Test the Spirits
1 John 4:1‑6
Tonight we're looking at 1 John chapter 4 verses 1 through 6. And this is the portion of Scripture the Lord has given to us tonight for our study in His Word.
The passage has to do with false doctrine. And primarily deals with the source of false doctrine and how to determine the source. We've entitled the message, "Test the Spirits." And you'll certainly see why as we get into the text.
The Bible is full of warnings against error. It is full of warnings against corrupting God's revelation. These warnings are multiple in the Old Testament and in the New Testament. And the reason the Bible gives such a heavy emphasis to warnings against corrupting the revelation of God and warnings against doctrinal error is because that is precisely what Satan attempts to do. He is busily involved in corrupting God's truth, in propagating worldwide and repeatedly gross error, in confusing the minds of people. And so we are well warned to avoid error and corruption of God's truth. In fact, I believe that Satan and his demons spend the vast majority of their time doing just that. According to 2 Corinthians 11, they manifest themselves in what appears to be angels of light, masked as if they were giving God's truth and in fact giving the very opposite.
And the great plague of all the earth through all the history of man has been the plague of false doctrine, the plague of corruption of God's truth and revelation. It began in the Garden of Eden, the first temptation that ever occurred was based upon an effort to corrupt the Word of God. God's Word was attacked by Satan, first of all, through doubt. Satan said to Eve, "Hath God said?" Did He really say that? Planting doubt. Secondly, through distortion. "Yes, Eve replied, why He said you shall not eat of the tree, neither shall you touch it." God never said that. God never said anything about not touching it.
But another very very common thing that we find in the error that surrounds the Bible is distortion of it. First there was doubt and then there was distortion and thirdly there was denial. Satan said to her, "You shall not surely die." And these are the same three things that the devil and his host have proceeded to do from that time on, caused people to doubt the Word, to distort the Word and flatly to deny it. There are many people who just can't accept the Bible. There are other people who accept distorted views of it and there are some people who deny it altogether and take up a totally different source of revelation.
Now all three of these things add up to one word that also starts with a "D" and that's the word deceit. Satan is busily engaged in deceiving people about what is true. Satan's demons wage a persistent and endless counter‑campaign to keep men ignorant of divinely revealed truth and salvation. Now because of this the Bible is loaded with warnings against false doctrine, loaded with warnings against error, whether it's Moses who, for example, in Deuteronomy 9 passionately exhorts the Israelites to serve Jehovah and not forget His precepts, or whether it's David who gives the same counsel to Israel and to his son Solomon in 1 Chronicles, or whether it's the prophets who again and again and again warn the people not to compromise their commitment to the Word of God, or whether it's the Lord Jesus Christ in Matthew 24 predicting that there would come false prophets and false Christs, or whether it's the Apostle Paul who cautioned the Ephesian elders that grievous wolves would enter in not sparing the flock, perverse things would be what they speak. Or whether it's Peter who in 2 Peter chapter 2 and 3 warns about apostates who will come along teaching false doctrine. From end of the Bible to the next, there is the continual and constant warning against false doctrine. This is a real problem and all of it face it constantly. In everything we do and say, we run into differing opinions that constitute the false doctrine of Satan's deception.
Now mark this, this is important, though the Bible talks about false prophets and though it talks about false teachers and though it talks about those who will speak perverse things and though it focuses for the most part on the human agent, the Scripture also goes much deeper than the human agent and deals with the deep source of false doctrine who is Satan and his demons. And that is precisely what we see occurring in the text in which we look tonight.
To illustrate this thought, though, before we look at our text, 1 Timothy chapter 4 and verse 1. Behind all false human teachers there are the ultimate invisible demons. No false teacher teaches out of his own brain. He teaches from a demon or demons who inspire him to teach. Don't kid yourself into thinking that there is a difference between false teachers. Some are obviously demon possessed and some are not. That isn't the case, they all are. The manifestations may vary from one to the other but they all speak the message, they are all mouthpieces for Satan. You see, a prophet is a mouthpiece and somebody's controlling everybody's mouth.
Now in 1 Timothy 4, the Spirit speaks very clearly that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith giving heed to seducing spirits...seducing spirits. People are going to listen to seducing spirits. Have you ever heard a seducing spirit? Have you ever had a floating spirit speak to you?
No, you say, I haven't. Well, I'm not surprised. In all my life time I've only talked to a few of them. And that was a rather bizarre situation, I'm not too sure I ever want to have a conversation with them again. Most of us don't ever talk to seducing spirits. But you know something? You've heard an awful lot of their propaganda coming out of the mouths of their mouthpieces. Seducing spirits are behind false prophets. And the doctrines that they teach are not the doctrines of men distorted, they are the doctrines of what? Of demons.
Now this passage in 1 Timothy emphatically links false doctrine with demonism as its source. False teachers and false prophets are not primarily to blame. They are to blame, they are not primarily to blame, they are secondarily to blame. Primarily the blame goes to the demon who is invisible, that demon spirit who is the false teacher and the man is only the mouthpiece. Remember that the next time you hear somebody propagating something that's contrary to the Scripture, that's a demon. Now the manifestation may come in a bizarre way or it may come in a very very unobvious way, but it's a demon. The doctrines of demons have been going on since Genesis 4. The first doctrine that demons ever taught, they taught through Cain. And Cain believed and propagated that you can save yourself by your own works. That was the first one, and incidentally that's probably the most popular one. They're still teaching the same thing. You can always spot a demonic religion, salvation by works.
And Satan and his hosts are very effective, I want you to know that. You know, they've got the world pretty well locked up. And all these systems apart from the truth are demonic, even the ones masquerading as Christianity, the cults and liberalism. They're all demonic.
In 1 Corinthians chapter 10, to continue just some introductory thoughts, 1 Corinthians 10:19, "What say I then that the idol is anything?" If you want to worship an idol, you say, "Is that anything?" I mean, the guy wants to worship a rock, let him worship a rock, big deal, so he worships a rock. And he worships a totem pole, or he carves a little God out of silver, or he has a little God out of gold, so he bows down to a fat Buddha. I mean, it's nothing. Is an idol anything? No, an idol isn't anything really. But, an idol is something. Though an idol isn't anything in reality, that is it isn't what it's supposed to be, it is something else. Verse 20, "But I say that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice to idols," we could add in there, "they really sacrifice to...what?...to demons." You see, they don't know that but what they think is an idol is really a demon. And I've told you before, I used to wonder why a guy would worship a rock all his life and then his son would worship a rock and generation after generation over in Bula Bula land and keep worshiping a rock. You say to yourself, "Why don't they give up on the rock? I mean, the rock doesn't perform too well." But it does because a demon impersonates the God they think is in the rock and there's enough stuff to keep them hooked to the rock.
The things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons. So stay away from their false religions cause I don't want you to have fellowship with what? With demons. You certainly can't drink the cup of the Lord in the cup of demons, you can't be partakers of the Lord's table in the table of demons. You want to provoke the Lord to jealousy? If you do, you better be stronger than He is. You see, here is a very important fact. While an idol in the genuine sense is nothing at all, there is a terrible reality underlying that idol, there is a demon or demons impersonating the God that is supposedly in that system and capturing the minds of men.
Now you can illustrate this in many ways, but maybe the best would be to go way back to the beginning in the first books in the Bible, the Pentateuch and you read this in Deuteronomy 32:17, "They sacrificed unto demons, not to God." Now there you have it. When they sacrificed to their idols, they sacrificed to their false gods, they were actually sacrificing to demons.
Later on in your Old Testament you find in the Psalms a similar indication again. Psalm 106:37, "Yea, they sacrificed their sons and their daughters unto demons." And the verse before says, "They served their idols." Idols are demons.
Now if you want to get yourself involved in a religious system...I don't care what it is, it can be anything from animism, the worship of some kind of an idol or something to the most sophisticated kind of cult, you are really worshiping demons. And there will be things that will occur supernaturally. There will be hooks to hold you to the system because those demons will make sure they manifest enough of the supernatural to keep you there.
Now let me illustrate this to you. Turn to Revelation 16. Now in the book of Revelation there is much symbolic language. Please remember, symbolism doesn't mean there isn't a reality, it just means that the reality needs to be translated into a symbol to give it understanding and meaning in human terms. And demons are seen as many different things and many different symbols. One of those is as frogs, Revelation 16:13, "And I saw three unclean spirits like frogs." And the idea is slimmy mucky coming out of the slop kind of thing. "Three unclean spirits like frogs come out of the mouth of the dragon‑‑and of course that's Satan‑‑ and out of the mouth of the beast‑‑that's the Antichrist, if you will‑‑and out of the mouth of the false prophet." So, the Satanic trinity spawns these demons.
You say, "How do you know they're demons? That's an arbitrary interpretation." No, no, no, verse 14, "For they are the spirits of demons working miracles. They go forth unto the kings of the earth and of the whole world to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty." Now they proceed to gather them together into a place verse 16 says called Armageddon.
Now here you have frog‑like demons, unclean spirits, deceiving demons and what do they do? They come up and they deceive the entire world. In fact, they deceive them so much that they get the whole world gathered at Armageddon to do what they want them to do, the world thinks it's going to do one thing and the demons have a plan to do something else. The demon plan is to prevent Jesus Christ from conquering. They deceive the nations to gather to stop Christ from setting His Kingdom upon the earth, seducing spirits.
Now you say, "How do they do this?" Well, most likely, they operate through some human agents. Believe me, Satan and his demons are busy seducing people. They have all different approaches. Sometimes they use atheism cause there are atheistic people. They use communism sometimes. That's a religion, animism, polytheism, idolatry, cults, perverted Christianity. They'll use anything they can to deceive. And I would say that particularly deceitful and particularly important for us to be aware of is that they are very busy in the context of the Christian's situation. They are very active within the faith doing everything they can to destroy it. Acts 20, Paul said this, "Of your ownselves...of your ownselves‑‑speaking to the Ephesian elders‑‑shall men arise speaking perverse things." Of your own selves, right out of your own ranks. And their attempt will be to draw away disciples after them. That's why he said in the next verse, "For three years I haven't ceased to warn you that it would happen."
In 2 Peter chapter 2 verse 1 says, "There were false prophets among the people, there shall be false teachers who secretly shall bring in destructive heresies." They secretly bring in destructive heresies. So, the biggest problem here is from the inside. Within the context of Christianity is the rising up of destructive heresy spawned by demons.
Now believe me, demonic deception leaves no doctrine unattacked. They get after every good doctrine, everyone. You go back to the New Testament times and you see it, it's all there. There was legalism. There was antinomianism. There was Gnosticism. There was everything. There was the denial of all the things that we know are biblical. But nowadays, here we are two thousand years passed the New Testament and all those beginning things have now developed into very elaborate systems, haven't they? And they're well organized sects who have slain their ten thousand, spiritism, theosophy, Christian Science, Roman Catholicism, Mormonism, Jehovah Witness, etc., etc., Unity and liberalism, modernism. All of those are Satanic deceptions, doctrines of demons.
Now in the community in which John is writing, there was one very specific group of these doctrine deceivers, of these demon‑ inspired teacher and they were known as the Gnostics. They propagated the idea that Jesus wasn't really the Christ. And we've gone into that in detail. That's basically it, that Jesus was not God incarnate in human flesh. And John is very concerned because they are so good at it that they're really confusing the believers. And he wants those mock Christians, those false teachers unmasked. So he writes 1 John, 1 John is geared to unmask these false teachers. And really, up until chapter 4, we just kind of see them as false teachers. But all of a sudden we hit chapter 4 we realize that it isn't really them we're after, but behind these guys are demons propagating their error. So John suggests tests to tell true Christians from false ones. You remember it? The doctrinal test and the moral test? What do they believe? Do they believe in sin and Christ? That's the doctrinal test. What do they do? The moral test, do they obey the laws of God and do they love the brothers? That's the moral test. And John has been dealing with those same tests over and over again. They kind of, as I said, spiral to a wider and wider circle as he gives more and more information on basically the same thing.
Now as we come to chapter 4, he's going to apply the doctrinal test. And he's going to tell the people in Ephesus, where it was most likely he was writing, how to tell a demon spirit from the Holy Spirit. When a guy comes along and propagates, how do you know whether he's legit? How do you know whether he's a true teacher or a false teacher? Give him the test, the test to unmask him, the doctrinal test. He begins with a command to test, then he talks about why they need to test and then how to test. Verse 1, "Beloved, believe not every spirit, but test the spirits." Now there's the command to test. Test the spirits whether they're of God. Now here's the reason to test them. "Because many false prophets are gone out into the world."
Now, you see, John says here...watch this...test the spirits because many false prophets....now do you notice that you've got the human agency and the spirit behind it, don't you? Since there are many false prophets in the world, you better test the spirits. And what is he doing? He's linking false prophets with demon spirits. John shows that demonism is the real power behind false doctrine. When a speaker opens his mouth, be it John MacArthur, be it anybody else, when a speaker opens his mouth he's either a prophet‑‑look at the end of verse 6‑‑he's either a prophet speaking for the Spirit of truth, or a prophet speaking for the spirit of error. That Spirit of truth, who is that? Why the Holy Spirit is called the Spirit of truth in the gospel of John. And the spirit of error is a demon.
You can't just believe everything. Test...the command to test. Look at the word "beloved." To whom does beloved refer? It's got to refer to Christians, right? Listen, unbelievers wouldn't have the faintest idea what was what. It has to be addressed to believers because unbelievers have no hope of knowing how to evaluate truth or test the spirits.
Now you see at the end of verse 24, just to link it with 3, he says, "And you really have the Holy Spirit whom He's given us." Listen to this. You have the Holy Spirit, but there are other spirits in the world also, beloved, and you better be careful to find out whether it's the Holy Spirit or some other one.
You know, he says believe not every spirit. Believe not every spirit and the literal Greek is stop believing every spirit. He forbids a continuation of an action already going on, don't believe it. Boy, when I think about how many people read Taylor Caldwell's books like The Dear and Glorious Physician, a story of Luke and her book, Dialogues with the Devil. And people say, "Oh, Taylor Caldwell's book are so wonderful." You know, recently Jess Stern put her under hypnosis and found out that she's loaded with demons. Of course that's not his perspective on it but the reason she knew so much about Luke was that she says in a former incarnation she was Mary Magdalene's mother and has first‑hand information. Taylor Caldwell's demon possessed.
And, you know, I told that to some Christian women one time, they said, "Oh, it can't be." See. But it is. You read it. Jess Stern's book, The Search for a Soul. She's a medium just like everybody else in that field. She's like Edgar Casey. And then people will come in and they'll bring in something that's totally divisive or totally confusing and announce it as God's truth. Don't you believe it. Don't believe every spirit.
You say, "Well, he said it was the Holy Spirit." Sure. Guard against deceptive spirits. Don't be gullible. Don't believe everything you hear. And don't believe everything you read. But, watch, verse 1, "Test the spirits whether they're of God." Dokimazo is test, a technical term for testing persons for a very high office. You test them, and it's present tense, continually be testing. The believer must have in his life the continuing practice of the...of testing spirits.
Now please, this does not just refer to talking to demons. If a guy comes along and says such and such, it isn't the idea that you say, "All right now, I don't want to talk to you. Hey, you demon in there, now I want to say something to you. Question number one on the test..." you know. Now it isn't only a dialogue with demons, it's a dialogue with the mouthpiece of the demon, or the demon. I talked to a demon in the occasion where I was involved in that situation, I don't even like to talk about it because people think I've lost my marbles, but it occurred some years back. And I know they're there and they know who I am cause they told me. And I'm glad they know who I am because I bug them and that's good. You know, Paul says that Satan is shortly placed under your feet, and I like him there. You know, take that, see.
But it isn't just the idea that you're talking to the demon itself, although that may be, but when you talk to the demon they try to fool you, too. They tried to fool me. They tried to fool me. But I recognized that they were doing that, trying to deceive me. But it's talking about anybody who propagates the truth, test that truth...test that spirit behind that mouthpiece. The real source of false teaching is demons.
Now, why should we test? The end of verse 1, "Because many false prophets are gone out into the world." There are so many of them, people, that we're going to really get sucked in if we don't test the spirits. And you know, so many times people say, "Well, you're so narrow minded." It's true. And skeptical. A prophet is a mouthpiece of some spirit, true prophets of the Holy Spirit. You remember, folks, not a few false prophets but what? Many of them. They are all over the place. And they come from the spirit of error. They come from demons. And really it's their origin that matters. You know, a lot of times in our Bible memorization we memorize the last part of 1 Thessalonians 5. You know why? You can memorize about six verses there like nothing. Verse 16, "Rejoice evermore." Verse 17, "Pray without ceasing." You've got all those, don't you? Verse 19, "Quench not the Spirit, despise not prophesyings." Verse 21, "Prove all things," that is test all things, "and hold fast that which is good." Don't despise prophesying, but test it, put it to the test and hang on to what's good.
Now the Bible says check it out. Now Satan is very clever and very subtle. And you have to be very careful. Many false prophets are gone out into the world. And that's the reason we have to test.
In Matthew 7:15, our Lord said this, "Beware of false prophets," now listen, "who come to you and announce, I am a false prophet." Is that what He said? No, they don't ever say that. "Beware of false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly are ravening wolves." They're not going to announce who they are. They're going to mask themselves, appear to be moved by the Holy Spirit.
Listen to this, Mark 13:22, "For false Christs, pseudo Christos and false prophets shall rise and shall show signs and wonders and shall...and result of this to seduce if it were possible even...what?...the elect." Is it possible? Not to seduce the elect, not ultimately. But they sure give it all they've got. "Take heed, before I have foretold you all things." I'm telling you, beloved, there are a lot of voices in this world, aren't there? And you go into the Christian bookstore and you look around, man, there's a lot of stuff in there. You don't know what's what. A lot of people talking on the radio, a lot of people preaching in churches, a lot of people asking for your money. And so many Christians are gullible and they show a naive readiness to credit everything to God. Don't you do that. Believe God but be suspicious...a good balance.
Now here the issue is doctrinal. How do we tell a true prophet? A true teacher? What are the tests? All right, we saw the command to test and the reason and now let's look at the method. How do you test? Three things. You just have to ask three questions. Number one, do they confess the divine Lord? Number two, do they possess the divine life? Number three, do they profess the divine law? Now if you can't get all that down, I'll reduce it to three words: do they believe in incarnation, regeneration and revelation? Verse 2, watch, the first part, this deals basically with the idea of doctrine, basic doctrine. "Now by this know ye the Spirit of God." How? Number one, confession of the divine Lord, that's number one, confession of the divine Lord. Verses 2 and 3.
The first thing you want to know about is do they confess the divine Lord, do they believe in the incarnation. If you want the one word it's incarnation. Verse 2, "Every spirit that confesseth," and your Bible may say that "Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God." The word confesseth is in the present tense, everyone who is continuing to confess. The word confess, homologeo means to say what? The same. Everyone who continually says the same thing about Jesus that God said about Jesus is from God. To confess Christ means to say what God says, to say the same thing, homologeo, to confess your sin means to say the same thing that God says about your sin. To confess Christ means to say the same thing about Christ that God says about Christ. And to be a true teacher from the Holy Spirit, he must agree with God's revelation concerning who Jesus Christ is. If he doesn't, he's speaking from a demonic source.
You say, "But he's got good things...he's a nice guy." I don't care if he is a nice guy, he's not really a nice guy down deep, Satan is going to deceive you through him. You say, "But they talk about God in that religion, they just don't see Christ the way we do." Then that is a demonic religion. Now I didn't say that, that's what the Bible says. Every spirit...not some, not a few...but every one that confesses Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God. Now that is the criterion. And verse 3, "Every spirit confessing not is not of God." Now you see it's an absolutely exclusive test. You must be continually saying the same thing about Christ that God said about Christ.
Now I want to take you a little deeper into verse 2 because there's something you must understand about the construction of the verse. It says "every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God." Now I want to show you something. In the Greek there is no word for "that" in this verse. What we have here is not a confession that Jesus Christ is come. In other words, it is not confessing a proposition about a person, it is confessing a person. You see the difference? John is not saying if they accept the creed. No, he is saying if they accept the Christ. The way that I would translate this is "Every spirit who is continuing to say the same thing about Jesus as Christ come in the flesh is of God." Say it again, "Every spirit who is continuing to confess Jesus as Christ come in the flesh is of God." The idea is not to confess something about Jesus but to confess what? Jesus. And that makes it not a proposition but a person. Such a person believes that the human Jesus and the divine God are one and the same person. That kind of person speaks from God. If anybody comes along and they do not believe that the human Jesus and the divine God are one and the same, they are of a demonic origin.
And you know why this is an important distinction between the proposition and the person? Because you can ask a demon, "Is Jesus Lord?" And you know what that demon might say? "Yes." He might. And you can say, "Is Jesus incarnate God?" "Yes...yes we would confess to that." You say, "Would they really do that?" Of course, they know who He is. Evil spirits recognize His identity, don't you think they don't. Listen to Mark 1:24, Jesus comes across this demon‑possessed person, the demon says, "Let us alone." There were a bunch of them in there. "What have we to do with Thee, Thou Jesus of Nazareth, aren't Thou come to destroy us?" Now listen to this, "I know Thee who Thou art, the holy one of God." Now they know, don't they?
Later on in Mark, chapter 3 verse 11, listen to this, "And the unclean spirit