“And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die: For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil” (Genesis 3:4-5).
The two verses above constitute the first three recorded lies in all of human history. To our great detriment they were believed, which lead to the fall of all mankind and introduced corruption to all of God’s perfect creation. What this article is about is how the pursuit of the false promises contained in those three lies are still, to this day being used by the enemy to deceive people.
First let’s analyze just what these three lies contain, and see how they relate to the conditions that were in effect when they were said. The first lie was, “Ye shall not surely die.” This implies immortality will be obtained by eating the fruit. The lie in this is that it had the exact opposite effect. Prior to this there was no death in the world. Adam and Eve were already in an immortal state and so this was patently false in two respects.
First, it could not give them this because not only did they already possess it, but on top of that Satan does not have the power and authority to bestow this on anyone if they don’t have it. The result of believing this lie had the opposite effect by taking away from them the very thing it promised to give, eternal life. When you think about it like this then you can see the sheer evil and hatred towards us that the enemy has.
The second lie was, “Then your eyes shall be opened.” The implication here is the gaining of secret knowledge. The lie in this is complex. The reality of their existence at that time was that they literally walked with God and interacted with Him on a personal basis face to face. Since the creation was without corruption at that time it was possible for them to do this. That means they had a close personal relationship with the Creator.
That access afforded them the most complete and accurate source of all knowledge. In other words because they could literally ask God anything, they in effect knew everything. By eating the fruit they lost this personal face to face relationship with God and their source of the knowledge of everything. Another “promise” that in reality had the exact opposite effect by taking from them that which they already had to begin with. Once again we see the hatred the enemy has for God and us contained in this lie.
The third lie was, “And ye shall be as gods.” This plays on their genuine and understandable desire to be like the One they interact with, God. I mean who doesn’t want to be more like God? We all want to emulate those which we love and respect. First of all, besides God they knew no one else so there was no one else to want to emulate. Second, if you want to emulate someone, who better than God?
We, as Christians are always striving to be more “Christ-like” so it is understandable why this would be so appealing. The enemy understood this from his own lusts and desires and used it in order to trick Eve. He knew first hand that this was an impossibility because if it was possible then he would have already done it.
The enemy also gives them a quasi-promise tied to the second and third, “knowing good and evil.” This was actually true. After eating the fruit they did know the difference between good and evil. The enemy knew this would occur but also knew that selfishness and unchecked desire would accompany this knowledge. His own experience proved it to him so it was a safe bet from his perspective. He also knew that this would make it extremely difficult, if not impossible, to continuously act in accordance to the will of God.
In other words, he knew it would cause a rift between God and mankind and therefore give him the opening he needed to continue to defy God. Another reason this promised worked is because in their innocent state they had no experience with evil so were ignorant of its capabilities and consequences. The best analogy for this state of innocence and how Satan used it to his advantage I can think of is the 2009 movie, The Invention of Lying.
So, what we have are three outright lies and one truth that is not fully understood due to an absence of a point of reference. The enemy actually made a safe bet in coming to Eve with these lies and unexplained truth. He knew that even if she didn’t do it that he would be no worse off than before, and if she did that it would cause an irreparable rift (in his mind at least), a rift between God and mankind. So, how is the enemy using these same three lies against people today?
The biggest and most obvious forms of these lies today can be found in the New Age Movement. When you boil it all down, virtually every aspect of the New Age Movement is some form of trying to achieve at least one of the three original lies, with the vast majority being a combination of the second and third.
Selling the first is a hard thing to do these days so it has shifted for the most part to be a long extension of life instead of immortality. The enemy knows that ever since he pulled this off the first time that mankind in its entirety has always tried to reacquire that close personal relationship to God.
Even atheists are trying to do it by claiming there is no God, since that elevates them to the level of godhood. The enemy understands we have this innate desire to have a close personal relationship with God and is using this knowledge against us. The big lie in the New Age Movement is that it falsely promises to reestablish this relationship. Satan knows that there is no way to do this except thru our faith in Jesus and repentance.
However, because of all the work he has done thru the ages, especially in the last 150 years, he knows that many people will follow his path. These advances that the enemy has made in the past 150 years or so all revolve around Darwinism.
The way Darwinism has greatly accelerated this advance of the enemy is that it has taken God out of the creative process. Once you remove God as being the One who created us it becomes much easier to remove Him from all other aspects of our lives. This banishment of God leaves a vacuum that is quickly filled by satanically inspired ideas. The really sad part to this is that many of the people who believe and advance evolution don’t realize the true source. In other words they are useful idiots.
The belief in evolution is also deeply rooted in virtually all New Age ideas. You would be hard pressed to find a New Ager of any sort who is also a young earth creationist. The two positions are diametrically opposed. The disproven ideas of evolution have even wormed its way into so- called Christian churches. In doing this it has taken on a few basic forms. These forms range from the wholehearted acceptance of evolution, to some form of having the days of creation in the Bible not literally 24 hour days.
But instead great expanses of time between events in order to allow evolution to occur, or some form of Divinely directed and guided evolutionary process, or a combination of these, especially the last two. All of these are contrary to the Word of God and found in Scripture and are therefore untrue. I touched on this in my earlier article “Four Steps to the End” and how this progressively leads to the current state of societal affairs as outlined in Romans 1:18-32.
Bottom line, the New Age Movement is anything but new, and is in fact nothing more than the same three lies the enemy used against Eve but with a new coat of paint. He keeps using these three lies because they have proven to be effective for him. As Bible believing Christians we need to be aware of these lies and know how to repudiate them to those around us. If you have loved ones involved in any aspects of the New Age Movement you need to try to get them to see the truth.
Even something as “harmless” as doing yoga for exercise purposes is too much since it is all based on Hinduism. There are many great resources out there to help you with this, starting with the Bible you carry. One resource I have found useful to help show how this is actually part of Satan trying to deceive people is the video Age of Deceit: Fallen Angels and the New World Order. [1]
Whether you use this resource or another is really unimportant. The important thing is to be aware of this tactic and how to combat it. As we rapidly approach the end of the Church Age it is imperative that we ramp up our efforts against the enemy before we are removed and he is given free reign over those left behind.
“And now ye know what withholdeth that he might be revealed in his time.For the mystery of iniquity doth already work: only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way. And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming:
Even him, whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders, And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved.
And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness” (2 Thessalonians 2:6-12).
Note: I know many will think, and some will even email me, as to why I didn’t take this to the next step and explain how this deception and New age garbage is connected with the enemy activity in the UFO and alien abduction phenomenon. I know of this connection and think it is the most probable explanation he will use after the Rapture to explain why we were taken away and that he and his minions are here to help us. However, in the interest of space I purposely didn’t go there but will probably do so in a future article.
Endnotes [1] Age of Deceit: Fallen Angels and the New World Order (linkhere).
All Scripture quoted is from the King James Version unless otherwise noted.
Email me at: peter.t.timmins@gmail.com