The Captivity of the Church

 

Lesson 3: The False Thing—Divine Divisions

 

The False Thing

It has always been the Enemy’s intent to create a “false thing” patterned after God’s “real thing”. End time events play out as a confrontation of the false and the true. We need to understand that the false is deceptive—it is designed, on purpose, to deceive us. Those who do not love the Truth as the Scriptures say will fall for this deception¹.

None of this is outside the plan of God, for the Lord intends to make a clear separation between the righteous and the wicked. God, Himself, will actually send the delusion, even though He will use the enemy to do it.

2 Thessalonians 2:11-12 NASB

(11) For this reason God will send upon them a deluding influence so that they will believe what is false,

(12) in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth, but took pleasure in wickedness.

So, for those who don’t love the truth, God will send “a leading away error” (literal meaning of deluding influence) that leads to the false so that all may be judged who didn’t believe the truth. In the end days, it will be easy to become involved with the false because its deception will be strongly empowered.

However, God doesn’t allow the enemy to do this before his time. All things are appointed by the Lord. The enemy has tried throughout history to bring forth the completion of his intentions; but God has not allowed it because it was not yet time.

Divine Divisions

To see how the Lord holds the enemy in check until the appointed time, we need to look at the Lord’s methods as recorded in the Scriptures. The clear example is in Genesis with the tower of Babel.

Genesis 11:1-4 NASB

(1) Now the whole earth used the same language and the same words.

(2) It came about as they journeyed east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there.

(3) They said to one another, “Come, let us make bricks and burn them thoroughly.” And they used brick for stone, and they used tar for mortar.

(4) They said, “Come, let us build for ourselves a city, and a tower whose top will reach into heaven, and let us make for ourselves a name, otherwise we will be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth.”

Everyone was united in “the same language and the same words”. This sounds redundant to us because language and words sound like the same thing, but, the fuller meaning of this is that they were of one mind and purpose. They determined to build a city and a tower that would preserve their name and reputation.

Now, we have a poor translation about the tower having a top that would reach to the heavens. The literal Hebrew says “a top like the heavens”, which says to me that the tower had a top that depicted the heavens by the inscription of the Zodiac on it. This was a way of preserving forbidden knowledge that had been gained through demons or fallen angels.

The most amazing aspect of the story is the way that God responded to what they were doing. His reaction should make us take notice of the importance of the events.

Genesis 11:6-7 NASB

(6) The LORD said, “Behold, they are one people, and they all have the same language. And this is what they began to do, and now nothing which they purpose to do will be impossible for them.

(7) “Come, let Us go down and there confuse their language, so that they will not understand one another’s speech.”

They had one mind and purpose that related to what they were doing. God said that if they succeeded in what they were doing that “nothing which they purpose to do will be impossible for them”. It is absolutely amazing to me that God would say that nothing would now be impossible for them. This was serious enough to God that He took drastic action by confusing their language and, I believe, also splitting the continents apart.

Why? Why did God do this? I think it was because they had come together in a carnal form of unity with a purpose that was not the purpose of God. When God made Adam, it was His intention that unity would be maintained between them and that Adam would accomplish the purpose of God. After the fall, man began to determine his own purposes apart from the purpose of God. The enemy has played on this to bring men into a unity of purpose that is contrary to God’s purpose. This is what we have here at the tower of Babel.

God’s solution was to create division. He divided them in such a way that they could not come back together. This is how the Lord keeps us and the enemy in check. Whenever, we begin to pursue something that is contrary to the purpose of God and we begin to bring others into a unity of purpose as it relates to it, God brings division.

Nowhere is this more apparent than in the institutional church. As we have moved from the purpose and intention of God concerning church and have created something that is false, God keeps it from coming into full unity by creating divisions. God’s method of protecting the true is to provide divisions for the false so that the carnal purpose cannot be accomplished. Why do you think we have so many denominations? They are the divisions that God has made to keep us from coming into a unity of purpose that is contrary to His intention before its appointed time.

However, there will come a time, the appointed time, when God brings His purposes to completion and that includes removing the restraints on the enemy so that he can bring forth a man who will unite the people into a unity of purpose that results in the rulership of the man of lawlessness as spoken of in the Scriptures.

2 Thessalonians 2:6-7 NASB

(6) And you know what restrains him now, so that in his time he will be revealed.

(7) For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work; only he who now restrains will do so until he is taken out of the way.

When the restraint is removed we have the result revealed in the book of Revelation.

Revelation 17:13 NASB

(13) “These have one purpose, and they give their power and authority to the beast.

We see this same process in the early Church as their unity moved from that which was spoken of by Jesus² to that which centered around man and man-made ideas.

1 Corinthians 11:17-19 NASB

(17) But in giving this instruction, I do not praise you, because you come together not for the better but for the worse.

(18) For, in the first place, when you come together as a church, I hear that divisions exist among you; and in part I believe it.

(19) For there must also be factions among you, so that those who are approved may become evident among you.

Earlier Paul had exhorted them concerning divisions and that they would come into the same mind and judgment.

1 Corinthians 1:10 NASB

(10) Now I exhort you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all agree and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be made complete in the same mind and in the same judgment.

However, divisions continue when we are worldly minded. When we have a mindset that is directed by worldly thinking it leads to divisions.

Jude 1:19 NASB

(19) These are the ones who cause divisions, worldly-minded, devoid of the Spirit.

The solution is walking in the Spirit. We have already received the unity of the Spirit. All we have to do is maintain it³. However, being worldly minded breaks the unity of the Spirit because it moves us back into the purposes of fallen man.

Taken Captive

In the years since the early Church there have been many divisions. As the false thing comes forth, God divides it. He is perfectly able to keep that which has been entrusted to Him, including His Ekklesia, in purity.

However, there have been many true Christians who have been taken captive by the false. When the divisions occur, they are carried away with the false in a manner similar to the Israelites being taken as captive to Babylon. When this occurred, the Israelites were still God’s people individually; however, they were no longer a nation and lived as captives of Babylon, subject to Babylonian influence and culture. The sad thing is that when God turned their captivity and provided a way for them to return to their land, those that returned were the minority. The majority of the Israelites preferred Babylon and its culture rather than return to Israel and the land that God had given them.

As explained in Lesson 1, we have taken “Church” and made something out of it that was not intended by the Lord. We have created a “false thing” that has grown and taken on a culture of its on. It is well on its way to becoming “Mystery Babylon”. Many true Christians are captive to the false thing and need to be set free.

The false become very visible from Constantine’s day forward. When Christianity became the “official religion” and came under the influence of the State, it marked the “coming out” of the false. The false has continued to grow. The Protestant revolution was an attempt to “restore” some biblical standards; however, anything restored to the false is still false. Our Protestant denominations are no better than the Catholic in God’s eyes. He is still building His true Ekklesia—it is one body, there are no divisions.

All of the false will eventually come together under the “False Prophet” as the religion of the Lawless One. It will stand in opposition to the true saints of God and, as Jesus said, the true saints will be hated and killed and delivered to tribulation⁴. The greatest enemy of the true is the false. We need to see that clearly. The false has already persecuted and killed untold numbers of the true saints during the previous centuries. It only gets worse during the end times.

However, God will empower the righteous and they will shine as lights in the darkness, overcoming by the blood of the lamb, testifying to the Truth, and giving their lives for the love of it.

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