The Spirit of Truth ~ FREE Scripture Doodle

Are you aware that ALL the scaffolding for what the Bible calls ‘The Great Tribulation’ has been quietly slipping into place? When the Lord Jesus spoke to His diciples about the end days, His first words were a warning. ‘Do NOT be deceived.’ ‘Take heed that ye be not deceived.’ How can we KNOW if we are being deceived? Is it possible that we could be deceived without even knowing it? How can we KNOW if we really have truth? Today, we’re going to ATTEMPT to take a look at that – a daunting challenge! :o – plus there’s a free Scripture doodle for anybody who survives :) … enjoy!

WARNING

As ancient Bible prophecy springs to life before our eyes, we already live in a time of great deception, but the Bible warns us that there is a MUCH bigger deception coming, one that could deceive even the very elect if that were possible. In order to stand firm, with our relationship to the Lord Jesus intact, and our wedding garments undefiled while we wait for His return, we need:

a love of truth;
to turn to the Lord Jesus with ALL of our heart; to look earnestly into His face; and to hang onto Him with everything that we have;
to turn away from, repent, and ask for forgiveness for any known sin, and if we love anything more than Him – that could be our family, our job, our money, our possessions, our reputation, our love for the world, etc – or if we are looking to anyone other than Him for what we need;
to fear God, and ditch the desire of the approval of man;
to soak in the truth, the Word of God, as never before;
to beware the ‘hirelings’. Be careful who we listen to. Search out truth. Think for ourselves. Research everything for ourselves;
to always ask the Holy Spirit, THE Spirit of Truth, to guide us.

Now, let’s unpack it.

STEP ONE. DO YOU HAVE A RELATIONSHIP WITH THE LORD JESUS?

If you DO have an intimate relationship with the Lord Jesus, listen to the Holy Spirit’s warnings. His promptings can be so subtle – and the voices around us so loud – that it might be easy to miss them. Take the time to stop and listen to His still, quiet voice.
If you do NOT know Him yet, and do NOT have the Spirit of Truth living in your heart, just ask Him.

DO WE REALLY WANT THE TRUTH?

The next most important question is, and we must be completely honest with ourselves… Do we really want truth? Do we dismiss evidence that disagrees with what we think we know? Or do we look carefully at all the facts, no matter how distressing or inconvenient it might be? Sometimes, even as followers of Christ, we just don’t want truth. It can be confronting, upsetting, or leave us feeling alone or very uncomfortable. It can also be pretty scary at times, making us want to pull the blankets up over our face like we did when we were kids; and if we pretend it isn’t there, we can make the big, scary monster go away. We must not fall for comforting lies that might make us feel better in the short term. Do not follow the crowd over the cliff. We must stand up for truth, even if we are standing alone. In the incredibly scary Bible verse below, that word ‘love’ is agapē. Love above all else. Do we agapē truth? Are we truly, genuine truthseekers? Am I truly a genuine truthseeker?

2 Thessalonians 2:10-12 …because they received not the love (agapē) of the truth, that they might be saved. And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: that they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.

THINK SPOT

“…been studying the art of propaganda… those who did not succumb to the brainwashing tended to be the ones with a strong faith in God, they were grounded, they knew what they believed, and they could not be broken…” — B. Howse

TURNING AWAY FROM TRUTH = TURNING TOWARDS ERROR

Can we be deceived without even knowing it? YES! Even as Christians, we can find ourselves saying, ‘Well, God’s Word says this, BUT…’ Be careful of those ‘buts’! They are nothing but a sneaky way for our ‘old self’ to get what it wants! Or to get the approval of the world rather than God’s approval. We must be very careful not to reject ANY truth that is inconvenient or makes us feel uncomfortable or because we just don’t like it. Deep within our heart, we know if we are dismissing evidence or rationalising something that makes us feel good. This is not just for spiritual matters, but for any truth, because it can have enormous spiritual ramifications. If we dismiss any evidence before even considering it, we find ourselves turning away FROM truth and TOWARDS error. ALWAYS, ALWAYS, we must ask the Lord to guide us. ‘God is this true? Please show me.’ And He will. It might not be in the next 10 minutes, this week, or this month, but show you, He will.

Acts 17:11 These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.
John 8:32 And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.

SOAK IN THE WORD OF GOD… HEY! MAKE IT A BUBBLE BATH!

If you are not reading your Bible every day, get back into it. I don’t know about you, but my heart gets really, really dusty travelling through this world. We need to be soaked in truth in order to navigate our way through it. We need to find out what the Bible really says and measure everything else by that standard. Not what our favourite teacher says that the Bible says. Our eternal future is too important to trust to anyone else. We need to search out truth for ourselves. It only takes a tiny margin of error – 1% at first – to turn a whole ocean liner massively off course and eventually plunge it into disaster. And we should not just cherry pick our favourite bits of the Bible to read, either. It is the whole counsel of God that protects us from shooting off into error. If your attitude is, ‘been there, done that’, find another translation. Try my fantastic e-Sword Bible program. It’s free and you can download any Bible translations you want, and you can read the original Hebrew and Greek by just hovering your mouse over a word. It really makes the Word of God come alive. God talks to us through His Word and cleanses our hearts when we read and ponder over the Word of God. When we ask the Lord to soften our hearts towards Him, we can actually feel it as He ‘…sanctifies and cleanses it with the washing of water by the Word…’ And all truth will ultimately line up with His Word. Anything outside of that must be immediately dismissed if we are genuine truthseekers. He alone is truth. All truth will eventually lead to Him. How does it go…? ‘In God we trust; everyone else we verify!’

John 15:3 Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.
Ephesians 5:25-26 …Christ also loved the church, and gave Himself for it; that He might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the Word…

SURRENDER

Fallen man is not simply an imperfect creature who needs improvement: he is a rebel who must lay down his arms… –CS Lewis

That extra portion of oil is something only the individual himself can secure. It comes from an outside place called “Gethsemane”––it’s a place of crushing, a place of surrender, and a place of emptying so one can be filled with Christ’s oil and His Spirit. –-Nancy Missler

‘…the real worship of God begins with surrender.’ —David Guzik (blueletterBible)

Matthew 10:37 He that loveth father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me.

Matthew 16:25 For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for My sake shall find it.

Matthew 10:28 And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.

Revelation 2:10 Fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer… be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life.

2 Corinthians 7:1 Having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.

1 John 1:9 If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Revelation 3:11 Behold, I come quickly: hold that fast which thou hast, that no man take thy crown.

Luke 22:42 Father, if Thou be willing, remove this cup from Me: nevertheless not My will, but Thine, be done.

BEWARE THE ‘HIRELINGS’

Everywhere we look around us, we see the ‘falling away’ that Scripture warned us about. Many ‘teachers’ of the Bible are showing themselves to be false teachers, who have rejected Truth. They prefer the approval of the world, rather than the approval of God. And if they’re in it for the money, Scripture also refers to them as ‘hirelings’ who do not actually even care for the sheep. They’re only in it for themselves. When danger arrives, they’re gonna split. Compare EVERYTHING they say to the Word of God. If you can’t imagine the Lord Jesus or one of His disciples saying it, chances are that it is false. RUN!

John 10:12-13 But he that is an hireling, and not the shepherd, whose own the sheep are not, seeth the wolf coming, and leaveth the sheep, and fleeth: and the wolf catcheth them, and scattereth the sheep. The hireling fleeth, because he is an hireling, and careth not for the sheep.
Mark 13:22 For false Christs and false prophets shall rise, and shall shew signs and wonders, to seduce, if it were possible, even the elect.
Matthew 24:24 For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect.
2 Peter 2:1-3 …false prophets… false teachers… damnable heresies… and many shall follow their pernicious ways; by reason of whom the way of truth shall be evil spoken of. And through covetousness shall they with feigned words make merchandise of you…
Romans 3:18 There is no fear of God before their eyes.
Jude 1:11-13 Woe unto them! for they have gone in the way of Cain, and ran greedily after the error of Balaam for reward, and perished in the gainsaying of Core… raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame; wandering stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever.
Matthew 7:21 Not everyone that saith unto Me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of My Father which is in heaven.
Revelation 18:4 And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, My people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues. For her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her iniquities.
John 12:43 For they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God.

Watch:

ASK FOR HELP FROM THE SPIRIT OF TRUTH

BEWARE! THE most effective barrier to truth is thinking that we already have it. Right up until the very moment that we leave this world, we have to vigilantly guard our hearts from falling into the ditch – because, yes, even Christians CAN fall into the ditch of error and start heading down the wrong path – and we need to constantly ask the Lord Jesus to guide us. The book of Jude explicitly deals with this issue, as well as other passages. King Solomon is a tragic example of this, which we would well take heed. He started out so well, but the goal is to FINISH WELL. That’s the hard bit. It’s a life-long marathon, not a short-term sprint. Scripture is full of strong commands to guard, protect, or put a hedge around our faith, often translated as ‘keep’.

H8104 | שָׁמַר | shâmar | shaw-mar’ | A primitive root; properly to hedge about (as with thorns), that is, guard; generally to protect, attend to, etc.: – beware, be circumspect, take heed (to self), keep (-er, self), mark, look narrowly, observe, preserve, regard, reserve, save (self), sure, (that lay) wait (for), watch (-man).
H5341 | נָצַר | nâtsar | naw-tsar’ | A primitive root; to guard, in a good sense (to protect, maintain, obey, etc.) or a bad one (to conceal, etc.): – besieged, hidden thing, keep (-er, -ing), monument, observe, preserve (-r), subtil, watcher (-man).

We need to seize the Lord and hang on tightly to Him. And if the circumstances get so bad that we can no longer hang onto Him, we need to ask Him to hold onto us… in His arms, just like a parent with a tiny child! Looking trustingly up into His face, with the expectation of, ‘Lord, don’t know how you’re going to do it, but I’m trusting You to figure it out’.

He tells us in John 14 that just because He was going away, that He would not leave us orphans, ‘And I will pray the Father, and He shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you forever, the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive because it seeth Him not, neither knoweth Him’ […get that? So don’t be looking for truth in the world, because the world cannot receive truth… and then He continues…] ‘but ye know Him; for He dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.’ As believers in Christ we have ‘THE Spirit of Truth’ with us and living in us! What an awesome thought. I find that it helps to ask Him to soften my heart and to put His desires for truth in my heart. And to lead me and guide me, and show me the truth. He is The Truth and if we are truly following Him with our whole heart, He will always lead us to truth. Because that’s where He is.

John 14:18-27 I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you… If a man love me, he will keep My words: and My Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him… But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in My name, He shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you. Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.
John 15:26 But when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, the Spirit of truth which proceedeth from the Father, He shall testify of Me [the Lord Jesus].
John 16:13 …when He, the Spirit of truth, is come, He will guide you into all truth.
Galatians 4:6 (Who is the Holy Spirit? It’s the Spirit of Jesus!) …God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father.
Luke 24:27 And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, He expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning Himself.
Revelation 3:11 Behold, I come quickly: hold that fast which thou hast, that no man take thy crown.

WHAT IS TRUTH?

Watch: Let’s take a closer look (Chuck Missler) What is truth?

FEATURING BIBLE VERSES

John 14:16-17 And I will pray the Father, and He shall give you another Comforter, that He may abide with you forever; Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth Him not, neither knoweth Him: but ye know Him; for He dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.

JOHN 14:16-17 ~ SCRIPTURE DOODLE ~ FREE PRINTABLE

Click on the colouring page or the link below it, to open it up in my cloud storage where you can download it in full resolution… enjoy!

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RELATED LINKS

Love Truth ~ FREE Scripture Doodle

Learn the Bible in 24 hours Chuck Missler really opened up the Bible for me. I highly recommend him. Start with ‘Learn the Bible in 24 hours’ and then do a search for any of his deeper commentaries if you want to know more. Books like Daniel, Revelation and Thessalonians have a lot to say about the last days. When you really know your Bible, it reads like today’s newspaper, and tells us what is really going on. You would be surprised how relevant it is. Ancient Bible prophecy is coming to life before our very eyes!

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