by Jacob Ninan
There are many kinds of wrong teachings going all, but all who teach wrong doctrines cannot be labelled as false teachers. Many sincere people are mistaken in their understanding. This could be due to ignorance, mistakes in interpretation, the Bible teachers or the denomination they follow, etc. In fact, none of us can claim that our doctrine is 100% right because of our limitations in different directions. Also, God Himself has not revealed the complete truths about different subjects in the Bible, and our understanding is many times subjective. Of course, errors in doctrines can be of the serious type, such as pertaining to the character of God, the deity of Jesus, the way of salvation by grace through faith, etc. If we are wrong about such subjects, that could even affect our eternal destiny. But there are also many small concepts that we need not quibble about with others, trying to prove we are right. For example, one man may believe that we need to celebrate communion every Sunday while others may be flexible. Such matters are not crucial for our relationship with God or one another.
False teachers are those who teach wrong doctrines with false motives. "But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will also be false teachers among you, who will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves" (2Pet.2:1). We can see that there is a deliberateness about them, and a secretive, deceitful way by which they try to win over followers. "Many false prophets will arise and will mislead many. Because lawlessness is increased, most people's love will grow cold. But the one who endures to the end, he will be saved" (Matt.24:11-13). We can see here that many times false teachers are associated with lawlessness or at least a tolerance towards lawlessness.
People who work in banks are sometimes trained to detect counterfeit currency notes. The way this training is done is to make them familiar in detail with genuine notes, so that they can easily notice where a deviation is there. In the same way, let us look at some of the characteristics of good teachers so that we can contrast them with the false teachers.
Talking about prophets in the church, we read that their goal is to edify, exhort or console people (1Cor.14:3). When we remember that the function of a prophet is to bring to people what God wants to tell them at any time, whether it is to warn, correct, discipline or comfort, we can see that a teacher too, when he speaks prophetically, is to bring out the word of God according to the specific needs of the people. An academic type of teaching may be suitable in a Bible college, based on the knowledge of Hebrew and Greek and what many scholars have said. But when people come to the church with many practical and spiritual needs in their lives, what they need is something more personal and applicable to them. As such, the goal of the teacher in the church is to lead people closer to God, through the way of godliness, and to help them to be transformed more into the character of Jesus.
The Bible warns us to be careful to avoid doctrines that do not lead us towards godliness, and warns us not to get involved in discussions and arguments about petty and useless ideas (1Tim.6:3,4). But good teachers are those whom the Lord trusts to be put in charge of people to give them their spiritual food, just the same way as a faithful steward of the house who has to give the people the right food (Lk.12:42,43).
A challenging example of a faithful teacher we have in the Bible is that of the apostle Paul. In his farewell message to the Ephesians, he told them that he had not withheld anything from them that would have profited them (Acts.20:27). Many times, teachers are tempted to omit saying certain things for fear that it might offend someone in the audience. But Paul had decided even in the early part of his ministry, that he was not going to be a man-pleaser but a true servant of God (Gal.1:10). A teacher's task is to bring forth truths from the Bible to the people without fear or showing favour. We don't want to offend anyone, but, just like God, we also want everyone to be saved. But we must realise that however careful we are, there will always be people who get offended. Why do we get offended except that we are not willing to receive the truth about ourselves? There is a warning in the Book of Revelation that says that some people choose to go ahead and sin no matter what we tell them (Rev.22:11). But that is not to stop us from sharing the truth.
Another lesson we learn from the life of Paul is how he recognised his role as one who served others and who strove to bless them in whatever way he could (2Cor.12:14). This is the example our Lord Jesus has given us, by giving His life itself for us in order to provide us salvation. In other words, a good teacher does not plan to benefit in any way from the people he serves, but is willing to make sacrifices to bless them.
This brings us to see one of the outstanding characteristic of a false teacher, that he is trying to gain something from the people he teaches. Jesus compared such people to ravenous wolves who come to devour the sheep (Matt.7:15). 'Wolves' only want to fatten themselves with the sheep and are least concerned that the sheep have to die for that. These men are usually looking for money, fame or power, when they come to people (Jn.10:10). They want to be popular with people rather than to be pleasing to God. They give more attention to impressing people with their teaching than to bringing out truths from the Bible to bless the people with. They know that what they are teaching is not right, but they carry on because that is what they think will profit them. One way to recognise if a teacher is false is to see if he is aiming to serve us or to exploit us.
One very common way such people exploit people is through emphasising tithing. On every other aspect of the Old Testament Law, they claim that we are free from the Law, but they forcefully insist on tithing. They don't teach that under the new covenant there is no compulsion to give, but that the emphasis is on having a heart to give. We ought to learn to give even sacrificially to serve God and His people. But false teachers force even poor people to tithe who are struggling to make both ends meet, warning calamities if they 'stole what belongs to God'. Tithing is what will provide their income, and the more people there are in the church, the more prosperous these preachers will become!
Other teachers promise prosperity, all-round health and answers to all prayers, and when these do not take place, they hold the promise to the future and tell the people to keep waiting! Those who preach hyper-grace make the hearers feel very good about themselves even when they are continuing in sin, because God is presented to them as One who always loves and is gracious. How many preachers bring out new gimmicks and fascinating theories to capture and hold people's attention while they themselves are prospering far beyond the level of those from whom they are getting their support! They do not realise that one day God will call them to account!
We need to protect ourselves from such false teachers for our own safety. Don't be afraid of examining preachers to see if they are false, or whether we can trust them. May the Lord help all of us.