Beware False Teachers

The danger of false teaching and how to defend/fight against it
The Bible warns us very clearly that there will be, and indeed are, false teachers (2 Peter 2:1). Wolves in sheep's clothing (Matthew 7:15). They are people who try to lead us astray from God and our salvation in Him, and so we are called to be on our guard, Ephesians 6:10-18:
^"10 Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. ¹¹ Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. ¹² For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. ¹³ Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. ¹⁴ Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, ¹⁵ and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. ¹⁶ In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. ¹⁷ Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.
¹⁸ And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people."

What is the "full armour of God"? It is "truth", "righteousness", "readiness that comes from the gospel of peace", "faith", "salvation" and "the word of God". With these we are fully equipped to take our stand against the Devil's schemes (Romans 8). To be on guard against false teaching, we need to know the truth and we know that from the word of God, so we need to know and understand the Bible as much as possible. We also need to believe the Gospel and have salvation through it.

So when false teacher's come we can use these things, this armour, to help us identify them, not be taken in by them, and even fight what they preach (lovingly, humbly and yet also boldly, of course).

Fighting against false teaching #1: How do we identify false teaching?
The Devil hates the Gospel. By dying on the cross and rising again Jesus "having disarmed the powers and authorities [I think here it refers primarily to Spiritual ones which fight against God, e.g. the Devil], he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross."

Do you see what it said? "Disarmed", "made a public spectacle of", "triumphing over". What Jesus did by dying on the cross and being raised from the dead defeated sin, defeated death and defeated the Devil. Through Good Friday to Easter Sunday Jesus obliterated Satan's greatest weapons against believers. Jesus won. God won. Anyone who believes the Gospel has victory through Christ.

We should find it no surprise, therefore, to find that there are a great many false teachers and fake "gospel"s out there, all of which deny in some way, great or small, the truth about Jesus and what he's done. If people don't believe the Gospel, they don't have freedom and victory in Christ. So to identify whether a teaching is false, the following sorts of markers are perhaps best to look for:
- Does the teaching deny that Jesus is really God?
- Does the teaching deny the 3 person, 1 God, God that is the Trinity, the God of the Bible?
- Does the teaching deny that Jesus really became a human?
- Does the teaching deny that Jesus really died?
- Does the teaching deny that Jesus really physically rose from the dead?
- Does the teaching deny that Jesus really took EVERY one of our sins upon himself when he died so that if we believe in him we really are forgiven for EVERY one of our sins?
- Does the teaching deny that by rising again Jesus WILL raise us to eternal life with him in the New Creation if we believe in him?
- Does the teaching deny that by believing in God we are filled with the Holy Spirit?
- Does the teaching deny that there is NO work whatsoever that we can do that will have any influence on whether or not we are saved, or to what extent we are saved (aside from, arguably, the unforgivable sin)?
- Does the teaching claim that Jesus has physically returned to Earth since he ascended into Heaven after his resurrection and before Pentecost?

I know there are a lot of points here, but they are actually pretty easy to remember, because they all focus around Jesus. The world and the devil just can't stand Jesus, and so they make every effort to take the real Jesus out of the Gospel, which stops it being the Gospel. If a teaching has any of these markers, then you should designate it as false and wrong (that is not to say you shouldn't think about it, it may not be saying what you think, but at the very least it is unhelpfully presented, and at the worst it is false teaching).

Another useful marker is this:
- Does the teaching deny a passage of Scripture (this is not to say that the teaching can't say that the passage doesn't directly apply in the same way today as it did before, but beware as some take this too far and too liberally)?

Fighting against false teaching #2: What to do when we face false teachers and false teachings
Pray. Everything we should to should start with, continue with and end with honest and sincere prayer to God. This is especially relevant here as it is His Holy Spirit that gives us life and can soften a person's heart to the truth, we are powerless without God.

Secondly we should arm ourselves with Scripture. Remember back in Ephesians 6 we saw that the sword of the Spirit was the word of God (v17)? "What part of the Gospel is this teaching denying?" We should ask ourselves, and then we should find the bit(s) of Scripture which refute this, prayerfully understand them, and then take them up against the false teaching/teacher.

Thirdly remember that we are hear to declare the Gospel and make disciples (Matthew 28), not to condemn people. And so we should lovingly approach those who believe false teachings, carefully and patiently helping them come to see the ugliness of their false Gospel, and the sheer beauty and majesty of the true Gospel of the true Christ.