Discern the Counterfeit Voices!

Yesterday, we’ve seen that God’s voice always agrees with Scripture, because it is the Holy Spirit Who inspired it. We’ve also seen that Satan tries to deceive us by counterfeiting God’s voice. And there’s a lot of that around these days!

There’s a passage in Isaiah 8:19-22 which really says it so clearly in a way that’s so appropriate for our culture and our situation today. This is what Isaiah says:

“When men tell you to consult mediums and spiritists, who whisper and mutter, should not a people inquire of their God? Why consult the dead on behalf of the living? To the law and to the testimony! If they do not speak according to this word, [the law and the testimony, the Old and the New Testament, the Scripture] they have no light of dawn; they’re in the dark. [And then this is the judgment on those that bring messages or listen to messages that are not from God:] Distressed and hungry, they will roam through the land; when they are famished, they will become enraged and looking upward will curse their king and their God. Then they will look toward the earth and see only distress and darkness and fearful gloom, and they will be thrust into utter darkness.”

What a terrible list at the end of that verse: distress, darkness, fearful gloom, utter darkness; that’s the result of being deceived, of listening to Satan’s counterfeits. The world is so full of those counterfeits today. It would take a long time to list them all. Let me just mention some of them. First of all, mediums, spiritists (as mentioned there in Isaiah 8), then fortune tellers, horoscopes, Ouiji boards, tarot cards, tea cup readings, various forms of mental science, etc.. Believe me, I’m talking from experience. Before I came to know the Lord Jesus, I was deeply involved in yoga and I know the darkness that I was in. I know the struggle that I had to turn from that darkness to the light and truth of Scripture and of the Lord Jesus Christ. What is the end of all these counterfeits? We’ve looked at the words. Let me read them once more. “They will see only distress, and darkness, fearful gloom, and utter darkness.” But, if we walk according to the Scripture, we will have light. Psalm 119:105 says this:

Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path.

When we walk according to Scripture we never walk into the dark. We may not see far ahead, but we always have enough light for our path and for the next step to take. So bear in mind, the first and most vital requirement of all is that what we believe to be God’s voice shall be in total agreement with Scripture.