Ring in my ears, grievous words spoken by many. A father after a sermon.

On the home. After his 20th sermon. On the home.

Yeah, well, it's good for us to be reminded of these things. You know, those can be grievous words if we always have to be reminded of those.

Things. When will we get it? Verse 25.

Gives the opposite of the great deception, the great self deception, and that is freedom and liberty and power in your life. Which one would you like? Freedom and liberty and power? Or wandering and stumbling away slowly from the truth and being doled by the life-quickening power of the Word of God?

Which one do you want? Freedom and liberty and power in your life? But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty and continuity therein, he being not a forgetful hearer, all it's good for us to be reminded of it again.

He being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man.

Shall be blessed in his deed. This man shall be blessed.

I wonder if this isn't the answer or one of the answers to stunted growth and many of the struggles that people seem to have in their Christian life. You saw, you agreed,.

And you walked away. Number three,.

Pride and the Illusion of Spiritual Strength

Galatians. I'm going to turn over there to the book of Galatians.

These are all in the Bible. Just.

Following a little concordant study here. You can do the same. How does this great deception take place? Galatians 6 1 -3 Through pride. Through pride. Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual, restore such an one in the spirit of meekness, considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted.

Bear ye one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. For if a man think himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceiveth himself. Now that's a good verse that we could put alongside or cross-reference back to Revelation chapter 3.

There was a whole corporate body of believers who thought themselves to be something, when they in fact were nothing. He deceiveth himself. We deceive ourselves through the pride of our heart, forgetting the words of the Lord Jesus who said, For without me ye can do nothing.

Nothing! Now it's true that we can do lots of religious things without Jesus. You can come to church this morning without Jesus. You can put on the right clothes this morning without Jesus. You could read your Bible this morning without a vital reality in Jesus.

You could even sing the songs this morning without Jesus. But Jesus said, Without me ye can do nothing. And all the self-deception and the pride of man's heart oceans in the depths of our.

Being, that there's no vital connection between me and Jesus for who knows,.

A day, two, a week. But yet, somehow we console ourselves by going through the motions of all the things that we have learned to do. This is a self-deception, brothers.

And sisters. When we.

Lose sight of the reality of Jesus, we fall into the self-deception of pride. First Corinthians chapter 10, Paul says these words to us, Let him that standeth take heed,.

Lest he fall.

And I believe the admonition that God gives to us here in this point is that we recognize the danger of pride and how pride twists our view of how we see. Do we ever get completely free of this self-deception of pride?

I don't know. It seems like it's in all of our hearts. But I believe the greatest thing that we can do to stay away from this is just to acknowledge how easily we can get lifted up and start thinking, you know, doing pretty good.

Things are, yeah. I can do it. I think the greatest thing that we can do is to open up our heart and humble our heart and acknowledge the fact that we can easily be lifted up in pride.

All of us. Pride.

Is a self-centered view of oneself. And humility is a God-centered view of oneself. That's a nice simple way to put it. Pride is a self-centered.

View of myself.

And humility is a God-centered view.

Of me. And I think.

That's a good way to describe it because I don't believe that God wants us to walk around through life dragging our chin around saying that I'm no good and I never amount to anything. That's.

Not humility. But oh,.

The beautiful balance that comes into view when we see through the eyes of God who we are and why we are what we are. There's a beautiful balance of humility there and confidence in God, not in me. In God!

May God give us eyes that we may see.

And by the way, one of the.

Greatest gifts that God could give to every one of us is a good, old-fashioned dose of self-revelation.

It's one of the greatest gifts that God could give you. If you.

Find yourself in the dust on your face and you're saying, Woe is me! Woe is me!

You are blessed!

The Delayed Harvest of Sowing and Reaping

Number four. How does this deception take place? This self-deception, this great deception. The time factor in sowing and reaping deceives us. We deceive ourselves because there is.

A time factor.

In the process of sowing and reaping. Galatians chapter 6 verse 7 says these words, Paul writing to the Christians at Galatia, God is not the heathen. Be not deceived. God is not mocked. For whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.

For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption. But he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting. And let us not be weary in well-doing, for in due season we shall reap if we faint not.

Look at that verse there. And be not weary in well-doing, for in due season we shall reap if we faint not. But we deceive ourselves because there is a gap between the sowing and the reaping. If the reaping were immediate, whether it be on the positive or the negative side, if the reaping were immediate, well, we would be right on it, wouldn't we?

But the reaping so many times is not immediate. God has put that gap there, my brother and sister, to prove us, to see who we are, to see what we will do, to see our character, to see do we love Him with all of our heart.

God has put that gap there to prove us. And that gap deceives us.

If we're not careful. You know, if the first time we got angry with.

A young person in our.

Home, they.

Packed their bags and left,.

Oh, we would, oh, that would shake us. But the reality is, again, again, again, and again, and again, and again, because God has put a gap in there.

Our own heart takes that gap and deceives.

Ourselves. But God.

Says, be not deceived. God is not mocked. What you sow, you will reap, both on the positive and on the negative. Both are there before us. If it were immediate, our hearts could not deceive us. But it always takes time.

And we think, oh, the reaping has not come. It won't come for me. It didn't come yet. It must not be so bad. Because it's not coming. And so, we go on and on in our way, which is a wayward way, not realizing that the plants are growing and soon there will be a crop.