Proverbs 30:6 Don’t add to His words, or He will rebuke you, and you will be proved a liar.
A preacher said, “When you are looking for loopholes in the word of God to justify what you want to do, the enemy will always help you find one.” While you are enjoying the fruit of your sinful loophole that the enemy helped you create, a hangman’s noose is being slipped over your head by the same enemy. Just because you justified your iniquitous actions with your invented loophole does not nullify the truth and fact of God’s word. Rom. 6:23a For the wages of sin is death.
Anyone can make the bible say what they want it to say while trying to make it seem like God said it. This is why there are so many cults. The hermeneutics of God’s truth has been chucked aside to be replaced with personal bias. This causes a mishmash of crooked doctrine confusing and leading the hearts of many to a painful end. The result of this kind of truth-bending is bitterness toward God and those who love Him.
Looking for loopholes in God’s word is not a new scheme. False prophets and lying bible interpreters have been around since the first words of God’s laws were recorded. Jer. 14:14 But the LORD said to me, “These prophets are prophesying a lie in my name. I did not send them, nor did I command them or speak to them. They are prophesying to you a false vision, worthless divination, the deceit of their own minds. Personal interpretation and lust for power can lead to a whole lot of people being deceived, getting hurt, and eventually hating God.
In my lifetime, we have seen the painful results that were caused by Jim Jones, David Koresh, and the Heaven’s Gate cult led by Marshall Applewhite. Their lies caused people to die for a worthless cause. To want something so intensely that justifying any action to get what is wanted will lead to horrific consequences and great destruction. History is full of people who have rewritten the meaning of scripture to get what they want at any cost. They have gone so far as to use so-called prophets to move the lie along the way they want it spun to the people. Yet God is clear about His word and covenant with us. Psalm 89:34 I will not violate My covenant or alter the utterance of My lips.
That is the problem when looking for loopholes in God’s word. Once the meaning of the word is distorted to satisfy personal bias, then everything falls apart. People start seeing things where there is nothing to see, and on the other hand, they reject clear instruction and pretend not to see it. Eze. 13:3 This is what the Lord GOD says: Woe to the foolish prophets who follow their own spirit and have seen nothing. This is the same reason marriages fall apart. Some spouses look for loopholes by rewriting their vows to suit their lusts, and before you know it, relationships are shattered.
I was talking with an acquaintance who was trying to convince me that God had approved of his desire to leave his wife for another woman who was also leaving her husband so that they both could come together and be happy in God’s sight. He went on to explain that this had to be God’s will because they were so happy together, and both felt the conviction to go ahead with this plan of pure love. He had reinterpreted some scriptures to prove God was leading them in this direction. My meaning was clear, and I said gently, “You are both deceived and are looking for loopholes to do what you want to do. Don’t blame God for your adulterous choices. Don’t make the word of God say what you want it to say.” Shortly after, he disappeared from the social circles we walked in. Prov. 30:6 Don’t add to His words, or He will rebuke you, and you will be proved a liar.
Years later, I encountered this man in a church lobby. He was all alone and beaten down. The loopholes he had created fell through to the point that the joy of the Lord was a distant memory in his life. Like all of those who drank the Kool-aid before him, he was left with a bitter taste that would take a real revival of the Holy Spirit in his soul to reawaken the life that God has given him through Christ. Listen, Saints. Don’t go there. Don’t go looking for loopholes that do not exist. God is good, and He is not holding anything back that is good for you. We can trust that God’s intentions toward us are life-giving and full of His blessings. May God’s peace be on us all.
Yes The greatest problem with justifying sin, is we tend to use feelings to justify our fleshly calling, purposes and vision. Being led by the flesh and led away from God, normally starts with being led by a distortion of the word, his order of doing things or by rejecting the commandment of God. Our perception of truth gets distorted by reasoning that comes from Satan. Actually he helps us reason away these things with half truths, which are commonly know as lies. Rev 21:8 states that all liars go to hell, even those that tell white lies. "and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death."
Satan since the beginning of the Great Fall, has twisted the truth. He did it by twisting Eve's perception of God, the word of God and the order of God, by encouraging her to visualize his half truth as the real truth. Satan didn't encourage her to clarify the commandment with Adam, since he was the one that had received it directly from God, he actually took Adam right out of the picture. It wasn't God that had told her not to eat from the tree, but her husband, who had received the commandment before she was even created.
Satan will always make us look at things through our feelings or reasoning and judgements, and thereby isolate us from our brothers, so that we don't have to fulfill the 2nd commandment which states we need to love our brother as ourselves. 1 John 4:20 We can't love God if we don't love our brother whom we can see.
If Satan can use or distort how we see things through our 5 fleshly senses, he can change our reasoning or thinking process and thereby change our decisions and our future on earth as well as our eternal future.
If we are being tempted to or being seduced into another truth, we need to wisen up and look for our mentor, pastor, or someone that is a representative of God and who is not under that same spell of seduction to get clarity on the subject.
Sometimes as a friend we can help people see the wages of sin and thereby awaken them into embracing the truth again and letting go of the feelings that are a lie.
Blessings- Just some thoughts.
Thank you Norm for such a timely and Godly warning against being deceived at this time.