Be Not deceived (Review)
Tired of watered down Christianity? Not sure if your church is teaching you the Gospel the way it was intended?
Many new churches these days teach a watered down gospel. Telling you if you say the sinners prayer and get baptized that you can basically live your life whatever way you want and you are still saved. Be Not Deceived points out many of the fallacies of the modern church and shows you the way to true salvation. Once saved always saved is just not true but many believe this and don’t even know that they are being deceived and on the wrong path.
There is no such thing as cheap grace. You cannot live your life the way you want but must instead live it the way God wants you to. The Bible makes it very clear how to live our lives but some new churches ignore these facts and try to make the Gospel fit in to todays lifestyles. Unfortunately they are sending many unwitting “Christians” straight into the fiery pits of hell.
Be Not Deceived gives many Biblical references to show you that while you might think you are saved, you may very well have been lied to. The author even throws in a scriptural guide full of references to help you see how you should be dealing with things like anger, friends, gossip, and many other topics. I was in complete agreement with the first five chapters of this book.
That being said, he lost me on the sixth and final chapter by saying that you are only saved if you lead a perfect and sinless life after salvation. I have been on this subject before and stand by my belief that there has been only one who was able to be perfect and remain sinless on this planet and that was Jesus. It is impossible to be sinless and to believe otherwise is a slap in the face of Jesus. I can quote the old standby of John 8:7 Let he who is without sin cast the first stone at her. But that is but one reference in the Bible of our inability to remain sinless.
How about Ecclesiastes 7:20 For there is not a just man on earth who does good and does not sin. Another good one is John 8:34 Jesus answered them, Truly, truly, I say to you, Everyone practicing sin is a slave of sin. As far as the quote from John, I think the keyword is practicing. When they tell us to turn away from sin they want us to not do it on purpose. Jesus also knows that we are human and will sin but the righteous man will do it because we are born sinners and we shall die sinners, just forgiven sinners if we have been born again. The key is that we realize that we are sinners and ask for forgiveness. No I don’t mean you can do it on purpose. Knowing you are sinning and continuing to do it purposely is another thing all together.
We must strive everyday of our lives to walk this world as Christ wishes us too and when we stumble we must repent and ask for forgiveness. We are human, we are fallible. When we finally realize this we can truly start our walk with Christ.
I am going to give this book a 3 out of 5. It really is quite good except that little bone of contention I have with the last chapter.
[rating:3]
The book, Be Not Deceived, was provided to me at no cost by Active Christian Media for review purposes. To become a reviewer for ACM you may click here.
