“An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” We all recognize the wisdom in this Benjamin Franklin quote, that it is better to try to keep a bad thing from happening than it is to try to fix the bad thing after it has happened. (Thanks to idioms.thefreedictionary.com for the quote and definition!) When we find that we have been the victims of deception and its lies, how we wish we could have prevented being deceived instead of having to cure what has happened to us! We determine to be wiser the next time, to be alert for any subtle signs we may have missed, to be more cautious about who and what we trust.
In the Bible, God implores, warns, instructs, and commands us to prevent deception from affecting our lives—spiritual deception, that is. He knows, and wishes us to know, that a person who exits this life spiritually deceived will encounter the fate of hell from which there is no cure. If we fail to be continually wise, alert, and cautious about who and what we believe in this life, we will not get a second chance to make things right.
Here are some scriptures with general warnings (and their implications) about this deception:
Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren. James 1:16
James, out of love, implores that we not be deceived. He does not want us to experience the cost of spiritual deception.
And Jesus answered and said to them: “Take heed that no one deceives you.” Matthew 24:4
Jesus Himself, also not wanting us to experience the cost of spiritual deception, instructs His disciples to be cautious about being deceived by anyone.
Similarly, in Deuteronomy 11:16a:
“Take heed to yourselves, lest your heart be deceived…”
This deception in our hearts is dangerous—it makes us elevate our own reasoning or feeling above God’s word (for more information on this, see my recent blog http://wp.me/p4tk5J-2N). We believe we are smart enough in ourselves to not fall prey to deception.
Consider Jeremiah 37:9:
Thus says the Lord: “Do not deceive yourselves, saying, ‘The Chaldeans will surely depart from us,’ for they will not depart.”
Here is a warning that you can even deceive yourself by convincing yourself that what God has said will not come to pass! (God, of course, was right because the Chaldeans did not depart from Israel.)
1 Corinthians 3:18 says:
Let no one deceive himself. If anyone among you seems to be wise in this age, let him become a fool that he may become wise.
It is bad enough that we may be deceived by others, but so sad to find that we can even deceive ourselves! We lie to ourselves! A common example of this is found when people encounter bad news or bad situations and tell themselves, “Everything will be all right.” That is what they hope for, of course, and tell themselves this so they can feel better. However, the truth is that they have no way of knowing or controlling whether or not everything will be all right—sometimes it is, and sometimes it isn’t.
Time and acceptable blog length do not permit me to list the additional warnings against deception given in the Bible—there are several more! What we can glean from these multiple warnings is this: Deception must be a definite danger for God to warn us about it this many times. Deception’s insidiousness is this: People can be deceived without realizing it! A life apart from God and His truth is one of deception, even if a person “feels normal.”
The good news is that God tells us how to prevent being deceived. We have the entirety of His absolute truth contained in the person of Jesus Christ:
Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.” John 14:6
As long as we rightly divide His word of truth (see 2 Timothy 2:15) and do not twist His words (see 2 Peter 3:16), Jesus is the way to prevent the high price, the eternal price, of spiritual deception. My sincere prayer is for all to escape deception and believe Him and His words today!
Author Stephanie Davison 