• 2 Thessalonians 2:3 ³ Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition;

The falling away from the faith is already happening. Seeker churches are luring people with antics and teachings designed to tickle the ears and starve the spirit.

• 2 Timothy 2:3 ³ For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears;

The main goal of a seeker church is to replace sound doctrine of the Word of God. They replace sound doctrine with a false doctrine that sounds mostly right and FEELS right. These false churchs are feelings focused, whereas a true relationship with Jesus is focused on building faith through the Word of God. In order to lure Christians away from following sound doctrine, the false doctrine has to give them something that looks right…it has to look authentic and be an amazing counterfiet. People who know the word aren’t typically drawn to a seeker church, not because they can quickly pick out the false doctrine, but because they leave church spiritually starving. These Christians are only fed by the Word. The problem is, most (yes, most) professing Christians in America don’t study the bible for themselves and they don’t have a hunger for it. They get their beliefs and doctrine from their pastors, group bible studies, online teachers and friends…. but they don’t sit down consistantly and regularly to read the word nor do they challenge what they are being taught by these pastors, teachers and videos with the word. This leaves them open for deception.

These verses are on my heart this morning, so I want to walk through them for this situation.

Mathew 13:3-9
³ And he spake many things unto them in parables, saying, Behold, a sower went forth to sow;

The sower is the person who brings the seeds of salvation to the lost. The seeds are the gospel of salvation.

⁴ And when he sowed, some seeds fell by the way side, and the fowls came and devoured them up:

• Matthew 13:19 When any one heareth the word of the kingdom, and understandeth it not, then cometh the wicked one, and catcheth away that which was sown in his heart. This is he which received seed by the way side.

⁵ Some fell upon stony places, where they had not much earth: and forthwith they sprung up, because they had no deepness of earth:

⁶ And when the sun was up, they were scorched; and because they had no root, they withered away.

• Matthew 13:20-21²⁰ But he that received the seed into stony places, the same is he that heareth the word, and anon with joy receiveth it;²¹ Yet hath he not root in himself, but dureth for a while: for when tribulation or persecution ariseth because of the word, by and by he is offended.

⁷ And some fell among thorns; and the thorns sprung up, and choked them:

• Matthew 13:22 ²² He also that received seed among the thorns is he that heareth the word; and the care of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches, choke the word, and he becometh unfruitful.

⁸ But other fell into good ground, and brought forth fruit, some an hundredfold, some sixtyfold, some thirtyfold.

• Matthew13:23 ²³ But he that received seed into the good ground is he that heareth the word, and understandeth it; which also beareth fruit, and bringeth forth, some an hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty.

⁹ Who hath ears to hear, let him hear.

From the moment we accept Jesus as our savior, the enemy is trying to undermine the work of salvation in our lives. First he tries to steal the word of salvation away… then he tried to cause us to abandon salvation by overwhelming us with daily cares… then he tries to get us focused on things that don’t serve the kingdom like living our best life now. All of these different things a meant to keep up from being planted in good soil. I love those particular verses with the sowers parable for another reason too…one that makes me smile and kind of sad too.

My sister-in-law, Judy and I weren’t saved, but looking back I can see we both desired to be Christians. We were living in a barn outside of San Antonio… I was 17 and Judy was 23. To pass the time, we would get high and read the Bible… I remember one night we were trying to figure out what this parable meant… we read the first part and talked about different things it could mean… only to find out later on in the chapter, Jesus tells us plainly what the meaning is. Our heart were still stony, though. I went back home and she and her family moved to Oklahoma. I ended up having a baby, as did she. Both of us ended up becoming Christians. We no longer smoked weed… and we actually attended church. We didnt do this together, we did this while we were apart and without knowing each other was also on the same path. She had been my best friend and now she and I were both Christians. I wanted to be closer to her so we all moved to Oklahoma.

I was a Baptist and she was Assembly of God… and soon I was going to the AOG as well. They taught things I didnt really understand, but because I believed they must know, I went along with it (didn’t do my due diligence and compare what was taught against the word of God). After joining the church I became a Sunday School teacher and youth leader. My sister in law Judy never joined the church and to be honest, we drifted apart at this point. We moved home again. I got involved in a similar Church that was non-denominational and met “S” who introduced me to the Word of Faith movement. I remained derailed into this false doctrine for many, many years. I could always sense something was wrong with what I was believing, but I would either feel fear about questioning things or I would consider my doubt to be unbelief. It wasn’t until I set down all these doctrines I had been taught and began again with the Word that I saw the errors of doctrine. My prayer was that I would believe only what the Bible taught and if the Bible didnt teach it….I wasn’t going to believe it.

We all like to think we’re doing that… we refer to feelings we have or…. things we experienced as confirmation we are in right standing with God concerning doctrine. I saw S lay hands on someone and their leg grew out… she also told me of miracles that happened after we prayed over someone. In spite of seeing this and hearing about those miracles, I now refused to believe anything unless I found it in the word.

Jesus is the Word… I put my eyes on Jesus and Jesus alone. The Word of God became my entire doctrine and authority. Churches tend to decide the doctrine they promote and teach. For example, some churches have a once saved always saved doctrine while others have a belief you can walk away from salvation…. both have Bible verses to back their position… so each church determines what it will teach as doctrine. My position is to set aside everything I have learned in churches and only believe what I myself have read in the word. Everyone always thinks they’re doing this, like I said before… but very few really are…most are just backing their religion and that’s fine if that’s the way they are choosing, but for me… the Word of God is my doctrine and no other. I’m not anti-church… we need the pastorial covering and fellowship.

There were so many ways that the wicked one tried to derail my salvation. When he couldnt stop me from being a Christian, he attempted to get me into false doctrines. Here is a fact, when I was studying with S, she never really did a deep dive bible study with me… it was all cherry picking verses and books written by Kenneth Hagin and his ministry pals. I was afraid to question things because there was a verse about touching Gods annointed…and the Word of Faith/Prosperity Gospel ministers love to call themselves annointed by God… so if you question whether or not what they taught was godly or not, it was consided an insult to God himself. This fear tactic kept me stuck.

RIGHT AFTER I met S I started being mentally tormented in a horrific way and was clueless as to why.

Coming out of all of this I realized something vital… I can’t trust my own leadership, feelings or abilities to determine truth from a lie. Not even a little. I thought discernment was a kind of instant vision God gave us to show us the truth and the lies…or the good from the evil…but I know now, true discernment comes when you spend time in the Word and come to know the actual nature of God…then when something presents itself to you, you have the Holy Spirit welling up inside you with verses that come to mind to expose the truth. The sword of the spirit presents itself and divides the truth from the lie! My entire authorty must come from the Word of God and be led by the Holy Spirit. During the times when I was the most deceived I was also the most convinced of how I was on the correct path…CONVINCED….you would not have been able to shake me even with truth. I know Diane tried and I resented her for years for that. She’d correct me and I would get angry at her ignorance…I’d think “One day God will show her the truth.” When she died I thought “She knows now.” THE ARROGANCE OF ME!!! Because she was right and I was wrong… she knew…and tried so hard to skirt me back onto the right path. I can’t wait to hug her neck and tell her thank you….I hope the Lord rewarded her…I know how difficult it is to have to correct someone who is on the wrong path… especially when they have been blinded.

My point is… the wicked one wants us to be refocused from sound doctrine onto false doctrine… and he has created churches who will keep a person from ever meeting Jesus while convincing them they’ve already received him as their savior. A seeker church will fill your heart with nonsense that induces strong emotions that they’ll convince you is the moving of the Holy Spirit. They’ll get you believing your feelings are signs of the Holy Spirit moving in your life….so that you seek feelings like an addict seeks drugs. The wicked one will convince you that everything and anything is at least as important as sound Bible Study….and sound doctrine. Even after you leave a church that teaches false doctrine of any kind…. you take that doctrine with you and it runs your spiritual life until you line it up against the word to see if it’s sound. This is why God doesn’t call anyone into ministry until they know his word well.

The Destructive Nature of the Seeker Church

The seeker church is after attendants… because attendants mean money. The better the show, the more money flows in. So we have pastors flying in on zip lines… or whatever gimmick they think will fill the arena.

Their “worship” ministry often has the most beautiful music…while some of the songs seem to actually worship God, most of it is focused on self and meant to evoke strong emotional reactions, or it’s just outright false doctrine. The setting is a darkened room, with the stage lit for the worship team to take everyone’s focus… the leader instructs the congregation to worship… the music peaks, and they announce that the Holy Spirit is there moving… people are weeping and feeling all tingly… none of this is of God….everyone is caught up in emotions…which they now confuse with the Holy Spirit moving. The music, the lighting, the instructions from the worship leader are all designed to lead you into your feelings because feelings are of the flesh and the seeker church wants to keep you in the flesh. The next thing you know, people are addicted to the emotionalism… and if they are not moved emotionally, they feel cut off from God.

Weeping people, arms stretched up to God, singing beautiful worship…it all looks like true worship.
There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death. Proverbs 14:12
These people are now confused into believing that they are following God by getting in the fleshly emotions.

What’s happened here is the person has been cleverly shifted from seeking God through worshiping to seeking emotional highs they believe to be the Holy Spirit. They are now worshiping themselves…because their emotions are what they are actually seeking… that emotional feeling that falsely confirms to them that they have touched God, and he has touched them. This confirmation through emotions also leads the person to believe they are right with God… when they aren’t. The entire experience is about tapping into emotions…not offering up praise to God. Emotions and feelings are part of the flesh we are instructed to crucify.

When we praise God or do something in service to God… we are being obedient. When there is an expectation of a reward it then makes our actions an exchange… like “Here you go God, I’m praising you, let me get that emotional bump.” or “Ok God, I did what you said, make me feel wonderful for it.” When our praise to God is given it’s a gift, until we expect a return on the effort… then it becomes a transaction. God doesn’t work that way. We should praise and serve God for what he has already done for us. So when a person become dependent on the emotional hit… they have departed sound worship. This is not to be confused with the joy a person feels because they are saved by Jesus, which comes from the Lord. The difference is the person addicted to the emotional high they get when they worship and serve the Lord becomes their motivation… whereas the Joy of the Lord comes because you know you are saved by the mercy and grace of God… there was nothing we could do to earn it…but Jesus died for us so we could have eternal life. This is where our joy comes from and from that we are confident in the Lord and made strong.

All this and the seeker church service hasn’t even started. What this does is prime the congregation… they all believe God has touched them… the tears and weeping become their proof that the Holy Spirit has moved, and they take this as confirmation that this church is legit. Except, it’s not…

The worship service has the people believing they have entered into a place where God’s anointing is, so their need for discernment is disengaged. Then the seeker sermon comes… and it’s either a self-help “your best life now” sermon… or “God wants you just the way you are… he doesn’t judge you…” or teachings designed to redirect your faith from being built on the solid foundation of the word to things like the Shroud of Turin or Laminin… they preach anything except the word of God. These Church know the word taught correctly would out them as a scammer… so they avoid it.. And they know people come to feel good… so they tickle their ears with feel good nonsense….and they know that people enjoy their sin… so they don’t preach repentance… even though, there is no salvation without repentance. They give an altar call… and people come forward to say a prayer of salvation that doesn’t include repentance or discipleship. They are told they are now saved and given a false sense of security. Teaching like the one about laminin feeds the religiosity of a person, but not their spirit man who is left starved of the Word of God. Soon people crave these things more than the word so they place a higher value on these things than they do on the word.

Any bible verses used in these service are taken out of context and twisted to confirm the false doctrines… and the people leave having never been fed the real word, but feeling great about it. They profess to know Jesus…but they only know the distorted Jesus taught to them in this seeker Church, because it teaches a different Gospel.

The slight of hand trick where right before your eyes something disappears works by way of distraction. I spend parts of my days speaking to people who are being deceived… I know the frustraition Sister Diane felt now when she tried to tell me I was in error all those years ago when I was following the word of faith movement. I remember she annoyed me because I was sure she was wrong and I was right…only I was wrong and my stubborness cost me years because I didn’t stop and look into what she was saying. My pride and arrogance was running the show. But I needed that and the memory. Yesterday, after trying to expose the laminin hoax AGAIN…I had a woman tell me to only post my opinion on the agnostic and atheist post. It’s weird because I get it… I was just like her before the Lord delivered me. I was able to read that and not get hurt or annoyed. I think this is where maturity come in…when our emotions don’t run the show, our love for the Lord and faith does.

My wise husband offered this about the music being played in these false churches. He said that hollywood has trained us to take our cues from the music…. the music swells and the little lost dog finds his way home at last…. it’s moving emotionally. The effect is pavlovian…we know to become emotional when the music cues us.