Satan's Ten Most Believable Lies by Dave Breese

From the Introduction

There is a form of satanic activity that is more deadly than witchcraft. Serious damage has been done in naive personalities because of overt spiritualist activity, but far greater havoc has been wrought by another kind of satanism, the covert production and propagation of false doctrine. The enemy has produced a significant triumph when he can spread in our society a broad set of false views about God, Christ, the Holy Spirit, sin, the purpose of life, and other imperative parts of Christian doctrine. For every one person who is subverted by Satan worship, thousands are enmeshed in Satan's more deadly trap: doctrinal error. People who are otherwise perfectly rational, who would not dream of attending a seance, are, nevertheless, the more thoroughly undermined simply because they believe the wrong thing.

Satan's trafficking in false doctrine is more dangerous than spiritism. Few inquiries could then be more helpful than to examine the doctrines of Satan in the hope of deliverance from his mind-destroying theology.

From the Back Cover

Satanic activity on earth takes many forms. His overt activities -- witchcraft, sorcery, and related occult practices -- are well-known in many circles. But more devastating may be his covert attacks on unsuspecting victims. While Satan's public activity has deceived millions, he has led astray other millions with false doctrine.

Satan's Ten Most Believable Lies describes ten of the enemy's false doctrines. Each chapter defines a satanic lie and compares it to the truth found in Scripture. Learn to avoid falling into the pit of deception, as well as how to fight each lie. Author Dave Breese reveals the truth about these ten satanic lies:

• God Is a Cosmic Sadist
• God Is a Liar
• Man Is God's Slave
• Man Serves God Only for Human Rewards
• Adversity Results in Turning from God
• This Life Is Everything
• God Is a Magician Working Miracles on Demand
• God's Promises Are for Our Worldly Profit
• Satan's Way Is the Best Way
• God Has No Purpose for Your Life

Active, strong resistance is the way to defeat Satan. Strengthen your faith and put on the armour of God to resist the pervading influence of false doctrine from the prince of darkness.

From Chapter 12 - The Question That Remains

...while evangelical Christianity has grown commendably in these years, it still possesses a major problem, spiritual vulnerability. Dozens of well-promoted cults and sects are experiencing a field day, in that they are able to beguile thousands of immature and naive Christians into their simplistic and pseudo-authoritarian religions. Spiritual carnage has resulted in the lives of multiplied thousands of babes in Christ, for want of a development in the use of the sword of the Spirit, the Word of God. They have been subverted by Satan into sweet-sounding but false religions, only because of their lack of biblical knowledge.

Indeed, this is becoming a most serious problem within the church. Ours has been a generation of evangelism...today's media have made it possible for the eternal message to be brought to major segments of the population of the world...the problem is that the wide dissemination of seed sowing evangelism has been but fractionally matched by an equally wide teaching of sound, biblical doctrine. The consequence is that among the masses who claim to know Christ, there are relative few who are able to give a reason for the hope that is in them.

The presence of spiritual quickening along with the absence of strong doctrine has created the great problem in the church of our present age, cultic vulnerability. Like the Galatians, who began well in the faith but soon became re-enslaved to the law of Moses, Christians today are in danger of being victimized by one of the many clever systems that claim to be the full or the complete version of Christianity. Only a solid program of Bible study can prevent the spiritually naive from being beguiled away from the simplicity that is in Christ...

In whatever circumstances, the Christian watches and prays, for he knows that he is being relentlessly stalked by Satan, his determined foe. Transforming himself into a roaring lion, an angel of light, a grievous wolf, or even a loving friend, his enemy is the fateful hunter so long as this human life shall last -- which is not forever. We are taught that the day is coming in which Satan and his cohorts shall be cast into the lake of fire, forever banished from the presence of God and from the possibility of plaguing the steps of the Christian...

This book may be purchased at www.amazon.com.

The Health and Wealth Gospel by Bruce Barron

From the Back Cover:

"Name it and claim it!"

"God wants you rich!"

"God wants you well!"

These are the voices of a movement that is shaping the faith of millions of people today. Where did the faith teachers come from? What are they saying? Is it biblical? Is it dangerous?

Bruce Barron probes the teachings of prominent preachers like Charles Capps, Kenneth Hagin and Kenneth Copeland. Can we have whatever we ask from God? Can we see a hundredfold return on our kingdom investments? Is sickness a sign of lack of faith? These and other claims are examined fully and fairly. The story Barron tells is one of both triumph and tragedy, insight and error -- a movement that has ignited the faith of some and provoked the ire of others.

Here's a book that is sure to spark debate and disagreement about this controversial movement.

Bruce Barron is an independent researcher, writer and observer of the charismatic movement in addition to his work in the publications department of the Pittsburgh Presbytery of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)

Contents:

Ch. 1 - First Encounters

Ch. 2 - A Twist of Faith: The Hobart Freeman Story

Ch. 3 - The Roots of the Health and Wealth Gospel

Ch. 4 - Faith or Fancy?

Ch. 5 - Does God Want You Healthy?

Ch. 6 - Does God Want You Wealthy?

Ch. 7 - Name and Claim It

Ch. 8 - Does the Bible Really Say That?

Ch. 9 - The Faith Teachings in Real Life

Ch. 10 - Seeing What is Really There?

The book is available at www.amazon.com.

Why Does God Allow Suffering? by Dr. Brad Burke

Introduction - Were You Away Then?

I stood motionlessly by her graveside, asking the inescapable question: Why?

When life hurts, helplessness often takes over the helm and routine and pleasure jump ship. The loss of a beloved child, a soul mate, a sacrificing parent, or an endeared grandparent abruptly halts the mellow voyage of life, transforming the shimmering waves of happiness into towering waves of sorrow. Nothing we do, nothing we say, nothing we possess can bring our loved ones back. Memories both comfort and pain us. Questions both flee and haunt us. Answers both calm and anger us.

Often it isn't long before we find ourselves overboard, fighting to stay afloat amid the dark and foreboding waters of despair. Sometimes the waters are familiar to us, but no friendlier. We've survived them before. We've gone down time and again ... and somehow found the strength to resurface -- gasping for answers. But each time is a little different. Every crashing wave of grief pounds us into the ocean floor a little differently, contorting, spinning, and tumbling us head over heels, stopping just long enough to allow us to resurface so it can pound us again.

Perhaps you've never experienced the heart-rending loss of someone close to you. But make no mistake, in life's game of hide-and-seek, suffering will eventually find you; it's only a matter of time. The only place one can safely hide is in the grave. And for those who have rejected God, even this is an illusion. Your unutterable suffering may be a devastating divorce, a child with cerebral palsy, an unrelenting ache deep in your back, abandonment by your mother or father, the ruinous loss of your cherished possessions in a fire, or the painful memories of abuse suffered as a child. Professor and author, Dr. Edward Kuhlman, (no connection to the faith healer Kathryn Kuhlman), who lost his sixteen-year old son to cancer, bared his soul in his book An Overwhelming Interference. " No one escapes life without experiencing pain," wrote Kuhlman "although many become preoccupied with attempts to alleviate it. Pain is the overriding, inexplicable condition of life."

Indeed, pain and adversity hold no prejudices. A good friend of mine, in his capacity with the Canadian government, had the rare opportunity to meet Princess Diana on one of her last visits to Canada. Shielded from the press, he met with the Princess and described her as personable, shy, soft spoken, down-to-earth, -- yet restless. She asked my friend and his fiance about their upcoming wedding plans, making the comment about how expensive weddings are these days (a bit funny considering the cost of her own wedding). And she laughingly joked about sneaking away from the press outside to get a few beers with him and his officers. My friend said she came across as a "very normal person," and he remarked, "In hindsight, I wonder if at some level in her genuine desire to discuss our 'boring plain lives' she wasn't longing for that." Maybe the Princess really was just like the average person in many ways. The world's favourite Princess battled bulimia, wrestled with feelings of insecurity, experienced family feuds, and lived through a broken marriage. And at the age of thirty-seven her seemingly "fairy-tale life" reached the final line in the final chapter in a tragic Paris car crash. Even the most popular of England's royal family -- the most popular and well-loved person in the world at that time -- could not escape the vice-grip of pain, suffering, and death.

As I stood by my grandmother's graveside, staring blankly at her suspended coffin, the question was grinding through my head: Why? Toward the end of her life, my grandmother's final dream was to hold in her arms her first great-grandchild. When my sister became pregnant for the first time, you can imagine just how excited my grandmother became. She knew that her dream would be realized in a matter of months. But less than two weeks before my sister gave birth to her first baby boy, Joshua, my grandmother, at the age of seventy-two, died of cancer.

The minister at her funeral remarked that one life was ending and in a short time another would be beginning. The words left an indelible mark on my consciousness and I wondered to myself, Why? God? My grandmother faithfully served and worshipped You for decades, and You couldn't give her just two more weeks to see her first great-grandchild? You allowed Simeon, the righteous and devout saint, to live until he could hold the Messiah (see Luke 2:25-35). Why, God, couldn't you have spared her life for fourteen more days? It would have meant so much to her. We weren't demanding a miracle -- just two weeks. How hard would that have been?

But, as in Job's situation, God never answered our questions. My grandmother courageously battled breast cancer undergoing a mastectomy and the painful aftermath of radiation --only to find later that she was filled with more cancer from an unknown source. The explosively dividing cancer cells finally won out. The pain and abdominal bloating grew intense. And she spent her final days on morphine in the hospital where I had trained during medical school.

She was my last living grandparent and there was nothing she wouldn't do for me. But in the end, I couldn't even be there for her. I was isolated three thousand miles away in Los Angeles, working day and night in my surgery residency. One summer evening, my uncle called to tell me she had passed away. The director of the Cedar's Sinai Medical Center surgery program kindly allowed me some time off and I flew back to Canada for her funeral.

When one life is suddenly cut short, unanswerable questions inevitably surface. When millions of innocent lives are suddenly snuffed out -- as in a holocaust -- someone has to be blamed. I remember visiting the site of the World War II Nazi Mauthausen concentration camp in the Austrian countryside where an estimated 120,000 - 180,000 men, women and children died in one of history's ugliest scenes. I walked up the 186 stone steps known as "The Stairs of Death," where undernourished prisoners were forced to march up with huge granite blocks on their backs, some weighing more than seventy-five pounds, sometimes the blocks would slip off their backs crushing the bones of those struggling behind. The tortured prisoners were forced to climb up and down the steps until they died. I gazed down into the rock quarry where many prisoners were pushed to their deaths from the jagged cliff 100 - 150 feet above. Even Auschwitz captives were horrified at the thought of ending up at Mauthausen.

I stood in the basement gas chamber where the SS had herded 120 at a time to be gassed to death. I ran my hands over the dissecting table where SS doctors performed grotesque "experiments" on live patients. I gazed into the crematorium where tens of thousands of bodies were disposed of. I stood on the roll-call square where men, women, and children were shot and clubbed to death -- some mauled by dogs. Selected individuals were stripped naked, doused with icy water and left to freeze to death in the bitter cold.

Most of those who died at the hands of the Nazis were Jews, numbering approximately six million in total. Since the holocaust, convicting fists have been shaken at God for allowing one of the most heinous crimes in history to unfold. The Jews were God's chosen people -- His selected ambassadors to the world; but where was God in their suffering? Where was God in these horrible, unimaginable atrocities? Where was Jehovah when the SS officers were clubbing, gassing, shooting and torturing millions of Jews to death -- exterminating them like ants with the goal of developing a "Master race"? No wonder little Cindy Ellen wrote to God in her letter, "Did you know about this? Were You away then?"

Most of us probably have never sat down to write an actual letter to God. But if we did, I think a good number of us would pour out our hearts to the Almighty like the patriarch Job telling God how much we are suffering and that we've done nothing to deserve it. And like Cindy Ellen, we might ask God the very same questions: "Did You know about this? Were You away then?"

Where is God in my suffering? Perhaps no other question has bewildered, disheartened and angered saints more. Maybe this is the one unanswered question you've been asking all along on your journey. How can we reconcile in our minds an all-powerful, loving heavenly Father who would allow His children to suffer to such awful extremes? Why would God take the life of my loved one? And why does God seem so distant when I need Him the most? These tough questions could very well have been the catalyst that led you to pick up this book.

...Many of these answers are provided for us throughout the pages of Scripture. God often shares with us in an intimate manner what He is thinking. The problem is, we sometimes behave like little children, holding our hands over our ears, pretending we can't hear Him. More often, though, we act like grown adults. The answers in God's Word are so contrary to our humanistic reasoning, we automatically assume they can't be right. But these are all reasons why God lovingly gave us the Bible. If we could intuitively figure out all the answers to the really tough questions on suffering, why would we need His supernatural revelation?

I must forewarn you that the upcoming material may be a little disturbing. You may even find yourself becoming rather irritated or even downright angry with me. I totally understand....God's truth surrounding suffering is certainly not easy to comprehend. The message of this book will be very difficult to accept...but ultimately freeing. For the truth will set you free from the guilt, discouragement, anxiety, bitterness, anger, and confusion you may be experiencing in your suffering...

The fact of suffering undoubtedly

constitutes the single greatest

challenge to the Christian faith.

--John Stott

Contents

Ch. 1 - Suffering: God's Will or the Devil's

Ch. 2 - The "Sovereignty of Satan" Lie

Ch. 3 - When Our Children Die

Ch. 4 - "You Have a Lot of Explaining to do, God?"

Ch. 5 - Is God Punishing Me?

Ch. 6 - The Ultimate Reason We Suffer

Ch. 7 - Seeing the Complete Sunset

Ch. 8 - Solomon's Clues

This book may be purchased at www.amazon.com.

Know the Marks of Cults by Dave Breese

From the Back Cover

How to cope with cults?

There are so many of them . . . all different.

Who has time to study all their weird doctrines in order to refute them?

Here is a better way.

No need to get bogged down in the details of this or that cult. No need to debate the fine points in the original Greek and Hebrew. No need to fight over the interpretation of obscure passages of Scripture.

Each cult is guilty of one or more certain characteristic doctrinal errors. Once you know what these typical errors are, you can know what's basically wrong with a cult, whatever weird or seemingly rational form it may take. Awareness of these characteristics can help you spot creeping errors among true Christians too . . . maybe save you from going astray.

Knowing the Marks of Cults.

They miss the mark.

Don't you.

Introduction

We are living in a day when many are attempting to move beyond Christianity.

Because of the myths of progress in vogue today, the word (beyond) has a certain appeal. Something that is forever fixed and changeless seems in the minds of some to be stodgy and undynamic. In this existential age, things must forever progress, engined by the dynamism of a newly discovered life-force in our time. The prevailing emotion of this civilization is not love or hate or anything so activistic; it is boredom. We demand new fascinations to feed our ever-shortening spans of interest.

This demand for new fascinations has led many to try to move beyond the faith once delivered to the saints to something newer (and therefore presumably truer) and more exciting. I will always be grateful for the words of Dr. Eastburg, my philosophy professor at Northern Seminary, who said, "If it's new, it isn't true; and if it's true, it isn't new."

Christianity should not be thought of as a stone wall behind which we cannot get. It is rather the highest mountain top beyond which it is downhill no matter which way one goes. There is nothing greater, nothing higher, and certainly nothing more magnificent than the mountaintop of divine revelation in Scripture and in Jesus Christ. To move beyond that mountaintop in the pursuit of something better is to lose one's self in the crags and crevices of the slopes that fall away from real Christianity. And beyond the crevices of heresy are the fever swamps of the cults, where the serpents and the scorpions wait. Beyond rationality is insanity, beyond medicine is poison, beyond sex is perversion, beyond fascination is addiction, beyond love is lust, beyond reality is fantasy.

Just so, beyond Christianity is death, hopelessness, darkness and heresy.

Nevertheless, people continue to be offered those side paths whose ultimate direction is downward. The increasingly complicated religious situation of our time is producing an explosion of the strangest religious concoctions ever brought to the mind of man.

This book is presented with the hope and prayer that it will be used to point out those errors most characteristic of the cults of our time. It is not really a study of the cults themselves; they are deserving of no such attention. It is rather an expression of hope that we may develop the spiritual facility to recognize instantly the marks of the cults. This will save us the bother and expense of further involvement.

We may also note that the same characteristics of religions that are out-and-out cults can have beginning tendencies within the true Church of Christ. The recognition of those characteristics which may be cultic, coupled with their early correction, may prevent future spiritual tragedy.

Writing to the Corinthians, the Apostle Paul suggested that they examine themselves to be sure that they are "in the faith" (2 Cor. 13:15). This admonition, coupled with the warning that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith (1 Tim. 4:1), should be cause enough for each of us to make careful doctrinal examination of himself.

The clear teaching of Scripture is that if we would judge ourselves we would not be judged by God (1 Cor. 11:31-32). When one corrects his course in time, he shortens the process of sometimes painful spiritual correction. The absence of doctrinal correction produces spiritual ruin. How many disillusioned Christians have stood amid the broken pieces of their shattered lives and said, "If only I had known. Why did not someone warn me in time?"

It is our prayer that our pages will bring a timely warning.

Contents

Ch. 1 - Why Do Cults Prosper?

Ch. 2 - Extra-Biblical Revelation

Ch. 3 - A False Basis of Salvation

Ch. 4 - Uncertain Hope

Ch. 5 - Presumptuous Messianic Leadership

Ch. 6 - Doctrinal Ambiguity

Ch. 7 - The Claim of "Special Discoveries"

Ch. 8 - Defective Christology

Ch. 9 - Segmented Biblical Attention

Ch. 10 - Enslaving Organizational Structure

Ch. 11 - Financial Exploitation

Ch. 12 - Denunciation of Others

Ch. 13 - Syncretism

Ch. 14 - What Shall We Do?

This book can be purchased through www.amazon.com

Reckless Faith by John F. MacArthur

From the Back Cover

"Unless I am convinced by

Scripture and plain reason,

my conscience is captive

to the Word of God."

- Martin Luther

Scripture and reason -- the two together comprise the formula for true discernment. Yet in many North American churches, reason has been abandoned for something more digestible: faith that feels good. It is what Pastor John F. MacArthur calls "reckless faith" -- and it leads people away from the one true God.

Because of it, numerous Christians have lost their way, they've given up absolute truth in favour of blind, uncritical trust. Replaced black-and-white, foundational doctrine with clouded belief systems. They've even come to view reason and doctrine with contempt -- as if spiritual truth were supposed to bypass the mind altogether.

In the wake of such emotion-based "faith," the church is losing its ability to discern right from wrong. And it is leaving itself defenseless against false teaching.

But there is still time for the church to turn around. Still time for a return to discernment -- if Christians will "incline their hearts to understanding" and begin to use their hearts, their minds and the unchanging Word of God to determine the truth that endures forever.

Inside the Front Cover

"...Spiritual truth is meant to be rationally contemplated, examined logically, studied, analyzed, and employed as the only reliable basis for making wise judgments. That process is precisely what Scripture calls discernment."

In a society that is hostile to anyone who declares absolutes, that tolerates faith in any form, that values emotion over reason and trendiness over conviction, it's no surprise that many North American churches have lost their ability to discern between Biblical truth and doctrinal error.

Such emotional, reckless "faith" inevitably leads to Spiritual disaster, taking its followers on a dangerous journey that leaves them defenseless against false teaching.

Reckless Faith is a plea for discernment. A plea from God's Word -- and from the heart of pastor and best-selling author John F. MacArthur -- for Christians, and the church itself, to return to the truth.

This book takes a serious historical look at where many Christians have gone wrong, and explains in-depth the point at which faith becomes "reckless." It also gives a clear prescription for how the church can return to discernment, and offers a detailed discussion of the fundamentals of Christian belief -- all of which can help concerned believers formulate a biblical response to contemporary trends like fundamentalist political activism, forging links with Roman Catholics, and the animal rights movement.

Spiritual discernment begins with God's Word. But authentic faith cannot bypass the mind. It requires that we engage our intellect as well: "As Christians, we need not fear to use our rational faculties. We need not distrust sound logic. We need not -- we dare not -- abandon reason...For when a church loses its will to discern between sound doctrine and error, between good and evil, between truth and lies, that church is headed for spiritual crisis."

Contents

Ch. 1 - The War Against Reason

Ch. 2 - The Rise of Reckless Faith

Ch. 3 - The Biblical Formula for Discernment

Ch. 4 - What are the Fundamentals of Christianity

Ch. 5 - Evangelicals and Catholics Together

Ch. 6 - Laughing Till it Hurts

Ch. 7 - Looking for Truth in All the Wrong Places

Appendix 1 - Is Roman Catholicism Changing

This book may be purchased at www.amazon.com or through John F. MacArthur's website.