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“But I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds (or: perception) will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ” (2 Co 11:3).

“When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit and ate; and she gave also to her husband with her, and he ate” (Gen 3:6).

Mankind is tested once more. The deception is in full swing and its insidiousness can´t be put into human words. Whoever tries now-a-days to openly display the serpent’s true working method only achieves to support and accelerate his infernal work. The father of lies is working with such a supernatural demonic slyness that once again in the end, the righteous is declared a criminal and the murderer as righteous. As in Jesus’ time, the true Christians will experience the very words in their mouth being twisted and the cross set up for them. But we already find this scenario of end-time deception foreshadowed in Genesis (Gen 3). Will Adam stand the test this time? In these days man once again decides on paradise or downfall. If he once again will fall victim to the serpent’s deceiving, then, in retrospect, this so deeply fallen creation will be looked at in his memory almost as a lost paradise. The fall will be unspeakably great.

Again the two trees make up the focus of the last scene––the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and the tree of life. The tree of life, however, is standing in the midst of the garden! This tree is the life of Christ himself. Only those who keep far from the tree of the knowledge and orient themselves solely by the tree of life will be kept from the crafty deceit.

What are we meant then to do in practise? He who believes he could escape this deception which already has fully set in, by means of enlightening literature and knowledge about good and evil is very much mistaken. It is just in the "enlightenment" as such where ever since the serpent’s power of deceitful persuasion has been hidden. Real deceiving always makes its victims think they would be fully in the picture and fully see through the schemes of the darkness. Thus, as ever, the serpent’s end-time activities as well will be wrapped up by the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Once again he has seated himself in the chair of the teacher commending seemingly indispensable knowledge. But whoever doesn't want to fall victim to the deception must orient oneself solely by the tree of life in the midst of the garden. Only he who follows the pleasing fragrance of the tree of life (i.e. the Spirit of Life of Christ) will find his way through all the confusion of this time. Only he who really knows the peace of this life in Christ and who lives bound to it will be spared the distressful ways of deception.

Christendom is standing right in the middle of the hour of temptation. An enormous amount of knowledge and stacks of literature of warning alike are flooding in upon it. But isn't clarifying information important, after all? Don't we have to warn the poor Christian souls against all the imminent dangers and sublime trends of the evil? Surely, an enlightenment of these things may be helpful here and there. However, the problem with the deception covered here is not a lack of knowledge, but rather a lack of discernment. Instead of seeing us furnished with knowledge the Lord Jesus is far more interested in having our very being made responsive and sensitive to Him. "Is it you, Lord?" is the most important question that we always have to ask ourselves. Everything "new" we must discern according to its "aroma", and wherever we cannot smell purely Christ in it we are to learn not to touch it, even before we can understand, classify or explain it. By weighing up all the differing teachings against one another this spiritual sense of smell, however, will never become sharper, but rather only duller––which is exactly what the enemy is up to. He wants to teach us discernment of "good" and "evil" by means of knowledge and enlightenment alone. But true discernment will only be born out of having intimate fellowship with Christ (the tree of life) and our love for Him. He who knows the fragrance of his beloved and the voice of his shepherd will always and without any “warning manual” discern what is wrong and mixed and turn away from it (SS 1:3 1 , John 10:27-302). On the way to enlightenment Christendom has become sluggish and passive. Instead of incessantly following the fragrance of the bridegroom, they put their trust in the maps of the guides for the blind, whether these are seeing or blind themselves. But now, as the deception is about to change the spiritual landscape faster than new maps and timetables can be drawn up and printed, the majority of Christians stands helpless in the rampant darkness of this time. He who today wants to have a view of but a fraction of this now rampantly progressing deception will have to spend his whole time reading books and attending enlightening lectures from now on.
Do you have the fragrance of the "oil of the nard of Christ" in your nose? If not, you are a ruined man! It is imperative now to immediately take the stand that is assigned to us in the New Covenant. For it is written in the prophets: "And they shall all be taught of God" (John 6:45; cf. Is 54:13-14 3 ). This is exactly how the New Testament people proves to be genuine and true in regard to truth and lie, light and darkness, and that they do not have to cling to the prophet's apron-strings as was the case in the time of the Old Testament. "They will not teach again (under the New Covenant), each man his neighbor and each man his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ for they will ALL know me, from the least of them to the greatest of them, declares the LORD" (Jer 31:34). In his first letter John puts it this way: "As for you, the anointing which you received from Him abides in you, and you have no need for anyone to teach you; but as His anointing teaches you about ALL things, and is true and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you abide in Him" (1John 2:27). Here the apostle talks about the end-time deception and how it is perceived or discerned. Do you know the fragrance of this anointing? Thus, this basic discerning faculty is given to every member of the body of Christ, whereas some of them, in addition to it, are yet equipped with specific gifts of distinguishing which enable them to precisely locate and name spirits and their influences. The New Testament office of a prophet, however, centers on totally different areas and responsibilities. It is not assigned to supply needs which are to be met by the members of the body of Christ themselves. Furthermore, it says in Col 3:15: "Let the peace of Christ arbitrate (or: decide, rule or reign) in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body": The peace of Christ is no emotion or an emotional figment of one’s imagination. Rather, it is the influx of godly calmness into our circumstances. It expresses the assurance of God being well-pleased in a matter, a person or a movement. The peace of Christ is an inward conviction of the genuineness of a matter, a word, an impression or influence. It always brings the testimony of the Scripture in line with what is before our eyes and vice versa. It is light and power––simply peace.
What do you allow yourself to be led by, dear brother and dear sister? Are you led by all kinds of knowledge or by the peace of Christ? Be assured of this: We will either learn to listen to the peaceful voice of the shepherd or definitely become victims of the deception! Either we immediately stop going on as the inward peace of Christ withdraws from us, or we will find ourselves pretty soon in a muddle losing first our peace and finally every orientation as well. Whoever does not know and have this peace, namely in his own heart, to this one no warning pamphlets whatsoever and no views of others will be of any use. Believe it or not, the enemy beats his victims at their own game. He is an expert in turning the truth and deeper knowledge of all things into a snare for us––with infernal precision. And to do this he will start from and build upon all the very elements of worldliness which can still be found in us.

"When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took …." (Gen 3:6).

Are you open for exciting testimonies, powerful stories and exceptional experiences? Go, and you will find an abundance of Christian literature which will bring ruin upon you. Here I could come up now with a long list of deceptive literature just like that. But I won't do it – for the sake of the fragrance of the bridegroom! He who is filled with eagerness for new things, even the best literature will be to his own ruin. This deception will push scores of Christians beyond the Scripture and make them think they understand far more than anybody else around. It will exalt experiences of men far above the Scripture so that in the end every biblical counterargument appears to them like immature talk.

Are you a person who always lets the light come into him only that much as one could convict him of having wronged? Are you pursuing repentance, or do you act like Adam and Eve?

Adam said: "’The woman whom You gave to be with me, SHE GAVE me from the tree, and I ate.’ Then the LORD God said to the woman, ‘What is this you have done?’ And the woman said, ‘THE SERPENT deceived me, and I ate’ "(Gen 3:12-13).

For those whose character is to shun the light and the truth, the deception has available an ever increasing host of Christian literature. The enemy will always start wherever your old being has still a hold on you! He will be glad to help you shift your guilt to somewhere or somebody else, so that you are not to take the full responsibility yourself. Preferably, he will put the blame for it on your past, your ancestors, your fellow human beings or even on himself. Don’t be afraid, you won’t have to humble yourself in due measure. God made sure that the selfish nature can hide behind a whole forest of Christian literature and teaching.

Once more the serpent will act according to his original pattern in sowing "distrust": "Did God really say ...?" With perfect precision, this old twister and notorious instigator to any disorder and confusion will surely succeed not only in pushing the children of God beyond what He spoke in His Word (the Bible), but also, in addition to it, in instigating a deep-reaching distrust and any kind of suspicion against each other. And this distrust he will manage to set in them in such a way that they think they are acting just as God would have done.

The source of such inspirations are the talks with the serpent, and do not stem from the wisdom of God (Jas 3:17 4). Increasingly the Christians will more rest on others’ experiences testified to them as well as on their own ones than on the written Word. They will pay more attention to the sayings of demons than to God’s Word, because they lent them their ear, seeking to satisfy their eagerness for knowledge in the end even at the murky fountains of occult and philosophical or other kinds of literature instead of in the Word of God alone (Col 2:8-9 5 , Mk 1:34 6 ). Because they have drunken from these murky fountains, God gives them over in what they drank which then appears to them as having a much bigger say than God’s Word (cf. 2The 2:11-12). The special thing about the last deception will be again the truth within the lie: Again "one’s eyes will be opened" and "one will be like God"––only that it once again will be awfully different than expected, simply because again it stemmed from the serpent’s mouth.

Whoever still shows fickleness and immaturity in his faith, may seek his foundation and steadfastness solely in fixing his gaze on the Exalted One. The enemy, you see, is out to increasingly turn our eyes towards him and his dark machinations. He preaches the victory of the LORD too! But he knows how to simultaneously talk so much about himself that he not only seems omnipresent to the weak believers, but that they also start to even concede to him seemingly “secret rights” and to reckon more with his schemes than with the all-controlling and overall ruling presence of Christ (Luke 12:4-7 7 ).

In this respect, "Do not give room for the devil!", as says in Eph 4:27, also applies to biblical teaching and preaching! The true child of God, however, is not indebted to submit to the devil nor to sin nor to his own flesh (1Jn 4:48, Rom 8:12 9). The enemy, you see, also displays the victory of Jesus! But he does it in a way that in the end the focus of attention is always “man in his power”, be it as an experienced counselor or as demonstrating a “powerful” ministry. One talks about the victory of Jesus, but glorifies man. May God anoint our eyes! In covering this subject we could go on and on as long as you like.
The enemy will fill every gap or shortcoming in our spiritual life with his "Christian teachings". Therefore, the one and only question is how tangibly have we lived crucified to this world, and, in precise terms, is the world already crucified to us. Only in this way can we obtain as well as maintain the "spiritual sense of smell".

The entire deception will take its course along the same old tracks as fixed in Genesis 3. Every seed, after all, can only bring forth fruit after its own kind. Thus, we will see again the woman (Heb: female-man) play her role as the serpent’s preferred tool. To an increasing extent she will once again pass the forbidden fruit of the tree of knowledge to Adam. She will have eaten of it herself and doesn’t seem to come off too badly with it. On the contrary, her fetching and carrying (for the serpent) appears irresistibly attractive and mysteriously thrilling. Oh no, this “female-man” doesn't appear repulsive. More and more she will place herself in the pulpit, hold the chair of teaching and fill the book shelves. In this respect, many an Adam will not be able to hold a candle to her, and that’s precisely why the deception becomes even the more rampant.

Beloved brothers and sisters, wherever we discover first signs of such a development and still have "inner peace" about it, then the deception has already deeply progressed in us. Then we’ve got to follow the testimony of the Scripture without any discussion––just as it is called for in any situation where there is plain speaking of the Scripture: "But I do not allow a woman to teach or exercise authority over a man, but to remain quiet. For … it was not Adam who was deceived, but the woman being deceived fell into transgression" (1Tim 2:12+14; read also Tit 2:3-5 10 , 1Cor 14:34 11).

Whoever calls himself a Christian, but does not know or even does not guard that testimony of the peace of Christ (i.e. the fragrance of His anointing), such a one is most pitiable. There is only one way to regain that "fragrance of Christ", if you’ve lost it. Only he who lives as having died to this world and all its diverse lusts will find this peace (Gal 6:14 12 ). As long as we still have our own desires––even if they biblically could be considered as most pious––we will have no lasting part with the fragrance of Christ. It’s true, we will still partly experience the peace of Christ, but that won't help us more as does a malfunctioning compass whose needle only once in a while points to the magnetic north. The same applies if we still fear this or that or are entangled in the affairs of everyday life or the worries of this life (2Tim 2:4; Luke 8:14). Exactly that long our "sense of smell" will be malfunctioning and we are prone to be deceived. Thus, it’s not seldom that our pious desires and plans of all things as well as our manifold fears because of all sorts of matters render us insensible to the guiding voice of Christ. Only the ones who are crucified and do live in the full light will be able to debunk the machinations of the enemy and his personnel. So, outward things, behavioral patterns or words as such will never be suitable to instruct us on how to discern "good and evil", but alone the testimony of peace.
We may come together with groups and people who outwardly do not necessarily meet our expectations––none the less the peace of Christ may bear witness to them. On the other hand we may be in exceedingly pleasant company and our mind may agree on everything that is said or done––and still the peace of Christ may become dampened, tarnished or even suppressed. The testimony of peace goes far beyond all reason, emotion and will of man. Beloved, this message points us to our exceedingly great responsibility that we have as followers of Christ. Only he who is free from the spirit of criticism or faultfinding, free from his own will and aspiration and likewise free from preconceptions and men-pleasing as well as the fear of man can truly discern the Light of life from the light of deception.

"But I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve in his craftiness, your minds (or: perception) should be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ" (2Cor 11:3).

So, figuratively speaking, there are two serpents: the one lifted up (i.e. Christ on the cross – John. 3:14 13) and the other put down (the fiery, poisonous serpents crawling in the dust). Only he who turns his eyes away from the many serpents on the ground (the devil, sins and demons) and fixes his gaze on the serpent who was lifted up (Christ on the cross) will be kept from the poison of deception. Therefore let us single-mindedly hold on to the simplicity as to Christ, and where we have lost it, turn back to it! Wherever we take our eyes off from the Exalted One (Num 21:9 14 ), there the serpent gains power over us. Oh, how I wished I could appropriately make us aware of the hour in which we find ourselves and of the degree of its seriousness. Please, pray earnestly that you may recognize in full the gravity of what we have pointed out here.

1 “Your oils have a pleasing fragrance, your name is like purified oil; Therefore the maidens love you.”

2 “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. ‘I and the Father are one.’”

3 “All your sons will be taught of the LORD; and the well-being of your sons will be great. In righteousness you will be established: You will be far from oppression, for you will not fear; and from terror, for it will not come near you.”

4 “The wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, reasonable, full of mercy and good fruits, unwavering, without hypocrisy.”

5 “See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to Christ. For in Him all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form.”

6 “And he healed many who were ill with various diseases, and cast out many demons; and He was not permitting the demons to speak, because they knew who He was.”

7 “I say to you, My friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body and after that have no more that they can do. But I will warn you whom to fear: fear the One who, after He has killed, has authority to cast into hell; yes, I tell you, fear him! Are not five sparrows sold for two cents? Yet not one of them is forgotten before God. Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Do not fear; you are more valuable than many sparrows.”

8 “You are from God, little children, and have overcome them; because greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world.”

9 “So then, brethren, we are under obligation, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh.”

10 “Older women likewise are to be reverent in there behavior, not malicious gossips nor enslaved to much wine, teaching what is good, so that they may encourage the young women to love their husbands, to love their children, to be sensible, pure, workers at home, kind, being subject to their own husbands, so that the word of God will not be dishonored.”

11 “The women are to keep silent in the churches; for they are not permitted to speak, but are to subject themselves, just as the Law also says.”

12 “But may it never be that I would boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through
which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.”

13 “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up.”

14 “And Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on the standard; and it came about, that if a serpent bit any man, when he looked to the bronze serpent, he lived.”

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The Great Deception