Peter – A Breath of Fresh Air
When a self-pronounced leader draws a following with talk that sounds good, looks attractive, seems full of love and uses “mostly” Truth from God’s Word as a tool to hammer in a stake of importance in this world…watch out! Peter warns us today about “lying leaders” among us. It is an age old problem.
I think of the pop song, “You Gave Love a Bad Name” as I read Peter’s warning about lying leaders. The betrayed lover sings…
Shot through the heart
And you’re to blame
Darlin’, you give love a bad name
An angel’s smile is what you sell
You promise me heaven, then put me through Hell
Chains of love got a hold on me
When passions a prison, you can’t break free
Oh, you’re a loaded gun, yeah
Oh, there’s nowhere to run
No one can save me
The damage is done
Shot through the heart
And you’re to blame
You give love a bad name (bad name)
I play my part and you play your game
You give love a bad name (bad name)
You give love, a bad name
Yes, lying leaders give the way of Truth and Love a bad name to the world. Peter outlines a way to spot LL’s and run from them. Here are but a few ways:–Will cause divisions. Put down someone else to lift them high.
–Will manipulate and pit you against each other so you will look to them alone.
–Perform ridiculously splashy presentations to turn your focus from Jesus to them as your “savior”, the only one with answers for your life.
–Recruitment of others to them is mandatory to their survival.
–LL’s are only out for what they can get for themselves.
–They’ll say anything, ANYTHING, that sounds good to exploit you. (It’s happened to me! From a small group of pastors with the main pastor as “lord” of the following.)
Peter reminds us, “They won’t, of course, get by with it…God has never just stood by and let that kind of thing go on.” In the meantime, BEWARE. Be in tune with God’s Truth. Check and double check what is said to what is read in God’s Word. Ask for the Holy Spirit to help us discern Truth from fiction.
2 Peter 2, The Message
Part One
Lying Religious Leaders1-2 But there were also lying prophets among the people then, just as there will be lying religious teachers among you. They’ll smuggle in destructive divisions, pitting you against each other—biting the hand of the One who gave them a chance to have their lives back! They’ve put themselves on a fast downhill slide to destruction, but not before they recruit a crowd of mixed-up followers who can’t tell right from wrong.
2-3 They give the way of truth a bad name. They’re only out for themselves. They’ll say anything, anything, that sounds good to exploit you. They won’t, of course, get by with it. They’ll come to a bad end, for God has never just stood by and let that kind of thing go on.
4-5 God didn’t let the rebel angels off the hook, but jailed them in hell till Judgment Day. Neither did he let the ancient ungodly world off. He wiped it out with a flood, rescuing only eight people—Noah, the sole voice of righteousness, was one of them.
6-8 God decreed destruction for the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. A mound of ashes was all that was left—grim warning to anyone bent on an ungodly life. But that good man Lot, driven nearly out of his mind by the sexual filth and perversity, was rescued. Surrounded by moral rot day after day after day, that righteous man was in constant torment.
9 So God knows how to rescue the godly from evil trials. And he knows how to hold the feet of the wicked to the fire until Judgment Day.
SO, DON’T FALL FOR IT!
Last week, a salesman used holy scriptures to try to sell me on a product. Another person said I “won $950,000” and quoted scripture when he figured out I was a believer in the first few minutes of the conversation. “If I truly believed”, he said, I would pay him a small amount of money to get the big money…SERIOUSLY? But that is the way of lying leaders….They give love and truth a bad name.
Dear Heavenly Father,
Thank you for helping us sift through a world of lies to find Your Truth, love, mercy and grace. Help us to STAND for your truth so that we do not fall for fiction and lies. Help us to walk in Your ways, led by Your Hand in ours. May your Holy Spirit help us to discern the world around us with your wisdom, insight and understanding. I may have fallen for it once but not again! I love you, Lord with all my heart, mind and soul.
In Jesus Name, Amen
