False Teachers, Part 1
2 Peter 2v1
9th February 2024
Peter has been writing about the absolute reliability of the Old Testament and, in particular, the Old Testament prophets. Their words are a light shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts (2 Peter 1v19). Now he turns from commending the true Old Testament prophets to acknowledge that there were also false prophets in those days, and he compares false Christian teachers to those false Old Testament prophets. He has much to say about this, and we can only make a start on studying it this week. We begin with the first verse of Chapter 2:
2 Peter 2v1
But there were also false prophets among the people, just as there will be false
teachers among you. They will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying
the Master who bought them — bringing swift destruction on themselves.
In the Old Testament we find the wonderful writings of men like Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel. However, not all the people who claim to be prophets are genuine. We also find God's condemnation of the false prophets and His warnings to us not to listen to them. Moses said:
Deuteronomy 13v1-5
If a prophet, or one who foretells by dreams, appears among you and announces to
you a sign or wonder,
and if the sign or wonder spoken of takes place, and the prophet says, "Let us
follow other gods" (gods you have not known) "and let us worship them,"
you must not listen to the words of that prophet or dreamer. The Lord your God
is testing you to find out whether you love him with all your heart and with all
your soul.
It is the Lord your God you must follow, and him you must revere. Keep his
commands and obey him; serve him and hold fast to him.
That prophet or dreamer must be put to death for inciting rebellion against the
Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt and redeemed you from the land of
slavery. That prophet or dreamer tried to turn you from the way the Lord your
God commanded you to follow. You must purge the evil from among you.
In the church age we don't put prophets to death (of course) but this passage from God's law shows how very serious false prophesy is. It was a continuing problem in Israel, addressed in several passages including:
Jeremiah 14v14
Then the Lord said to me, "The prophets are prophesying lies in my name. I
have not sent them or appointed them or spoken to them. They are prophesying to
you false visions, divinations, idolatries and the delusions of their own
minds."
Ezekiel 13v1-4
The word of the Lord came to me:
"Son of man, prophesy against the prophets of Israel who are now prophesying.
Say to those who prophesy out of their own imagination: 'Hear the word of the
Lord!
This is what the Sovereign Lord says: Woe to the foolish prophets who follow
their own spirit and have seen nothing!
Your prophets, Israel, are like jackals among ruins.'"
Micah 3v5
This is what the Lord says: "As for the prophets who lead my people astray,
they proclaim 'peace' if they have something to eat, but prepare to wage war
against anyone who refuses to feed them."
Zephaniah 3v4a
[Jerusalem's] prophets are arrogant; they are treacherous men.
I'd like us particularly to consider this example:
Jeremiah 23v16-18
This is what the Lord Almighty says: "Do not listen to what the prophets are
prophesying to you; they fill you with false hopes. They speak visions from their
own minds, not from the mouth of the Lord.
They keep saying to those who despise me,'The Lord says: You will have peace.'
And to all who follow the stubbornness of their hearts they say, 'No harm will come
to you.'
But which of them has stood in the council of the Lord to see or to hear his
word? Who has listened and heard his word?"
The false Old Testament prophets, and some people who prophesy today, speak visions from their own minds. They have not stood in the council of the Lord to see or to hear his word. I'd like to make it clear that I believe the gift of prophesy, and all the other spiritual gifts mentioned in Scripture, are still available to the church today. However, we must be very careful with it, because it's so easy to make up a fake prophesy. Some people do this deliberately but I suspect that most do it accidentally by imagining that their own thoughts were put in their minds as a message from God.
But Peter is not discussing false prophets here. He's comparing false teachers in the church age to false prophets in the Old Testament age. God hates false teaching just as he hates false prophecy.
A prophet needs to hear the word of God supernaturally but a teacher - or anybody - can hear the word of God by reading the Bible. We can all stand in the council of the Lord to see or to hear his word simply by studying the Bible. But we must not speak visions from our own minds, whether we are prophesying or teaching. We must teach what the Bible says, not what we think, not what the culture around us says, not what the society in which we live wants us to say, not what feels comfortable. We must teach the Bible, all the Bible and nothing but the Bible.
Just as false prophets in ancient Israel prophesied falsehoods, false teachers in the church "secretly introduce destructive heresies". Very few preachers will stand up in church and admit that what they're saying is not Biblical truth, but many will teach things that are not in the Bible. Many will torture passages of the Bible in order to pretend that they say things they don't say, and don't say things they do say. Many will convince themselves they're doing no such thing. Many will simply be repeating falsehoods that they have received from the lips or the books of other false teachers.
All false teaching is destructive. Either it waters down the word of God, or it perverts the word of God, or it outright contradicts the word of God. The English church urgently needs to remember how serious the sin of false teaching is, how disrespectful it is to God and how much it damages the hearers, who are lured into believing something is from God when it isn't. To claim that a teaching is in the Bible when it isn't is just like the sin of false prophecy. It is claiming God has said something that He hasn't said.
Every word of the Bible is there because God wants it to be there. The Bible contains all the wisdom about God, man, goodness, sin and redemption that God intended to impart to us. We should teach only what is in the Bible, and what can be logically deduced from the Bible. There is no room for earthly wisdom, earthly morality or earthly aspirations. What the Bible says is good is good. What the Bible says is bad is bad. What the Bible says is true is true, What the Bible say is false is false. Anybody who claims to be a Christian leader or teacher must be faithful to the Bible.
We will continue to think about this next week.