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The Apostle Paul said that in the latter days there would be a falling away from the faith (II Thessalonians 2:3). He also said that the previous Old Covenant scriptures were a guide for us (Romans 15:4). With these instructions in mind, we turn our eyes back through the centuries where God’s wisdom has recorded the examples that have particular significance for these latter days we are living in now. Related Content - Woman in the Pulpit | Spiritual Warfare | The Jezebel Influenced Pastor
Apostasy Happens
We have been given the historical record that chronicled the beginning of creation to Moses delivering God’s people from their bondage in Egypt, to the victories of his successor, Joshua, who led the children of Israel into the Promised Land. From the pinnacle of his success in securing the land, we can look over the spiritual landscape ahead to observe the pattern of apostasy that so often repeats throughout the history of the church.
During Joshua’s reign and the subsequent leadership of the elders, the people served the LORD. –
And the people served the LORD all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders, that outlived Joshua, who had seen all the great works of the LORD, the He did for Israel.- Judges 2:7
Yet, when the generation of those elders had died out, the people fell into apostasy.
And also all that generation were gathered to their fathers: and there arose another generation after them, which knew not the LORD, nor yet the works which He had done for Israel.
And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the LORD, and served Baalim;
And they forsook the LORD god of their fathers, which brought them out of the land of Egypt, and followed other gods, of the gods of the people that were round about them, and bowed themselves to them, and provoked the LORD to anger - Judges 2:10-12.
As we continue on through the ensuing chapters contained in the book of Judges, we see the same pattern repeating over and over again; God’s people sin, opening the door for their chastening by foreign entities. God responds to their cries of repentance and sends righteous judges and leaders like Gideon, who deliver them from their oppressors.
When the righteous judges die out, the people again fall away and the pattern repeats.
Because the people did not fully rid the land of the idolaters as they had been commanded, the LORD told them that those tribes would be “thorns in their sides” and that their gods would be “a snare to you.” –
That through them I may prove Israel, whether they will keep the way of the LORD to walk therein, as their fathers did keep it or not.
Therefore the LORD left those nations, without driving them out hastily; neither delivered He them into the hand of Joshua - Judges 2:22,23
Thus we are given a principle of scripture, “The LORD tests the righteous" (Psalm 11:5).
We have also been shown the vital importance of doctrinally sound leadership. When the leadership falls away from God’s word, these heretics end up breeding more heretics and God’s pattern of judgment will inevitably repeat because He is a righteous judge and a loving father who cannot allow unrepentant, willful and deliberate sin to continue.
One of the evidences of apostasy among the people is an abundance of woman in leadership. When the male leadership that God has ordained is failing or had failed, He will use women as a sign to the men that they have been falling away from following His word.
How long will you go about, O you backsliding daughter? for the LORD has created a new thing in the earth, A woman shall compass a man - Jeremiah 31:22
The Lord raised up Deborah as a judge in Israel at a time when the people were being oppressed by the opposition. She was also a prophetess who called Barak and reminded him of a command from the Lord that apparently he did not have the courage to obey. –
Has not the LORD God of Israel commanded saying, “God and draw toward Mount Tabor, and take with you ten thousand men of the children of Naphtali and of the children of Zebulun?” Judges 4:6
He refused to go unless she went with him (verse 8). And she tells him that he will not get the glory for the victory, that will go to a woman (verse 9). The oppressor was slain by the woman Jael (Judges 4:18-21).
This is the reason why the Apostle Paul said it was a shame for women to speak in the church (I Cor. 14:35); not that they can’t when they are under an anointing (I Cor. 11:5, Galatians 3:28), but women in leadership can be a sign that the male leadership is failing.
A woman pastor I met took over a church where the previous two male pastors had failed morally. The Lord told her when she took the assignment that she was “not My first choice.”
Within the pages of the book of Judges, we are again introduced to another example of compromised leadership.
Samson was a Nazarite, meaning that his calling was a sign of holiness and separation to God. As we follow his story we see a gifted leader whose spirituality for the most part was hindered by his desire to gratify his flesh. In Samson we see a leader who operated not only by lust, but also was driven by anger and vengeance.
If the inner man is not forced under the control of the Holy Spirit by the will of the mind which is motivated by a love for God, then pulpits will be filled with leaders who are operating like the carnal example we are shown in Samson.
As a Nazarite he was forbidden by God to touch anything that was dead. Yet, he violated God’s command and took honey from the body of a dead lion and gave it to his family without telling them where it had come from (Judges 14:8,9). An apostate leader will take honey from a dead lion so to speak, when he takes doctrine from foreign sources apart from God’s word and feeds those aberrant doctrines to God’s people.
God had full knowledge of Samson’s shortcomings and He used the strong man’s weaknesses to deliver the people from the Philistines. Samson’s unrestrained lust eventually caused his captivity and the loss of his sight, yet his repentance restored him and as a result he succeeded in procuring the deliverance for his people through his death.
God uses tribulation to correct His people, and many sincere, yet apostate leaders today will be restored to God like Samson, during the prophesied great tribulation.
All leaders who have been entrusted with the care of God’s people should follow the apostle Paul in his example to overcome his flesh in order to protect his ministry.
But I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection: lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway. – I Corinthians 9:27
I can picture the Apostle Paul reading through the same scriptures in Judges and recognizing the parallels to the people in his own day and beyond. Inspired by the Holy Spirit, he wrote a description of the characteristics of the people that were seemingly religious outwardly, (having a form of godliness) but had denied the power of God, (the atonement through which we receive the Holy Spirit who helps us overcome sin), and as a result had become a people whose characters had disintegrated.
This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come.
For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy,
Without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good,
Traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God;
Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away. - II Timothy 3:1-5
This description of the people in the future has also been foreshadowed in the past as we witness how apostasy instigated a civil war among God’s people. Judges 19 describes an unprecedented time in Israel’s history when the tribe of Benjamin had become so depraved, the other tribes had no choice but to eradicate most of the offenders. To relate this incident to the spiritual condition of many in the body of Christ today, there are leaders and congregations who have abandoned following the word of God exclusively and as a result have declined morally and have accepted within their midst practices that God has labeled in His word as abomination. But unlike the example in Judges, in the latter days the liberal church will most likely be the majority.
Many years ago my husband had a prophetic dream. In the dream, he was thousands of feet in the sky. He saw a beautiful, yet somewhat unnatural rainbow and multitudes of people who were reaching for it and putting their hands into it. My husband’s only thought in the dream was, “Where is Jesus?”
Then the clouds parted beneath his feet and he found himself looking down at a barren mountain. The only thing on the mountain was a cross formed with evergreen trees. Then the dream ended.
This dream was given to him over thirty years ago. We believe that he was being shown the latter day’s apostasy that is intensifying upon us now.
Rainbows in scripture are symbolic of God’s promises. But the rainbow in the dream was unnatural and distorted, just like the rainbow symbolism that is being distorted today. The people were reaching for a faith that had been disconnected from the truth. The mountain symbolized a place of intimacy with God, and the evergreen cross represented the remnant Christian church that is holding onto the truth that Jesus is the way, truth and the life; and the only way to the Father as He said in John 14:6. In scripture evergreen trees are symbolic of the righteousness of the saints, and God beautifies His sanctuary with them (Isaiah 60:13,61:3).
The people in the dream who were reaching for the rainbow, had been deceived into thinking that they could enter heaven without the cross, and continue in unrepented sin. God’s promise of eternal life is real, but He has made it very clear in His word how entrance into heaven is obtained, and that it is by the plan He has ordained, illustrated in His word from Genesis throughout the Old Testament and fulfilled in Jesus’ death and resurrection.
Many people today are following the teachings of those who use a rainbow as a symbol of God’s acceptance, but no one can be accepted unless that rainbow is connected firmly to the Gospel and repentance as it has been revealed by Jesus and His apostles.
If church leadership is not zealous for sound doctrine as it is exemplified by Jesus and His apostles, then we can actually end up having counterfeit revivals and false conversions. The Apostle Paul warned of teaching “another Jesus,” other than the One that had been revealed to the apostles (II Cor. 11:1-4).
God’s people sinned when they refused to heed God’s warning to not marry foreign wives.
And they took their daughters to be their wives, and gave their daughters to their sons, and served their gods – Judges 3:6
When God’s people refused to separate from the pagan influences around them He gave them over to the will of their enemies. The Biblical pattern will repeat as the sins of the people continue, oblivious to the impending storm clouds of tribulation gathering above their heads.
I attended a Charismatic church many years ago in California. The leadership had just returned from a conference where several of them had the same vision of dark clouds. They were bubbling about the clouds representing showers of blessings, unaware that dark clouds in scripture represent God’s judgment (Joel 2:2, Zep. 1:15). Bright clouds are symbolic of His blessings Zech. 10:1).
We can spiritually marry foreign wives when we embrace non-biblical doctrine and immerse ourselves in non-Christian entertainment. Do you please yourselves in the children of strangers? (Isaiah 2:6); that is secular entertainment produced by people who are opposed to God and His Christ.
A friend of mine in California was watching a made for television movie when she felt something slam on her chest. Several days later she received a call from someone who operates in the prophetic saying that there was a movie that was promoting a spirit of murder and not to watch it. That was the movie she was watching when she felt that thing hit her chest.
Shortly after that she and her husband were watching a National Geographic special. It was about to show a Voodoo ceremony. She heard the Still Small Voice whisper, “Turn it off.” She didn’t respond. Then the Spirit went to her husband and told him the same thing. He didn’t obey either and they both felt something land on their chests.
I had another friend, who was a speaker who operated in the prophetic. She told me that she was invited to a movie by the people she was staying with before a service she was to speak at the next morning. She agreed to go with them. But when the film began to become violent, the Lord let her see demons come out from the screen and begin to “mess with the people.” She left immediately and waited in the lobby until the movie was over.
I believe that the devil is using much in our media today to spread spirits of lust and violence and that is one of the reasons there is so much unrestrained immorality. I also believe that spirits of complacency are transferred onto susceptible Christians through the media resulting an increasingly "dumbed down church."
It is my prayer dear reader, that you will be courageous enough to stand up for the Lord, cleave to the fundamental truth of the gospel, cast away any compromise and take your place among that remnant forest of true believers and followers of the Messiah Jesus.
Israel’s continuous habit of falling away from God eventually resulted in a devastating captivity in Babylon which lasted seventy years. Today God’s church is also facing the prospect of the prophesied great tribulation. It is time for the church to return to following our first century examples and embrace their exhortations to “press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus”. – Philippians 3:14.
Because God has called us to be “obedient children, not fashioning yourselves to the former lusts in your ignorance: but as He which has called you is holy, so you be holy in all manner of conversation; because it is written, ‘You be holy for I am holy’” (I Peter 1:14-16 from Leviticus 11;44-45).
But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people; that you should show forth the praise of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light. – I Peter 2:9
Let us not be ashamed to let our light shine into the darkness of this world, and encourage those who are among the leadership in our churches to be courageous enough to feed God’s sheep His pure, uncompromised word, and cast away the apostasy that can so easily happen.
Copyright 2024 by H.D. Shively
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