“But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ.” 2 Corinthians 11:3 ESV
Reflection: what would the enemy have to do to deceive you?
Is it possible that some of the things you currently believe in are carefully constructed deceptions? Actually lies? I have heard it said, that best deception of the devil is to convince people he doesn’t actually exist. “Why?” you might ask. If what he was doing was obvious, then we would catch on, right? Most of us think that we are not easily fooled. Pretty smart, in fact. That we quickly catch on if someone is trying to fool us. But the truth is that most people, 70-80% of the population, perhaps even as high as 90%, are not critical thinkers. Meaning that, if an idea is presented through a trustworthy method, even if the idea is crazy, they will not challenge it. That is pretty scary.
Paul recognized this already 2000 years ago. Now, notice that he is speaking to the Greeks in Corinth, who considered themselves as very intelligent, very smart. And yet he tells them “But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ.” 2 Corinthians 11:3 ESV. Paul and his traveling companions had carefully presented the gospel to the people there, and after much labor among the people eventually baptized some and established a church there. In a way, he considered this and other congregation as his spiritual children, protective. “For I feel a divine jealousy for you, since I betrothed you to one husband, to present you as a pure virgin to Christ.” 2 Corinthians 11:2 ESV
But the enemy knew well of what was happening in the area. And, therefore was working a scheme in the background to confuse, to lead the people astray. Now, notice CAREFULLY who Satan used to lead these early Christians astray. He used people who called themselves apostles. In other words, they were preachers who Paul called “super-apostles”. Paul writes “For if someone comes and proclaims another Jesus than the one we proclaimed, or if you receive a different spirit from the one you received, or if you accept a different gospel from the one you accepted, you put up with it readily enough. Indeed, I consider that I am not in the least inferior to these super-apostles.” 2 Corinthians 11:4-5 ESV He called them super, because they were clever, well articulated. Sound familiar?
And, because of their clever manipulation of facts, of the gospel, the people fell for it, as Paul states in our focus verse today. Paul says that they presented “a different Jesus”, “a different spirit”, and “a different gospel”. Perhaps we are more afraid of the devil’s attacks from outside the church than from within? Because this attack Paul is talking about was completely from within and it really concerned Paul. He spoke with a divine jealousy, to wake them up from these deceptions from false teachers, in order “to present you as a pure virgin to Christ.” 2 Corinthians 11:2b ESV.
So what about you and I? Have we been deceived by the enemy, in our faith? There is also a lot of false teaching today. So has anyone presented a different Jesus to us, a different spirit, or a different gospel than who Jesus was and is? Different than what Peter, Paul and the other apostles taught? How would we know? John writes “Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you heard was coming and now is in the world already.” 1 John 4:1-3 ESV.
Let’s take time to really study the Bible, to ask for discernment of thoughts and spirit, and follow the only Way, the only Truth and the only Life; Jesus Christ.