Module 5: The Lying Spirits

A prophet speaks exquisitely encouraged words to others. Prophets are willing to give up their life for what they believe in. They bring new ideas to situations, and don’t follow other’s work. They are gifted with the ways of God, and have spiritual insight on certain problems. To be a prophet takes hard work. If you do something so immense, and it helps people around you, doesn’t mean you automatically fall under prophecy. You have to have the full criteria. That is why it’s hard to find a modern day prophet today. Many people in the world today have done something big, but are not viewed as prophetic, because of their power, or personality.

Deceptions have always been part of human nature. They are not only considered acceptable in certain situations but are essential when the aim is to achieve good and avoid harm. On the other hand, deceptions are morally wrong when it is intentionally conspired against individuals who have a moral right to know the truth. It would be simple-minded and naïve of us to ignore the fact that people sometimes deceive us. The truth is that we cannot really know what is going on in the mind and heart of others. We have no choice but to judge them by their appearance and to trust them in what they tell us. At this point, we are all potential prey to manipulators; for an individual who seems to be good and righteous may actually be evil and vice versa.

The false belief is not accounted for by the persons cultural or religious background or his/her intelligence. The client experiencing this will hold on firmly to the belief regardless of the evidence to the contrary, the client is absolutely convinced that the delusion is real. Delusion are symptoms of either medical, neurological or mental disorder.

The prophets are difficult to interpret mainly due to misunderstandings about their function and form (Fee/Stuart p182). Most dictionaries define the word “prophecy”as ‘foretelling or prediction of what is to come. Using the prophets in this way is highly discerning, for less than 2% of OT prophecy is messianic; less than 5% describes the new covenant age and less than 1% concerns future events (Fee/Stuart p182). The prophets usually announced the immediate future of Judah, Israel and the surrounding nations, rather than our future. Those events were forthcoming for them but past for us (Fee/Stuart p182). The primary function of prophets as a spokesperson was to speak for God to their own contemporaries. Of the hundreds of prophets in

First, what must be looked at is who is a prophet and what is a prophet’s message. A prophet is an Israelite called on by God to express in poetic form the vision of God, His kingdom, the messianic age of peace, the work of the Holy Spirit, a new community of people, and the transformation of creation and humanity (VanGemeren 16). One example of a prophet is Amos, where the feeling of prophetic sense of an inner compulsion, “Surly the Lord God does nothing unless He reveals His secret counsel to His servants the prophets. A lion has roared! Who will not fear? The Lord God has spoken! Who can but prophesy?” (Amos 3:7-8).

“Do you solemnly swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help you God?” Most people wouldn’t be able to honestly swear to this for their entire lifetime and only for certain periods in time, for instance, when attending court. Why is this? Why is it that humans lie so frequently? Research shows that this behavior started not too long after language began to be prominent among human beings and it was, and still is, used as a way to manipulate others without having to use physical force (Morris).

Each lie is based on a true subject. Little Johnny's hamster died? Technically, he just ran away... to heaven. Little Johnny just did not happen to hear the last part. The point of all this is that the truth can be easily distorted, even to the point where

People often think they are people who have died and come back to haunt people still on the earth. That is a very faulty concept. There is a spirit who is real and active today in the life of the Christian. The Bible refers to Him as the Holy Spirit or Holy Ghost. The study of the Holy Spirit is called Pneumatology.

To fully understand the meaning behind his sermons and predictions we must first look at what a prophet is and what he holds true.

Lying can be a tool for our personal benefit instead of a tool for deceiving and ill will. For example, in the beginning of the novel we are given Dolores Driscoll’s narration first. Here I believe Dolores lies to herself as a form of protection, these lies are what keep her functioning in her day-to-day life. If Dolores had been entirely truthful about herself as a person and driver she would never be able to think that she didn’t kill those kids. Even if Dolores had done everything right as a bus driver before the accident the doubt would have been too much for he to cope with.

Later on, he realizes the act of lying and uses it for good but soon finds himself feeling overwhelmed with a few of them. A few of the reasons being heaven and the unknown, believing everything that is said, and the lies in advertisement.

But he later comes to realize that he does exist. Or rather did exist. But the only deceitful person he speaks of is really just his own self-doubt. After realizing what his own mind has come to he later states “now I surely am awake, and I see something true; but since I do not yet see it clearly enough, I will deliberately fall asleep so that my dreams might represent it to me more truly and more clearly (Cahn, Location:

The prophets are some of the most studied individuals in the bible, but often many people overlook the primary mission of the prophets. According to Bratcher “the prophets’ primary task was to call the people

Prophets typically flow in the revelation gifts, which can bring about some amazing things. Names, addresses, homes, employment and family members may be described with great accuracy. Total strangers may have their troubling issues described in detail companied with a comforting word of the Lord. I have seen the anointing so powerfully demonstrated that the prophet could blow on the people and they fall to the ground. At other times, the coat of the prophet thrown at a bystander could bring them to the ground at the amazement of the audience.

This is because silence is not the truth, so by remaining quiet, that person is not telling the truth. A more recognizable form of lying is outright lying, such as when a student claims to be working hard on her philosophy paper when she has in fact been partying at Myrtle Beach for the last two days. Deception is yet another form of lying, because by tricking another person into believing something false, one is withholding the truth from that person. By withholding the truth, the truth is not being told, so the deceiver must be a liar. Regardless of the form in which a lie is being presented, all lies have one thing in common. By giving others false thoughts or perceptions of an event, lies can have a strong influence on our free thinking. Therefore, they are all violations of human reason, something that many people strongly respect. As we will see shortly, the ability to reason is also considered valuable to both Mill and Kant, since it underlies both of their moral theories.