Dear friends, don’t believe every spirit. Test the spirits to see if they are from God because many false prophets have gone into the world. This is how you know if a spirit comes from God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come as a human is from God, and every spirit that doesn’t confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming and is now already in the world. You are from God, little children, and you have defeated these people because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world. They are from the world. So they speak from the world’s point of view and the world listens to them. We are from God. The person who knows God listens to us. Whoever is not from God doesn’t listen to us. This is how we recognize the Spirit of truth and the spirit of error. (1 John 4:1-6, CEB)
According to this reading, we are to test the spirit and see if it is of God.
Well, exactly how do we do that? The author of 1 John says, “This is how you know if a spirit comes from God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come as a human is from God, and every spirit that doesn’t confess Jesus is not from God.”
Ok. I know people who say homosexuality is an abomination and they confess Jesus as the Son of God and I know people who say homosexuality is not an abomination and they confess Jesus as the Son of God, so which spirit is of God? It is not as clear cut as this reading seems to make it. And the author says they have all of the right answers, and if you do not listen to them then you are wrong. That sounds a lot like the sides of the issue I talked about above. Neither side has all the right answers. We think we all read the scripture the way God intended, but when we are never challenged or pushed then we are making God in the image we have for God and it really isn’t God.
So if you are always right and never challenged, I think you are not actually following God.
Follow God. When it’s easy and when it’s not.
And love everyone.
Loving People. Loving God.
aSacredRebel 