Spirit of Truth
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Introduction - What are Spirits & Difference between Spirits -
The term “spirits” can refer to a lot of things: the stuff you’re not supposed to lose during hard times. Something cheerleaders are professionally obsessed with. The beings you negotiate with after you’ve accidentally moved into a haunted house. And, oh yes, bottles of power-packing alcohol. However, the spirit that we are talking about is more like the being that needs to be removed from a haunted house. The more technical meaning would be:
a supernatural being or essence: such as
a: HOLY SPIRIT
b: SOUL
c: an often malevolent being that is bodiless but can become visible (Ghost)
d: a malevolent being that speaks to or enters and possesses a human being
The Greek word pneuma means “breath” but in a biblical meaning is Spirit and A spirit is the nonphysical part of a person which is the seat of emotions and character - So the Spirit is also the breath of life.
So what does our passage for today say?
24 The one who keeps His commandments abides in Him, and He in him. We know by this that He abides in us, by the Spirit whom He has given us.
1 Beloved, 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.
2 By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God;
3 and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God; this is the spirit of the antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming, and now it is already in the world.
4 You are from God, little children, and have overcome them; because greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world.
5 They are from the world; therefore they speak as from the world, and the world listens to them.
6 We are from God; he who knows God listens to us; he who is not from God does not listen to us. By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.
Transitional Sentence: God has given us the ability to discern between the Spirit of Truth and other spirits - spirits of the world.
Verse 1 immediately provides us with a word of caution and one of scrutiny for the readers about spirits.
A word of Caution (care taken to avoid danger or mistakes)- do not believe every spirit (or trust) Greek word believe - pisteuo
- From false prophets (teachers) Any prophet declaring anything other than what is true
Jesus Himself warned the disciples about wolves in sheep's clothing Matt 7:15
15 “Beware of the false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves.
- Illustration - The cartoon road runner where Willy E. Coyote dressing up as a sheep to try and get a meal.
Hiding a true identity can be easy - that is why we need to be on guard and learn to test the spirits so we are not easily deceived and carried away. After all satan is capable of dressing himself in light in order to take advantage of the weak.
The apostle Paul warned the Elders from the church in Ephesus about the same thing.
28 “Be on guard for yourselves and for 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 “I know that after my departure savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock;
The savage wolves are false prophets. It doesn’t necessarily take to much for one false prophet to destroy a church. You’ve all probably heard stories about a church being torn apart by false teaching. The history of this church shows it. Another church I know about started simply enough...
- Story about a ruined church - Teach false doctrine and take advantage of the people.
The other idea of verse 1 is - Scrutiny - test the spirits. In testing the spirits we must determine whether the spirit is of God or some other spirit such as the antichrist. A spirit of the antichrist would be a false prophet. For this particular point of this passage John is telling us a way of how to tell the difference between a prophet and a false prophet. He is specifically pointing to one demonic spirit - the spirit of the antichrist.
Verses 2 & 3 of our passage says:
2 By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God;
3 and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God; this is the spirit of the antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming, and now it is already in the world.
So the spirit of the antichrist will not be able to confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh. That spirit just can’t do it. Unfortunately there are other demonic spirits in the world and they can speak the name of Jesus Christ. Because they can speak His name we need to know how to test them. We need to be able to test all the spirits. So let’s take a look at some ways to test all the spirits.
The first and best way to do this would be easy for those with a spiritual gift...
10 and to another the effecting of miracles, and to another prophecy, and to another the distinguishing of spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, and to another the interpretation of tongues.
The Holy Spirit provides a lot of different gifts for the use of the body of Christ and one of them is for being able to distinguish between spirits. With this gift someone would be able to tell in a deep down sort of way. The Holy Spirit within them would just start ringing bells.
A second way to tell the difference would be the way in which someone acts. The prophet Hosea said:
9 Whoever is wise, let him understand these things; Whoever is discerning, let him know them. For the ways of the Lord are right, And the righteous will walk in them, But transgressors will stumble in them.
The righteous will walk in the ways of the Lord. False prophets will not be righteous. It will be a matter of the actions and how they are acting. False prophets will eventually show their true selves and stumble. Later in the bible the apostle Paul provided us a list of habits that those with the presence of the Holy Spirit in them would exhibit. We call them the fruits of the spirit. He also provided a list of habits that those with a different spirit would exhibit - these he called the deeds of the flesh.
19 Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: immorality, impurity, sensuality,
20 idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions,
21 envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these, of which I forewarn you, just as I have forewarned you, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.
Test these against the fruits of the spirit:
22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,
23 gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.
There is a big difference between these two lists. Carrying a lie of love and joy for very long would be difficult and eventually the stumbling should come. The false prophet will trip and show the true nature of the spirit which is leading the body.
The third way to test the spirit is to take some time to look at what is being said and compare it to scripture to test it against the word.
14 But solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil.
Solid food of the word (scripture) and practice. In other words as you grow in your knowledge of the word you can test what is being taught against the truth of scripture and determine if what is being taught is false or true. A rather obvious example would be if someone told you that divorce for any reason is acceptable. Well if you know the word you can open the scriptures and tell them exactly what Jesus said about divorce.
So how many other demonic spirits are named in the Bible?
According to Dr. Jerry Robison in his book, "Strongman's his name… What's his game?" Says that there are 16 biblically named demonic spirits. Each of these spirits has particular manifestations.
Here is the list of demonic spirits listed in the Bible:
Spirit of Divination; Familiar Spirit; Spirit of Jealousy; Lying Spirit; Perverse Spirit; Spirit of Haughtiness; Spirit of Heaviness; Spirit of Whoredoms; Spirit of Infirmity; Deaf and Dumb Spirit; Spirit of Bondage; Spirit of Fear; Seducing Spirits; Spirit of Anti-Christ; Spirit of Error; The Spirit of Poverty; Spirit of Death
I’m not going to talk about all of them - just three:
Lying spirit
Manifestations: Strong Deceptions, Flattery, Superstitions,
Religious Bondages, False Prophecy, Accusations, Slander, Gossip,
Lies, False Teachers
Spirit of Anti-Christ
Manifestations - Denies Deity of Christ, Denies Atonement, Against
Christ and His Teaching, Humanism, Worldly Speech and Actions,
Teachers of Heresies, Anti-Christian, Deceiver, Lawlessness
Spirit of Error
Manifestations - Error, Unsubmissive, False Doctrines, Unteachable,
Servant of Corruption, Contentions, Defensive/Argumentative, New-Age Movement
All 16 of these named spirits can lead the elected astray. That is why we always have to make sure that we are vigilant to test what we hear and what we see. A spirit of anti-christ or error could lead us astray not by being out right wrong but simply by not being right. The big lie is easy to discern but it is the small lie that gets you to just step off of the narrow path. Once you are off the narrow path it is easy to go a little farther and eventually you are no longer even close to the narrow path; you are caught in the mass of people heading to destruction on the wide path.
These spirits they are the voices of this world. Those who hear these voices and follow them are of the world. Verse 5 of our passage says:
1 John 4:5 (NASB95)
5 They are from the world; therefore they speak as from the world, and the world listens to them.
They are the false prophets. They are the ones who do not speak truthfully of God and cannot profess Jesus Christ as Lord. These false prophets will say lies that are slightly true or they will say flat out lies that are easy to discern for anyone who knows the truth. The false prophets are the ones whose deeds will be of the world and those of the world will follow them.
However verse 6 says:
6 We are from God; he who knows God listens to us; he who is not from God does not listen to us. By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.
With this verse John flips his last message around. In verse 5 it is about those of the world but with verse 6 it is about those of God… We are from God! Those who are of God listen and the world doesn’t.
This passage ends with the point of these six verses - By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error. We know that the spirit of error is a demonic spirit leading people to eternal death...
So who is the Spirit of Truth?
16 “I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever;
17 that is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him, but you know Him because He abides with you and will be in you.
The Spirit of truth is the Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit. The Spirit whom God gave us. He gave Him to us because we keep His commandments. He dwells in us because we know His Son Christ Jesus and believe in Him. Those of the world do not believe in Him or know Him so He does not dwell in them nor do they listen to Him.
Exit -
I have covered the difference between the spirits; those of lying, the anti-christ and error. I also covered some of how to test or discern between these spirits and the Spirit of truth but, I have left out the big point of this passage. Verse 4 has the The Big Point; which is from whom we belong and that we have Victory in Jesus!
4 You are from God, little children, and have overcome them; because greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world.
We are from God - our identity lies in Him. Yes little children we may be, but we are God’s children. Adopted into the family of God and given full rights in His kingdom. We the children of God have overcome the world and all the false prophets and the demonic spirits that roam the world looking for whomever they may devour. We have overcome the world not because of who we are but because of who He is. So here is the big point...
Greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world.
If we stand on this rock, this bit of truth, the world cannot overcome us. The voices of these worldly spirits will whisper in our ears and try to tell us that we are not enough. The voices will tell us that we are not alright. The voices will tell us all kinds of things. They will try to make us doubt that we are children of God. They will try to lead us astray but because we are not of this world we will not listen to the voices. We will hear the voice of the Good Shepherd our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ not the voice of the anti-christ.
We know that we can overcome the spirit of error and have the victory because Jesus told us so...
33 “These things I have spoken to you, so that in Me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world.”
We too can overcome the world because we are hidden in Him and He is in us.
Be of good courage, we will overcome through His power.
Pray!