The Bible in Jeopardy: Who’s Behind It? (Lane)

The Bible in Jeopardy: Who’s Behind it?

by Lonnie Lane

The prevailing thought in the world system today is that belief in absolutes, such as absolute truth, is considered the height of arrogance; to believe in an intelligent Being having created the world is viewed as profound ignorance; and to commit oneself to obedience to God’s Word is seen as slavery to religion and the surrendering of one’s freedom. But to anyone even remotely Biblically minded, especially in light of all this, it seems quite imperative that humankind is surely in need of a wisdom far greater than our own. 

The Words that God gave to Moses were intended to give to Israel, and through them to all mankind, a prescription for lives of wellbeing, provision, prosperity and His protection. When Israel heeded these words and lived accordingly, that was their experience. So it has been for anyone who has chosen to abide by the spirit of those words. David personally expressed it this way: “Thy word is a light unto my feet and a lamp unto my path” ( Ps. 119:105). God’s words to Joshua centuries earlier stated the value of His Word clearly: 

“…be careful to do according to all the law (Torah) which Moses My servant commanded you; do not turn from it to the right or to the left, so that you may have success wherever you go. This book of the law (Torah) shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it; for then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have success” (Josh 1:7,8) 

However, within a few hundred years of Yeshua’s resurrection, erroneous thinking by Christian leaders considered Torah irrelevant for the church, despite the fact that it had served as the foundation for the New Covenant (See Jeremiah 31:31). The New Covenant wasn’t to exclude Israel; it was for Israel! Here’s what God said about when He announced a new covenant:

“Behold, days are coming,” declares the Lord, “when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah….this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days,” declares the Lord, “I will put My law within them and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people” (Jer. 31: 31, 33)

As you can see, this new covenant was not, as some have thought, to be for those who were other than Israel or instead of Israel. Nevertheless, having turned away from the rock upon which the wisdom of the church was seated, the church was left as vulnerable as a cucumber shack on a sandy beach against the storms of life.* The divergence from truth that took place resulted in profound error becoming ensconced in the church. The consequential untold suffering to mankind cannot be measured.  Any time there is a turning away from the Word of God, tragedy will result. Just as any turning in obedience to the Word of God will bring healing and blessings. Both are inevitable. *(Deut. 32:4, 31 re:rock; Is. 1:8; Jer 10:5 re: cucumber shack; Matt 7:26 re: sand.)

So a question arises: How could men who claimed to have been believers turn away from so much of the Word of God?  Whatever their reasoning may have been, there was a force of evil behind their thinking that they were unaware of, and which we would be wise to be aware of as there are similar forces at work in our world today. At this time, when more Jewish people are coming to the Lord, including orthodox Jews, than have since the first century, there also appears to be an increasing polarization of views about God and His Word. It’s not a surprise that the two should happen concurrently. As God’s Kingdom seems to be manifesting what will usher in the return of Yeshua, the opposition to His Kingdom is also at work to try to keep it from happening.  That force would be the devil’s work, of course. And just how does he plan to bring that about? The same way he deceived Eve – by misrepresenting God’s character and His Word. By bringing the Word of God into question so that it appears to challenge our intelligence, or threaten our well being or our freedom. 

Funny thing about our ideas of freedom. In 1776 we Americans fought for Independence and freedom of religion. For 350 years we were the “land of the free.”  But something happened that began to change that. In the 1960’s the idea of freedom began to mean “free love” and throwing off moral restrictions. Some blame it on “the pill” because for the first time people could have “no fault sex.”  Now people were “free” to be sexually immoral.  In the 1980’s that extended to “free choice” and a license for abortions. In the 2000’s this “freedom” further extended to the freedom for homosexuals to marry. The concept of freedom is being redefined in our land in our day. Where America began as a cry for freedom of religion, now what we hear is a demand of freedom from religion!  The same force is behind the discarding of our Biblical values as was in the garden with Adam and Eve.  

Any time the Word of God, whole or in part, is discarded or disregarded, the forces behind it are, without a doubt, satanic. To state it clearly, the devil would like to do away with the Word of God, and to keep people from hearing it and believing it. Additionally, it’s the devil’s lie that promotes the idea that belief in a real devil or in satan is archaic and ignorant. Any Bible believer knows the devil is real and the author of evil. If he was real to Yeshua, he’s real. (See Mtt. 4:1; Mk. 1:13; Luke 4:2.) That’s who Yeshua came to conquer, “that through death He might render powerless him who had the power of death, that is, the devil” (Heb 2:14). 

Yeshua made it clear that “unless you are born again you cannot see the kingdom of God” (John 3:3).  Once you are born again you can see what you’ve not seen before. Things of God and the Bible become clear and you find that you have become alive or alert to the things of God. You know when He is speaking to you. Your heart is sensitive to what pleases or displeases Him. You become increasingly aware of how all things are made by God and are God’s, and that “in Him you live and move and have your being” (Acts 17:28).

At the same time, you become aware that you’re in a war, and that there’s a battle against God, and you find that you and your fellow Believers are in fact the battle ground. You now can see not only God’s kingdom but that there is another dominion, that of satan or the devil. I knew my 60-something year old (at that time) Jewish father was really saved when he called one day to say that he now realized that there is a devil and it wasn’t just some mythical red creature with a tail and pointy ears. God has an enemy and so does the church. And as God’s own people, we wish to give no ground to the devil in any manner. That takes knowing and believing what the Word of God has to say. This includes  repentance as a way of life so that we are immediately restored to the Lord when we sin so as to maintain “a clear conscience” (1 Tim 3:9) and thereby give no place to the accuser, the devil.

Since the church’s doing away with Torah as being valid for New Covenant believers was directly linked to anti-Semitism and hatred for the Jewish people, we can presume that satan was the motivating force behind both. Why would satan have such an adversity against Torah? Let’s consider what the Torah, the first five books of the Bible, would have to say that would cause the devil to want to do away with them.  First, they tell us that God is the Creator of all that exists. God was there before “the beginning” (Gen 1:1). That makes Him rightful owner of all there is. It also makes Him the uncreated sovereign Lord of all there is. That’s a given. You create it; it’s Yours!  

We also learn that God had created Adam and Eve as the prototype for all humankind in God’s image. It is possible that what satan forfeited in relationship with God through his rebellion he now witnessed Adam and Eve experiencing. Did that observation cause him more bitterness toward God, if that was possible? God created Adam and Eve perfect in every way. They lived in great joy with all provided for them and in sweet fellowship with God. Was that once true for satan too? Whatever his motive, he is determined to cause Adam and Eve to break fellowship with God through sin. He masquerades as a snake and lies to Eve – about God and about herself. His tactics are revealed right there in Genesis 3 when we see how his lies caused Eve to doubt God’s goodness toward her and God was portrayed as withholding from her what would be in her best interest. So we see in Genesis, satan’s ploys are exposed in these passages and we see he is the “father of lies” (John 8:44), beginning with lies about God.

When we consider that God is only and always the Truth, we begin to get an idea of how entirely antithetic and obverse lying is to the essential nature of God and therefore to His creation. We see how satan is the opposite of God in character, and how he tries to make God look like what he himself is: untrustworthy and a liar, and out only for His own self-satisfaction and no one else’s well being. Through the snake, satan insinuates to Eve that God isn’t a keeper of His word and that He lied and that there would be no consequences to what he, satan, was luring her into doing: “You won’t die,” he lied.  So she did eat it, and they did die, spiritually first, resulting in physical death eventually. The terrible consequences of Adam and Eve’s doubt that God’s word to them was for their good are still our lot today.

But satan doesn’t want us to see that. He doesn’t want us to know his tactics because he’s still using the same ones: What God told you isn’t in your best interest; you can have more than God wants you to have; He’s limiting you. He wants to control you. But you can be master of your own fate; He’s trying to control you; you don’t need God; and besides, what He warns you about won’t come to pass anyway; so you can be like God yourself.  

Now we see where evil comes from. Once armed with this knowledge, we can be aware when we hear something that sounds a lot like what Eve heard from him. Knowing what these verses tell us gives those of us who learn from them the advantage of being aware when we hear accusations against God or against our “brethren” of knowing that they come from “the accuser” (Rev 12:10). When we begin to become aware of satan’s ploys, we can have wisdom that will save us a great amount of trouble. Being cognizant of the fact that there is a devil who is “the god of this world (who) has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Messiah, who is the image of God” (2 Cor 4:4), and that he is “the father of lies” (John 8:44) makes one aware that not everything that claims to be truth is truth and that which we hear that is not truth, is likely to have its origin in the heart of the evil one. 

We would be wise to pray for discernment to know the difference between the lies and the truth. Often these take the form of the difference between the flesh and the spirit. We are to be those “who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil” (Heb 5:14). 

By now you can see that when people don’t have the Torah, they don’t know or are minimally aware of what took place in Genesis. They don’t necessarily know God is the Creator of the world and that the world is His. (Certainly we don’t treat the planet with the respect due to Him.) Without access to Genesis, they wouldn’t know that people were created sinless; or know how sin came into the world; and they don’t know satan is the author of all evil. Nor are they aware of the fundamentals of his tactics because they are the same today as they were in the Garden of Eden. Satan is not interested in having this expose’ of his ways broadcasted through the Bible over the earth. He has succeeded in convincing even some Christian denominations still that the Old Testament is not for them. But God is in the process of restoring all things before Yeshua’s return. (Acts 3:21)

Since you do know, be forewarned that you will hear increasing lies against the Word of God. And since God’s Word promises the land of Israel to Abraham “forever,” there will be increased controversy against that land belonging to the Jews. It’s all about satan trying to make God out to be a liar. If the devil can make God’s promise to Abraham null and void, that is equal to invalidating all that God is. We know that can’t happen, but don’t be surprised if the battle becomes fierce.

Just as Yeshua used the Word of God as His defense in His own temptation (Matt 4:1-11), we would do well to have the Word available to us like a six-shooter in the holster of someone who is always “quick on the draw” whenever the need arises.  A good verse to use as a shield has been going through my mind for a few days: “In righteousness you will be established; You will be far from oppression, for you will not fear” (Is. 54:14). That’s a powerful verse — no matter what happens, if we are determined to stand in faith and keep our trust in the Lord so that we refuse to fear, then we will not succumb to oppression, no matter what the devil or man may attempt to do to us. Oppression is an internal matter of the heart; not what happens circumstantially. Peter and then Paul were free even while in prison.

We can depend on God to keep His Word as we trust in Him.  Daniel gives us insight into the last days. He too mentions a polarization that will take place with regard to the promises in God’s covenant: “By smooth words he (the devil or the anti-Messiah) will turn to godlessness those who act wickedly toward the covenant, but the people who know their God will display strength and take action, and those who have insight among the people will give understanding to the many” (Dan. 11:32, 33).

This may be a large aspect of the “insight” God is bringing about in the restoration of Hebrew roots today, as He gives “understanding” which is essential for the true bride of Messiah. Abraham believed God and God counted his belief as righteousness. The Bride of Messiah is being given garments in which “to clothe herself… (which are) the righteous acts of the saints” (Rev 19:8). When asked by the disciples what the works or acts of God were that they were to do, “Yeshua answered and said to them, ‘This is the work of God, that you believe in Him who He has sent'” (John 6:28, 29). To pull all this together, Abraham’s belief in God got him righteous standing with God; so does ours. In the last days, the true bride of Messiah will be clothed in righteousness by believing in the Word of God, who is Yeshua!

It all comes down to faith and trust in God and in His Word as the only truth. Never let anyone, not matter what authority or intimidation they may throw around, tell you that God didn’t mean exactly what His Word says — it’s not hard to understand — or that God isn’t looking out for your good for you or that what His Word says is open to interpretation to mean other than what it directly says. Above all, know that God is trustworthy. He alone is worthy of our complete trust. May Americans (and all people everywhere) continue to cherish these words with all our hearts that have been so foundational to our country: “In God we trust.” Amen.  

Reprints of this article is permitted but must include: Reprinted by permission of Messianic Vision, www.sidroth.org,  2008.

Scripture quotations are from the New American Standard Bible Copyright ©1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation, La Habra, Calif.  All rights reserved. Used by permission.