How to Spot a Fake

2 Corinthians 11:1-15

In Chapter 11 Paul begins to dig into the controversy between he and the ?false apostles? and point out both the fallacy of their thinking and the danger of letting that thinking in. It?s a danger that each of us faces today even inside the church.

1

Paul considers it utter silliness to even have to defend himself, and makes it clear to the Corinthians in several places that they shouldn?t be doubting his credentials and his place as their spiritual father. But since the Corinthians were willing to ?put up? with the utter foolishness of the gospel as presented by the false apostles, then, why not!

2

There is such a thing as godly jealousy. The Bible is replete with examples of how Yahweh was jealous over His people. (Exodus 34:14) ?You are to never bow down to another god because the Lord, being jealous by nature, is a jealous God? for example. God isn?t jealous like we are jealous. What it means is that He wants us all for Himself because 1) that?s what we were made for and 2) being joined to anything else is being joined to evil.

The problem that Israel, the Corinthians, and we, face is that there is pressure to cover all of your bases. You love God but you also see benefits loving other gods like money, power, position, and physical appearance. What we see as beneficial God knows is lethal, and the Corinthians may not have realized it but they were cheating on their husband with the false apostles.

3

Remember how last time, in our study of Chapter 10, we discussed how the weapons of spiritual warfare are actually aimed at the mind? The same holds true here. In the Garden of Eden, Eve was pure; she didn?t know sin. Satan, in the guise of a serpent, attacked her idea of the person of God and the Word of God. He said that God couldn?t be trusted and that His Word was not true. Once she was convinced in her mind, her actions followed and she disobeyed God be picking and eating the forbidden fruit.

In the same way, Paul worries that the false teachers are going to ?ruin? (corrupt) the minds and then the relationship between the Corinthians and their Messiah, by a false gospel.

In essence what Eve did was to cheat on her marriage covenant with God. When we embrace false doctrine and a false idea about God we do the same thing?and it?s more common than you might think.

4

Just because something sounds good or makes sense doesn?t make it true. The false teachers were teaching a different Jesus, a different spirit (presumably than the Holy Spirit) and a different gospel message. Just what they were teaching Paul does not spell out here.

Scholars have given at least two possibilities for the heresy: either it was a legalistic heresy that Christians had to follow the Jewish Law, or it was a Greek heresy involving being an incredibly an impressive public figure in order to get money out of people.

Either way, Paul tells the Corinthians that they are eating it up hook line and sinker. There is a website out there called Politifact. They try to weigh the truthfulness of political statements and they have this truth meter which goes from total falsehood to absolute truth. I wonder where the Truth-o-meter was for the Corinthians. Their garbage detectors were set to ?off?.

In Acts 17:11 Luke gives us some insight into people who had good garbage detectors: the Beroeans. ?The people here were more open-minded than those in Thessalonica, since they welcomed the message with eagerness and examined the Scriptures daily to see if these things were so.?

The Corinthians didn?t have the word of God (New Testament) but they had God?s Word as spoken by a genuine Apostle and they had the Old Testament to back it up.

In Galatians, Paul is even more strident about identifying the source of this kind of false doctrine and what should happen to it:

Galatians 1:6-9 I am amazed that you are so quickly turning away from Him who called you by the grace of Christ, and are turning to a different gospel? 7 not that there is another gospel, but there are some who are troubling you and want to change the gospel of Christ. 8 But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel other than what we have preached to you, a curse be on him! 9 As we have said before, I now say again: if anyone preaches to you a gospel contrary to what you received, a curse be on him!

So how do we spot doctrine from the pit versus from God?

When it comes to listening to teachers, I?ll use the list from Chapter 4:

•  Does their doctrine line up with the Bible?
•  Is their focus on themselves more than on Jesus?
•  How genuine are they?how real?
•  Do they put a lot of emphasis on the cost of ministry? (2:17)
•  Is the gospel their number one aim?

Specifically from this section then:

•  A different Jesus: not God come in the flesh as the sole Savior for man?s sin and way back to God.
•  A different Spirit: the Spirit is some ?force? that you bend to your personal gain, rather than you as a tool of the Spirit for the gospel.
•  A different gospel: anything other than grace alone by faith alone.

Looking at it another way, based on the behavior of the false apostles:

Different Jesus: Acting cool

Different Spirit: Acting weird

Different Gospel: Acting good

Next Paul addresses the issues that the ?super apostles? brought up: Paul?s inferior appearance in public, and his lack of leveraging his ministry to make money.

5 ? 6

Clearly the Corinthians were enamored by a slick package of poison. Paul says it isn?t the package but the contents that matter. What you believe matters.

7 ? 11

Paul was a tent maker by trade. He used that trade to support himself in ministry. And at times he went ?full time? and took donations from other churches to support himself just so that the accusation of Paul being ?in it for the money? could not be levied against him. Instead the false teachers used that benefit as an accusation in and of itself?that not being paid meant you were not successful and shouldn?t be listened to!

Paul says ?This is the way I?ve done it, it?s right, and I?ll continue it!?

Now the truth of these false teachers is revealed:

12 ? 15

Wow. No diplomacy here. Paul lays it on the line.

1. Paul is going to make it clear that there is no comparison between someone called directly as an Apostle and these pretenders.
2. They are false prophets. The penalty for this in the Old Testament was death.
3. They are deceitful workers ? they claim to work for God but are fooling others. Their words sound good but are false
4. Just because they wear the disguise as an apostle does NOT make them one
5. In fact, they are serving the needs of Satan (maybe not consciously), not of God.
6. What is the result of their influence in Corinth: people acting more like the world than the Lord. There will be no fruit for righteousness here and they will have a lot of explaining to do when they stand before God.

Conclusions

To further illustrate the character of false teachers like this, let?s look at: 2 Peter 2:12-19

But these people, like irrational animals?creatures of instinct born to be caught and destroyed?speak blasphemies about things they don\'t understand, and in their destruction they too will be destroyed, 13 suffering harm as the payment for unrighteousness. They consider it a pleasure to carouse in the daytime. They are blots and blemishes, delighting in their deceptions as they feast with you, 14 having eyes full of adultery and always looking for sin, seducing unstable people, and with hearts trained in greed. Accursed children! 15 By abandoning the straight path, they have gone astray and have followed the path of Balaam, the son of Bosor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness, 16 but received a rebuke for his transgression: a speechless donkey spoke with a human voice and restrained the prophet\'s madness.

17 These people are springs without water, mists driven by a whirlwind. The gloom of darkness has been reserved for them. 18 For uttering bombastic, empty words, they seduce, by fleshly desires and debauchery, people who have barely escaped from those who live in error. 19 They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption, since people are enslaved to whatever defeats them. 

This same type of thing exists today in the church.

As Paul departed from the Ephesians in Acts, he told them this would happen in their church:

Acts 20:28-31 Therefore take heed to yourselves and to all the flock, among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the church of God which He purchased with His own blood. 29 For I know this, that after my departure savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock. 30 Also from among yourselves men will rise up, speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after themselves. 31 Therefore watch, and remember that for three years I did not cease to warn everyone night and day with tears.

In the end it is a battle for the mind. The enemy (mentioned twice in the first half of this chapter) seeks to cloud and confuse the mind, get it thinking about fulfilling desires of the emotion and body, rather than focusing on getting what you desire in God?s way and understanding who God is through Jesus Christ. Paul said to not be ?conformed? to the image of this world but be transformed through the ?renewing of your mind.? That happens as you understand God?s word and let God apply it to your mind!

Do you have a ?complete and pure devotion to Christ? or are you covering the bases? (vs 3)

Be very concerned about a gospel that sounds a lot like the values of this world because it will pull you away from a relationship with Jesus. Just because something sounds good to the ear or feels good to the mind or flesh does not make it good!

Are you ?trained in knowledge? or being trained to be cool? (vs 6)

The best way to avoid this is to doing something just like we are doing today, to learn God?s Word and ask Him to seep His character deep into our psyche. If you are not being trained by the Lord you are likely being trained by the world!