Consider the thoughts that cause you to doubt or question the Bible’s testimony of Jesus Christ. Think about the people around you and what you hear from them. Think about your dreams and the messages they contain. Consider the news and the message the news contains. Think about TV shows or movies and the messages they contain. Think about the music you listen to and the messages they contain. If those messages move you away from the faith, cause you to question your belief and your faith think about the temptation of Jesus in the desert and the very first temptation in the garden where the serpent deceived Eve. Is there a difference between that temptation and the temptation in the desert? Are the messages you hear and receive any different than the temptations Eve and Jesus faced? Consider the consequence of giving into temptation and what benefits take shape when you refuse the tempting message. If you are a born from above follower of Christ then you spirit is incorruptible, but we are human, and the nature of the flesh is to gratify and to feel good. We sin and we repent, and this flesh will one day no longer be an issue because we will receive a new body that is just as our spirit–incorruptible. In the meantime, we must resist the messages that enter our lives and abstain from accepting any media that enforces those messages that attempt to move us away from Jesus. Trust what the Apostles have told us. Believe upon Jesus and follow him and him alone. Pray for discernment and that the Holy Spirit within you will keep you away from fulfilling the tempting messages. As the text states below, any message that contains doubts concerning Jesus Christ coming in the flesh is not of God, and every message that refuses to confess Jesus is also not from God and is the spirit of the antichrist. Remember, we are in the world, but we are not of the world. This is especially true if you have been born anew from above, i.e., born again. Read the Bible and see for yourself what is said concerning these things.
1 John 4:1-6 (NASB 1995)
1 Beloved do not believe every spirit but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.
2 By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God.
3 and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God; this is the spirit of the antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming, and now it is already in the world.
4 You are from God, little children, and have overcome them; because greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world.
5 They are from the world; therefore, they speak as the world, and the world listens to them.
6 We are from God; he who knows God listens to us; he who is not from God does not listen to us. By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.
Those who are born again will connect with the words of the apostles because they are of the same spirit. Those who speak of worldly things have the spirit of the world or the spirit of the antichrist.
In verses 7, 8 John writes Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. 8 The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love.
In this love that John mentions it is not a love with emotion, affection, empathy, or any other worldly understanding. This word love refers to expressing the essential nature of God, Love can be known only from the actions it prompts. God’s love is seen in the gift of His Son, 1 John 4:9,10. But obviously this is not the love of complacency, or affection, that is, it was not drawn out by any excellency in its objects, Romans 5:8. It was an exercise of the Divine will in deliberate choice, made without assignable cause save that which lies in the nature of God Himself Cp. Deuteronomy 7:7,8.
Love had its perfect expression among men in the Lord Jesus Christ, 2 Corinthians 5:14; Ephesians 2:4; 3:19; 5:2; Christian love is the fruit of His Spirit in the Christian, Galatians 5:22.
The phrase translated “born again” can also be translated as “born from above.” Nicodemus had a real need. He needed a change of heart—a spiritual transformation that could only come from above. New birth, being born again, is an act of God whereby eternal life is imparted to the person who believes (2 Corinthians 5:17; Titus 3:5; 1 Peter 1:3; 1 John 2:29; 3:9; 4:7; 5:1–4, 18). John 1:12–13 indicates that being “born again” also carries the idea of becoming “children of God” through trust in the name of Jesus Christ.
The question logically comes, “Why does a person need to be born again?” The apostle Paul in Ephesians 2:1 says, “And you He made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins” (NKJV). To the Romans he wrote, “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). Sinners are spiritually “dead”; when they receive spiritual life through faith in Christ, the Bible likens it to a rebirth. Only those who are born again have their sins forgiven and have a relationship with God.
In testing of spirits, we have criteria set by the Apostles for us to follow, and the greatest test of the spirit is love, and not the love that stirs emotion or feelings, but God’s love, and that love is known as Agape. Agape is a gift, and the gift is Jesus Christ. God’s expression of love through us is one of action, commitment, and the understanding that the only reason we love is because God first loved us. God’s love in us causes us to do His will and share His love with others. Remember God’s love is a love based on action, service, sacrifice, mercy, and compassion. John 15:12-13 “This is My commandment, that you love one another, just as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that one lays down his life for his friends.”
There is much more to be said concerning the testing of spirits and there is no way I could write about it since the Bible already says everything needed. I just wanted to share my thoughts in a reader’s digest version even if my thoughts are not as congruent as they should be. However, we live in times unlike any time during my life and what I hear from people, read about in the news, and even hear in music is not human but humans being influenced by spiritual beings, and what is heartbreaking is they are not aware of it. Please pray for discernment for yourself and for all followers of Christ Jesus.
Have a blessed day.
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