Believing A Lie
Just after creation Satan deceived Eve into believing a lie. God had said, "Of the tree of knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die" (Genesis 2:17). But Satan told Eve, "You will not surely die" (Genesis 3:4). Ever since the creation mankind has been deceived by believing the lies of Satan.
We are warned to, "Let no one deceive you by any means" (2 Thessalonians 2:3). "But evil men and impostors will grow worse, deceiving and being deceived" (2 Timothy 3:13). How does Satan use people to deceive other people into believing his lies? "For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into apostles of Christ. And no wonder! For Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light. Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers also transform themselves into ministers of righteousness, whose end will be according to their works" (2 Corinthians 11:13-15).
A person who is deceived actually deceives himself into believing a lie. But we are warned, "Let no one deceive himself" (1 Corinthians 3:18). Jesus says, "And you shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free" (John 8:32). We must desire to know the truth or we will believe the lies of Satan. "Because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved. And for this reason God will send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie, that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth" (2 Thessalonians 2:10-12). Those who are deceived will lose their souls in eternity. This is such a great price to pay for believing a lie.
To keep from believing a lie we must do as those in Berea who "searched the scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so" (Acts 17:11). We must read, study, and follow what God’s word says so, "That we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting" (Ephesians 4:14).
Satan doesn’t care how much of God’s word one believes, as long as he doesn’t believe enough to be saved. Satan knows that at baptism one passes from an unsaved state to a saved state. This is where he has concentrated much of his effort in getting people to believe his lies. Some of his lies include infant baptism, sprinkling instead of immersion, and being saved before baptism by saying "the sinner’s prayer".
When a person is "baptized" as an infant, it does him no good and when he becomes accountable he becomes lost, but he thinks he is in a saved condition since his parents had him "baptized" as an infant. This is another lie of Satan. If a person is sprinkled instead of being baptized (immersed), it also does him no good and he is still lost since baptism is a burial (Romans 6:4). This again is a lie of Satan.
Satan has been successful in his efforts to redefine baptism in the minds of many people in getting them to believe that baptism is not essential to salvation even though the Lord says, "He that believes and is baptized shall be saved" (Mark 16:16). As a result people remain lost. Satan has also fooled people into believing that one does not need to "be baptized and wash away your sins" (Acts 22:16). As a result people still remain lost in their sins by believing the lies of Satan. To say that baptism is not is not essential to salvation is to deny and reject what Jesus says. Jesus says, "He who rejects Me and does not receive My words, has that which judges him, the word that I have spoken will judge him in the last day" (John 12:48). Satan has convinced people that all one needs to do is "accept Jesus as their personal saviour" and say "the sinner’s prayer" to be saved. To do this Satan has people to handle "the word of God deceitfully" (2 Corinthians 4:2) and to "change the truth of God into a lie" (Romans 1:25).
Denominationalism and its doctrines gives people a false sense of security. Let’s be careful and "Take heed that you not be deceived" (Luke 21:8) into believing any of the lies of Satan.