“THEN CAME certain of the elders of Israel to me and sat before me. And the word of the Lord came to me:
Son of man, these men have set up their idols in their hearts and put the stumbling block of their iniquity and guilt before their faces; should I permit Myself to be inquired of at all by them?
Therefore speak to them and say to them, Thus says the Lord God: Every man of the house of Israel who takes his idols (of self-will, unsubmissiveness, and lawlessness) into his heart and puts the stumbling block of his iniquity (idols) before his face, and yet comes to the prophet (to inquire of him), I the Lord will answer him, answer him according to the multitude of his idols, That I may lay hold of the house of Israel in the thoughts of their own mind and heart, because they are all estranged from Me through their idols.
Therefore say to the house of Israel, Thus says the Lord God: Repent and turn away from your idols, and turn away your faces from all your abominations. For anyone of the house of Israel or of the strangers who sojourn in Israel who separates himself from Me, taking his idols into his heart and putting the stumbling block of his iniquity and guilt before his face, and yet comes to the prophet to inquire for himself of Me, I the Lord will answer him Myself!
And I will set My face against that (false worshiper, prophet, and teacher) and will make him a sign and a byword, and I will cut him off from the midst of My people; and you shall know (understand and realise) that I am the Lord.
(The prophet has not been granted permission to give an answer to the hypocritical inquirer) but if the prophet does give the man the answer he desires (thus allowing himself to be a party to the inquirer’s sin), I the Lord will see to it that the prophet is deceived in his answer, and I will stretch out My hand against him and will destroy him from the midst of My people Israel.
And they both shall bear the punishment of their iniquity: the iniquity of the (presumptuous) prophet shall be the same as the iniquity of the (hypocritical) inquirer, That the house of Israel may go no more astray from Me, neither defile themselves any more with all their transgressions, but that they may be My people, and I may be their God, says the Lord God.” (Ezek. 14:1-11)
When are those, who claim to be Children of our Living God, our Lord Jesus Christ, the One True God, Who is Truth, begins their life-long journey of understanding and knowledge of those “earthly and heavenly things” of the spirit of deception and seduction and doctrines of demons.
How many times HE has looked down upon us, and seeing such a mess in our life that we have created for ourselves, believing that we are still walking aligned with HIM. How many times has HE reached into HIS pocket and said: "Look at what I have here for you”, and hands us a “get out of jail” free card?
Many have not seen that free card, the card of confession, repentance, forgiveness, and love, that very card that gives us the Freedom in our Lord Jesus Christ from our bondages. We never see that spirit of deception and seduction, we never see that our “house is empty, swept, and put in order”, because of our own self-deception and self-seduction. How does a born-again Christian, who is supposedly loves our Lord Jesus Christ and is filled with the Holy Spirit and is determined to walk righteously before God and men wind up in such a dark place of the “unfruitful works of darkness”?
We end up there because we deceive and seduce ourselves through our self-will of determination to succeed in our endeavour at all costs to prove others wrong, and ourself right; and because our unsubmissive heart has not been “transformed or renewed”, and we are unwilling to listen or hear HIM through other believers that HE has put across our paths, and have surrounded us with. As a result, we seduce and deceive ourselves through the spirits of darkness, believing that we are hearing His Voice and that HE condones our walk and, thus, we become determined to see what we believe to be HIM through to the end, and regardless of the cost; regardless of what others are saying to us; and regardless of the pitfalls we continually encounter that we think they are the enemy trying to keep us from doing “HIS good, and acceptable and perfect will” (Rom. 12:2).
What is sobering about the promises of our Lord Jesus Christ in His Inspired Word, is that, HE will fulfil HIS promises in our lives and will continue to speak to us, even though our self-will unsubmissiveness, and lawlessness places idols before our heart, which become a filtering mechanism by which His Word travels through those idols, and by the time His Word reaches our spiritual ears, through our carnal ears, “the TRUTH that we will know” (John 8:32), the TRUTH of His Inspired Word, becomes lost, and distorted, losing their original meaning and intent.
As sad as it is, through our seduction and deception we begin to think He is certifying and sanctioning our way, when just the opposite is the real TRUTH. When He sends others across our path to speak to our “rebelliousness” and “lawlessness”, we write those people off as being intimidating, disrespectful, presumptuous, and insensitive to the Spirit, because, after all, “WE HAVE HEARD FROM OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST”, and His Words speaks to us, even though it is distorted and has been changed. To me that is a very scary place to be in.
Scripture says the way we stay out of error is to hear our brothers: “We are of God. He who knows God hears us; he who is not of God does not hear us. By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error” (1 John 4:6).
And if we “do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of our mind, that we may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God, with fear and trembling, in sincerity of heart, as to our Lord Jesus Christ; not with eye service, as men-pleasurers, but as bondservants of our Lord Jesus Christ, doing the will of God from the heart, with goodwill doing service, as to our Lord Jesus Christ and not to men” (Rom. 12:2; & Eph. 6:6-8).
