What the Bible Has to Say about False Teachers (False Prophets) (False Doctrine)

False teachers have been around since ancient times. They may sound good and say some correct things, but their deception is destructive and can be quite powerful. False teachers have certain characteristics which the Bible speaks of. Let us take a look at some of them.

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What the Bible Has to Say about False Teachers

1. False Teachers Scatter the Sheep of God’s Pasture

2. False Teachers Tolerate and Encourage Sin by Their Teaching

3. False Teachers Turn “the grace of our God into lasciviousness”

4. God is serious about repentance. 

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(1.) False Teachers Scatter the Sheep of God’s Pasture

Jeremiah 23:1-2 (bold added)

1 Woe be unto the pastors that destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture! saith the Lord.

2 Therefore thus saith the Lord God of Israel against the pastors that feed my people; Ye have scattered my flock, and driven them away, and have not visited them: behold, I will visit upon you the evil of your doings, saith the Lord.

False teachers scatter the sheep by bringing divisions in the Body of Christ: divisions which are contrary to the Word of God.

Romans 16:17-18

17 Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them.

18 For they that are such serve not our Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly; and by good words and fair speeches deceive the hearts of the simple.

Divisions are necessary when they are done according to the doctrine that the Bible teaches. Divisions which are “contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned” are against God’s will.

(2.) False Teachers (or False Prophets) Tolerate and Encourage Sin by Their Teaching

Jeremiah 23:13-14

13 And I have seen folly in the prophets of Samaria; they prophesied in Baal, and caused my people Israel to err.

14 I have seen also in the prophets of Jerusalem an horrible thing: they commit adultery, and walk in lies: they strengthen also the hands of evildoers, that none doth return from his wickedness; they are all of them unto me as Sodom, and the inhabitants thereof as Gomorrah.

The prophet of God, Jeremiah saw abomination (wickedness) being done in Israel and Judah. False prophets were not telling people to repent from sin. Instead, they “strengthen also the hands of evildoers”. They were teaching people that God tolerates sin and that God will not judge sin.

Jeremiah 23:7 says, “They say still unto them that despise me, The Lord hath said, Ye shall have peace; and they say unto every one that walketh after the imagination of his own heart, No evil shall come upon you.”

Many teachers today say that God just wants to bless you and give you whatever is in your heart. The Bible shows us this truth about the heart.

Jeremiah 17:9-10

9 The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?

10 I the Lord search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings.

Following your heart may sound good, but the “heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked” and we cannot understand how wicked it really is. False teachers appeal to the heart’s desires. They sound good on the surface, but if you take time to seek God with all your heart and search the scriptures, God will reveal their true nature to you, by His Spirit.

Jude warns about false teachers in the Book of Jude:

Jude 1:3-5

3 Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints.

4 For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ.

5 I will therefore put you in remembrance, though ye once knew this, how that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed them that believed not.

(3.) False Teachers Turn “the grace of our God into lasciviousness”

These false teachers are “turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness”. How are they doing that? 

Lasciviousness is sin that can be sexual in nature but it can also have other forms. It is related to the words, ‘lust’, ‘wanton’, and ‘lewd’. Lust is sexual desire; wanton refers to something done maliciously; and lewd refers to lust or something obscene or indecent. 

Turning “the grace of our God into lasciviousness” is making God’s grace a license to sin. This is abomination to God. God forbids it!

Romans 6:14-16

14 For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace.

15 What then? shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid.

16 Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?

If we follow sin, we will become a servant to sin. If you are a servant to sin you will die in your sin at some point. If you obey God you will live in God’s righteousness. You can choose to be a servant “of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness”. If one hardens his (or her) heart “through the deceitfulness of sin”, he will not enter God’s rest (including Heaven).

Hebrews 3:7-15

7 Wherefore (as the Holy Ghost saith, To day if ye will hear his voice,

8 Harden not your hearts, as in the provocation, in the day of temptation in the wilderness:

9 When your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw my works forty years.

10 Wherefore I was grieved with that generation, and said, They do alway err in their heart; and they have not known my ways.

11 So I sware in my wrath, They shall not enter into my rest.)

12 Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God.

13 But exhort one another daily, while it is called To day; lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.

14 For we are made partakers of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence stedfast unto the end;

15 While it is said, To day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts, as in the provocation.

(4.) God is serious about repentance. He commands all men everywhere to repent.

Acts 17:30 says, “And the times of this ignorance God winked at; but now commandeth all men every where to repent:”

God commands “all men every where to repent”. This is a command. Repentance is necessary for forgiveness when God is convicting one of sin.

Acts 17:31 says, “Because he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead.”

God will “judge the world in righteousness” by Jesus Christ, the God-man, who is ordained to judge. That is why we must repent from sin.

1 John 1:5-10

5 This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.

6 If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth:

7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin.

8 If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.

9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

10 If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.

Look at verse 1 John 1:9. “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” If we confess… We must confess our sins to God and repent (Acts 17:30) from them. Repent means to turn away from something. It means to choose to stop. By looking to God for help and guidance to deliver us, we can choose to not sin. And when we do sin, we must choose to confess and repent. This is not false works. This is part of what it means to be a follower of Christ.

If we sow to the flesh (our own heart or sinful nature) we will “reap corruption”. This corruption is the opposite of “life everlasting”.

Galatians 6:7-8

7 Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.

8 For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting.

Let us listen to the words God inspired the Apostle Paul to write in Ephesians. These are powerful and important words.

Ephesians 4:17-24

17 This I say therefore, and testify in the Lord, that ye henceforth walk not as other Gentiles walk, in the vanity of their mind,

18 Having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart:

19 Who being past feeling have given themselves over unto lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness with greediness.

20 But ye have not so learned Christ;

21 If so be that ye have heard him, and have been taught by him, as the truth is in Jesus:

22 That ye put off concerning the former conversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts;

23 And be renewed in the spirit of your mind;

24 And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.

Let us not give ourselves over unto lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness with greediness.” Let us deny ourselves, take up our crosses, and follow Jesus Christ.

Mark 8:34-35

34 And when he had called the people unto him with his disciples also, he said unto them, Whosoever will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.

35 For whosoever will save his life shall lose it; but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake and the gospel's, the same shall save it.

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IF YOU ARE SEEKING TO KNOW GOD, please read this message.

God loves us so much that He sent His Only Begotten Son, Jesus Christ, to die for our sins and shed His precious blood to pay for all of these sins.

If you repent (turn away) from your sins (Acts 3:19), and believe and confess aloud that Christ has done this for you (Romans 10:9-10), and have made Him your Lord and Savior (again Romans 10:9-10) you are saved.

Now seek God with all your heart. Seek to know Him and you will (Jeremiah 29:13).

John 17:3 says: "And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.”

Jeremiah 29:13
13 And ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart.