Spend More & Save

1 John 4:1-6

　
　
We live in a world where the truth is easily manipulated.

Having just finished the Christmas season, we heard daily the message, "The more you spend, the more you save". Silly me, I thought that the less I spend, the more I saved. Advertising can make us feel like there is something wrong with us if we are too old, too heavy, too little hair, don’t wear designer clothes, don’t drive a new car, don’t have a big house… the list goes on.

What about movies or TV shows? It’s hard to tell who the good guys are from the bad guys because the good guys justify bad behavior to catch the bad guys. Sleeping around has become the norm. Beer commercials promote the belief in drinking to be happy and either macho or sexy, depending on which gender you are. A lie has become the truth.

In this passage John warns about not being gullible and about listening with critical thinking. Eugene Peterson interprets it like this in The Message:

"My dear friends, don’t believe everything you hear. Carefully weigh and examine what people tell you. Not everyone who talks about God comes from God. There are a lot of lying preachers loose in the world."
According to John the test that we are to apply is what do they say about Jesus. Do they believe that Jesus was both the Son of God and "an actual flesh and blood person"? If not, John says that, "the message is not from God but from one who is against Christ, like the Antichrist".

Besides Sunday mornings, we are bombarded by messages throughout the week whether it is on the radio, television, the Internet, Facebook, twitter, billboards. What are those messages telling us? Do we believe them? How do they affect our lives? As Christians have we blended into our culture so much that you can’t tell the difference?

Be sure to use John’s test as you listen to preachers preach but also, be sure to apply the principles of God’s Living Word to the thousands of messages that you hear throughout your week. In order to do that of course, you need to spend time reading, studying and meditating on God’s Word and make sure you don’t fall for the old line, "Spend more so that you can save".

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1john%204%3A1-6&version=MSG;TLBhttp://www.biblegateway.com/audio/mclean/niv/1John.4.1-1John.4.6