Testing The Spirits 1 John 4:1-6. We Can Be Sure Of One Thing… False prophets have gone into the world. False teachers abound today. We must defend the.

Testing The Spirits1 John 4:1-6

We Can Be Sure Of One Thing…

False prophets have gone into the world.

False teachers abound today.

We must defend the truth.

The Fact of One Spirit/spirit

•1 John 4:1 -- Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.

One Holy Spirit

Ephesians 4:4 -- There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called….

1 Cor. 12:13 --For we were all baptized by one Spirit so as to form one body—whether Jews or Gentiles, slave or free—and we were all given the one Spirit to drink.

Philippians 1:27

•Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ. Then, whether I come and see you or only hear about you in my absence, I will know that you stand firm in the one Spirit, striving together as one for the faith of the gospel

John 14:16-17

•And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever— the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you.

There is one spirit shared by the church

•2 Corinthians 4:13 -- It is written: “I believed; therefore I have spoken.” Since we have that same spirit of faith, we also believe and therefore speak….

Romans 8:9

•You, however, are not in the realm of the flesh but are in the realm of the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, they do not belong to Christ.

•Vs. 16 -- The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children.

1 Corinthians 12:13 -- For we were all baptized by one Spirit so as to form one body—whether Jews or Gentiles, slave or free—and we were all given the one Spirit to drink.

Philippians 2:2 --then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind.

Opposed to the spirit of error

Romans 11:8 --  “God gave them a spirit of stupor, eyes that could not see and ears that could not hear, to this very day.”

Ephesians 2:1-2

•As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient.

1 Corinthians 2:12

•What we have received is not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may understand what God has freely given us.

Test The Spirits

•Vs. 2-3 --This is how you can recognize the Spirit of God: Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, 3 but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is already in the world.

The Gnostic Heresy

•Jesus was not really God made flesh.•The Holy Spirit merely rested upon Jesus.

But Paul explains: Philippians 2:6-7 -- who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men.

Today’s Denominationalism

•Vastly diverse understandings•Contradictory doctrines•Modern day prophets

The Word of the Apostles

•Vs. 4-6 --  You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world. They are from the world and therefore speak from the viewpoint of the world, and the world listens to them. We are from God, and whoever knows God listens to us; but whoever is not from God does not listen to us. This is how we recognize the Spirit of truth and the spirit of falsehood.

•The true believer listens to the words of the apostles:

•Luke 10:16 -- “Whoever listens to you listens to me; whoever rejects you rejects me; but whoever rejects me rejects him who sent me

•Those in God have already overcome the false prophets and antichrists.

•Can we discern between the WORD and the WORLD?

•Hebrews 1:2 -- …but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom also he made the universe.

•Galatians 1:8 -- But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let them be under God’s curse!