Here's a little something to think about:
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Not too long ago, I was encouraged by a woman from my church to share the gospel with a young man who was dating her daughter. She felt that he would be open to a gospel presentation, and when I called him, indeed he was.
I met with this young man for a couple of hours, getting to know him personally, and then carefully explaining the good news about Jesus Christ to him. At the end of the gospel presentation, I asked him if he was willing to trust Christ as his Savior. He immediately said yes. We prayed together and I sincerely believed that he had entered into God's family.
When I sent one of the elders from our church to follow up on him, however, this new "Christian" kept putting him off. Later on when I talked with him personally, he professed to be a Christian, but he could not explain to me in any intelligible fashion what it meant to be a Christian.
Since that time, it has come to light that the young man's "conversion" did not result in any spiritual fruit that could be observed, and I have had to conclude that he is almost certainly a "professor," but not a "possessor." John Piper in his book Desiring God stated:
We are surrounded by unconverted people who think they do believe in Jesus. Drunks on the street say they believe. Unmarried couples sleeping together say they believe. Elderly people who haven't sought worship or fellowship for 40 years say they believe. All kinds of lukewarm, world-loving church attenders say they believe. The world abounds with millions of unconverted people who say that they believe in Jesus (p.42).
There are undoubtedly many people in the world today, and especially in the United States, who call themselves Christians, but who are not truly born again. This should not surprise us, because this was also true in Christ's day.
One day Christ was speaking in the synagogue in Capernaum, and He told all who were listening that "he who eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life" (John 6:54). This caused quite a stir among those listening, including Christ's "disciples" (vv.60-61). The final result was that "many of His disciples withdrew, and were not walking with Him anymore" (v.66).
Here were people who professed to "believe" in Jesus and were following Him as "disciples," but who then left Christ, never to return. What was the problem? Were they unwilling to accept the lordship of Christ? Not according to the passage. Were the rigors of discipleship too much for them to endure? Apparently not. The problem was that they had never truly believed that Christ was the Savior and the Messiah. In fact, Christ told them that "there are some of you who do not believe" (v.64).
For some time these people followed Christ and claimed to be His disciples, but when they finally understood the essence of Christ's message, they rejected it and Him. When they said, "This is a difficult statement; who can listen to it?" (v.60), they really meant, "Who can accept it?" They were unwilling to accept Christ as their Savior and Messiah. There are always people around who claim to be Christians, but who actually are not.
First of all, there are false teachers as well as false professors. False teachers are different from false professors because they deliberately misrepresent themselves as true believers for various reasons. Sometimes false teachers pretend to be believers in order to gain sex, money, or fame. Jude warned about this in his letter (Jude 16). But in many cases false teachers claim to be Christians so that they can spread false doctrine.
Recently, some Mormon missionaries showed up at our Wednesday night service, claiming to simply be Christians who were looking for a place for worship and fellowship with other believers. Their real motive, however, became apparent when they began to contact people from our church. They were seeking people to convert to Mormonism. I arranged a meeting with them and told them they were not to enter our services again or contact our people. They left my office still insisting that they were Christians who meant no harm. They were false teachers, not just false professors.
When we know that someone is not a Christian but is pretending to be one for sinful reasons, then according to Paul we are to "turn away" from him (Rom. 16:17-18).
False professors, however, are people who think they are saved but who have not truly believed. They may have faith, but that faith is deficient and/or defective.
False professors sometimes have a problem understanding that they are sinners who are totally lost. They may be "trusting" in Christ, but these people are also trusting in their good works. Thus their faith in Christ is deficient. They are not trusting in Christ alone to get to heaven. Others who are false professors realize they are sinners, but they do not understand that Christ's death totally paid for all their sins. Thus their faith is defective because they believe they have to do good works in order to make up the difference.
So false professors do not completely or correctly understand the gospel message, and it is our responsibility as Christians to help them comprehend it.
It is true that the Holy Spirit is ultimately the one who convicts people about their sinfulness as well as the righteousness found in Christ (John 16:8-11). If it were not for Him, not one person would ever come to a clear understanding of what the gospel message is all about. Nevertheless, God has sovereignly decided to use people who faithfully present the Word of God as a part of this process (Rom. 10:14).
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