|
The Remnant
Teaches Against the Doctrine of the God-Sent Strong Delusion
There are many
outrageous apostate teachings and examples in the
Left Behind Series. I have summarized
these in the last chapter of my book, God's Wrath on Left Behind. One of the predominant
dangerous and soul subverting teachings is the omission of the God-sent strong delusion
doctrine in Second Thessalonians, chapter 2. This
doctrine has not only been
omitted in the series, but is also repeatedly taught
against.
Everyone who enters the Tribulation having
knowingly rejected the gospel of Jesus Christ is primed to
receive the strong delusion sent by God. Those who have heard the gospel but
refuse to love the truth and forsake their unrighteous lives will receive this
delusion if the Antichrist rises to power while they are still in rebellion to God's authority
over their lives. Noah warned of the judgment of a worldwide
flood, and the scriptures warn of a flood of delusion sent by God himself to all
who refuse to love the truth as revealed in the Holy Bible and continue to have
pleasure in unrighteousness.
What
is the God-Sent Strong Delusion?
2
Thessalonians 2: 1-13
1 Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our
Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto him,
2 That ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be
troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the
day of Christ is at hand.
3 Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day
shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be
revealed, the son of perdition;
4 Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that
is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of
God, shewing himself that he is God.
5 Remember ye not, that, when I was yet with you, I
told you these things?
6 And now ye know what withholdeth that he might be
revealed in his time.
7 For the mystery of iniquity doth already work:
only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way.
8 And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the
Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the
brightness of his coming:
9 Even him, whose
coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders,
10 And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in
them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they
might be saved.
11 And for this cause God shall send them strong
delusion, that they should believe a lie:
12 That they all might be damned who believed not
the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.
13 But we are bound to give thanks alway to God for
you, brethren beloved of the Lord, because God hath from the beginning chosen
you to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth:
The
God-sent delusion, which the authors completely omitted in the Left Behind Series and actively taught against through the storyline of Desecration
and The Remnant, means that God will cause every person who had the opportunity to follow
Jesus Christ before that "that Wicked" rises to power, but would not,
to believe the lie.
When
"that Wicked" is revealed he will come "after the working of
Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders." He will come with all
"deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish." Who will
perish? Those who "received not the love of the truth, that they might be
saved." (See 2 Thess. 9,10)
This
is the reason why "God shall send them strong delusion, "that they
should believe a lie." Which lie will the people who received not the love
of the truth before that Wicked is revealed believe? They will believe what that
Wicked "shows" himself to be: God. (See 2 Thess. 2:11)
What happens to
those who believe that Wicked's lie? "That they all might be damned who believed not
the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness." (2 Thess. 2:12)
People
who refuse to believe the truth and continue to have pleasure in unrighteousness will
be caused to believe that Antichrist is really the true God. God himself will
cause them to believe this lie and they will be damned! They will not be able to
fight against this delusion. They will believe it because God will cause
them to believe it. People who think they can serve sin now and
still have the spiritual ability to discern the times are
fooling themselves.
Those who are intent on
serving sin—and
therefore the master of sin—
and enjoying the trappings of this world won't suddenly change
their spiritual tune once the Tribulation begins. They will find
themselves outside the 'ark of salvation' when that Wicked is
finally revealed.
|
If you
continue to "believe" the truth on your terms, which means you continue to have
pleasure in unrighteousness and are convinced that you can't out-sin the grace of God, you
are not believing in the biblical sense of the word. If you "believe in Jesus"
while still loving the world and enjoying unrighteousness, your definition of grace is
not the same as
God's.
|
If you do not repent and begin to serve God now with
single-hearted devotion, you will receive God's judgment
and believe the lie. God has chosen us to salvation through
not only belief of the truth, but also sanctification of the Spirit:
". . . because God hath from
the beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and
belief of the truth." 2 Thess. 2:13b
Lionel
Whalum Definitely Would Have Received the God-Sent Delusion
The authors continually reinforced the "no God-sent delusion" theme
in all the books of the Left Behind Series. They used the The
Remnant to pour on this lie even thicker than ever before. They made certain the reader knew that Lionel Whalum
received a gospel witness from a born-again Christian, but that he refused to be saved.
Two
days later after the "disappearances" occurred, Lionel was suddenly saved
in ten minutes. The morals of the story? The God-sent delusion does not exist,
and the disappearances will be the catalyst for the salvation of many souls.
(The Bible teaches the opposite)
The
Left Behind Series teaches that the "disappearances" will be the best
thing going for evangelism, and if that does not work, then those whose hearts
are too hard to turn to Jesus Christ as
soon as they hear of disappearances might turn into the "undecided."
It is anti-biblical and spiritually dangerous to teach that during Satan's time
of unprecedented world-wide control, with untold numbers of demons having free reign, that people
will not only not be deluded by God to believe the lie, but they also might spend years wavering between God and Satan, wondering who they will
choose! This is out-and-out "make sure you fall away from the
faith and go to Hell" teaching.
Today is the day of
salvation, not years down the road during tthe New World Order
takeover (the Tribulation), where
the God-sent delusion is the rule and salvation is only for those who did not
have the opportunity to hear the gospel. It will NOT be you if you have already
heard the gospel of Jesus Christ and spurned his call on your
life. The Left Behind series lies
about this. It is anti-evangelistic
and
anti-christ to teach the
doctrine of the second chance in place
of the doctrine of the God-sent delusion!
In
the following excerpt, we see that Lionel Whalum's children pleaded with him to
be saved, but he rejected the Lord Jesus Christ:
"Now our kids, on the other
hand--two girls with a boy in between--they went the other direction. They got
off to college and wound up, every one of them, in the kind of church I grew up
in. Wrote us. Pleaded with us to get saved. Asked why we hadn't exposed them
to this when they were kids. Flabbergasted me, I have to tell you.
"But did it reach me,
change my mind? not on your life." (The Remnant p. 311)
Lionel Whalum was depicted as
being presented with the gospel again, but he hardened his heart against the wooing of the
Holy Spirit. Predictably, right
after the disappearances, the authors depicted his hard heart suddenly softening and he believed in
the Jesus he had rejected just two days before:
"One time the guy who
invited us the first time asked if he could talk to us afterward. When it was
just the four of us--his wife didn't say anything-- he kind of put it to us.
He told me that wasn't what he meant. He laid out how to become a born-again
Christian. I had heard it. I knew. It was just a little overboard for me,
that's all." (The Remnant p. 312)
"Two
days later, millions of people all over the world disappeared. Including--are
you ready? --every last person in that Bible study except us. And all three of
our kids were gone." (The Remnant p. 112)
"Saved?"
We got saved in, like, ten minutes." (The Remnant p. 112)
This example instructs the reader that he can indeed refuse to believe the
truth and continue to have pleasure in unrighteousness and repent at his own
leisure. Whalum repented sooner (but still too late to escape the strong
delusion), but the "undecided' spent years in a state of spiritual limbo while
Satan ruled the earth through Antichrist.
The
"Undecideds" are Already Serving the god of This World
The Bible says that
whoever is not serving Jesus Christ is already serving the god
of this world by default whether he realizes it or not, but the
authors have concocted the category of the "undecided." The
undecided are never deluded into
serving Satan; they just can't make up their minds who they want to serve. (See
The Remnant, p. 119) They
are in a spiritual neutral zone. This lying, false hope given to the reader is
that he may wait a long time to decide who he wants to serve. In
fact, he can even wait until the Tribulation is nearly over and
Jesus' Second Coming is near. Anyone who believes this scenario
as depicted in The Remnant will end up
believing Antichrist is God and will be damned.
All
"undecideds" already serve the god of this world because they have not
believed on the Lord Jesus Christ and been translated from the kingdom of
spiritual darkness into the spiritual kingdom of God's dear Son.
The authors
outrageously teach throughout the storyline of The
Remnant that there will be three categories of
people during the Tribulation:
The "believers", the "followers of
antichrist," and the "undecided."
This is a cruel lie. The "undecideds"
will worship antichrist if they reject Jesus Christ. They will not live in a
spiritual neutral zone.
The so-called
undecideds will be
swept into the demonic whirlwind and worship the beast like the rest of the
world if they do not surrender in faith to Jesus Christ when God gives them the opportunity to believe. If
you live in the United States, that time is BEFORE the Tribulation begins. No
matter where you live, if you are reading this article, and have access to my
site you are accountable to God. You know how to avoid the strong
delusion, and God has lovingly directed you to this article
because he does not want to judge you by sending you strong
delusion. He wants you to repent and live.
There
will be the "don't knows" but they will change into either real
Christians (not The Remnant kind) or reject the gospel and come under the delusion to believe the lie. God will use his
sealed witnesses to fearlessly preach the gospel during this time. Sealed means
protected, not tattooed with visible crosses. Also, the real remnant witnesses
will not use anagrams like satanists do to hide their identity and they will not
wear disguises, which is a carnal and useless weapon. They will walk in the
Spirit and go where the Holy Spirit leads and speak what he is leading them to
say.
The "Undecided":
A Group in the Tribulation That Does Not Exist in Scripture
The authors used
the phrase, "the undecided" to denote people who still could not make up their
minds whether they wanted to serve God or Satan, even five years into the Tribulation. The
authors want you to think that people can live during the Tribulation for years
trying to decide whether they want Jesus Christ or Antichrist and not be
affected by demons pulling them into the worldwide worship of antichrist.
The
God-sent delusion is real and we must purpose to avoid this damning judgment
and help others to escape it as well. It is a judgment that God will send
upon all who refuse to surrender to him (both Christian and the unbeliever)
before "that Wicked" is revealed.
What
about those who have not heard the gospel and then enter into the Tribulation?
God has made provision for these people. He will send forth evangelists to preach the gospel.
|
God will send delusion on those who
had the opportunity to be reconciled to him but rejected
the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ over their lives. The genuine Christian
life is a led-of-the-Spirit kind of life.
|
Those
who have already heard the gospel and rejected the Lord Jesus Christ, or
accepted him
on their own terms—they
continued to have pleasure in unrighteousness and refused to be
sanctified in the Spirit—
will receive
the strong delusion when "that Wicked" is revealed. They will not
have a "second chance" to be saved as the Left Behind series falsely
and diabolically teaches.
The
"Undecided" Might Decide if They See Signs and Wonders?
What is even more
unsettling is what the authors had the spiritual leader, Tsion Ben Judah think
the undecided needed to see so they would decide:
Tsion was troubled in his spirit
by a deep sense of foreboding. He knew he would not be able to shepherd all
the way to the Glorious Appearing every person who had arrived in Petra. And
yet he believed that when they had seen the mighty and miraculous hand of God,
many of the undecided would be persuaded. (The Remnant p. 338)
This passage suggests
the gospel of Jesus Christ as written in the Holy Bible is not good enough to
bring people to salvation. Those who are "undecided" need to see some miracles to be persuaded that Jesus is really who the Bible
says he is.
Jesus warned:
"There
shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and
wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very
elect". Matthew 24:24
The real remnant
Christian will not
be trying to persuade the lost to believe in the true God of the Holy Bible
because of miracles they see. They will seek to lead the lost to God
through his written Word, the Holy Bible. Signs must not be the determining
factor of what is of God because the antichrist will work many signs and lying
wonders by Satan's power.
If you are "undecided" today
because you have not seen the signs you are looking for, beware.
Satan is quite capable of obliging you with lying signs and wonders in hopes of
deceiving you into accepting him instead of Jesus Christ. (That is what the
"Marion apparitions" are all about.)
What you see with your eyes is not
necessarily what you get. Satan will dangle in front of you anything that will
entice you to get on his path to his desired end for your life. Only
the Bible is the perfectly lit lamp where what you see written plainly in
context, is always what you will
get.
The "Undecideds"
Might Wait Too Long
"This may seem an
unparalleled opportunity to plead once again for the souls of men and women,
because millions will lose loved ones. But the Scriptures also indicate that
this may come so late in the hearts of the undecided that they will have
already been hardened. (The Remnant p. 386)
Here we see a smidgen of realism. Now the
reader is being led to believe that there could be a point of no return if you
remain "undecided" too long. This does not rectify the false teaching
of the "undecided"— the
person who knows the gospel but refuses to commit to Jesus Christ and stays in
some kind of spiritual neutral zone during years of the Tribulation.
Muslims Refusing the Mark of
the Beast?
The authors' teaching against the
God-sent delusion was especially obvious in the passages about Muslims refusing
the Mark, but also rejecting the Lord Jesus Christ. Whoever does not have the
Holy Spirit will not know antichrist is not God. The Muslims will think he is
Allah, the Buddhists will think he is Buddha, The "continuing to have
pleasure in unrighteousness Christians" will think he is Jesus Christ, etc.
The authors are teaching that the God-sent delusion does not exist by this
example, and it is seriously soul-subverting. (See The Remnant, pp. 291-294)
Loyal to Antichrist, But You
Won't Take the Mark of the Beast?
"We know Wongs. Late
middle-aged couple. He very loyal to potentate but never took mark." (The
Remnant p. 265)
If you will recall from The Mark, Mr. Wong
worshipped Antichrist. We later learn he believed on the Lord Jesus Christ (the
authors almost never ever use the title, "Lord Jesus Christ" in the series but I love it and
use it often) AFTER he had already believed on antichrist! This will never ever
happen in real life. Whoever believes the lie will be damned. (See 2 Thess.
2:11-12)
Why do the authors want you to think this is
possible. . . that someone could believe antichrist is God and worship him, but not yet take his mark, and
then come out from under this strong delusion and be saved? Believing the lie is a
judgment from God, and he will not reverse it.
Just as it is a lie of Satan to tell
people they can be saved after death, it is just as heinous to teach them they can believe
Antichrist is God and get saved later.
If You Have the Mark of the
Beast You Might Not Want to Worship the Beast?
Here is yet another example of the
way the authors taught against the God-sent delusion as well as repeating
the false doctrine of separating having the mark of the beast and the worship of
the beast:
Even many who had already taken
the mark of Carpathia were punished for not bowing to worship his image three
times a day. (The Remnant p. 224)
The Bible is plain. The mark of the beast and
the worship of the beast go together. (See Rev. 14:9, 14:11, 16:2, 19:20) Those
who believe the lie, that the beast (Antichrist) is God, will WANT to worship
him. They will be under the strong delusion that he is God, and their minds will be
given over to Satan's control. They will not simply have a mark but have minds
that are not under Satan's control. Those who refuse the mind of Christ
before
the Tribulation will have the mind of Satan during it.
This article is a brief
overview of the examples in the book, The Remnant, that teach against the God-sent delusion as
promised in 2 Thessalonians, chapter 2. For your further investigation, here are
some pages that refer to the "undecided": 119, 122, 222,
224, 264, 338, 370.
"But this is just fiction, right?" The authors don't really want
you to believe these lies
do they?
Yes, they do.
related articles:
Circumstances:
The Way to Judge if Christianity is Still True?
Murder For "The Cause" (The Remnant Articles)
return to:
Exposing False Doctrines in the Left
Behind Series
|