The Spirits Must Be Tested - 1 John 4:1

   
Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world. - 1 John 4:1

    Truth be told, there is only one way to test the spirits to see whether they are from God or not: verify them with the Bible! Today, the most pervasive and poisonous teachings are being spread through the “Christian” church at a rate that is truly hard to process. Everything from the false teaching that God wants us to be financially prosperous to the erroneous idea that God will accept us as we are with no need for us to change. “For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths.” - 2 Timothy 4:3-4.
    The one thing these various false teachings have in common is that they are nowhere found within or supported by the Word of God: the Bible. In fact, for any false teaching that is taught, one can find the exact opposite of its patent untruth within Holy Scripture. Take a false teaching, any false teaching and the Bible will correct it in word and spirit! Everyone should be prosperous? “For you always have the poor with you, but you will not always have me.” - Matthew 26:11. Holding onto our sin despite our claim to redemption? “Jesus stood up and said to her, ‘Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?’ She said, ‘No one, Lord.’ And Jesus said, ‘Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more.’” - John 8:10-11.
    The fact is that there are no “Liberation Theologies” contained within God’s Word. There is no Prosperity Gospel nor is there a Health Gospel. There is but one Gospel: the Gospel of Jesus Christ. He came into the world with one mission, one purpose - “She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” - Matthew 1:21. In fact, any teaching that does not point back to the Messiah is a false teaching! Any teaching that doesn’t point back to the Cross is a false teaching. And any teaching that does not point to Jesus Christ as the one mediator between God and man, as our Lord and Savior, and as our Prophet, Priest, and King, is a false teaching.
    The false teachers present and advance their soothing poison specifically because they have a welcoming audience. These are the people who claim to have found “the church for people who don’t like church.” These “christians” could never sit under the teaching of honorable preachers like John Knox, George Whitefield, Jonathan Edwards, Charles Spurgeon, David Martyn Lloyd Jones, or R.C. Sproul! In fact, the only preachers that such Christians could follow are of the most unscrupulous kind. Men who are “in it” for what they themselves can get out of it. “If anyone teaches a different doctrine and does not agree with the sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ and the teaching that accords with godliness, he is puffed up with conceit and understands nothing. He has an unhealthy craving for controversy and for quarrels about words, which produce envy, dissension, slander, evil suspicions, and constant friction among people who are depraved in mind and deprived of the truth, imagining that godliness is a means of gain.” - 1 Timothy 6:3-5.
    One with a grasp on the holiness of God can see very plainly the error of such false teaching. And the only means of acquiring a grasp on the holiness of God is through His inerrant and infallible Word; the Bible. That is why it is of the utmost importance to test the spirits to see if they are from God and not the mere cacophony of the wolves in sheep’s clothing.